Opinions on the Ocean dub of movies 1-3?

[BootyCheeksJohnson]

The Pioneer/Ocean dub of the first 3 Z movies is considered by many to be some of the most accurate English adaptations that Dragon Ball has ever had. Personally while they were a step in the right direction I still feel that there were holdovers from the Saban/Funimation collaboration that hold the Pioneer dubs back. Mainly the voices. Yes, while the overall scripting and directing is better that can only do so much to fix miscast characters. We still have goofy marble mouth Kaio. We still have Ocean Krillin and Muten Roshi who sound like they came straight out of a Hanna Barbera cartoon, with deliveries that I can just never take seriously. (When Muten Roshi tells the bio men "no. I already told him I don't want to go with you." my brother and I started laughing because his voice and delivery made him sound like an old man who didn't want to take his medicine.) Speaking of Hanna Barbera, there are lots of goofy H/B sound effects layered over the movies for some reason. (Which I think is a holdover from Saban, and it was also used a bit during the beginning of the 1999 in-house dub. Thanks internet archive.) It really takes me out of the movie because they feel out of place in Dragon Ball.
That said there are some bright spots. The scripting in these adaptations was high quality. Probably the best any of these movie dubs received until Battle of Gods. Goku talks in a more ghetto way (for a lack of better terms) that I think is in character. "Where you got Master Roshi? Tell me now!" "Ya can't beat me, I'll take ya' all on." Probably the best examples that come to mind. These movies contain the first case of an English Dragon Ball dub using the original Shunsuke Kikuchi score. Scott McNeil remains terrific casting as Piccolo. While I think she's been surpassed by Colleen's performance Saffron Henderson showed potential as Gohan, and is infinitely easier to digest than Nadolny. And, Peter Kelamis I think had potential to be great as Goku had he been allowed to reinvent the voice into a more hillbilly esq performance like he brought out with Rolf. Instead of having to mimic Ian Corlett for the purpose keeping continuity.
I watched the Ocean dub of the first two movies last night with my brother and I think he put it best. "I think we just like those movies." He's not wrong 9 times out of 10 I'll pick the Japanese version. With the other 1 to show friends who've never seen the Ocean dub that version as a curiosity, since most people I know who're fans have never seen it.
So, what are your feelings on the Pioneer/Ocean dub of movies 1-3? What are your feelings on the Funimation re-dubs? Am I digging too deep into 1997/8 dubs of old Japanese cartoons? Yeah, probably.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Speaking of Hanna Barbera, there are lots of goofy H/B sound effects layered over the movies for some reason. (Which I think is a holdover from Saban, and it was also used a bit during the beginning of the 1999 in-house dub. Thanks internet archive.)

Actually the sound effects are a very common feature of Ocean dubs, particularly in series generally aimed towards younger audiences. Ocean used additional sound effects in not only their own dub that was independent of Funimation (known by fans as the "Westwood dub") but also in the edit of Funimation's dub they produced for broadcast exclusively on YTV. Allegedly Ocean's dub of Kai also makes use of added sound effects.

The Pioneer dubs in particular, while they were produced by Pioneer had heavy involvement from Ocean Productions and their various contractors. Ward Perry wrote the scripts and Karl Willems directed, for example.

As for my thoughts on the Pioneer movie dubs, it's all personal preference at the end of the day but I'm quite fond of them. To this day they still have some of the best performances we've heard in any Dragon Ball dubs.

Peter Kelamis captures Goku's naivety and country bumpkin mannerisms perfectly, Scott McNeil has that right demonic edge for Piccolo, who at this point was very much an anti-hero, even some of the less than stellar castings like Don Brown as Kaio or Matt Smith as Tenshinhan are not as bad as they were in the edited Funimation or Westwood dubs, and I would say are serviceable at worst.

[WittyUsername]

I know they’re seen as the gold standard of how to do an English dub of Dragon Ball, but I think they’re still a product of their time to some extent, and those sound effects are pretty unnecessary and distracting. I think the fact that movies 1-3 are generally well liked by fans might contribute to why those dubs are held in high regard.

[ABED]

They'd be perfect if not for Kelamis. I'm not being glib. He's just awful. He's at his best here, but that's not saying much.

[MasenkoHA]

I agree with you they were a step in the right direction but holdovers from Funimation's prior decisions held it back a bit.

I don't like Peter Kelamis as Goku and think Sean Schemmel did a much better job in Funimation's in-house redub of the movies. Shame Ian Corlett wasn't still voicing Goku when they did the movies. Don Brown's Roshi is just embarrassing and it kind of hurts the World Strongest dub in particular. Also there are some odd localizations like Gohan shouting "Power Beam" when he uses Masenko and Yamcha's Sokidan being called Power Shot (which eventually became Spirit Ball by the Dragon Ball dub). I can't remember did Funimation not get around to keeping Masenko until season 3?

