Are There Any Updates On The Harmony Gold Dub Of Dragon Ball?

[10gigtriforce]

Honestly I dont think it was any 1 show that did the anime boom. It was kidswb and foxkids. The former aired 4kids property like pokemon (the big boi of the anime boom) yugioh and before toonami got it sailor moon. Foxkids had digimon, monster rancher, and the like. It also had power rangers which while not anime the action scenes were Japanese actions scenes.


Even before toonami, which was the main anime boomer on cable and satellite networks and arguably bigger for anime once the boom started than the ota channels were, kidswb and foxkids brought anime into every house hold that could receive ota signals.

[MasenkoHA]

Honestly I dont think it was any 1 show that did the anime boom. It was kidswb and foxkids. The former aired 4kids property like pokemon (the big boi of the anime boom) yugioh and before toonami got it sailor moon. Foxkids had digimon, monster rancher, and the like. It also had power rangers which while not anime the action scenes were Japanese actions scenes.


Even before toonami, which was the main anime boomer on cable and satellite networks and arguably bigger for anime once the boom started than the ota channels were, kidswb and foxkids brought anime into every house hold that could receive ota signals.

And before that you had Robotech in the 80s and before that Astro Boy, Speed Racer, and Kimba the White Lion in the 60s. Anime wasn’t some obscure niche thing before “Our Saviors Funimation made anime a thing in America with Dragon Ball Z with the aid of Sailor Moon and Pokemon”

[eledoremassis02]

It seems another tape of the FUNi-Zero dub is around and has been fully digitized. This guy got it from a seller on ebay when he went to buy the Kakarot game
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1ZbaoB6mL4

[Planetnamek]

It seems another tape of the FUNi-Zero dub is around and has been fully digitized. This guy got it from a seller on ebay when he went to buy the Kakarot game
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1ZbaoB6mL4

Hot damn that's an awesome find! The crazy part is just today I had a thought about getting something DB related on Ebay and winding up with a tape of something rare and lo and behold someone else actually did just that

Who knows, maybe we'll get lucky and get a tape of the remaining four HG episodes


Anime may not have exactly been obscure before Funimation but it wasn't exactly a household name either, claiming Funi didn't play any part at all in the anime boom of the 90s and 2000s is quite simply inaccurate.

[SuperSaiyaManZ94]

It seems another tape of the FUNi-Zero dub is around and has been fully digitized. This guy got it from a seller on ebay when he went to buy the Kakarot game
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1ZbaoB6mL4

Hot damn that's an awesome find! The crazy part is just today I had a thought about getting something DB related on Ebay and winding up with a tape of something rare and lo and behold someone else actually did just that

Who knows, maybe we'll get lucky and get a tape of the remaining four HG episodes


Anime may not have exactly been obscure before Funimation but it wasn't exactly a household name either, claiming Funi didn't play any part at all in the anime boom of the 90s and 2000s is quite simply inaccurate.

Man that's just wow, here's to hoping that the rest are found after the first one just being unearthed because this rare dub was considered possibly lost for so long.

[DrBriefsCat]

I think FUNimation did play some role, HG had issues getting it to stick and FUNimation somehow got it on syndication. Did it go national before Cartoon Network? I used to watch it on Channel 11 (here in the NY area) but now that I hear HG aired in little areas and NY is a pretty big market, I'm not sure about FUNimation and broadcast history.

It was national, but was handled by Saban. The syndication broadcasts must have done well enough to get a second season dubbed, but Saban pretty much dropped out of it soon after. DBZ didn't really become mainstream until Funimation stepped in and got it on Cartoon Network.

Harmony Gold had problems getting affiliates to air their anime shows by the '90s. They struck success with Robotech in the '80s, but that was pretty much due to it having a built-in toyline. Carl Macek (the guy behind the Robotech adaptation of Macross) tried to get Nadia, Secret of Blue Water and Lupin III on American TV in the '90s but no one was interested. It was probably a factor why the Harmony Gold dub of Dragon Ball didn't really make it out of the gate in 1989. Also, the landscape was already crowded with domestic American product from Disney, WB, Hanna-Barbera and the like.

