Another dub I really want to learn more about, even if we never get to see is the Animax dub of Dragon Ball.
I've still not got any leads on recordings, but I spoke to one person who saw it, and another person who had a friend he's no longer in contact with that saw one episode, both on Discord.
I did get one interesting
response on Reddit recently that may give us some clues as to what we can expect should this dub ever surface:
kanasai427 wrote:
The Animax dub of Dragon Ball was what introduced me to the series. In Malaysia where I’m from, most animes are dubbed in Malay, Cantonese or Mandarin. The only English dubs aired then was Pokemon but video stores also sold Digimon which wasn’t the American dub but some poorly produced Southeast Asian dub.
Animax dubs are notorious for being bad but it was slightly better in quality than the Southeast Asian dubs of certain anime. Animax not only helped introduce a variety of anime beyond the usual children series to me but also English dubbed anime.
That said, the Animax Dragon Ball dub was entertaining. It certainly can’t compare with the Funimation dub or even the Ocean dub but for a Malaysian teenager in the late 2000s, it’s good enough.
The script was mostly toned down. Whenever the characters would curse, they would say “Crap!” which was the most common cuss word in Animax English dubs.
As for the voices, from what I can remember, the Animax dub largely followed the Funimation/Ocean dub. Adult Goku was voiced by a guy who tried his best to mimic Sean Schemmel. I forgot what the other characters sounded like but one that sticks in my head was that they replaced Yamcha’s voice about 3/4 into the series.
His voice was changed to a different actor and apparently, that original actor was recasted for a lot of other Animax dubs that were airing around the same time. There aren’t much details and credits on the actors but most Animax dubs were recorded in Hong Kong by English speakers who were mostly American expats.
Almost all of Animax dubs are considered lost media and despite being exposed to more superior dubs, I still reminisce those youthful days and would sometimes search for Animax dubs on YouTube. As cheesy, stilted, or sometimes being double or triple casted the dubs are, they are memorable to me.
We knew about Yamcha's voice actor changing. My source similarly said his friend told him Roshi's perverted scenes were either censored or toned down, but that Mr Popo was left as-is. There was
one blog from a Filipino fan talking about the Animax dub at the time saying it was uncut, but it's worth noting this was only after he saw the first episode so there may have indeed been censorship throughout the remaining 152 episodes. For what it's worth though this friend of my source also said the voices were good. The other source I spoke to that has seen this dub recalled enjoying it.
Indeed the above Reddit user is
not the only one who says the Animax dub was their introduction to Dragon Ball, which again is always a positive for any dub this series has had. Its just unfortunate not all fans have the luxury of revisiting "the dub" that was their entry point. I feel very lucky good recordings of the Westwood dub were eventually found, and while the existing rips of the Blue Water dubs aren't perfect I am glad I can at least rewatch them, as the Animax dub shows, there was always a possibility an English dub that never got an official release after its initial broadcast could become lost, even if its 153 or more episodes aired on a good timeslot in various countries.
In terms of accuracy Dave Bridges told me Animax dubs are always translated from the Japanese version, so as he was adult Goku hopefully his statement holds true for the Animax dub.
