"FUNimation thinks its audience is stupid" - Wait, what?

[JulieYBM]

While Barry Watson's era (and subsequently his prescence in the industry whatsoever) is long over, I agree with the notion that his influence (and FUNimation simply not wanting to put out the money for new dubs for 508 episodes, three specials, and 17 films) still lingers like a bad weasel's last fart. As much as nostalgia plays a role in any jaded or rose-tinted views any of us have of the dub, and subsequently the original version (go, go, International Channel, go!), I think it's clear--both in the writing, or rewriting one should say, and casting--that the Dragon Ball Z dub wasn't marketed or crafted to be respectful of the series or the fans of the series before the license was obtained by a guy and his wheat mill (although the fans themselves weren't very respectful). FUNimation prides itself on it's social networking and the community of fans it has cultivated, and it is because they listen only to that 'modern anime fandom' that they don't see, or rather, don't care, that their dub is pretty atrocious and their tactics 'demeaning', whether or not intentional. Whatever brings in the money, right? Things won't ever change until the money stops flowing. The Orange Brick deal was a loud enough uproar (thanks in part to our friends in the media) and so out of it we (literally, this community) got the Dragon Boxes tailored espicially for us (save for the current dub being available, of which I'm sure many of us would have preffered to not be on the box or be a completely redone one). My stance is that if there is going to be a dub produced then it should be a good one (i.e. something done with respect and intergrity like pretty much all of their other dubs). The Dragon Ball dubs aren't "up to code" by any meaning of the phrase. As a marketing tool (at least to those who just won't touch a Japanese show in Japanese with subtitles) it only services the [aging] Toonami gen. What happens in ten or twenty years, assuming FUNimation still has the license? Do we want that to be the "face of Dragon Ball Z" in the R1 market? Do we want a potential, and vocal, subset of anime fans to be approving of the sort of changes and marketting the Dragon Ball franchise is powered by in North America? That'd very well help counteract a decade-plus of long, hard, fighting. And the scary part is it only takes a small fraction of a seed for something like that to grow.


To avoid getting off on a tangent, let us look at it like so: FUNimation seems to think everything is fine the way it is. Fans who buy into their marketting are happy with the status quo (...assuming they exist?). Non-fans of Dragon Ball don't care. Looking at the situation objectively, would anyone say the Great Orange Brick Debacle of 2007, the Ultimate Uncut release, the general and blantant Americanization of the show, and lack of over all care to evaluate and compare the property with the treatment they have given others? They wouldn't dare think twice of trying this shit with One Piece fans, that's for sure.

So I ask, what does change mean in the long run? If the current ways are ditched and replaced with the opposite of those practices...will anyone complain in five, ten, fifty years?

[Piccolo Daimaoh]

On the topic of the Season Sets marketing, FUNimation couldn't have said that the cropping was bad and the remastering process actually made the show worse because then no one would fucking buy it. It's common sense people, yet some people here fail to understand it.
The didn't treat us like idiots, they didn't treat us like 9 year olds, (though the Season Sets were marketed to pre-teens) they were just trying to sell a product to make money because that's what companies do.

What?! Again they made the choice to crop it and do a shitty re-master. They weren't victims of someone else's whims. They weren't forced to do it and forced to try and sell it. They cropped the picture and said it gave more image - they shit in our coffee and called it sugar.

I have no idea where you get the idea that FUNi needed to put out these terrible season sets. They didn't.

Yes, FUNi fucked up. The cropping and shitty re-master was bad and I don't know what was going through their heads at that time.

Yes, they lied to sell a product but that's not an uncommon occurance in the world of marketing. Lots of companies lie or change the truth to sell a product. Stop singling FUNi out as the Devil for doing this because they are definately not alone.

[VegettoEX]

Yes, they lied to sell a product but that's not an uncommon occurance in the world of marketing. Lots of companies lie or change the truth to sell a product. Stop singling FUNi out as the Devil for doing this because they are definately not alone.

