Space-Time Detective Genshi-Kun/Flint the Time Detective Episode 25 (24 for the Dub) Leafy’s Magical Forest | Sub/Dub Comparison

Plot: In 6^th century England, the kids search for Leafy – a Space-Time Monster with the power to control plant life. Along the way, they meet the child version of the legendary King Arthur who, surprisingly, has a severe issue with self-confidence.

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In the original, the game they’re playing is called Dragon Fantasy VI, which looks to be a spoof of Final Fantasy. In the dub, it just says “Dragon Game.” Hey, guys, are you pumped for Dragon Game? Coming out on the Game Console? I heard they’re filming the adaptation Dragon Movie soon. It’s gonna be awesome!

Subbed:

Dubbed:

Tokio said he was about to beat the dragon and complete stage two. In the dub, he says all he had to do was reach level five and defeat the dragon to become a knight of the round table.

Genshi asks what a hero is. In the dub, Flint mistakes “knight” for “night.”…..You’re telling me, Flint, the kid who has a disturbing addiction to food and brings it up constantly focused more on “knight” than the mention of a table? Character development or the writers missing an obvious joke? You decide.

Genshi just says he wants to be a hero too. In the dub, he says he wants to be a knight of the “brown” table.

I don’t understand the shot orientation of this next sequence. They get a call from Rei while they’re in this playroom and display the video call as if it’s in the same room. However, the wall they’re looking at was clearly entirely blank a minute ago, so it can’t be in the room. And the next part of the scene, they’re walking into the normal video call area where the call is continuing. This is the same way in both the original and the dub. It’s strange.

A shot of Jillian is inserted before the shot of Leafy.

Name Plate removed.

Subbed:

Dubbed:

Title Change: Leafy’s Magical Forest is changed to Leafy.

For some reason, they cut out a shot of the flowers and cover up the edit with a transition.

As I mentioned in the previous review, today’s episode is about King Arthur – someone who most likely never existed. Historians have been debating for centuries whether the character of legend was based off of a real person. The best assumption debating for his existence references to an Arthur who lead a Welsh resistance prior to the sixth century. The issue here is that the earliest references to him are believed to have been from a work of poetry or otherwise an exaggerated and fantasized version of a real event or even, to a certain extent, political and religious propaganda. There are some other indications of at least someone named Arthur being involved in battles in the 500s, but no indication that he was a king or any other particularly important or impressive figure.

Obviously, the most notable story of Arthur is the mythical tale written by Geoffrey of Monmouth in History of the Kings of Britain. The story has withstood the test of time, being one of the most well-known ancient tales from around the world and earning many re-tellings, additions, reimaginings and adaptations. In fact, it was the second most popular book in the Middle Ages with the first being the Bible. However, even this tale has been criticized for pushing a political agenda.

If you’re unfamiliar with the story, you can read it here, but the main idea is that Arthur was a result of a rape, then he was kidnapped as a baby and raised by a wizard named Merlin. The wizard designated a round table in which 150 knights would attend, headed by Arthur’s father, Uther. But after Uther’s death, the knights would be lost as to who would lead them and head the round table.

Merlin declared that whomever pulled a mystical sword, named Excalibur, from a stone would take Uther’s place. Over the years, many tried to free the sword, but they all failed. Until, however, Arthur came along and yanked it out, not even realizing the prophecy he fulfilled. He then became a powerful, legendary and brave king who was the subject of many incredible stories and romances known as Arthurian legends.

Reportedly, Geoffrey got his inspiration from a book about ancient Welsh history, but no title was given, and no history book containing details of any heroic Arthur have ever been found.

Personally, I’m open to the idea that some heroic figure named Arthur existed and his story was blown massively out of proportion almost immediately. However, I can’t buy that he was a king or even anyone of very significant position otherwise there would be more sources available about his exploits.

It’s great that this tale has been so inspiring and interesting to people – It’s certainly captivating no matter what version you’re reading or watching – but at the end of the day, it’s just fiction. Even if it’s revealed that the character was definitely based on a person they can verify, that person won’t be anywhere near the King Arthur figure people have painted in their minds, and maybe it’s better that way.

But none of this really matters because, before we ever see Arthur in this episode, we know what version of events they’re going for. One of the first things they see when they come out of the portal is a sword in a stone….

So either the writers truly believe the legends are real or they’re dropping any pretense that this is any form of actual educational-ish program based on real history. I’m going to bet the latter.

Either that or they’re just bad at finding legitimate historical events and people to talk about and explore, which, given we’re only on episode 25 with several episodes not even focusing on a historical event or person, that’s pretty sad.

They repeat a shot of Sora talking to extend the scene before the first commercial a little bit.

Tokio just points out, again, that it’s insane Genshi was able to pull the sword from the stone. In the dub, he feels so bad for the people of the village that he wonders if they should just reveal that Flint can pull the sword out and become king to help them. Sora adds that they would have been in deep trouble if the old man (….Is that meant to be Merlin?) had seen Genshi pull out the sword. Sarah says they might reconsider Flint as king once they see how much he eats.

Also…..I don’t know why this is, but the shot is flipped.

Subbed:

Dubbed:

*shrug*

Originally, the old man knows Arthur and calls out to him by name when he runs off. In the dub, he doesn’t know him.

How is it possible Arthur knows about the sword in the stone but he’s unaware of the legend of the sword in the stone?

Originally, TP Lady says the castle is a symbol of her love for the Masked Man. In the dub, she says she was worried he’d think it was a bit too froo froo, and they could put up a dartboard or some wood paneling in the den for “that boy look.”

So, yeah, they confirm that King Arthur actually existed and was some legendary hero, not that he was a (possibly mostly) fictional character. Ya know, there’s a difference between not being very educational and teaching kids that fictional stories are real history. I guess there’s no real harm in it for this circumstance, but it’s still really irresponsible to do that to kids.

There’s a short plotline in Kodocha where a little girl believes she can hatch a real chick from a store bought egg. Sana decides to covertly switch her egg with a real chick to make the kid happy, but Akito points out that, while she thinks she’s doing something nice, she’s setting the kid up for a possibly huge embarrassing moment in the future. At some point in her life, that kid is going to learn that you can’t hatch a chick from a store bought egg. Before that happens, she may share her belief with others who know better. Then they’ll make fun of her for such a silly belief, she’ll feel really embarrassed and dumb, she might be upset that Sana lied to and tricked her, and it will negate Sana’s seemingly nice act.

Acting as if the story of King Arthur is historical fact in a supposedly edutainment series is basically the same thing. You’re reinforcing false beliefs in little kids that may make them feel foolish in the future.

This kinda confuses me too, because if they were willing to explore more fictional stories, why the actual hell did they talk about the REAL story of the MASS MURDERER Vlad the Impaler? And they have a Space-Time Monster who can send them into fictional stories, so if they wanted to do a King Arthur story, they could have done it that way. But nope. Just claim Arthurian legends are fact. Whatever.

To make matters worse, they kinda ruined Arthur’s story. Since Genshi yanked the sword from the stone and just placed it back in, literally anyone could have walked over, pulled it out and acted as the chosen one. I know Genshi has super caveman strength, but that’s a magical sword that had a spell placed on it. He still shouldn’t have been unable to free it…..unless they ARE saying Genshi is the chosen one, in which case I don’t know what to think.

Arthur explains that the area beyond the waterfall was a popular spot for children to play in until “that witch” came to town. In the dub, he explains that Leafy is a kind and brave soul that he wanted to be friends with.

What exactly did Leafy do to those kids? Did it legitimately make plants grow OUT of them? Because that’s pretty horrifying…….But if it was just flowers appearing ON them, then it’s weird they’d just run off in horror like that.

Arthur originally says he understands Leafy’s name is….well….Leafy. In the dub, since Leafy can talk and introduce himself, Arthur says he understands that Leafy has the power to grow plants and flowers.

Speaking of Leafy’s power, how exactly is the power to grow plants and flowers helpful in maintaining the time stream, considering that was its main intention was?

This is minor, but in the original, Tokio kinda implies that he’s not understanding who the witch in Arthur’s story is, and Sora responds in an annoyed tone with irritation in her expression that, obviously, it’s TP Lady. In the dub, Tony clearly knows who this witch is, saying “Are you thinkin’ what I’m thinkin’?” I guess the expression on Sarah’s face still works here because she’s annoyed by Petra Fina, but still.

Putera yells out for help, and Tokio says he doesn’t want to die. In the dub, Pterry says he can’t swim, and Tony says it doesn’t matter because they’ll get smashed on the rocks anyway. Jeez, Saban. What the hell?

Ammon says manual labor doesn’t suit Kyoichiro. In the dub, she tells him he did a great job and she didn’t take him for the swashbuckling type.

Sora tells Arthur that he’ll get stronger from this point forth. In the dub, she says Flint does stuff like that all time, in regards to saving them from the waterfall. Sarah, it’s really not helpful to tell someone who feels inferior to another that they do the super impressive heroic stuff all the time.

That WORKS? Wow, Arthur, you sure are easy to convince. “I’m not strong. :(“ “Well, you’ll be strong and save Leafy and save the village and be a hero.” “You’re right! Let’s go!” I’m not even really paraphrasing there, I swear.

The action selection box is translated.

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Dubbed:

The two following dialogue boxes are also translated.

Subbed:

Dubbed:

Tokio’s not saying anything as we see the animation of his character finding the waterfall. In the dub…it’s really weird. They have Tony say that he left his character by a waterfall, went to make a sandwich, came back and there was a passageway opened…..Even though the animation clearly shows him using “search” on the waterfall. So what, did a ghost possess Tony’s game while he was gone?

Tony: “Man, I’m good at that game!” Yeah, you found a secret passageway in that game by doing literally nothing. Such skills.

How did they get Ridon back? They just went down a huge waterfall, and they have no means of calling it to them.

Name Plate removed.

Subbed:

Dubbed:

Name Change: Waruryu is changed to Leafy-Kon.

What kind of sense does it make for a plant Space-Time Monster to turn into a dragon besides adding a dragon to the King Arthur/Fantasy medieval motif? Especially since it has fire breath and fire and plants don’t mix.

Genshi says TP Lady will pay for this. Flint says Leafy-Kon’s breath is worse that his attitude.

Waruryu’s body is harder than diamonds?….Why? Again, it’s a plant-based monster. What kind of logic, if any, goes into these monsters’ powers half the time?

Also, if his body is that hard, shouldn’t he be unable to move?

So….did Yamato send a monster egg without being told they needed one?

Name Plate removed.

Subbed:

Dubbed:

Name Change: Super Raldo is changed to Raldo Master.

Super Raldo FREEZES THINGS? What kind of sense does THAT make? He’s a frickin’ turtle who sucks things up into his shell prison.

Also, isn’t that stealing Mosbee’s shtick?

I thought for a bit that maybe they were trying to still keep to a semi-realistic Arthur story. That maybe the sword was just a sword and it was just stuck in a rock somehow. And that everything else was just exaggerated.

Excalibur is magical now, glowing and blocking dragon fire and everything, so I guess that throws that theory in the trash.

I love how Leafy and Arthur knew each other for all of literally 30 seconds, and they flashback to their moments together like they were longtime pals.

The dialogue from the clips shown in the dub is not the same as the clips from earlier. I dunno if they just didn’t bother to check or if they did that on purpose to create the illusion that they spent more time together than we saw.

TP Lady says, as her flower castle crumbles, that the life of a flower is brief, but next time the flower of a woman will bloom. Then I think Dyna yells “A flowery runway!” while Mite adds “Here’s where we take our “leave.” which I think is meant to be a leaf pun. In the dub, Flint says all the evil is crumbling, causing Mite to ask “Did he say “crumbling”?” as the flower castle falls. Petra yells in frustration, and Dino says next time they should make the castle out of brick. Then Petra asks if he thinks they’re the three little pigs before going through the portal.

