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

[Snail]

This could just be a TV Only release like previous ocean versions.

My thoughts exactly.

[TVfan721]

What's the point to this when DB KAI IS ALREADY AIRING IN CANADA?!?!?

Canada already gets CW, we watch it every Saturday just like the Americans do.

[Paradox295]

What's the point to this when DB KAI IS ALREADY AIRING IN CANADA?!?!?

Canada already gets CW, we watch it every Saturday just like the Americans do.

I know right? If it's already airing in Japan, America and Canada, then there's no point! It's already airing all over the world!
/sarcasm

[PuppetDoctor]

What's the point to this when DB KAI IS ALREADY AIRING IN CANADA?!?!?

Canada already gets CW, we watch it every Saturday just like the Americans do.

You can only get the CW in Canada if you have a digital cable box. You can't get the CW on basic cable which is probably what most Canadians have.

[Mewzard]

What's the point to this when DB KAI IS ALREADY AIRING IN CANADA?!?!?

Canada already gets CW, we watch it every Saturday just like the Americans do.

I know right? If it's already airing in Japan, America and Canada, then there's no point! It's already airing all over the world!
/sarcasm

I think he's referring to the fact that you can, technically, watch Kai's English Dub in Canada, so why make another English Dub in Canada, when instead one could just license Funi's version for their region.

[Dark Vegeta-Sama]

What's the point to this when DB KAI IS ALREADY AIRING IN CANADA?!?!?

Canada already gets CW, we watch it every Saturday just like the Americans do.

I know right? If it's already airing in Japan, America and Canada, then there's no point! It's already airing all over the world!
/sarcasm

I think he's referring to the fact that you can, technically, watch Kai's English Dub in Canada, so why make another English Dub in Canada, when instead one could just license Funi's version for their region.

Because it makes more financial sense for a Canadian company to produce and sell their own dub to Canadian television stations than to allow those stations to air an American production.

[Mewzard]

Because it makes more financial sense for a Canadian company to produce and sell their own dub to Canadian television stations than to allow those stations to air an American production.

It should cost more money to make and then purchase a dub from scratch than it would to license an existing dub. You're going to make the same amount of money for your channel via ad revenues, it's only going to cost more for a dub made from scratch.

[TVfan721]

What's the point to this when DB KAI IS ALREADY AIRING IN CANADA?!?!?

Canada already gets CW, we watch it every Saturday just like the Americans do.

I know right? If it's already airing in Japan, America and Canada, then there's no point! It's already airing all over the world!
/sarcasm

I think he's referring to the fact that you can, technically, watch Kai's English Dub in Canada, so why make another English Dub in Canada, when instead one could just license Funi's version for their region.

Yeah, that's exactly what I meant. I don't know how Paradox295 didn't understand that.

[RazorX]

What's the point to this when DB KAI IS ALREADY AIRING IN CANADA?!?!?

Canada already gets CW, we watch it every Saturday just like the Americans do.

I know right? If it's already airing in Japan, America and Canada, then there's no point! It's already airing all over the world!
/sarcasm

I think he's referring to the fact that you can, technically, watch Kai's English Dub in Canada, so why make another English Dub in Canada, when instead one could just license Funi's version for their region.

Most countries* received the Ocean dub. The Funi dub is alien to them, why not make an Ocean dub. In some countries, the Ocean dub is bound to be more popular, do better in ratings and bring more money in for the producers and broadcasters. Fortunately, there are people in the industry who can see that. Fans benefit from the Ocean dub, Ocean Productions gets the opportunity to return to one of the most successful Anime they dubbed, Toei Animation benefits from licensing 2 dubs of the same language. It's a win-win situation in having a dub by The Ocean Group/Ocean Productions.

Considering that people complain even about free streams of DBZ, I shouldn't be surprised that this "discussion" has resurfaced.

Funi started the problems by changing the voice actors, we don't want a problematic dub, yes there are still problems with Funi's Kai dub and Funi's dub quality has gone downhill since the start of the Trunks saga, despite the improved Kai music. That can be attributed to lack of recasted voices, worse scripts and going from someone as talented as Chris Ayres to someone....not so talented as Kent Williams. Williams' Gero isn't bad but his Tao, Kaioshin and Old Kai are terrible. I shouldn't just pick on Kent, Eric Vale's Trunks is worse than before and there are other voices in Funi's dub which aren't very good



*Countries that received an English dub of DBZ.

