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.

[funrush]

Was the Dragon Ball english dub even that Americanized really? They changed some names but it was mostly like simplifications like Kuririn to Krillin, Muten Roshi to Master Roshi that sort of thing. The big changes were the attack names like Makankosappo to Special Beam Cannon or Kienzan/Taioken/etc., but even then there were ones like the Kamehameha or the Galick Gun that were mostly left alone.

One that's interesting is how they left Kami as Kami. They didn't have the characters call him "God" and they didn't totally change his name either, I guess cause kids wouldn't know that in Japanese Kami means God.

When I think of dubs that were really Americanized I think of some of the stuff 4Kids was putting out. Yugioh they changed the names to names that American kids would have. Jonouchi's not Jonouchi anymore he's Joey. Honda's now Tristan. Or in Pokemon how anytime they were eating a rice cake it was never a rice cake it was a jelly donut. When I think Americanization I think stuff like that, dubs that have an agenda of actively implanting American cultural stuff often in the place of the Japanese cultural stuff.

Do we know for sure if Goku was purposely made into this Superman kind of guy? Or was that scene of him giving the speech to Freeza just another instance of the Funi writers throwing away entire portions of the Japanese script and putting their own shit in over it, like Freeza making Vegeta give him a countdown before transforming? I guess that could be considered Americanization by my own definition but I'm not sure, I don't usually think of that scene as that.

I wonder more about the score. Would DBZ still have done well if it's the Kikuchi score? And I want to say yes because DBZ Kai had the whole orchestral deal going on with Yamamoto and later Kikuchi and that turned out to be a big hit with people who had Nicktoons to watch it on. But it's hard to say for sure if kids in 2002 would have reacted positively to that super old sounding Kikuchi soundtrack versus the Faulconer studios stuff just cause we're so far removed from that time now to know for sure.

[Scsigs]

I was gonna say the Tim Burton Batman, but to also list some unconventional heroes other than him: Ben 10, some versions of Spider-Man, some Power Rangers seasons had some heroes who were more ambiguous in their morality, etc. To say that American kids couldn't handle a dub where Goku was written more like his Japanese self is ludicrous. Even in the 90s, he'd be more of a breath of fresh air compared to most heroes on TV. Kids all over the world loved Goku before the English dubs were a thing & most of THEM got more accurate dubs.

It should also be noted that Goku's NOT a superhero, though. He's a martial artist that accessed ki control which gave him access to supernatural powers from his own life energy. It would also be more honest to compare Goku to Japanese heroes, which Toriyama specifically wrote him not to be those people.

[funrush]

Also I see discourse in here on the aspect that the english dubs were aired out of order. So that makes me wonder about the timing of it all. Like I think Dragon Ball hit in America at a time where it was primed for anime to start being popular. You had Dragon Ball, Pokemon, and Sailor Moon all showing up at the same time. Now would Dragon Ball have helped bust down the doors for anime in the west as much as it did if kids had to wait 3 or 4 years to even get to the Z part of it? Would late 90s/early 00s kids who have little to no exposure to anime give a crap about the Kid Goku arcs? Hard to say. But I think once it DID get to the Z part the response would be so much more insane because the kids would have got to see that progression.

[Zebra]

Also I see discourse in here on the aspect that the english dubs were aired out of order. So that makes me wonder about the timing of it all. Like I think Dragon Ball hit in America at a time where it was primed for anime to start being popular. You had Dragon Ball, Pokemon, and Sailor Moon all showing up at the same time. Now would Dragon Ball have helped bust down the doors for anime in the west as much as it did if kids had to wait 3 or 4 years to even get to the Z part of it? Would late 90s/early 00s kids who have little to no exposure to anime give a crap about the Kid Goku arcs?

Dragon Ball's first arc did air in America during 1995. But it flopped, so Funimation skipped over to DBZ in 1996. Early timeslots were partly to blame for DB flopping, but DBZ's timeslots were only slightly better at first and it still did well.