Is the dub saying Petra Fina is the one responsible for the toppled pillars at Stonehenge?

Oh right, yeah, they did bring up Stonehenge quite briefly at the start of the episode, so there’s your ‘actual’ history tidbit of the episode….one that’s still ruined because they never actually talked about it, I barely noticed it was there, and now they’re saying Petra Fina knocked over some of the pillars. I mean, if we’re being fair, we don’t exactly why the pillars were knocked down. We know some of them were knocked over by fierce wind storms and erosion, but other than that we can only theorize.

The two strongest theories behind some of the pillars being felled is that they were toppled on purpose for some reason by the ancient people who built Stonehenge and that nearby construction and human activity knocked them over by accident.

For the record, the original just said TP Lady ruined the flower field.

Why does this matter? No idea. I know that Arthur said this spot was popular for the flowers, but there are no flowers whatsoever in modern day Stonehenge. Maybe some, but hardly a flower field. It’s mostly just a grass field as far as the eye can see.

Speaking of topography, guess what else isn’t at Stonehenge? A river and/or waterfall. The River Avon is closest to Stonehenge, but you still can’t even see it from there. It’s a good mile or two from it. And, as far as I know, there are no large waterfalls in it.

Admittedly, that’s really nitpicky, but it was such a significant portion of the story that I felt I should mention it.

Putera says this is the true power of Leafy. In the dub, he says Leafy’s powers would be useful for sprucing up Goodman’s lab.

This is another perfect example of the weird confusing nature of how this show really works. Arthur only became a hero because of the example Genshi and the others gave in regards to bravery and friendship. He also learned to overcome his fears and fight for himself and others by saving Leafy….but then they erase his memory anyway, so shouldn’t he be back to being timid and meek? Or are they saying character development sticks even if you don’t remember actually developing?

Arthur talks about working together with the kingdom to help improve everything. Tokio says he might be able to be a hero too, but his friends shut him down and tell him Arthur’s the real hero, which is pretty rude. In the dub, Arthur says he has a lot to learn about being a king, but he thinks he’s found something within himself that will help him to heal the land. The others tell Arthur that he’ll be a great king as long as he remembers to be nice to the people, and Flint tells him to let them eat cake, which….why does Flint know that reference? He doesn’t know some of the most basic things ever, but he remembers a quote from Marie-Antoinette and also remembers it’s connected to royalty? Is it just because it mentions cake?

As if the dub didn’t abandon the message of working together already, they make it worse in the next sequence. We see Toki G watching the events and explaining that the legend of King Arthur was retained, and he did indeed work together with the kingdom and Knights of the Round Table to restore it back to its former glory. In the dub, Old Timer only praises Flint for a job well done in saving Leafy and getting Arthur back on track.

Yamato says he loves Rei, while Goodman says she smells as nice as the morning jasmine.

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I like the idea of going through a King Arthur story, because it is such a classic tale that just tends to be fun and inspiring, but not only does this story not belong in a show that is trying to explore actual historical events or people, at least to a basic extent, but this interpretation was just poorly executed in general.

First of all, it’s very unclear whether Arthur even was actually the chosen one here. Like I said, since Genshi freed the sword and only gently placed it back in the hole, probably anyone could have pulled it out after that. I realize I just made a lot of accidental innuendos, but let’s move on.

Why was Genshi even able to free the sword? I realize that Genshi is ridiculously strong, on a superhuman level, but Excalibur is a magic sword. I don’t really believe that Genshi, this cave child, is capable of being so physically strong that he can forcibly weasel around whatever spell is on the sword and just free it anyway despite not being the chosen one. I could believe he’d be able to smash the rock, but I’d still feel like a part of the rock would stay on there to uphold the legend. Is the show implying that Genshi was just THAT strong or he really was the chosen one and just let Arthur take his place?

Was that old man at the beginning Merlin? It really seemed like that was the idea, but he’s never referred to as Merlin, and, besides having a weird staff and wearing a hooded robe, he doesn’t seem to be a wizard.

Having Raldo show back up and become his Super form was cool, but his powers are confusing to me, he wound up being similarly as cowardly as Arthur after being attacked once and then kinda took the thunder away from Arthur in the final battle.

Not to mention that it’s a teeny bit frustrating that Raldo’s backstory with TP Lady really doesn’t seem to matter in the end. Raldo doesn’t mention her, and TP Lady doesn’t recognize him as an old friend. Even though her memory of their friendship was erased back then, she still watched it unfold from the outside and has those memories. You’d think it might mean something to her, but no. They’re basically strangers now, I suppose.

The actual story itself wasn’t even interesting. You have Arthur who has no other backstory besides that he was a wimp who got bullied and was then saved by a creature who summons flowers. The group all nearly dies going over a waterfall, but then they’re saved by Kyoichiro, whom they never see again, and Genshi. They confront TP Lady and Leafy, who, for no other reason besides fantasy aesthetic, turns into a fire-breathing dragon whose body is hard as diamonds. Then Arthur gathers the bravery to wield Excalibur to save his friend by watching Genshi be heroic, but even Excalibur isn’t enough and he still needs Super Raldo to come in at the end for an assist in the final blow?

The structure is also strange. The beginning of the episode really teases that this will be a story about Tokio learning what it means to be a hero and maybe becoming one himself in the end somehow, but instead Tokio’s basically a non-factor. The focus is almost entirely on Genshi being a hero and Arthur learning what it is to be a hero through him. Then they all insult Tokio in the end (in the original anyway) by saying he could never be a hero.

They didn’t even hit the historical figure and the Space-Time Monster friendship aspect right. I wasn’t exaggerating – they were literally friends for like 30 seconds before TP Lady attacked. Sure, Leafy saved him from bullies, but that’s about it. They didn’t bond beyond that.

It’s a massive mess, especially for a tale so simple as King Arthur’s origins. I don’t want even talk about the completely lazy way they stapled Stonehenge onto this to act as if it was legitimately historical if we didn’t buy the Arthur stuff.

Next time, we meet the Space-Time Monster, Bouzan, in Heian era Japan, and learn about the warrior, Benkei.

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Space-Time Detective Genshi-Kun/Flint the Time Detective Episode 24 (23 for the Dub) TP Lady’s Bad Transformation? | Sub/Dub Comparison

Plot: Still lost in the flow of time by Unita’s powers, TP Lady has no choice but to call for help from the Time Bureau. While TP Lady, Dyna and Mite spend some time imprisoned, they’re soon broken out by the Masked Man who gives them a Time Card with instructions to capture the Space-Time Monster, Raldo. When they arrive at their destination, they find that they’re actually at TP Lady’s childhood home, a palace in an unknown region. Turns out, TP Lady is actually a princess who was once very sweet and loving, but was under the thumb of her controlling mother, the queen. She was best friends with Raldo, but had to keep it a secret from her mother.

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In the original, our first shots are of Dyna, Mite then TP Lady. Saban reverses this order. I have no idea why.

Mite says they’ve been stranded for a week. In the dub, Dino says they’ve been lost for a month.

Title Change: TP Lady’s Bad Transformation? is changed to Raldo.

The dub omits Rei asking TP Lady her age and birthplace.

In the original, Yamato asks what kind of upbringing TP Lady must have had. Rei then comes in and asks what he’s even doing there. Genshi says he gave him a ride there, and Yamato says he felt a responsibility as his guardian to escort Genshi to this interrogation. In the dub, Goodman sarcastically mocks how uncooperative Petra is being, and Jillian comes in saying she’s the one interrogating Petra….which…Okay? He didn’t ask a question. Flint then, as usual, thinks she’s talking about food. Goodman then excuses his remark, saying he was just talking to himself.

In the original, Dyna grabs Yamato on accident while trying to grab Mite’s hand so they don’t get separated in the smoke. In the dub, he grabs Goodman on purpose.

The text on the card the Masked Man gives to TP Lady is removed and replaced with the actually very accurate English translation.

Subbed:

Dubbed:

Saban adds in a cut to Dino and Mite as they run in between when Petra reads the card and picks it up. This is to add in a line exchange where Mite asks Dino why he grabbed Goodman, and Dino says it seemed like a good idea.

Dyna and Mite tell each other to not let go, thinking they’re holding each other’s hands when they’re really holding Yamato’s hand. In the dub, Dino and Mite say “No more donuts!” “What about milkshakes?!”

Why are Dino and Mite shocked at seeing Goodman in the dub when they know they took him with them?

In the original, Mite just asks TP Lady what they should do with Yamato. In the dub, he admits that they took him “accidentally on purpose” before Dino asks (as his original counterpart does) if they should just throw him outside.

I don’t understand why Saban jumped through so many hoops to change this from taking him on accident to taking him on purpose just to have them still immediately ask if they should throw him out of the Catamaran. I know these two are a little dense, and I could see this happening as a regular writing snaffoo if not for the fact that the original version didn’t have them doing this.

It’s cool to finally see Kyoichiro’s Time Ride, even if it is just a plain white scooter thing.

Saban adds in a closeup cut to Petra as they go to their destination just to have her think “I have a good feeling about this mission.”

Name Plate removed:

Subbed:

Dubbed:

Also, the original pauses on Raldo when he first comes out so we can read the name plate. The dub repeats his little gesture instead.

Raldo is an adorable Space-Time Monster. I love its crystal shell.

Wow, I think when Lil’ Petra says “You always protect me. Thank you.” might just be one of the most wooden deliveries I’ve heard in ages. Truly remarkable.

Lil’ TP Lady says Yamato doesn’t seem like a bad person. In the dub, Goodman explains that he’s a scientist, and Lil’ Petra says, since he’s a scientist, he can’t be that bad. Raldo suggests he could be mad, but Lil’ Petra says, if he is mad, they’ll put him back in Raldo’s shell.

So Raldo’s power is to shrink things and trap them in his shell? Okay, cool. He did that to a snake that was about to attack TP Lady? Okay, cool……What uh….what happened to the snake after that? The snake isn’t in his shell now…..Did you….did you kill it, Raldo?

Goodman: “I think you might be underestimating your mother, Fifi.” Fifi? She never said her name to you. The original doesn’t give her a name yet either.

Yamato tells the girl that TP Lady, Dyna and Mite are the ones who kidnapped him. In the dub, he tells them “(I) may be a scientist but don’t think I won’t wrestle ya!”

In the original, TP Lady says she doesn’t remember seeing a dumb face like the kid’s, but once she realizes the kid is her she says her face is sweet and full of intelligence and grace. It’s kinda funny. In the dub, though, they don’t even bother trying to make a joke here. Petra calls her a brat and then says the little brat is her. Also, Saban, for some reason, adds in another cut to a closeup shot of Petra’s eyes while she’s staring herself as a kid.

Goodman refers to Lil’ Petra as ‘Princess’ too despite no one else calling her that.

Goodman: “You were a princess? I don’t believe it!” Why are you acting like this is new information? You somehow knew Lil’ Petra was a princess earlier, you learned a minute ago that Petra is this little girl, but NOW it clicks that Petra was a princess? You’re not very bright for a scientist.

Also, he is just mirroring his original line there, but since they changed some lines to indicate Goodman knew “Fifi” was a princess, it doesn’t make sense.

Their butler/assistant/whatever tells Lil’ TP Lady that her fiance, a prince from a neighboring land, will be arriving shortly. Her mother then tells her it’s important for a princess to entertain her fiance. She tells her to throw away Raldo and get ready for her fiance’s arrival. In the dub, the butler guy points out that Fifi is holding a reptile creature. Her mother tells her such creatures are unbecoming of a princess. She tells her to throw it away and go inside because a prince wishes to meet her.

I find it funny that TP Lady and her crew kinda remind me of Team Rocket, and they also have a member who was secretly rich, was betrothed, but ran away from home to have their freedom from their overly controlling parent(s). Both stories even have a beloved pet they had to leave behind.