Same reason why ocean's not change the their actors, they don't wanna start a fan riot. Regardless if they were replaced by superior actors fans would riot and bitch about why there favorite actor is not playing the role, take Gohan's role for example.

I can understand (but don't agree) on why Funi would be reluctant to change a character like Vegeta's voice, but Funi could've changed voices for characters like Yamcha, Karin, Tenshinhan etc. I don't know why Sabat was even allowed to keep Karin in Funi's Kai dub, he can't even differentiate it as much from his Vegeta as he could before.

Ocean already used voice actors who had previous experience/training and they could cast well. The consensus for the Ocean/Funi/Saban dubbed Saiyan-Namek sagas was good voices but bad scripts. Ocean already have a good cast so they don't need to change. It would be difficult for you to find a voice actor superior to, say, Scott McNeil.

There are plenty of guys who're more fitted towards piccolo than scott will ever be, and I wouldn't doubt the same for drummond either.

Just because they're the first ones to do the role doesn't make them the definitive VAs for the role.

Now you're just being like every other ocean elitist.

How am I being an "Ocean Elitist"? I'm saying Scott McNeil is better than most other Ocean VAs as well as being better than all the Funi VAs. I'm saying that based on his contribution to DBZ, which, needless to say, went far beyond what he did in the first 53 episodes.

For Piccolo and Vegeta; McNeil and Drummond are the best actors. Not even their Japanese counterparts can beat them. Paul Dobson did say that Ocean are keeping existing voices, I'd take that as a sign that McNeil and Drummond returned, they are among the most popular in the Ocean dub.

[Paradox295]

I know right? If it's already airing in Japan, America and Canada, then there's no point! It's already airing all over the world!
/sarcasm

I think he's referring to the fact that you can, technically, watch Kai's English Dub in Canada, so why make another English Dub in Canada, when instead one could just license Funi's version for their region.

Yeah, that's exactly what I meant. I don't know how Paradox295 didn't understand that.

Ughr, no. You said 'What's the point to this when DB KAI IS ALREADY AIRING IN CANADA?!?!?
Canada already gets CW, we watch it every Saturday just like the Americans do.'.

So I sarcastically said that the whole world consisted of Japan, America and Canada, which is obviously not true, because, I was referring to the fact that the UK, and English Speaking parts of Europe haven't got DBZ Kai yet, and we'll probably get the Ocean dub since that's what we got last time.

I'd actually prefer if we got Funi's dub aswell, since it's pointless having 2 English dubs of the same show.

[Mewzard]

Most countries* received the Ocean dub. The Funi dub is alien to them, why not make an Ocean dub. In some countries, the Ocean dub is bound to be more popular, do better in ratings and bring more money in for the producers and broadcasters. Fortunately, there are people in the industry who can see that. Fans benefit from the Ocean dub, Ocean Productions gets the opportunity to return to one of the most successful Anime they dubbed, Toei Animation benefits from licensing 2 dubs of the same language. It's a win-win situation in having a dub by The Ocean Group/Ocean Productions.

Considering that people complain even about free streams of DBZ, I shouldn't be surprised that this "discussion" has resurfaced.

Funi started the problems by changing the voice actors, we don't want a problematic dub, yes there are still problems with Funi's Kai dub and Funi's dub quality has gone downhill since the start of the Trunks saga, despite the improved Kai music. That can be attributed to lack of recasted voices, worse scripts and going from someone as talented as Chris Ayres to someone....not so talented as Kent Williams. Williams' Gero isn't bad but his Tao, Kaioshin and Old Kai are terrible. I shouldn't just pick on Kent, Eric Vale's Trunks is worse than before and there are other voices in Funi's dub which aren't very good



*Countries that received an English dub of DBZ.

Why make an Ocean dub when there is a perfectly good dub already in existence? Besides, many who would watch Kai now are kids who have never seen the Ocean dub or the Funi dub. And you can't tell me there aren't people in those country, even if only a few, who haven't seen the Funi dub and thought "Hey, I'd like to see that actor do that character more". It wouldn't hurt these places to have a Funi dub of Kai. I see absolutely Zero reason why an Ocean dub would do any better than Funi's dub. I will give you that Toei makes more money for it, so that's one reason I can see for it happening, even if multiple dubs of the same material is a bit much.