But the good outweighs the bad and it should have been proof to Funimation that Dragon Ball Z could succeed in America with accurate scripts, the original Japanese music, and uncut. Sure it was probably too late to course correct completely and recast Frieza with an appropriate male voice and direct Brian Drummond to voice Vegeta like a normal person and pronounce Saiyan the correct way but we still could have fixed everything else. Instead the only thing Funimation took from it was there was a market for an uncut dub but that was just a slightly edgier version of their tv friendly dub.

I think the fact that movies 1-3 are generally well liked by fans might contribute to why those dubs are held in high regard.

I think the fact Funimation followed those movies up with dog shit contributed to those dubs being held up in high regard more than anything.

[NitroEX]

They were still better than Funimation's in-house output until (arguably) the post-Kai era but similar to your criticisms of this dub, I personally find those modern dubs are held back by various problems inherited from Funimation's Z dubs, as well as occasionally being overwritten.

The Pioneer/Ocean dubs had the benefit of being produced without Barry Watson's oversight and used Pioneer's own producers instead. It's why there was more freedom for Ocean to fix pronunciations and make the script closer to the original.

The sound effects I never took issue with, aside from one or two placements here and there. Generally, I feel their sound editors did a professional job and gave the films a more cinematic sounding mix. That's not to say the original is bad but there are times when the original mix sounds flat and old-fashioned by comparison. In particular things like explosions, ki attacks and general foley are much improved in the Ocean dub. I don't think stripping that away would improve it. If I want to hear the original mix I'll watch the original.

The one area I can agree on is the Roshi casting. Kelamis and Don Brown took over and served as transitional voices to match Ian's Roshi, none of them worked as well sadly. The Roshi voices that came before and after were better castings in my opinion.

I suppose if I had to improve these dubs in any way it would have been to ditch Funimation's attack names (Destructo Disc, Power Pole Extend, etc) and instead use more accurate terms (Kienzan, Nyo-Bo), similar to the Blue Water dubs that Ocean scripted later. It's kind of a bizarre oddity that they even ended up using Hire Dragon instead of Icarus.

And, Peter Kelamis I think had potential to be great as Goku had he been allowed to reinvent the voice into a more hillbilly esq performance like he brought out with Rolf. Instead of having to mimic Ian Corlett for the purpose keeping continuity.

I don't think that Rolf idea would work honestly, especially as a follow-up to Ian. Peter was already receiving hate back then despite the good job he was doing. Had he gone full Rolf it would have garnered backlash.

Kelamis was still being directed to match Ian at the time, he didn't drop this until the Westwood era dub when Karl was no longer directing him. Overall I think he was the right guy to be able to match both Ian Corlett's voice as well as Nozawa's screams. He really was the perfect casting for those movies at that time and I think he had the potential to do even greater things had he been given the same opportunities as Schemmel.

"Where you got Master Roshi? Tell me now!"

I think it's supposed to be "Where've you got Master Roshi? Tell me now!"

While I think she's been surpassed by Colleen's performance Saffron Henderson showed potential as Gohan, and is infinitely easier to digest than Nadolny.

Performance quality is arguable but I think Saffron was a better voice casting than Colleen, who often struggled to sound convincing as a boy. Saffron, as a result of being well cast for the part, never had this issue.

We still have goofy marble mouth Kaio.

I hope you also complain about marble mouth Cell too.

[TheGreatness25]

I really like the dubs, but just never liked the movies in general. It took me a long time to appreciate Kelamis's Goku because I just really loved Corlett's voice--even if Goku did sound way too superheroic. I pretty much thought that the casting was perfect except the occasional oddity like the Roshi replacement. I didn't realize that Corlett voiced Roshi too--I liked Corlett's performance and hated it since. Though, I think that Roshi's Funimation voice is the rare improvement on the Ocean dub.

I am indifferent to Kelamis's Goku just because it's a pretty loud and aggressive performance. But then again, Nozawa's performance is the same way. So, I can't really fault Kelamis for it.

I know this is an unpopular opinion (probably), but I like the TV edit of Tree of Might more because I really love Corlett's performance (even if it's not as accurate).

[SuperSaiyaManZ94]

I really like them, and they definitely showed especially back in the late '90s that dubbed Dragon Ball COULD be done without replacement scores or butchered scripts full of horrid, corny one liners and bad jokes. It's a shame that FUNi didn't get the hint and proceeded on to in house and put out a worse product themselves.

To this day the Pioneer dubs they still remain my preferred versions of Z movies 1-3 to watch over the FUNi redubs.

[Super Sonic]

I know this is an unpopular opinion (probably), but I like the TV edit of Tree of Might more because I really love Corlett's performance (even if it's not as accurate).

It has its moments in as mentioned above regarding the Sokidon and Masenko's odd name changes in it Yamcha and Gohan are saying something along the lines of "Take This!" Also liked that while they added groans for the henchmen, it clearly said that Turles had been destroyed. Not sent to another dimension, but destroyed.

[WittyUsername]

I hope you also complain about marble mouth Cell too.

If you’re talking about Dameon Clarke as Cell in his second form, I’m not sure that’s a good comparison. Cell doesn’t spend that much time in that form, and in the time he does spend in it, he’s easily at his least intimidating and effective when compared to his other two forms.