Also, while Dragon Ball became huge in 98-00's I do have this feeling Pokemon played a much larger role into acceptance of anime, between the cards and more "kid-friendly" aspects of the show.

Bingo. Before Pokemon came out in the US, many Americans outside the fandom assumed all anime was tenticle porn. Or they thought it was some badly animated product that came from Asia.

But I think it was the big 3: Sailor Moon, Dragon Ball Z and Pokemon.

The first two never really caught on until they were vindicated by Toonami through decent timeslots (and lots of promotion). Sailor Moon flopped hard when it first came out in the US (though it did succeed in Canada, thanks to YTV). Dragon Ball Z had endless reruns of the first two Ocean-dubbed seasons, which made a lot of people notice it. There was a demand for more episodes of the show and Funimation had a big well to draw from when it came to dubbed content.

[MasenkoHA]

It seems another tape of the FUNi-Zero dub is around and has been fully digitized. This guy got it from a seller on ebay when he went to buy the Kakarot game
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1ZbaoB6mL4

It’s a shame he felt the need to do a Channel Awesome style review where annoying nitpicks throughout=Review

[Planetnamek]

Sailor Moon did poorly at first due to being aired in syndication during weekday afternoons while it's target audience was in school and that led to DiC cancelling it after the first season, but it did start to pick up steam when USA Network picked it up and the ratings were good enough to justify getting DiC back in to dub season 2.

You are correct that Anime was largely perceived as being for adults before the late 90s, and earlier anime shows weren't considered high art, Roger Ebert actually pointed out in his review of the live-action Speed Racer movie that the original anime was largely considered disposable filler between reruns of Gilligan's Island and The Munsters back in the day and people only really watched it because it was in color. A lot of TV stations viewed anime as filler for decades until DBZ started getting big.

It seems another tape of the FUNi-Zero dub is around and has been fully digitized. This guy got it from a seller on ebay when he went to buy the Kakarot game
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1ZbaoB6mL4

It’s a shame he felt the need to do a Channel Awesome style review where annoying nitpicks throughout=Review

Disagree, I don't get a Channel Awesome vibe at all, I found the review very funny and entertaining(especially the bit with the "I could've taken him" guy). Felt more MST3K-esque to me.

[Cure Dragon 255]

With that link I meant that they WERE interested in Dragon Ball. They wouldnt give up valuable timeslots for any other anime. In fact they were so sure the show would be a big hit that it was the first and sadly last of the "Take another company's anime and air it" thing they had going on. And it was a big hit! 1.6 in their desired rating and OVER ONE MILLION VIEWERS. Toonzai might have been a Toonami ripoff... but we are in serious dire need of more of those. I know I know, this is heresy to you Kunzait. I am genuinely looking forward to your post on this.

I

[10gigtriforce]

Honestly I dont think it was any 1 show that did the anime boom. It was kidswb and foxkids. The former aired 4kids property like pokemon (the big boi of the anime boom) yugioh and before toonami got it sailor moon. Foxkids had digimon, monster rancher, and the like. It also had power rangers which while not anime the action scenes were Japanese actions scenes.


Even before toonami, which was the main anime boomer on cable and satellite networks and arguably bigger for anime once the boom started than the ota channels were, kidswb and foxkids brought anime into every house hold that could receive ota signals.

And before that you had Robotech in the 80s and before that Astro Boy, Speed Racer, and Kimba the White Lion in the 60s. Anime wasn’t some obscure niche thing before “Our Saviors Funimation made anime a thing in America with Dragon Ball Z with the aid of Sailor Moon and Pokemon”

Dude speed racer was my first anime, our kidswb affiliate played re-runs each morning before school. But yeah you're right, anime wasnt some little thing that woulda been dead without db/z. I do hold huge nostalgic love for the original run/dub but even toonami wasnt the big savior of anime in the west like so many fans claim

[10gigtriforce]

It seems another tape of the FUNi-Zero dub is around and has been fully digitized. This guy got it from a seller on ebay when he went to buy the Kakarot game
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1ZbaoB6mL4

It’s a shame he felt the need to do a Channel Awesome style review where annoying nitpicks throughout=Review

That the 1995 funi dub? If so you can still find dvds from vidmark with it and the first 13 episodes pretty easy on ebay. I got mine there last month pretty neat little thing

[MasenkoHA]

With that link I meant that they WERE interested in Dragon Ball. They wouldnt give up valuable timeslots for any other anime. In fact they were so sure the show would be a big hit that it was the first and sadly last of the "Take another company's anime and air it" thing they had going on.

