Forum - View topicWhy do people hate Dubs so much?
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TheVileOne
Posts: 272 Location: Texas |
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That was then, this is now. Sailor Moon originally wasn't aired on Toonami in prime time or in the evening. It might've been a reasonable expection 5-10 years ago but not anymore. Plus 4Kids was not doing this series either. And Gash Bell is Gash Bell. Its not Naruto. Viz knew how valuable it was and how highly regarded it is, how seriously the fans take it.
No they weren't. Everyone pre-judged it. None of them were patient enough to wait and see how it turned out, making them just look more ridiculous when they turned out to be wrong.
No they really haven't. The edits have been few and far between. OH FOR THE LOVE OF GOD! WE DIDN'T GET TO SEE SASUKE AND NARUTO HAVE THEIR FIRST KISS! I'M SO TRAUMATIZED I WON'T GET MORE YAOI INSPIRATION! All the VA's so far have been great. Yuri Lowenthal as Sasuke, Dave Wittenburg as Kakashi, and Steven Blum as Zabuza. Maile Flanagan gets better as Naruto each week, especially even after his Kyuubi chakra was released. Now what do I see the haterz whining about after they were proven wrong at every turn, they whine about BELIEVE IT! Oh wah, they translated Dattebayo into English, so now they have to whine about that too. I'm so traumatized I can't watch anymore anime! 
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Samurai-with-glasses
 Posts: 628 |
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I myself felt...too aware...at times as I read reviews, discuss anime, and all that, and feel like "hey, this anime is sooo flawed; they edited THAT out; and this guy is sooo wrong, not to mention all stereotypes!" until I decided to go back and watch them. And oh, how enjoyable these shows are. "What was that about Naruto edit again?" 
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Ohoni
Posts: 3421 |
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Excuses, excuses, excuses. All that stuff happened. Whether Viz would go the same route with Naruto was always in doubt, whether your hidsight wishes it wasn't or not. Some chose to err on the side of Viz, making wild claims that it would be completely unedited, and some chose to err on the side of the fans of the anime, listing ways they might screw it up in the hopes that they wouldn't do any of those things.
There was plenty of pre-judging form the other side too, people claiming that Viz wouldn't change a thing about the series.
Actually, I was more talking about the scene in which Naruto stabs his hand, which had significantly more dramatic effect in the original. Editing the kiss thing I thought was stupid, but I don't much care whether I saw it or not. Yes, the edits are fewer and smaller than, say, Yu-gi-oh, but that doesn't mean that they don't exist, or that people are completely out of line for pointing them out when they do exist.
Did I critize them? I believe I mentioned two characters specifically, Naruto and Iruka. Now perhaps Maile Flanagan is improving and I'm just not hearing it, but so far I'm not detecting the same acting quality as the original VA, nor comperable to the rest of the cast. The delivery and emotional range are simply not there, and it cheapens your credibility to insist that they are. Yes, she sounds earilly similar to the original VA, but simple mimickry does not make for a solid performance.
So you don't think it sounds stupid and annoying? I do. Oh, and "Believe it!" is by no means a translation of dattebayo. |
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TheVileOne
Posts: 272 Location: Texas |
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Viz was very open about the approach they were taking. Otaku haters were not patient enough to wait and see and were rabidly ornery about it from the start. These are not excuses either, they are facts. Viz never wildly claimed it would be unedited. They made claims about what would be edited and what wouldn't be edited. And what would NOT be changed. You want to know who was making the wild claims? The idiot anime fans that seem to hate everything.
They've changed very little. The translation has been very faithful. And the series itself is left intact. They don't say things like, "They are going to another dimension, or the home for infinite losers." This isn't like what happened with Sailor Moon or One Piece. I didn't see anyone on the Naruto forums claim Viz was going to change not one thing. Especially when representatives from Viz and guys like Marc Handler spoke at conventions and said the series would be slightly edited for TV.
The scene where Naruto stabs his hand was changed yes. But they left the scene in and the implication was still there. Now according to the otaku haters on the Naruto forums, the scene wouldn't be in there at ALL it would've been totally cut. The edits are there and people are pointing them out and they are not out of line for doing it. However, these edits that have been made are not unreasonable edits, and it just makes the haters seeth that they have little to no ammunition anymore. That is why they now complain about trivial BS like BELIEVE IT!
It doesn't sound like mimicrky to me. Everyone seems to be putting in a lot of effort and their A game into it. Its just Naruto in English and its still compelling and obviously, audiences agree. Millions of people wouldn't be tuning into Naruto every week if they didn't find it compelling or if they found it cheap.
