Old Vs New voices for Goku and Vegeta in the various dubs

[TheRed259]

This is basically for dubs that have more than one voice actor for Goku and Vegeta. And here is my preference on the various voices of Goku and Vegeta that I have heard from some of these dubs:

• From the English dub, I would choose Sean Schemmel for Goku and Chris Sabat for Vegeta. Definitely more fitting than the Ocean or any other English dubbing group for me.

• From the Latin American dub, I would choose Mario Castañeda for Goku and René García for Vegeta. They are the most fitting voices even though Andrés Gutiérrez Coto was awesome as Vegeta and he was living his role. I think that Mario Castañeda was at his best as Goku in Dragon Ball Z while René García vocally is better now but his forced performances is an issue. I would say that he was at his best as Vegeta in the Battle of Gods (2013) and Resurrection 'F' (2015) films.

• From the French dub, I would choose Patrick Borg for Goku and Eric Legrand for Vegeta. It does take time to get used to their voices but they were more fitting than the others. Thankfully, Eric Legrand has improved a lot since Dragon Ball Z.

• From the Castilian dub, I would choose José Antonio Gavira for Goku and Alberto Hidalgo for Vegeta. They were more fitting than the other voices in my opinion even though none of these two were putting too much emotion in their performances. Gavira was also an age appropriate voice for Goku along with Miguel Ángel Montero of course.

• From the German dub, I would choose Tommy Morgenstern for Goku and Oliver Siebeck for Vegeta. Oliver Siebeck was also an age appropriate voice for Vegeta.

• From the Italian dub, I would choose Claudio Moneta for Goku. I wouldn't choose Paolo Torrisi because some of his voice expressions sounded silly to me.

• From the Greek dub, I would choose Themis Psihogios for Goku and Yiannis Papaioannou for Vegeta. They were more fitting voices than the others and they were putting more emotion in their performances (despite the filter on Vegeta's voice). Themis Psihogios improved a lot after the Frieza Saga.

• From the Portugal dub, I would choose Henrique Feist for Goku and Ricardo Spínola for Vegeta. These two seem to me the most decent voices for these characters.

• From the Tagalod dub, I would choose Vincent Gutierrez for Vegeta. His fierce voice suits Vegeta better than the character's previous voice, Richie Padilla.

I would like to see your opinion in case someone else here watches DB in different languages. I wouldn't even mind an opinion only on the various English dubs because I know that only a few people watch DB in other languages anyway.

[simtek34]

For the English Dub side of things, despite growing up with Seán Schemmel and Christopher Sabat's performances as Son Goku and Vegeta in Dragonball Kai, when they were at their best, and not their performances in the English Dub of Dragonball Z, which were god-awful, I have a more split view on the superior English voices.

With Goku, I'd gotta give my vote to Peter Kelamis. While I don't have much exposure to much of his dubbing on Dragonball Z, from the clips I've seen on the internet of his performances, he really fits Goku well. I've been meaning to finally give a look at the original English dubs of the first three Dragonball Z movies for awhile now, just to experience the Canadian voice cast. Dragonball Z movies 1-3 along with Dragonball movies 2 and 3 are the only Dragonball films I haven't seen outside of Dragonball Z: Abridged.

On Vegeta, I really like Brian Drummond's work and acting, but the voice used for Vegeta, I don't know, there's just something about it that seems unfitting to me. Maybe growing up with Christopher Sabat and Horikawa Ryo's performances has shaped my mind that way, due to those two having a much more lower pitch for the character of Vegeta, where Drummond's higher pitched voice just doesn't seem right to me coming out of his mouth. I heard somewhere that his performance for the unreleased Ocean Studios English Dub of Dragonball Kai, that his performance isn't as high pitched. I would be interested in hearing that if it ever gets released. His performance as Copy Vegeta in Dragonball Super was better than it was in Z, not being as high pitched. But yeah, it's gotta go to Chris Sabat for me, in terms of an English Vegeta. And I'm referring to modern Chris Sabat. His performance in Dragonball GT was pretty bad, but his performance in the English Dub of Dragonball Z was absolutely horrendous, especially while trying to do a bad Brian Drummond impression.

[MasenkoHA]

For the international dubs I'm only really familiar with the English dubs.

