USA got it worst with anime/manga releases?

[coola]

Anime:
DB: Incomplete singles and zoomed in Blue Bricks, neither had next episode previews
DBZ: Only decent release was limited and now cost 1000$ (DBoxes)
DBGT: Singles have decent quality and feature next episode previews, Green Bricks meanwhile look smeary and previews are missing

Manga: Despite so many re releases, they still have meh translations and silly name changes, but worst of all, not a single release was fully uncensored!

Why USA is so unlucky with anime/manga releases of Dragon Ball? While some countries in Europe got full good anime and manga releases (Even if they are "just" upscaled DBoxes, at least they have previews ) even Poland, who only got French dub with Polish voice over of DBZ Movies 1 - 3 and DBZ Movie 12 and 13 with Polish dub for anime release, we at least got full uncensored manga with great translation, and Full Color manga is now released, USA really seem to always get screwed over.

[90sDBZ]

I wouldn't say the US had it the worst. The UK didn't even get a home release of the anime until 2012, at which point we started getting the Orange Bricks followed by all the other various series and movies.

I'll gladly take a mediocre release over no release any day. Not being able to rewatch your favourite show sucks, and that was the case over here for several years after Toonami UK stopped airing it. The Orange Bricks were a godsend for me because I could import them at an affordable price.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

I wouldn't say the US had it the worst. The UK didn't even get a home release of the anime until 2012, at which point we started getting the Orange Bricks followed by all the other various series and movies.

I'll gladly take a mediocre release over no release any day. Not being able to rewatch your favourite show sucks, and that was the case over here for several years after Toonami UK stopped airing it. The Orange Bricks were a godsend for me because I could import them at an affordable price.

Yeah, I always wished the UK and Ireland had home releases sooner. I would have taken anything between 2005-2012 when Toonami stopped airing Dragon Ball, even just for it to stay in people's minds. Would have been cool if Manga UK could have repackaged Madman's DVD singles that had a readily available PAL master and are quite valuable considering they have more recaps and NEPs than Funimation's equivalents and contain the "Stay tuned for Dragon Ball Z" in the Saban era volumes. In the long run they would have also been easier to find second hand. Though considering AB Groupe was likely still hoarding the rights for many of those years Manga UK probably couldn't have done that even if they wanted to.

[90sDBZ]

Yeah, I always wished the UK and Ireland had home releases sooner. I would have taken anything between 2005-2012 when Toonami stopped airing Dragon Ball, even just for it to stay in people's minds. Would have been cool if Manga UK could have repackaged Madman's DVD singles that had a readily available PAL master and are quite valuable considering they have more recaps and NEPs than Funimation's equivalents and contain the "Stay tuned for Dragon Ball Z" in the Saban era volumes. In the long run they would have also been easier to find second hand. Though considering AB Groupe was likely still hoarding the rights for many of those years Manga UK probably couldn't have done that even if they wanted to.

Shows like Pokemon, Digimon, and Beyblade at least got a few VHS volumes released around the time they aired. They mostly weren't complete releases, but at least it was something. Even if AB Groupe had just put out a few volumes of the Saiyan saga on VHS to test the waters it would've been something. It still boggles my mind how DBZ was this massive hit on Cartoon Network/CNX/Toonami for all those years, but couldn't get a home release until much later on.

Thank goodness Manga UK rescued it from AB Groupe.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Even if AB Groupe had just put out a few volumes of the Saiyan saga on VHS to test the waters it would've been something. It still boggles my mind how DBZ was this massive hit on Cartoon Network/CNX/Toonami for all those years, but couldn't get a home release until much later on.

What's more disappointing is that AB and Bridge Entertainment did release that exact material in the Netherlands, albeit with Dutch subtitles. In the UK it was just Z movies 2-4 through a distribution deal with Warner Vision that inevitably was cut short, although considering those VHS/DVD featured the Big Green cast its no wonder sales didn't justify putting out anything else as no one was familiar with them and the performances were vastly inferior. No doubt if AB were willing to spend a bit more money to license the Pioneer trilogy or Funimation inhouse movies they would have sold far better and made the series a no-brainer to follow up with.

I don't think sales of Pokemon, Digimon and Beyblade on home video was any indication of how well Dragon Ball would have done. The fact Dragon Ball has consistently topped the Anime charts in Amazon and has been milked far more since Manga UK licensed it should say that it would have been far more profitable had AB tried to release the series on home video with the cast people knew and loved as other distributors did with other shows.

