Weird Old Dub Stuff

[WittyUsername]

Didn’t Dale Kelly mention something about FUNimation wanting Batman Beyond sounding music? I can vaguely hear it in the Andy Baylor theme.

[MasenkoHA]

Didn’t Dale Kelly mention something about FUNimation wanting Batman Beyond sounding music? I can vaguely hear it in the Andy Baylor theme.

The interview I remember was Dale Kelly telling Funimation their music needed to be more like Batman Beyond because Batman Beyond was doing better in the ratings

[Scsigs]

A new video by Hensama comparing the uncut & censored dubs of Super. for the U6 & Copy Vegeta arcs.
https://youtu.be/i1Gxm7JCUC4?si=c1_6XWgw5WLEaKKZ

Again, so odd a lot of the censored dialogue. So much of it seems so arbitrary & like they overcompensated by basing a lot of the changes on what they had to do for Nicktoons & CW for Kai.

[SuperSaiyaManZ94]

I think it's odd (and kinda funny) in retrospect nearly 20 years later how FUNimation had only went so far with the partial re dub for the orange bricks. While the preceding re dub a few years earlier made sense for the first 67 episodes for the UUE broadcast (and sadly canceled DVD release) which had been up to that point only available in their original edited, cut down dub only 53 episode form with the Ocean Studios cast, the redub of their own in house material from ep 54/68 onward felt like such a half assed effort. While some of the unquestionably bad voice work was revised like Chris Sabat's initial poor Brian Drummond impression of Vegeta, Sonny Strait's awful early Krillin voice and many of the other early performances which were basically attempts to imitate the Ocean cast weren't redone. In particular, because of logistical reasons at the time among others thus Sean Schemmel didn't redub the vast majority of his early work as Goku up to a certain point (back when it sounded like an impression of Peter Kelamis) and Sabat for the most part didn't re voice his dialogue as Piccolo where early on it was more or less a poor attempt on his part at sounding like Scott McNeil.

Then of course, up to a certain point the re dubbing pretty much stopped and the voices more or less reverted back to the original dub (that is outside of the odd changes here and there like line reads changed, voice filters for characters like No. 19 and Super Buu inexplicably removed) and so it was basically a patchwork that only sort of addressed the poor quality of the in house cast's earliest work. I think it could've benefited from much more effort, even if they weren't going to go back to the drawing board at the time for a better dub. Seeing as about two years later Kai came along and basically gifted them that opportunity more or less anyway.

[AlexSketchy04]

I find it surprising that Funimation held onto those sessions for as long as possible, that's kind of the only reason they were able to do the partial redubs and re-mixes.

It helps those were recorded direct to disk from the start, so they could have easily kept them on some form of storage.

[Yellow Flower King]

A new video by Hensama comparing the uncut & censored dubs of Super. for the U6 & Copy Vegeta arcs.
https://youtu.be/i1Gxm7JCUC4?si=c1_6XWgw5WLEaKKZ

Again, so odd a lot of the censored dialogue. So much of it seems so arbitrary & like they overcompensated by basing a lot of the changes on what they had to do for Nicktoons & CW for Kai.

Its not overcompansating... Well it IS but its not unwarrated. Sure, Nicktoons did let them get away with a lot until they didnt (Or simply recorded for easier editing for The CW) but they learned from that and realized they save a lot of time and money simply recording dialogue for the strictest standards they can think of. As long as there is an uncut version, it doesnt really matter how edited and softened the "Kids Channel Versions" are. I wonder if there is a version of Daima for kids channels. It was popular with kids before it even premiered, it got to be nominated for the kids shows awards, only Pokemon got nominated, and since then anime has never been otherwise.

[Scsigs]

I find it surprising that Funimation held onto those sessions for as long as possible, that's kind of the only reason they were able to do the partial redubs and re-mixes.

It helps those were recorded direct to disk from the start, so they could have easily kept them on some form of storage.

The older '99 DBZ dub were initially recorded to tape before they eventually switched to digital, I believe, so they just had those lying around. It's a lot like how other old shows mixed in stereo did the same & we get new audio mixes for them nowadays.