[ABED]

Kaio is goofy, so the marble mouth performance by Don Brown works fine and he's a good actor who makes it sound natural. He's able to emote and not just play the silly side, but also convincingly play the wise martial arts master.

As for marble mouth Cell in his second form, while not on topic, that also works. It is silly, again it works as that form is mostly silly and pathetic.

[NitroEX]

The point was that neither is accurate to the Japanese.

As for the justifications for Dameon's second form Cell, I disagree but this isn't the thread for it.

[WittyUsername]

The point was that neither is accurate to the Japanese.

As for the justifications for Dameon's second form Cell, I disagree but this isn't the thread for it.

Did anyone in this thread even claim that dub voices have to sound like the Japanese voices?

[Super Sonic]

The point was that neither is accurate to the Japanese.

As for the justifications for Dameon's second form Cell, I disagree but this isn't the thread for it.

Did anyone in this thread even claim that dub voices have to sound like the Japanese voices?

That's more of an otaku thing. From what I heard, in Japan, there is no sub/dub debate on American cartoons and they don't care if they don't sound like the gaijin actors.

[BootyCheeksJohnson]

That's true you don't have to sound like the original actor to give a good performance. Dameon Clarke's first form Cell is a serious departure from the Japanese version, but it fits in line with his scary bug monster look. As for his second form voice, that sounds pretty stupid.

[MasenkoHA]

. As for his second form voice, that sounds pretty stupid.

To be fair, Toriyama's own editor complained that Semi-perfect Cell looked like a moron so Clarke's voice fits.

As for Don Brown's Kaio, I don't mind it. It did give way to Schemmel's progressively more intolerable version so it retroactively has that working against it

[TheGreatness25]

Since the topic was scratched on, I don't think that the voices have to sound like TV Japanese performers' to be good. English and Japanese are different languages with different sounding words. Nozawa fits Goku so well when she speaks Japanese, but I can't imagine her--or an imitator--sounding good in English. The languages just sound different, so different voices suit each language. It's kind of like how a different instruments sound better for one genre of music than another. So, yeah, the English voice actors might sound different, but the entire language sounds different.

[Kendamu]

Those movies were my first DBZ dub with my first DBZ cast. I think they're pretty aged nowadays in terms of the acting and whatnot but for the time period they're pretty good and a lot of what's not great was still WAY better than a lot of what we already had.

I enjoy them legitimately but I am also wearing really thick nostalgia goggles when I do. So I'd probably just recommend watching the films in Japanese to a newer fan nowadays but if they were looking for hidden gems from the past these movie dubs are a good choice.

[BootyCheeksJohnson]

[quote=ABED post_id=1759306 time=1675726444 user_id=77208]
They'd be perfect if not for Kelamis. I'm not being glib. He's just awful. He's at his best here, but that's not saying much.
[/quote]

I understand why Kelamis can be off putting to some. I just showed the first two Pioneer dubs to two people who've never seen Z, and one longtime fan who's never heard of the Ocean dub. None of them took to Kelamis' Goku voice. Personally I just look at it as something different, and a weird oddity to show people unfamiliar with the Ocean dub. That being said I've never understood the appeal of Ian Corlett. I was introduced to Schemmel first, then checked out the previous English voices and Kirby Morrow (R.I.P.) retroactively. Ian Corlett just sounds really underplayed and kind of stiff to me most of the time. I'm sorry I just don't get it. Now to be fair Schemmel was very bad starting out to say the least, (along with 99% of the other cast members) but now I feel like he's got Goku's full emotional spectrum down. But, like we said this is all a matter of personal preference.
Funny enough the two voices that everyone watching universally said were good was Piccolo, and Doc. Wheelo. (Wiro? Willow?)

[NitroEX]

Did anyone in this thread even claim that dub voices have to sound like the Japanese voices?

OP took issue with Ocean's voice casting. Clearly, they weren't saying they should sound more like the Funimation/in-house voice cast (as in this case, the Kaio voice is based on the Ocean one), which only leaves one option left. It's a very common opinion on these forums to push for voice accuracy toward Japanese performances. I don't always agree with that but it is what it is. If people want voice accuracy to Japanese I at least expect them to be consistent in their opinions.

Since everyone wants to discuss the Dameon thing. No, I don't think it fits at all and I find it hypocritical to call out Don Brown's performance as unfitting whilst giving a pass to something as horrible sounding as Dameon's semi perfect Cell. Calling that version of Cell "silly" is a very bizarre statement and misses the point of his characterization, he's a villain who is meant to be taken seriously. I can't take him seriously with that marble-mouthed voice as it just sounds like he has a speech impediment. It's not intimidating or adequately monstrous. If they wanted to take it in a more monstrous route you'd just cast an actor with a deeper voice. I honestly think those who are fine with it are just used to hearing it and thus don't question it. Dameon has done great voices, but that's not one of them.

As for Don Brown and Kaio, you can at least make the argument that the character is often unmistakably used for comedic relief, and thus a silly voice can fit. The attempts at accurate English casting for Kaio (Michael McConnohie) also haven't really been well executed in my opinion.