Ocean Studios' "Dragon Ball Kai" Dub Turns 14; Still Unreleased

[jelleline89]

A little last minute but Brendan Hunter will be at an anime convention I'm attending tomorrow. From what I've read, he's supposedly playing Tien in Ocean Kai.

I am a little hesitant to actually ask him about Ocean Kai since in the past, he has chosen to remain silent on the project:
https://www.facebook.com/brendanhuntera ... ream_ref=5

This was three years ago, but the project still remains unofficially announced so I'm pretty sure Hunter's stance on the matter will remain the same though I could be wrong.

Should I try?

[Attitudefan]

A little last minute but Brendan Hunter will be at an anime convention I'm attending tomorrow. From what I've read, he's supposedly playing Tenshinhan in Ocean Kai.

I am a little hesitant to actually ask him about Ocean Kai since in the past, he has chosen to remain silent on the project:
https://www.facebook.com/brendanhuntera ... ream_ref=5

This was three years ago, but the project still remains unofficially announced so I'm pretty sure Hunter's stance on the matter will remain the same though I could be wrong.

Should I try?

No harm in trying. It's been years too, so it would be great to get some updated knowledge! Go for it!

[TheBlackPaladin]

A little last minute but Brendan Hunter will be at an anime convention I'm attending tomorrow. From what I've read, he's supposedly playing Tenshinhan in Ocean Kai.

I am a little hesitant to actually ask him about Ocean Kai since in the past, he has chosen to remain silent on the project:
https://www.facebook.com/brendanhuntera ... ream_ref=5

This was three years ago, but the project still remains unofficially announced so I'm pretty sure Hunter's stance on the matter will remain the same though I could be wrong.

Should I try?

Absolutely, feel free to try. As long as you respect and understand that he still may not want (or may not be allowed) to say much, there's no harm in asking.

[TheWhiz]

It's been 5 years so I think it's safe to say the "well they never really announced it" excuse is wearing thin.

My four best guesses are...

1: As mentioned above the dub is ready but companies think it's wiser to just not release them as they would probably lose money.

2: There are multiple companies involved making it a clusterfuck.

3: There waiting for the recent DB boom to end in order not to flood the market.

4: Scott McNeil, Sean Scheme and others all got together to pull a massive act of trolling.

While that 4th guess would be devious as hell, It's highly unlikely. I won't lie, it made me chuckle a little

[jelleline89]

Well I mustered enough courage to ask him today about it and... he "can't confirm or deny his involvement in such a project." It was still great meeting him, He was there with his wife and child and he was one of the nicest voice actors I've ever met.

[Android17]

Well I mustered enough courage to ask him today about it and... he "can't confirm or deny his involvement in such a project." It was still great meeting him, He was there with his wife and child and he was one of the nicest voice actors I've ever met.

Brendan Hunter definitely is working on Ocean Kai, or at least was at some point (who knows what's happening with the production anymore).

He was a guest at Otafest 2013 (a Calgary anime convention) and hosted a panel alongside Andrea Libman. During the panel he mentioned doing work for Kai (from how he phrased it, he may have believed it was already released and available to the public) and if my memory serves me he also performed a few of Tenshinhan's lines. At the end of the panel I asked him if he knew or could talk about when the Ocean dub might be getting any sort of release. He seemed surprised that it hadn't, and simply said that he wasn't informed of much on the production side of things.

[jelleline89]

Well I mustered enough courage to ask him today about it and... he "can't confirm or deny his involvement in such a project." It was still great meeting him, He was there with his wife and child and he was one of the nicest voice actors I've ever met.

Brendan Hunter definitely is working on Ocean Kai, or at least was at some point (who knows what's happening with the production anymore).

He was a guest at Otafest 2013 (a Calgary anime convention) and hosted a panel alongside Andrea Libman. During the panel he mentioned doing work for Kai (from how he phrased it, he may have believed it was already released and available to the public) and if my memory serves me he also performed a few of Tenshinhan's lines. At the end of the panel I asked him if he knew or could talk about when the Ocean dub might be getting any sort of release. He seemed surprised that it hadn't, and simply said that he wasn't informed of much on the production side of things.

Interesting. Wonder why the sudden change in his response to Ocean Kai.

[TheBlackPaladin]

Well I mustered enough courage to ask him today about it and... he "can't confirm or deny his involvement in such a project." It was still great meeting him, He was there with his wife and child and he was one of the nicest voice actors I've ever met.

