Dogasu's Backpack Discussion

[SammyW27]

Still, Richie was the only League rival to make future appearances, so he must've done something right. (though I'm not quite sure what )

 

[MizuTaipu]

Noriko Hidaka (who was a pretty popular VA and singer back then) voiced the one-time appearing Kaoruko in the previous episode, so I don't think the actor budget was really an issue. Hiroshi is still a pretty blah character anyway regardless of who's voicing him; him nicknaming his Pokémon is the only memorable thing about him.

 

[Silktree]

Ritchie's successors aren't much better, if at all. They just provided better battles, with the debatable exception of Cameron. I guess that Morrison has the best personality, but it's hardly unique.

The problem with league rivals is that they shouldn't really be long-term rivals, or else we end up with an Alain situation where Ash constantly loses to him without any payoff. I wish that Samurai, AJ and Giselle had entered the Indigo league; there really haven't been CoDs of their caliber.

 

[marshiyanmisuta]

I don't really buy "we think Brock is racist, so we replaced him" thing. They didn't change Jynx's skin colour till the AG. Other parts of the same interview, too, hard to buy. They allegedly dropped GS ball plot because they decided to use Celebi in the movie, yet they had no problem with using Lugia and other legendaries in the show.

 

[Silktree]

They used Lugia about two years after its movie debut. I think that the better point is that nothing prevented from using the GS Ball in the movie, so...

 

[Hidden Mew]

I don't really buy "we think Brock is racist, so we replaced him" thing. They didn't change Jynx's skin colour till the AG. Other parts of the same interview, too, hard to buy. They allegedly dropped GS ball plot because they decided to use Celebi in the movie, yet they had no problem with using Lugia and other legendaries in the show.

Jynx's redesign came during the second generation, so it was odd that the anime took longer to follow suit. Maybe they thought that Celebi being in the GS Ball would be less noteworthy after being featured in the movie. They've used other Legendary Pokemon in both the show and movies, but there's usually a gap between their appearances. Plus, the interview mentioned that they figured that kids would just forget about it. It was a bit harsh to dismiss their audience like that, but at the same time, it wasn't an unreasonable assumption given that the GS Ball hadn't been mentioned after Ash dropped it off. It was kind of ironic that they thought people would forget about it when it was a frequent topic of conversation for years. Before the Team Plasma two parter, the GS Ball was the go to dropped plot point that people were still upset over.

 

[Charmander4]

So my mention of The Simpsons in my comparison, as most of you have correctly noticed, has absolutely nothing to do with how the show was localized in Japan and is instead an attempt to help put the "no more Japanese writing" policy that seems to be going on with Pocket Monsters, in Japan, in a context that might make more sense to the people reading my site. But it seems like my analogy wasn't clear enough for some people so I thought I'd take the time to elaborate.

(I used The Simpsons because that's a show I assume most people are familiar with, though literally any other American show would work just as well.)

The Simpsons is currently in its 29th season. Let's say that Fox approaches the creators of the show and tells them that, for the 30th season onwards, there is to be no more English writing allowed on-screen. It's just a pain in the butt for foreign localizers to have to deal with, y'know? So in order for the show to conform to these new standards, a number of changes will need to be made to all new episodes moving forward.

For starters, that chalkboard gag at the beginning of every episode will probably need to be axed altogether. Famous landmarks like Moe's Tavern, Krusty Burger, the Kwik-E-Mart, and The Android's Dungeon & Baseball Card Shop will all need to be redesigned to remove the English text from the signs they have out front. Maybe replace that text with pictograms, or create an English language cipher that we'll call "Groeningan" or something. Mayor Quimby will need to have his "MAYOR" sash removed, and the word "DUFF" on Duff Man's shirt will need to be erased as well. The title cards for the "Itchy & Scratchy" cartoons will need to either be redesigned or removed altogether. If it becomes absolutely necessary for a character to be reading something then make sure the camera is angled in such a way so that we can't actually see any of the text they're reading; make it so that we can only see the back of the sheet of paper, or place the camera behind the signpost they're referring to. Non-English writing gets to stay.

Oh, and Fox is not willing to shell out the money for the animation studio to make two verisons of every episode (one regular, one international) so all the changes listed above will be made to the original, uncut version of the show that premiers in the United States for an American audience.

Sounds absolutely fucking insane, right?

And yet this is exactly what's been going on with Pocket Monsters since before the turn of the century.

There is no veritable proof that anyone at 4Kids asked the producers to remove Japanese text.

 

[Yash]

I guess the accusations of racism/xenophobia stem from the thought that children wouldn’t be interested in the show if it was perceived as “foreign” which seems kind of dumb? A lot of young kids are fully aware that anime is Japanese, and even if they’re not I doubt they care much.

