The Italian Dubbing of Mindhunter: Characterisation and Speech Registers

The worldwide distribution of television series on streaming platforms has made audiovisual translation, especially dubbing, crucial for reaching diverse audiences. Dialogue-driven series are particularly challenging, especially when featuring specialized terminology and nuanced character interactions. This work examines the audiovisual translation strategies used in the Italian dubbing of the first season of Mindhunter (Mindhunter [TV series], 2017-2019) , a Netflix series. The study analyses dialogue, specialized and technical terminology, and character registers through a selection of scenes, which portray the early development of criminal profiling within the FBI and the interactions between the main characters and serial killers. It focuses on how these elements are rendered in Italian and how such choices shape meaning, tone, and narrative tension. It also explores the challenges of translating complex dialogue, highlighting the strategies employed to maintain equivalence, convey pragmatic meaning, and reflect register variation, to ensure clarity, accuracy, and naturalness in the Italian dubbing. Ultimately, this research provides insights into the interplay between translation, storytelling, and audience perception in contemporary television series, proposing a framework to guide future studies and practical approaches in audiovisual translation.