Brendan Hunter definitely is working on Ocean Kai, or at least was at some point (who knows what's happening with the production anymore).

He was a guest at Otafest 2013 (a Calgary anime convention) and hosted a panel alongside Andrea Libman. During the panel he mentioned doing work for Kai (from how he phrased it, he may have believed it was already released and available to the public) and if my memory serves me he also performed a few of Tenshinhan's lines. At the end of the panel I asked him if he knew or could talk about when the Ocean dub might be getting any sort of release. He seemed surprised that it hadn't, and simply said that he wasn't informed of much on the production side of things.

Interesting. Wonder why the sudden change in his response to Ocean Kai.

Probably because he got an angry phone call/email/in-person talk from Ocean. A few voice actors have revealed they were working on the Ocean dub only to delete their remarks/tweets or backtrack on their comments. Even Scott McNeil, who most commonly disregarded his NDA, seemed to backtrack a little bit. The last time somebody asked what he was working on at a con, his response was, "Oh man.....I'm gonna get in so much trouble for this, but we're working on...." He then proceeded to mouth the words "Dragon Ball Kai."

[ShadowDude112]

This thread astonishes me for so many reason. In literally one month, it will have been half a decade since we heard about this at all. Still, nothing on this, other than actors saying they worked on it. No sneak preview that a tv studio or anime con has done. This seems like vaporware, or the tv equivalent of one. Like, the odds are that it was made and then shelved when they realized it wasn't profitable, or other reasons. We literally have next to nothing on it other than actors saying they did voice work for it. This could have been shelved, never to be seen by the public. Like, by this point, shouldn't we just give up? I doubt anything with this will happen. I will literally dress as Goku and walk around jumping up and down, pretending to fly, in public if this ever gets an official release.

[Pokewhiz7]

This thread astonishes me for so many reason. In literally one month, it will have been half a decade since we heard about this at all. Still, nothing on this, other than actors saying they worked on it. No sneak preview that a tv studio or anime con has done. This seems like vaporware, or the tv equivalent of one. Like, the odds are that it was made and then shelved when they realized it wasn't profitable, or other reasons. We literally have next to nothing on it other than actors saying they did voice work for it. This could have been shelved, never to be seen by the public. Like, by this point, shouldn't we just give up? I doubt anything with this will happen. I will literally dress as Goku and walk around jumping up and down, pretending to fly, in public if this ever gets an official release.

I will hold you to that, amigo. It's still fun to talk about, though.

[TheBlackPaladin]

Like, by this point, shouldn't we just give up? I doubt anything with this will happen. I will literally dress as Goku and walk around jumping up and down, pretending to fly, in public if this ever gets an official release.

Haha, you sure about that? I agree that the chances of us seeing this dub look slim now, but if we do, you may come to rue those words.

In any event, I think this thread should continue until the dub has been officially announced as cancelled. We may yet see it. A lot of things that I never thought would be seen have been seen. To name a few...

-Ridley Scott finally got to make his definitive cut of Blade Runner.
-The Richard Donner cut of Superman II was released.
-They're remaking Final Fantasy VII for the PS4.
-Shenmue III is being released.

[Android17]

If, hypothetically, this dub has been shelved and isn't going to see a release in any form, would the actors not then be allowed to talk about it? How long do NDA's stay in effect if the project is indefinitely cancelled?

I'm only asking because I really have no idea how the whole thing works.

[jelleline89]

-Moved to the next page-

[NitroEX]

[Wed Apr 29, 2015 8:04 am] Come July, if this dub is still not yet released, I'm moving past this once and for all.

I swear, I'm getting deja vu with all these recurring posts of the same people claiming to no longer be interested in this dub. It's like someone's standing on the edge of a building threatening to jump but never actually doing it.

I am pretty much ready to just bury this once and for all.

We get it, jump already!

P.S. If anyone working on Ocean Kai just so happens to stumble upon this thread (since, you know, it's like the second search result when I Google the words "Dragonball Kai" and "Ocean" together) then please don't listen to the negativity and continue trying to release it!

[jelleline89]

[Wed Apr 29, 2015 8:04 am] Come July, if this dub is still not yet released, I'm moving past this once and for all.

I swear, I'm getting deja vu with all these recurring posts of the same people claiming to no longer be interested in this dub. It's like someone's standing on the edge of a building threatening to jump but never actually doing it.

I am pretty much ready to just bury this once and for all.

We get it, jump already!

