Would Dragon Ball be successful in English-speaking countries if the old English dubs weren't Americanized?

[LostTimeLord]

Did the 4Kids dub of One Piece air on Cartoon Network in the US?

In the US, it premiered on the 4Kids TV syndication block and was repeated on Cartoon Network. Apparently the ratings on 4Kids TV were solid but below Toei's expectations. After about a year it left 4Kids TV and Cartoon Network started running new episodes; they aired the Alabasta arc (dubbed by 4kids) and some of the Skypiea arc (dubbed by Funimation but presented as a continuation of 4Kids' episodes) before dropping it.

[Scsigs]

We will never know if DB/DBZ would have succeeded or failed if the dub was faithful to the Japanese version.
Here is a better question, why did One Piece English dub fail? I know One Piece used to be on Cartoon Network. I think I did watch some episode on Cartoon Network, it didn't impress me, so I didn't watch it. Many years later I watched the Japanese version of One Piece and I liked it, I am up to date with the episode.

I can't say why I didn't like the English version of One Piece, this was many years ago. I think it was around the time when Luffy was trying to get Sanji to join his crew.

The fact that DBZ succeeded in the US despite its bad dub is, I think, a testament to the story & characters Toriyama wrote & how Toei adapted it into the anime. A more faithful dub, though, would've prevented so many US fans from misunderstanding so many things in the series & liking it for only things the dub put in or changed that weren't there in the first place, which would unify the English-speaking fandom more. The Z dub genuinely created a lot of misunderstandings in the English fandom because of their want to change the characters to be more "in-line" with traditional heroes in Western media, plus them misunderstanding what Toriyama was writing a lot of the time.

The reason the 4Kids One Piece dub failed was multiple reasons. It SHOULD be noted that most of the reasons fall on 4Kids actively not caring about it, as Toei essentially forced them to license & dub the series to license & dub a few other shows that they ACTUALLY wanted to get. However, to go into the reasons:

1. Bad dub that had shit casting decisions, dialogue censorships, & changes typical of 4Kids to make the show suitable to a TV-Y7 audience. One Piece is aimed at a slightly older demographic of at least 10 years old to pre-teens & teens. To say nothing about the weird content edits like the unnecessary making of Luffy's mouth moving when he breaks out of a barrel in the first episode to make him talk for no reason, but also that weird gun edit where they seemed to go out of their way to make it a Dr. Seuss type device that made no sense.

2. Bad acting where too many of the voice actors either received poor voice direction, or their acting was just bad, or both. The worst being 4Kids' Sanji where he not only has an unfitting Brooklyn accent, but a voice tone that makes him constantly sound like he has a cold. I also personally don't like Erica Shroeder's Luffy or their Usopp from the clips I've heard. I'm glad Erica was brought back in the FUNi/Crunchy dub of the show recently as Joy Boy (a piece of stunt casting matching the Japanese dub's casting of the Luffy actress from the original OVA from before Toei produced the show that can only really be done in English), but none of their voices worked for me. 4Kids' general attitude towards anime dubbing on this level ruined the show.

3. Cutting of multiple episodes that were seen as either filler, or unimportant. This caused multiple problems in terms of continuity, as does Oda not only love his continuity, callbacks, & bringing characters back years later (even the smallest ones), but it also caused some small continuity errors in the dub itself (an example I know of is them eliminating a small arc where Nami gets sick, they addressed her getting sick by saying it's some sort of sea illness, but then later had someone still mention that they visited a place where she caught a virus). Had they continued to dub passed where they stopped, due to them changing Laboon to a giant iceberg to skip passed him, Brook's backstory would partly make no sense & wouldn't have any of the emotional weight to it Oda intended on top of future reintroductions & cameos of certain characters would neither make sense, nor have their intended impacts because they didn't dub those episodes. Admittedly, in 2004, I don't think this was as prevalent in the manga at the time as it is now, but even at the time, people were disappointed by this that knew about them just from the themes & early character moments lost.

