FUNimation DBZ TV Blu-ray Official On-Going Thread

[BlazingFiddlesticks]

I can't find the post, but my response (Which was on the website) was pretty much "wha? ok." It sort of was inevitable, so far as covering every single base possible with the series. Funimation is starting to risk emulating what Toei's done with Kai at this point, I think its reasonable to say.

Only thing that got me was the episode count; Orange Bricks in their native 1080p is one thing, I recall some of the Blu-Ray movies looking pretty nice, even just from 1080p-displayed Youtube rips. 17 sets and episode batches that don't stand on their own after two complete box set releases is just wonky. I'm not judging until I see the results, I'll be picking up the DBoxes like the rest of this community. Now, the Kai combo packs are what's actually interesting me. A "complete series" down the line maybe? Yes? Great?

Ironically, I have a Kai-suspicious friend (Not on grounds of the dub, he knows its the "serious" version, more the footage cuts and video edits) who was waiting for a Blu-ray version by virtue of the fact that we all knew Funimation was going to do it, so why not HD? So I texted him this, tthen texted him the episode count and potential Orange Brick base, and while he's not really a brick-basher, his response was the same "wat?" as mine.

Uh...you'd actually be surprised. Everybody I know in my area, who probably haven't watched Z since the Toonami days, have all watched Kai at some point in the past year and have all had the same reaction: "What the fuck is this shit?" "What's up with Gohan's voice?!" "This music sucks, where's that song from when Goku went Super Saiyan, that shit was dope!" and so on.

That is, until you put in your DVD's and show them both versions back to back like I did with one of my friends who was exactly like that.

His response, vaguely, was "Oh..."

The purist in me says that multi-series owners seriously need to start doing this. Nothing wrong with nostalgia, heck, my first run through of each of my Dragon Boxes is the dub (Which makes how much sense, right?), but I don't see a problem in pointing out when it is clearly misplaced.

I myself think Kai's color correction looks kinda "off" somehow at times. It's kinda difficult to explain (And the amount of randomly-placed digitally-redrawn scenes may compound the issue), but... yeah, let me just cut a few lines here because I'm having difficulty with my point. Sorry if this sounds poorly-communicated.

Colors that looked "natural" or subdued when rendered on older film (particularly certain skin tones or red/orange shades) instead "pop out" in the remastered footage. If you take a shot of Dbox Z and compare it to Kai, you can note that besides the color corrections, it tends to appear like all the other colors were adjusted to appear... would "Sharper" or "harder" be a good term here? They aren't saturated like the Orange Bricks, but instead they appear to have a "Digital Coloring" feel to them. All the colors pop out more. A lot of times with Kai the yellows, oranges and reds seem to "pop out" a lot more, and this can make things like skin tones, character outfits, and such make my eyes feel a tad unnatural or visually uncomfortable with the high amounts of contrast or the use of jarring colors that worked in film because they'd appear subdued by the time they got to an audience, but not so much when a "remastering" corrects the color and removes the grain, making the image look more digital.

I agree, vehemently. There are times where Kai's colors seemed to be puffed up and boldened just for the sake of it. That's not a remaster so much as proof that you were desperate to show you digitally edited it.

Some of the redrawn stuff in the Cell Games was gorgeous, though.

Got to see this. jjgp is absolutely right, the redrawn portions are painfully obvious, but on occasion is works out great.

I'll wait and see what it looks like before even bothering, but I think popping the Dragon Boxes into a system that can upscale (My laptop can, as can the PS3) will be the best quality version of the show possible.

Ironically, my HDTV-connected DVD player has a fantastic upscaler (I will never need Blu-Ray, at all, let's just say that), yet of all the things I've watched on it I recall the DBoxes being the least affected. Then again, they don't rip apart at the pixels due to stretching, and that's pretty much what upscaling is supposed to do for something like that . I'll check that again sometime.

[Luke Groundwalker]

I'm 99.9% sure. It's pretty much the general consensus on here. Again: the scenes that were redrawn are very clear. Most of them look a lot more "modern" in comparison to the rest of the episode, and at their worst, look like flash animation. The rest of the episode very clearly look like 16mm film that's blurred.

Hrm I see. Looking on kanzentai, I found some screens and yeah it does look noticeably different (even though it's modeled the same).

But yeah, would there really be any other way to transfer it to Bluray decently than doing approximately this to the entire series?

[Piccolo Daimaoh]

I figure they need something (anything) new to advertise for these. Because クヘタルにくこと, aka. "The way it was meant to be seen" and "Original Japanese masters" is already taken

If FUNimation had wanted those slogans translated (or transliterated), they could have done so. They were just using random Japanese characters for stylistic effect. I'm sick of people asserting or implying that they were being ignorant or lazy.