P.S. If anyone working on Ocean Kai just so happens to stumble upon this thread (since, you know, it's like the second search result when I Google the words "Dragonball Kai" and "Ocean" together) then please don't listen to the negativity and continue trying to release it!

Now you know how I feel when I still see people clinging to the hope that this dub is still actually going to be released when there hasn't been a single official confirmation from Ocean or Toei regarding this production. I have just as much of a right to express my opinion on this as you do so don't act like I can't because I don't believe this dub will be released.

And you're hilarious if you think someone from Ocean would actually be affected from the negativity in thread that they wouldn't release this. I don't think 5 years of silence from Ocean regarding their Kai dub is attributed to negativity of online discussions here or that they even care what we think on the matter.

[jelleline89]

Why? That's the question I ask myself every time I think about this dub. Why was this even produced?

First of all, it's was pretty risky of Ocean to even get the rights to produce a dub for this without even securing a channel to air this on, namely a Canadian channel. You have to wonder if YTV was on board to air this before they dissolve their "Bionix" anime block in September 2009. Z Kai started airing in Japan in April 2009, so this theory could work, but I can't be sure.

Was the CRTC even a big enough issue that it warranted the production of a Canadian dub for Z Kai? Alternate Canadian dubs are pretty much unheard of nowadays when you're talking about US dubs. You just don't see it anymore because there obviously isn't the same need for it like before. And with an anime block like "Bionix" that aired US dubs like Naruto and Bleach, they could have easily make do with a FUNimation dub of Z Kai. The UK did, they aired that dub not too long ago instead of the Ocean dub. As well, Digimon Fusion, a US dub and the first English Dub of a Digimon series in roughly five years, was easily able to be aired in both Canada and Europe.

If an edited version of the show was necessary, they always had the Nicktoons' edit to work with, especially since Ocean was the team behind the edits, meaning we would most likely see the same edits in Ocean Kai. If not, there was always the CW's edit, you can't much more edited than that, because let's face it, if it was anymore edited than that, they would be targeting the completely wrong demographic.

I guess the point I'm trying to make is, was there really a point for the production of Ocean Kai? In my opinion, no. The only reason I can even think for why this was even considered was for nostalgia. After all, they did originally dub early DBZ episodes for North America and even dubbed later episodes for Europe. Yet they took the edited approach rather than appealing to the older audience that would have nostalgia for such a dub? FUNimation has successfully accomplished dubbing Z Kai uncut and two formats of censored and they did a hell of a good job doing it too. To me, this would be like the DiC cast being brought back together to dub Sailor Moon Crystal even though Viz Media will also be dubbing it. It just doesn't make sense why we need it and I think that's why we ultimately never got it. Someone, whether it be Ocean, Toei or someone else involved in this, came to the realization that it wasn't necessary and just dropped the ax on this project all-together.

Next month, this thread will be five years old. Z Kai wrapped up in Japan 4 years ago (Not including Final Chapters) and in US 3 years ago (not including Episode 98, which aired a year after 97 on Nicktoons but was made available much earlier). The series has been made available on R1 home media, which includes Canada, for over three years. And with the arrival of new theatrical movies as well as Dragon Ball Super, I am pretty much ready to just bury this once and for all. Should new information be made public, such as official confirmation from Ocean about this dub's existence or an announced date and place it will be distributed, I will be ready to discuss it further. Hell, perhaps someone from Ocean will leak this dub online in twenty some years for us to finally enjoy. But at this point, I'm pretty certain we will never see this dub and this will be forever known as the dub that never came to be.

[Attitudefan]

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[sangofe]

Sorry attitudefan, didn't see you editing out your message and the following posts before now

[Attitudefan]

Hmm... well I haven't slept for 24 hours when writing this. What I mean is that it should just be left to "why not?" I didn't mean to sound so... ew. Haha! I think if it remains in Canada alone, there's no harm in it. I think it is a good thing.

Nothing wrong with having variety.

[sangofe]

Sounds like you were brain washed by your goverment, man... I mean, what? All english people should be satisfied with one english dub I'd say. I don't know why you shouldn't...

Hmm... well I haven't slept for 24 hours when writing this. What I mean is that it should just be left to "why not?" I didn't mean to sound so... ew. Haha! I think if it remains in Canada alone, there's no harm in it. I think it is a good thing.

Nothing wrong with having variety.

Certainly not, and I prefer the "ocean" cast myself, but the way you worded yourself