It boggles my mind that a French company like AB that was there for Dragon Ball's long history in France dating back to the late 80s could be so ignorant and shortsighted about the series and its potential longevity (which has now proven to be a thing nearly 20 years on).

[TheBlackPaladin]

I can't speak for the manga since I haven't finished reading it and am not that familiar with the various different releases there, but as far as anime releases? Oh gosh, we didn't get the worst release at all -- not even close! For a few reasons.

-If one counts the Japanese audio track on the DVDs, we were technically the first country to get a home video release of the TV series at all. We had it before Japan did!
-Or how about the fact that we even have bilingual, uncut DVDs? A lot of countries don't have a home video release at all. We're among the few -- not the only --but among the few countries to have those.
-We have the Dragon Boxes. A lot of countries can't make that claim.
-A lot of the countries that do have home video releases have releases that are, at best, sub-standard, and at worst, incomplete. For example, Germany has a DVD set for DBZ...but it is the TV-edited version, dub only, and uses the same footage that aired on TV (which was, itself, a multi-generational video copy of the edited French version). So their DVDs were edited, dub-only, and used footage that was nearly two decades old at the time. Or how about their DVD set for GT? Their airing of GT was edited even worse than DBZ, with many episodes not even airing originally. So what they do for the DVD release? They released all the episodes, but all the episodes that aired on TV were on the DVDs as edited and dub-only, with the unaired episodes being uncut, but Japanese and subtitled only. It was a mess.
-I seem to vaguely recall that the Arabic dub got an incomplete DVD release with bad footage and box art that made it look like a bootleg.

So, all that to say, I don't know that I'd necessarily say we had the best anime releases, but we weren't even close to the worst.

[SuperSaiyaManZ94]

I can't speak for the manga since I haven't finished reading it and am not that familiar with the various different releases there, but as far as anime releases? Oh gosh, we didn't get the worst release at all -- not even close! For a few reasons.

-If one counts the Japanese audio track on the DVDs, we were technically the first country to get a home video release of the TV series at all. We had it before Japan did!
-Or how about the fact that we even have bilingual, uncut DVDs? A lot of countries don't have a home video release at all. We're among the few -- not the only --but among the few countries to have those.
-We have the Dragon Boxes. A lot of countries can't make that claim.
-A lot of the countries that do have home video releases have releases that are, at best, sub-standard, and at worst, incomplete. For example, Germany has a DVD set for DBZ...but it is the TV-edited version, dub only, and uses the same footage that aired on TV (which was, itself, a multi-generational video copy of the edited French version). So their DVDs were edited, dub-only, and used footage that was nearly two decades old at the time. Or how about their DVD set for GT? Their airing of GT was edited even worse than DBZ, with many episodes not even airing originally. So what they do for the DVD release? They released all the episodes, but all the episodes that aired on TV were on the DVDs as edited and dub-only, with the unaired episodes being uncut, but Japanese and subtitled only. It was a mess.
-I seem to vaguely recall that the Arabic dub got an incomplete DVD release with bad footage and box art that made it look like a bootleg.

So, all that to say, I don't know that I'd necessarily say we had the best anime releases, but we weren't even close to the worst.

True, and for some of FUNimation's questionable/stupid/short sighted decisions (mostly for Z) home video wise i'd say that we've gotten it better than other regions like you say in regard to uncut versions. Many of the Euro countries' releases are just the straight up TV edits (most of which were sourced from the French dub's masters) slapped onto DVD or whatever, old ass garbage looking, heavily censored footage and all. France apparently has a release that essentially is the most complete cut of the dub where they inserted bits that were removed from their old heavily censored TV broadcast version taken from the Japanese version with it's audio in addition to the full uncut Japanese track and footage.

So, at least in that regard the French fans have a better situation home video wise than other countries in that part of the world do.

[MasenkoHA]

Anime:
) ) even Poland, who only got French dub with Polish voice over of DBZ Movies 1 - 3

I'm gonna have to say never having to get a release that is another country's dub while someone talks over it in English is a point in the US's favor. Maybe that's just me.

[M16U3L2015]

I can't speak for the manga since I haven't finished reading it and am not that familiar with the various different releases there, but as far as anime releases? Oh gosh, we didn't get the worst release at all -- not even close! For a few reasons.

