why do some ppl like their anime dubbed?

[sanosuke]

the last post wasnt a complaint although i was complaining in previous posts, neither was it the continuation of the agruement i was just pointing out what side i feel is winning.

wasnt it straight forward enough?

[vitris]

Well it kinda sounded to me like a continuation of the argument.
You clearly state that in your biased opinion...as someone who prefers subs already, that the Dubs have no worthwhile points whatsoever.

From what I've seen I think both sides make good points, but to outright say that one side failed seems like an attempted dismissal of the Dubbed argument in favour of your preferred Sub argument.

[Zagatto]

For as long as I've been watching anime, I've never had a serious debate about the whole subs vs. dubs issue.

Rereading peoples posts I do see merit to both sides of the debate and believe that it boils down to personal tastes.

One reason I haven't seen mentioned for watching a dub instead of a sub is horrible subs. Recently, I watched Evangelion for the first time all dubbed. The dubs were just below the standard I like for dubs but the subtitles were dropping way too many lines. Halfway through the series, I had gotten used to how the characters sounded in the English dub and I'm not sure that I would enjoy the original soundtrack now that I've associated those voices with those characters.

One final thing is that this thread has gone a bit off topic from the original posters question. The point of this thread was to find out why people watch dubs to begin with. It wasn't to be which is better.

[kakomu]

Originally posted by sanosuke
all the mods must be in bed because this thread has had too good an innings.

based on the arguements ive read it looks like sub is well winning, the dub crew aint got not real good points. infact this debate would convince me to watch anime in japanese if i already didnt!

Dub points:

1) It's the native Language of the watcher and it allows them to concentrate on the animation instead of text at the bottom of the screen.

2) It's more how like a Japanese person would be watching an anime (that is, they would watch the show and listen to the dialogue, not read text all over the screen).

3) Voice acting can be pretty irrelevent, since there are many bad and good Dub jobs both in Japanese and in English (damn how I hate the way Kenshin sounds in the Japanese version).

4) It's plain easier to listen to dialogue than it is to read it while the show is playing.

Sub point - It's more how a Japanese person would watch the show since it's in Japanese, however, a Japanese person would not watch it with English subtitles all over the screen, so that argument is invalid.

From what I can tell, the Native Language Dub watchers have a better argument. As was said before, it all boils down to personal taste. You can't make sweeping generalizations that all English Dubs suck and all Japanese Dubs are far superior, because we know that to be untrue (and in some cases both the Japanese and English Dub are just awful, like in Sorcerer Hunters' TV case).

Talking about how much better Japanese VAs are over English VAs is irrelevent, considering there are many series out there where all emotion seems to sound the same, that is, unless you know the language. I listen to the Dubs, and they have some pretty good Voice Acting skill. So it balances out, some good and some bad in both camps. Lastly, as I already said before, you can't have English VAs act in the Radio drama sort as opposed to the Japanese VAs, considering the Japanese VAs have no control over the script, they read and act, whereas in the English VAs case, they have to tinker with the script to make it fit correctly, do multiple takes. Can you imagine doing that with three people at once? You'd have each person saying their line over and over again to try and sync the words, then wait for the next person to do their lines, then try and do it ALL at once. It wouldn't work that way. Anyways, methodology isn't always the determining factor behind the quality of the acting, but rather how good the actor truly is.

Saying that you're watching it in Japanese, because that's how the artist meant it is also irrelevent, not only because of the argument I gave above, but also because in localization, scripts are often run by original directors and writers for approval. The same goes for the actual dub. Anyways, think about it. Do you think the original writer is in control of EVERY aspect of a show? No. You have multiple people doing multiple tasks. YOu have character designers, music composers, dialogue writers, VA producers, key frame artists, producers out the Wazoo, directors out the wazoo etc etc etc. There are MANY artists in the mix. Having an English VA director and producer is just adding one more artist to the mix.

That, my friends, is my argumentation. Shit, I should write a dissertation :p

[Elcoholic]

Hey Kakomu, you better save that post on your harddrive for the next dub/sub argument that comes allong. That sums it up perfectly

[kakomu]

I'll be honest. It doesn't matter about all the points I had already put up. It all boils down to preference. They could have hired the creme de la creme of Japanese VAs for the Akira Movie, however, I still love listening to the old track with Leonardo playing Kanaeda. I totally love watching Cowboy Bebop in Japanese, but totally love watching Tenchi in English. There is no real rhyme or reason to my listening habits. More often than not, the language I watch my anime in is totally determined by one of 3 factors. Either A) what I heard it in first, B) My HK DVDs come in Japanese only, C) longets exposure.

I should explain C. I had watched DBZ for quite a few episodes back when the Freeza saga was new in English. I must have seen around 20 or so episodes in English, but because of my desire for more DBZ, I acquired many recorded episodes of DBZ past the point toonami was at, and proceeded to watch hundreds more episodes in Japanese. So, while I had a lengthy exposure in English before Japanese, I prefered the Japanese version leaps and bounds more (also, I hated the Dub's music...it was awful). Given the choice between the two languages, it's typically up in the air, whatever I think sounds better and which ever series has better sounding characters. More often than not, the Japaense characters sound alike to me (except in rarecases, where I can point out characters like Vash from Trigun, Spike from Cowboy Bebop and Goku and Vegeta from DBZ), so if I typically am neutral about how they characters sound (especially considering it's not my native tongue). I find it ludicrous for anyone to make a total judgement about which version of the anime they will watch all the time, considering the variable nature of actors.