I

They aired a show on their programming block from a franchise that was already a proven ratings hit in the US. That’s not even close to the same as licensing a franchise that hadn’t really been in the states especially with the company MO is “anime with obvious intention to sell toys, video games, trading cards” etc.

Again there’s next to no chance 4Kids would have ever been the company to license Dragon Ball if it hadn’t been Funimation.

Sailor Moon did poorly at first due to being aired in syndication during weekday afternoons while it's target audience was in school and that led to DiC cancelling it after the first season, but it did start to pick up steam when USA Network picked it up and the ratings were good enough to justify getting DiC back in to dub season 2.

The Sailor Moon dub stopped initially midway through its second series because it met the required 65 episodes for an American children’s cartoon. The rest of the second season ended up being dubbed two years later because the Canadian toy licensee paid for it.

And no it didn’t do poorly. It got a thanksgiving day marathon in 96 with an “actress” hosting the segment dressed as Sailor Moon, a PC game in 1997 and the novel series and other crap all before coming to Toonami and getting a choice after school timeslot. Stuff like that doesn’t happen to a series that did poorly.

Sailor Moon in syndication was in the same boat as Dragon Ball Z in the syndication. It did just fine, it just did much better on Toonami.

[10gigtriforce]

Is it possible we're looking at the wrong company to say who was/wasn't responsible for DB(z)'s western success?

I mean look at what we've got for DB. HG did 5 episodes and 1(technically 2 but in one run) movies. Original funimation DB: 1 movie(that may have been the pilot) and 13 episodes/1 arc. Nether were exactly a lot or enough to get off the ground while they woulda taken time to dub more as they aired on OTA stuff let alone toonami. Its not like rugrats where they had a megacorp paying for the production of a show season by season.

Then once saban came in and financed, (helped)edited, and helped produce 53 episodes(did they have a hand in the 3 movies?), handled distribution, and from my understanding may have had a hand in them doing more than a tiny number of episodes. And they were the ones that secured DBZ's time slots to get it off the ground(possibly toonami's slot too?).


Maybe its just me but it seems saban handled the distribution, time slots, and especially number of episodes dubbed, to help get people hooked. Vs the not even appetizer that HG or funi's original DB 'run's had.

[10gigtriforce]

Sailor Moon did poorly at first due to being aired in syndication during weekday afternoons while it's target audience was in school and that led to DiC cancelling it after the first season, but it did start to pick up steam when USA Network picked it up and the ratings were good enough to justify getting DiC back in to dub season 2.

The Sailor Moon dub stopped initially midway through its second series because it met the required 65 episodes for an American children’s cartoon. The rest of the second season ended up being dubbed two years later because the Canadian toy licensee paid for it.

And no it didn’t do poorly. It got a thanksgiving day marathon in 96 with an “actress” hosting the segment dressed as Sailor Moon, a PC game in 1997 and the novel series and other crap all before coming to Toonami and getting a choice after school timeslot. Stuff like that doesn’t happen to a series that did poorly.

Sailor Moon in syndication was in the same boat as Dragon Ball Z in the syndication. It did just fine, it just did much better on Toonami.

I watched sailor moon's first dub/syndication religiously on kidswb each day after school. That show was by far the hottest show at school or church/sunday school during its first mid 90's syndication run. DBZ got popular on toonami around here, sailor moon was already the big anime on campus before toonami was even a thing.

[Planetnamek]

Sailor Moon did poorly at first due to being aired in syndication during weekday afternoons while it's target audience was in school and that led to DiC cancelling it after the first season, but it did start to pick up steam when USA Network picked it up and the ratings were good enough to justify getting DiC back in to dub season 2.

The Sailor Moon dub stopped initially midway through its second series because it met the required 65 episodes for an American children’s cartoon. The rest of the second season ended up being dubbed two years later because the Canadian toy licensee paid for it.

