Japanese or English Voices?

By Hellagoddess. 20/07/08, 11:49 am

While my preference is Japanese w/or w/out subtitles - I actually tend to find the trend among people is to become comfortable with whatever you've watched that particular series in initially. For instance, if someone watches something in Japanese and then switches to the English version - the voices tend to sound very...wrong for the characters. However if you've been watching it in English from the start and then watch it in Japanese, the reverse is also true. If I have the choice at the beginning, I like Japanese - but there are a few series - take Saiyuki for example - that I can't watch in Japanese as it doesn't sound right to me.

I think it's just a case of what you're used to unfortunately, as there are some really horrible dubs out there which should never have been created in the first place! Haha

By Yunnik. 26/10/08, 08:43 am

I prefer the Japanese voices since in my opinion the actors they choose always give the perfect voice for a character. It always turns out to be exactly how I imagined if not better.
But there were a few animes that I used to watch on TV and now I'm used to the English voices used for them so when it comes to watching those animes with Japanese voices I kind of get weirded out lol
But now I only watch anime with Japanese voices. They are just so much more natural to me for some reason ^^

By Pura. 26/10/08, 08:49 am

Pyro wrote:: I'm just going to go whimper in a corner with the Trinity Blood dub and my tears of immense pain now...

Esther's voice is horrid. Most are okay though. I haven't seen TB in Japanese for ages, so I don't know which one I prefer. Abel's voice also annoys me a little. I like Ion's though (screetchy Al! <3).

By bekah. 26/10/08, 09:38 am

Whenever I watch anime or anything, I have to watch it dubbed or else I lose interest because I dunno, I just don't find anime that interesting to start off with.

And I believe that sub is kinda uh, annoying and causes Satan spawn-age -- it causes everyone to run around saying KAWAII SUGOI DESU NE! and the like. :bitchslap:

So, yeah, dub pwns. I don't really care about VAs usually, as well. Unless they obviously suck really bad or something. But, I swear I'm deaf to things being made of suck. |D

Yeah, that's my. Um. 10 cents?
From basically a non-anime-watcher~

But yeah, the world needs more dub love ~

By PinkGoggles. 01/11/08, 01:27 pm

The worst thing in english dubbing history is One Piece. It sucks BAD.
I love OP so it's really annoying that it got such crap dubbers in english...
However, some english dubs are awesome
Like the dubs in movies for instance. Vampire Hunter D and Blood the Last Vampire were really good.

By RaiKorn. 02/11/08, 03:43 am

I guess some of them are either really good or REALLY bad XD
i'd prefer to listen to Japanese version but if i have to, it's okay to listen in english... but if it's terrible my ears will bleed and i'll become a deaf XDDDD
but at the same time, i really feel sorry about english voice dubbers, they try hard but... TT___TT

By IcyRose. 02/11/08, 04:19 am

PinkGoggles wrote:: The worst thing in english dubbing history is One Piece. It sucks BAD.
I love OP so it's really annoying that it got such crap dubbers in english...
However, some english dubs are awesome
Like the dubs in movies for instance. Vampire Hunter D and Blood the Last Vampire were really good.

Well the fun fact here is that Vampire Hunter D was dubbed in English before it was dubbed in Japanese. But I supposed everyone already knew that.

By Pura. 02/11/08, 05:39 am

IcyRose wrote:

PinkGoggles wrote:: The worst thing in english dubbing history is One Piece. It sucks BAD.
I love OP so it's really annoying that it got such crap dubbers in english...
However, some english dubs are awesome
Like the dubs in movies for instance. Vampire Hunter D and Blood the Last Vampire were really good.

Well the fun fact here is that Vampire Hunter D was dubbed in English before it was dubbed in Japanese. But I supposed everyone already knew that.

I didn't know that. That's really interesting. I can't remember what the dub sounded like though xD.