Its not overcompansating... Well it IS but its not unwarrated. Sure, Nicktoons did let them get away with a lot until they didnt (Or simply recorded for easier editing for The CW) but they learned from that and realized they save a lot of time and money simply recording dialogue for the strictest standards they can think of. As long as there is an uncut version, it doesnt really matter how edited and softened the "Kids Channel Versions" are. I wonder if there is a version of Daima for kids channels. It was popular with kids before it even premiered, it got to be nominated for the kids shows awards, only Pokemon got nominated, and since then anime has never been otherwise.

I doubt they did a censored dub for Daima. Considering it was made for streaming services rather than Toei necessitating them have a TV deal like with Kai & Super to dub it, I doubt they spent the time & energy.

[Doctor Seaweed Roll]

In the case of the Saban/FUNimation/Ocean dub of DBZ, in a similar fashion to Bruce Faulconer taking the credit for the music for the original FUNimation in-house dub, Shuki Levi and Kussa Mahchi

Fun Fact: Kussa Mahchi is also a transliterated name of Middle Eastern version of Stuffed Zucchini. My
Here's A Recipe For It: https://zaatarandzaytoun.com/kousa-mahshi/
P.S. Haim Saban's alias uses transliterated Hebrew while this recipe uses transliterated Arabic for spelling.

[Scsigs]

So, the old Z dub came up on Twitter because Kai's anniversary just passed & nostalgic Z dub fans can't let people enjoy Kai's better dub & I wanted to ask these in a more level-headed environment.

Does anyone know at all why the Z dub as presented since 2007 has: outtakes replacing the used takes in some instances, added dialogue that wasn't there in the original broadcasts, wrong placements for the US music, missing vocal effects, & some badly mixed audio at points? I always figured it was just a weird screw-up on the part of the audio engineers & they didn't fix it for some reason.

There's also the argument of why the Z dub turned out like it did. It's my understanding that they scripted the dub like they did to directly appeal more to American children, but also they apparently didn't have the best translations to go off of, which resulted in so many of the script changes & mistranslations in the Z dub. Then I've seen people try to excuse these things with them having to appeal more to the target audience than maintain a more true translation. I make the argument that, while you can't have a 1:1 translation of the Japanese dialogue as that creates its own problems, a dub that's based off a good translation of the Japanese dialogue that's been written to fit the timings & lipflaps is what should be happening rather than one that takes the translations as a suggestion. It doesn't make any sense to me to do a dub otherwise & the Z VS Kai dub comparisons are a good case study with this, as the Z dub has unfortunately colored the perception of the material in a detrimental way for a lot of fans who grew up with it. Why would anyone think differently?

[GTx10]

So, the old Z dub came up on Twitter because Kai's anniversary just passed & nostalgic Z dub fans can't let people enjoy Kai's better dub & I wanted to ask these in a more level-headed environment.

Does anyone know at all why the Z dub as presented since 2007 has: outtakes replacing the used takes in some instances, added dialogue that wasn't there in the original broadcasts, wrong placements for the US music, missing vocal effects, & some badly mixed audio at points? I always figured it was just a weird screw-up on the part of the audio engineers & they didn't fix it for some reason.

There's also the argument of why the Z dub turned out like it did. It's my understanding that they scripted the dub like they did to directly appeal more to American children, but also they apparently didn't have the best translations to go off of, which resulted in so many of the script changes & mistranslations in the Z dub. Then I've seen people try to excuse these things with them having to appeal more to the target audience than maintain a more true translation. I make the argument that, while you can't have a 1:1 translation of the Japanese dialogue as that creates its own problems, a dub that's based off a good translation of the Japanese dialogue that's been written to fit the timings & lipflaps is what should be happening rather than one that takes the translations as a suggestion. It doesn't make any sense to me to do a dub otherwise & the Z VS Kai dub comparisons are a good case study with this, as the Z dub has unfortunately colored the perception of the material in a detrimental way for a lot of fans who grew up with it. Why would anyone think differently?

Short answer is "I don't know."

But I've watched the "Remastered" dub (Orange Brick/US Dragon Boxes) with the Japanese subs on and the dialogue isn't as different as people claim. From what I've seen it seems the "changes" are as follows:

1) Censorship despite the Uncut dub. Changing stuff like "I'll kill you!" To "I'll destroy you " or some other euphemism.