[xzero]

For anyone who cares, I emailed them and asked for clarification on the dub voice and music information. No response yet, and I probably won't get one, but the question has been posed them. Specifically, I asked whether the Johnson/Faulconer music will be an option ala the Season Sets and whether the dub is the same as we've seen on the DBoxes and Season Sets or whether it was redone with the Kai cast. Like I said, I don't anticipate a response, but it was worth asking.

[jjgp1112]

Well they said, "original FUNimation soundtrack" in the press release so I'd assume it's in. A better question is whether the Dub w/ Japanese score will be in.

[Zestanor]

It says "features the original U.S. voice actors." Maybe they thought that we thought that they were making a new dub? And they obviously hold their "restoration process" higher than their audio tracks. When I read that last bit "also includes audio..." that's what I thought.

kanzentai

[Daimo-Rukiri]

So now we finally get to see the infamous HD master? Well that means season 2 is gonna be bright as f***.

I'd buy this only for 2 reasons.
A.) It's super cheap
B.) Redub

[kei17]

- Fully mixed Japanese audio track
- Isolated music track
- Isolated sound effects track

It seems that FUNi doesn't have access to the isolated music track of some early Z episodes. They used the ME (music & effects) track for those episodes.

[jpdbzrulz4sure]

It seems that FUNi doesn't have access to the isolated music track of some early Z episodes.

Which ones, exactly?

[Codarik]

Kinda weird putting the dub music in this, they didn't include it in the Dragon Box, online streaming and PSN. Thought they were trying to phase out their music.

I know I will buy it, but I'm hoping FUNimation says or does something to it to make me not want to buy it. Like not including the dub music.

[jjgp1112]

Kinda weird putting the dub music in this, they didn't include it in the Dragon Box, online streaming and PSN. Thought they were trying to phase out their music.

I know I will buy it, but I'm hoping FUNimation says or does something to it to make me not want to buy it. Like not including the dub music.

How would it's exclusion somehow make it worth buying? If it were there, you wouldn't be watching it either way.

[kei17]

It seems that FUNi doesn't have access to the isolated music track of some early Z episodes.

Which ones, exactly?

If my memory serves me well, they're episode 1 to 16. BGM and effects are all combined in these episodes.

[Chibi Gohan]

There's really no reason for me to buy these. The only thing different about this release is the format and I already have the Dragon Boxes, which I feel will easily have a greater quality than the Blu-Ray set. Plus I'm not really the type of person that can justify buying the same thing multiple times...

I'm also not sure why there's speculation on a re-dub, since that would require some time and effort, which from a business point of view wouldn't be a smart decision.

[sangofe]

I'm not exactly emotional one way or another about this. We got the DBox. I really don't care about anything else. The only thing that got a "wat?" out of me was the extremely low episode count. Not sure if fans will buy this volume episodes for $30-$50 a volume. They may just pirate it instead.

The way I read the initial announcement, it seems as if this'll be a new remaster. If that's the case, I'll at least give FUNimation props for not using the Orange Bricks again, even if this is barely a blip on my radar.

Maybe once I see some actual footage I might see about at least grabbing the first volume just for kicks.

If this is better video quality, and clearer than the Dragonboxes, I will purchase them, even though I got the Japanese Dragonboxes as well as the French DBZ boxes

[Choujin Daizenshuu]

For anyone who cares, I emailed them and asked for clarification on the dub voice and music information. No response yet, and I probably won't get one, but the question has been posed them. Specifically, I asked whether the Johnson/Faulconer music will be an option ala the Season Sets and whether the dub is the same as we've seen on the DBoxes and Season Sets or whether it was redone with the Kai cast. Like I said, I don't anticipate a response, but it was worth asking.

Dude, it's not worth e-mailing the company in this day and age over something like that. I should know. I've sent them countless e-mails in the past regarding the status over the Ultimate Uncuts and never once got a response.

[KiddoCabbusses]

I'm also not sure why there's speculation on a re-dub, since that would require some time and effort, which from a business point of view wouldn't be a smart decision.

I could see them splicing in some Kai lines to replace some of the Z lines, if they wanted to make some changes without rerecording everything. Theoretically a good amount of Sean Schemmel's or Chris Sabat's cornier lines could be swapped for Kai lines without breaking the flow of the "dub" too much.

[jjgp1112]

I really doubt they're redubbing anything. There's absolutely no reason to.

[funrush]

If they are, that might be a good explanation as to why these sets only have 17 episodes other than "Funimation wants our money".

[JulieYBM]

If they are, that might be a good explanation as to why these sets only have 17 episodes other than "Funimation wants our money".

Well, they likely spent a lot of money making these new Blu-ray masters, so they have to spread things out. I suspect the next set will be eighteen episodes, though, just to end the arc with Vegeta leaving.

[Tanooki Kuribo]

... I suspect the next set will be eighteen episodes, though, just to end the arc with Vegeta leaving.

I was thinking that too but, a listing for level 1.2 on Amazon.com shows it's running time of 410 minutes which is (roughly) 17 episodes. But hey, it's still early. Things could change... I hope.