So there is something I heard once (don’t stop me from spitting out misinformation I’ve gathered from corners of the internet), that 4Kids would erase Japanese text to circumvent an FCC rule that they would need to be provided with translations for any on-screen text to make sure there was nothing offensive. The only two things I can think of that might point to there being some truth to this is the Japanese writing for “sake” being removed from a liquor bottle in an episode of Naruto (it’s not like kids would know what that is, but the FCC doesn’t have dominion over cable TV) and a Dragonball Z Kai episode having a vocal song replaced with an instrumental version for the Toonzai broadcast (when it aired fully intact on Nicktoons). But given that they often erase English as well... eh.

I actually brought this up to my girlfriend the other day how 4Kids and other localizers often change Japanese food to other things, and her first thought was “why wouldn’t they keep it as-is and use it as a way to teach kids about other cultures?” Same with the background music - she’s a nanny for a family with two small boys, and she was saying the cartoons they watch are constantly blaring with background music and talking, and she can’t tell if the boys are actually absorbing any of it or just being overwhelmed by the noise. Hey, where does that sound familiar? She brought up a segment by Fred Rogers (Mr. Rogers) where he expresses concern over how little silence there is in children’s television, which doesn’t give them any time to process what they’re watching.

I think 4Kids (and now TPCI) had a great opportunity to teach kids about Japanese culture and condition them to take in silent moments a bit more, and it’s too bad they feel the need to make their dub as obnoxious as everything else. There’s a great quote from Funimation’s early days of dubbing Dragonball Z, where Cindy Fukunaga talks about how unique the show is and that’s what makes it so popular, but then admits they made the new theme song to sound exactly like other American cartoons at the time. That’s what happens when you prioritize short-term financial gain above all else, I guess.

 

[PTOldMan]

I guess the accusations of racism/xenophobia stem from the thought that children wouldn’t be interested in the show if it was perceived as “foreign” which seems kind of dumb? A lot of young kids are fully aware that anime is Japanese, and even if they’re not I doubt they care much.

So there is something I heard once (don’t stop me from spitting out misinformation I’ve gathered from corners of the internet), that 4Kids would erase Japanese text to circumvent an FCC rule that they would need to be provided with translations for any on-screen text to make sure there was nothing offensive. The only two things I can think of that might point to there being some truth to this is the Japanese writing for “sake” being removed from a liquor bottle in an episode of Naruto (it’s not like kids would know what that is, but the FCC doesn’t have dominion over cable TV) and a Dragonball Z Kai episode having a vocal song replaced with an instrumental version for the Toonzai broadcast (when it aired fully intact on Nicktoons). But given that they often erase English as well... eh.

I actually brought this up to my girlfriend the other day how 4Kids and other localizers often change Japanese food to other things, and her first thought was “why wouldn’t they keep it as-is and use it as a way to teach kids about other cultures?” Same with the background music - she’s a nanny for a family with two small boys, and she was saying the cartoons they watch are constantly blaring with background music and talking, and she can’t tell if the boys are actually absorbing any of it or just being overwhelmed by the noise. Hey, where does that sound familiar? She brought up a segment by Fred Rogers (Mr. Rogers) where he expresses concern over how little silence there is in children’s television, which doesn’t give them any time to process what they’re watching.

I think 4Kids (and now TPCI) had a great opportunity to teach kids about Japanese culture and condition them to take in silent moments a bit more, and it’s too bad they feel the need to make their dub as obnoxious as everything else. There’s a great quote from Funimation’s early days of dubbing Dragonball Z, where Cindy Fukunaga talks about how unique the show is and that’s what makes it so popular, but then admits they made the new theme song to sound exactly like other American cartoons at the time. That’s what happens when you prioritize short-term financial gain above all else, I guess.

This. These are exactly my thoughts. Why can't the kids simply be aware that this is a foreign show? What is so bad about it? I don't really understand it. I'll accept it as a cultural difference between my country and the US, but I think it is so dumb. Here in Portugal we get cartoons from almost every corner of the world (Australia, USA, Japan, Spain, France) and there isn't a single effort to try to hide the fact that they are from another country, and there is absolutely no problem about it. Any cartoon can have top ratings and any cartoon can be one of the favorites. I remember that as a kid I learned a lot about other cultures through cartoons, and the thought of avoiding a cartoon because it was foreign never occurred to me. So when I read about all these extreme changes that 4Kids made in order to americanize the show I can't avoid to think about how pointless this all seems to me.

 

[GuyWhoTellsTruth]

There is no veritable proof that anyone at 4Kids asked the producers to remove Japanese text.