Brian Drummond is a great performer and his voice fits the Saturday Morning Cartoons villain vibes that Funimation and Ocean were going for but it doesn't really work past the Saiyan arc. He still has some great line reads after but it's super obvious that nobody at Funimation or Ocean was thinking ahead when they directed Drummond to sound like that. Sabat started doing a shitty Drummond impression and eventually polished it into his own. It works much better for the character, but I wouldn't lose sleep if Sabat got replaced by another actor.

As far as Goku goes I have always liked Ian Corlett best and wish he got more to do than a season and a half. Kelamis Goku always sounded a bit ridiculous, like he's going to rescue a reporter in a yellow jumpsuit and ask for pizza any minute. Schemmel is fine. I've accepted him as "the" english voice for Goku but like Sabat it wouldn't be a travesty in my heart if someone else took over.

[90sDBZ]

Overall I like Sean Schemmel and Chris Sabat more in the roles, as they've had much longer to grow into them and grasp the characters, but I still love the earlier stuff the Ocean cast did.

Ian Corlett was great from day 1. His delivery was incredibly natural, and he fit the heroic take on Goku perfectly. He could do innocent and naive, while also nailing Goku's serious side.

I still prefer Drummond for early Vegeta, even if the performance is a bit cartoony. While Sabat's younger Vegeta is fine, Drummond really made him feel unhinged and was incredible with the screams. Drummond's later work in the Westwood dub was more grounded, which fit the character at that point but was less fun to listen to.

Peter Kelamis has grown on me over the years. I've come to like his goofy delivery for the most part. Considering he never dubbed any of the really iconic moments he still managed to leave an impression.

Kirby Morrow was decent enough, and he stuck with the character for quite a long time (longer than any other Canadian VA). The Westwood dub suffered from poor direction, but Kirby was pretty consistent in his performance.

[UpFromTheSkies]

For the English dub, I prefer Peter Kelamis as Goku. In my opinion Kelamis' portrayal is much more faithful to what Masako Nozawa did, while Sean Schemmel seems to reinvent the character with a completely different feel or tone.

[nineko]

From the Italian dub, I would choose Claudio Moneta for Goku. I wouldn't choose Paolo Torrisi because some of his voice expressions sounded silly to me.

I disagree so much with this. Paolo Torrisi was iconic, and he only got replaced because he died, but Claudio Moneta just doesn't fit as Goku, that's why I watched the Super anime in Japanese.

[chalaheadchala1989]

claudio moneta voiced cooler in italian dub

[chalaheadchala1989]

From the Italian dub, I would choose Claudio Moneta for Goku. I wouldn't choose Paolo Torrisi because some of his voice expressions sounded silly to me.

I disagree so much with this. Paolo Torrisi was iconic, and he only got replaced because he died, but Claudio Moneta just doesn't fit as Goku, that's why I watched the Super anime in Japanese.

yeah paolo torrisi is better, his super saiyan screams are cool r.i.p legend

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

For the English dubs it's not really fair to compare FUNimation with all the other choices like Ocean, AB Groupe, Bang Zoom, etc.

I've previously said Sean Schemmel was my favourite Goku, but he had so much more time to grow into the role as any other actor who played him did. He was a natural fit for the character, but so was Peter Kelamis, and I'd honestly say his work in Dragon Ball Z movie 2 tops Schemmel's best work. Ultimately it all comes down to how well the dub was directed, and the Pioneer trilogy remains the ideal standard all Dragon Ball dubs should aspire to. Hell, David Gasman said he wished he could have known more about Dragon Ball before he blew through all the Big Green movies and specials, which AB rushed out the door.

Brian Drummond and Chris Sabat have both done great work as Vegeta, but the former is a more seasoned actor, and his performance as Copy Vegeta is better than anything the latter was done, again, because FUNimation's Super dub was (for the most part) much more faithfully directed than the old Z dub.

[TheRed259]

Well, since this thread was resurrected after 2 years I would also like to add:

From the Tagalod dub, I would choose Vincent Gutierrez for Vegeta. His fierce voice suits Vegeta better than the character's previous voice, Richie Padilla.

[sangofe]

How has Eric Legrand "improved since Dragon Ball Z"? He was always subleme... The scripts were bad in DBZ, but he was always a subleme actor. Patrick Borg's Goku in DBZ Kai is really not good because of smoking. His black though is great.

