Why does Funimation refuse to acknowledge the term "Ki"?

[Cure Dragon 255]

I thought back to a chat I had with Kunzait on an older Kanzenshuu thread. He said the whole Piccolo Reincarnation thing was removed by Funimation to get rid of *Eastern Asian themes and traditions* and I said that they've just mistranslated that by accident. But Ki? Ki has never been acknowleged by Funimation. Never. In the 20 plus years they've had the franchise they have used the term in their dubs.

[ulisa]

I thought in the later sagas, they used energy as a translation. Isn’t that what ki/chi translates to? Life energy?

[KBABZ]

I don't recall Ki ever being used as a phrase in either of their Kai dubs, with "power" and the slightly more appropriate "energy" being used a lot instead.

EDIT: I watched the Kai scene of Gohan teaching Videl about Ki control before flying, and he consistently refers to it as energy and energy control. The closest he gets to saying Ki is "key".

DOUBLE EDIT: Oh, I also noticed that Gohan notes that he should have expected that Videl would have picked up energy control as quickly as she did given how into martial arts she is. This alludes to the ki and martial arts connection!

[Dragon Ball Gus]

They do acknowledge that word in the video games. But in terms of the anime, you're right they never acknowledge it.

[Zephyr]

Because they're demonstrably unqualified to deliver an accurate localization of the series.

I don't want to say they're committed to avoiding such a delivery, but it sure wouldn't be a shocker.

[DragonBallKing]

Same reason they won't start pronouncing saiyan correctly, "energy" has been ingrained in the localization for so long that a big change would be jarring to casual fans.

[linkdude20002001]

I don't think hearing 'qi' instead of 'energy' would even be noticed by casual fans. I even lost the ability to notice. But now that you've all gone and pointed it out...

[nickzambuto]

Why would they though? Ki is a Japanese word. Translated, it basically does just mean life energy. Why would they randomly leave this word untranslated?

[KBABZ]

Why would they though? Ki is a Japanese word. Translated, it basically does just mean life energy. Why would they randomly leave this word untranslated?

I personally suspect it might be useful for the lip flaps when it's used. Kinda like how by shortening Tenshinhan's name into Tien Shinhan, they can expand the amount of dialogue delivered in a set of lip flaps.

[MrTennek]

Ki isn't an English word, silly. That's why.

[dbgtFO]

I could have sworn I have heard at least one instance of the funi dub using the term ki.
Guess I must have heard it in the video games then, as Gus says.

[Bajosexto]

Why would they though? Ki is a Japanese word. Translated, it basically does just mean life energy. Why would they randomly leave this word untranslated?

You mean like Kaioken, Masensko, and Senzu?

Personally I do think that translating names/words is okay in dubs. Like translating Final Flash to Resplandor Final. Or Spongebob to Bob Esponja. And in this case, Ki to energy. (which I'm not too sure if "Ki" is an actual Japanese world that means energy or a word invented by Toriyama that means energy) That said, I'm also okay with dubs leaving names/words untranslated. Specially words that really don't have an equivalent in English, Spanish, etc. Like the Mexican foods Enchiladas or Tacos. You can't translate them into English. You just keep them as is.

My problem with FUNi using energy instead of Ki is that, like Kunzait said, it removes the "Eastern Asian themes and traditions" from Dragon Ball. It's a little sad that one of the most iconic words from Dragon Ball, "Ki", is not known or used by the majority of English speaking fans.

[dbgtFO]

Or Spongebob to Bob Esponja.

I wonder, if they did that for the pun. That was certainly the first thing I thought of!

[Bajosexto]

Or Spongebob to Bob Esponja.

I wonder, if they did that for the pun. That was certainly the first thing I thought of!

They simply adapted Spongebob into Spanish. Either name, Spongebob or Bob Esponja, would've been okay really. It depends on the dub. For example, Spider-Man is usually translated to Hombre Araña in Latin American dubs but Batman isn't. Batman just stays as the English word "Batman". Like I said either one works. Although, hearing someone call Batman "Hombre Murcielago" would be very weird. I'm too used to hearing Batman.

[ABED]

Batman is a proper noun. It's his name, so you wouldn't translate it. Ki isn't a proper noun.

[Michsi]

Couldn't they have gone with 'chi' instead. It means the same thing, doesn't it? I've seen this word left untranslated many times in old movies and cartoons, so it's not like the viewer wouldn't have understood what they were talking about.

[OmegaRockman]

Couldn't they have gone with 'chi' instead. It means the same thing, doesn't it? I've seen this word left untranslated many times in old movies and cartoons, so it's not like the viewer wouldn't have understood what they were talking about.

If I'm not mistaken, "ki" is the Japanese pronunciation of "chi," so I don't think it would have been an inappropriate change. I just think they decided to localize it as "energy" because it was the 90's/early 2000's era where Americanizing anime was par for the course. They probably just kept "energy" as their go-to localization in Kai because it had already been ingrained into the dub, much like their pronunciation of "Saiyan" never using the "Son" in Goku's name (though they made that one exception in the "I am" speech). If I were handling the dub I would have went ahead and started using "ki" in Kai, but I won't lose sleep over "energy" since it's an okay enough translation of the concept (not perfect, but okay).

[KBABZ]

never using the "Son" in Goku's name (though they made that one exception in the "I am" speech).

Found this today: when selecting Goku in FighterZ, one of his quotes is the last part of the I Am speech, with the full name!

[OmegaRockman]

never using the "Son" in Goku's name (though they made that one exception in the "I am" speech).

Found this today: when selecting Goku in FighterZ, one of his quotes is the last part of the I Am speech, with the full name!

I was talking about the anime, but I didn't really make that clear. My bad on that! But yeah, they occasionally use it "Son" in the games, the first instance being Burst Limit, I think. It's cool that they used it in FighterZ, though!

[KBABZ]

never using the "Son" in Goku's name (though they made that one exception in the "I am" speech).

Found this today: when selecting Goku in FighterZ, one of his quotes is the last part of the I Am speech, with the full name!

I was talking about the anime, but I didn't really make that clear. My bad on that! But yeah, they occasionally use it "Son" in the games, the first instance being Burst Limit, I think. It's cool that they used it in FighterZ, though!

As I recall (don't have the game on) it goes "I am a legendary warrior, pure of heart, awakened by fury! I am the Super Saiyan, Son Goku!!"

So it's a bit abridged from the Kai version, but checking it again it's actually the entire speech, and easily the longest character select quote in the game. And lemme tell ya Sean gives such a good performance on the Son Goku part I would have told you they added an echo effect at the end the first time I heard it.