And to add to that, TPCi still removes every instance of actual Japanese text since XY to the SM dub that isn't Tajirian to this day, so it's not any different today either in the English dub (and TPCi generally now does exactly the same things 4Kids was/is vilified for doing with regards to still making script errors as well as visual edits- they're also arguably worse in regards to the voice acting though I'm not interested in igniting flame wars on that subject, hence I say arguably, and are absolutely now worse in regards to even more excessive music replacement, handling of Team Rocket dialogue, and the length of OP themes they cut down in half from more than a decade ago).

Back to the matter at hand, along with various other localizers that dubbed anime like Saban, DiC, Nelvana, etc., there were *many* others besides 4Kids and TPCi to employ the same sorts of practices with other dubs that made their way overseas, it wasn't just the Pokémon dub that did/does these sorts of things. Although with 4Kids, Saban, DiC, etc. I'd say it was somewhat more justified, since back in the late 90s/early 00s doing these sorts of things was way more commonplace with English dubs targeted at kids, and there was certainly less awareness of different cultures then.

Whereas in 2017, the only dub besides TPCi's Pokémon still on the air nowadays I know to be still removing Japanese text is Yokai Watch (although I'll argue that dub is way more watchable to me despite its Americanization due to possessing qualities the former doesn't possess to me). I think one has to keep in mind that in this day and age, more people have the Internet available to them, and different cultures are more widely accepted vs. the past, where it wasn't as much the case back then.

But I don't think there's anything truly xenophobic or racist about removing Japanese text on signs in the background or on the screen for only a few seconds most of the time, regardless of whether it's true or not: even if it's true, I think it's probably what they thought/still think would just appeal to the International English viewer more so they could get more viewership in their minds or some other jaded logic.

Again, I'd obviously keep it because it doesn't hurt to expose kids to other cultures and I don't see a point in removing it anyway, but calling them what people do for doing so is going a bit too far, at the same time. Pointless? Yes. Stupid? Arguably. Racist/xenophobic? Not so much...

 

[Red Ryu]

Ritchie's successors aren't much better, if at all. They just provided better battles, with the debatable exception of Cameron. I guess that Morrison has the best personality, but it's hardly unique.

The problem with league rivals is that they shouldn't really be long-term rivals, or else we end up with an Alain situation where Ash constantly loses to him without any payoff. I wish that Samurai, AJ and Giselle had entered the Indigo league; there really haven't been CoDs of their caliber.

Does Paul count? Because I think that is the payoff people wanted with Alan but they didn't get. Even if I think they were going for while they are close in combat Ash is better with his resolved, but idk Alan never bothered me since losing to him made the most sense out of most of the rivals.

I guess the accusations of racism/xenophobia stem from the thought that children wouldn’t be interested in the show if it was perceived as “foreign” which seems kind of dumb? A lot of young kids are fully aware that anime is Japanese, and even if they’re not I doubt they care much.

So there is something I heard once (don’t stop me from spitting out misinformation I’ve gathered from corners of the internet), that 4Kids would erase Japanese text to circumvent an FCC rule that they would need to be provided with translations for any on-screen text to make sure there was nothing offensive. The only two things I can think of that might point to there being some truth to this is the Japanese writing for “sake” being removed from a liquor bottle in an episode of Naruto (it’s not like kids would know what that is, but the FCC doesn’t have dominion over cable TV) and a Dragonball Z Kai episode having a vocal song replaced with an instrumental version for the Toonzai broadcast (when it aired fully intact on Nicktoons). But given that they often erase English as well... eh.

I actually brought this up to my girlfriend the other day how 4Kids and other localizers often change Japanese food to other things, and her first thought was “why wouldn’t they keep it as-is and use it as a way to teach kids about other cultures?” Same with the background music - she’s a nanny for a family with two small boys, and she was saying the cartoons they watch are constantly blaring with background music and talking, and she can’t tell if the boys are actually absorbing any of it or just being overwhelmed by the noise. Hey, where does that sound familiar? She brought up a segment by Fred Rogers (Mr. Rogers) where he expresses concern over how little silence there is in children’s television, which doesn’t give them any time to process what they’re watching.

I think 4Kids (and now TPCI) had a great opportunity to teach kids about Japanese culture and condition them to take in silent moments a bit more, and it’s too bad they feel the need to make their dub as obnoxious as everything else. There’s a great quote from Funimation’s early days of dubbing Dragonball Z, where Cindy Fukunaga talks about how unique the show is and that’s what makes it so popular, but then admits they made the new theme song to sound exactly like other American cartoons at the time. That’s what happens when you prioritize short-term financial gain above all else, I guess.