-If one counts the Japanese audio track on the DVDs, we were technically the first country to get a home video release of the TV series at all. We had it before Japan did!
-Or how about the fact that we even have bilingual, uncut DVDs? A lot of countries don't have a home video release at all. We're among the few -- not the only --but among the few countries to have those.
-We have the Dragon Boxes. A lot of countries can't make that claim.
-A lot of the countries that do have home video releases have releases that are, at best, sub-standard, and at worst, incomplete. For example, Germany has a DVD set for DBZ...but it is the TV-edited version, dub only, and uses the same footage that aired on TV (which was, itself, a multi-generational video copy of the edited French version). So their DVDs were edited, dub-only, and used footage that was nearly two decades old at the time. Or how about their DVD set for GT? Their airing of GT was edited even worse than DBZ, with many episodes not even airing originally. So what they do for the DVD release? They released all the episodes, but all the episodes that aired on TV were on the DVDs as edited and dub-only, with the unaired episodes being uncut, but Japanese and subtitled only. It was a mess.
-I seem to vaguely recall that the Arabic dub got an incomplete DVD release with bad footage and box art that made it look like a bootleg.

So, all that to say, I don't know that I'd necessarily say we had the best anime releases, but we weren't even close to the worst.

Even in Latin America, despite how big DBZ is here, the only DVD releases that were legally made were incomplete and one of them had terrible video and audio quality.

[GokuHater]

Oh yeah...?
Poland speaking here

Let me tell you what we had...
As for anime we had one airing from 1999. It was full DB, DBZ, DBGT but the tranlsation was a bit awful, which I adressed here:
viewtopic.php?f=7&t=47683
and the censorship was above the board

As for the manga we didn't have it since 2001 making it VERY not famous and make us believe the anime is first.

There are no DVD sets or VHS published, the only ancient VHS we had are DBZ movie 2 and 3 with 12 and 13 being in the cinema only years later

Currently we have a better translated airing of DB Kai and DBS on TV but it's still mainly obscure television with still no sign of Bog, RoF or Broly with only Super Hero having an official cinema release.

So yeah, Dragon Ball in Poland = never that much cared for

[TheGreatness25]

It's a little crazy, but I think that the US actually has the best history of releases. Looking at all the stories, we never went through a total void of DB home video content like every other country did, really.

Even Japan... They had the limited Dragon Box release in the early 2000s (consoder when DB/Z/GT actually asked) and then the singles and that was pretty much it. Otherwise, no country really got first generation footage from Toei anyway.

So, yeah... While the US had some terrible releases, we always had the option to watch. Whether it's the singles that added up in cost or the cheap orange bricks, so on and so forth, we've been super lucky. Look at other English-speaking countries, for example--they didn't get all the releases that the US got and when they did, not only were they the same crappy releases that the US got, but for a lot of these countries, it wasn't even with the dub that they knew. That's terrible.

It's pretty sad to think that we're the lucky ones...

[M16U3L2015]

Time for manga, how does the U.S. compare to the rest of the world?

Because I think when it comes to manga, many countries have made quality releases but I would like to know how it compares to what they have done in the US.

[TheGreatness25]

Time for manga, how does the U.S. compare to the rest of the world?

Because I think when it comes to manga, many countries have made quality releases but I would like to know how it compares to what they have done in the US.

You know, I feel pretty lucky with the manga release in the US too. Yes, it was censored, so no Bulma's breasts the two times they were shown in the manga and no middle fingers the X amount of times they were done in the manga. Otherwise, it was perfectly fine. Yes, they did draw their own things over Japanese writing. But overall, there was always a steady release of the manga. We got a few releases, including the VizBigs (what I own), which I think was a great release. It does suck that the full color manga never got finished.

From what I know, the translation is decent and they did a good job with the names (a lot better than Funimation did).

So, overall, can't complain. I did get the Japanese Tankōbon and full color releases, though (just to supplement my collection).

[Super Sonic]

We got it better than some series with getting the entire series. There are some If I recall they only released the first half of "Monster" due to poor sales, despite it being aired in its entirety on Sci-Fi Channel back in the day. And this will show my age, but of the old "My Little Pony n Friends" series, the original MLP has been released fully on dvd, but not the Friends segments. which do have their fans.