And I disagree. While there were one or two rough spots in the Trunks arc, it's gotten better once again. And Kent Williams is excellent for the character of Dr. Gero. And Chuck Huber was a great #17 (still hoping he can stay on). As for Trunks? We'll see if his delivery improves, but you assume that Ocean will do a better version for sure...but you don't know that. For all you know, the dub could be bad from the start. There's evidence for Funi's dub to be good...but no evidence for an Ocean dub to be, because we have nothing.

And as for "For Piccolo and Vegeta; McNeil and Drummond are the best actors." ...That's hilarious. They work as voices for the characters SOLELY when they're villains, truly evil. Those voices are out of place on anything other than demonic villains.

[RazorX]

Why make an Ocean dub when there is a perfectly good dub already in existence?

I wouldn't attribute that description to the Funi dub.

There are some people who think Funi's old season 3 dub is good enough, doesn't mean it is. The current Funi dub of Kai is not good enough, though the Freeza saga turned out better than expected, I'll give you that.

Besides, many who would watch Kai now are kids who have never seen the Ocean dub or the Funi dub. And you can't tell me there aren't people in those country, even if only a few, who haven't seen the Funi dub and thought "Hey, I'd like to see that actor do that character more". It wouldn't hurt these places to have a Funi dub of Kai. I see absolutely Zero reason why an Ocean dub would do any better than Funi's dub. I will give you that Toei makes more money for it, so that's one reason I can see for it happening, even if multiple dubs of the same material is a bit much.

There are still plenty of DBZ fans who would watch Kai. Kai is also aimed at the Z fans as well as new fans.

I've given this example before but I'll give it again. I own a few DVD recorders by Sony, which are very good. Their recording quality is nice and they do more than what I'd expect them to. Sony have made DVD recorders which are good enough, does that mean Panasonic, Pioneer, Toshiba, LG, Philips, Samsung etc shouldn't make them? Of course not, competition is good for the electronics industry.

And I disagree. While there were one or two rough spots in the Trunks arc, it's gotten better once again. And Kent Williams is excellent for the character of Dr. Gero. And Chuck Huber was a great #17 (still hoping he can stay on). As for Trunks? We'll see if his delivery improves, but you assume that Ocean will do a better version for sure...but you don't know that. For all you know, the dub could be bad from the start. There's evidence for Funi's dub to be good...but no evidence for an Ocean dub to be, because we have nothing.

There actually is evidence from what we know of Ocean's Kai dub so far to support the assumption that it will be good. That is in the form of the director's comments to Morrow about what he wanted for Goku "Innocent and childlike" and Dobson stating that Ocean are retaining their DBZ voice cast members.

Past performance is evidence enough for me to expect the Ocean dub to be good. My expectation is the Ocean dub will be good unless proven otherwise. I see no reason to proceed the discussions with a negative outlook.

For example, I had a negative outlook at Funimation's Freeza recast when Funi announced it, because I doubted Funi's ability to get a decent voice for the character and I went with the assumption that Funi pandered to the vocal minority of people who wanted Freeza to "sound like a man" therefore I expected a generic male voice which I doubted would fit the character well. I was pleasantly surprised by how good the voice and acting turned out to be, though.

And as for "For Piccolo and Vegeta; McNeil and Drummond are the best actors." ...That's hilarious. They work as voices for the characters SOLELY when they're villains, truly evil. Those voices are out of place on anything other than demonic villains.

Both actors are versatile enough to adapt to changes for their respective characters, and both did. It seems you have not heard their performances past the Namek saga.

[Mewzard]

Why make an Ocean dub when there is a perfectly good dub already in existence?

I wouldn't attribute that description to the Funi dub.

There are some people who think Funi's old season 3 dub is good enough, doesn't mean it is. The current Funi dub of Kai is not good enough, though the Freeza saga turned out better than expected, I'll give you that.

