Subs or Dubs?

[Erranty]

Dubs. Why? Because America > Japan.

RACISMRACISMOMGURBAD

But if it wasn't for Japan, our anime would be Disney Channel cartoons. Now is that what you want for America, son? I think NOT.

Support America by watching Japanese cartoons!

No, we'd have more Thundercats and Hanna Barbara, who couldn't use more loney tunes and johnny bravo... and thundercats! MORE THUNDERCATS!

[Azure Knight]

Dubs. Why? Because America > Japan.

RACISMRACISMOMGURBAD

But if it wasn't for Japan, our anime would be Disney Channel cartoons. Now is that what you want for America, son? I think NOT.

Support America by watching Japanese cartoons!

No, we'd have more Thundercats and Hanna Barbara, who couldn't use more loney tunes and johnny bravo... and thundercats! MORE THUNDERCATS!

Thing is, all of those great shows are cancelled. Now it's shows like... crappy animated Star Wars, and, god, I can't think of other new cartoons because they don't have them anymore. Now it's all CGI or live action.

[_Tri-edge_]

RACISMRACISMOMGURBAD

It's considered racism if the person hates a specific race, not a country.

[Annwyn]

I honestly think the sub vs. dub thing is circumstantial. Sometimes I prefer the dub, sometimes the sub. Like, the original Japanese voices for my favorite anime, Now and Then / Here and There, suit the characters amazingly well; then, like an idiot, I felt adventurous and bought the dub, and lo and behold, the child soldiers suddenly didn't sound like children anymore! Dan Green and Crispin Freeman as child soldiers--WTF?! Two of the deepest, manliest voices known to the dubbing industry! I kept expecting Nabuca to shout "It's time to d-d-d-d-d-d-duel!" and Tabool to rip his head off or molest the nearest pink-haired loli. Yay, Yugi and Albedo. In that instance, I hated the dub, as many people probably did, and recommend watching the sub. But sometimes the dub is just plain better because, I don't know, it's easier to suspend belief and partake in the story when your subconscious isn't registering the fact that the characters are speaking a language different from your own. It makes you feel closer to the occurrences. Or in some (few) cases, the dub voices just suit the characters more than their original ones. Reasons like that are why I prefer the dubs for Furuba, Yu Yu Hakusho, Rozen Maiden...

[Azure Knight]

RACISMRACISMOMGURBAD

It's considered racism if the person hates a specific race, not a country.

'Twas solely a joke. I'm Japanese myself, so I know. If I actually was offended, I wouldn't have said it like that.

Annwyn: I agree with you that it's circumstantial. There are a select number of voice actors that I like in English. It's actually most of the VA's from .hack//GU, which is why I like the dubbed Code Geass. (Johnny Young Bosch, Liam O'Brian, Yuri Lowenthal (good as Suzaku), etc. etc.)
Sorry if I spelled a name wrong.

[zerokoolpsx]

Subs all the way, some of the dub is just awful and the context of what they're saying isn't close sometimes. I don't mind reading when I'm watching anime.

[Kuukai]

I realize dub voiceactors have a lot of fans by virtue of the roles they play, but I much prefer to watch the original, for about two and a half reasons:

First of all, obviously, it's the original. The original vision has not been compromised by a random third party. There are plenty of horror stories of Japanese directors doing dozens of takes before they're satisfied; the director of Death Note wasn't satisfied with real NHK newscasters voicing the newscasters because they didn't emote exactly the way he wanted. By contrast, I've heard that the voice director for Sailor Moon's dub was French and didn't even speak English. Obviously not everything is going to be that severely stupid, but unless it's something that was originally made in English like Afro Samurai, the dubbing will be completely detached from the original creative process.

Secondly, just close your eyes and compare an anime dub with a live action movie, a good American cartoon, and an anime in Japanese. It doesn't sound like any of these! It sounds like an anime dub! Isn't that weird? Why can't it sound more natural? That always puts me off... The exception again is things like Afro Samurai which features notable actors like Samuel L. Jackson and Mark Hamill (doing a Joker-like voice).

The other demi-reason is that personally, if I don't watch in Japanese I feel like I'm being hit with a Forget Japanese Ray, but obviously that doesn't apply to everyone...

It's also worth noting that 99% of Japanese media originally made in English (God Hand, Dead Rising, Etc.) are affected by my second point anyway because the target audience (Japan) isn't going to be able to tell if it sucks. In the U.S. release of Xenosaga they actually redubbed the English opening scene, and made it much better in my opinion, but that's when the first point comes back to haunt us because they changed the music for that part. Win some, lose some, I guess...

[SunfallE]

Unless a dub is really bad I always prefer things in my own language. I like to multi task so that makes watching/listening to something a whole lot easier if it's in a language I understand. There are of course some that I really prefer the sub since the dub is bad, but those, at least out of what I've seen, are few and far between.

[Pic0o]

In fairness too, don't forget that JP and EN culture is not the same, and that tends to be a big factor in why the content changes in Dubs.

Lost in Translation sums it up, but in all fairness, some make a great transition, while others fall on their faces. I personally, tend to lean with Dubs, as I like the more direct dialog that seems to occur in the dubs, and the matching emotional tones and expressions from the content and original voice track.

[vagrantAI]

For the most part I prefer subs just because I usually like the Japanese voice actors over the English speaking ones. Also, I can read REALLY fast, so I don't miss any on screen action unless the fan-subbers made the lines too long for me to look up. Black Lagoon=worst English dubbing I've ever heard!

[Kuukai]

Which is weird considering how much of that show was originally in (bad) English...

[Haseo-Skaith]

I would have to say dubs. Partly because I'm dyslexic and have to constently mentally correct myself when I read subs to the point where I have to pause to read each line. Which gets annoying after a while. The other reason is because dubs really have gotten as good as the japanese original, and in some cases even better than the original. Of course if all there is, is that japenses version then I'm willing to watch it subbed. But perferably I go for dubs more.

Case in point would be Full Metal Alchemist. The english dub was soo good that even some of the japanese fans like it more than the japanese version.

Sometimes the re-writes they do improve the story. Like in Gundam SEED when Nicol Amalfi died, in the japanese version his last words were "My Piano", but in the english version he says "Athrun Run". Which I think gave him a much more noble death in that he was trying to save Athrun all the way to the end.

The big problem I see with the Subs only side of the argument is that they are so biased against dubs that they aren't willing to admit that they are good. If you have the mind set of "It Sucks" when you watch it then it will suck to you no matter how good it is. They littereally go into denial. And what really sucks is that these are the people who write reviews on anime web sites. They say how good the show is and how its a must see, but when they get to talk about the dub they always say it sucks. Sometimes all they say is "It Sucks", which makes me wonder if they didn't even watch the dub at all. If they didn't like it then give us some better reasons other than "It Sucks". There needs to be more sites with reviewers that actually can watch anime objectivly and rate each version on its own merrit and not just follow the "All Dubs Suck" crowd like a bunch of school kids.

This isn't the 70s and 80s where bad dubs was the norm. Now a days they are putting a lot of effort into keeping the dubs consistent and on par with the original version. If you ever see those voice actor interviews on DVD's they always mention how the director will have them say the lines several different ways to capture the characters emotions. They put a lot of work into these dubs.

[twilight_keeper]

SUBS! Or raws. I'm not bad at Japanese so I guess it's just my personal thing. As the saying goes: "American Dubbing: Butchering the Japanese Language since 1972!"