This is an issue with any dub aimed at kids, Pokemon is one of the few anime that still holds onto this practice and I don't know why they still do when kids and teens who know about anime get stuff from funimation and viz as an almost 1:1 faithful dub outside of dub voices.

Dogasu made the claim that they can get royalties or be cheaper to not buy the rights to the original music, given the circumstances this seems to be likely and really disappointing. I get it for vocal stuff since that can be trickier to work around. Some video games and even other anime have run into issues with this in the past because for one reason or another the royalties were super dang high or something just wasn't there.

"Tales of" series is really random in when is uses an instrumental song, a new English version or just an original song they decide to use. I wonder if it is a strict royalties issue or something of the sort.

Past that, I think the text changing is kind of dumb. It's not hurting anyone to have Japaneses text or a made up language. sometimes paint edits make sense like here, Japanese Episode DP 001, where it's changed to the English game town names. Not an issue at all.

With OSTs, are you making it better or are you improving it? If not, then why change it? TPCI is better about keeping silent moments than 4kids ever would be who would have constant background music repeating the same 6-8 soundtracks they replace background music with. It's still a shame, while I don't think some music is bad 90% of the time I favor the original music, so if it's not being done for monetary reasons, i don't see why they still do it. Unless it's vocal tracks I guess?

Pokemon should move up with the dub becoming more acceptable, I'm fine with watching it and I prefer things dubbed, but it really should be offering better.

 

[Duke Spubber]

So there is something I heard once (don’t stop me from spitting out misinformation I’ve gathered from corners of the internet), that 4Kids would erase Japanese text to circumvent an FCC rule that they would need to be provided with translations for any on-screen text to make sure there was nothing offensive. The only two things I can think of that might point to there being some truth to this is the Japanese writing for “sake” being removed from a liquor bottle in an episode of Naruto (it’s not like kids would know what that is, but the FCC doesn’t have dominion over cable TV) and a Dragonball Z Kai episode having a vocal song replaced with an instrumental version for the Toonzai broadcast (when it aired fully intact on Nicktoons). But given that they often erase English as well... eh.

There is a problem with that theory though: Saban. Their Digimon dub only ever changed the actual Digimon names if they were different between regions and most of the time they were in English to begin with. They left 90% of the Japanese text alone. Most glaringly, the Digimon Analyzer in the first two seasons listed all the stats of the various Digimon in Japanese, but Saban never bothered to edit any of those shots. Plus, each and every evolution sequence had Japanese flying around and it was never edited out. The only time they did paint away Japanese was during the movie (which made it inconsistent with the show, but that's the least of the movie's problems). It's been a while, but I don't think they bothered painting away most of the Japanese text from other anime they dubbed around the same time either.

I may be wrong on this, but I don't think other independent anime dubs around that time (Ronin Warriors, Samurai Pizza Cats, etc.) bothered to erase Japanese text either. Hell, I don't even think DiC's Sailor Moon dub erased a lot of Japanese text, though that show didn't have much on-screen text to begin with. I wanna say the only writing replacement was the stock footage shot of Usagi's school.

 

[Silktree]

Does Paul count? Because I think that is the payoff people wanted with Alan but they didn't get. Even if I think they were going for while they are close in combat Ash is better with his resolved, but idk Alan never bothered me since losing to him made the most sense out of most of the rivals.

He was pretty much bound to lose to Ash as a long-term rival; the point I'm making is that someone like Alain is problematic since watching Ash always lose is repetitive. So to me, the ideal league rival (the winner) would be someone familiar that either never battled Ash beforehand or lost by a hair.

 

[kantoskies]

I never knew Satoshi's line when he stole the Rocket trio's bike was a callback to the first episode, I love little stuff like that and I wish the dub had carried it over.

I didn't like that the writer had the Rocket trio be the ones to tire out Satoshi's Pokemon instead of having a proper battle, but I don't blame the characters themselves. And I do agree that the writer probably could not have thought of something better so the Rocket trio is fine. This whole league/arc I'm general hasn't been formed very well so I guess this ending is appropriate?

Imagine if the Rocket trio did this to Satoshi before his battle with Alain in the Kalos league....people were already mad enough I couldn't even imagine!

 

[SammyW27]

Yeah, Ash had this loss coming...but the way they handled was just BS.

Heck, when you put it like that this might be even worse than losing to Kotty in BW...

(great, now you got me feeling bad about hating on TR over it all these years. )

 

[Pokemaster Justin]

My thread is still around all these years later?!?

Hello dogasu I still read your site!