[Scsigs]

Was the Dragon Ball english dub even that Americanized really? They changed some names but it was mostly like simplifications like Kuririn to Krillin, Muten Roshi to Master Roshi that sort of thing. The big changes were the attack names like Makankosappo to Special Beam Cannon or Kienzan/Taioken/etc., but even then there were ones like the Kamehameha or the Galick Gun that were mostly left alone.

One that's interesting is how they left Kami as Kami. They didn't have the characters call him "God" and they didn't totally change his name either, I guess cause kids wouldn't know that in Japanese Kami means God.

When I think of dubs that were really Americanized I think of some of the stuff 4Kids was putting out. Yugioh they changed the names to names that American kids would have. Jonouchi's not Jonouchi anymore he's Joey. Honda's now Tristan. Or in Pokemon how anytime they were eating a rice cake it was never a rice cake it was a jelly donut. When I think Americanization I think stuff like that, dubs that have an agenda of actively implanting American cultural stuff often in the place of the Japanese cultural stuff.

Do we know for sure if Goku was purposely made into this Superman kind of guy? Or was that scene of him giving the speech to Freeza just another instance of the Funi writers throwing away entire portions of the Japanese script and putting their own shit in over it, like Freeza making Vegeta give him a countdown before transforming? I guess even that instance is a form of Americanization by my own definition even though I don't usually think of that scene as that.

I wonder more about the score. Would DBZ still have done well if it's the Kikuchi score? And I want to say yes because DBZ Kai had the whole orchestral deal going on with Yamamoto and later Kikuchi and that turned out to be a big hit with people who had Nicktoons to watch it on. But it's hard to say for sure if kids in 2002 would have reacted positively to that super old sounding Kikuchi soundtrack versus the Faulconer studios stuff just cause we're so far removed from that time now to know for sure.

Yes, the dub was Americanized. The changed dialogue for every character that they did to make them more heroic & saintly or even more evil than they originally were or removing any subtleties, making Vegeta say that Freeza forced him to be evil, having Goku make a big speech about being the hope of the universe, giving Gohan a dumbass internal monologue after Cell crushed 16's head with information he shouldn't & didn't know of, & the replaced music.

I don't know what you're talking about. Kikuchi's music is great. But even then, there were multiple Western kid's shows with Asia-inspired music playing in them that I liked as a kid. Hell, the Pokemon dub kept a LOT of the Japanese music & it worked very well. Granted, they were mainly tracks from the games, but even then. Hell, the Disney dubs of the Ghibli movies also kept their music (with the exception of Castle in the Sky getting a re-score by the original composer when people apparently didn't like the original score & 1 song in Kiki's Delivery Service, but those were the exception). Many other dubs of DB kept the Japanese music as well, so don't say the music wouldn't have worked in America if it worked everywhere else. Only in America do we get this dipshit notion of, "This dub won't work if it's not changed to explicitly appeal to the kid audience we're targeting with it." It's just nonsense. The same with the dub writers feeling they needed to fill the silence by having the characters talk every time there's no noise going on because they think kids can't pay attention to something for more than 2 seconds.

[Scsigs]

Also I see discourse in here on the aspect that the english dubs were aired out of order. So that makes me wonder about the timing of it all. Like I think Dragon Ball hit in America at a time where it was primed for anime to start being popular. You had Dragon Ball, Pokemon, and Sailor Moon all showing up at the same time. Now would Dragon Ball have helped bust down the doors for anime in the west as much as it did if kids had to wait 3 or 4 years to even get to the Z part of it? Would late 90s/early 00s kids who have little to no exposure to anime give a crap about the Kid Goku arcs? Hard to say. But I think once it DID get to the Z part the response would be so much more insane because the kids would have got to see that progression.

