Poll: Japanese w/ Subs vs. Dub: Which is better for an anime? [W/ Digimon clips!]

[Yosato]

It's a mixed batch for me, usually I'll watch the first few episodes of a show in English and then Japanese before deciding which one I want to stick with. If the show is good enough to watch multiple times I'll always end up seeing both versions start to finish.

Seriously though, if Digimon Adventure conjures up that much rage then you should get around to watching some 4kids dubs. Shows like Pokemon, Yu-Gi-Oh and One Piece had FAR worse censoring. I always thought Digimon's dub was really good (at least compared to those ones); in Digimon at least they never altered the core storyline and always made it clear what was happening. They never had anything like threatening with invisible guns, 'sending someone to prison' instead of death or omitting entire episodes and arcs.

Try watching Digimon Tamers. With US censorship what it is there's a shit-tonne of really unnerving and dark stuff in that show that probably shouldn't have made it through.

 

[Quellist]

I prefer the Dub because then i dont have to watch the text so i can concentrate more on the show, plain and simple. Also there are some really good dubs out there and with a good dub you get more of a feel for the characters by hearing their english voices.

Favorite example Vash in Trigun, no way could subtitles have conveyed his personality, and i cant pick up any real feeling by hearing Japanese language voices

 

[Drops a Sweet Katana]

I prefer dubs. I find subtitles distract me from the other elements of the show/film like the animation, soundtrack and original voice acting. Dubs allow me to focus on the other bits since I'm not having to constantly read the text on the bottom of the screen. If I wanted to read, I'd read a book.

 

[bobtail123]

I personally will almost always watch dubbed. In some cases I can certainly admit that the sub is better voice acted than the dub on average, in about ~30% of shows. But in most, ~60%, I believe the two are equal in terms of quality and that gives the edge to dub simply because it is easier for me to see the full emotion put into a scene in a language I understand.

I also think it's too much of a simplification to talk about an entire shows cast being better in one language, because while that may be true in some cases, in most there is incredibly varied talent. e.g. Greed and Wrath in FMA:B are better in dubbed but Lust and Envy are better subbed. A further example is Naruto, where Naruto and Naguto are much better in subbed, but Pain, Madara and Itachi are better in dubbed in my opinion.

Finally I think there are roughly 10% of shows where the dub is better for the show than the subbed. Baccano, Black Lagoon, Cowboy Bebop and Hellsing are all examples of these, in many cases because the style of the show is more western than most anime, or there are characters from non-japanese countries where a dub is superior in getting that national diversity across.

Really cool to see a fairly reasonable and fair discussion on this topic which so often deteriorates into pointless contradiction

 

[T3hSource]

I'm just used to sub, I have nothing against dub. Though I don't watch that often, nor do I think much about which one I choose, doesn't make a lot of difference for me.

 

[Piorn]

It really depends, I mostly watch Subs out of necessity, and japanese always sounds nice.

Everything else, I usually watch what I'm used to. Many animes have a german version that's on par or even better than the english version, and I'm slowly reacquainting with german as a language.

And the german, original Digimon intro is far superior to the american one, because it's actually a song, and not just someone stuttering DIGIMON.

 

[DarthBartus]

I don't watch anime, so I can't tell what's the situation there, but goddamn, when it comes to games, subs all the way. I mean, just play Final Fantasy X, or even worse, FF X-2. In the latter voice acting was so horrendous I had to torrent a modified version of the game, with japanese audio. I couldn't understand thing without subs, but at least my ears weren't constantly assaulted by audible diarrhea.

 

[aceman67]

Depends on how many hours of sleep I've had, and/or how annoying the VO is (for both languages).

But I always watch with subtitles. To not do so just seems like... I don't know, sacrilege.

 

[wings012]

Sub purist for most part. The Japanese voices generally come with better acting, range and variety. Japan has a whole industry built on it after all.

And I feel there's some dissonance when I see a Japanese teenager squeak English out horribly. Dubs wouldn't be half as bad if most actors didn't try to forcibly raise their pitch so damn much. The whole subject matter vs voices.

Like I was totally fine watching Lodoss in English. I had my fantasy knight, wizards and elves speak English. Just seemed right. A samurai jabbering English doesn't feel quite as right.

 

[Gypsyssilver]

TL;DR - Which do you think presents an anime better? The original Japanese w/ English subs or an English or localization dub?

It really depends on the individual anime.

I generally prefer the subs. The quality seems to be higher overall, and it has the side benefit of helping me practice my Japanese listening skills.

I'm a lot warier when it comes to the dubs - most of the time they're just not quite there. Or they're really bad.


When dubs get it right:

Cowboy Bebop - I like the sub AND the dub on this one. The dub is polished, the voice acting is terrific and the casting was well done. Ditto for the sub.

Sergeant Frog - The dub is actually better in this case - by far. Humour is something that is pretty area-specific. If there are references that you don't understand - you're not going to do much laughing. The sub is, I understand, hilarious if you're Japanese (or have spent a lot of time in Japan). For me though, I was missing most of the deeper meaning behind most of the jokes, so could only laugh at what was on the surface.

The dub, however, is amazing. They've totally redone the jokes so that it fits a westerner's background knowledge/sense of humour. They've jammed it full of pop-culture references, and it really works.


Dubs (in general) DO have their problems though:

1) Dumbing down - a lot of the more 'childish' (at least in appearance) anime do seem to get dumbed down when localised in America. The American executives obviously see children as being the target audience, and so strip it of anything that could possibly cause offence (nudity/violence/crucial plot points). I really, really hate that. The more 'adult' seeming anime often do a little bit better in that respect.