Besides, many who would watch Kai now are kids who have never seen the Ocean dub or the Funi dub. And you can't tell me there aren't people in those country, even if only a few, who haven't seen the Funi dub and thought "Hey, I'd like to see that actor do that character more". It wouldn't hurt these places to have a Funi dub of Kai. I see absolutely Zero reason why an Ocean dub would do any better than Funi's dub. I will give you that Toei makes more money for it, so that's one reason I can see for it happening, even if multiple dubs of the same material is a bit much.

There are still plenty of DBZ fans who would watch Kai. Kai is also aimed at the Z fans as well as new fans.

I've given this example before but I'll give it again. I own a few DVD recorders by Sony, which are very good. Their recording quality is nice and they do more than what I'd expect them to. Sony have made DVD recorders which are good enough, does that mean Panasonic, Pioneer, Toshiba, LG, Philips, Samsung etc shouldn't make them? Of course not, competition is good for the electronics industry.

And I disagree. While there were one or two rough spots in the Trunks arc, it's gotten better once again. And Kent Williams is excellent for the character of Dr. Gero. And Chuck Huber was a great #17 (still hoping he can stay on). As for Trunks? We'll see if his delivery improves, but you assume that Ocean will do a better version for sure...but you don't know that. For all you know, the dub could be bad from the start. There's evidence for Funi's dub to be good...but no evidence for an Ocean dub to be, because we have nothing.

There actually is evidence from what we know of Ocean's Kai dub so far to support the assumption that it will be good. That is in the form of the director's comments to Morrow about what he wanted for Goku "Innocent and childlike" and Dobson stating that Ocean are retaining their DBZ voice cast members.

Past performance is evidence enough for me to expect the Ocean dub to be good. My expectation is the Ocean dub will be good unless proven otherwise. I see no reason to proceed the discussions with a negative outlook.

For example, I had a negative outlook at Funimation's Freeza recast when Funi announced it, because I doubted Funi's ability to get a decent voice for the character and I went with the assumption that Funi pandered to the vocal minority of people who wanted Freeza to "sound like a man" therefore I expected a generic male voice which I doubted would fit the character well. I was pleasantly surprised by how good the voice and acting turned out to be, though.

And as for "For Piccolo and Vegeta; McNeil and Drummond are the best actors." ...That's hilarious. They work as voices for the characters SOLELY when they're villains, truly evil. Those voices are out of place on anything other than demonic villains.

Both actors are versatile enough to adapt to changes for their respective characters, and both did. It seems you have not heard their performances past the Namek saga.

I think the Funi dub of Kai is more than good enough. Perfect? No. Rough in a few places? Yes. But it is mostly a good dub.

There are plenty of fans who would watch Kai, and I think many of them would be happy with a dub of high quality voice acting, accurate scripts, correct music, and good voice direction, even if it isn't Ocean dubbed. I started my fandom off with the Ocean dub of the early material, so it's not like it's impossible to enjoy a different dub than what one is used to. And your DVD recorder reference isn't the same. Technology can be modified for an array of purposes, effectiveness, and price. They can have different features, aesthetic design, and quality. There really doesn't need to be multiple dubs of one series, it's pointless. Does there need to be a dub for New York, Texas, California, Canada, England, Ireland, Scotland, Australia, etc? If there doesn't need to be a dub for all the various regions of the world that speak the same language, then why does there even need to be two? Why can't one suffice? A second English dub is entirely pointless. It's not even like this is Cantonese vs Mandarin, or anything like that.

So, those two statements mean they will be good? We don't know the details of the script, who's doing the directing, what level of censorship may or may not exist, and what their goals are for this dub. And see? You disprove your own point. You tell me to expect a good dub from Ocean because of their past performances (and I'd argue that when it comes to the first dub), yet you expect the worst from Funimation, yet get proven wrong. See? Expectations aren't always right. It could be a good dub, I admit that. But, you don't know, and it's entirely pointless when an English dub already exists.

And yes, I think both voice actors can do fine jobs. But those voices still have too much of those early dub traits that stand out to my ears when I do hear the later material. To be honest, they should do what Sabat did, tone them back a bit towards their natural voices. Not all the way, but closer, to give a more natural sound. Because those voices don't sound natural in the least. Sabat's Piccolo sounds much closer to his speaking voice now, and at least Vegeta's much closer to natural. I think they can do it, I just don't know if they will.