But, that's just my 2 cents (or possibly three or four).

[meowchi]

Originally posted by kakomu
(damn how I hate the way Kenshin sounds in the Japanese version).

I am just glad to see that I am not the only one who hates the way Kenshin sounds in the japanese version. I watched it Subed the first time, and I was OMG this is crap. I love the English voices though. After watching it Dubed it became my fav. anime.

[sanosuke]

the almighty sub points:

1) it takes me less than half the time to read the subs and its quite possible to do two things at once, therefore anyone who watches with sub should be able to enjoy the animation as well as understand the dialogue, maybe not at first but it should be easy after a while.

2) the point of subs on the screen making it less like the original japanese version is just plain stupid. its just a bit of text, not like theyve replaced the entire cast with a bunch of canadians that couldnt make it as actors so they voice cartoons, oops isnt that what eng dubs are?

3) i know for a fact that around 2/3s of eng dubs are horribley acted, and usually badly cased. to me almost all jap dubs are infinately better acted and reflect character much more accurately, maybe this isnt the case but hey ignorance is bliss.

4) the easier route is no doubt the lazier route, i would know.

the japanese dub point is intirely valid. it would just be plain stupid to watch something in a lanuage you didnt understand without subtitles. its just as stupid to say that it effects the original form of the anime because of words on the screen. i dont care what way the japanese watch their anime, i want to watch it in its original, intended form. i wouldnt be too happy if some motherfucker changed altered something that i had created.

acting is so much better in japanese dubs because they are recorded in a "radio drama"-esk manner. this is fact. because english dubs have to fit the lip-sync of the original animation, they are forced to slowly change lines and words and eventually a good portion of the script. this is where alot of it goes wrong. imagine a japanese guy with a strong american accent shitting on an original picasso. this is called the eng dub. and im sure that the original japanese creator of the anime doesnt have much of a say in voice dubbing, but hey its not like theres only 3 male leads in japan that anime dubbers used over and over. its like tom cruise being in every one in three movies youll ever see, but whats so bad with that? whats so bad is that he stops becoming characters and is forever remembered as ethan hunt or shinji in animes case.

adding one more artist you say? adding one more american artist to a japanese show, if i want to watch american cartoons i can watch cartoon network, if i want to watch an american raping something japanese then im sure i could find it on the net.

and i totally agree that its all a matter of opinion what you watch and which version you enjoy. infact i couldnt really give a shit who watches eng or jap dubs cause i can do whatever i want and im sure ill sleep well tonight knowing that i did it my way. i only bothered with all this because i think that all the dubs points have been shit (basically people are too lazy to read) and i like to argue.

that, my friends, is waffling shit, but good shit at that

(hope you deleted that post from your hard-drive because all of a sudden it isnt quite as convincing)

[Schultz]

Originally posted by meowchi
I am just glad to see that I am not the only one who hates the way Kenshin sounds in the japanese version. I watched it Subed the first time, and I was OMG this is crap. I love the English voices though. After watching it Dubed it became my fav. anime.

I would really have to disagree with both of you IMHO.. I think Kenshin's English actor sounds like he is gay.. and does not do justice at all.. I couldn't even watch 5 mins of it in English.. But i do know that Kenshins japanese voice is a female.

[sanosuke]

(damn how I hate the way Kenshin sounds in the Japanese version).

this may be because he has a woman trying to do a man voice. this is perfect for the roll because the creator (name?) designed him to be very female looking (ill post the link when i find it). but why on earth does male ranma have a womans voice in the eng dub of ranma 1/2? isnt it enough that he changes into a girl when he touched cold water?

this is a good example of how the japanese cast voice actors better than the english.

[evilomar]

I thought this forum was closed, but in any case I prefer Coke over Pepsi any day.

[kakomu]

Originally posted by sanosuke
this may be because he has a woman trying to do a man voice. this is perfect for the roll because the creator (name?) designed him to be very female looking (ill post the link when i find it). but why on earth does male ranma have a womans voice in the eng dub of ranma 1/2? isnt it enough that he changes into a girl when he touched cold water?

this is a good example of how the japanese cast voice actors better than the english.

Why on earth does Goku sound the same at 40 than he does at 12? With a female voice actor? Same goes for Gohan and Goten.

Sanosuke, your points are all just you saying that Dubs suck in one way or another, sometimes more with more expletives than others. YOur Arguments aren't convincing.

To coutner your points:

1) Doesn't matter, they didn't intend for you to read subs

2) Yes it has changed the show, you aren't listening to what they're saying, you're reading it. Most aren't terrible either, most are very professional.

3) You can't make sweeping generalizations like that. Anyways, what do you know?

4) What's your point?

As I;ve stated, the original intended version isn't with subtitles on it. The original inteded version is inteded for fluent Japanese speakers. Obviously you aren't one.

Your points aren't convincing at all.

[kakomu]

Originally posted by sanosuke
and i totally agree that its all a matter of opinion what you watch and which version you enjoy. infact i couldnt really give a shit who watches eng or jap dubs cause i can do whatever i want and im sure ill sleep well tonight knowing that i did it my way. i only bothered with all this because i think that all the dubs points have been shit (basically people are too lazy to read) and i like to argue.

I think all your points have been shit too...

[evilomar]

On second thought I am leaning more towards Pepsi right now.

[sanosuke]

ohh touchy touchy