Ultimately, the mistakes made by 4Kids made it so FUNimation wouldn't fuck up their dub when they got the license in 2007. I think I've made the point in another thread when One Piece was brought up a while ago, but 4Kids getting the rights first, while fucking over One Piece's first impression in North America that took over a decade to clean up, was a blessing in disguise, as while FUNi's dub wasn't perfect, they knew what NOT to do & Toei & Oda were more heavily involved in the dub's production & approvals of what they've done over the years. The current One Piece dub is close to perfect & just as good as the Japanese dub for the most part. I think it also inspired Chris Sabat's approach to the DBZ Kai dub, as that dub had a very similar approach to how they did things. In fact, I view the 4Kids One Piece dub as only slightly worse than the DBZ dub, the only differences being that Z was dubbed uncut under FUNi & released on DVD uncut back in the day as well as continually being made available uncut on the home releases since, as well as most of the Z voice cast being brought back in future dubs in the franchise, getting better at voice acting, & getting a chance to redeem themselves with better dubs in the future.

Did the 4Kids dub of One Piece air on Cartoon Network in the US? I know it aired on Toonami UK, but I've only seen the Funimation dub, which is regarded as much more faithful and without the censorship.

It did later on in its run, yeah. In fact, when FUNimation got the rights to the show after 4Kids dropped it, they continued the TV dub from where they left off before going back to the beginning & redubbing the show uncut on Toonami. It's surreal if you look up TV rip clips of it & are more familiar with the uncut dub.

[LostTimeLord]

It SHOULD be noted that most of the reasons fall on 4Kids actively not caring about it, as Toei essentially forced them to license & dub the series to license & dub a few other shows that they ACTUALLY wanted to get.

This detail is actually a fandom myth. 4Kids and Funimation had a bidding war for the rights, and there were no other Toei properties that 4Kids could have picked up in a bundle with One Piece. According to Norman Grossfeld, what actually happened was much simpler: those in charge of 4Kids recognised that One Piece was the next big thing in Japan but neglected to check that the series itself would be appropriate for their audience.

[miguelnuva1]

I don't think Goku is as popular if he wasn't made into a traditional super hero character in the US with kids in the 90's. Adults like the different character arc but I just showed my nephews kai the other day and they interpreted Goku as a traditional hero.

Not sure how'd they take the selfish guy who inly wants a fight and thunks his family are comrads.

[Scsigs]

I don't think Goku is as popular if he wasn't made into a traditional super hero character in the US with kids in the 90's. Adults like the different character arc but I just showed my nephews kai the other day and they interpreted Goku as a traditional hero.

Not sure how'd they take the selfish guy who only wants a fight and thunks his family are comrades.

Bro, there have been multiple kid's shows and movies in the West where the protagonists are worse than Goku. Goku still cares about his family & friends at the end of the day. He would've fit right in with main characters of Western cartoons back then just fine.

[miguelnuva1]

I don't think Goku is as popular if he wasn't made into a traditional super hero character in the US with kids in the 90's. Adults like the different character arc but I just showed my nephews kai the other day and they interpreted Goku as a traditional hero.

Not sure how'd they take the selfish guy who only wants a fight and thinks his family are comrades.

Bro, there have been multiple kid's shows and movies in the West where the protagonists are worse than Goku. Goku still cares about his family & friends at the end of the day. He would've fit right in with main characters of Western cartoons back then just fine.

Name them. Are they an icon like Goku?

The popular super heroes when I grew up were Natman, Superman, Spiderman, Goku and the power rangers.

[The Dark Knight]

The popular super heroes when I grew up were Natman...

Get my name right; I've thrown people off rooftops for less.

[MasenkoHA]

I don't think Goku is as popular if he wasn't made into a traditional super hero character in the US with kids in the 90's. Adults like the different character arc but I just showed my nephews kai the other day and they interpreted Goku as a traditional hero.

Not sure how'd they take the selfish guy who only wants a fight and thinks his family are comrades.

Bro, there have been multiple kid's shows and movies in the West where the protagonists are worse than Goku. Goku still cares about his family & friends at the end of the day. He would've fit right in with main characters of Western cartoons back then just fine.

