Poll: English dubs for anime: good or bad?

[Ben Legend]

I don't watch anime... but I do remember watching the Japanese version of Advent Children, and thinking the voice actors matched the characters perfect, then I watch the American version, not only did they not sound like the characters I loved, they changes some of the dialogue, to the point it made me cringe. =(

 

[traceur_]

Always good in my opinion. I hate the Japanese language, in animes it sounds like the men are always constipated and the women are sucking helium.

If something is mistranslated, I'll never know and I'll never care because I don't know any Japanese.

If it's not in English then I will not watch it.

 

[Noamuth]

I don't particularly like most Japanese voice acting. It generally sounds very dull and same-y to me.

So I prefer English dubs. Not saying they're all great, though.

 

[AvsJoe]

I chose other because there isn't an 'always bad' button. The only real good exceptions I found were Full Metal Alchemist and Karas, and I guess that you could say Macross Plus is okay. I've been told that Princess Mono-oke has a good one as well, but I haven't seen it yet.

But other than those I have not come across a good dubbing job, and I've seen my fair share of animes, so 'always bad' would be my option.

 

[iBroham]

Bad, lost in translation much. Best way is to learn the language IMO.


saying that GITS had tollerable voice acting, tollerable because it was GITS and I promptly switched over to the japanese audio with subs

 

[Gaderael]

Subs are the only way to go, for the most part. The only decent dubs I have seen are the Miyazaki films that Disney imported and paid crazy money to somewhat well known actors to do the voices for.

 

[Azraellod]

i tend to watch subbed.

dubbed is acceptable sometimes, but i don't enjoy it as much, and thus watch subbed wherever it is an option.

i will admit that there are sometimes some disadvantages [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-okHc4NNzo] to watching subbed, but i still consider them far superior in most ways.

 

[Ghostkai]

As with most things, it's good if done well.

 

[Graustein]

I chose other because there isn't an 'always bad' button. The only real good exceptions I found were Full Metal Alchemist and Karas, and I guess that you could say Macross Plus is okay. I've been told that Princess Mono-oke has a good one as well, but I haven't seen it yet.

But other than those I have not come across a good dubbing job, and I've seen my fair share of animes, so 'always bad' would be my option.

So, they're always bad except when they're not?

 

[Icehearted]

I'd rather watch my anime than read my anime.

'nuff said.

 

[Super_Nintendo_Chalmers]

English dubbed animes are usually awful.
The only exception to that rule is Full Metal Alchemist, not sure why, it just flows in English.
But animes like Bleach and Neon Genesis are just meant to be in Japanese.

 

[SL33TBL1ND]

Only if its dubbed well, otherwise it makes my ears bleed.

 

[mindlesspuppet]

I think the difference between English dubs vs. Japanese is getting less significant as time passes. I remember back in the 90s when most dubs were like listening to nails scratch a chalkboard. These days I think most are pretty tolerable. As anime continues to grow outside of Japan the quality of dubs will continue to improve as well.

 

[iBroham]

I'd rather watch my anime than read my anime.

'nuff said.

true if I wanted to read anime id read the manga - which in most cases (bleach,naruto,black lagoon,beserk,tenjhou tenge to list a few) is better than the anime.

That said I assume you mean watch the anime in Japanese dot dubbed.

 

[BK-110]

In my opinion, the majority of dubs are bad. Really, really bad. Actually, I've only yet encountered one that I found to be acceptable. The English dub of 'The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya'. But I still prefer the original voice acting by far. And as a Japanese-learner I get some kind of annoying feeling everytime I hear Japanese words in dubbing, due to the 'localized' pronunciation.

But yeah, I personally really don't like dubs.

 

[AvsJoe]

I chose other because there isn't an 'always bad' button. The only real good exceptions I found were Full Metal Alchemist and Karas, and I guess that you could say Macross Plus is okay. I've been told that Princess Mono-oke has a good one as well, but I haven't seen it yet.

But other than those I have not come across a good dubbing job, and I've seen my fair share of animes, so 'always bad' would be my option.

So, they're always bad except when they're not?

I deserved that. You are correct.

But still, I have seen about 80 or 90 different anime shows or movies and I can only come up with 3 examples of good or better dubbing, that means that it's bad about 96% of the time IMO. It's not 'always', you're right about that, but I will no longer give dubbing even a chance anymore thanks to those terrible odds. So from now on the answer will be 'always' for me.

 

[flaming_squirrel]

I can think of VERY few dubs which have been half good, pretty much all of the reasonable ones are made by Ghibli and so can afford voice actors with at least a shred of talent.

Best example of why dubbing is horrible, the one so many people love to hate: Naruto.
That voice...it's like cleaning your ears out with bleach.

 

[D0WNT0WN]

Dubs are usually shit but in some rare occasions (Dragonball Z) the dubs are better than the original japaneese version.

(Im not joking the Jap voice actor of Goku really gets to me).

 

[Sparrow]

Most are complete naff.

However, some are quite good. For instance, FLCL and FMA have amazing dubbing. Bleach has quite good dubbing as well, and to a certain extent, so does DBZ.