Gaffer Tape wrote:Well, I wouldn't say that point doesn't often get brought up. To be blunt, you bring it up every time this topic is breached. That's not a knock against you. I don't think anything in this thread is new to anyone who's been around the block.
Yeah, I guess this subject has come up on this forum...y'know, somewhat frequently here and there.
My response to the
Charlie Brown example you brought up would be that--assuming everybody in the cast is in the relative same ball-park age-wise, save the 13-year-old--since the play is demonstrating early on that older-looking people can play younger-looking people, the "rules" of the world of that play have been established. In other words, it doesn't seem out of place because it is established early on that, in that production, older-looking people playing kids is an artistic decision that the director made, and something that can happen in that world.
Aaaaaand.....here's where being exposed to a dub first, before the original Japanese version, has come back to haunt me and others.
Yup, I'm admitting it. As much as I
hate to admit it, I'm admitting it. The dub--and it happens to be the English dub in this case, but it could have been any dub of
Dragon Ball, really--made it a slight problem. If I had seen the Japanese version first, it would have been much easier for me to accept that the world of
Dragon Ball is a world where each character has one voice that changes only marginally depending on their age. Alas, that's not what happened. I saw the dub first...and the dub, for me, established the world of
Dragon Ball as a world where each character (at least in concept, if not necessarily in execution) sounds their age. So it was odd to see another version--in this case, the Japanese version--where the same rule wasn't followed.
If I could compare it to the
Charlie Brown example you brought up, it would be like showing a version of that play where all of the kid characters were played by kids, and then one day, after the intermission, we suddenly heard on the PA system, "Attention audiences, the actors seen thus far will not be playing their parts for the remainder of the play...for the remainder of the play, we have the following new cast..." and then the adults came out. Metaphorically speaking, that's how the introduction of some of the Japanese voices felt to me. It came across as...odd.
Since every other dub did the same (my apologies for bringing that up again for the umpteenth time
), I'd have to assume that it's like that for many other fans as well. In whatever version of something you see first, the rules are established, and deviating from them is not always easy for audience members to do. That's where the accusations of "nostalgia-blinding" typically come in...but then again, that's the reason why certain terms like "my cast" get thrown around...some casts work better for some than others. In every instance where a character has been played by more than one actor, there will be some who like one performance and some who like another. It's all subjective. Between the way I was first exposed to
Dragon Ball, and my satisfaction with the performances of (most) of the English cast as of
Kai...I guess, in this case, hearing voices that don't match the characters age-wise is a tad too odd for me.
My need for realism doesn't trump my ability to connect with characters, the latter is what is paramount. However, a lack of believability can interfere with emotional connection...if something feels like it doesn't fit, it can become difficult to focus on the performance in and of itself.
Could assigning one voice actor to each character, regardless of their age, work? Absolutely it could, and for many, it has. For many others, it hasn't.
PS/Off-Topic: Congrats on landing the lead role in
Charlie Brown!
