The History of Dragon Ball in Every Country

[Tian]

Yo, Derek! I just recalled I've got info (which I even posted in another topic long time ago) about the franchise in some countries that aren't on this topic.

This info comes from some kind redditors who responded my question-topics about the show's presence in their respective countries:

Bulgaria
The series was never locally aired there. So like Czechs, they had to watch the German dub from RTL II.

Latvia
Same case as Czech Republic and Bulgaria.

Georgia
The series was never aired there nor anyone watched it from a foreign channel. Videogames were sold, although they weren't easy to find.

Slovenia
The series was watched both locally (subbed version through POP TV) and internationally (Italian dub through Mediaset)

Ukraine
One of the Ukrainian redditors told me that the series was apparently aired locally through the defunct Ukrainian channel QTV.

I hope this helps you with your documentation of the franchise's worldwide presence.

[MCDaveG]

While researching the history of Dragon Ball in different countries, I realized that there's no single place where you can go to read about the history of the series in every country on earth.
[/spoiler]

UPDATE on Czech Republic - Dragon Ball GT aired here on Animax with czech subtitles and Japanese voice track. There was option on cable TV to switch to Hungarian dub as Animax had HQ in Hungary and aired in Czechia, Slovakia, Poland, Hungary and Romania.
It aired in 2013-2014. Animax aired from 2007-2014, then it was cancelled.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOMdUddYgNk

[DerekPadula]

Thank you to everyone who has provided updates.

I need to hire someone to reorganize this info for me because I don't have the time to do so myself with my current book projects. I'd like to reformat the history for each country into an easy-to-understand and chronological order, and then combine all of them into a book.

If you're interested in being paid for this project or just want to help out, then please reach out to me here in a DM, on my social media, or through my site's contact form. We'll go from there. Thanks!

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Thank you to everyone who has provided updates.

I need to hire someone to reorganize this info for me because I don't have the time to do so myself with my current book projects. I'd like to reformat the history for each country into an easy-to-understand and chronological order, and then combine all of them into a book.

If you're interested in being paid for this project or just want to help out, then please reach out to me here in a DM, on my social media, or through my site's contact form. We'll go from there. Thanks!

Hi Derek, check your messages.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Well, I can confirm, thanks to MAIAMEEEEEE who is a fellow fan in a Discord group I'm a part of, there is a Kurdish dub by Sima Studio that covered all of Dragon Ball Z, OG Dragon Ball movies 1-4, Z Movies 1-8, and Super.

I've also been told the Arabic dub was dubbed by Venus Centre and aired on SpaceToon.

There are also some localizations that used lectors instead of dubbing where a reader speaks in the native tongue. I'm aware this happened in Poland, but still have some research to do on the series history there.

Also, a huge thanks to sangofe for confirming Lisa-Marie Pettersen Leira is the translator for most of the Norwegian manga volumes.

For English dubs, it's worth noting it has never been confirmed that the later Ocean dub was made to fulfill Canadian content quotas, as the edited episodes 108-167 of this dub never aired there. This dub was also distributed by Westwood Media, who were Ocean's production arm during that time. AB Groupe only distributed this dub in Europe, but they were responsible for the Big Green dub.

I'll be posting more info on international dubs as I uncover them.

[Adamant]

Also, a huge thanks to sangofe for confirming Lisa-Marie Pettersen Leira is the translator for most of the Norwegian manga volumes.

She did the second, Outland-published translation, I believe. The older Schibsted one was by Dag Lønsjø.

And if we're listing translators, the Danish manga translation was done by John Lysmand.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Thanks Adamant.

I can confirm, as of now I've talked to a number of sources from various countries to ask about whether or not Dragon Ball has ever had any kind of broadcast or releases there.

Here's what I've got thus far:

Armenia : As far as this individual is aware, Dragon Ball has never been released there

Botswana : I was told the series did air before 2009 in English on BTV (Botswana televison) and SABC 2 (South African Broadcasting Channel)

Cambodia : My source remembers a few Dragon Ball series were aired on a local station with a Khmer dub, but he doesn't remember which series in particular. The manga is not sold in stores, and most import the English versions

Dijbouti : I've been told they only use the French versions of the anime and manga, although he didn't specify if it was on TV or through imported products

Nepal : Person I asked confirmed it aired on Cartoon Network in English, but switched to Hindi later on. I know some obscure English dubs air in Asian countries, but the individual I spoke to said he was 10 when he saw it (in 2010) so I didn't think it would be fair to ask if he knew what English dub it was

Sri Lanka : Individual said anime is very popular and many people grew up watching Dragon Ball. From what he's said it aired from the late 90s to around 2014 in English on Cartoon Network. Source was guessing it the Funimation's dub. Like Cambodia, the manga has no official release because no local sources bring down Manga officially

That's all for now, but I'm waiting to hear back from sources elsewhere.