2) Terrible voice actors. Voice acting in Japan is a pretty good career (if you can break into the industry), so they have the ability to attract talented actors. They don't NEED to settle for people with lesser acting skills - they can choose the person they believe is best for the role.

The studios that produce the majority of the dubs however... I'm going to do them the courtesy of imagining that they just have trouble attracting talented voice actors due to it being a niche industry that hasn't had a lot of mainstream exposure yet in the western world. That they're not just picking random people off the street and throwing them in a recording booth because they just don't care.

That said, it may be a judgement issue. I've seen a few anime now where the same (terrible) voice actor has substantial roles in each of them. Who is hiring these people? Are you remembering to audition them? It's okay to say no if they're not right for the part/can't act at all. Really! My gut tells me it's probably a corporate culture issue. If management sees no problem with doing a half-assed job...



TL;DR It really depends on the individual anime. I generally finds subs to be better quality, but there are a few exceptions.

 

[MrHide-Patten]

I'm not a chameleon, ergo dubs. I can't watch Jap subs and work at the same time, doesn't end well. If I can only see a subbed show then I'll watch it, but if dubs are available then I prefer to watch/listen to them.

People talk about nuances and the Japanese actor?s original performance, but to me it's only noise, and sometimes the show moves at such a pace that I either lose track of what?s happening or what the joke was. This was very evident with Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt; at first it was off putting, but I grew to like it a Hell of a lot more because I didn't miss anything.

Maybe taking into regard that I'm simply not a reader might have something to do with it.

Mostly animation quality and the art affects whether I'll like the show more than the sound, like I tried giving Transformers Prime a go and the 3D was a bit of a turn off. Legend of Korra and the original series on the other hand, awesome sauce.

 

[Elfgore]

If the anime is dubbed, I will watch it dubbed. If it isn't I will go subbed. Simple. But I used to be a dub purist and refused to watch anything subbed. I only got over that when the second season of Is This a Zombie? wasn't going to be dubbed for a while and I really wanted to watch it.

Though after I watch an anime subbed, I have some difficulty going back to dub. The dubs of Haganai and Is This a Zombie? sound really bad after watching subbed and some dub av's have really bad voices.
Go to 18:45 or so and watch that scene. The guy's va makes me want to claw me eardrums out and now that I watch it again Icarus (the angel) va is pretty bad too.

 

[Verlander]

Totally depends on the show. In things like Outlaw Star, the dub is better. For westerners particularly, Japanese male voices in anime might take you out of the experience, or vice versa.

I'd say that if the translations were identical, I'd still lean towards subs, but I can see why some don't

 

[Bat Vader]

I like both equally. The only time I don't like a dub is when the voices don't match the characters and what type of voice they should have. An anime dub I highly recommend is Ghost Stories. It is hilarious and great.

Spoiler

Spoiler

 

[Your Fearless Captain]

I remember watching that episode as a kid and being confused as to why he was such a dick.

 

[Talvrae]

Honnestelly it depends of your individual taste, there is no correct answer i think, it's subjective.

 

[The_Echo]

The original is always the best. The original doesn't have to lose anything in translation, the voice acting is just how it was intended, everything.

That's not to say there aren't good dubs out there (Frankly... I prefer the English voices for Digimon. Matt sounds like he's 22 in Japanese.), however the original Japanese audio is almost always preferable.

 

[daibakuha]

I think using digimon of all things to for a dub vs sub comparison is a little disingenuous. A show dubbed in the late 90s for children isn't going to have the best voice acting or a super accurate translation of the material.

Take it on a case by case basis. Not every dub is equal, and not every anime is either.

For example: The dub for Gundam SEED is horrible (as is the show itself, but that's another matter), but the dub for Gundam Unicorn is fantastic.

 

[Raggedstar]

If you're talking about Digimon, Tamers (season 3) had the best dub in the franchise. Best acting, least amount cut out, and less of the tension killing jokes and puns unique to the dub. Growing up with Digimon, I can watch both dub and sub. I hold that for it's time (the original 4 seasons were 1999 to 2002) it's perhaps one of the better anime dubs for kids. It's better than Cardcaptors by a mile and I think better than Pokemon too. I don't like the changes they made, but it doesn't go as far to KILL the show.

In general it sort of depends on the show. I can watch the dubbed or subbed version of FMA, and most Ghibi movies. I prefer the subbed versions of Death Note and Wolf's Rain (though both of their dubs are good) and dubbed version of Cowboy Bebop. Anime dubs are getting better to the point where I just don't mind. Though I WILL say that despite preferring the original Cardcaptor Sakura, I HATE the sound of squeaky Japanese girls. Kinda grates on me lol.

Also if you want to see a terrible dub, Finland is pretty well known for REALLY bad ones throughout history. Ever heard of a show called Ginga Nagareboshi Gin? It's a violent anime from the 80s about stray dogs in the Japanese wilderness. The dubs in Northern Europe (Sweden, Finland, Denmark, etc) were so badly cut that characters would just "vanish" and the audio and scenes would just STOP. Basically imagine a really violent show for adults and try to make it for kids. The dubs were also not of high quality, particularly Finland's who I think only had 4 people acting. I know this is about 25 years ago, but it's hilarious. I'll also link Finland's Digimon. You don't need any context.

Spoiler: Hilarious GNG dub clips, but some minor spoilers and violence. Both are also in the same episode from an official DVD