And no it didn’t do poorly. It got a thanksgiving day marathon in 96 with an “actress” hosting the segment dressed as Sailor Moon, a PC game in 1997 and the novel series and other crap all before coming to Toonami and getting a choice after school timeslot. Stuff like that doesn’t happen to a series that did poorly.

Sailor Moon in syndication was in the same boat as Dragon Ball Z in the syndication. It did just fine, it just did much better on Toonami.

I watched sailor moon's first dub/syndication religiously on kidswb each day after school. That show was by far the hottest show at school or church/sunday school during its first mid 90's syndication run. DBZ got popular on toonami around here, sailor moon was already the big anime on campus before toonami was even a thing.

Ah very interesting, I did not know that.

[Robo4900]

This is the third copy of the BLT Zero dub to show up. That's quite interesting.

A shame no one's sharing it with anyone, though.

Spoiler:

Is it possible we're looking at the wrong company to say who was/wasn't responsible for DB(z)'s western success?

I mean look at what we've got for DB. HG did 5 episodes and 1(technically 2 but in one run) movies. Original funimation DB: 1 movie(that may have been the pilot) and 13 episodes/1 arc. Nether were exactly a lot or enough to get off the ground while they woulda taken time to dub more as they aired on OTA stuff let alone toonami. Its not like rugrats where they had a megacorp paying for the production of a show season by season.

Then once saban came in and financed, (helped)edited, and helped produce 53 episodes(did they have a hand in the 3 movies?), handled distribution, and from my understanding may have had a hand in them doing more than a tiny number of episodes. And they were the ones that secured DBZ's time slots to get it off the ground(possibly toonami's slot too?).

Maybe its just me but it seems saban handled the distribution, time slots, and especially number of episodes dubbed, to help get people hooked. Vs the not even appetizer that HG or funi's original DB 'run's had.

I kinda agree, yeah. Saban gave it huge coverage, and it did REALLY well under them, whereas before it had got no where. Saban was when Dragon Ball became a hit in the USA.

[MasenkoHA]

This is the third copy of the BLT Zero dub to show up. That's quite interesting.

A shame no one's sharing it with anyone, though.

Based on what we can see it sounds like the exact same dub aside from the Harmony Gold names, I’d be surprised if they even bothered to redub dialog that didn’t have the old names.

Funimation being lazy about re-doing something? Shocker

[Robo4900]

This is the third copy of the BLT Zero dub to show up. That's quite interesting.

A shame no one's sharing it with anyone, though.

Based on what we can see it sounds like the exact same dub aside from the Harmony Gold names, I’d be surprised if they even bothered to redub dialog that didn’t have the old names.

Funimation being lazy about re-doing something? Shocker

Sure.
Still, it is quite notable that every single line that mentions a character name is an alternate take. And apparently it doesn't have a segment of DB episode 2 spliced into the middle (the version we generally know, which has the revised non-HG character names, has like six minutes of episode 2 spliced in the middle).

[Zestanor]

I watched sailor moon's first dub/syndication religiously on kidswb each day after school. That show was by far the hottest show at school or church/sunday school during its first mid 90's syndication run. DBZ got popular on toonami around here, sailor moon was already the big anime on campus before toonami was even a thing.

Mkay this is funniest thing I’ve heard in weeks.

“~~~ Amen. Okay children! Who made lightning and thunder?”
Everyone: “Sailor Jupiter!”
Teacher: (Utter despair)
Priest: “You’ve turned them into pagans.”

[10gigtriforce]

I watched sailor moon's first dub/syndication religiously on kidswb each day after school. That show was by far the hottest show at school or church/sunday school during its first mid 90's syndication run. DBZ got popular on toonami around here, sailor moon was already the big anime on campus before toonami was even a thing.

Mkay this is funniest thing I’ve heard in weeks.

“~~~ Amen. Okay children! Who made lightning and thunder?”
Everyone: “Sailor Jupiter!”
Teacher: (Utter despair)
Priest: “You’ve turned them into pagans.”

He watched it with his nieces, so he knew what the show was.