Kunzait_83 wrote:gokaiblue wrote:In all seriousness, perhaps with much less venom? Maybe not insult them as actors but just judge their performances eithout insults. You can say "Sean Schemmel sounds forced," and we can discuss whether that assertion is correct. However, saying he and the rest are "bargain barrel hacks" spits in the face of their improvement instead of simply showing areas that are lacking.
This is part of what I was talking about: this weird obsession that many fans here have with everyone being respectful and deferential to the FUNimation cast's "acting abilities", as if they're the cast of a David Lean movie or something. The fans have consistently graded these people's shitty performances on a ludicrously lenient and WAY overly-generous curve for the better part of two decades now.
Why shouldn't someone be able to call out a bad actor's bad acting as being indicative of... that person just being a lousy actor?
Because even good actors have lousy performances. You might think one actor is bad in one role, but what if the actor blows you away in another? It just seems to me you're making these judgements based on your feelings on their Dragon Ball work alone.
Kunzait_83 wrote:And I also love that last sentence about "spitting in the face of their improving".
This COMPLETELY misses the point that myself and Kamiccolo were making: we don't think (or at least I certainly don't think) that the FUNimation cast has improved NEARLY all that much over the years. Just because its become "conventional wisdom" within fandom that "the FUNimation cast have gotten SO much better over the years!" doesn't therefore mean that ALL OF US agree unanimously and universally with that particular appraisal.
I think that what "improvement" the FUNi cast has made over the years has been ABSURDLY minor, to the point at times almost of splitting hairs. They've gone from straight up on their face laughable, to a much more conventional and polished sort of terrible: yeah sorry/not sorry, but that ISN'T the sort of "growth" that I find them to be deserving of any kind of praise for, especially after over TWENTY YEARS now of their doing these roles.
I think that when these guys have been doing these roles for THAT LONG (people have lived and died entire adult lives within twenty years) and have shown SO PITIFULLY LITTLE in the way of "progress" and such minuscule "improvement" within that time: I say fuck "dub iconography", fuck the fanbase's nostalgia, fuck what people are used to after 20 years... these guys are Just. Plain. TERRIBLE. In. These. Roles. And. NOTHING. Is. Ever. Going. To. Fix. That.
20 years is giving them WAY too much of a "chance" to "redeem" or "prove" themselves. They've had an INSANE number of chances across a positively ridiculous stretch of time. They're just bad actors who suck in these parts. Fuck the butthurt fan outcry that would result and just shitcan the entire damn lot of them already
I
wouldn't
call
this
absurdly
minor
That is my main gripe with this whole thing. In my eyes, these guys are good actors, and they have improved. Yet, thus improvement isn't enough for some. I even gave reasons for why I feel this way, yet I still see very little credence or even example of the cast not being that good of actors now. I also wonder how exactly high these standards are of these fans. Oscar winning over-acting? A star studded cast that Funimation can't really afford (they were lucky to get Marsters)?
The voices to sound exactly like their Japanese counterparts?
If you want them to simply act well, then you've got it in these dubs. They evoke the needed emotion and embody the characters well. Sean Schemmel has finally mastered both Goku's
silly side and his
serious side. Sabat has also expanded his
emotional range as
Vegeta and
even
Piccolo (apologies for so many links, but I felt gibingbactual examples would get my point across better).
You have every right to criticise their performances, but truly think about what you're saying when you criticize them.as actors as whole.
