Top Five anime got dubbed that shoud have been Sub Only

[Darkster]

Telemundo? :laugh: They lately have been playing movies that have just aired in English. That's from what I've seen when I barely watch any television.

Dubs aren't bad. It's just that sometimes, you can't properly dub something, and that's when it's best to watch it subbed or in its original language if you can.

 

[Gryphman]

some people make **** up to justify hating dubs. I mean if you hate them ok, but just don't make crap up.

Yeah, and to be honest, Japan is FAR worse about changing content than we ever were. Just look at the clusterfuck that is the Japanese Transformers continuity. Back when there was just G1, everything was fine. Japan did their own thing, and we did ours. Then they got Beast Wars. Season 2 wasn't finished yet, so they had no clue that BW actually took place in the G1 universe, so they went about doing it themselves, by rewriting various characters. For starters, they made Primal into the original Optimus Prime, named Convoy in Japan. They turned Megatron into a wuss, who screamed like a girl at the first sign of danger. They added an almost constant barrage of jokes into the dialog. Oh yeah, and they made Airrazor a guy, because they didn't think kids would buy a girl transformer. They had apparently neglect to look ahead, and didn't know about her and Tigatron's relationship. They tried getting around it by turning Tigatron into a samurai, and writing their relationship as a master and his pupil. By the time the end of season 2 comes around, they've dropped the whole Convoy being the original guy thing, and hope everyone just forgets about it.

After Beast Wars ran it's course, they decided to do Car Robots/Robots in Disguise. The first TF series not tied to G1 at all. After that is the Unicron Trillogy, which was also not related to G1. Here's where things get super fucked up. After Galaxy Force ended, there was no new series planned to come out until after the first Bay movie. During this period of time, Takara decided to do a smaller, more collector oriented line, because Galaxy Force hadn't done very well. Enter Kiss Players.

Kiss Players used the Binaltech/Alternators toys, adding an extra accessory, and a small pvc figurine of a cute girl. The story of Kiss Players is long and stupid. I'll just give the basic premise. Certain girls have the ability to power up transformers by kissing them. You might think that's bad, but it actually gets much worse. This abomination was crammed into the G1 timeline, between Transformers the Movie, and season 3, which in Japan, took place in 2010. Did I forget to mention that the main Transformer is Convoy? Yeah, he's magically not dead for some reason. It gets even worse. Through some time travel bullshit, they also forced Car Robots into the G1 timeline.

After that creepy bit of lore was over with, the live action movie was coming out. So Takara, being the brilliant minds that they are, immediately decided that everything had to take place in G1, including the movie. They didn't make any changes to the movie itself, mind you. They just said so in their official time line of Transformers.

By the time the second movie came out, they had actually realized what kind of incomprehensible mess they had made things. So they went about setting things back to where they should have been in the first place. After awhile they finally get Transformers Animated, and proceed to go retarded all over again, by making it part of the movieverse.

So yeah, I think this kind of insane bullshit is probably worse than any of the changes made to a dub over here. 4Kids is the only thing close, and I can't really say which is worse.

 

[Painted_Outlaw]

Dubs aren't bad. It's just that sometimes, you can't properly dub something, and that's when it's best to watch it subbed or in its original language if you can.

Ignoring me, I see. -.-

 

[SamuraiEchidna]

I am surprised this discussion exploded as much as it did.

Minor content issues aside, there are companies dedicated to giving us uncut releases of anime on DVD, BluRay, and any other future mediums. Yes, they have to make edits for TV, and some channels require more edits that others, but as long as the TV broadcast gets us interested, as long as the dubbing company is dedicated to giving us uncut releases where you can change to subs and Japanese audio at any time, as long as the company is doing their absolute best to stay true to the original vision, shouldn't that be all that matters? The only ones we can persecute for this are companies like 4Kids, who don't give a rats behind about the original vision or the fans of their shows. Their only goal is to make things *child friendly*.

