See you in the next dimension!

[eledoremassis02]

Why do people have such a problem with this line? I know the edited fist FUNimation dub stopped using words like "Die" and "Kill" early on but in the Japanese version they did use "kill" and "die" but they also used "destroy" and a line similar to the next dimension, "another world".

On another note, why did Dragonball Z get so much flac for using "Die" and "Kill" on TV when shows like Batman TAS used it frequently? Though, they did also use words like "iced".

[Herms]

but they also used "destroy" and a line similar to the next dimension, "another world".

"Another world" is a (perhaps overly) literal translation of the Japanese word for "afterlife"/"the land of the dead", ano-yo. It probably is where Funi got "next dimension" from, but they created the phrase for the express purpose of avoiding the concept of death, which isn't how ano-yo is used in Japanese.

[Hellspawn28]

I always found it a stupid term. I'm glad they started to use terms like "Die" and "Kill" after 1999 since I remember Gohan said "No I'm going to Kill You" during his fight with Super Buu like 10 something years ago.

[eledoremassis02]

but they also used "destroy" and a line similar to the next dimension, "another world".

"Another world" is a (perhaps overly) literal translation of the Japanese word for "afterlife"/"the land of the dead", ano-yo. It probably is where Funi got "next dimension" from, but they created the phrase for the express purpose of avoiding the concept of death, which isn't how ano-yo is used in Japanese.

That makes sense. Thank you ^^. In the case of translation, I think "the afterlife" would of suited better. But I read FUNimation had to sanitize the subtitles at first and when they started to include curse words they just left "another world" in.

Hellspawn28,

You're probably right as to why they came up with the term. It's annoying from the standpoint that they had to stop using "death" and "die" (they said it in the Ocean cast FUNidub in the first 2 episodes but then they had to change it).

I mean, I don't think it bothers me because it's quite obvious they die. I always interpreted the after life to be another dimension (but I think the Funi/Ocean dub helped that a bit), especially when Goku can go there at will even if he is not dead. Kami as well, though his connection as "Kami" makes sense as to why he could go to the afterlife.

I found it to be a kind of cool creative line. I mean it's better than "Now I will destroy you" lol

[TheBlackPaladin]

Y'know, strangely enough, it didn't bother me as a kid because I mentally registered "next dimension" as just a cooler way of saying "death." Whenever I heard a line like, "I'm going to send you to the next dimension," I didn't think anything of it and just thought to myself, "Oh, he's going to kill them." So as a young fan, I never had a huge problem with it and figured that the next dimension meant death. Even when I was discussing DBZ with my friends at school as a kid, we didn't talk about anybody "being sent to the next dimension," even my friends registered that to mean death. For example, when talking about Piccolo "being sent to the next dimension," we never used that phrase...we would always just say, "Nappa killed Piccolo when he tried to save Gohan."

However...to answer your question as to why people had problems with it...

It seems that us younglings--at least, me and my friends--didn't correctly register what FUNimation was trying to make us believe. We were never meant to register "next dimension" as just another phrase to indicate death. We were supposed to think that nobody dies in DBZ, they just go to the next dimension instead. It was not meant to be thought of as the same thing as death, FUNimation intended it to be interpreted as another thing entirely.

Soooo...for the older crowd who knew about the edits FUNimation was making, they were bothered that FUNimation "didn't have the guts to just say that characters died." They didn't like that FUNimation was (in their minds) wussing out and sidestepping the issue of death. So whenever they were watching the old dub and heard the phrase "next dimension," what they heard in their minds was, "HI, WE'RE FUNIMATION AND WE'RE CENSORING THIS SHOW!"

For the sake of context, this is pretty much the exact same issue that people had with the 4Kids dub of "Yu-Gi-Oh," except instead of "next dimension," we got "Shadow Realm."

[kidglov3s]

To me, it felt like they were diminishing the significance of the deaths (you think they could've just waited for "No matter how many times they've died!" to do that for them), and dumbing down the show without enough justification for doing so.

[Avenged]

I always found it a stupid term. I'm glad they started to use terms like "Die" and "Kill" after 1999 since I remember Gohan said "No I'm going to Kill You" during his fight with Super Buu like 10 something years ago.

"I don't want to fight you, I want to kill you."

[Bussani]

My problem with the phrase is that a dimension isn't a place: it's an axis.