HOLY CRAP! Their butler just grabs Raldo from her and throws him in the river! I get that he’s kinda a turtle, but screw you, man.

Saban adds in a repeat shot of Petra’s mother talking from further away to have her command the butler to throw away Raldo. The butler then accidentally says “Your travesty” before correcting himself to “Your majesty.”

Name Change: I dunno if Butler guy has a name in the original – I never hear one. In the dub, he’s referred to as Mortimer.

Mortimer calls Raldo “Rounder.” It was obviously on purpose to show how little they care about Raldo, but worth noting anyway.

Ammon tells Kyoichiro to find TP Lady before Genshi does. In the dub, she tells Merlock that they have to help find Goodman.

They reverse and repeat Kyoichiro talking to extend his lines.

Also, I don’t know how old Kyoichiro/Merlock is meant to be. He seems to be roughly the same age as Sora, so I don’t tend to mind much when he’s fawning over her. However, the fact that he calls Lil’ TP Lady “attractive” and “A pretty young lady” and then clearly gets motivated to save Raldo to impress her is uncomfortable to say the least. TP Lady here seems to be quite a bit younger than the other kids.

Hahah, I love how Raldo in the dub just says “Eeeeviillll” when he gets stamped.

They insert another shot of Lil’ Petra talking just to have her say “Isn’t there something we can do?”

They also insert another shot of Genshi talking just to have him say “I’ll get you, Petra!”

They change the shot of TP Lady whipping Raldo to a different shot of her using her whip. I guess they just like how that shot looks because this has happened a few times by now.

Name plate removed:

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Dubbed:

Name Change: Waru-Raldo is changed to Raldo-kon. I’ve decided I’m sticking with the K spelling since it looks better than ‘Con’ and I really can’t get a confirmation on which spelling is correct.

Flint: “He looks mean!” So does literally every bad transformed Time Shifter. He literally just said “Eeeviiill” before he transformed.

In the original, he just said “TP Lady.”

They add in a shot of Ototan using Fighting Spirit after he already did it, just without saying it.

Name plate removed:

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Dubbed:

Name Change: Super Elekin is changed to Elekin Master.

Lil’ TP Lady yells out for Raldo. In the dub, she calls him a monster.

When she runs away, Lil’ TP Lady yells an apology to her mother. In the dub, she yells to Raldo that she’s coming for him.

Genshi tells Waru-Raldo to go back to being good. Flint points out that his attacks aren’t doing anything.

When Kyoichiro falls from the tree, he lands in a split, and the joke is obviously that he’s crushing his balls. In the dub, they kept this, which surprised me, but they changed it a little to have Merlock say “But these lightning bolts kinda tickle!”….Is Saban implying that those lightning bolts are real to avoid acting as if this is a nutshot moment?

They insert another instance of Ototan using Fighting Spirit, and then they remove the repeat shot of Flint smacking Waru-Raldo.

The dub makes Raldo-Kon’s eyes glow twice for some reason when they only glowed once after TP Lady whipped him again.

Lil’ TP Lady keeps telling Waru-Raldo to stop, but when he doesn’t she loses her temper and yells at him to stop before slapping him across the face. In the dub, she keeps trying to convince Raldo-Kon that he’s not evil. Then she suddenly loses her temper, says “Alright, Raldo, you asked for it!” and then slaps him. The dub just kinda has tantrum come out of nowhere. It also kinda comes out of nowhere in the original, but there’s a little buildup to it. It’s just weird for the scene to go “Oh Raldo, you’re not evil! Please believe me! This is so horrible………ALRIGHT, RALDO, YOU ASKED FOR IT! I’M GOING TO ABUSE YOU INTO BELIEVING YOU’RE NOT EVIL!”

Lil’ TP Lady called TP Lady an old hag, which is why she’s so offended. In the dub, she just tells her to stay out of this, and Petra is appalled that she said that to her.

The original version actually has an animation hiccup in the background during the flashback. When you see Raldo running, the background juts really abruptly for some reason, like the animation cycle ran out and the loop started somewhere odd. In the dub, this doesn’t happen. So either they fixed the footage before sending it to Saban or Saban fixed it.

Genshi says he’s glad the professor is back. Flint says “You look better bigger!”

UH EW. The guy TP Lady’s mother was going to set her up with looked to be at least 40. EW. EW. EW.

Lil’ TP Lady seems more aggressive now as a default….Did taking Raldo from her and erasing her memories have a hand in making her evil?

Queen: “Is that your final answer?”

Lil’ TP Lady: “Final answer!” Who Wants to be a Millionaire was getting popular around this time. Dunno why I thought of that.

Why exactly are so many seemingly adult men proposing to this child?

None of the marriage candidates get names in the original, but they’re named in the dub. They don’t matter and are difficult to spell so I won’t bother listing them all.

Also, it’s very clear that TP Lady/Petra Fina doesn’t live on earth. At what point in time did we have literal cat people? Because her guards are cat people. However, the queen and butler in the dub are listing off real places like Barcelona and Greece as areas where the marriage candidates originate from.

The original doesn’t mention Attila the Hun. The dub has Goodman compare Petra to Attila as an example of people drastically changing, claiming Attila was a perfect child. I don’t think there’s any legitimate information as to Attila the Hun’s temperament as a child. He was born into a stable and secure family with a lineage in one of the most powerful rulers in the Hunic empire and was brought up with values of leadership and nobility, but that’s about all I could find.

———————————-

This episode was kinda disappointing, to be honest. I didn’t dislike it, but for a backstory episode it really didn’t answer a whole lot. We learn that TP Lady was originally a princess with an overbearing mother who was trying to dictate her life, especially her marriage. We also learn she was much nicer as a child, but had a temper, but I guess eventually grew more angry and violent as a rebellion against her mother. We don’t see her father, if he exists, we never learn her real name in the original, and TP Lady doesn’t undergo any character development at all.

In fact, for most of the second half, TP Lady really doesn’t have much of a role, especially in regards to seeing her past. She gets angry hearing her mother being controlling, but that’s about it. Otherwise, she does the same things she always does in every episode and actually kinda stays to the background.

I guess if you want to dig deeper into this, we could theorize that the reason she’s so hung up on the Masked Man is because she fell in love with him because she wanted to not because her mother dictated it, but that’s a bit of a stretch.

Speaking of the Masked Man, why did he send her there? It’s an awful big coincidence that he gives her a special note with a personalized card that sends her to her own past where a Space-Time Monster just happens to be. I guess it’s not impossible, but that seems really weird.

As far as I know, we’re not going to get much more explanation on TP Lady’s backstory in future episodes. If her Wiki is any indication, we’ll also never learn her real name. We’ll find out how she met Dyna and Mite, but other than that, not much. Even the anime kinda lampshades that we’ll never find out what really lead her to a life of evil because the last line, that is reinforcing what Kyoichiro said a scene prior, is about how women’s hearts are puzzling, and they can’t understand what could lead a kind girl like that into becoming a criminal.

It was also disappointing that they revealed Super Elekin here and it didn’t get to do a whole lot. Not that his super form is all that great anyway. He’s basically just Warukin with his normal face and normal arms.

Raldo, however, was super adorable. And his bad transformation was pretty cool too. His power is kinda weird, but useful, I guess. He’s mostly a storage system, really. He can neutralize threats by shrinking them and pulling them into his shell, but can’t they hurt him from the inside?

His bad transformation doesn’t have any power of this sort. He does have a powerful shell, and anyone in his shell when he’s regular Raldo still stays in his shell when he transforms, even though there’s no way to see or hear whoever is inside, but his other powers are unrelated.

Overall, a fine episode, but I just wish they had done more with the concept. I don’t know if they planned to do more in the future and they got canceled, but it’s just a backstory to a character in a mostly episodic comedy show – there’s no need to procrastinate with it.

Next time, we go on an adventure with….King Arthur? Okay, there’s a lot to unpack there…

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Space-Time Detective Genshi-Kun/Flint the Time Detective Episode 23 (22 for the Dub) Unita of the Land of Time | Sub/Dub Comparison

Plot: The group learns of a mysterious Space-Time Monster named Unita who is able to freely roam in the flow of time and space. As they try to rescue him from TP Lady, Genshi and Ototan find themselves in the Land of Time where Toki-G finally explains the entire situation to his best Space-Time Detective.

——————————–

Title Change: Unita of the Land of Time is changed to Enter the Unicon.

Contrary to what the title implies, Unita’s name is not changed to Unicon. That’s the name of his bad transformation.

They insert a couple of shots of Rei and Yamato talking before the screen of Unita.

Name plate removed:

Subbed:

Dubbed:

Yamato doesn’t mention having food in every decade like Goodman does.

The usual pre-time travel additional filler is particularly fillery today. They do bring up that they don’t know where or when they’re going, but Jillian notes that they’re going to the Grand Canyon, which is supposedly one of Unita’s favorite places. It’s mostly information we’re going to learn in a minute anyway.

Saban tries to be educational here where the original wasn’t, which is appreciated, but a fact they convey is wrong. Pterry explains that the Grand Canyon is 217 miles long, but it’s actually 277 miles long. The thing is, this note is technically correct if you follow a map from pre-1975. 60 miles were added to the official length of the Grand Canyon when they started incorporated Marble Canyon into its length and included it in the Grand Canyon National Park. This show was made in 1998-99, which is well beyond when this change was made.

However, Pterry is right in saying that it’s one mile deep in some places.

Super Unita’s name plate is removed:

Subbed:

Dubbed:

Why was it necessary for Wing to hide in Ridon? Couldn’t he have just stayed out like Love-Love does?

I do like how Tokio continues to be particularly close with Wing, though. I hope Sora gets her own Space-Time Monster who connects with her.

They insert a shot of Flint talking before Tony and Wing fly off.

Tony is much ruder than Tokio is. Tokio was hoping using Wing’s power would let them show off. In the dub, he’s disappointed that their flight speed isn’t faster and calls it ‘bogus’ when Wing’s right there.

Why did they have Getalong say “Eh” after Sarah pointed out that Tony hurt Wing’s feelings as if he didn’t care?

Putera says they’ll never catch up to Unita on Ridon. In the dub, Pterry points out that he flew behind a cloud bank.

Tokio asks Wing if there’s anything he can do to help them catch up, which prompts Wing to Super Transform. In the dub, Tony just tells Wing to shapeshift.

Name Change: Jetton is changed to Wing Master.

Name Plate Removed:

Subbed:

Dubbed:

I don’t know who the hell said “Follow him into the canyon, Wing!” in the dub. It sure as hell wasn’t Tony. It’s like they wanted that line in but couldn’t get Brian Donovan in that day so they just had an intern try to mimic his voice. It was weird. I almost want to say it’s Wing because that’s the only voice that’s similar but….is he talking in third-person…..to himself?

For some reason, they insert a bunch of shots of Tony acting frightened while flying on Wing Master before Flint corners Unita.

Originally, Unita refused help because he claimed he belonged to no one. In the dub, he said he doesn’t need help from a mere human.

In the original, they all just yell Unita’s name. In the dub, they tell Unita, who is already trapped in Petra’s chains, to look out for Petra’s chains.

Between when Petra opens her fan and when she starts making her proclamations, they insert a shot of Sarah talking to say “We’ve got to stop her! Can’t you do something, Flint!?” Which sounds really like something you’d say with a very concerned expression. Not this.

They remove TP Lady gloating and dancing with her fan.

The original just has Mite say they used a special chain. In the dub, he says they got the chain from a mail-order catalog.

Originally, Genshi says he’s been paralyzed. Then he apologizes to Unita for failing to save him because he’s now paralyzed (he just got electric shocked). In the dub, he sings the Old MacDonald song and then makes the “I’ve fallen and I can’t get up” reference before saying he’s had all the power sapped from him.

