Question to people who prefer the original voice track for anime

[DarklordKyo]

Anyone who's been an anime fan for any length of time are aware of those fans who always watch the show in the original language, hell, might be one themselves.

This isn't to complain about those people, but to ask a question. What if you run into one of those extremely rare, "once in a blue moon" scenarios where a Japanese anime technically has the Japanese version as the dub?

One of the more recent examples of this being Space Dandy. As Watanabe-san realized that a couple of his most famous directorial works, Cowboy Bebop and Samurai Champloo, had much bigger English speaking fanbases than local ones, it was arranged so that the English version of each episode premiered about an hour or two before the Japanese premiers.

As this is one of the rare instances where what should be an international dub is actual the original voice track (another example being Lupin The Third: The Italian Adventure being released in Italy before Japan, as a response to the franchise's massive Italian fanbase), for anyone who're hardcore that way, do you still stick to the Japanese version with subs?, or do you go for what's actually the technically original version?

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

I think those two are bad examples of what you're trying to put your finger on. Dandy was released simultaneously in both languages, for one.


Afro Samurai, or in the case of games, Bayonetta, are examples of a situation in which what you have as the original is the English-audio version. Bayonetta 2 had Japanese voices but 1 didn't so in that case they definitely are not the original and the actual Bayonetta is the English-voiced one.


In the case of Bebop or Champloo though, it really doesn't matter what they did in regards to marketing or in the business side of things which governs when something is shown, how big the fanbase was in any country, none of that stuff matters. What defines weather something is the original or not is if you have something that is as-is without having been localized. No matter when you show the localized version, it having been localized instantly makes it be not the original.

Cowboy Bebop would have to be conceived as an English-voiced anime in the same way Afro Samurai was for its English version to be the original one. What the audience or creative team end up "liking" more in the end has no relevance. You may like a knockoff Mona Lisa more, it's still not the original Mona Lisa.

 

[DarklordKyo]

snip

Fair points, fair points, what about in the case of Bayonetta: Bloody Fates then? (because, while the original game version is meant to speak English, Bloody Fates originally in Japanese, wasn't it?)

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

snip

Fair points, fair points, what about in the case of Bayonetta: Bloody Fates then? (because, while the original game version is meant to speak English, Bloody Fates originally in Japanese, wasn't it?)

I am not familiar with bloody fates at all but assuming it's a spinoff anime that was intended to be in Japanese, well, yeah, it's intended to be in Japanese. You can see the content in it as not canon or a spinoff in a different universe from the games, kinda how you got a Lilo and Stich anime which has an originally Japnese version but it doesn't undo the originality of the English-voiced Disney film.

 

[balladbird]

I'm the furthest thing from a dub hater you'll find, but I understand where a lot of pet peeves with dubs can come from. Matching pre-made lip flaps with a new language means making dialogue choices that can sound stilted and akward, and due to budget concerns, dubbing companies usually have a very narrow field of talent to work with.

The situation you refer to depends a lot on whether it would alleviate either of those problems. For instance, Space Dandy was animated with the japanese vocal track in mind, so while the dub was released simultaneously, they still had to match lip flaps with their dialogue.

As to which a person would prefer, I imagine when the release happened wouldn't matter much. The kinds of peeps who complain about dubs as though they literally cause their ears to bleed while singing praises to the semi-divine super-talent of the Japanese seiyuus probably isn't really going to care that technically the english version came out at the same time/earlier, after all. Whereas for people who are less obviously passionate bout everything, it usually comes down to preferring whichever version one hears first. Just shrug and move on.

 

[Michel Henzel]

I would still go for the Japanese dub as that is what I'm used to and what I prefer. That is really all there is to it.

 

[Tanis]

Is it shit?
Is it not shit?

That's all that matters.
Chicken, egg, or pterodactyl...doesn't really matter to me.

 

[Pyrian]

Is it shit?
Is it not shit?

This. I'm not at all militant about preferring subs to dubs, but so many dubs I've watched are just dire, even ones with high production values and name actors and so on.

 

[infohippie]

I prefer anime that has not been localised, so I'll always watch it in Japanese. Besides that, American accents sound a little weird to me anyway and hearing them in anime just sounds bizarre. I'm also gradually learning Japanese, so it's great to be watching in Japanese and find I understand a sentence here and there without even needing subtitles. It also helps me understand better how some words are used.

 

[default]

I'm very sensitive to tone of speaking, line reads, emphasis, intonation, etc. Even a small mistake or slightly awkward read makes me cringe. It's a big problem for me when it comes to english dubs, especially since japanese writing when adapted to english tends to sound flowery and hard to take seriously in the first place.

If there's an english dub with even a small amount of unfortunate voice acting it spoils my whole view of the film. It's why I always watch Princess Mononoke in Japanese. Even though the rest of the english cast is stellar and arguably better than the japanese readings, San's voice just upsets me. Bad voice acting just pulls me out of the whole film, unfortunately.

So yeah, I tend to stick to subs. Since I don't speak Japanese it's a lot more difficult for me to pick up awkward reads or bad acting. Just feels more enjoyable, and the script often doesn't need to be quite so torturously twisted to make things like jokes or cultural references work. Feels more natural.

I'm also partial to the view of wanting to hear the version that was directly overseen by the director himself, rather than a second party.

