Dogasu's Backpack Discussion

[Snake Bandage]

Speaking of this episode, anyone else ever wonder what was up with Gastly being able to communicate with the dead? I wonder if all Ghost-types can do that or if it's just this particular Super Gastly.

In the second episode of the Sabrina three-parter, the ghosts communicate with Ash's spirit very well. It's not exactly the same, but he's practically dead during that time so I think it counts.

 

[Pokemaster Justin]

That edit always confused me. Don't the games just have Pokedollars?

Right there were Pokedollars if you remember in the cash register...so I don't think that's the problem.

I also don't believe that the Penny thing was a bad idea either. See Dogasu keeps forgetting that this is an American Adaption for the show. It's not a translation, and it's not an adaption either. Nintendo of America went out of its way to make sure they pretty much changed everything Japanese about the games for the American audience.

I think I personally connected with the show when I was little with the little pop culture references they threw in here and there. If the show is marketed worldwide I don't see what hurts if each region has their own interpretation of Pokemon. Kojiro didn't pick up the "penny", James picked it up. The whole concept of them forcing American content in the show, or trying to make things a bit more American isn't that farfetched. Sure you might not agree with it, and you may not even like it - but changing the names, little cultural references, and innuendo make the show connect more for the non japanese viewers.

I'm mad that they took it a step further and eliminated all the Japanese quirkiness too, but they have their reasons I suppose.

It's fun to point out these references, but at the end of the day 4Kids were diong their job...an American Adaption of the show. Nintendo of America already Americanized the games, so they were just falling in line.

 

[Yash]

I think what Dogasu's problem is isn't so much that the American version is altered, but that the changes made to the American version have impacted the Japanese version as well.

It's like, it's okay for 4Kids to Americanize the show, but the Japanese producers are made to make the show international-friendly.

(PUSA doesn't seem to have as big of a problem with Americanizing it)

 

[Pokemaster Justin]

One thing I always wanted to point out what was annyoing as hell in the 4Kids dub was that little fan fare that they made up that played like 20 times in their Advance Generation series.

 

[Adamant]

but changing the names, little cultural references, and innuendo make the show connect more for the non japanese viewers.

As I already said, no. That the Japanese currency is called "yen" is a hell of a lot more common knowledge for most kids than the fact that the nickname for an American one-cent coin (if they even know the name of the 1/100th dollar in the first place) is called a "penny".

4Kids/PUSA have demonstrated again and again that they don't care for the "international" viewers, only the American ones. So the Japanese "internationalize" the series by keeping everything Japanese to a minimum, then the Americans go in and screw over everyone else by bogging the script with hard-to-translate puns and obscure references before sending it off to other countries.

 

[Pikapi]

Indeed.

I had NO idea why Ash said Vikings came from Minnesota in the 1st movie dub, and the only clue I had eventually was the note about sports references on Dogasu's site.

I am not an American. I don't know anything about Vikings and Minnesota. 4Kids is hypocritical to go removing Japanese references and then putting in stuff that probably only Americans will even get...

 

[Pokemaster Justin]

So then why don't the other companies just adapt their own script?

 

[Snake Bandage]

4Kids is an American company and it caters to Americans first and foremost. As annoying as it is, I don't see what doesn't make sense about it.

 

[Pokemaster Justin]

Because they think that the show is a translation rather than an adaption -I bet Nintendo told them to Americanize the show too at first.

Other than the music stuff I really liked 4Kids dub. Ugh I just did a "comparison" for "The Art of Pokemon" and the ending really misses its impact without the sad Kanto piano piece

 

[The Outrage]

4Kids is an American company and it caters to Americans first and foremost. As annoying as it is, I don't see what doesn't make sense about it.

Exactly, theres no hypocracy when the intent was always to "Americanize" it as annoying as it may be to some people.

 

[Cybersai]

So then why don't the other companies just adapt their own script?

I remember someone saying they did just that.

I remember someone saying the spanish dub added some jokes that only they would understand in their culture.

I'm sure its the same thing in other languages with jokes adapted/added, we just don't have a site like Dogasu's for the spanish Pokemon dub, or any other language.

 

[Chatsy]

So then why don't the other companies just adapt their own script?

Denmark's company used to do so throughout the first season.
But now they just plain translate - they don't even bother to translated the attacks into Danish now - and throw the garbage on-screen. They don't even care.