Name them. Are they an icon like Goku?

The popular super heroes when I grew up were Natman, Superman, Spiderman, Goku and the power rangers.

Venom, Shadow the Hedgehog, Wolverine, Deadpool just to name a few. Also, Batman depending on which version we’re talking. The Tim Burton version definitely leaned more toward the anti-hero side. And look no further than Vegeta being way more popular than Goku during the series heyday on Toonami.


The anti hero archetype has always been popular with children. Even in your Power Rangers example one of the reasons the Green Ranger was the most popular aside from being treated as more special and awesome than the other Rangers is because he had a 5 episode stint as a bad guy.


Not that Goku is in anyway an anti hero but the sentiment that Goku could only be accepted if he was portrayed as a true blue paragon of justice is just hilariously out of touch with reality.

[jjgp1112]

Bro, there have been multiple kid's shows and movies in the West where the protagonists are worse than Goku. Goku still cares about his family & friends at the end of the day. He would've fit right in with main characters of Western cartoons back then just fine.

Name them. Are they an icon like Goku?

The popular super heroes when I grew up were Natman, Superman, Spiderman, Goku and the power rangers.

Venom, Shadow the Hedgehog, Wolverine, Deadpool just to name a few. Also, Batman depending on which version we’re talking. The Tim Burton version definitely leaned more toward the anti-hero side. And look no further than Vegeta being way more popular than Goku during the series heyday on Toonami.


The anti hero archetype has always been popular with children. Even in your Power Rangers example one of the reasons the Green Ranger was the most popular aside from being treated as more special and awesome than the other Rangers is because he had a 5 episode stint as a bad guy.


Not that Goku is in anyway an anti hero but the sentiment that Goku could only be accepted if he was portrayed as a true blue paragon of justice is just hilariously out of touch with reality.

Yeah but in the case of most of those characters, they're secondary roles. Shadow, Venom etc, they were never THE face of those series, and in Shadow's case doing something with him front & center was received in a sideways manner. They work more as foils to the actual traditional heroes. Because Goku's not necessarily "edgy" just goofy, I could see the argument that his character could come off more clmsy, lackadaisical and annoying than cool the way a Wolverine would seem. This is likely the same reason that Luffy's character was softened a bit in the live action One Piece, too. Luffy is more altruistic than Goku but he also can be a bit of a rude jerk and aloof which is harder to digest for American audiences.

[miguelnuva1]

Bro, there have been multiple kid's shows and movies in the West where the protagonists are worse than Goku. Goku still cares about his family & friends at the end of the day. He would've fit right in with main characters of Western cartoons back then just fine.

Name them. Are they an icon like Goku?

The popular super heroes when I grew up were Batman, Superman, Spiderman, Goku and the power rangers.

Venom, Shadow the Hedgehog, Wolverine, Deadpool just to name a few. Also, Batman depending on which version we’re talking. The Tim Burton version definitely leaned more toward the anti-hero side. And look no further than Vegeta being way more popular than Goku during the series heyday on Toonami.


The anti hero archetype has always been popular with children. Even in your Power Rangers example one of the reasons the Green Ranger was the most popular aside from being treated as more special and awesome than the other Rangers is because he had a 5 episode stint as a bad guy.


Not that Goku is in anyway an anti hero but the sentiment that Goku could only be accepted if he was portrayed as a true blue paragon of justice is just hilariously out of touch with reality.

No one said Goku wouldn't be accepted. I said I don't think he would be as popular.

Han Solo isn't a paragon of justice and is popular but he wasn't Luke Skywalker.

[Brodes]

Not that Goku is in anyway an anti hero but the sentiment that Goku could only be accepted if he was portrayed as a true blue paragon of justice is just hilariously out of touch with reality.

No one said Goku wouldn't be accepted. I said I don't think he would be as popular.

Han Solo isn't a paragon of justice and is popular but he wasn't Luke Skywalker.

No, he wasn't Luke Skywalker. He's Han Solo, someone who has always been far more popular than Luke Skywalker. Because of his less than heroic qualities, in fact.