Yes it is. Does it sound of silly and annoying? Yes but it fits appropriately for Naruto's personality. Naruto is a loud and obnoxious guy. And he constantly repeats DATTEBAYO in Japanese. You think the Japanese don't find that annoying? Or is it only cool for English people who don't know Japanese to hear? So they basically gave Dattebayo an English translation in Believe It. And yes it is a translation of Dattebayo. |
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shirokiryuu
Posts: 714 Location: Northern California (SF Bay Area) |
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i think you mean "equivalent" not "translation" |
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ShadrachAnki
 Posts: 180 Location: New England |
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Well, first to address the original topic of the thread. As others have pointed out, there are plenty of reasons why people say they hate (or love) dubs. Some of these reasons hold more weight than others, but in all honesty what it finally comes down to is opinions, and those are notoriously difficult to change. I am only capable of speaking for myself and stating the things that I have observed in watching others.
I prefer to watch anime in Japanese with English subtitles, not because I hate dubs, but because in general I prefer to watch everything with the audio in the language it was originally created in when at all possible. Watching something in the original language (even with subtitles) gives a different viewing experience than watching something dubbed into English, and I appreciate and value that difference. Animation is, of course, a bit different than live action film, but the basic concept remains the same. I find that I'm more tolerant of English dubs than a lot of my anime-watching friends tend to be, but there are only a handful of series where I prefer the English dub over the original Japanese. There are plenty of series where I enjoyed the dub equally well (or only slightly less) than the original Japanese. In general, I've found that people are more accepting and tolerant of a dub if that was the first experience they had with the series.
By and large the question of cost has been rendered moot at this point. Since nearly every anime series that gets an R1 DVD release these days does have both the Japanese and English audio tracks available, it really doesn't cost any more to watch a series subtitled than it does to watch it dubbed. You're paying for both languages when you buy the DVD. Of course, there are cases where a series is released with only an English track, but those truly are few and far between when you look at the big picture.
Well, even though I'm not a dub hater, I have to disagree with both of these statements. Even someone who has little to no familiarity with a language will be able to comprehend the basics of the emotions being conveyed. That comprehension may not be as complete as it would be with their native language, but it is still going to be there. For a prime example of this phenomenon, look at babies. They do not know what the words being spoken around them mean, and they are unable to form words of their own. The only things babies can work from are the emotions being conveyed by the sounds around them. These emotions are conveyed through tone, pitch, volume, and the use of specific types of sounds (such as fricatives and sibilants). The language itself (a combination of different sounds and tones with essentially arbitrary meanings) is unimportant overall. So I'm sorry, but "dub haters" are going to be able to tell at least the general sense of the emotions and emotional levels being conveyed. As for the other statement dealing with taking Japanese in college and the resultant educational proficiency in the language...it will vary from person to person, but overall a student of Japanese will come away with more than a second grade proficiency level in at least the spoken language provided they study for more than just a semester or two. Individuals who major in the language can and do gain fluency or near-fluency. Even if all a person does gain is a mastery of the language equivalent to that of a Japanese second grader, they are going to be able to comprehend the linguistically conveyed emotional cues that much more precisely than someone with no knowledge of the language (who will be comprehending those same cues as an infant would). Yes, each person is entitled to their own opinion with regards to subs and dubs. However, claiming that one group is any more narrow-minded than the other is, quite frankly, narrow-minded in and of itself. It is possible for one person to dislike or downright hate something without them ever infringing on the rights of others to feel differently. I've found that it's only when you start trying to put words in other people's mouths that things really start to get ugly. ~Shadrach Anki |
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rebelofbloodlust
 Posts: 13 Location: Santa Barbara, CA |
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Three words: Lost in translation (and no, I don't mean the overrated film starring Bill Murray).