[OutlawTorn]

I always felt the use of the word "dimension" was along the lines of the "alternate dimensions" sci-fi concept, thus another plane of existence. What started to grate on my nerves about it was how lines were often structured to bring attention to "next/another dimension" when it really could have been scaled back after a while since we didn't need Vegeta announcing he was going to send them to "another dimension" whenever he was going to kill somebody.

It would have sounded pretty stupid if they had replaced every mention of "death" with "another dimension" as one of Roshi's early DBZ lines might have been "I smell another dimension in the air" or it could have gotten comical with "You scared me halfway to another dimension!"

[eledoremassis02]

I always felt the use of the word "dimension" was along the lines of the "alternate dimensions" sci-fi concept, thus another plane of existence. What started to grate on my nerves about it was how lines were often structured to bring attention to "next/another dimension" when it really could have been scaled back after a while since we didn't need Vegeta announcing he was going to send them to "another dimension" whenever he was going to kill somebody.

It would have sounded pretty stupid if they had replaced every mention of "death" with "another dimension" as one of Roshi's early DBZ lines might have been "I smell another dimension in the air" or it could have gotten comical with "You scared me halfway to another dimension!"

A lot of good points. I can understand when you say Vegeta said it too much, as it was pretty much his catchphrase. And before the internet it would have been almost impossible to find out that they used to say die and death (heck, with the internet it's almost impossible *but thanks to Kanzenshuu we know *)

I guess me, and us youngsters took it for what it was lol. Perhaps it's the same reason why people hate the edits in the earlier dub as TheBlackPaladin suggested ""'I, WE'RE FUNIMATION AND WE'RE CENSORING THIS SHOW!'"

That brings up another question. I read an interview by one of the FUNimation guys (can't remember who) and they pretty much said that on the first Ginyu Saga DVD they had to have 2 video tracks because for the first English dub they had to re-edit the episodes because up until that point they were practically editing two episodes into one. Seeing as how after FUNimation became solely responsible with the production the Dragonball Z dub and also stopped fusing episodes together...my question is

Who was responsible for editing episodes together? Was it Saban, since they were huge on censoring?

[OutlawTorn]

That brings up another question. I read an interview by one of the FUNimation guys (can't remember who) and they pretty much said that on the first Ginyu Saga DVD they had to have 2 video tracks because for the first English dub they had to re-edit the episodes because up until that point they were practically editing two episodes into one. Seeing as how after FUNimation became solely responsible with the production the Dragonball Z dub and also stopped fusing episodes together...my question is

Who was responsible for editing episodes together? Was it Saban, since they were huge on censoring?

I think it was still FUNimation as the only real bit of production which was taken in house at that time was the ADR. If I had to guess, I'd imagine FUNimation had an order for x-amount of episodes and guidelines from Saban of what had to be censored or not. Then again, it does make you wonder since the title card sequences, which even some purists admit are better than the original*, stopped entirely following the end of FUNimation's partnership with Saban.

Even those nifty little CG animations for the episode titles are gone, now it's just simple white text. Wouldn't you know it? The one and ONLY thing that was actually BETTER than the Japanese show is no longer there.

[Tanooki Kuribo]

On another note, why did Dragonball Z get so much flac for using "Die" and "Kill" on TV when shows like Batman TAS used it frequently? Though, they did also use words like "iced".

Because, DragonBall Z was edited to be suitable for 3 year olds. Shows like Batman were aimed for kids a little older (7 - 12?).

[eledoremassis02]

On another note, why did Dragonball Z get so much flac for using "Die" and "Kill" on TV when shows like Batman TAS used it frequently? Though, they did also use words like "iced".

Because, DragonBall Z was edited to be suitable for 3 year olds. Shows like Batman were aimed for kids a little older (7 - 12?).

Wow.....they went wrong there lol

[matt0044]

On another note, why did Dragonball Z get so much flac for using "Die" and "Kill" on TV when shows like Batman TAS used it frequently? Though, they did also use words like "iced".

Because, DragonBall Z was edited to be suitable for 3 year olds. Shows like Batman were aimed for kids a little older (7 - 12?).

Seriously?! That young?

[TheBlackPaladin]

On another note, why did Dragonball Z get so much flac for using "Die" and "Kill" on TV when shows like Batman TAS used it frequently? Though, they did also use words like "iced".

