Ocean Studios' "Dragon Ball Kai" Dub Turns 14; Still Unreleased

[Tian]

I wonder how the Ocean guys reacted when they noticed in episode 1 that Bardock doesn't turn out to be a scientist as they thought back in the 90s.

[Super Sayian Prime]

I quickly scoured some "episode 1 English dub" videos for those and LBX uses the Westwood dub score mainly, the others sound good, I haven't heard them before. Do they recycle music from unpaired shows? I know it sounds like a plan because it saves them time, effort and money, but no one gave up on trying to air Kai.

If they're willing to recycle music from released projects, why would they be against doing so with tracks made for unreleased shows? We don't really have a lot of test cases here (unreleased things generally stay unreleased), but that duo definitely reused a song they originally (?) composed for an unsold pilot of Magic Knight Rayearth.

[MasenkoHA]

I wonder how the Ocean guys reacted when they noticed in episode 1 that Bardock doesn't turn out to be a scientist as they thought back in the 90s.

.....you know Funimation wrote and produced that dub right?


https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=aXp4sR7sN9Y

[SX10]

I quickly scoured some "episode 1 English dub" videos for those and LBX uses the Westwood dub score mainly, the others sound good, I haven't heard them before. Do they recycle music from unpaired shows? I know it sounds like a plan because it saves them time, effort and money, but no one gave up on trying to air Kai.

If they're willing to recycle music from released projects, why would they be against doing so with tracks made for unreleased shows? We don't really have a lot of test cases here (unreleased things generally stay unreleased), but that duo definitely reused a song they originally (?) composed for an unsold pilot of Magic Knight Rayearth.

Those are valid points. I just thought they would want to hold off given that the option of airing Kai wasn't completely off the table. A littttle worrying but I still think it could be good.

Does anyone have any examples of original tracks made just for Westwood Z's later days?

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Honestly I wouldn't blame Keenlyside and Mitchell if they allowed the score they composed for Kai to be used on other shows. After all if this dub never airs (which I reiterate is still a possibility but hopefully Marni can work things out) it would just go to waste. I may be talking idealistically because I know there are musicians with unreleased work but I fully believe all art intended to be made commercially available should be released to be heard and appreciated.

On the other hand I do hope this dub won't be reusing music from shows (other than a few we heard in the Westwood dub for bits of fan service here and there) that were released before it went into production as it will be nice to have a score custom made for it.

[Tian]

I wonder how the Ocean guys reacted when they noticed in episode 1 that Bardock doesn't turn out to be a scientist as they thought back in the 90s.

.....you know Funimation wrote and produced that dub right?


https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=aXp4sR7sN9Y

Well, I knew they produced the dub but didn't know they wrote the scripts too. I thought FUNI's production part was the distribution but now I see they did more than that.

[Robo4900]

Pretty sure they picked like a dozen cues and just threw darts.

I believe what they did was take every Yamamoto piece, find a Kikuchi piece that sounds somewhat similar, and replace all instances of that Yamamoto piece with the Kikuchi piece.

And we know they’re not going to/allowed to use The Yamamoto score. A replacement score really is the best option

Well, in fairness to Toei, apparently the problem was that they only had access to a few tracks. I....vaaaaguely remember reading something about how they could only use stereo tracks and not mono tracks (I could be completely wrong here though, like I said, my memory is vague as hell on that point).

The problem wasn't a refusal to use mono tracks. In actuality, only a handful of the tracks Kikuchi composed were done in mono; aside from that, basically every single track Kikuchi recorded was stereo, just mixed down to mono for the TV show.

The problem was that Toei didn't have immediate, easy access to every Kikuchi track in stereo(The tracks Toei chose were all tracks that had CD-ready digital stereo masters ready, IIRC. That's the level of immediacy they needed. Anything less was simply not good enough), and because they assembled the Kikuchi Kai score by just replacing Yamamoto tracks, it ends up being quite repetitive, since Yamamoto's score was quite repetitive. (Difference, of course, being that Yamamoto's score was designed to be repetitive... Kikuchi's just doesn't work when used as it was in Kai...)