Anime is Japanese at heart - no matter how Westernized the creator attempts to portray it as (although, there are some cases where its very hard to find any distinctly Japanese elements, such as Watanabe Shinichiro's masterpiece, Cowboy Bebop). Certain Anime is made to appeal to Japanese audiences almost exclusively, which means Japanese slang, Japanese customs, and Japanese behavior is portrayed for the most part (again, this is not the case in ALL anime). However, this is the "translation" argument in a nutshell - there are things portrayed in Anime as part of the expression as a whole that are distinctly Japanese, and really have no exact equivalent in the Western World. Therefore, when you encounter these, there runs the problem of how to interpret it to an audience that may not know a thing about Japanese culture. So, sometimes things are changed in ways that may seem like they're insignificant - but in fact, in some people's opinions, it is more than that. Anyway - I won't go too much into it - I don't care that much - it's all a matter of Personal Preferrence anyway. It's also Psychological. The first version you watch of something may seem to be the best and only version there is, since your mind has established that those characters have those voices - and any other is not the real voice. A great example is Full Metal Panic, which has a great Dub - but still pales in comparison to the original Japanese cast. |
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Efan
 Posts: 340 |
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I just like the sound of Japanese compared to english, if i wanted to listen to people talk in english I'd watch a hollywood movie, but to me listening to them is as much of an experience as watching. Having said that, to clerify, I don't like to listen to the words, but rather the way they are said, which is why I don't watched dubbed. And besides, it's good to read every once in a while, nay?
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Yashouzoid
 Posts: 411 |
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I don't think anyone with any realistic expectations assumed Naruto would air completely uncut. The fact that it's been able to air on Toonami with as little edits as it's had is amazing, and personally I chose the pessimist side, where I expected a lot worse.
In the long run, they haven't really edited anything substantial. While edits like cutting the Naruto-Sasuke kiss, or painting a cross into a pole are annoying... There's always going to be the reasonably priced, unedited DVDs, with the Japanese language track for those who want it. It's not as if they're completely denying fans the option of that, unlike a certain company.
Sometimes I'll agree with the "RAWR, NO BLOODZ!?" people, as blood can have an impact on scenes (the stabbing being an example). While cutting out the actual stab is a shame, yes, they still kept the general meaning of it, and that's a lot more than what can be said than, say, Yugioh.
I think Naruto's VA is a fine actor, but that all boils down to personal opinion. In any case, I think a bad voice here or there can be excused, although I don't really have any problems with the current cast.
It may not be a direct translation, but it's a good enough equivalent. Speech characteristics are always hard to translate properly, and they easily could have gone the Kenshin route by having him talk like Yoda. |
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TheVileOne
Posts: 272 Location: Texas |
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You can call it whatever you want, but that's basically what its meant to be. I think that anime is Japanese and how the specifically Japanese elements need to be changed into English are very interesting. I just see it as another challenge for the dub crew and if they can come up with any interesting solutions. Samurai Champloo specifically has a fantastic English dub, and I think the way they've still been able to incorporate the Japanese cultural elements as well as reference things like Mugen's different dialect and language was outstanding. |
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Ohoni
Posts: 3421 |
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Not really. Until the particular episodes aired, they made NO mention of whether they would edit the stabbing scene, or change Haku's gender, or edit the Sexy no Jutsu, or any of that stuff. It was up to the individual fan to decide whether to trust that Viz would do the right thing or not in each of those cases.
They did no such thing.
And yet there are still noteworthy content edits, so it's not as if it was left untouched. Both the most extreme naysayers and the most extreme viz-junkies were wrong, only the moderates were right.
Yes, but if you compare the two, the Us version was a hacked up mess, and a good deal of the drama and flair was lost in the translation.
That would have been next to impossible, and fairly pointless, given the amount they were able to hack out of it.
So you don't find it to be very annoying? I do. I'd like them to stop it.
Again you try to avoide the subject. I was speaking ONLY in reference to Maile's performance as Naruto, nothing else. Don't try to bring in that the show is still enjoyable, or that people still watch it, I know that, I still watch it too, but that doesn't mean that I approve of the poor performance of what is (supposedly) the lead role.
It's rarely subbed, and I tend to just blur it out. Japanese is FULL of things like that, and I don't think you should speculate as to whether it annoys the Japanese or not, I really doubt that it does. Personally, I don't feel that there is a proper way to translate it. They should have either removed it completely, or have just left it as "dattebayo" a phrase which is equally as meaningless in English as it is in Japanese, similar to "Hakuna matata", or "Momotai" in previous shows. The words "Belive it!" simply seem out of place at least half the times they appear in the show.
Actually, it's more a "substitution" than either an equivalent or a translation. The Japanese meaning in no way relates to the English meaning of the phrase "Believe it".
How so? I thought that they ignored Mugen's dialect. He sounded identical to Kazuma and Spike at least (although with a fouler mouth). |
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Keonyn
 Subscriber Posts: 5567 Location: Coon Rapids, MN |
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Oh god, Ohoni on the warpath against dubs he has marginal to no exposure too anyways. Sorry bud, but as you yourself have admitted your primary exposure to dubs has been television releases which are generally lower quality and far more edited than DVD releases.