By ganzt. 16/12/08, 03:48 pm

I can watch either but i prefer Japanese except when its old style american accent like inuyasha and ranma 1/2 i love that for some reason

By Basaka. 16/12/08, 06:25 pm

The Japanese voices. NEED TO IMPROVE MY JAP DDDDD:

By Rolly. 16/12/08, 07:14 pm

PinkGoggles wrote:: The worst thing in english dubbing history is One Piece. It sucks BAD.
I love OP so it's really annoying that it got such crap dubbers in english...
However, some english dubs are awesome
Like the dubs in movies for instance. Vampire Hunter D and Blood the Last Vampire were really good.

The only thing I remember about the one and only time I saw dubbed One Piece on TV is "Let's go to One Piece" *drone drone drone - OP finished YAY*. And then I felt the OP was so dumb as most dubbed OP's are. D:

By MissTubby. 25/04/09, 05:00 pm

....i prefer the jap voices WAYYYY better..
and i guess you kinda get use to reading the subtitles.... Pikachu

plus the theme songs are better !!

By Cassiel. 26/04/09, 03:13 am

For me it's not so much "Dub vs Sub". For me it's more "Cencored vs uncensored".

I have an extremely strong objection to having anime censored. I want to watch it in full uncencored glory dangnammit! I do prefer the original of pretty much anything, be it movies, anime, whatever. Obvioulsy, this isn't going to be the case with something relatively obscure like, I dunno, Elfen Lied, but more the stuff thats been made 'child safe' for American TV. In that case I honestly feel like the dub is just a watered-down version, and so with those ones, even if the voices sound really odd to me, I'll watch it in Japanese with subs. It's actually very entertaining to see how much they chopped and changed to make it suitable for children. Yu-Gi-Oh's invisible guns anyone?

I do have a slight personal preference to Japanese voices if i'm watching alone. I'll attribute this to it to just being what I'm used to. If there's been no changes from the original to the dub, then I might watch it in English. For example, Princess Mononoke, Howl's moving castle have no changes so I really don't care if it's subs or dubs. I shove it in my PS2, press a button and switch them during the show. It's mad fun to hear them switch languages between sentences.

However, in a group-watching setting I'd prefer English with English subs because my hearing is not very good and when people talk I can't hear what's going on D:<

By venom. 26/04/09, 05:24 am

38:4. No game.

Dubs suck. (Most). Period.

By daydreamer. 27/04/09, 06:05 am

The Japanese voice ^-^

Wayyyyyyyy better than English

By Squishy blob. 27/04/09, 10:41 am

I feel sorry for the english voice actors sometimes. They're probably used to being snubbed by fans ( apart from the swarms they get at cons) and they're just doing their job. But the people who dub OP songs are just cruel. Are they trying to make ears bleed? And do the english seiyuu really have to [put on corny accents?

By Pyro. 27/04/09, 11:58 am

F-forty two?!

Against four?!

D8
-suddenly feels very alone in her dub-lovin'-

By Mandie_Chan. 27/04/09, 12:00 pm

english coz then i can multi task and not have 2 stare at the words >_<;

By secretasianman. 27/04/09, 03:36 pm

I think this would have to depend on how I percieve an anime. Like for Cardcaptors, I first watched it in English, but then after seeing it in Japanese, I didn't like the English version very much. But on the other hand, I watched Full Metal Alchemist in English, then I tried Japanese and it didn't quite feel the same. I might take it for a case by case basis....

By Squishy blob. 29/04/09, 11:26 am

I guess its not something you can generalize about. And dubs are good if you're not looking at the screen and doing something else.

By Aikome. 30/04/09, 02:34 pm

I vote Japanese..except I ABSOLUTELY LOVE JERRY JEWEL'S VOICE ! (aka - the english dub for Kyo, Furuba) XD

By lednera. 02/05/09, 02:30 pm

any anime with Steven Jay Blum I will watch in english 1st as I have found most dubs hes done have been better than the japanese.

By deathbypiano. 04/05/09, 04:47 am

It just depends on how good the subs are. I normally like english dubs best but Elfen Lied subs were better than the dub. Same with Shugo Chara.
Just depends how well translated it is..

By Keysha-chan. 05/05/09, 06:51 am

Oh man...this is a subject I'm always unable to really be on either side for, so here goes.

