If You Could Ask FUNimation Anything? Interview in The Works

[Castor Troy]

Ok, I finally have my question.

Why did they go with the screencap covers for their initial VHS and DVD releases? I'm sure they had tons of access to a lot of the promotional art.

[Taku128]

Why did you spell Freeza with an i?

[DerekPadula]

The covers and Frieza... both good questions I had wondered about myself. I totally would not have thought to ask those though. Good ones. Maybe we can finally get some answers!

[GS7X7]

Most of my "inside info" for the bad translations wasn't inside at all- it simply came from multiple Funi quotes publicly made about how badly translated the scripts were. I was just the first guy to assemble all the quotes together to lay out as evidence of the poor translations Funi's dub had been using thus far.

Hell, even Simmonds called the translations before him "haggard" in his interview with Planet Namek.

"61.5% of Funi's dub is based off of horrible, inaccurate scripts," I used to rant at Funi a lot.

I am curious though- which dub episode was the first to be based off of Simmonds translations? I always placed it right after the end of the Cell saga because I thought he'd come on right after then.

Oh yeah, and I think the episode where Goten learns to fly was his "test script."

Interesting fact- one of Anime Labs' episodes was based on a fan script by Simmonds. "Interesting story that," he said in the PN interview. I always wondered just what that story was....

[GS7X7]

Here's my question- Jon Allen once asked Funi if they'd do a dvd feature with Steve Simmonds. They said it sounded but nothing ever came of it.

Why not? Or, have they done a Simmonds feature already?

Imo, if they never did one it was probably so as to de-emphasize the Japanese version on their dvd's. They seemed to do the same w/ their heavy pushing of VHS tapes even when the VHS medium was dying and dvd's were becoming a lot cheaper. (notable in that GT was able to take a lot of top spots in the VHS sales rankings back then because most everyone else was moving away from VHS)

[penguintruth]

I'd like to know what the reasoning behind the arc titles were.

Why a Ginyu, Freeza, Trunks, Androids, etc instead of an easier to refer to all the Namek stuff as the "Freeza Saga" and all the androids/Cell stuff as "Cell Saga"? The omega of those arcs is Freeza and Cell, respectively, so that's what I've always referred to them as, and said hell with the smaller designations.

[Li'l Lemmy]

I'm guessing that it was because of the manner in which they were dubbed and/or released. Labeling the Artificial Humans episodes as part of the Cell arc is all well and good, but if they only release those episodes and then wait to release more, I imagine that people would be confused by several boxes that are all individually released as "Cell saga".


~Da Lemmy

[Taku128]

I'd like to know what the reasoning behind the arc titles were.

Why a Ginyu, Freeza, Trunks, Androids, etc instead of an easier to refer to all the Namek stuff as the "Freeza Saga" and all the androids/Cell stuff as "Cell Saga"? The omega of those arcs is Freeza and Cell, respectively, so that's what I've always referred to them as, and said hell with the smaller designations.

That's pretty obvious marketing stuff. Selling a four volume arc in its entirety is a lot easier than selling a fifty volume arc when you consider how much those singles cost. The smaller arcs also make people feel like they got more. It feels more substantial when you can say "I own the Imperfect Cell arc" than if you said "I own four volumes in the middle of the Cell arc".

[Gotham22]

Why didn't you fix the cropping/widescreen problem after the season 1 set of Z?
When are you going to dub "Plan to Eradicate the Super Saiyans"?

Ok, I finally have my question.

Why did they go with the screencap covers for their initial VHS and DVD releases? I'm sure they had tons of access to a lot of the promotional art.

I actual like those covers.

Funimation picks bad promotional art images.

The season sets of Z are a great example.

I think the image of Freeza on season 3 was the best cover out of all of them.

[Li'l Lemmy]

I find that the DVDs that use screencaps for covers tend to be hit or miss, although as a general rule I think using them in place of art is lazy anyway. I really disliked the cover for Movie #5.


~Da Lemmy

[Taku128]

Why didn't you fix the cropping/widescreen problem after the season 1 set of Z?
When are you going to dub "Plan to Eradicate the Super Saiyans"?

Seeing as they worked at FUNimation between 1998 and 2005 I don't think they're properly equipped to answer either of these questions.

[penguintruth]

I have to admit, as lazy as they were, I liked some of the screenshot covers. I definitely prefer promo art, though.

[Gotham22]

Why wasn't there slipcovers for the 10 Freeza volumes and the 2 Ginyu and Trunks volumes?

Why was there no English dub score for Dragon Ball?

Definetly like to know why for question number 1.