Does anyone have any examples of original tracks made just for Westwood Z's later days?

I think this and this were scored with original pieces, though I'm not 100% certain.

I do hope this dub won't be reusing music from shows (other than a few we heard in the Westwood dub for bits of fan service here and there) that were released before it went into production as it will be nice to have a score custom made for it.

I mean, we know the score is going to be, for the most part, an original score. If they happened to find that there were a couple of places where an existing track was just a perfect fit, then I think declaring war on the concept of reusing tracks just doesn't make sense in such cases.

As for Kai tracks being reused in other shows, I think that's entirely possible. At one point, the Z score used a track from the 1995 Ocean dub pitch for Magic Knight Rayearth, and a variety of other such odd intermixes of shows' scores can be observed in stuff Anitunes has scored, so... I would say it's entirely possible we've heard a track or two from Kai in other Anitunes-scored productions.

Well, I knew they produced the dub but didn't know they wrote the scripts too. I thought FUNI's production part was the distribution but now I see they did more than that.

Funi produced the dub. They hired Ocean to handle voice duties, and had them do a lot of work on the scripts, but ultimately Funi were holding the reins, and in fact Barry Watson himself was the ADR director.

[SX10]

Thanks for those examples Robo, I love those moments in the Ocean Dub. The score there is actually pretty good! That makes me feel a lot better.

[MasenkoHA]

quote="Tian"]

I wonder how the Ocean guys reacted when they noticed in episode 1 that Bardock doesn't turn out to be a scientist as they thought back in the 90s.

.....you know Funimation wrote and produced that dub right?


https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=aXp4sR7sN9Y

Well, I knew they produced the dub but didn't know they wrote the scripts too. I thought FUNI's production part was the distribution but now I see they did more than that.[/quote]


Saban distributed the show for Funimation during those days. But Funimation is mostly responsible for how the product turned out. Though best as I can tell Barry Watson and Chris Neel were a big factor in quality or lack thereof of American DBZ.

Funi produced the dub. They hired Ocean to handle voice duties, and had them do a lot of work on the scripts, but ultimately Funi were holding the reins, and in fact Barry Watson himself was the ADR director.

To what extent did Ocean’s talent have involvement with the scripts for that era though? It doesn’t surprise me that that they had some level of involvement with the dialog...since they were recording it but those 1996 episodes only credit Chris Neel and Chris Forbis as writers, both being Funimation employees. Compare Dragon Ball where the first 13 of the BLt dub (and for obvious reasons the in-house funi redub) do credit Ian Corlett and Terry Klassen as two of its staff writers.

Weirdly enough Ward Perry and Terry Klassen are being credited as writers by the time Funimation took over the ADR work themselves

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4fCL7bVYaZc

[MistaL]

Generally, it's just the ADR studio that does the scripting and not the distributor. For example, the dub for Your Name is produced and distributed by Funimation, but all the ADR work (script, direction, acting, editing, etc.) was done at NYAV Post. Yes, Funimation obviously have the people who could do that in-house, but that's not really how things work.

[MistaL]

Though I guess at the time the original DBZ dub happened, standardized practices like that may not have really been a thing yet. Wasn't Funimation kinda sitting on the series for a while before they started getting Ocean to dub it? They could have done the scripts themselves before they found a studio so that they could speed the overall process along.

[Tian]

What I'm gonna say is off-topic but... I think it would be really cool to have a DLC with the Ocean cast for Xenoverse 2 or Fighter Z (barring characters with no Ocean voice actor, of course). I know it's unlikely to happen but a man can dream, right?

[MasenkoHA]

Though I guess at the time the original DBZ dub happened, standardized practices like that may not have really been a thing yet. Wasn't Funimation kinda sitting on the series for a while before they started getting Ocean to dub it? They could have done the scripts themselves before they found a studio so that they could speed the overall process along.