How was that chain so strong a direct hit from Ototan’s Fighting Spirit didn’t dent it, but Jetton’s missiles broke them, and Unita simply pulling on them broke them as well?

Sora yells that the ship is going to hit them. In the dub, she asks if Unita got away.

Ototan wonders where they are before Genshi suddenly wakes up and wonders where Tokio, Sora and Love-Love are (No concern for Wing? Or Putera?) In the dub, Rocky says “I don’t know where we are, but this is not relativity.” The word “relativity” wakes Flint up and he wonders where Tony, Sarah and Getalong are (Again, not Wing or Pterry.) The reason I bring this up is because Flint doesn’t know the simplest words sometimes, but “relativity” makes him think of Sarah and Tony for no other reason I can think of besides the fact that they’re relatives to each other?

When Genshi wakes up, he’s searching for Sora, Tokio and Love-Love again. In the dub, he’s telling Petra (who’s not there) that she’s under arrest.

We finally learn that the floating pig Toki-G rides on is called Buta. In the dub, it doesn’t seem he’s given a name – at least not yet. I tried looking it up, but got nowhere.

Toki-G is originally a god of time – hence the G in his name. In the dub, he’s just the keeper of the Land of Time.

Toki-G tells Genshi that the pork buns coming out of Buta’s nose (ew) are real. In the dub, he says “They’re not the ideal shape for pigs in a blanket, but they’re close enough to fake it.” So…..are they still pork buns?

So, again, Fighting Spirited Ototan wasn’t able to break the chains, but Genshi can pull them apart with his bare hands?

I can’t get over how much little Unita looks like he belongs in My Little Pony lol

What the hell is up with TP Lady’s eyes when she’s saying they have to get Unita to leave? They’re not blinking or moving at all. It’s like she’s a doll.

Toki-G originally tells Genshi that the Space-Time Monsters were created to be angels who protected the Land of Time. Genshi and Ototan are shocked, but then Genshi whispers to Ototan “What are angels?” which makes everyone fall over. Toki-G collects himself and explains they are beings meant to assist him. In the dub, Old Timer says he’s over a billion years old, which shocks everyone. Rocky says that’s impossible, but Flint responds “Careful. I think he’s off his pig.” which is kinda funny, but I don’t know why they didn’t just have the original dialogue. Also, with all the stuff they’ve seen and the fact that they can time travel, why is it so hard to believe someone could be over a billion years old?

I don’t quite get how all of the Space-Time Monsters are angels meant to assist Toki-G. Most of their powers just make no sense for that task. They’re literally just watching machinery. Why would they ever need to freeze things or make people get along or bring art to life?

Also, why even bother hiring more Space-Time Detectives if Genshi is the only one who really matters due to his pure heart and friendship? What were the circumstances of Kyoichiro getting hired? Does he just usually go after the Space-Time Monsters TP Lady doesn’t know about yet? Or does he have another job?

TP Lady gushes after hearing the story of the Masked Man breaking out all of the Space-Time Monsters from the Land of Time in order to rewrite history to fall under his rule acting as if he’s doing all of this to make a new world for her. In the dub, Petra mocks Flint by saying she, Dino and Mite are helpless criminals who have rough pasts that made them that way and to have mercy on them.

In response, Dyna and Mite look at TP Lady like she’s nuts and they ask if that’s really what’s going on here. In the dub, they say she’s milking this act for all it’s worth.

It’s really ridiculous that Genshi never tries to stop TP Lady from stamping a Space-Time Monster. She usually takes quite a bit of time to do it, clearly builds up to it so you know that’s what’s coming, and Genshi is certainly fast enough to stop her, but he just doesn’t.

TP Lady tells Unita to show her his true dark side. In the dub, she says there’s a new sheriff in town and it’s her.

Name Plate removed:

Subbed:

Dubbed:

Also, goddamn, that bad transformation is sick. Looks like it belongs on a death metal album cover. Unita has probably the best trio of forms so far. Its default form is adorable, its super form is awesome, and its bad form is kickass.

Name Change: Warufa is changed to Unicon.

Kinda shocked they left in TP Lady having her ass set on fire.

Okay, now Genshi’s ass is being set on fire. What is happening?

Genshi tells Unita to stop. In the dub, he tells Rocky they need to take cover.

The baseball references Rocky makes when he bats Flint away are not present in the original.

TP Lady tells Warufa to smash Genshi. In the dub, she seems to tell Dino and Mite to help Unitacon, but they don’t.

…….Wait, what?

Petra: “Unitacon needs help!”…..UniTAcon?…..But the title says “Unicon”….According to the Wiki, it’s “Unita-kon (I honestly don’t know if they’re supposed to use a K or a C for “c/kon” Some entries use C and others use K, but I’d think it’d be consistent. Sadly, there’s no official source for this info, so either the script has a flub in it or they messed up the title card. They never say his bad form’s name vocally ever again in the dub. To make things more confusing, Unita’s Wiki page says the title of the episode it debuts in is called “Enter the Unicorn.” which is not what the title card says.

They originally yell that the Time Ride is out of order (so I guess they’re asking themselves where they’re even going since they can’t leave the Land of Time.) There’s nothing but screaming in the dub.

Originally, Dyna and Mite break the fourth wall and tell the audience to join them for the next episode called “TP Lady’s Bad Transformation.” TP Lady yells “Look forward to it!” In the dub, Dino asks where they’re going if the computer’s broken. Mite says he doesn’t know. Then they both say they hope wherever/whenever they land has bowling. Petra then yells “This is so not fair!”

What the hell have Sora and the others been doing this whole time? Time has clearly passed since it’s sundown now when it wasn’t when Genshi, Ototan and Unita left. Have they just been staring blankly into the horizon from that rock formation for several hours?

Genshi simply doesn’t know how to explain everything Toki-G told them. He just says he met a god and he told them a lot of things, which the others don’t really believe, while Ototan says he’ll fill them in later. In the dub, for some reason, they make off like Flint had his mind erased, and it seems like he did…….????? Why the hell would Old Timer tell Flint all of that stuff just to erase his memories later? He’s a Time Detective. What’s the point?

Merlock: “It’s alright. He’ll be normal after some food.” UHM I’M SORRY. WHAT ARE YOU IMPLYING HERE? That anyone who has their mind erased by the memory erasure beam will get their memories back after a hearty meal?

Also, Rocky says “Pizza for everyone!” in the spot where he says he’ll explain later.

Genshi just says Unita’s name. In the dub, he asks if Unita remembers.

While most of Unita’s dialogue is the same here, he starts by saying he remembers that Flint is his beloved friend…..so…is he also keeping the events of the Land of Time a secret or does he really not remember?

I know that Unita values his freedom, but why is he the only Space-Time Monster they’re allowing to roam free?

And what was even the point of Merlock being here? He didn’t do anything besides literally be there.

————————————-

All in all this episode was………okay. I hate saying that because this is one of the few episodes that actually furthers the overall plot besides just capturing Space-Time Monsters, but it was really kinda bland. Unita is by far the best thing about it, even if I don’t understand why Warufa has fire powers. However, the rest of the episode is just kinda disappointing. The only new information we really learned is that the Masked Man was the one who attacked the Land of Time and released the Space-Time Monsters, but we don’t learn who he is (is there really any point in disguising him? We don’t know any adult men with long teal hair. So any reveal would ring a little hollow wouldn’t it?), and his motives are typical take-over-the-world stuff.

We got Wing’s super transformation, which was kinda cool. I don’t much care for the design. It comes off more like a weird rocket than a fighter jet. I’m also getting kinda sick of Tony or Sarah being mean to the Space-Time Monsters when they call on them to help.

I do like that we finally get to explore the Land of Time more and learn a tiny bit more about the Space-Time Monsters, but I was expecting something with a bit more oomph for such an important episode. If anything, it just raised more questions, especially regarding Genshi being the messiah of this mission. I get that he’s pure-hearted and kind, but many of the bad transformed Space-Time Monsters change back because of the influence of their friendships formed with historical figures, not really Genshi in particular half the time.

I also liked Genshi getting turned back into a fossil. That was a little funny and unexpected.

It is disappointing that this is another episode with not much to talk about history-wise. We got a two fact blurb about the Grand Canyon in the dub, and one of the facts was incorrect.

Dub-wise, it’s fine until the ending where they make a huge change for seemingly no reason. If they actually do keep up this amnesia excuse, then how does that affect future episodes? If him getting fed returns his memories then…..holy hell in August, the timeline should be screwed a billion times over by now! What would even be the point of erasing his memory if it returns with food? I really, truly don’t understand a single thing about that change. It baffles me.

Next time, we learn of TP Lady’s backstory in an episode titled, you guessed it, “TP Lady’s Bad Transformation.”

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Yu-Gi-Oh! GX Episode 5: Demon Deck of Darkness | Sub/Dub Comparison

Plot: As Judai, Shou and Hayato are telling scary stories, Daitokuji tells them a legend about an abandoned dorm on the island where apparently all of the students mysteriously went missing. The rumor was that the students at the dorm were experimenting in Shadow Games that likely caused their vanishings. The boys head out in the night to see the dorm for themselves. They bump into Asuka who knows the legend is real because her brother was one of the students who went missing. She is kidnapped by a self-proclaimed Dark Duelist who challenges Judai to a Shadow Game using the supposed Millennium Puzzle to create it. As he loses life points, Judai will slowly lose more and more of his body. If he loses the game, he will vanish forever.

——————————

Shou is telling the story of the cave like it’s a local legend and his character is merely taking the place of the interchangeable main character in horror stories. The legend is that when the moon hits just the right spot in a cave north of the school, students will see the card they want most in the waters in the cave. When they go to reach for it, an arm grabs them, drags them underwater and supposedly drowns them.

In the dub, Syrus is telling the story like he actually experienced it. I guess he was just wandering around in a cave by himself, because we all know how likely that would be of Syrus. According to him, he randomly saw the Dark Magician card in the water when a monster dragged him under. Ya know, it’s easy to fall for a scary story about some unknown person experiencing that, but when you say Syrus did it’s not scary at all, considering that Syrus is still very much alive. Although, maybe that’s why 4Kids changed that to begin with – so we know the person in the story didn’t actually die?

Possibly because of that slight alteration, the next dialogue is changed. Judai actually gets excited because he wants to go see the cave I guess to either have a chance at getting his most wanted card or to see the monster, and Shou is disappointed that he wasn’t scared by the story. In the dub, Jaden says water’s not scary and Syrus says he’s right. “Only chumps” would be scared of water. Yes, only chumps would be scared of drowning…..

Judai doesn’t wish for a high level card (They’re apparently playing a game where you have to tell scary stories and their level of scariness is based on the level of card. The higher the level, the scarier the story has to be…..It’s stupid, yeah. Why wouldn’t you just share the scariest stories you can? What if you draw a one star card? Do you just tell the mildest scary story you can think of? “She waited all night for Windows to finish updating, but it never did. She was faced with a decision…..force shut down or continue to see if it got about 45%….she turned the computer off……and then back on……and to her horror….the update AUTOMATICALLY RESTARTED! *thunderclap*) he just wonders what his next card will be.

Judai believed that his cards came to life and would have parties while he was sleeping. Jaden only recalls hearing voices that he couldn’t place.

Shou tells Daitokuji to give them his best shot with the level 12 horror story. In the dub, he seems too scared and wants to go to bed.

What the hell was Cronos/Crowler doing outside of their dorm? Daitokuji/Banner being there I understand because he’s their dorm master, but what the hell, Cronos?

Shou doesn’t imply that he knows where the dorm is like Syrus does.

The Dark Duelist, Titan (he doesn’t seem to be given a dub name) talks about his fees in the original when we first see him. Also, how is his fee a flat rate if the criteria is three months of the client’s salary? That must vary from person to person so I don’t see how that’s ‘flat’ per se. Anyway, in the dub, he just talks about how scary he is.