[DerekPadula]

Why wasn't there slipcovers for the 10 Freeza volumes and the 2 Ginyu and Trunks volumes?

What do you mean by slipcovers? Can you give me an example description or image of what these are? Thanks for the clarification.

[Gotham22]

Why wasn't there slipcovers for the 10 Freeza volumes and the 2 Ginyu and Trunks volumes?

What do you mean by slipcovers? Can you give me an example description or image of what these are? Thanks for the clarification.

like this.



Each saga from Garlic Jr. to the GT series had these slipscovers to keep the each volume from each saga together.

I wonder if this question could be answered.

Were there plans to to release the entired Z series in the those Ultimate Uncut Editions?

[Castor Troy]

Why wasn't there slipcovers for the 10 Freeza volumes and the 2 Ginyu and Trunks volumes?

What do you mean by slipcovers? Can you give me an example description or image of what these are? Thanks for the clarification.

like this.



Each saga from Garlic Jr. to the GT series had these slipscovers to keep the each volume from each saga together.

I wonder if this question could be answered.

Were there plans to to release the entired Z series in the those Ultimate Uncut Editions?

I remember they even made a huge slipcover boxset for the VHS Freeza saga that looked pretty nice.

"THE 10 TAPE FREEZA SAGA!"

[linkdude20002001]

This may have been before their time at Funimation, but it's possible that they'd know anyways.

What was Bandai Entertainment's relationship with Funimation?
(The back of the DVD cases for the TV series and Geneon's Uncut Movie Trilogy say "In association with Bandai Entertainment")

How and why did Geneon (formerly Pioneer) come to dub the first three Dragon Ball Z movies?

[Arique]

I have a few questions:
1) Do you guys have any plans on bringing the Dragon Ball, Dragon Ball Z, and Dragon Ball GT episodes to Blu-Ray? I know you guys are doing it with the movies and Kai, but what about the original series themselves?
2) Will any of the Dragon Ball series be released out onto sites like iTunes, Zune Video Marketplace, and Netflix Instant Streaming? It would kinda help instead of wasting dozens of GBs on DVDRips of the discs that I own.
3) You've mentioned in the past that "Yo! Son Goku and his Friends Return!!" can't be dubbed by you guys due to copyright restrictions. Can you give us details as to what those restrictions are?
4) Have you guys had any ideas in showing DBZ Kai uncut and unedited on TV once Nicktoons ends it run of the edited version, i.e. on Cartoon Network or the Funimation Channel?

I think that's it for right now, unless I can think of anymore, at which I will edit this post with more questions.

[Goku100xKamehameha]

I have a few questions:
1) Do you guys have any plans on bringing the Dragon Ball, Dragon Ball Z, and Dragon Ball GT episodes to Blu-Ray? I know you guys are doing it with the movies and Kai, but what about the original series themselves?
2) Will any of the Dragon Ball series be released out onto sites like iTunes, Zune Video Marketplace, and Netflix Instant Streaming? It would kinda help instead of wasting dozens of GBs on DVDRips of the discs that I own.
3) You've mentioned in the past that "Yo! Son Goku and his Friends Return!!" can't be dubbed by you guys due to copyright restrictions. Can you give us details as to what those restrictions are?
4) Have you guys had any ideas in showing DBZ Kai uncut and unedited on TV once Nicktoons ends it run of the edited version, i.e. on Cartoon Network or the Funimation Channel?

I think that's it for right now, unless I can think of anymore, at which I will edit this post with more questions.

I don't think they can answer any of the question above, since they were only employed from 1998 to 2005.

[Arique]

I have a few questions:
1) Do you guys have any plans on bringing the Dragon Ball, Dragon Ball Z, and Dragon Ball GT episodes to Blu-Ray? I know you guys are doing it with the movies and Kai, but what about the original series themselves?
2) Will any of the Dragon Ball series be released out onto sites like iTunes, Zune Video Marketplace, and Netflix Instant Streaming? It would kinda help instead of wasting dozens of GBs on DVDRips of the discs that I own.
3) You've mentioned in the past that "Yo! Son Goku and his Friends Return!!" can't be dubbed by you guys due to copyright restrictions. Can you give us details as to what those restrictions are?
4) Have you guys had any ideas in showing DBZ Kai uncut and unedited on TV once Nicktoons ends it run of the edited version, i.e. on Cartoon Network or the Funimation Channel?

I think that's it for right now, unless I can think of anymore, at which I will edit this post with more questions.

I don't think they can answer any of the question above, since they were only employed from 1998 to 2005.

Oh, I see now. My bad.