At any rate the two credited writers for the first two
broadcast seasons were under Funimation. And Barry Watson was actively involved.

Compare to say the old Sailor Moon dub that was also licensed to an American based company and had the actual dubbing in Canada they did have to credit the ADR writers as writing the English adaptation. From what I understand there the licensing company oversaw the production but the ADR studio was pretty much given free reign on day to day business.

[SX10]

Revisited the Anitunes website and went to their music sample page. The best track is one called "High Tension" (think that is the name) right at the bottom. It's so good. Could be a taste of what is to come for Ocean Kai. At least I hope so!

[TheBlackPaladin]

Just checked that website out for the first time. Interesting samples...I was also surprised to find the highest-quality version I've ever heard of the Westwood version of "Rock the Dragon."

[8000 Saiyan]

Yeah, Marni's a load of awesome.

I'm so glad that we're likely getting this dub on the air. Hopefully Ocean gives me the great voices I always wanted for certain characters.

[Attitudefan]

Just checked that website out for the first time. Interesting samples...I was also surprised to find the highest-quality version I've ever heard of the Westwood version of "Rock the Dragon."

Woah that is CD quality!

[Dark Vegeta-Sama]

Does anyone have any examples of original tracks made just for Westwood Z's later days?

I think this and this were scored with original pieces, though I'm not 100% certain.

While I believe there were some original tracks composed during the later days of the Westwood run (there was a noticeable improvement in production quality during the later part of the Buu Saga in general), those two tracks are from the English dub of Monster Rancher.

Ironically, the Monster Rancher music was a much better fit for Dragonball Z than it ever was for Monster Rancher.

Just checked that website out for the first time. Interesting samples...I was also surprised to find the highest-quality version I've ever heard of the Westwood version of "Rock the Dragon."

That theme song isn't specific to the Westwood dub. It actually predates it, although it was indeed used for it as well.

Rather, it is the opening theme that the series had in Canada throughout the entirety of its run, regardless of at which point in the series it was, or who the cast was. It was there right from the early FUNi/Saban/Ocean days, right through FUNi's in-house recast and into the Westwood run. Each and every single episode of the series had it (except for, randomly and inexplicably, episode 21 of the FUNi/Saban/Ocean dub in which Nappa kills Piccolo).

I suppose it's most accurate to just refer to it as the Canadian version of "Rock the Dragon." The only times the American version of "Rock the Dragon" ever aired in Canada were the aforementioned episode 21 (every time that particular episode would air in reruns), the eventual airings of the edited TV versions of the first 3 FUNi/Pioneer movies in late 2001, and bizarrely, when episode 1 was re-aired for YTV's 20th Anniversary in 2008.

[SX10]

It's interesting seeing a lot of appreciation and love for the Anitunes guys. Can't wait to hear what they turn out.

[MasenkoHA]

Ironically, the Monster Rancher music was a much better fit for Dragonball Z than it ever was for Monster Rancher.

I can see that. Masked Rider’s bgm worked better in Digimon than it did in Masked Rider. (Though the best pieces were the few original bits they did)

That theme song isn't specific to the Westwood dub. It actually predates it, although it was indeed used for it as well.

Rather, it is the opening theme that the series had in Canada throughout the entirety of its run, regardless of at which point in the series it was, or who the cast was. It was there right from the early FUNi/Saban/Ocean days, right through FUNi's in-house recast and into the Westwood run. Each and every single episode of the series had it (except for, randomly and inexplicably, episode 21 of the FUNi/Saban/Ocean dub in which Nappa kills Piccolo).

I suppose it's most accurate to just refer to it as the Canadian version of "Rock the Dragon." The only times the American version of "Rock the Dragon" ever aired in Canada were the aforementioned episode 21 (every time that particular episode would air in reruns), the eventual airings of the edited TV versions of the first 3 FUNi/Pioneer movies in late 2001, and bizarrely, when episode 1 was re-aired for YTV's 20th Anniversary in 2008.

That’s wild. Why did Canada get its own opening even for the pre-Westwood era?