2) Possible translation error. (Watch Goku and Piccolo's encounter with Dr. GERO. Piccolo says "Are you that killer Android made to kill us" as opposed to "You talk as if you are Dr. GERO himself." (I'm paraphrasing here)

3) Words thrown in simply to match the lip flaps.

Because believe it or not English Goku while he does have "Superman" moments he is still into fighting for the sake of fighting. Plus Japanese Goku has said "heroic" things too. English Goku says he wants to beat 100% Freeza at his best just to humiliate him for example. Matching lip flaps is science sometimes more than art.

[Scsigs]

Short answer is "I don't know."

But I've watched the "Remastered" dub (Orange Brick/US Dragon Boxes) with the Japanese subs on and the dialogue isn't as different as people claim. From what I've seen it seems the "changes" are as follows:

1) Censorship despite the Uncut dub. Changing stuff like "I'll kill you!" To "I'll destroy you " or some other euphemism.

2) Possible translation error. (Watch Goku and Piccolo's encounter with Dr. GERO. Piccolo says "Are you that killer Android made to kill us" as opposed to "You talk as if you are Dr. GERO himself." (I'm paraphrasing here)

3) Words thrown in simply to match the lip flaps.

Because believe it or not English Goku while he does have "Superman" moments he is still into fighting for the sake of fighting. Plus Japanese Goku has said "heroic" things too. English Goku says he wants to beat 100% Freeza at his best just to humiliate him for example. Matching lip flaps is science sometimes more than art.

You forget a ton of mistranslated lines that actively change how characters are supposed to be seen, mainly Goku being more outwardly heroic ("Ally to good, nightmare to you! type lines) & Vegeta having deeper motivations for the things he did than he originally did in the Buu Arc (not to mention the stupid lines about him being evil because Freeza made him be like that, even though that neither makes sense with the scenes beforehand, nor with why he does the things he does later). Not to mention all of the added shitty joke dialogue that replaced lines of either exposition or added characterization & filled silence that you didn't need (or do we really need a dumb countdown joke or lines about Freeza speaking his "native language" that were never originally there?) I can link YouTube videos or channels that do deep dives into the different translations of certain lines & scenes that alter how you'd perceive the series if they were all you had to go on.

The problem is that, yes, Goku's done & said heroic things. He's a character that has a good heart & stands up for what he thinks is right (which is what makes what Toriyama did with him in the Android Arc frustrating since it's not out of nowhere that Toei portrayed Goku more outwardly heroic at points), but he also has other reasons for doing the things he does. FUNimation's dub goes absolutely overboard with making Goku more of a goody good, even more than Toei did. The 2 aren't readily comparable. Toei still adapted Toriyama's manga pretty much to a T, with the only real differences being filler & in the movies that weren't written by Toriyama. FUNimation changed entire lines of dialogue that change how you'd understand the series. Toriyama already hated the changes & additions Toei made that changed how you see Goku. He would've had a stroke if he knew how much further FUNi went with it.

See, if it were just adding words to fit the lipflaps, I wouldn't have much of a problem with it. Kai did that just fine (possibly to its detriment as, while I've gotten used to it over time, the dialogue put me off at first because it felt over-stuffed like they pulled out words from a thesaurus). However, the Z dub went out of its way to make a different show to appeal directly to American kids. Changing lines of dialogue to entirely different ones that change characterizations or how scenes were meant to be taken, adding dumb jokes that weren't there, nor did they need to be, & adding dialogue to fill the silence of moments that were meant to build tension because they were afraid the kids wouldn't be paying attention to what they were watching only serve to water down the original material. I really can't agree with this point here.

[GTx10]

All you're doing is repeating the same talking points people have used for years.

It's like saying which soundtrack is better US Sonic CD or JPN Sonic CD. You have your personal answer and it doesn't seem like you are actually want a answer.

[MasenkoHA]

So, the old Z dub came up on Twitter because Kai's anniversary just passed & nostalgic Z dub fans can't let people enjoy Kai's better dub & I wanted to ask these in a more level-headed environment.

Does anyone know at all why the Z dub as presented since 2007 has: outtakes replacing the used takes in some instances, added dialogue that wasn't there in the original broadcasts, wrong placements for the US music, missing vocal effects, & some badly mixed audio at points? I always figured it was just a weird screw-up on the part of the audio engineers & they didn't fix it for some reason.