Give it up, seriously, your exposure to dubs is far too limited for you to be the expert you pretend to be and making your case with the likes of a Naruto or other television hack jobs is as bad as those who judge anime based on seeing a handful of Pokemon episodes and hearing about hentai. People will like what they like and it's their right to do so. Arguing why your opinion is better than theirs is not only pointless but arrogant. Contrary to your apparent belief a large number of dubs are translated quite well and performed effectively. If people want to prefer that then let them, it doesn't impact how you watch it in any way so stop trying to effect theirs. You hate dubs, we get it already, we really do. |
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Mugen The Great
Posts: 189 |
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1) Actually, they did report at several conventions that the Sexy Justsu would be kept intact and that they'd edit out blood, and the YTV website said that Haku's gender would be intact. All of those statements turned out to be correct. 2) Notice that I bolded the words "lost in translation" in your quote. The fact you wrote that means that you are obviously very confused. Saying that makes it seem like you think they hacked up the dub. You are wrong about that. They dubbed the show uncut. They had to make edits to get it on Toonami but the uncut version of the dub will still be coming out on DVD. American R-rated movies are shown slightly-editted on television. That doesn't mean that the original intentions were entirely destroyed during production. The original production with everything intact is still out there (and LEGALLY, mind you, in case you start bringing up fansubs), and therefore you can't put the blame on the production (or in the case of Naruto, the dub). 3) So essentially what you're saying is that it's fine for something to suck in Japanese yet when that suckiness is brought into English it must be gotten rid of? I don't follow. |
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Ohoni
Posts: 3421 |
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Yes, and I speak from that basis. I don't think that just because the dubs I've seen are those that they thought were good enough to show on TV should discount my opinion. I fully accept that the stuff not shown on TV might be leaps and bounds better than the stuff on tv, I can't speak to that, but I can speak to what's shown on tv. And BTW, did you even read this thread? You're painting me out to be much worse than my words would indicate me to be. If anyone here is on a warpath, it is not I.
They might have. If so, that news apparently did not reach the ears of those who feared otherwise, or came via untrustworthy sources.
I put the blame on the PRODUCT. In this case, I was discussion the PRODUCT of the Naruto dub shown on tv. Whether that's indicative of the DVD product is irrelevant. Either way, I doubt that they're going to redub every one of Maile's lines of dialog, so it would change very little.
Ok, just checking, but are you Japanese? If not, then can anyone else here who is comment on "dattebayo"? From what I understand about Japanese, it is not NEARLY so annoying in the context of the Japanese sentence structure. It it not nearly as out of place or strange as the American Naruto shouting "Believe it!" all the time. Japanese is a different language than English. It has a different structure, a different flow, and YES, some things that sound fine in Japanese sound stupid in English. A similar example would be Chichiri in Fushigi Yuugi, who would end each sentance with "noda", a relatively meaningless phrase that comes off fairly naturally in Japanese, but for which there is no workable English equivalent. That means that when converting it to English you either have to leave it (or some equivalent) in, or remove it, neither of which is true to the spirit of the original, hence one of the reasons that dubs are inevitably lacking when compared to the original language work, whether you prefer them or not. |
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Mugen The Great
Posts: 189 |
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1) It came from reliable sources (YTV's website, and if I remember correctly ANN mentioned some stuff about it). And it was spread pretty widely throughout the internet. Narutards are just too dense to notice, and unfortunately Narutards are an unusually powerful group in anime fandom who could easily confuse everyone else by sending mixed messages. 2) As far as I know, the dub shown on TV is the same as the one on the DVD, only certain scenes that had to be editted were changed visually. Those edits might be poorly done in some places, but they're a necissary evil that comes with broadcasting on Toonami. For what it is, they've actually been very good in terms of keeping things intact. I'm pretty certain that the past few episodes have been entirely uncut even. And anyway, editting and dubbing are 2 entirely different issues. Any gripes you have with editting don't belong in this thread. If you just hate the VAs or think the dub pales to the original, that's fine. I think that the dub pales to the original as well and admittedly Naruto's VA is a bit annoying at times. But even then that's just one dub and shouldn't be used to represent all dubs. 3) It might be normal for Japanese viewers to hear constant repetitive catchphrases. It might also be normal for Japanese viewers to accept inflatable testicles as part of a serious drama and to find mannequines talking to be comedic gold. That doesn't mean that it's good. If you think it's good, fine, you can dislike dubs. But you seem to be dissatisfied because you seem to be saying "Dubs should be better!", and if your admitting that dubs can never live up to what you'd want just stop watching dubs entirely and don't post in these threads. |
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