Countries/Regions that LOVE Dragon Ball but dont get talked about much.

[Cure Dragon 255]

Cure Dragon's Monthly Thread for November is: Countries/Regions that LOVE Dragon Ball but dont get talked about much!

I think we all know about the USA, UK, Canada and Latin America... but do we ever talk about South Africa? Or Hungary? How about Poland?

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Great thread, I too love hearing stories about countries where the series was popular but isn't documented as well, and am happy to share what I've learned from talking to fans in various territories around the world.

In terms of the places you mentioned, from what I know about Hungary the local dub wasn't aired, other than A Heroes Legacy, which was broadcast on Animax with a Hungarian dub. Original Dragon Ball and Z aired on RTL Klub in the late 90s but the channel ran the French dub. Dragon Ball Z was cancelled at episode 121 because of a court case between RTL Klub and the ORTT because the latter claimed the series was harmful to children and shouldn't be shown to anyone under the age of 18. RTL apparently tried airing the series at midnight but because they ran original Dragon Ball instead of Z the ratings weren't very good. Dragon Ball Z aired again in 2011 on Viasat, initially with 52 episodes but it had good viewership so all 291 episodes were aired, I believe the same channel aired Super 8 years later. Animax aired GT the same year the same year as Z was rerun on Viasat, although again it was with the French dub.

NitroEX would know more about the series in South Africa because he lived there. Z, GT and possibly original Dragon Ball aired on SABC2 between 2003 and 2005. Z aired again in 2009 but was replaced with Kai in 2011, which was also followed up by GT in 2015 or 2016. Final Chapters aired between 2019 and 2020. In 2020 Super aired and was the first Dragon Ball show to be broadcast on the local Cartoon Network's Toonami block instead of SABC2, although in a return to tradition it aired on SABC2 in 2022. As far as I know, all of these broadcasts used the same edits of the dubs as seen in the US. As you know from my other thread the Chinese dub of Dragon Ball aired on Startimes Kungfu Channel in 2016, but it seems at some point there was a dub switch over to Funimation.

In Poland original Dragon Ball, Z and GT aired on RTL7 between the late 90s and early 2000s, but as you may know none of them got a Polish dub, instead they were aired all three series, initially with a lector who spoke over the French dub but on a later run it was the French dub with Polish subtitles. There was also a dub switch in Poland from GT episode 47 when they began airing the Japanese version. Apparently a lot of Polish fans watched pirated broadcasts, like the German dub on RTL2, the Italian dub of GT on Italia 1, and even the English dubs, although that stopped in 2003 when Polish law mandated broadcasters conformed to EU standards. Luckily the series has had a resurgence on Polsat Games with Super in 2018, and as of this year Kai, both of which had Polish dubs, marking the first time any of the series were dubbed locally.

In terms of other countries that love Dragon Ball but aren't talked about as much, I think Finland deserves a mention. The manga was banned there because of claims it promoted paedophilia, although it was eventually reissued due to the series popularity. It was also a lesser known fact that Finnish fans got the Westwood dub on TV, we always knew this dub aired in Canada, the UK, Ireland and Netherlands but fewer people talked about Finland. China must have loved Dragon Ball too, because although there's little info about the airings online, the one native fan I've spoken to said that it was one of the most heavily imported shows in the late 90s and early 2000s and it was run on a large number of channels and even had cards that were available with packaged noodles. I also don't hear many fans talk about the series in Morocco, but fans on Reddit have recalled it airing on a channel called 2M and having nostalgia for it. From what Moroccan fans have told me Z aired between 2008 and 2010 and it constantly restarted after the Ginyu Force episodes and in 2012 or 2013 they finally aired the remainder of the Namek episodes. The Arabic dub was aired.

[Tian]

In terms of the places you mentioned, from what I know about Hungary the local dub wasn't aired, other than A Heroes Legacy, which was broadcast on Animax with a Hungarian dub. Original Dragon Ball and Z aired on RTL Klub in the late 90s but the channel ran the French dub. Dragon Ball Z was cancelled at episode 121 because of a court case between RTL Klub and the ORTT because the latter claimed the series was harmful to children and shouldn't be shown to anyone under the age of 18. RTL apparently tried airing the series at midnight but because they ran original Dragon Ball instead of Z the ratings weren't very good. Dragon Ball Z aired again in 2011 on Viasat, initially with 52 episodes but it had good viewership so all 291 episodes were aired, I believe the same channel aired Super 8 years later. Animax aired GT the same year the same year as Z was rerun on Viasat, although again it was with the French dub.

1) You mean French dub as a source, right? Because it is known that the Hungarian dub of Z was fully recorded by the studio Echo Szinkron Kft in 1999 despite the TV ban, which explains why some episodes post Future Trunks' introduction could be later released on this Nagy Dragon Ball DVD and how some guy (apparently, a former employee from Echo Szinkron) had access to the audio recordings of rest of the series, which he shared with fans on forums.

2) Yes, both the rerun of Z and the Super were aired on Viasat 6.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

1) You mean French dub as a source, right? Because it is known that the Hungarian dub of Z was fully recorded by the studio Echo Szinkron Kft in 1999 despite the TV ban, which explains why some episodes post Future Trunks' introduction could be later released on this Nagy Dragon Ball DVD and how some guy (apparently, a former employee from Echo Szinkron) had access to the audio recordings of rest of the series, which he shared with fans on forums.

No, I wasn't aware the Hungarian dub aired on TV, but thanks for the correction. It makes sense the French dub was used a source too, as most European dubs were at this time.

[Tian]

1) You mean French dub as a source, right? Because it is known that the Hungarian dub of Z was fully recorded by the studio Echo Szinkron Kft in 1999 despite the TV ban, which explains why some episodes post Future Trunks' introduction could be later released on this Nagy Dragon Ball DVD and how some guy (apparently, a former employee from Echo Szinkron) had access to the audio recordings of rest of the series, which he shared with fans on forums.

No, I wasn't aware the Hungarian dub aired on TV, but thanks for the correction. It makes sense the French dub was used a source too, as most European dubs were at this time.

You're welcome!

About the guy who shared the audio recordings of Z on forums, it happened some years before Viasat 6 aired the rest of the series.

[Cure Dragon 255]

I have to kindly thank Dragon Ball Ireland and Tian for always posting in my threads. I REALLY appreciate it.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Vietnam probably deserve a mention too. I've noticed that since Kai and Super a lot of territories have become more averse to airing original Dragon Ball, but conversely Viatnamese fans got it [u]AFTER[/u] their dub of Kai, which was nice and suggests the series might have surpassed expectations during its run on HTV3.

[Cure Dragon 255]

OMG Vietnam! That's a totally ignored region and I KNOW they love Dragon Ball!!!

[GhostEmperorX]

Ditto, in fact you could probably throw all of SEA into that classification. Minus the Speedy dub we don't get to hear much about their side of things.

[Dragon ball master]

I've been recently paying attention to the Portugal dub because I'm trying to make a instrumental for the z opening. Because they have a different instrumental compared to the French opening.