There's also the argument of why the Z dub turned out like it did. It's my understanding that they scripted the dub like they did to directly appeal more to American children, but also they apparently didn't have the best translations to go off of, which resulted in so many of the script changes & mistranslations in the Z dub. Then I've seen people try to excuse these things with them having to appeal more to the target audience than maintain a more true translation. I make the argument that, while you can't have a 1:1 translation of the Japanese dialogue as that creates its own problems, a dub that's based off a good translation of the Japanese dialogue that's been written to fit the timings & lipflaps is what should be happening rather than one that takes the translations as a suggestion. It doesn't make any sense to me to do a dub otherwise & the Z VS Kai dub comparisons are a good case study with this, as the Z dub has unfortunately colored the perception of the material in a detrimental way for a lot of fans who grew up with it. Why would anyone think differently?

Short answer is "I don't know."

But I've watched the "Remastered" dub (Orange Brick/US Dragon Boxes) with the Japanese subs on and the dialogue isn't as different as people claim. From what I've seen it seems the "changes" are as follows:

1) Censorship despite the Uncut dub. Changing stuff like "I'll kill you!" To "I'll destroy you " or some other euphemism.

2) Possible translation error. (Watch Goku and Piccolo's encounter with Dr. GERO. Piccolo says "Are you that killer Android made to kill us" as opposed to "You talk as if you are Dr. GERO himself." (I'm paraphrasing here)

3) Words thrown in simply to match the lip flaps.

Because believe it or not English Goku while he does have "Superman" moments he is still into fighting for the sake of fighting. Plus Japanese Goku has said "heroic" things too. English Goku says he wants to beat 100% Freeza at his best just to humiliate him for example. Matching lip flaps is science sometimes more than art.

There’s plenty of notable instances where the dialogue is dead wrong and it’s not just “because lip flaps” like Vegeta claiming Frieza made him evil.

But yes generally the dialogue is in the vague ballpark of what’s being said in the Japanese version or it’s wrong but if you read the subtitles and squint you can almost see where Funimation got from point A to point B


Iffy translations are hardly the only problem Funimation’s dub suffers from though

[Scsigs]

There’s plenty of notable instances where the dialogue is dead wrong and it’s not just “because lip flaps” like Vegeta claiming Frieza made him evil.

But yes generally the dialogue is in the vague ballpark of what’s being said in the Japanese version or it’s wrong but if you read the subtitles and squint you can almost see where Funimation got from point A to point B

Iffy translations are hardly the only problem Funimation’s dub suffers from though

Thank you. There are so many weird line changes that were clearly made to appeal more to Western children at the expense of continuity & consistent characterizations that the Japanese dialogue just didn't have.

So, I've started a project of rewatching everything dubbed by FUNi. I watched the 2 Z TV specials today & there's so much changed dialogue. SOME of it was the script writers just embellishing on parts that were already there, but a lot of it's just nonsensical & reeks of them thinking they can tell the stories in them better. They genuinely changed Bardock's personality to make him more outwardly "good" & in the Trunks special, Bulma's dialogue was changed to being a more outwardly strict, worried parent where there's no subtlety to it at all. It wasn't even to fit the lipflaps either because they caked on so much more dialogue around those lines to hammer it in more when they could, mainly when no one was talking. Hell, they also made the Kanassan that gave Bardock the psychic powers more of an asshole than he was meant to be in the Japanese dub given his dialogue changes and additions, as well as how the VA voiced him. It waters down the intended writing of the stories & makes things about as subtle as getting hit in the face with a brick.

Yep. Another problem is the extra dialogue they caked on top of scenes that had the characters not speaking. It legitimately ruined the fight between Trunks & 17 & 18 in that special. They're all meant to be silent outside of I assume grunts or other battle foley, but the dub has them keep fucking talking. It took what was supposed to be a pretty brutal beatdown of Trunks & ruined the mood. Unless maybe you're, I don't know, 5 & you for some reason couldn't fucking pay attention to fighting that only had sound effects & music playing with it. See, added dialogue during quiet moments, I don't agree with, but I can at least understand the argument if your show or dub is meant for anyone under the age of 10 where they have shorter attention spans, but not talking over an action scene where it's clearly not needed. That pissed me off. You can legitimately remove the majority of the added unnecessary dialogue in those specials & you'd lose absolutely nothing of value. Hell, you'd legitimately improve the dubs by just removing it entirely. Their obvious lack of trust in the kids watching back in the early 2000s to pay attention is so clear & so annoying. It's legit 4Kids-level dubbing, it's that bad.