The thread was created to very specifically to discuss FUNimation and the way that they treat fans and market the show.

What or who on Earth are you expecting to read about? I think it's just more of you not liking what you're reading.

[Piccolo Daimaoh]

Yes, they lied to sell a product but that's not an uncommon occurance in the world of marketing. Lots of companies lie or change the truth to sell a product. Stop singling FUNi out as the Devil for doing this because they are definately not alone.

The thread was created to very specifically to discuss FUNimation and the way that they treat fans and market the show.

What or who on Earth are you expecting to read about? I think it's just more of you not liking what you're reading.

It's just that everyone is saying that FUNimation lied to us and that they think we're idiots. I'm saying that they had a reason to lie which was to sell a product and some people actually believed their lies.

[MajinVejitaXV]

It's just that everyone is saying that FUNimation lied to us and that they think we're idiots. I'm saying that they had a reason to lie which was to sell a product and some people actually believed their lies.

So...they lied for personal gain. That basically describes the motive for nearly every lie people tell, whether they're individuals or corporate entities, so I'm obviously not getting your point.

[Piccolo Daimaoh]

It's just that everyone is saying that FUNimation lied to us and that they think we're idiots. I'm saying that they had a reason to lie which was to sell a product and some people actually believed their lies.

So...they lied for personal gain. That basically describes the motive for nearly every lie people tell, whether they're individuals or corporate entities, so I'm obviously not getting your point.

Yes, you hit the nail on the head.

[MajinVejitaXV]

It's just that everyone is saying that FUNimation lied to us and that they think we're idiots. I'm saying that they had a reason to lie which was to sell a product and some people actually believed their lies.

So...they lied for personal gain. That basically describes the motive for nearly every lie people tell, whether they're individuals or corporate entities, so I'm obviously not getting your point.

Yes, you hit the nail on the head.

...so by not getting your point, I got your point? Wow, that's mighty zen.

[B]

It's just that everyone is saying that FUNimation lied to us and that they think we're idiots. I'm saying that they had a reason to lie which was to sell a product and some people actually believed their lies.

So...they lied for personal gain. That basically describes the motive for nearly every lie people tell, whether they're individuals or corporate entities, so I'm obviously not getting your point.

Yes, you hit the nail on the head.

Yeah, we get that. But why do you think that excuses them? Why is that a satisfactory reason to you?

[Gaffer Tape]

Yeah, I'm just still not getting this defensive mentality with the season sets. Every time someone defends it, I'm still getting that vibe that desirecampbell pointed out: it comes across as though you think a raggedy FUNimation just happened across a tin of 16:9, horribly colored DBZ and just HAD to do something with it. No. They'd been dubbing the show for over a decade at that point. They chose to do all those things because they thought it was the best thing to do with the show. And it was really stupid. But that's not the point. People do stupid things and rationalize them all the time. And there were plenty of "marketing" ways to justify what they did, some of which they used. They could say it was more cinematic, the colors more vibrant, say it was updated for new HDTVs, say it was the way it was the meant to be seen, any SUBJECTIVE marketing speak that would fool the uninformed masses into thinking the product was good. And like I said, they did say a lot of those things. I roll my eyes at those things, but I don't call FUNimation liars for those things. I call them liars for claiming the colors were unchanged. I call them liars for claiming that cutting off the tops and bottoms of the frames provided more picture. I call them liars for introducing artificial grain into comparison shots. Those things cross the line. Those were dishonest and unnecessary to sell the product. Seriously. How can you possibly defend that? How can anyone step back and objectively defend blatant lies? It just makes no sense!

[desirecampbell]

It's just that everyone is saying that FUNimation lied to us and that they think we're idiots. I'm saying that they had a reason to lie which was to sell a product and some people actually believed their lies.

So...they lied for personal gain. That basically describes the motive for nearly every lie people tell, whether they're individuals or corporate entities, so I'm obviously not getting your point.