But aside from 4Kids, the other companies have done their best to stay true to the original vision by making sure they work exclusively with the Japanese creators and making sure what we make pleases them. So, if the Japanese are happy with what we've done to their properties, why can't we be happy with it to? You hear Chis Sabat and many others talk about it all the time. Just browse Youtube. I even have a video faved where Vic Mignogna admits that the Japanese creators get the final say in which American voice actor voices which character. If the Japanese are happy, why not us? That's my argument and I'm sticking to it.

As for cultural references or things that cannot easily be translated literally...
Who cares? For many animes, you have to give specific examples. I've seen some more recent animes that have kept puns and sayings in their direct translation. But even if they change it in the dub to something else, does it matter? As long as the same basic idea is communicated, and as long as the Japanese creators are happy, shouldn't that be enough? Besides, do you know how hard it is to westernize Japanese content like that without making a 4Kids-style edit? That's practically an art form in itself.

Again, I cannot over stress the fact that companies like Funimation and such are dedicated to giving us UNCUT, bilingual, optional subtitle releases. And if you are glad that they do that and want them to give us even better releases to fit our tastes, our niches, and whatever else, then PLEASE buy and support their releases! Go to their conventions! Send them e-mails! Post to their blogs! Do whatever it takes to get your word across, but don't waste time with empty complaints. Trust me, they are listening to us. No one is going to stop you if you're only buying the DVDs just to switch to Japanese audio with English subs. No one cares if you want to do extra research so you can enjoy the cultural references and puns and what not. That's fine if you want to do that, just support the official release. Don't take away their ability to bring even more anime across the shores for us to enjoy.

 

[bigone]

This.

Stop hating dubs, they keep legal anime in North America alive

FYI i dont hate all dubs i just listed these ones to make a point

and i gave valid reasons of why Otaku anime [ ie stuff like Lucky star uie stuff that is reference driven will never translate well cause one of two groups will understand in Natives or 外人 who are culture experts in the nation of origin of the product

 

[Darkster]

I buy Funimation series, but they are too expensive, so I can only get one every few months. I still get my favorites when they are very expensive.

For those two or so of you who don't understand, there's bigone's point that references won't be caught by someone who speaks another language because you can't translate references, and there is my point of subtle things that cannot be translated into another language in sound. This includes accents, way of speaking, and just overall speech. How do you make someone speak in English while making the other person speaks in English when one person spoke in English in the beginning and the other spoke in another language without them understanding each other? You can't.

 

[KingRanger]

Ignoring me, I see. -.-

He does that when you give a point of view counter to his. or if you have proven him wrong.

 

[KingRanger]

I buy Funimation series, but they are too expensive, so I can only get one every few months. I still get my favorites when they are very expensive.

For those two or so of you who don't understand, there's bigone's point that references won't be caught by someone who speaks another language because you can't translate references, and there is my point of subtle things that cannot be translated into another language in sound. This includes accents, way of speaking, and just overall speech. How do you make someone speak in English while making the other person speaks in English when one person spoke in English in the beginning and the other spoke in another language without them understanding each other? You can't.

It's called a translation, you should look up how that works sometime.

 

[Gryphman]

How do you make someone speak in English while making the other person speaks in English when one person spoke in English in the beginning and the other spoke in another language without them understanding each other? You can't.

I thought Azumanga Daioh did a fantastic job of getting around that, by having them speak Spanish. The languages are different, but it's the exact same gag. Also, Genshiken did an ok job of it, by informing you that the American and Japanese characters weren't speaking the same language.

Really though, why does it matter? All of the shows listed have both dub and subs. It's not like you don't have an option.

 

[KingRanger]

I thought Azumanga Daioh did a fantastic job of getting around that, by having them speak Spanish. The languages are different, but it's the exact same gag. Also, Genshiken did an ok job of it, by informing you that the American and Japanese characters weren't speaking the same language.

Really though, why does it matter? All of the shows listed have both dub and subs. It's not like you don't have an option.

Yeah exactly. Your first point is what translation is about. You have to have it make sense in the language you are translating the show into.