In the original, Judai talks about how surprised he is that they got Hayato to come with them to the abandoned dorm since he’s such a scaredy cat, and even getting him to go to class is a challenge because he sees everything as a hassle. Hayato says it’s not that he likes staying at the dorm or studying, he just doesn’t like classes where the main focus is learning how to win (learning how to lose would take like half a second…) Shou asks him what he means since that’s the whole point of playing, then they bring up talking about Shadow Games in class……Still the main objective in Shadow Games…winning. I mean, if you lose Shadow Games you lose your soul sooo….yeah.

In the dub, this is changed to them talking about being lost, then Chumley says they need to find the dorm quickly or else they might run into some scary swamp water like Syrus talked about in his story. Then Syrus says Chumley was too scared of the water to even take a bath last night. They fight over cleaning the bathtub, and say Chumley should grow up and take showers and whatever.

The sign saying ‘Keep out’ in English is painted to look blank.

Subbed:

Dubbed:

Shou yells that the Shadow Games are just superstition whereas Syrus yells at Jaden, who can’t possibly be in his line of sight in this shot, to not stand too close to the carvings.

Written on the photo of Asuka’s brother was ‘Fubuki Tojoin’ (His name is actually Fubuki Tenjoin….I dunno what happened there). In the dub, they obviously paint this off completely instead of just replacing it with his dub name, and they also have to remove the pan back down and zoom in on the words since they erased them.

Subbed:

Dubbed:

Hayato says it looks like something was dragged in a certain direction. Chumley says ‘there’s only one way she could’ve gone’. Uh, no. There are plenty of ways out of that room without going through the dark dank tunnel, Chum.

Titan actually introduces himself after Judai asks who he is. Since he’s never given a name in the dub for whatever reason, he just responds to that question with ‘Your worst nightmare come true.’ but at least 4Kids recognizes this dumb line by having Jaden say ‘Gimme a break…’

Eyecatches:

Jaden: “Uh yeah, I already knew that.” That’s nice, Snooty McNoseinair. Seriously, can someone tell me why super sarcastic cocky asshats are so popular as protagonists? Judai just says that Demon decks are powerful, but they come at a high cost.

Titan explains how Terrorking Arch-Fiend can’t be summoned unless another arch-fiend is on the field, but with the Inferno-Queen on the field, he can. In addition, the Terrorking gets the 1000 point bonus for being on the field with Inferno-Queen. In the dub, the first part is omitted, but I actually don’t mind because I find it pointless to yell out a rule like that unless someone is trying to break that rule.

Bursting! Internal Organs! is changed to Locust Storm Barrage.

Roulette of Hell (Sometimes Destiny) is changed to Wheel of Fate.

Shou points out that there’s a 1 in 3 chance that the Roulette would land on 2 or 5, which would destroy Jaden’s trap. In the dub, Chumley states that that odds are way in Jaden’s favor, and Syrus points out that he flunked math. Chumley denies that and says he got a 54. Uh….before I address the obvious, how does Syrus know Chumley flunked math? Do they teach math at this dueling school? But now the obvious, the odds are in Jaden’s favor. Maybe not way in Jaden’s favor, But he has twice as much of a chance as Titan. So I dunno why Syrus decided to say that. Did you flunk math, 4Kids?

They cut the scene of Titan talking about the darkness slightly short so that Jaden can be obnoxious some more. Shame, because I liked the camera effects they had going there.

Anyway, the obnoxious Jaden stuff was to interrupt the Dark Duelist to tell him that he’s not afraid of the dark. In fact, he got blackout curtains for the dorms so he could sleep and he loves the dark.

Judai just says that this situation doesn’t seem right. In order to start a Shadow Game, you need a Millennium Item. Judai asks if he has one, and Titan presents the Millennium Puzzle.

Chumley: “This is totally anti-licious”…..ugh.

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In terms of changes, this episode wasn’t all that bad. In fact, many of my notes probably border on nitpicky. I just really get irritated with Jaden’s little ‘tude. Judai seems to get better and better to watch but Jaden just gets worse.

Well, as you can guess, this is our first two-part episode of GX. Next time, we continue the Shadow Game and Winged Kuriboh may turn out to be Judai’s trump card again.

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Yu-Gi-Oh! Episode 14: Pitch Dark Duel! Castle of Concealing Darkness | Sub/Dub Comparison

Plot: Mai has been targeted by one of the tournament’s Player Killers, a duelist specifically hired by Pegasus to weed out duelists that are still left behind. He implements the power of shadows and darkness to frighten his opponents and psych them out during the duel. After losing all eight of her star chips, Yugi steps up and challenges the Player Killer to win them back.

——————————————–

After the commercial break, 4Kids reedits and dubs a new conversation before Panik and Yugi start their duel. It adds nothing to the story, so I don’t know why they did that.

Name Change: 4Kids named PaniK (yes, apparently, the K needs to be capitalized.) He had no name beyond Player Killer (of darkness) in the original. That is why he has PK on his jacket. But I guess 4Kids didn’t want to say “kill” so they renamed him PaniK….To be honest, though, that’s a pretty intimidating name, just a silly way to write it.

In the original, PK refuses the bet Yugi offers because six star chips won’t be enough to win back Mai’s eight (Why DID Mai bet eight star chips anyway? She’d only have to bet two in order to get the ten she needs to gain entry into the castle. Can the Player Killers really just straight up force you to bet everything? Also, how is she a straggler who needs to be targeted for elimination anyway? She was like one duel away from getting in. For that matter, if duelists likely get kicked off the island when time is up and they don’t have the proper amount of star chips anyway, aren’t these PKers moot?)

So PK insinuates that if Yugi loses he’ll either kill him or burn him alive along with taking his star chips. In the dub, PaniK says that the bet is fine with 6 to 8 chips, because he doesn’t care. However, he kinda insinuates that he’ll burn him with the flamethrowers if he loses….It’s pretty unclear.

In the original, Mai is surprised that those flamethrowers were in the dueling arena. In the dub, she says PaniK used them on her too. Weird, you’d think 4Kids wouldn’t purposely create that kind of situation. Also, if you knew those were in there, a warning to Yugi would’ve been nice.

Wait, if Yugi’s Winged Dragon attacked and couldn’t defeat any of the monsters, why didn’t the Winged Dragon die or Yugi take any damage to his life points? Did he aim his attack on the arena?

Yugi missed a way that he could figure out the attack power of PK’s opposing monsters. When his Winged Dragon was out in attack mode, he got attacked and Yugi lost 394 LP. That means that one of those monsters has at least 1794 attack points since the Winged Dragon has 1400 attack points. If he played a stronger monster, he could keep learning the attack points value. It’s risky, but it would work and would likely be worth it.

In the original, Mai believes Yugi’s confidence is real after Yugi taunts PK. In the dub, she says he’s making amateur mistakes by telling PaniK what his strategy is (Even though they always do that, every duel ever) because he’s panicking.

In the original, Mai explains that Yugi’s changed up his strategy. If he can’t see in the darkness, he’ll use his voice to penetrate it instead. In the dub, Mai just explains again that Yugi is panicking and PaniK is too skilled for Yugi.

Hm, 4Kids left the WARNING on the screen after the Reaper’s attack. Curious…

Originally, Yugi does show PK the Swords of Revealing Light card, but he sets his card face down without insinuating that it is the Swords. In the dub, Yugi insinuates that the face down card is the Swords, which is why Mai keeps berating him for making mistakes.

In the original, they don’t imply any powerful card of PK’s at the end of the episode. 4Kids threw that in as a teaser, but this is reflected in the next episode preview that always gets removed so it’s not that bad.

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I don’t like this couple of episodes at all. It is, by far, the most nonsensical duel in Duelist Kingdom. Though it doesn’t really start grating on me until the next episode.

Next episode, the duel with PaniK concludes.

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Cardcaptor Sakura/Cardcaptors (Nelvana) Episode 14: Sakura, Toya and Cinderella | Sub/Dub Comparison

Card (s) of the Day: Mist – A card that creates an odd green mist that destroys anything that it touches. Its weakness seems to be Shadow as it can contain Mist and keep it from spreading and causing harm.

Plot: Toya’s school is holding a fair, and he’s set to be in the play of Cinderella. As Cinderella. The play is actually gender-swapped, meaning the boys play all the girl parts and vice versa. A girl named Yoko, who has a crush on Toya, gets the part of the prince. However, the Clow card, Mist, appears and puts Toya and Yoko in danger. Sakura has to stop Mist before they’re hurt or worse.

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Title Change: Sakura, Toya and Cinderella is changed to Play Misty for Tori, which makes sense, but also doesn’t?

Sakura’s ticket is painted over in English and the details are changed. The Seijou High School Fair is changed to the Reedington High Culture Fest. The dub gets the date right, but the original doesn’t state that it’s the 24^th annual fair.

Subbed:

Dubbed:

Also, I have no clue why they erased everything but one of the x parts of one of the kanjis.

Hey guys, guess what? Yukito was cut out some more! As she looks at the ticket, Sakura flashes back to Yukito giving it to her. They talk about how Toya’s been staying late at school the past few days to prepare for it, and say he might be worried about the play. Yukito hands her the ticket, says it’s good for both her and a friend and that the ticket also allows her to eat at any of the booths. All of this was removed. And because we have an overlaid transition to get us back to where the dub starts, they do some REALLY sloppy editing that makes it seem like the footage got somewhat eaten in a VCR.

Tomoyo originally gets in a good close-up of Sakura because she looked so lovely as she was lost in thought in her flashback. Sakura then nervously laughs with a somewhat cartoony face. In the dub, this is changed to just her freaking Sakura out because she brought the camera in case a Clow card showed up – something she really shouldn’t be surprised at anymore considering that thing is almost always glued to her hand. Also, the editor must just be drunk today because they cut out Sakura’s nervous laugh and cartoony face, but it’s shown for a brief second again making the footage look like it was messed with.

The other student asks Toya if he can mend the shoes, and Toya says he can do it with the other guy’s guts (??) In the dub, the guy asks Tori if he needs the shoes, and Tori says he has his own.

After that, the girls rush over and clamor at Toya for being good at sewing and they say he’d be a good husband. The editor strikes again because they cut out the shot of the girls clamoring for no reason I can fathom, causing a jump in the footage and a whiplashing dialogue shift. The dialogue is changed to them basically mocking him for ‘losing a bet’ and taking an embarrassing role in the play.

Yukito’s stand is specifically a candy shop, not just a generic food store.

The food choices are cold-candy water and ramune soda in the original. They’re lemon soda and desserts in the dub.

Sakura looks at Yukito as he walks away and says softly ‘Yukito-san’. This is removed.

God, the editor is having a rough day. Sakura sees Syaoran, and he stares hard at the three of them. Sakura freaks out slightly, and we cut to Syaoran with intense flames in his eyes. Yukito asks if he’d like another, and Syaoran shyly nods ‘yes.’ Sakura and Tomoyo see a mess of bottles and plates indicating that Syaoran has been there for quite some time. We get more glaring and Syaoran jumps towards the girls dramatically. All of this is edited it out because it’s more poking at Syaoran’s crush on Yukito, but it, like the other scenes, was edited with a second of footage from the clip left behind making it glaringly obvious that something was removed there. In addition, Julian doesn’t ask Lee if he wants another, he just greets him and Syaoran lunges at the girls.

Toya’s friends are baffled by Toya’s work ethic and strength as he doesn’t believe the trunk that they’re lugging around is heavy. They ask if he’s a robot or a gorilla and Toya stops to think. In the dub, they just say they need help moving it.