[SilverPlaqueVII]

It would appear Argentina pulled the plug for Dragon Ball due to the perverted nature of Kame-sennin. Kinda weird eh?

[sangofe]

Also, a huge thanks to sangofe for confirming Lisa-Marie Pettersen Leira is the translator for most of the Norwegian manga volumes.

She did the second, Outland-published translation, I believe. The older Schibsted one was by Dag Lønsjø.

And if we're listing translators, the Danish manga translation was done by John Lysmand.

Yes. The redo for Outland. And after speaking to her I found out she did all volumes. The story was that someone else started translating but she changed a lot of the translation but was forced to keep the names as they were.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Thanks again sangofe for the clarification.

I'm really proud to be assisting Derek in this research, it's all fascinating stuff.

As it turns out, in Timor-Leste the series has never been released on any local stations, although people have watched it in the country through Indonesian TV channels, which are available for free, and most people there understand and speak Indonesian. That's not uncommon, as we've seen with Canadians that were able to watch Kai through US Nicktoons even though the network wasn't local to them. The manga seems to be a more unique case, it can be found in stores, but it's rare and sold in random chapters, they are translated into Indonesian (so if I can track down the translator for the Indonesian manga that will cover both countries). I was also told Indosiar (Indonesian broadcaster) made the anime available to stream in Timor-Leste, and the Indonesian GTV broadcasted it, but briefly.

My source in Latvia has also said that Dragon Ball has not been released there, and the only anime shown locally is the odd title on some of their TV streaming services, so maybe there's a chance one of them could pick up the series.

I've also been told there is an Arabic dub that was done by Syrians. Now I'm not familiar with the Arabic dub, so this may or may not be the same dub by Venus Centre, but it would certainly be interesting if they also had alternate dubs. Likewise, I'm trying to find out if Indosiar and RCTI aired the same dub. Hopefully I'll learn more soon.

[Tian]

My source in Latvia has also said that Dragon Ball has not been released there, and the only anime shown locally is the odd title on some of their TV streaming services, so maybe there's a chance one of them could pick up the series.

Yeah, Latvia didn't air much anime locally. They did air stuff like Pokémon on PBK (in Russian tho) and LNT and Yu-Gi-Oh! on TV3 but that's pretty much all they aired on national TV.

Anime fellas from Latvia, as I said above, had to rely on both German channels RTL II and Pro 7 to watch it.

And I realized I forgot Estonia. One guy on reddit commented that like Latvia, it wasn't aired locally but in a foreign channel but in this case, it was somewhat localized in Estonian (I guess he meant they aired ads in Estonian)

[The Iron Fjord]

For English dubs, it's worth noting it has never been confirmed that the later Ocean dub was made to fulfill Canadian content quotas, as the edited episodes 108-167 of this dub never aired there.

I always thought it was weird how the voices/music changed during the Cell Games, nice to know I wasn't the only one that it happened too, no matter how illogical that sounds.

[Brilliant_Gear_258]

I stumbled acrossed a different GT Intro (not the awful "Step Into The Grand Tour" rap, nor the Blue Water Dub intro). The different intro I stumbled across was the first French GT Intro. If you're gonna reply "The GT Intro used in France was the Japanese theme", you're right but no. The very first intro used the unreleased French theme (the RARE TV Size version NOT THE EXTENDED VERSION) which can only be seen on the 1997 French Broadcast (which is impossible to find on YouTube and Google due to copyright strikes by Toei and/or AB Groupe). I'm half lucky to find the French Intro via the DBGT Opening Multilanguage intro from 2015 (since the unreleased Extended Version was released in 2018 on Generation Club Do's YT Channel 3 years after the Rare TV-Size version was revealed on that Multilanguage Video) I do have the 20 second clip of that rare intro (taken from that 2015 GT Multilanguage video I mentioned.)

For those who are French & known about the French Dub of GT and those of you who heard about the French Dub of the Dragon Ball series, let me know if you found the rare intro with the rare TV-Size version of the unreleased French Theme (not the Japanese Version which is common, but the RARE UNRELEASED FRENCH THEME FROM THE 1997 BROADCAST)

[Brilliant_Gear_258]

Link to the 20 second clip of the intro (incompleted intro due to multilanguage and reason why I put in 220s is because that's the TV-Size Version of the French Intro taken from the 1997 Broadcast):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a-JrTScQ2w0&t=220s

[DerekPadula]

Thank you for sharing that GT clip. It's interesting to watch the different dub adaptations.

I appreciate everyone's support with filling in missing info. There's so much out there I didn't grow up with.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Just wanted to confirm for anyone interested, the Turkish manga was published by Gerekli Seyler and the translator is Alp İlkkursun.