[penguintruth]

If the Ocean dub for Kai is as good as their dubs of the first three DBZ movies, then that'd be great.

But I get Mewzard's position, even though I'm a big fan of Drummond, McNeil, Lindbjerg, Brown, Dobson, and others. I mean, why not just have one uniform dub for Kai? There aren't a bunch of different English dubs for most of the rest of anime released. The Kai dub is a solid one, and frankly, it's not like the Ocean cast was so over-the-top better than the Funimation that we need another one.

I'd be really excited to hear a new English dub Goku, though.

[Dark Vegeta-Sama]

Because it makes more financial sense for a Canadian company to produce and sell their own dub to Canadian television stations than to allow those stations to air an American production.

It should cost more money to make and then purchase a dub from scratch than it would to license an existing dub. You're going to make the same amount of money for your channel via ad revenues, it's only going to cost more for a dub made from scratch.

How?

Let's call FUNimation "company A," and whatever Canadian production company that's making Kai "company B." The television station(s) that airs the show is an independent entity.

Company B somehow has the legal go-ahead to produce their own dub, independently of FUNimation. Sure, it costs them money to produce it, but they get to sell it and make money that way, as opposed to just sitting by and allowing company A to sell their own dub to the same TV station. Argue all you want about the inherent necessity of another dub, but you can't deny that it makes more financial sense for company B to sell their own dub than to just do nothing, sit back, and allow company A to sell their product to what would've been their customer(s).

It's business 101. A ton of things in business are unnecessary, but they happen anyway because everyone wants a piece of the same pie. So while a Canadian dub is not necessary from a fan standpoint, it makes perfect sense to do so from a business standpoint.

And money is the only reason that Kai was ever conceived in the first place.

[Mewzard]

Because it makes more financial sense for a Canadian company to produce and sell their own dub to Canadian television stations than to allow those stations to air an American production.

It should cost more money to make and then purchase a dub from scratch than it would to license an existing dub. You're going to make the same amount of money for your channel via ad revenues, it's only going to cost more for a dub made from scratch.

How?

Let's call FUNimation "company A," and whatever Canadian production company that's making Kai "company B." The television station(s) that airs the show is an independent entity.

Company B somehow has the legal go-ahead to produce their own dub, independently of FUNimation. Sure, it costs them money to produce it, but they get to sell it and make money that way, as opposed to just sitting by and allowing company A to sell their own dub to the same TV station. Argue all you want about the inherent necessity of another dub, but you can't deny that it makes more financial sense for company B to sell their own dub than to just do nothing, sit back, and allow company A to sell their product to what would've been their customer(s).

It's business 101. A ton of things in business are unnecessary, but they happen anyway because everyone wants a piece of the same pie. So while a Canadian dub is not necessary from a fan standpoint, it makes perfect sense to do so from a business standpoint.

And money is the only reason that Kai was ever conceived in the first place.

What I mean is that Funimation already has a dub, one that has been released on two networks and both DVD and Blu Ray, they've already begun to make revenue, and have multiple sources of revenue. They can afford to charge less to release to a network. Ocean not only would have yet to make a revenue from a Kai dub at first, but would also lack the ability to profit off of a home release, so they would have to charge more to make a profit, unless they make a cheaper dub, or Funimation jacks up the price.

A good compromise would be Ocean doing the marketing/releasing for Funi's international releases, and making a modest profit, making less actual income, but also spending less money. With Ocean having done the video edits, maybe it's enough to count against Canada's law about Canadian programs too.

[Kendamu]

Whatever happened to the show that Kai replaced when Kai first hit the air?

[TripleRach]

Whatever happened to the show that Kai replaced when Kai first hit the air?

Gegege no Kitarou? That ended entirely the week before Kai. And it doesn't look like there's been any new movies or episodes since then. But it's a franchise that's been around since the 60's, and this was its 5th anime, so it will probably make another comeback someday.

This particular series aired for two years, and it doesn't look like its ratings were much worse than Kai or One Piece. It seems like it usually made the top 10. But I guess that wasn't enough for Toei/Fuji TV to want to continue it elsewhere.

[Mewzard]

From what I've seen, this is nothing new. It seems to do a two-three year anime every decade (60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, and 00s so far). So, that's not a very good example of what may or may not happen to Kai. It was just a few episodes shorter than the anime they did in the 90s.

