Ocean Studios' "Dragon Ball Kai" Dub Turns 16; Still Unreleased

[Scsigs]

Toei Animation seems to want to settle on just using the Crunchyroll cast, so I doubt that we'll see the Ocean dub used.

Oh wow, I get to change the thread title again text month lol

Well, the US cast IS the official definitive one for English-speaking DB. Even the old Ocean dubs (yes, even the original one that came first in 1996) are treated as alternate English dubs akin to the Filipino dubs of Yugioh, One Piece, & the like from 20+ years ago. Whether anyone here LIKES that or not, that's how it is, frankly. Hence why the alternate Kai dub has never come out of Ocean's vaults. It's a niche dub for a niche audience that the US dub has already served because Ocean thought that European & Canadian broadcasters might wanna license a different dub for cheaper like back in the old days (at least, I assume money's the main reason because I can't understand why else they switched to the later Ocean dubbed Z episodes when the US cast became the standard, at least in Europe since Canada has laws that tell TV stations that they need to air at least 50% of Canadian-produced content). The US dub is widely available on physical releases & streaming in each region & the US cast is what's used in the video games, so you'd have to specifically have someone at a TV station who knows about the Ocean Kai dub & be interested in airing it, then get the ok from the heads at the station to pursue licensing it, then Ocean needs to be interested in licensing it & then the station needs to finally air it. This kind of thing usually doesn't happen in anime dubbing. Usually what happens is if an old dub isn't usable for whatever reason, a new company comes in & pays a studio to redub it. I know SOME people who work in these industries have expressed interest in doing so, but none of it's come to fruition.

I've made this point before multiple times, but don't get your hopes up unless there's a specific announcement made by someone actually working in these industries or if you actually see it airing. Sorry to be blunt on this.

[MasenkoHA]

. It's a niche dub for a niche audience that the US dub has already served because Ocean thought that European & Canadian broadcasters might wanna license a different dub for cheaper like back in the old days (at least, I assume money's the main reason because I can't understand why else they switched to the later Ocean dubbed Z episodes when the US cast became the standard, at least in Europe since Canada has laws that tell TV stations that they need to air at least 50% of Canadian-produced content).

In this case it does appear the idea behind Ocean Kai was appealing to Canadian tv channels with a Cancon friendly dub. Apparently streaming sites also have to follow Canadian Content laws. But if Toei Animation is only offering the Crunchyroll dub I doubt Disney Plus Canada is gonna pass it up.

There’s also the fact that there is no Ocean dub for a Buu Kai or Super so it just makes more sense to use the Texas dub across the board.

[Scsigs]

In this case it does appear the idea behind Ocean Kai was appealing to Canadian tv channels with a Cancon friendly dub. Apparently streaming sites also have to follow Canadian Content laws. But if Toei Animation is only offering the Crunchyroll dub I doubt Disney Plus Canada is gonna pass it up.

There’s also the fact that there is no Ocean dub for a Buu Kai or Super so it just makes more sense to use the Texas dub across the board.

Yep. The best anyone can hope for is it turning up as an alternate audio option, but that's about it.

[M0nsoon07]

I contacted Crave, and they've passed on my acquisition request to the appropriate people at Bell Media.

We shall see!!

[Tian]

It's a pity there's no big demand for a Quebec French dub of Dragon Ball Kai. It could've used this dub as source and air it as a SAP track.

Yeah, I'm aware of that ridiculous Quebec dub of the World of Dragon Ball Z DVD but hey, that wasn't even recorded in Montreal, where most of the Quebec French dubs are recorded.

[wjbraden]

It's a pity there's no big demand for a Quebec French dub of Dragon Ball Kai. It could've used this dub as source and air it as a SAP track.

Yeah, I'm aware of that ridiculous Quebec dub of the World of Dragon Ball Z DVD but hey, that wasn't even recorded in Montreal, where most of the Quebec French dubs are recorded.

If Kai had been destined to go to Teletoon, it might've been given a Québécois French dub via it's Télétoon feed, however, the English channel did not use SAP as far as I'm aware (and oftentimes Télétoon used a corresponding dub from France if they were available, or sometimes even just aquired the French dub of a show, and not any English version at all). So not a guarantee that would've helped in getting Ocean Kai out there to the world, as that's the only major bilingual kids channel that did things like that.