[Tian]

In the European Portuguese dub, I prefer Miguel Raposo over Henrique Feist for Goku. Mostly because Raposo didn't sound as stiff and boring as Feist was sounding in Super.
On other hand... Vegeta's best European Portuguese actor is undoubtedly Ricardo Spínola. João Loy and Vítor Rocha were miscasts, and Simon Frankel missed the chance to do a good Vegeta.

In the Polish dub, my vote is for Sebastian Perdek for Goku and Borys Szyc as Vegeta. Krzysztof Banaszyk was an amazing voice actor but he sounded too serious for Goku and Kamil Pruban, even though he improved a bit for Kai, he still doesn't convince me as Vegeta.

In the Serbian dub, I go for Milan Tubić and Tomas Sarić for Goku and Vegeta respectively. Nenad Nenadović's Goku could've been better if there was a director on board and Nikola Bulatović... well, he's one of the worst international Vegetas I've ever heard.

[TheGreatness25]

I can only speak for the English dub, where I always have to give the edge to the Canadian voice actors. I feel like they were just very polished, even though a lot of them were amateurs when they started on DBZ. They just have nor natural delivery and range than the Texas cast, who always sounded like they were trying to put on cartoon voices to me.

At this point (since Kai), I can't say that I particularly dislike the Texas cast or that they do a bad job, I just feel like the Canadian cast was more pleasant to listen to. Even the abysmal Westwood dub sounds pretty good to me. It's not a knock on Sean Schemmel in the slightest, but I do prefer any of the Ocean/Westwood Gokus to him: Ian Corlett, Peter Kelamis, and Kirby Morrow. I just enjoyed their performances, but again, I'm not about to go saying that Sean isn't perfectly fine as Goku.

I understand the notion that Brian Drummond's Vegeta wasn't great, but it's really the tale of two different performances. With zero visual cues and a vague description to go on, Brian played Vegeta pretty well in the beginning, all things considered. But in a short time (by the Namek arc), I feel like he really got into it and Vegeta sounded great there. I also know the range that Brian has, so I know he murdered his Kai role without ever hearing it (not to mention his Super role). But again, I'm not getting all up in arms about Chris Sabat because he really did make Vegeta his own at some point, and he does a great job.

I feel the same about Scott McNeil's Piccolo, Saffron Henderson's Gohan, Terry Klassen's "Krillin," and maybe a handful of others. My viewpoint is that I wish that Ocean Kai came out so there would be another alternate way to enjoy the series and bring another fresh spin on something that I've seen over and over and over again.

[クリリン]

I did not know somebody could voice this. Like thhhiiiiiiiiiiiiiisssssssss. Or thiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiissssssssss. Like



Thiiiiiiis.

Dragon balls are everywhere these days.

[MasenkoHA]

I can only speak for the English dub, where I always have to give the edge to the Canadian voice actors. I feel like they were just very polished, even though a lot of them were amateurs when they started on DBZ. They just have nor natural delivery and range than the Texas cast, who always sounded like they were trying to put on cartoon voices to me.
.

Okay, but the Ocean cast were, for the most part, doing cartoon voices too. They were just better at it. Ian Corlett might be doing something more naturalistic for Goku (to my understanding he finds that boring and prefers when he can do cartoony voices for his characters) but Kelamis, Klassan, Newstone, Drummond, and Don Brown were all Indisputably doing cartoon voices for their roles.

[TheGreatness25]

I can only speak for the English dub, where I always have to give the edge to the Canadian voice actors. I feel like they were just very polished, even though a lot of them were amateurs when they started on DBZ. They just have nor natural delivery and range than the Texas cast, who always sounded like they were trying to put on cartoon voices to me.
.

Okay, but the Ocean cast were, for the most part, doing cartoon voices too. They were just better at it. Ian Corlett might be doing something more naturalistic for Goku (to my understanding he finds that boring and prefers when he can do cartoony voices for his characters) but Kelamis, Klassan, Newstone, Drummond, and Don Brown were all Indisputably doing cartoon voices for their roles.

Definitely more natural and better delivery. I realize they were making voices, but they sounded like a person might sound. They didn't sound like they were putting on a voice, if that makes sense. Everyone in the early Funimation cast sounded really strained.