Yes, you hit the nail on the head.

So, it's cool to treat you like an idiot if it makes you give me money? I'm confused.

[Piccolo Daimaoh]

So, it's cool to treat you like an idiot if it makes you give me money? I'm confused.

Well, some people don't realise they're being treated like idiots.

[MajinVejitaXV]

So, it's cool to treat you like an idiot if it makes you give me money? I'm confused.

Well, some people don't realise they're being treated like idiots.

So, in your mind, taking advantage of a group that is incapable of realizing they're being deceived for financial gain is a-ok? And this doesn't necessarily apply to the topic at hand, simply because I believe 90% of the populous here is perfectly capable of realizing they're being lied to, they just don't care (but make topics for some reason, *insert rimshot here*) or are too ashamed to admit that they were duped.

[desirecampbell]

So, it's cool to treat you like an idiot if it makes you give me money? I'm confused.

Well, some people don't realise they're being treated like idiots.

No, apparently some people don't.

[Piccolo Daimaoh]

So, it's cool to treat you like an idiot if it makes you give me money? I'm confused.

Well, some people don't realise they're being treated like idiots.

So, in your mind, taking advantage of a group that is incapable of realizing they're being deceived for financial gain is a-ok? And this doesn't necessarily apply to the topic at hand, simply because I believe 90% of the populous here is perfectly capable of realizing they're being lied to, they just don't care (but make topics for some reason, *insert rimshot here*) or are too ashamed to admit that they were duped.

Deceived? You're acting like it's some sort of scam. Bear in mind that some people liked the cropping and just wanted to buy the series no matter how it was presented. It's just the hardcore fans who were pissed that FUNi said that the cropping gained more picture (it did, but a lot was lost in the process however).

[JulieYBM]

So, in your mind, taking advantage of a group that is incapable of realizing they're being deceived for financial gain is a-ok? And this doesn't necessarily apply to the topic at hand, simply because I believe 90% of the populous here is perfectly capable of realizing they're being lied to, they just don't care (but make topics for some reason, *insert rimshot here*) or are too ashamed to admit that they were duped.

Deceived? You're acting like it's some sort of scam. Bear in mind that some people liked the cropping and just wanted to buy the series no matter how it was presented. It's just the hardcore fans who were pissed that FUNi said that the cropping gained more picture (it did, but a lot was lost in the process however).

It was a scam. Did the lying not tip you off?

[B]

Deceived? You're acting like it's some sort of scam. Bear in mind that some people liked the cropping and just wanted to buy the series no matter how it was presented. It's just the hardcore fans who were pissed that FUNi said that the cropping gained more picture (it did, but a lot was lost in the process however).

Bolded for emphasis. The definition of "deception" is to mislead on technicalities.

[Piccolo Daimaoh]

It was a scam. Did the lying not tip you off?

Again, it was a scam to you because you didn't like the cropping. Yes, they lied about one thing but that doesn't mean you were being scammed.

[B]

It was a scam. Did the lying not tip you off?

Again, it was a scam to you because you didn't like the cropping. Yes, they lied about one thing but that doesn't mean you were being scammed.

Okay, now you're using the term "scam" as if it's subjective. Thoughts on the cropping bear little importance to the main issue: they mucked around with things and misleadingly touted it as "definitive."

[Raki]

It was a scam. Did the lying not tip you off?

Again, it was a scam to you because you didn't like the cropping. Yes, they lied about one thing but that doesn't mean you were being scammed.

It was a scam because it was presented as being one thing and it was something totally different all together.

[Piccolo Daimaoh]

It was a scam. Did the lying not tip you off?

Again, it was a scam to you because you didn't like the cropping. Yes, they lied about one thing but that doesn't mean you were being scammed.

Okay, now you're using the term "scam" as if it's subjective. Thoughts on the cropping bear little importance to the main issue: they mucked around with things and misleadingly touted it as "definitive."

Bad advertising and a scam are two different things.