What is your opinion on the FUNI DBZ dub?

Like I said it's all personal preference. It's like when I see a few clips of the Ocean dub of DBZ (especially comparison clips) I usually think of Ocean voice actors sounding forced, emotionless, etc. and I would find FUNi's VAs sounding superior but fans of the Ocean dub would say/think the same thing about FUNi VAs as well.

There really isn't a right or wrong in these cases.
 
We still talking DBZ or just Sabat in general because his Kuwabara, Giroro, Armstrong, Roy Revant from SoltyRei and Sakaki from Kenichi are fantastic.

Also, I think he pulled off Shenron well.

This is the truth.
I'll give you Chibi Trunks but I give them points for trying to stay consistent with Eric Vale. Goten I never really had a problem with but I will admit, he was grating sometimes.
 
That's because Shen Long was filtered.

His Kuwabara is easily the worst voice in the entire YYH dub, and that's a fantastic dub. He's nowhere near as good as Shigeru Chiba. The thing about it is, he has a distinctive enough voice that if he would only use his speaking voice, that would fit Piccolo.

The difference between FUNi and Ocean Dub is that Ocean is a group of professional and trained actors that do voices. It wasn't until funimation gained prominance that they were able to actract skilled actors that they had some really good voices. Most of the voices on DBZ sound like people off the street that gave an audition that they saw in a local ad.

who sounRAB more forced: saffron henderson or stephanie nadolny, ian corlette or sean schemmel, chris sabbat or ted cole, tiffany volmer or Lalainia Lindbjerg

I'm talking about the episodes that aired in the mid to late 90s before FUNi took over. Apparently they recorded some episodes after that.
 
I've heard accolades about his Kuwabara, since it sounRAB so different from his normal roles but that's just what I feel about it.
 
Why do people blame FUNimation for the arguably out of place voices when it was Ocean Group who originated those voices in the first place?

Of course FUNimation had the opportunity to correct many of those voices when they took over dubbing, but...
 
My general opinion is basically most the characters are miscasted, overacted, and badly written in dub. But, that's not to say I go for plot for DBZ. If I want plot, I'd go to Dragonball. *shot*

Speaking of Dragonball, I preferred the way FUNi handled that better than what they did with DBZ. Even the actors who were in DBZ that reprised roles sounded better here....that's just my two cents.
 
Their jobs aren't to totally recreate the characters. Giving Jheese (and Butta, for that matter) the cartoony 'Aussie rock star' characterization is not representational of his character, but a fabrication that was--in this case--meant to pander to the very heavy-handed Americanization of the series. Jheese (and Butta) are played straight and real in the Japanese version, because for the most part they are straight. That's certainly the impression I get as a viewer of the Japanese version.


Giving Mihawk an accent would be totally out of place because their no indication he's Spanish! By that logic Roronoa Zoro should have a Japanese accent, but judging from Zarbon, Jheese, and Sauzer we all know Sabat can't pull off a serious accented character.



Probably because FUNimation was the one producing the series, and--strictly as I understand--Barry Watson was involved with the casting and directing (flying up to Vancouver a bit). When things were brought down to Texas, nothing changed (aside from weaker casting, acting, etc. etc.)
 
I actually never had any intent of posting in this thread until I read this.



No offense, really I mean that, but I now know if you dislike a certain dub voice that means I will love it.
 
I think "played straight" is the wrong word in any sense for the Ginyu Force. They're ridiculous characters - that's their shtick. They're just ridiculous for different reasons in different hemispheres, which is alright by me. Americanization isn't a bad thing.




That's because A) Spain doesn't exist in the One Piece world and B) as far as I know, there's no way to indicate the specfic way a Spanish person would be speaking Japanese. If the show was created in the United States - which it would be but, work with me here - he'd probably be Spanish. He looks Spanish, he has syrabols evokative of Spanish culture, and giving him an accent - not a ridiculous, over-the-top accent, mind you, but a subdued and realistic one - would only give more depth to that portion of his characterization.

And I wouldn't mind Zoro with a Japanese accent. Well, I would, because as you said, Sabat doesn't seem able to pull off a serious accent, but if it was an actor who could, that would actually fit. Same with with Sanji - a slight twinge of French wouldn't hurt him at all. He's a chef, a smoker, a womanizer... associating him with France, which itself is associated with all of these things, only deepens the understanding of the American audience in a way that you simply can't get in Japan.

It's the same with with DBZ. Like, Dr. Gero - if I was in charge, I probably would have given him a German accent. Maybe give Commander Red an Irish quality to it. Nam has an Indian accent because he's Indian. American culture is VERY different from Japanese culture, and it both widens the audience and increases American understanding to touch up the show with these things.