The girls are watching the guys carrying the trunk and they gush over Toya some more. They talk about how he’s on the soccer team, good at cooking and sewing etc. and they ask Yoko, the red-haired girl from earlier, if she likes Toya too. She asks why they’d ask her such a thing, and they say she’d make a cute match for him seeing as how she’s the head of the drama club and is good at taking care of people. She rolls her eyes and walks off. In the dub, oh wait a sec:

Name Change: Yoko is changed to Vicki.

As I was saying, in the dub, the girls are basically complete bitches. They whine about how the boys better not ask them to help move the trunk and how they better get moving to get to the stage with the trunk on time. They then ask Vicki if she memorized all her lines, and she says she memorized most of them. The girls taunt about how she’ll forget her lines and make a fool out of herself if she doesn’t ensure that she memorizes all of the lines. Vicki then walks off to study her lines some more. What is with older English dubs and making girls snobby divas? 4Kids did the same thing. Also, why are they removing a heterosexual same-age crush from the series too? There are no “content” excuses for that. Do they just want to remove most romance aspects now?

Even more of these hints of a crush are removed because, after Yoko leaves, the girls assert that Yoko probably does like Toya, but they understand why she’s so avoidant of the matter because it’s supposedly one of the ‘seven mysteries’ of their school as to why Toya and Yukito don’t have girlfriends and shoot down every girl who asks them. Gee, two of the hottest guys in school who spend practically all of their time together and seem to show no interest whatsoever in the opposite sex sure is a mystery. I mean, it’s not right to make assumptions but really, come on. I refuse to believe no one at their school ever suggested this possibility. This entire scene is removed. At least they didn’t make the edit sloppy this time, though.

Syaoran responds to Sakura liking the stuffed pink bunny by asking her why she would like such childish things, and she responds that it’s because it’s still cute. In the dub, Lee tells Sakura that she has one just like that at home, and Sakura says she likes it anyway. How exactly does Lee know what stuffed animals Sakura has at home? He’s never been in her room has he?

The fee to do the challenge for the toy is actually 100 yen, roughly a dollar. But since 100 yen is a coin, they change it to a quarter. By the way, really, the challenge for getting one of various SMALL CUTESY STUFFED ANIMALS is to dribble past five players on the school’s basketball team? This is either a booth specifically designed for guys to impress their girlfriends and win them a prize or this is the suckiest booth ever. I’m not saying a girl couldn’t do it or wouldn’t want to, I’m quite certain there are some girls in the school who would, but I doubt the number would be big enough to warrant a booth. I also doubt the number of teenage boys who would do the challenge would want a pink bunny.

In response to Yukito giving Sakura the bunny, Syaoran grumbles a bit. The grumbling’s removed.

I’m actually surprised they left the following scene where it’s shown that Yukito also wins toys for Tomoyo and Syaoran.

Syaoran shyly asks Yukito if he’s also going to be in the play. Yukito says yes and that his role is a can of mackerel. The kids all try to process this weird information, but Yukito just smiles. All of this is removed and the editor mucked up the cut again. Dude, even when I did AMVs in Windows Movie Maker I was still able to do fairly clean cuts almost all the time. You have professional editing equipment, what is happening?

Also, I can understand removing the part where Yukito and Syaoran talk, at least by Nelvana’s stupid standards, but why the rest of it? There’s so much hacked away today that it’s one of those episodes that I really fear will be extended for time with something or other.

Since all of that is removed, the rest of the scene is changed. Sakura originally says that it sounds like a yummy role, and Yukito agrees because canned mackerel is really good. In the dub, Sakura continues on the previous discussion about Tori being in the play and says that whatever role he plays he’s sure to be great at it. Julian responds that he’s sure it’s a performance that they’ll never forget.

Syaoran asks why canned mackerel would be in a play about Cinderella. In the dub, Lee says Tori’s probably going to play one of the rats.

Upon seeing Toya as Cinderella, Sakura falls out her seat and the girls in the audience clamor over Toya. When Sakura pulls herself together, Tomoyo points out that Toya’s really popular. In the dub, all of this up until Sakura pulls herself up in her chair is removed, and since the scene with the girls was removed, Madison says that Julian was right about this being a performance they’ll never forget.

I’m starting to wonder why this entire episode wasn’t axed. I mean, it’s butchered enough as it is, you can tell that just from this comparison, and we’re just barely past the commercial break so there’s probably plenty more to go. Now we have crossdressing. Look at all the stuff that has been cut either for stupid reasons, pointless reasons or no reason at all in this one episode. Now take into consideration that Toya’s crossdressing and it’s left alone. It’s not just him either, the other female roles are being filled by guys from his class too, and the prince is played by a girl because it’s a gender-swapped play. I don’t get their logic at all. I’m glad they’re leaving it, but I don’t get their nonsensical rules.

ALSO, this scene directly contradicts the girls’ words from earlier about feeling bad for Tori because he ‘lost a bet’ and I guess had to take that part because of it. It’s a gender-swapped play, meaning other boys are dressed in feminine clothing too. If anything, Tori had the best part in the play because he gets a love scene with an attractive girl.

They remove a shot of the two boys playing the evil stepsisters getting in each others faces about who’s going to marry the prince.

To add more time, they add in a shot of Sakura making an awkward face from earlier.

The play’s actually been fairly loyal, dialogue wise, but before the stepsisters and stepmother leave, the evil stepmother tells Cinderella to be jealous, and the stepsisters tell Cinderella to make ramen for them before they come home from the ball. No demands for Cinderella to be jealous are made, and the stepsisters tell Cinderella to make them a late night snack for when they come home.

In response to Toya’s less-than-enthusiastic acting about wanting to go to the ball, Syaoran says “I don’t think he wants to go to the ball at all.” In the dub, it’s kept the same, but Lee’s delivery of “I don’t think he wants to go.” is almost as bad as the way Tori’s VA is purposely trying to act right now.

Okay, this is just getting ridiculous now. I’m actually getting a little angry. Yukito comes on stage and, again, all of the girls clamor. Tomoyo points out that Yukito is also very popular. Sakura agrees, claiming it’s because he’s so wonderful. Syaoran nods in agreement then realizes what he did and grumbles. Yukito’s role is….odd…to say the least. You remember how he said he’d be playing a can of mackerel? He wasn’t lying. He is playing some wizard or something that hands Cinderella an invitation to the ball. He has a can of mackerel on his head and states that the can of mackerel is where he gained his powers. Sakura and Syaoran both fall over this time, and Tomoyo states they must’ve used that to raise awareness over wasting things. It’s a weird yet funny scene. All of it is removed. Also, no, it is never once explained what this is actually about, though that’s the joke.

Something had to have been done outside of one funny face shot insertion to make this episode run longer. There is just too much removed. Maybe they jam packed a lot of commercials.

Another shot of a goofy face of Sakura’s is removed.

Sakura and Syaoran both get a goofy face and say this is a weird play. They realize they said the same thing and both grumble. This is removed too.

More of the dance is removed for no reason.

Another mention of the ramen for dinner is omitted.

In addition, since Yukito’s part was completely cut, we get another funny line gone since Toya originally says ‘but the can of mackerel said I had to be home by midnight.’ In the dub, it’s the obvious Fairy Godmother.

Tomoyo only missed the capture, she never intended on recording the play nor did she ever try. The dub claims that she ran out of film before the play started and that’s why she also missed the capture.

When Yukito shows up, Syaoran bows and says he did a great job as the can of mackerel. Yukito thanks him. This is removed, but they couldn’t avoid showing Syaoran’s embarrassed face in the next shot as Sakura asks where Toya is.

Yoko brings Toya up to the roof and confesses her feelings to him. However, he gently declines. She asks if he likes someone else and he nods. She says she figured that was the case and wipes some tears away telling him to not worry about her and apologizes for crying. She then points out that the bonfire dance is starting soon and asks him for a favor – one dance. He agrees.

In the dub, Vicki just says thanks to Tori and says she owes him big time. She says it’s a shame that the play was ruined, he nods in agreement and she says there’s always next year. Then she asks to dance with him. The shot of her wiping away tears is also removed. I have no idea anymore. I guess all love is bad in Nelvana’s eyes. Maybe it was changed because Toya kinda-ish implies that he likes Yukito in the end, but it’s not that much. He just said he likes someone else. It’s only because I know about what happens later on that I know this is a poke at him liking Yukito. Plus, they could’ve left in the stuff about Yoko’s crush without implying that he has a thing for Yukito or even anyone else period. He could have just said he doesn’t feel the same way and let her down gently.

If you were only watching the dub, you’d be totally confused as to what this character’s purpose in the episode was. She didn’t study her lines much then got saved by Toya. The end.

Toya originally says as he walks away, since it was time to change partners, that he never promised anyone else to a dance. Yoko then says he acts a little too cool. In the dub, Tori says he wants to talk to his sister for a bit and Vicki says she’ll wait for him then.

Also, a music note, in the original, the song playing during the bonfire dance…..is “Do Your Ears Hang Low?”…………………………………..Wh….why? I just….why? Why would that song be playing at a high school bonfire dance? Oh yeah, when I want to have a nice dance with someone I like, the first sweet romantic hit I think of is ♪ Do you ears hang low? Do they wobble to and fro? Can you tie ’em in a knot? Can you tie ’em in a bow?♪

It’s not even the fact that it’s not a romantic song, because it doesn’t have to be for a bonfire dance. It’s the fact that it’s a children’s song, one most kids don’t dance to, being played on something like an organ grinder. In the dub it’s just generic BG music, which, in this one instance, is actually better.

Yet they leave in the final scene with Yukito and Sakura dancing and even the closeup shot of Syaoran’s emotionally crushed face, but they remove the later scene of him making an equally crushed face in the background as Tomoyo films.

Also, hey Madison, I thought your camera ‘ran out of film.’

Leave it to Kero-Chan!/Kero’s Corner: They actually get everything right, but the reason Tori’s bag has no school emblem is because it’s not given by the school, and they never mention that Julian’s bag is from his grandparents.

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Overall, this episode is okay. The weird play was quite funny, but the Clow card and capture were ultimately boring. The dub was awful, and they made what seems to be way more cuts than usual. The only scene that was mostly left alone was the capture scene.

Next time, Kero and Sakura have a fight and he runs away from home.

…..Previous Episode

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Space-Time Detective Genshi-Kun/Flint the Time Detective Episode 22 (21 for the Dub) Clash! Genshi vs. Ototan Sub/Dub Comparison

Plot: TP Lady hatches a new plan to seduce Ototan and steal all of the Space-Time Monsters.

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Title Change: Clash! Genshi vs. Ototan is changed to Rocky in Love.

They originally don’t explain why Moaiwa is outside. In the dub, Sarah asks Mowah to wait outside because he’s so big he’d get in the way of their cleaning.

Putera tells Dr. Yamato that his lazy attitude towards cleaning is the reason why he can’t get a bride. In the dub, he chastises Dr. Goodman for how dirty the place is.

The original doesn’t have any mention of Dyna and Mite going surfing.

They reverse and replay TP Lady looking through her binoculars.

The sign in the garbage pile that Oto-tan falls into originally said “Garbage Disposal.” In the dub, it’s wiped free of text.

Subbed:

Dubbed:

Okay, I get they’re in the future so I won’t question why they have a robot garbage man……but what are these?

Does garbage get turned into weird giant spheres in the future?

So not only are the Space-Time Monsters not a secret, but Ototan also talks with Ms. Aino like it’s not weird he’s a stone axe?

…Okay.

Originally, Ms. Aino says she was at the dump because she likes to go to there to look at the mountains of trash to relieve stress. In the dub, she says she’s taking her class on a trip there and wanted to make sure it was safe. Points to the dub here because the original’s explanation is just stupid.

I get the logic with Tokio and Wing flying higher to see more, but also Ototan’s a small stone axe. You’ll never be able to see him if you go that high.

With all the Space-Time Monsters now roaming freely around town, it truly is safe to say that they don’t care about keeping them secret.