I used to be all 'ZOMG! SUBS ONLY!' years ago. Of course, I grew up in the 80s when anime dubs really were abismal. These days we're lucky. Treated to uncut DVDs (which give us the option of watching it subtitled if we wish) with better talent than what was on offer years ago.

English dubs have a huge negative against them from the start. 90% of us at least see any anime first in Japanese with subs (given the internet and downloading fansubs ect). This can range from a few episodes to a whole series before the English dub kicks off - by then we're well and truly used to the original Japanese cast and find it hard to adjust to any new voices.

Second is the range of talent. There are some AMAZING actors in the industry but given how large a cast of any anime is, the talent is going to range from great, good, moderate and then some (or many more) duds. You can have some great stars, but it's hard to shine when you're surrounded by the not-so-talented - who can stick out far more sometimes as it's what people usually notice first.

Dub actors get paid peanuts compared to any other type of voice acting/ADR - so the fact that we DO get some talent in the industry is amazing enough. Let's add to that how hard it is to record a dub anime - matching the mouth flaps to the lines (sometimes some Japanese Seiyuu don't even get this right, considering the different way they record their lines as a group) as well as ACT right the whole time (anyone ever taken part in/watched Crispin Freeman's anime dubbing sessions hes done at Armageddons before? Then you'll have a very good idea). Hmmm...hardest job and lowest pay. It's a wonder we have talent like Steve Bloom working in this industry still.

I guess acting talent also depends on if it's an anime dub or not. 4kids has a MASSIVE reputation for being pretty poor. Yet have you heard some of their actors when they actually just get to voice act (without all the messing around timing lip-flaps and such?) Some of them are actually VERY talented actors, they just never get the chance considering the script and such they have to go with.

Someone else also mentioned it - editing. Un-editing DVDs = BIG yay. Editing for TV...that depends. There are laws in the US, I belive, that they can't show things like running blood before a certain time of the day, and smoking is something I don't think they allow on anything animated shown between a certain time of the day too.

Now that being said, my opinion depends on the individual anime itself. I found that FMA had one of the better english casts, and this was after I watched almost the whole thing in Japanese, it was still easy to watch it with a different set of voices. I diss-like the Jing dub but ADORE some of the Japanese cast (most of all the two mains).

I think One Piece (now that Funimation has taken over) is one of my faves in both Japanese and English. The cast has had a hard time re-dubbing the original episodes, plus ones from where 4kids left off. They've been under contract that anything televised before 4kids contract ends has to include the 4kids edits (that's why they got 'Zolo', 'Trace' ect on some of the Skypiea TV episodes, and 'Zoro, 'Ace' ect in the DVDs), and even had to work with a video game that 4kids had apparently started to cut up already. Yet somehow they did it. The cast is starting to fit more into their roles and they're trying their best to salvage an anime most western viewers still won't give the time of day due to a bad start from another company.

Of course, I adore the Japanese cast too. Otani and Yamaguchi~! chuu~!

Also, on the older subject of Vic, it is sad. When he came to NZ several years back he was very polite, didn't preech at us at all about religion and was actually very calm and collected when the yaoi question was brought up. I really wonder if something went on down the line...or maybe it was popularity in general (from what I hear, a lot of the Rangers act really retarded at cons these days too, which doesn't help when you say your a fanbase representing him). I'd like to say it's hear-say, but I have US friends who tell me the stuff they've seen him do at cons. :<

Mostly, I'm nervous since he seems to have his eyes on the character of Brook in One Piece right now. Oh sure, he can sing. Doesn't mean his voice is going to fit the character (infact, from all his past roles, I've not yet heard him pull off a Brook-like one at all). Ah well, time will tell...

By PIe. 05/05/09, 02:43 pm

I don't like dubs generally, I have come across a few voices that i like (I refer Ash's voice to Satoshi's for some reason, I just find Satoshi [original name for Ash from pokemon] wierd), I find that the Japanese voice actors are way more suited to a character, english dub Mikuru (MoHS) makes me want to die for example while I am completely fine with origional Japanese Mikuru. Just my opinion

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