How did Toonami fans deal with the bad voice acting?

[LuckyCat]

At the time season 3 was released I just wanted more DBZ and didn't care about the voices. However once the glow of getting new episodes wore off, the voices and constant music were really grating! Luckily, I was also able to watch the original Japanese version on the International Channel. Over time I picked up Japanese, and the original became by far my favorite.

So you might say the bad dubs ultimately turned me on to Japanese language?

[Dbzfan94]

Most of us were kids and didn't pay attention to the voice acting. (What kid does?) We just watched the incredible show for what it was, not the acting.

[DrBriefsCat]

I remember people being indifferent to it (mostly kids and teens). It was regarded as like an animated equivalent of WWE pro-wrestling. No one took issue with it unless they were fans of the Japanese version.

I myself however found it strange at the time that Cartoon Network ran something of such low quality.

[Gaffer Tape]

Most of us were kids and didn't pay attention to the voice acting. (What kid does?)

Hey, come on. I just said I did!

Seriously, though. While kids aren't exactly the best barometers of quality, and they can certainly put up with more crap than adults can, I think it's a bit disingenuous to say that kids aren't at all discerning, or that all kids are the same. So I don't really think it's fair to say, "Oh, we just didn't notice." Season 3 sucked, and a LOT of us DID notice. And for a lot of us, like LuckyCat and myself, the poor quality of it helped push us over to seeking out the original version.

[sayian_nation_]

Holy hell, just listened to Vegeta's big green dub voice... . The voice sounded like it belonged to Goten, I couldn't deal with watching anymore of that dub.

[DrBriefsCat]

And for a lot of us, like LuckyCat and myself, the poor quality of it helped push us over to seeking out the original version.

I remember watching the Spanish dub on Telemundo as an alternative. Some lucky people got the International Channel though.

[IDreamtIWasABee]

The shows "So Bad, It's Good" voice acting during it's original run on Toonami was what made DBZ legendary in the eyes of many fans.

This. DBZ was water cooler talk for those of us in high school during the Toonami run, and not just among anime fans. It was just something people watched, a true after school soap opera, and the off-balance dubbing eased acceptance.

DBZ Abridged harkens back to that original appeal, but with actual satire.

[Dbzfan94]

Most of us were kids and didn't pay attention to the voice acting. (What kid does?)

Hey, come on. I just said I did!

Seriously, though. While kids aren't exactly the best barometers of quality, and they can certainly put up with more crap than adults can, I think it's a bit disingenuous to say that kids aren't at all discerning, or that all kids are the same. So I don't really think it's fair to say, "Oh, we just didn't notice." Season 3 sucked, and a LOT of us DID notice. And for a lot of us, like LuckyCat and myself, the poor quality of it helped push us over to seeking out the original version.

I honestly didn't pay attention to the acting back then. I guess when I was little I might've been watching the show and have said "that sounded off" at some point, but idk. I didn't even get into DBZ until Cell, so I missed out on S3 on Toonami. I probably wouldn't have cared either way. And even if I did, the 7 year old me would've had no idea how to find the Japanese version anyway lol

[ShaneisMC]

What pretty much everyone else said. I was 6 when i saw it premiere in 98. I was just blown away by how cool the shit was. Also to be fair, Brian drummond definitely had some kickass screams. I thought it was strange when the voices changed though, but again very little boy so, not a significant amount of questioning.

[TheBlackPaladin]

Most of us were kids and didn't pay attention to the voice acting. (What kid does?)

Hey, come on. I just said I did!

I did too. I think a lot of us noticed the voice acting (the day after "Season 3" premiered, all me and my friends talked about were the changed voices), but only so many of us went so far as to call it "bad," because the style of acting found in the DBZ dub--even Season 3--was reminiscent of a lot of other kids shows at the time, so it didn't particularly stick out as being irregular.

With age comes perspective, though. Not to mention that the acting in the Kai dub made the performances in the DBZ dub stick out even more...for the wrong reasons.

[NitroEX]

I started watching the show during the Ocean Android & Cell sagas so my first exposure to the voice switch happened when I saw reruns of the Garlic Jr saga (I was about 10-11). I remember it being tolerable to listen to (at the time) but I could never quite get over how weird Piccolo, Krillin and Vegeta sounded in comparison to the Ocean versions (Sabat's Piccolo stood out to me most as it made Piccolo sound brutish and less intelligent).

When CN showed reruns of the Saiyan and Freeza sagas I remember not bothering to watch past the episodes of Freeza's second transformation. Looking back it was probably a combination of knowing the outcome in advance but I think the new voices also played a part in me tuning out as I remember really enjoying the Saiyan saga.

It wasn't until years later when I discovered the Japanese version that I fully explored all those Freeza episodes, I tried marathoning the Funimation version prior to that but I couldn't stand the music and voices. Even when playing DBZ video games I tend to switch to Japanese voices but I guess that could be because all the games I played up until the first Budokai (PAl version) were Japanese only.

[Bananape]

I have a friend who, thanks to the old Funi dub, to this day still denounces the show, and specifically cites the atrocious acting as one of his reasons. He caught a few episodes of the Freeza arc on TV back then, and said to me that the actors "couldn't act their way out of a paper bag".

He also questioned me wondering why Saiyan wasn't pronounced properly.

Have you tried showing him Z Kai in English Dub?

[thaman91]

There definitely was a lot of bad acting in season 3. But at the time, I didn't think about voice acting; to me, Vegeta just talked like that. And Piccolo's weird way of talking was just Piccolo being Piccolo.

So instead of thinking about it as bad voice acting, I instead thought about it in terms of in-universe reasons.

[ABED]

While I and most of the people I talked to didn't care for the new voices (by and large, but I still considered Schemmel a step up from Kelamis), we were so hungry for new DBZ that it didn't matter. It also helped that we got an uncut footage option. I was 13/14 at the time so my memory is vivid. Season 2 finished over a year prior, so I was hungry for anything.

[Mewzard]

While I and most of the people I talked to didn't care for the new voices (by and large, but I still considered Schemmel a step up from Kelamis), we were so hungry for new DBZ that it didn't matter. It also helped that we got an uncut footage option. I was 13/14 at the time so my memory is vivid. Season 2 finished over a year prior, so I was hungry for anything.

Pretty much. When you watch all of the Ocean Dub's episodes several times over due to it airing multiple times a week, you're just craving new stuff come Season Three.

I had problems with some of the new voices come the change (I remember being especially shocked by Gohan's voice change), but I eventually got over that and was just glad to have more Z. It wasn't until the end of Z that I started to realize I could get better stuff and wanted better stuff when it came to Dragon Ball.

Of course, with Kai, I got what I wanted, so it's all good.

[WittyUsername]

I never paid attention to the quality of voice acting for the series when it was still airing on Toonami. Obviously I noticed how different the voices were compared to the Ocean voice cast, but I didn't care enough to be put off by any of the voices.