The sign on the coffee shop says “Coffee Shop” in the original. In the dub, it says “Etta’s Coffee House.” Additionally, text is removed from the tiny sign below that one, but the image quality is too poor for me to read it.

Subbed:

Dubbed:

Wait a minute, so hardly anyone bats an eye at the Space-Time Monsters traipsing around town, but everyone stares at and is confused by Ototan being a living stone axe? This world makes no sense.

*sigh* I hate that this episode is making me imagine the physical logistics of a human having an intimate relationship with a stone axe…..I mean, I get that he’s a human too, he’s just stuck in the form of a stone axe, but still. Eugh.

Ototan mentions that they’re in Tama City. He doesn’t mention they’re location in the dub.

Ototan asks Ms. Aino how the ride is (he’s currently carrying her on his head….) In the dub, they just talk about where they’re going. I understand this change because uh…..yeah asking your love interest how the ride you’re giving them is….Hmm….

Genshi asks why they’re hiding, and Tokio responds that it would be bad to interrupt them. Sora then asks when Ototan and Ms. Aino got so close. In the dub, Flint asks where they’re going, and Tony says he doesn’t know. Sora then says they should follow them but make sure they stay hidden….I know, small potatoes. But this episode’s kinda uneventful change-wise so far.

They repeat a short shot of Tony talking after they cut to Dr. Goodman.

Tokio originally points out that she’s rubbing his “shoulders” while Yamato takes notes on his romantic technique. In the dub, Tony says he didn’t know Ms. Iknow was so strong, and Goodman says she’s full of surprises.

Huh, I honestly didn’t think they’d ever address this, but they actually bring up Genshi’s mom here…..and it has a very unsatisfying resolution. Ototan just doesn’t remember who she was. He explains that turning into a stone axe gave him a bit of memory loss, which is very confusing. He’s never shown to have any memory loss before now, and he remembers everything with Genshi just fine. Genshi also doesn’t remember ever having a mom, so I assume she’s either missing or dead. All this is kept in the dub.

Apparently, in the dub, Ms. Iknow’s first name is Emma. I don’t know if that has any significance.

In the original, Genshi asks if he can eat ‘marriage,’ which reminds me so much of Goku with Chichi in Dragon Ball. In the dub, he just asks if anyone can tell him what’s happening.

After Dyna and Mite shake the net and punch it in the cat mech, the dub repeats them spinning the group over their head for some reason.

Ototan tells Ms. Aino that they’ve only just met, and proposing marriage is going way too fast. However, he still wants to be friends with her. In the dub, Rocky tells her “A man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do.” She tells him that, if he leaves now, it’s over, and he says he’s sorry she feels that way.

Wait….so this is our payoff for Talun getting bummed in the other episode about being a coward? She just…..randomly goes super in an episode that barely involves her?….Okay.

Name Plate removed:

Subbed:

Dubbed:

Name Change: Super Talun is changed to Talen Master.

Eugh, Super Honey-Honey looks way too weird with its barely-changed face….

Name Plate removed:

Subbed:

Dubbed:

Name Change: Super Honey-Honey is changed to Jitterbug Master.

Like usual, their attacks have no names in the original. In the dub, Jitterbug has a Jitterbug Power Whirl, and Talen has…..*sigh* “Accessory power”……You see…..she throws off her beads and traps….her enemies………..*deep sigh*

Oh and Honey-Honey’s dancing beam? Jitterbug just says “Jitterbug” when he does it. *shrug* I get that the Jitterbug is a dance, but considering it’s also his dub name it just seems awkward.

Tokio specifies that the food falling on them is takoyaki. In the dub, he just says it’s a fast food attack.

Ototan originally points out that, since he’s a rock, being underwater doesn’t affect him….I guess he means….he doesn’t have to breathe? In the dub, Rocky just says it doesn’t matter how much Flint squirms, he’s not getting away.

In the original, Genshi says “Ototan, it hurts!” In the dub, he talks way too much for someone currently drowning and on his last breath. He explains to Rocky that he’s under the control of Petra’s stamp and he has to break free of it.

They inserted an old shot of Rocky using Fighting Spirit and Flint swinging him. I dunno why. He had already used it before they started running.

They reverse and replay Flint and Rocky’s hug to when he was holding up Rocky to insert a line about them achieving anything together even if Rocky married Ms. Iknow.

Again, reversed and replayed Tony, Sarah and Pterry talking.

There’s no mention of a field trip in the original.

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This episode was fine. Kinda felt like they just threw some things together, though. Like they mention Genshi’s mom, but it goes nowhere. They show Talun and Honey-Honey transforming, but there’s little fanfare to it, especially considering they made a big to-do about Talun running away before and feeling bad about it. Ototan gets mind-controlled, which is a cool concept, but there’s not much tension there because of course he’ll break free of it. Other Space-Time Monsters have broken free for much less than something like their own children.

TP Lady’s plan had legs, but it was poorly executed. Seducing Ototan and infiltrating Genshi and the group to steal the Space-Time Monsters could have worked if she was in it for the long game instead of just romancing him for an hour, assuming literally everyone on the good side would follow them and then throwing a net on them….

There wasn’t even a whole lot for me to note for changes. Much of the dub changes or story notes were extremely benign, and there was no historical figure to talk about this episode.

It has a very slow first half, but the second half has enough in it to keep your attention.

Next time, we meet the Space-Time Monster, Unita and learn about the Space-Time Monsters as they travel to the Land of Time.

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Space-Time Detective Genshi-Kun/Flint the Time Detective Episode 21 (20 for the Dub) Entering the Olympics with Musclun?! Sub/Dub Comparison

Plot: The group heads to ancient Greece to find Musclun – a Space-Time Monster that can give people massive muscles, super strength and super speed. When they arrive, they find that an aspiring Olympic athlete, Damon, is using Musclun’s powers to cheat in order to win races at the Olympics.

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Title Change: Entering the Olympics with Musclun?! is changed to Muscles.

Ms. Aino tells the girls to run three more laps and the boys to run five more. In the dub, she tells everyone to do five more laps.

Ms. Aino says Genshi’s not easy to pick on (She’s teaching PE right now and is trying to punish him by making him work more, but Genshi being Genshi, he enjoys it.) In the dub, she says “Hm, he must’ve eaten his oatmeal.”

Sora tells Tokio he’s just awful (at running). Sarah cheers Tony on.

Uhm….what the hell? Sora tells Tokio that Ms. Aino has a point and says it’s weird that he’s so bad at running when he puts so much effort into soccer and baseball. Tokio responds by saying games are fun, but running is monotonous and boring. In the dub, Sarah basically just agrees that he’s a bad athlete in general and points out that he needs to be in great shape in order to be a Time Detective. She is literally sitting right next to two other kids who are listening intently to this conversation. Are they not trying to hide what they do at all? I’m so confused. Also, Tokio’s lines are changed to saying there’s more to life than running and he finds it boring.

Ms. Aino tells Tokio that running is the basis of all sports, and if he doesn’t learn the basics, he’ll never build a good foundation. In the dub, she says he has to work it, work it, work it and then laments on how lazy the youth of today is.

When Ms. Aino tells them to run 20 more laps, Tokio yells “Why?!” In the dub, he and the other kids yell “Yes, Ms. Iknow!” It’s just weird because Tokio’s facial expression doesn’t match what he’s saying in the dub.

Ms. Aino thinks to herself, “If you want to blame anyone, blame Genshi.” Ms. Iknow thinks, “Hehehe, I love watching them sweat.” Please phrase that in a less creepy manner.

So now Putera is coming to school out in the open and is loudly talking about Space-Time Monster stuff. Okay, I guess they really don’t keep it a secret.

The original has them learning about Musclun after they’ve already arrived in 4^th century Greece. In the dub, they learn about it on the Time Cycle then splice in old animation of them time traveling before they get to ancient Greece. I actually prefer the dub because it seems weird that they’d leave before learning anything of the Space-Time Monster.

Name Change: Musclun is changed to Muscles.

With the spliced in animation we get some extra lines, including Rocky saying ancient Greece has some great food like moussaka, spanakoita and baklava, none of which existed in 4^th century Greece. Also, why exactly does Rocky, the caveman, know so much about Greek food?

The original says they’re in 4^th century Greece, which does line up with when the original Olympic games were held in Olympia (8^th century BC to 4^th century AD.) The dub claims this is 4 BC, which…no. Even if they put “century” in there, it would be the wrong date. 4^th century Greece would indicate AD not BC.

Sora says they’d hold sports competitions instead of battling, which started the first Olympics. This is oddly phrased but technically correct a little kinda. In the dub, Sora says the Olympics started out as religious and athletic festivals that eventually evolved into the Olympic games that we know today, which is surprisingly more accurate and even included a mention of religion. Wow.

They reverse and replay a short bit of Tokio talking to Genshi about the games in order to give him more dialogue.

I find it hard to believe that Genshi has been living in the modern world and been going to school for so long at this point but he doesn’t know what sports are. They literally listed two sports earlier and indicated that Tokio was very active in both.

Tokio is impressed this guy can keep up with Genshi. In the dub, Tony says she thought Sarah ran fast, but these guys are way faster. Flint was running with you guys earlier and showed how fast he was. Sarah never seemed to be noticeably fast.

For some reason, they cut out the shot of the two when they’re shown jumping. I think, maybe, because you can see their underwear?

Also, this makes the dub only have two cutaway images, making the flow of the scene kinda wonky.

Split-second, but, again, they cut out a shot where you can see their underwear after they fall down.

So this guy is Damon – a name so vague it’s a bit of a pain to try and figure out if they even modeled this guy on anyone at all. There is a notable figure in Greek legends that supposedly existed around this time period, but he had nothing to do with the Olympics. He was one of the main figures in the story of Damon and Pythias. When Pythias was accused of conspiring against the tyrant, Dionysius, he was sentenced to death. However, he wanted one last chance to say goodbye to his friends and family.

He obviously wasn’t going to be allowed to leave without Dionysius having some leverage, so Damon offered to take his place in jail until Pythias returned. If he didn’t return within an agreed upon time, Damon would be executed in Pythias’ stead. Dionysius had no faith that Pythias would return, but Damon never gave up on his friend, and Pythias never gave up either. He returned as he said he would and saved Damon’s life. He was willing to accept his punishment, but Dionysius was so moved that he let them go. Some sources even claim he was so moved by their friendship and love that he asked to be their third friend, but they shot him down.

The balls on this guy. “Hey, I know I just nearly killed both of you for absolutely no reason, but can I be your pal?”

And, yes, Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas was based very heavily on this legend.

So….what is this, really? They just found a Greek figure from around the same time period and decided to make him an Olympic athlete? Why? There are many people that we know participated in the ancient Olympics. Why not use one of them? I feel like they kinda gave up on this show being even partially educational.

They repeat a bit of Sarah talking after Tony talks about Damon’s muscles.

Okay, what? Now they leave in a clear underwear shot of Flint? I’m so confused.

Name plate removed.

Subbed:

Dubbed:

Damon doesn’t know what training is while in the dub he says he’s trained before but it never works out. The dub makes more sense because you’re telling me an aspiring athlete in ancient Greece doesn’t know what training is?

I’m honestly surprised some of these training shots made it into the dub. There’s one shot where they’re holding weights while standing perched over lit candles so if they relax they’ll either get burned or they’ll get a candle straight up their ass. One kinda shocked me – they’re meant to hold weights with their arms held straight out to the sides, and they have knives tied to their upper arms so if they relax their arms they STAB THEMSELVES.

Kyoichiro says he’s taken in too much sunlight, which is why he’s weakening so quickly. In the dub, he says his outfit will never be the same and he was never meant to sweat.

Why would TP Lady tell Musclun to attack Genshi? It would just make him like ten times more powerful.

