How do you see Crunchyroll's growing monopoly on anime distribution affecting Dragon Ball?

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Now that Crunchyroll is the license holder in all English-speaking territories and a growing number of international territories like Spain and Germany it's not hard to see many more following in their footsteps.

We all used to fear Funimation's influence and dominance, particularly with regard to companies like Manga UK and Madman consistently following in their footsteps by putting out near identical home releases, with some exceptions like both releasing Super Broly without the green tint, the latter containing more recaps and NEPs in the Z singles and better original Dragon Ball DVDs. But that was just English-speaking territories.

Now Crunchyroll used Selecta Vision's remaster for the German original Dragon Ball Blu-Rays and will likely do the same if the series gets re-released on the format in the US, UK and Oceania, which I wouldn't count on.

I don't think monopolies are inherently bad, but examples of this standardisation and unwillingness to stray from Funimation or other companies lackluster efforts is not promising. Many have said even with Crunchyroll's re-release of Dragon Ball GT no effort was made to improve on the green bricks, they just slapped the existing discs in with a new cover. Ditto Funimation's 2013/14 Blu-Rays. Total laziness.

I'd much prefer for different licensors to own Dragon Ball in different territories and for us to see some healthy competition which often brings out better results when everyone is pushing themselves to give the best product. Conversely when no one can compete with your company it's easy to become complacent and not try, as we've seen with the aforementioned examples.

There's so much potential for the franchise to have wider accessibility and greater access to the best possible video and audio tracks that the additional funds could easily pay for, as well as every country having access to all the dubs, both rare and lost that were ever aired there or released in some other way. Monopolies can be good in theory for these reasons and many more, but I've yet to see an example of a company using it in a way that benefits all the fans they serve.

AB Groupe in France are arguably the best example of how less power can drive workers to give it their all, as their video team had just 2 months to do the colour correction for over 60 episodes of original Dragon Ball. This company that once had a monopoly on most, if not all of Europe and showed such little faith in the UK and Irish market now have fans working for them that have the fan's best interests in mind. It would be just amazing if Crunchyroll had the same mindset, or if Discotek had the rights to Dragon Ball in all countries, then we would all be saved.

For now I fear the worst is yet to come, but I hope I'm wrong and Crunchyroll will show promise in time of delivering better products and services.

[MasenkoHA]

I don't think monopolies are inherently bad,

They are. No competition no need to do better and no need to have competitive pricing. Who cares if we overcharge? Where else are you gonna get it?

For now I fear the worst is yet to come, but I hope I'm wrong and Crunchyroll will show promise in time of delivering better products and services.

So far we've seen Crunchyroll

Re-release the Green Brick for over double the price you could still get the complete series at Wal-mart

Re-release the Z season blu-rays instead of the 30A sets or even the Dragon Boxes

Somehow manage to fuck up and give Hulu a mix of the Nicktoons edited for tv masters and the Home Video masters for Kai......how do you even do that?!?


It's the same level of incompetence we've come to expect from Funimation, if not worse.

[ABED]

How do they have a monopoly?

[GhostEmperorX]

They just aren't cut out for this sort of thing and should stay in their lane, but sadly this series still appears to be cursed to fall into incapable hands on this front forever.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

They are. No competition no need to do better and no need to have competitive pricing. Who cares if we overcharge? Where else are you gonna get it?

That says more about Crunchyroll than it does about monopolies in principle. In the right hands universal management of the Dragon Ball brand could do wonders. If Discotek held the rights and had a monopoly we would be getting the best releases for the best prices everywhere and no one would complain.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

How do they have a monopoly?

They don't yet, at least not internationally but Crunchyroll are on a dangerous path to world domination in the anime industry by buying up all their competitors and not doing anything to change the way Funimation operated with regard to the handling of this franchise. In terms of English-speaking territories Crunchyroll do have a monopoly as Manga UK and Madman are gone and no one else can challenge any decisions they make as a business.

[MasenkoHA]

They are. No competition no need to do better and no need to have competitive pricing. Who cares if we overcharge? Where else are you gonna get it?

That says more about Crunchyroll than it does about monopolies in principle.

No, that is how monopolies function on principle.

Even if Discotek had complete control of Dragon Ball's home video distribution worldwide they're still competing with other anime distributors.

A monopoly has never been a good thing

[BootyCheeksJohnson]

They just aren't cut out for this sort of thing and should stay in their lane, but sadly this series still appears to be cursed to fall into incapable hands on this front forever.

I'm going to be honest. I haven't bought an official U.S. release of a Dragon Ball product since Resurrection F. Every home release since then has been terrible. (I understand that in the case of Kai 2.0, Super Broly and Super Hero that those were ruined by Toei, Something Funimation didn't need any help doing.) And, it's not just the anime we could have a field day about Viz Media's handling of the manga.

[GhostEmperorX]

ruined by Toei, Something Funimation didn't need any help doing.

Incompetence on both sides, don't even know how many other JP studios outsource remastering to middle men of all people.

Concerning the manga, isn't Viz supposed to be a proper professional company or something? I know they make some bad market-driven decisions, but I'm not so sure about what went on with the manga exactly.

[MasenkoHA]

Concerning the manga, isn't Viz supposed to be a proper professional company or something? I know they make some bad market-driven decisions, but I'm not so sure about what went on with the manga exactly.

The manga got pulled from some school libraries, so Viz probably decided to play it safe from there

I do find some of their localization choices weird though like "Hey Bro whazzup" and Piccolo being under the impression he's performing Shakespeare at the park

[TheGreatness25]

Somehow manage to fuck up and give Hulu a mix of the Nicktoons edited for tv masters and the Home Video masters for Kai......how do you even do that?!?

Are you sure about this one? It's not like I checked out all of Kai on Hulu, but I looked for two things: (1) Bardock's blood and scar were still there; and (2) Vegeta says Goku's fighting power is over 8,000, not 9,000. I am in the US, in case you're not.

[MasenkoHA]

Somehow manage to fuck up and give Hulu a mix of the Nicktoons edited for tv masters and the Home Video masters for Kai......how do you even do that?!?

Are you sure about this one? It's not like I checked out all of Kai on Hulu, but I looked for two things: (1) Bardock's blood and scar were still there; and (2) Vegeta says Goku's fighting power is over 8,000, not 9,000. I am in the US, in case you're not.

A mix as in some episodes are the uncensored version and some are the edited version

.
- They used the Nicktoons TV masters for some episodes. I looked through them all because I'm a crazy person, so I can tell you it affects the following episodes: 2, 3, 5, 6, 9, 27, 54, 59, 60, 61, 65, 67, 71, 73, 76, 80, 82, 88, and 97.
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