Because, DragonBall Z was edited to be suitable for 3 year olds. Shows like Batman were aimed for kids a little older (7 - 12?).

Seriously?! That young?

Yup. I have a VHS with a few of the episodes of the Ocean dub, and I remember it did indeed say on the back cover, "Suitable for ages 3 and up."

[DBZAOTA482]

Whoever decided to that should get sent to the next dimension.

[Piccolo Daimao]

Basically, yes, “next dimension” is technically accurate, but it was just FUNimation’s way of getting around the touchy topic of death. Still, though, even as a youngster, it was pretty obvious to me when characters died. If anything, they made it more apparent with some of their edits, when they had Piccolo’s body disappear along with Kami.

[TheBlackPaladin]

Whoever decided to that should get sent to the next dimension.

Agreed, as long as they don't die.

Basically, yes, “next dimension” is technically accurate, but it was just FUNimation’s way of getting around the touchy topic of death. Still, though, even as a youngster, it was pretty obvious to me when characters died. If anything, they made it more apparent with some of their edits, when they had Piccolo’s body disappear along with Kami.

I actually kinda liked that edit, oddly enough. In a way it almost makes more sense, 'ya know? Kami disappeared, why wouldn't Piccolo? They either should have both disappeared, or Kami should have just suddenly fallen to the ground and died. Granted, this edit was done for the wrong reason, but I actually think it makes more sense.

[matt0044]

I actually kinda liked that edit, oddly enough. In a way it almost makes more sense, 'ya know? Kami disappeared, why wouldn't Piccolo? They either should have both disappeared, or Kami should have just suddenly fallen to the ground and died. Granted, this edit was done for the wrong reason, but I actually think it makes more sense.

Plus, that edit was exceptionally well done how they basically erased him. It like they were the ones doing the animation.

[the_abberration]

Personally, I believe some people may have found fault with the phrase, because it was American terminology to escape the use of the word death. If you've ever watched Voltron, you can clearly see how this phrase became infamous to many an anime fan. However it kinda backfired in DB's case IMO, because the afterlife could be viewed as "another dimension".

The case with Batman though, falls to my personal belief that while they were trying to be edgy, America still has some reservations (going back to anime shows like Kimba for example) of sanitizing shows from the East, using guidlines established way back in the 60's IIRC.

Softening the Story:

The final recurring problem was with the violence in the Japanese program. Ladd's team just had to disguise it as much as possible. Often this wasn't very possible, and the censorship was so obvious that it became a running joke with Kimba's young audience. Every time that the screen showed what was clearly a corpse, the kids would chant, "I'll just lie here and rest a moment," along with the dialogue. But the American audiences never realized how much violence was toned down in Kimba's own character.

In the Japanese version, Kimba was constantly struggling to maintain his ideals against his own carnivorous instincts. There were numerous incidents when it was much more obvious in the dialogue than in the action that he was on the verge of totally losing control of himself. In "Nightmare Narcissus", when Roger Ranger tries to stop Kimba from attacking Dr. Mendel Specs after Kimba realizes that Specs is responsible for the jungle's peril, Kimba says, "Don't try to stop me, Ranger, 'cause he endangered the animals with that horrible plant just for the sake of an experiment! I'm gonna see to it that he doesn't do it again!"

But what Kimba really said to Roger in the original Japanese was closer to, "Get out of my way unless you want to get hurt, too! " The voice actors had to constantly disguise personality lapses such as these. Sometimes they could be written out entirely. Sometimes, when it was obvious that Kimba had lost his temper, they would substitute some much milder statement and then further downplay it by having Dan'l or someone else say, "Why, Kimba, that's not like you!"

By comparison, the U.S. (seemingly) "takes risks" with a show that tackles the animated taboo of death, violence, or what have you.

I came to this conclusion during the 80's or 90's when shows like Starblazers, Robotech, and Voltron went to great lengths to be censored, but Transformers (an American show) had Blitzwing (the tank/plane Triple-changer) say to a human once in an episode called Triple Takeover: "Tell me what's on your mind, or I'll splatter it on the wall and see for myself!".

Nowaday$, for $ome rea$on, it $eem$ the U.$. ha$ noticed that the American viewer$hip want$ to $ee our anime $how$ uncen$ored. Which i$ why the $hift to bringing them out relatively untouched now ha$ become the new trend. For the life of me, I can't figure out why though.