So, I don't think it's time to give up hope quite yet on Kai.

[RazorX]

I think the Funi dub of Kai is more than good enough. Perfect? No. Rough in a few places? Yes. But it is mostly a good dub.

OK, but you need to understand that there are people who don't share that view.

There are plenty of fans who would watch Kai, and I think many of them would be happy with a dub of high quality voice acting, accurate scripts, correct music, and good voice direction, even if it isn't Ocean dubbed. I started my fandom off with the Ocean dub of the early material, so it's not like it's impossible to enjoy a different dub than what one is used to. And your DVD recorder reference isn't the same. Technology can be modified for an array of purposes, effectiveness, and price. They can have different features, aesthetic design, and quality.

There is no reason for fans of the Ocean dub to put up with Funimation's dub if they don't have to.

As for my example, the principle I was pointing out was that competition, if utilised, can be good for the dubbing industry.

There really doesn't need to be multiple dubs of one series, it's pointless.

Let me ask you something. If the Ocean English dub of Dragon Ball Kai was released first and after a good number of episodes, information about a second English dub by Funimation was leaked, would you hold the same stance against the Funimation dub in this scenario?

Does there need to be a dub for New York, Texas, California, Canada, England, Ireland, Scotland, Australia, etc? If there doesn't need to be a dub for all the various regions of the world that speak the same language, then why does there even need to be two? Why can't one suffice? A second English dub is entirely pointless. It's not even like this is Cantonese vs Mandarin, or anything like that.

I would not mind multiple English dubs. I'd be interested in at least taking a look to see how good they'd be.

So, those two statements mean they will be good? We don't know the details of the script, who's doing the directing, what level of censorship may or may not exist, and what their goals are for this dub.

I said, for the sceptics, we have more information to assume the Ocean dub will be good than otherwise.

For myself, I am expecting the Ocean dub to be good.

Your points might've had some validity if it was a completely new company dubbing Kai, but we're talking about a highly professional company that has a reputation for producing good quality dubs and has worked on Dragon Ball Z before.

And see? You disprove your own point. You tell me to expect a good dub from Ocean because of their past performances (and I'd argue that when it comes to the first dub), yet you expect the worst from Funimation, yet get proven wrong. See? Expectations aren't always right. It could be a good dub, I admit that. But, you don't know, and it's entirely pointless when an English dub already exists.

No. You misunderstood my post or simply didn't read it.

In a nutshell, I said I have reasons to believe the Ocean dub will be good. I had reasons to believe Funimation's Freeza recast won't be good. I don't know if I can make it any clearer than that.

And yes, I think both voice actors can do fine jobs. But those voices still have too much of those early dub traits that stand out to my ears when I do hear the later material. To be honest, they should do what Sabat did, tone them back a bit towards their natural voices. Not all the way, but closer, to give a more natural sound. Because those voices don't sound natural in the least. Sabat's Piccolo sounds much closer to his speaking voice now, and at least Vegeta's much closer to natural. I think they can do it, I just don't know if they will.

If all you've seen is the first 53 episodes and then you happen to come across clips of Ocean's later dub, then the early traits would probably stand out simply because it's the same voice. You need to watch more than a few clips to appreciate that they adjusted their acting to reflect the changes to their characters.

McNeil and Drummond's Piccolo & Vegeta voices are perfectly fine as they were in DBZ, they don't need to change them or bring them closer to their natural voices. Both actors are able to create a voice different to their natural voice and act with it with relative ease, that's one reason why they are talented. Sabat needed to bring his character voices closer to his natural voice because he strained too much and has trouble acting.

A good compromise would be Ocean doing the marketing/releasing for Funi's international releases, and making a modest profit, making less actual income, but also spending less money. With Ocean having done the video edits, maybe it's enough to count against Canada's law about Canadian programs too.

No. Ocean are a media production company, not a marketing company. An actual good compromise would be Funimation marketing Ocean dubbed DBZ/Kai DVD/Blu Ray releases in USA and taking a bit of profit for their trouble.

I don't think Canada's law on their programs is a driving force behind the production of Ocean dub Kai, though it would help networks who want to broadcast Kai.