Also, if Kei17 is reading this I know you mentioned once that there was a Korean English dub of Z that was made for educational purposes. If you have any more info on that dub it would be greatly appreciated.

An English dub also apparently aired in Uganda. I would assume it's the Funimation dub, as it's known it aired, and was available on home video in Africa (or at least South Africa), but for anyone who watched it in Uganda if it was a different dub please let us know.

I've also reached out to a source in the Caribbean as I have no info on Dragon Ball in countries like Belize, Jamaica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, or Saint Lucia for example, other than the Mexican Spanish dub is what aired, so will hopefully report back on that soon.

[Brilliant_Gear_258]

Thank you for sharing that GT clip. It's interesting to watch the different dub adaptations.

I appreciate everyone's support with filling in missing info. There's so much out there I didn't grow up with.

No problem! I tried to searching up the exact GT intro from the 1997 broadcast, unfortunatley, idk if got copyright striked by Toei and Mediawan Thematics (formerally known as AB Groupe) or not. The exact intro was around on YouTube a couple of years ago and that was before Generation Club Do uploaded the extended version of the intro in 2018. I tried replying to those on YouTube who found the 1997 GT French intro, they have no answer because they didn't know where they found the intro.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

So, a source has confirmed for me there is a dub of Dragon Ball Z made in Pakistan, but it is very rare and no known copies are in circulation.

Kids Zone, who are a channel that dubs series into Urdu are planning to air the Z dub at some point, so hopefully it will be rerun. I am trying to follow up on which channel aired the series originally, but from what I gather it was the Pakistani Cartoon Network.

Worth noting English is also spoken in Pakistan, in fact Pop is airing the edited Funimation Super dub, although I don't think they ever aired Funimation's Z dub.

[chungohan]

As I am from Catalonia, I would like to sutmit some corrections regarding the "Spain" Anime story

Anime
The Dragon Ball anime first premiered on channel TV3, in 1990, in the Catalan LANGUAGE.

Catalan is not a dialect, it is a language. It's roots were the same as the ones for Spanish/Castilian, but it is not a dialect of that.

This was followed by the ¿Mexican? dub by Intertrack in Andalusia, Barcelona, and Madrid. It was then redubbed by the studio called High Frequency. The series became a hit and was picked up nation-wide.

This is not correct, either. Mexican is the language spoken on Mexico. In Spain the language spoken is Spanish/Castilian.
The first 26 episodes of the series were dubbed in Catalan and Spanish in Barcelona (Catalonia) by Dovi, sharing some of the voice actors which usually speak both languages. That studio bought the series assuming it was a 26 episode series and after some time, they shut down their activities.

Afther that, the serie was continued in Catalan in the studio Dicavi/Tramontana with a different voice cast until the end in varios blocks of different number of episodes and with some actor changes through the years.

After episode 26, the series were dubbed to Spanish by the "Videotake Sur" studio in Andalusia (south of spain) until episode 146. Then that studio closed and "Alta Frecuencia" did the job and another studio called "SURCO" dubbed some of the later episodes and Dragon Ball GT.

The serie was also dubbed to Galician, Euskera (Vasque) and Valencian. So, in fact, we have 5 totally different dubs in Spain

[Cure Dragon 255]

As I am from Catalonia, I would like to sutmit some corrections regarding the "Spain" Anime story

Anime
The Dragon Ball anime first premiered on channel TV3, in 1990, in the Catalan LANGUAGE.

Catalan is not a dialect, it is a language. It's roots were the same as the ones for Spanish/Castilian, but it is not a dialect of that.

This was followed by the ¿Mexican? dub by Intertrack in Andalusia, Barcelona, and Madrid. It was then redubbed by the studio called High Frequency. The series became a hit and was picked up nation-wide.

This is not correct, either. Mexican is the language spoken on Mexico. In Spain the language spoken is Spanish/Castilian.
The first 26 episodes of the series were dubbed in Catalan and Spanish in Barcelona (Catalonia) by Dovi, sharing some of the voice actors which usually speak both languages. That studio bought the series assuming it was a 26 episode series and after some time, they shut down their activities.

Afther that, the serie was continued in Catalan in the studio Dicavi/Tramontana with a different voice cast until the end in varios blocks of different number of episodes and with some actor changes through the years.

After episode 26, the series were dubbed to Spanish by the "Videotake Sur" studio in Andalusia (south of spain) until episode 146. Then that studio closed and "Alta Frecuencia" did the job and another studio called "SURCO" dubbed some of the later episodes and Dragon Ball GT.

The serie was also dubbed to Galician, Euskera (Vasque) and Valencian. So, in fact, we have 5 totally different dubs in Spain

I know this is ironic or intentionally wrong but lol.