Honestly, all signs point to YTV having been the show's sole destination, and when that didn't materialize, everything fell apart. They were the only ones that had the money and desire to buy popular, non-toy anime, but by the time Ocean Kai was ready, the channel had all but abandoned said anime programming. Not to be a pessimist, but I think that was our only short window of opportunity when we realistically would've ever seen this dub, in Canada at least.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Ocean thought that European & Canadian broadcasters might wanna license a different dub for cheaper like back in the old days (at least, I assume money's the main reason because I can't understand why else they switched to the later Ocean dubbed Z episodes when the US cast became the standard, at least in Europe since Canada has laws that tell TV stations that they need to air at least 50% of Canadian-produced content).

Canadian content laws had nothing to do with Ocean producing their own dub of Dragon Ball Z because by 1999 YTV already had 80% Canadian content. At this point the Saban dub (which as you know was an American production outsourced to Canada for voice recording only) was still airing in reruns. Your right that money may have been a factor when the channel and all European channels that broadcast Dragon Ball in English switched over to the Canadian dubs though.

I contacted Crave, and they've passed on my acquisition request to the appropriate people at Bell Media.

We shall see!!

That's good, Crave would be a more likely option since they are Canadian and not part of any global monopolies.

Also, Sam Vincent recently confirmed he never had the chance to audition for anything Dragon Ball so he won't be in this dub, which is a shame. He would have been great as Krillin.

[eledoremassis02]

Disney+ Canada is apparently streaming the FUNi dub of Kai

[Scsigs]

Disney+ Canada is apparently streaming the FUNi dub of Kai

Not surprising.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Disney+ Canada is apparently streaming the FUNi dub of Kai

Not surprising.

Disappointing, but expected. Sucks that now every English-speaking territory that received Kai has got Funimation's dub, including Canada.

With the traditional TV industry struggling now a Canadian streaming service like Crave is probably the last hope for this dub.

[M0nsoon07]

title of thread needs changing haha... 16!!!

might contact TLC UK as they're turning into a general entertainment channel- so perhaps z kai would be good there

[Tian]

Aww, our little Ocean Kai dub is now 16. Although I'm not sure whether call it a sweet 16 or not.

might contact TLC UK as they're turning into a general entertainment channel- so perhaps z kai would be good there

Haven't heard about a channel's decline that bad since MTV.

Wish you good luck on your quest, Monsoon07. Hopefully you don't get a goddamn automated response like me when I contacted RTÉ time ago.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Hopefully you don't get a goddamn automated response like me when I contacted RTÉ time ago.

Yeah, automated responses are probably to be expected from a lot of these companies because they get so many emails.

RTÉ were a long shot anyway because although they have a history with anime (Pokemon, Yu-Gi-Oh, etc) they have never aired any Dragon Ball specifically. I imagine theres also probably a lot of pressure for them to air Irish content because we are a small country, they are our national broadcaster and only have two linear channels.

That said I'd love to see RTÉ experiment with streaming anime like the BBC have been doing. Maybe if BBC iPlayer continues to have success with Dragon Ball and One Piece it could inspire RTÉ to do more with their Player app.

[NitroEX]

Sean's also kind of a dick when it comes to this kind of shit with DB.

Yep, I'm aware of that. The guy seems to be overprotective of Goku.

Strangely enough, he didn't have any problem with and even gave his blessing to Lex Lang when Bang Zoom recorded their alternate dub of Super.

So it seems this overprotective behaviour is limited to his Canadian counterparts (Ian James, Peter, Kirby and probably Jeremiah Yurk as well).

Just wanted to chime in on this as I've seen it talked about in other places but knew it was wrong, I just couldn't recall why.

I looked for proof on this forum and found the following:

Well he "taught" Lex Lang how to properly voice Goku

That's just a rumour.

Schemmel actually confirmed that was totally untrue on Twitter following TotallyNotMark's video that perpetuated the rumour.

I can't be bothered finding the tweet, but this seems sufficient.

From what I recall, Lex and Sean seemed to contradict each other on the topic, and given how overprotective Sean has been in the past, I would say it's not likely he would have been okay with the situation.

[Tian]

Just wanted to chime in on this as I've seen it talked about in other places but knew it was wrong, I just couldn't recall why.

I looked for proof on this forum and found the following:

That's just a rumour.