In regards of the "Minnesota" part in the first movie, for example, it was changed to vikings living in Sweden. Not remotely amusing.
In The Bridge Bike Gang episode, when some random bicyclists greeted that bridge-porter dude, the short dialogue was changed to a blatant reference to a Danish commercial. That was amusing, but hardly something other nationalities would understand.

Now it's just a Danish American thing to watch. Plaaaaaaain.

I agree, though, that 4Kids should focus mainly on the nationality it works for.
If other countries want a more 'Japanese' version or a version more fit to their respective nationalities, they should start dubbing 'from scratch' themselves rather than buying off the American version because it's cheaper and easier and what do I know.

 

[Adamant]

Exactly, theres no hypocracy when the intent was always to "Americanize" it as annoying as it may be to some people.

Hypocracy may not be the word, but when the Japanese go through the trouble of making the series as internationally appealing as possible, keeping things deemed "too Japanese" out of it for the sake of everyone else, it's rather dickish of the American adaptors to Americanize it to such an extreme amount, ruining the internationalization completely.
Around 10% of Team Rocket's American dialouge is basically "Make up your own dialouge here" as far as the international translators are concerned.

If other countries want a more 'Japanese' version or a version more fit to their respective nationalities, they should start dubbing 'from scratch' themselves rather than buying off the American version because it's cheaper and easier and what do I know.

From what I understand, 4Kids/PUSA own the international license for the series - it HAS to be licensed through them. It's the same with various Shonen Jump manga in Scandinavia - as you're probably aware, they're licensed through the German Carlsen Comics, and the translations suffer from this (and there's all kinds of stupidity involved there - supposedly the Swedish translator of One Piece was forbidden to use the name "Luffy", as the license agreement demanded "Ruffy" for various reasons).

 

[AtoMan]

Not only that, but seems that Pokemon Adventures manga had to be crosslicensed from ViZ.

 

[Chatsy]

From what I understand, 4Kids/PUSA own the international license for the series - it HAS to be licensed through them. It's the same with various Shonen Jump manga in Scandinavia - as you're probably aware, they're licensed through the German Carlsen Comics, and the translations suffer from this (and there's all kinds of stupidity involved there - supposedly the Swedish translator of One Piece was forbidden to use the name "Luffy", as the license agreement demanded "Ruffy" for various reasons).

Ah, well that sure makes it tough then :/
Though, I recall hearing about France dubbing entirely on their own, or at least at one certain point in the early seasons. That may easily have been a silly rumour, though.

 

[Yash]

Though, I recall hearing about France dubbing entirely on their own, or at least at one certain point in the early seasons. That may easily have been a silly rumour, though.

I remember hearing about that, and that by the end of Kanto they got rid of the voice cast and went for voice actors that sounded more like the 4Kids cast (hey, isn't that a funny parallel).

 

[Snake Bandage]

In Israel we had Pokemon Chronicles not hurt nearly as much thanks to BMGF's very own Piplup. It was still dubbed from the 4Kids dub (like everything else), but we got all kinds of mistakes fixed and stuff thanks to Pip's notes. So we had Eusine, and Jackson, and Hun sounding indisputably male (though his voice was very different from the Japanese version, but it's still incredibly fitting).

 

[Yash]

In Israel we had Pokemon Chronicles not hurt nearly as much thanks to BMGF's very own Piplup. It was still dubbed from the 4Kids dub (like everything else), but we got all kinds of mistakes fixed and stuff thanks to Pip's notes. So we had Eusine, and Jackson, and Hun sounding indisputably male (though his voice was very different from the Japanese version, but it's still incredibly fitting).

Ooh, I'd love to hear about this, and any other changes that were made thanks to him.

 

[Kazamatsuri]

I have a few music corrections to point out. Both BGM that you mentioned in your Ghost of Maiden's Peak comparison are actually used in other episodes of the series.

I actually like how you've mentioned the BGM in your most recent comparisons Dogasu. I'd actually like it if you would point out exactly how many BGM were kept intact out of the total in more of your episode comparisons.

 

[Geodude]

In Israel we had Pokemon Chronicles not hurt nearly as much thanks to BMGF's very own Piplup. It was still dubbed from the 4Kids dub (like everything else), but we got all kinds of mistakes fixed and stuff thanks to Pip's notes. So we had Eusine, and Jackson, and Hun sounding indisputably male (though his voice was very different from the Japanese version, but it's still incredibly fitting).

I had absolutely no idea he was responsible for anything like that.