Though, obviously subs have their own host of issues...

 

[Candidus]

Hi there.

I prefer JP voice actors and actresses in almost all cases because they are simply superior to English voice actors and actresses from the US, for the following reasons:

First, the VA industry in Japan is far better developed. There are dedicated educational institutions for voice artists- somewhere between 100 and 150 of them- and competition is fierce because the bar for talent and professionalism is so high.

Yes, you `can` tell the difference between a good and bad JP VA. Just have a listen to some of the early dialogue in Enchanted Arms. It's AWFUL.

Yuri Lowenthal, Christina Vee and the majority of their anime-and-vidya voicing US peers wouldn't stand a snowball's chance in hell as aspiring artists in Japan. They simply don't read well enough-- like most US VA's, they make me embarrassed to be playing the games they voice for.

Second, the American accent. This one is just personal, but I simply can't stand it for protracted periods of gameplay-- particularly when the standards are so low.

So even in a hypothetical where the English VA is the original, I would say that it isn't the `original` property that swings it for me. I'd still be listening to the JP, or passing completely where dual audio isn't available.

 

[deadish]

The biggest issue is lip sync. The animation is timed for the Japanese voices. English VAs need to contort their dialogue to fit the onscreen animation which results in it sounding horrible.

Another factor is the culture barrier. Sometimes when non-Japanese VAs read a script, they aren't sure exactly how a character is supposed to be portrayed and do it completely wrong - with the director not knowing any better either. While for a Japanese VA it's obvious what the writer was going for.

Thus I always watch stuff in the original JP language.

An exception are animes timed to the English track because they are intended for the US market first and foremost. Those are hit and miss as half the time they get the worst VAs/directors to do it and everything is just bad.

 

[Tiamattt]

Like many things in life I take anime voices on a case by case basis. Just because original language has sounded better than dubs in some cases doesn't mean that it'll always be that way, and if the dub is better than the original language I would happily switch to it.

One time I actually ran into a case on Netflix where they had a German dub for the first 2-3 seasons of a anime that sounded better to me than the original Japanese voices I found later. If I could have finished the whole series in German I gladly would have but I bumped into the rest of the series in Japanese and I just finished it rather than waiting for the ???? time it would have taken for Netflix to get the rest of the series. (if ever)

So yeah I would just go for whatever sounds the best to me. If it's the original voices, great. English dub, also great. German, Spanish, Russian, French, Chinese, Klingon, it doesn't matter as long as my ears are happy.

 

[Vendor-Lazarus]

If the author, writer or director for a show/movie/game is creating the work from a certain cultural perspective it would be best viewed within that context.
Subs allow every viewer from from those not at all familiar with a certain language to those that are fully versed in it.
It also allows one learn and better understand jokes, phrases and cultural things and to gain a deeper understanding without tarnishing the works themselves.

I always use subs myself. Except for one single show.. Hellsing (and Ultimate Hellsing).

 

[Zhukov]

When I prefer non-English VO with subs over English VO (in any context) it has nothing to do with purity or which came first.

It's just because the English voiceovers are shit.

The non-English ones might be shit too, or even worse, but I can't tell because I can't understand them.

 

[Catnip1024]

Well, Zhukov seems to have beaten me to it, but I'll go ahead regardless:

Give me a dub that isn't shit, and I will consider watching the dub. There is nothing more off-putting than a stupidly out of place, or particularly annoying voicing. It's reached the point where a lot of the time, I will stop watching a programme if it is dubbed. The dubbed Ghibli movies, for instance, that they always show on TV.

I've not come across something released in English first, afaik, but it would come down to how well they pulled it off.

It's not just anime, it's the same with international movies. I like my Germans to speak German, and my Chinese actors to speak Chinese, rather than in perfect, emotionless, Oxford English (the English dub of Crouching Tiger I saw was hypnotically bad).

 

[Casual Shinji]

Now, I'm probably going to sound vey pretentious here, but there's a reverence to japanese voice acting that english voices generally lack. This doesn't make it automatically better, just better suited for japanese written dialoge/storytelling.

This is why a dubbed line in an anime can make me cringe while that same line in japanese won't. And it's not because I can't understand the language, it's because there's a sincerity to the inflection that makes me buy into it more. And again, this is not me saying japanese voices are by default better than english, just better when it comes to stories that originate from Japan. I mean, I wouldn't want, like, The Last of Us, or Rick and Morty in japanese, God no.

 

[Scarim Coral]

I only prefered the sub due to the fact when they release a new anime, it's in its native language therefore subs for those who cannot understand what they are saying.

I never specifically sought out the dub version of an old anime like e.g. Berserk unless english was the first language like example Afro Samurai or the enlgish version was quite popular or release to the UK first like Golden Boy, Laputa, Samurai Pizza Cats or Cowboy Bebop.

With Space Dandy, it was whichever I found the link first which is most of the time was Japanese and then Enlgish (yes I watched both versions). Granted that High School episode I did watched in English first and prefered heavily cos of the song.

Just to be clear, I got nothing against the Enlgish dub regardless on how bad it is. Whenever I buy the anime dvd, I always watched the dub version first and some of them I do prefered the dub like Cowboy Bebop, Airbat, Burnup Excel and Ghost in the Shell etc.