English Horror

[Guest Mike256bit]

I'm not a huge fan of dubs, if only because English VAs are a rare breed. There's sort of a limited selection and frankly, when you grow up watching American cartoons, you start to relate language quality to the images onscreen. Now, that's not to say that there aren't some awesome looking American or European 'toons out there, becasue there are. And sometimes even they get hit with a bad VA. But for some reason, when I hear English in a Japanese cartoon, it sounds remarkably out of place -- even if there's nothing remarkably "Japanese" about the cartoon.

(Exception: I rather like David Lucas. He does a fine job, but he really does play the same character every time.)

Which brings me to my real beef. I hate, passionately, Amanda Winn Lee. She has the remarkable talent of bringing the same doofy line reading to every character she plays, even if they're more than one-dimensional archtypes (and they often are! So many lead roles ruined!) To name a handful:

• Rally Vincent (Gunsmith Cats) -- Doofy bounty hunter
  
• Momiji (Blue Seed) -- Doofy preistess/high-school student.
  
• Youko (Devil Hunter Youko) -- Doofy demon fighter
  
• Mimiru (.HACK//sign) -- Doofy RPG addict
  

My favorite, of course, is the dismal way she handled Rei of Evangelion fame. Generally, she sounds like a dopy moron (second only to the way Lisa Ortiz did Lina Inverse. I mean, come on!) but with Rei, you couldn't hear it because she was practically whispering all the time. Then again, I'll never forgive her for the way she said "bolagna pony."

The fact that she took such liberty with the script is another grievance all together. I simply cannot stand her acting. Maybe if she weren't busy trying to pretend she was still a high-school student she could bring a sense of professionalism to her half-baked talent.

Advice: STOP TRYING SO HARD.

Regarding Lisa Ortiz, though -- I think I'm just mad at her for the way she did Amy Rose. Or for the fact that she did Amy Rose at all.

[StoryJunkie]

Whenever I hear a bad voice-over, I always think the person got that job because he/she is fucking the producer or he/she is the producer's relative. I mean who picked the girl who does Naruto's voice? *shudders*.

[foeofthelance]

Aye, it's gotten to the point that I won't watch adult swim anymore, simpley because I expect to see the original Japanese versions at some point in the future. The last time I tried, I turned on Gundam SEED and couldn't stop laughing at Kira's voice. Not that there was anything wrong with it, it just had too much cheerfulness in it. Watching the Japanese version, Kira doesn't try to hide his angst, he embraces it! The English VO had him sounding falsely cheerful, as if he didnt want his friends to know he was upset about killing people left and right. (Even though, altogehter, I think he only actually kills about ten people.)

[Guest vampkitten27]

There are a lot of very good English VA's out there. Unfortunately, there are even more bad ones. It's just not that they are bad either, its because these people have worked a name for themselves in the industry and get repeat work, and then end up using the same techniques over again.

Examples of over-used voice actors: (If you don't know these people you don't watch anime)

1) Wendee Lee (Faye Valentine)

2) Steven Blum (Spike Speigal)

3) Chris Patton (Sousuke Sagara)

4) Lex Lang (Sanosuke Sagara)

5) Richard Hayworth (Kenshin Himura)

6) Eric Stewart (Seto Kaiba/Gourry)

7) Dorothy Elias (Kaoru Kamiya/Mimori Kiryu)

People are probably scratching their heads saying 'Why did she chose these people to be some of the worst VA's when they do absolutely everything?' Well, there you have it. It's because of that reason alone why they suck. You hear them all the time and it's getting old.

VA's that I have admiration for because they can change their voice range or their sound is just tolerable:

1) Luci Christian (Risa Harada:DN Angel/Kaname Chidori:Full metal panic)

2) Vic Mignogna (Edward Elric:FMA)

3) Illich Guardiola (Krad:DN Angel/ Yuri Killian:Kaleido Star)

4) David Kaye (Sesshoumaru:Inuyasha)

5) Yuri Lowenthal (Sasuke Uchiha/Daniel in Radiata Stories 'Video Game')

VA's that I used to like but now hate:

1) Christopher Sabat (Ayame-fruits basket. I heard that and thought 'Gay Vegeta')

Ayame's Voice Over was so scary... no wonder I prefer the Japanese dubs with Subtitles.......

That's all I have to bitch about when it comes to dubs.

[Guest Mike256bit]

I met Vic at a con (my only con, thankfully ) and he was a really funny guy.

[Guest Alien Pirate Pixagi]

I love Japanese voice actors for the fact that they are chosen for their voices. Most are pop-stars (if not all) and just know how to give the character LIFE!

The problem with dubs is that it changes what they're saying and a lot gets edited out. Or added in. It pisses me off. Not to mention that some of the voices they choose do NOT match the characters at ALL which makes no sense!

I think the best dubbing job I've seen is in Trigun. I LOVE Vashes voice acter. He does the character so well! that, and the voices just really seems like it's coming from the character. Same goes for Cowboy Bebop. It's really the less popular anime (get backer, yami no matsui) that get the shitty VA's.

[StoryJunkie]

Yeah, what about the guy that does Orochimaru's (Japanese) voice? I wanna give him a cough candy or something....!

[Guest vampkitten27]

I think the best dubbing job I've seen is in Trigun. I LOVE Vashes voice acter. He does the character so well! that, and the voices just really seems like it's coming from the character.

I saw an online article about two weeks ago that the guy who was Vash's VA in Trigun, is going to be doing Ichigo in Bleach.

[redsliver]

I almost universally hate english dubs, there are two exceptions, Slayers and Cowboy Bebop. And the reason is: I heard the english first, and even if the Japanese voice actor would do the roll better, if you've already watched 15 episodes of something that voice becomes part of the character, change the voice and its not the same character. Gourry as an idiot surfer was a shitty choice but to change over to the Japanese actor destroys the series for me.

The best English voice actor is Maddie Blaustein and I make that choice entirely for how she did Lezard and Lawfer in Valkyrie Profile.

[Iggy_lovechild]

I'm surprised no one's mentioned Crispin Freeman yet. *chuckles* To be sure, he's a dub whore, but I can't help to fond of him even though he seems to play the same sort of character again and again (evil/crazy/sexy/morally questionable types). Ah, he does it so well. His voice has the embarassing ability to make my brain turn to mush.

Ps. In addition to many animes and some RPGs, Crispin Freeman was the voice of Alucard for "Hellsing".

[Emi]

I love Japanese voice actors for the fact that they are chosen for their voices. Most are pop-stars (if not all) and just know how to give the character LIFE!

Actually, majority of them are not popstars. They are chosen because of their voices and not their looks and because of that, a lot of the seiyuus aren't... popstars because they don't looks good enough.

For example.... Roy Mustang's seiyuu. No offense, but he is on the chubby side and hair is falling out though I love him all the same because he does his roles insanely well.

Some seiyuus could pass as a popstar because they have both their looks and their voices. Though majority of the actual popstars are in Japanese dramas.

--

As for dubs? They make my ears bleed and I can't touch any of them. :\ The Prince of Tennis dub came out earlier and I was near tears because they don't know how to pronounce their names. How they speak their lines makes me want to go bash my head on the wall because they sound so stiff and unnatural.

It makes me feel that even I could do better than they can. Urgh.

(You can tell I don't have much experience with dubs because I'm spoiled with subs.)

[Guest Mike256bit]

Tiffany Grant makes me ears bleed.