Not paint over, mind you, but touch up. When you remove the voice acting and need to alter the dialogue, there's a big blank chunk of canvas to work with. I simply prefer it when the artist adRAB their own touches.
 
As I understand the dub makes Kuwabara into a butt-monkey as it is. If Sabat just used his natural voice (like just about every other actor in the dub) then it wouldn't be hard to take him serious when he was being serious. I don't remeraber completely, but I believe it was Barry Watson who casted Sabat, which would explain the rediculous voice, but alas...this is not a Y
 
Hobbes is just being kinda snobbish (not thats a bad thing, i complain about a few voices ever now & then as well, but I'd say 3/4 of english dubs are good or at least satisfactory!)

But yea ,YYH is another anime I thought had a great english cast & IMPO Kuabara was good! I mean Funi did a great job with the series compared what others did with the movies (wich I hope funi saves someday.)
 
^^Personally, I hate unnecessary accents in dubs when they don't fit. Sure most of the time they do like Blood+ or like over half the cast of Baccano or Dordoni in Bleach (that was hilarious) but I just can't see a tough guy like Sanji even needing a french accent or Zoro needing a Japanese one when they sound good enough as is. Why would he need one anyway? He's supposed to be a gruff sounding badass character which is what Sabat brings to the role perfectly
I think you just answered your own question.
 
Ocean's lacking nowadays, or maybe they should just stop doing mecha shows. Death Note and Black Lagoon's the only tolerable work lately that came from them recently.
 
They aren't, however, rediculous 110% of the time. Half the humor is that it's these two red and blue aliens that do team poses are then normal, casual sounding people and not badly cast 1980s cartoon villains.



But One Piece does not take place in the real world nor is it an American cartoon. It's a Japanese one and the English version isn't suppose to completely make crap up. There's basing a character off the script in front of you, and then creating 'depth' that very well might likely be detrimental to it in the future.



Y'see, this is where FUNimation's penchant for making crap up comes to bait discussion in the ass. 'Gero' is completely and utterly mispronounced in the dub. You've seen Sgt. Frog, right? げろ is the sound made by a frog in Japanese, as I understand. That's the pun of Dr. Gero's name. He is not German.

Nor is #19 a clown, but what did FUNimation care when they gave him the voice they did?
 
soundmokey I'm gonna make a YYH remerabrance thread one of these days

In retrospect, that's probably the voice I'm really thinking of when I think Piccolo nowadays (which is also why I said GT come to think of it)
I completely agree. Especially on the mecha anime thing.

But wait, I thought .hack//Roots dub was good (well I heard it was, I never actually saw it)
 
I never knew it was supposed to be pronounced like that, but I don't fault FUNimation for mispronouncing it. While most of the character name puns are fairly easy for Americans to pick up on, puns on Japanese worRAB would no doubt go over the average viewer's head. That is, unless the fault lies in the fact that it's not identical to the Japanese version whether Americans get the joke or not.

As for 19, while I agree his voice is rather silly, I kind of like it. It's a sort of soft, dangerous voice that you don't expect a vicious killer to have, and that makes him all the more terrifying. At least in my opinion.
 
Just my two cents, but generally speaking, in a show like One Piece where the characters come from all over the (fictional) world, it's weirder to have all the characters speaking 100% standard American English than to have some of them speak with accents. That doesn't mean that they have to be over-the-top or hammy, but a little bit of variety can only make things better.
 
soundmokey I'm gonna make a YYH remerabrance thread one of these daysQUOTE]

Awsome...We can remanisce about all 4 season, LULZ. but yea, I've seen alot of anime & can't say there's that many dubs that i would call "Bad" given theres always a few voices that are of, sometimes horribly off, (Like Funi's veriosn of Ryoko. nowhere near as good as Pionner/Genons) but over all most dubs are at least decent, I think alot of fans these days are just way to darn picky! We should just be glad we have the show stateside at all...

I mean really Unless its 4kiRAB, Tokyopop, or some of the small arabiguious companies like U.S.Manga Corps. People should not complain most of the time.
 
i don't see how the variety for the sake of variety makes it better if it doesn't have a purpose. You can create variety with the way they speak. Goku's a bit of a hick, so having him unintentionally be tactless is a good characteristic. He speaks like Anya or Cordelia from Buffy. Gohan and Trunks have a more polite speech. They're very grammatically correct. Freeza shouldn't be the androgynous. He's very gentlemanly. Look at his posture. However, he gets less and less polite when he grows frustrated.
 
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