Smaller dialogue changes where they keep the important information from the original lines, but just add stuff to them, ok, I don't take too big of an issue with even if I think it's wholly unnecessary even for kids, but THAT type of extra dialogue, I outright hate.

Also, maybe I asked this & someone else answered it before, but was it all 3 of the first 3 Z films that used the Saban Ocean dub scripts as their bases, or just Tree of Might?

[TheBigBoy]

Yeah, the CONSTANT talking in the dub is something that drives me nuts, especially when it's VERY obvious that no one else is supposed to be talking. The dub also feels....overly punchy in spots. Too many characters being smartasses.

As someone who has been out of the fandom loop for a long time...was there every any sort of continuation of DBZ Uncensored or a successor? I'd love to read an episode by episode breakdown of the TV edits (as well as things like dialogue changes) across all of DB.

[MasenkoHA]

Also, maybe I asked this & someone else answered it before, but was it all 3 of the first 3 Z films that used the Saban Ocean dub scripts as their bases, or just Tree of Might?

There was no Saban Ocean dub script for the first 2 Z movies so they stuck close to the Pioneer Ocean scripts for those two movies just made it a lot more wordy and some odd changes here and there

[rweasp]

I think the most obvious and annoying cases of the constant talking when there is supposed to be zero dialogue is when you have two characters having a stare down with the camera panning to each of their faces, but the only time either of them say something is when the camera is panned on the character that ISN'T talking. It is so painfully obvious that its added dialogue and it can be quite embarrassing at times.

[Scsigs]

There was no Saban Ocean dub script for the first 2 Z movies so they stuck close to the Pioneer Ocean scripts for those two movies just made it a lot more wordy and some odd changes here and there

Gotcha.

Yeah, the dub for Dead Zone is actually pretty accurate, just a few weird embellishments & changes. Feels almost proto Kai in terms of the script & even some of the performances. Chris Sabat's Piccolo sounds exactly like he would from Kai forward, which is pretty cool to hear. The only thing that's still a relic of the old Z dub is Goku still mispronouncing Kaioken, which he did correctly in the Pioneer dubs, so I don't get why he still doesn't here.

World's Strongest is a weird case. Its script is both accurate & inaccurate at the same time. The dialogue feels remixed rather than completely rewritten or changed like the script writer was on a mission to see how experimental they could be with it while not completely rewriting the lines entirely. They also embellished on Wheelo & Kochin being evil where they added on to it by saying they conducted evil experiments. Of which I'm just like...what was the fucking point? Granted, they're pretty bog standard villains, so it's not like they ruined them, but just...why? It also features probably 1 of the first instances of swearing in the dubs, with Wheelo screaming "Damn you, Goku!" as he's being blown up by the Spirit Bomb. It's weird since it's not in the Japanese script, but interesting nonetheless.

I'm at the very least happy the actors were at the point they could competently voice act as well because bad dialogue with bad scripts are the most painful types of dubs.

I think the most obvious and annoying cases of the constant talking when there is supposed to be zero dialogue is when you have two characters having a stare down with the camera panning to each of their faces, but the only time either of them say something is when the camera is panned on the character that ISN'T talking. It is so painfully obvious that its added dialogue and it can be quite embarrassing at times.

Bro, the 2 Z specials have that & THEN some. It's bad when they insert dialogue over scenes like those, but then they have it over shots where the characters' mouths aren't moving as well (but are a bit back from the camera) & it's painfully obvious. They just didn't give a shit as long as they could write their shitty useless, unnecessary dialogue. I'm so glad that slowed to a painful death after Z never to be seen again.

Also, something I noticed that bugged me. Because these early dubs were made for kid's TV first, no one's allowed to swear. In Bardock, it's not as noticeable since not a lot of things called for it, but in History of Trunks, the characters only being allowed to say, "Darn them!" instead of "damn" is particularly painful. The special takes place in a world slowly falling to shit as 17 & 18 are killing everyone. I think a few "Damns" are warranted like in the Japanese version.