This can go both ways whether you understand both the original dub and the subtitle language that differs from the dub, for example: I recall watching a TV show episode where a conversation about a friend of theirs being drafted to war, but this piece of dialog was horribly translated: “He’s still a kid” as in the guy is his early 20s.
The subtitles in 日本語 however, used the worst wording for this idiomatic prasing by translating “kid” as in a literal minor (子供) when the real context is more on referring to someone who’s 20 years old or above (basically equivallent to saying “young man” / 若い人) which butchered the scene since the subtitles failed to express that.
I mean, do you know examples of a movie or TV show where the subtitles suck at translating the spoken dialog when it involves idioms, puns or even cultural references? Whether it’s French Dub & English Sub or vice versa (like English Dub > Spanish Sub & etc.) since each language has their own way of conveying a message.
Since Dutch as a language is generally not big enough to make dubs profitable (the exceptions is media specifically meant for young kids) almost everything her is subtitled. Subtle here are mostly quite good. Sometimes I notice it doesn’t match exactly what is being said but then it does have approximately the same meaning. I never noticed examples like yours from english to Dutch, but I don’t watch a lot of TV anymore.
If it doesn’t match exactly what’s being said that means a human translated it based on not just what it literally says but also on context and on what a Dutch person would actually say.
Example, when Quirrel “finds” the troll in the dungeon in HarryPotter, he says “thought you ought to know”, which would literally be “ik dacht dat jullie dat moesten weten” but was actually translated as “Ik dacht, ik zeg het even.”
I remember that one because I laughed so hard.
Eh that kind of catches the spirit of it, certainly something a Dutch Quirrel would say.
But yeah get the wider point.
I remember in the moulin rouge, they translated “let’s make love” word for word. Laten we de liefde maken.