So, here's a brief history of the releases for the English dubs of DB:
1. Harmony Gold DB dub in the late 80s. DB episodes 1-13 & 2 of the movies with I think 1 of the movies edited into episodes for some reason. Most of which is considered lost media, iirc.
2. FUNi & Ocean-produced DB dub episodes 1-13.
3. FUNi, Ocean, & Saban-produced Z dub, episodes 1-67 (cut down to 53) & movies 1-3, with 3 edited into 3 episodes of the show for some reason.
4. FUNi, Ocean, & Pioneer-produced uncut dubs of movies 1-3.
5. FUNi-produced dub of DB movies 1 & 2.
6. FUNi-produced in-house dub of Z & the 2 TV specials that aired in the US & everywhere else until...
7. Ocean-produced dub of Z that aired in the UK & eventually Canada.
8. FUNi-produced redub of DB.
9. FUNi-produced dub of GT.
10. Blue Water & Ocean-produced dubs of DB & GT.
11. AB Groupe-produced dubs of the Z movies & specials for Europe.
12. FUNi-produced redubs with the Texas cast of Z movies 1-13 & DB movies 1, 3, & 4.
13. FUNi-produced dub of Kai (not counting Ocean's, since it didn't come out).
14. FUNi-produced dubs of BOG & RF.
15. FUNi & Sentai Filmworks-produced dubs of Super.
16. FUNi-produced dubs of the Super movies.
17. FUNi-produced dub of Daima.

Harmony Gold's dub ran in syndication, but failed to find an audience. FUNi's dub of it did too, I think.
The Z dub didn't find an audience until it was aired on Toonami where because it'd bee a few years since that dub was produced, FUNi didn't team up with Saban & Ocean again to produce more episodes & just cast local talent in Texas to do it.
Ocean's later dub of Z was seemingly primarily done for European markets, as the Z dub was apparently distributed over there by AB Groupe, but eventually aired in Canada as well. Their later dubs of DB & GT were only aired in Canada.
AB Groupe's dub is also known as the Big Green dub, produced for European countries & translated from the French dub scripts for those movies & badly.
Didn't mention the Speedy dub, but that was produced for Malaysia & was worse than the Big Green dub.

[Zebra]

The Z dub didn't find an audience until it was aired on Toonami where because it'd bee a few years since that dub was produced, FUNi didn't team up with Saban & Ocean again to produce more episodes & just cast local talent in Texas to do it.

DBZ was popular in syndication before coming over to Toonami; it was the highest rated syndicated cartoon targeted towards kids in 1997, earning much better time slots due to its success. Saban parted ways with Funimation because they moved away from syndicated TV in favor of producing original shows for Fox Kids.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

2. FUNi & Ocean-produced DB dub episodes 1-13.

Ocean had nothing to do with BLT, that dub just uses the same cast associated with Ocean Studios but all the actors are freelancers. It was recorded at Dick & Rodgers Studio with post production done by Josanne B Lovick Productions but Ocean Studios first came on the scene when Funimation teamed up with Saban and began working on Dragon Ball Z.

15. FUNi & Sentai Filmworks-produced dubs of Super.

Sentai didn't dub Dragon Ball Super, your thinking of Bang Zoom Entertainment.

Didn't mention the Speedy dub, but that was produced for Malaysia & was worse than the Big Green dub.

Theres also the Animax dub of original Dragon Ball that was recorded in Hong Kong and broadcast in Southeast Asia in 2006. Sadly all 153 episodes are lost to time though.

Also forgot to mention the Creative Corp Products dub of episodes 1-122/132 of original Dragon Ball and the first 49 episodes of Dragon Ball Z. That was recorded and aired exclusively in the Philippines during the 90s.

[LostTimeLord]

When I think Americanization I think stuff like that, dubs that have an agenda of actively implanting American cultural stuff often in the place of the Japanese cultural stuff.

Yeah, I don't know if Funimation were consciously aiming to Americanize the series, but when you have a group of American and Canadian creatives re-working the show to make it more appealing then that's the direction things are naturally going to go. Even relatively recent dubs like Super, when they do stray from the Japanese dialogue, feel a little Americanised when they're sarcastic or quippy.