Schemmel actually confirmed that was totally untrue on Twitter following TotallyNotMark's video that perpetuated the rumour.

I can't be bothered finding the tweet, but this seems sufficient.

From what I recall, Lex and Sean seemed to contradict each other on the topic, and given how overprotective Sean has been in the past, I would say it's not likely he would have been okay with the situation.

It's not like I'm gonna consider Schemmel more or less of jerk because of this but thanks for the confirmation. I wasn't aware Schemmel addressed the Bang Zoom dilemma on his Twitter.

I think what fueled that rumor was this post from Lex on the Bang Zoom topic:

Sean Schemmel happens to be a personal friend of mine, and we talked about it before this got started. He will always be Goku in my book, but he was unable to do this version, so they cast with english speakers from the USA, (instead of just english speakers from Asia, like they normally do).

I remember I was online that day when Lex suddenly joined to these forums.

Despite not agreeing with the way he initially handled the criticism of his performance, I'm glad he took his time to answer some questions about the Bang Zoom dub.

[M0nsoon07]

TLC's rebrand is tomorrow and so I will send an email tomorrow at 9am...

dream would be this: toonami (9pm-12am, with Ocean Kai as main sell) and then Adult Swim straight after haha

[Yellow Flower King]

Gotta say, I have to praise Ocean for evolving their editing techniques. When Funimation does them, or a local broadcaster, they ALWAYS look like shit. DBZKai has that "hide blood as dirt" that was very clever. It felt like the battles are as instense as the uncut version despite being censored.

[mecha3000]

Damn, seeing the thread turn 16 just makes me realize even more how old Kai is now and how old I AM NOW. I was 13 back in 2010, now I'm 28 going on 29. I mean, think about it, if this thing doesn't release in the next 2 years (2028), the thread will be titled "Turns 18" - making the thread a grown adult. And eventually "Turns 21" (2031), it'll be old enough to drink!

No, but seriously, I truly love what Kai did for the franchise (giving us a better English dub, cutting the filler, fixing errors such as red hair Vegeta, and making Z more accessible for newcomers) and for me (allowing me to experience it on Nicktoons akin to a Toonami experience that I never got because I was too young). After we got the Buu arc dub released by Funimation in 2017, I figured Kai would die out in the wake of Super, which pretty much happened with Toei and Funimation shifting their priorities to the latter.

But with the desire for this Ocean dub of Kai and Kai releasing in other territories (even in theaters and even Adult Swim always having it in its rotation), it's nice to see Kai is still relevant to the overall Dragon Ball franchise. I truly hope for all you Ocean fans, that this dub actually releases someday and soon. I would love to watch it too, but as a physical media guy, I'd prefer it on Blu-ray or something, but it's more likely it'd end up like the GT Blue Water dub and just exist online to watch. But whatever, I'd take it.

[JulieYBM]

Time has really moved fast. I knew we were at sixteen years since we first learned of this project, but to think that sixteen years ago was 2010 is kind of wild to me. I don't remember more than a handful of things from that far back rofl.

[mecha3000]

Time has really moved fast. I knew we were at sixteen years since we first learned of this project, but to think that sixteen years ago was 2010 is kind of wild to me. I don't remember more than a handful of things from that far back rofl.

Same. I was in 8th grade in middle school back in 2010 crushing on a girl in my class and talking to my best friend (in the same class) about Dragon Ball Z Kai airing on Nicktoons at the time. Life was just so different back then. Ah, my bad for getting nostalgic - BLAME THIS THREAD AND THE OCEAN DUB FOR NOT RELEASING ALREADY! Anyway, imagine how cool it'd be if Crunchyroll gives Kai a new Blu-ray release that includes Ocean Kai as a secondary audio option. I mean, that would never happen, but that would be a great way to re-release Kai, but also add something new to make it worth purchasing for older fans who grew up with the Ocean dub.

Knowing Crunchyroll, though, that's almost 100 percent not happening. Crunchyroll is terrible with their new home releases and how slow it takes them. I doubt an Ocean Kai release (let alone a Kai re-release at all) is a priority for them. I mean, the closest I could see them doing is re-releasing the Kai season sets, but slapping their Crunchyroll logo on them but using the same discs. Which is lazy, but they've done that with Z and Super and even GT.

If Discotek had the rights to Dragon Ball, I could see them going out of their way to acquire Ocean Kai, though.