I’m so happy your finally finishing up the indigo league. I love the snarky commentary as always, even though I don’t agree with your assessments all the time.

For some reason today’s commentary made me roll out laughing (it’s so random!). The bizarre choices when 4Kids does The Who’s that Pokemon and you say forget Léon Hello Aerodactyl! I dunno why I lost it lol

 

[Hidden Mew]

Imagine if the Rocket trio did this to Satoshi before his battle with Alain in the Kalos league....people were already mad enough I couldn't even imagine!

It's honestly pretty hard to tell whether or not Team Rocket factoring into Ash's defeat in the Kalos League would have made the backlash worse or not. It certainly would have directed more anger towards the trio than primarily to Alain at least.

I never really liked how they handled Ash's defeat either, but like I mentioned before, this was the best he could have reasonably done for his first Pokemon League. If they spent most of the episode on the battle instead of Ash running away from Team Rocket, it might have been handled better, but the battles during the Kanto arc generally haven't aged particularly well either. Even in the Indigo League, they only devoted an episode for the first and last round matches. It could have at least felt less rushed to make a big deal about the battle only to do it in the last five minutes. They even had the nonsense of Squirtle sleeping and Pikachu being surprisingly exhausted just so that Ash could lose faster than he would have otherwise.

I do remember being surprised that Ash lost when I first watched the series. I remember thinking that the series would end with Ash winning the Pokemon League. I'm not sure why, but maybe I was just expecting that because of how the protagonist losing at the end was really unheard of back then. I know that a lot of fans don't like that he keeps losing, but I kind of like that he keeps trying in spite of his defeats, even if it's mainly just so it would be less jarring for Ash to start from square one again in his next journey. I do like how the dub handled Misty and Brock's exchange after Ash lost though. It was a nice scene and I also loathe the whole "boys and girls shouldn't cry because it's a sign of weakness" and other such nonsense to the core of my being.

 

[Charmander4]

I was irritated with this episode back then. Did Kingler or Muk just up and die? Squirtle wasn’t knocked out being asleep. And Pidgeotto getting tired having to pull the balloon was stupid. He could’ve used it against Charmander or Butterfree.

 

[marshiyanmisuta]

Dr. Orchid replies that maybe Satoshi showing up late is some kind of strategy to irritate his opponent

As expected from Shigeru's family.

Kasumi: "That Satoshi sure is doing his best to act tough, isn't he?"
Takeshi: "That's just the way men are."
Kasumi: "But y'know, it's OK to cry every now and then."
Takeshi: "But that's not something he can do, you see."

I guess Takeshi is no man then, considering how much he cries.

Dr. Orchid also implies that Trainers apparently have some limitations as to what pokemon they can choose in the first four rounds? Even though we can see, based on the Sekiei Pokemon League matches we're allowed to see, that no such limit seems to actually exist? What is this "Trainers are mostly free to pick whatever types the like" nonsense?

Choosing something like a fire or rock type in Water Field is a disadvantaged for the pokemon, which is why trainers have limitations on choosing pokemon to use. Other rounds have no gimmicks like that, so they can choose any pokemon they want.

 

[Duke Spubber]

One of the things that always pisses me off about Kanto (which I wonder if Dogasu will talk about whenever he does "Pallet Party Panic") was how Pidgeotto was just kind of thrown aside once the starters entered the story. On one hand I can kind of understand since the battles here are slightly more "realistic" than what they'll become post-Johto, but Pidgeotto getting the shaft over and over again really annoyed me all throughout the saga. And its most significant victory was not only downplayed, but happened in a way that's just as BS as Pikachu electrocuting a Ground-type. So when this episode had that whole TR subplot that seemed to exist JUST to tire out Pidgeotto and force Ash to use Charizard, that was the last straw regarding this League for me.

Back when Season 2 first started airing, I had seen some clips of the Orange Islands and found out that Ash wouldn't be facing the Elite Four, so I figured he'd lose at some point along the way. I was racking my brain trying to figure out how Ash could conceivably win against Lance or Agatha with his blah team, so seeing him lose was more of a relief in my mind than anything.

I think the whole "Don't blame the characters, blame the writer!" is a bit wrong, though. By blaming Team Rocket taking up so much time and wearing out Ash's Pokémon, people pretty much ARE blaming the writers.

One thing I will give the ref credit is DQing Charizard. I mean, it literally refused to get up and battle, and likely wouldn't have unless Ritchie attacked it. You refuse to compete, you lose.

Something I've always wondered about this arc though: Who's watching the lab? The Professor doesn't have an assistant yet, so who's feeding all the Pokémon? Also, how did Ash send Muk and Kingler back to the lab if there's no one there to receive the Poké Ball?