TP Lady says “She’ll be fine….I think?” When Musclun uses its powers on Sora. In the dub, she says “We’re in big trouble.”

It’s so weird that Damon’s transformation is painless and quick, but when Sora gets affected by it, it’s massively painful and takes forever.

Okay, so now we’re at the point in the next episode preview from last time that gave me pause. When Sora gets affected by Musclun….for some reason…..she just gets super tall. And while she’s transforming, Kyoichiro uses his magic cloak to dress her, because her clothes are starting to rip off…..and he dresses her……in a playboy bunny-esque maid-ish costume.

Why?

How?

What?

And

Ew.

I can’t watch this without thinking “Someone had a very specific fetish and wanted to act it out in this episode…..with a child….”

It doesn’t even make sense. Musclun’s ability does also make the target taller, just for the sake of aesthetics I presume, but it’s main ability is to give the target massive muscles, super strength and speed. Why does Sora get no new muscles? Why does she become a cast member of Attack on Titan? The absolute only reason I can imagine is that Musclun’s powers don’t fully affect girls because…I have no idea besides sexism. Writing-wise the only reason I can come up with circles back around to the fetish thing. Big muscles aren’t a part of that fantasy, I guess.

The other thing you have to keep in mind with this transformation is that Sora gets MUCH bigger than Damon did. Damon just looked like he was a six-foot-tall muscular adult when he was like five foot-ish without Musclun’s powers. When Sora transforms, Tokio only comes up to her thigh. She looks to be about 15 feet tall or more.

Oh and what’s the first thing that happens to her after she transforms and gets her bunny costume on? Musclun settles itself between her boobs. What’s the second thing? Kyoichiro gushes over how she looks.

What the actual fuck were they thinking with this development? This is extremely disturbing. And even more confusingly, what the actual fuck was Saban thinking when they approved dubbing this episode? They just clipped out two shots because Genshi and some dude were showing their undies, but a 12 year old having a lengthy transformation sequence into a giant wearing a mix between a playboy bunny outfit and a maid costume is A-okay?

I know we’re collectively more aware of these strange-ass fetishes now than we were back then, but even so, she’s very clearly being sexualized right now, and Saban is rolling with it. They even left in the stuff with Musclun on her chest and Kyoichiro being turned on by it.

What the hell? Just, god, what the hell?

Oh well, at least that’s the only grossly offensive thing in this episode.

Ammon asks where he even kept a costume like that………Wait….so it’s not fully magic….It’s a costume he had at the ready? He just magically dressed her in with his dressing-room cloak? That’s so much worse. WHY did he have a giant bunny maid costume?

OH MY GOD. They even have an imaginary shot where Sora turns back to normal and is trying to cover her naked body because, being normal size, the costume would no longer fit and would fall off of her……and SABAN KEPT THIS TOO! I don’t even want to really continue watching this episode. I feel so icky right now.

The dub does have her imply that she’s more thinking about not wanting to go through a transformation again, but the imagery clearly implies that she’s trying to cover herself. Just cut out the half-naked shot, show a static image of her now and have that explanation in dialogue. I am forever baffled by the decisions they keep making.

Speaking of which….blackface.

Yup, Warusclu is using blackface, complete with dreads and big lips.

This entire episode can go to hell. Just as deep into hell as you can get.

Why is it even being given blackface? Why does a muscles-based Space-Time Monster translate to blackface or even a black person? Just because it’s meant to resemble a dumbbell and….dumbbells are….black? At least in this point in time blackface was finally starting to be taken seriously. This is basically the same year the Jynx controversy in Pokemon started, causing them to change Jynx into a purple color forever. I don’t know why this never affected Flint the Time Detective. I know it’s not nearly as popular, but certainly they got many messages about it. Were they just not on the air long enough for them to bother?

*sigh* Anyway….

Name Change: Warusclu is changed to Muscles-con…Yes, it sounds awkward that way. They should have just called him Muscle-con.

Name plate removed.

Subbed:

Dubbed:

It makes absolutely no sense that powers a person got from a base stage Space-Time Monster made them able to easily defeat a Bad Transformation version of that same Space-Time Monster.

Pterry: *as Sarah’s beating up Muscles-con* “I guess this is why women were originally kept out of the Olympics!” Why would you say that? Why would they write that line? Yes, let’s turn a depressing note in the long, long, long history of sexism into a joke. Haha, women weren’t allowed to participate in the Olympics because they were 15 foot tall leviathans with super strength and the men were too scared of them or something.

Women weren’t only not allowed to participate in the Olympics, to the extent that athletes and trainers had to appear in the nude to prove they were men, they originally weren’t even able to spectate them. If they were caught spectating, there was a law that said they would be “cast down from Mount Typaeum into the river flowing below.” This was seemingly never carried out, but the law still existed.

Unmarried women were allowed to watch the events, but only because it acted as a means of finding them suitable husbands.

This doesn’t mean women never competed in the ancient Olympics or even that they never won any ancient Olympic games. They did a couple times, but they had to use loopholes. The loopholes came in the sport of horse racing. Basically, this wasn’t really a sport, per se. The credit for winning the events was always given to the people who owned and trained the horses, not the racers (who were usually slaves). However, women were never officially banned from the event because breeding and caring for horses was so costly and women just didn’t have a lot of money back then since they weren’t viewed as having the rights to large sums of money, land, etc.

In came Cyniska, who, being from a wealthy family and literally being a Spartan princess, allowed her the funds and means to breed and train her own horses and enter them into the races, which they won. She then tried again in the next Olympics and once again won.

However, sexism being sexism, even though she technically won the events, she wasn’t allowed into the stadium to watch the event or collect her prize. She was, however, allowed to have a series of bronze statues set in Zeus’ sanctuary with an engraving that read “I declare myself the only woman in all Hellas to have won this crown.” Which, yeah, is pretty cool, but I don’t really see it as the win it’s made out to be. She did train the horses and raised them, but she didn’t race them. She wasn’t even present at the event, so it just kinda makes the victory seem a little hollow. Not to mention that only women who happened to be super rich somehow could abuse this loophole anyway, which they did numerous times after Cyniska’s wins.

Cyniska is a testament to Spartan women, who were encouraged to participate in sports and other intense exercise, unlike other Greek women who were barred from practicing or learning about pretty much any activity involving a lot of physical excursion that wasn’t baby making…..which, while being a step in the right direction, was also a tiny bit sexist because the reason they supported women partaking in sports and exercise was because they believed it would help them produce the strongest male offspring….

But things weren’t all bad for women athletes because they did have their own version of the Olympics called the Heraean Games. Named after the goddess, Hera, queen of the Olympian gods and wife of Zeus, the Heraean Games were held every four years right after the Olympics. The prizes were quite similar to those given out at the Olympics – you get a crown of olive leaves and portraits and/or statues with engravings that would be placed in honor of Hera.

There were still some caveats here. The only events were a variety of races, and married women were still not allowed to compete. They were obviously allowed to watch this time, though.

What I’m trying to say is sexism is shit, and this episode is awful.

“But Twix,” someone, somewhere says in order to fill the role of being a strawman here, “Sora is kicking butt! That’s not sexist at all!” Yeah, she is kicking butt……while yelling and crying. Anything she’s doing to Warusclu isn’t because she’s actively trying to fight. She’s basically panic-fighting. He might as well be a wasp that she’s trying desperately to swat away from her.

Sora is noted as being more athletic than Tokio, at least in regards to regular exercise, I don’t know if she plays any sports, but that’s about it. I don’t even understand what we’re supposed to get from this in terms of a possibly feminist message, if one even exists (if that’s what Pterry was trying to convey with that comment) because she’s not using her own skills and athleticism to win this fight – she’s using Musclun’s power boost.

As Sora is grappling with Warusclu, Kyoichiro takes pictures of her….including one of her ass. Try to convince me this has nothing to do with fetishism….Also, again, Saban left the butt shot in. Screw you, Saban. What the hell are you doing?

Sora wins the fight by throwing Warusclu then cries because she’s sick of fighting and begs Genshi to help her…..

Damon is chasing after Warusclu only deciding to take it as a race after Genshi suggests it. In the dub, he instantly decides to race him.

Genshi points out that their race is the Olympics. He tells Damon that instead of fighting Warusclu, they should do sports. In the dub, Damon asks Flint if he thinks they can catch him, and he says he doesn’t know.

Flint: “Alright, it’s a race! Last one to the Parthenon is a rotten egg!” How the shit does Flint know what the Parthenon is when he thought the Olympics were a food ten minutes ago? In the original, he just called it a building.

Damon says “A race to the Parthenon?! Impossible!” In the dub, he says “Can’t….lose!”

Sora’s voice when she’s enlarged is noticeably deeper than when she’s normal sized. Before, the dub kept her regular voice but added an echo effect when she was larger. At this point in the episode, they stopped using it for some reason.

It’s very weird that they’re having Sora run in slow motion just because she’s giant.

TP Lady asks what Warusclu is doing competing in this race. In the dub, she says it will be easier to defeat them when they’re worn out from this race.

In the original, Tokio points out that TP Lady is cheating, and she says she doesn’t care what’s fair or what she has to do as long as she wins. Damon then says “You can’t do that!” before realizing he was doing the exact same thing by trying to use Musclun’s powers to win at the Olympics. They try to convey this in the dub, but, man, is it clunky. Tony says “Don’t worry, I can save him….” And Petra responds, “Hey I’m sorry to burst your bubble, but some of us lose and some of us win!” Then Damon chimes in with “Winning is everything!” before his inner monologue cuts in with his realization that he’s as bad as her. Why cut out the stuff about cheating? And why change his line to something so awkward? Why would he suddenly yell that winning is everything (in an assured tone, not a questioning one) when his enemy just taunted them saying that same thing?

The hammer robot thing TP Lady has isn’t given an introduction in the original. In the dub, Dyna says “From Japan, it’s Louie and his flying hammers!”

As a result of the lack of focus on cheating in the dub, the end message is kinda messed up. In the original, Damon picking up Musclun so they can cross the finish line together is them winning without cheating. In the dub, Damon picks up Muscles so they can win the race together – which defeats the purpose of learning that winning isn’t everything.

So…..where the hell IS everyone? They’re in ancient Greece right before the Olympics, supposedly, and yet the only person from this era that I’ve seen this entire episode is Damon. There aren’t even any background extras.

I would think that Ms. Aino would get fired for making her students run non-stop for hours while she’s away. I’d also think some of those kids would say “fuck it” and quit. It’s literally sunset right now. They should be going home and reporting Ms. Aino to her superiors.

————————————

*sigh* So before I go off on my obvious “This episode was awful” spiel, I will go over some things I liked.

I liked that Sora got one legitimate instance of helping fight without being objectified or crying.

I liked the message in the original that cheating is not the way to come out on top. No matter how good winning seems, it will never feel genuine unless you do it on your own merits.

I liked the IDEA of going back to ancient Greece and having a storyline around an Olympic athlete who is struggling to achieve such a goal without cheating.

I like that the episode has a bit of a pro-exercise message, even if it didn’t really commit.

That’s about it.

Now for my spiel.

*deep breath*

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This episode was awful. Quite frankly, I feel about as exhausted with it as Tokio and Kyoichiro did from exercising so much. I knew this episode would be bad, but not quite this bad. They barely teach you anything about the Olympics or ancient Greece. They don’t even focus on an actual historical figure from ancient Greece or the Olympics. They pretty much only lifted the name of a person in a Greek legend and went with it. They didn’t talk about the legend associated with that person at all either.

It really feels like this entire episode was used as an excuse to get Sora into that form and outfit. If so, whoever made that decision, please go seek help and then go to hell.

And just throwing blackface in there so flippantly, just…why?

Next time, Ms. Aino/TP Lady seduces Ototan and turns him against Genshi.

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An Absurdly Deep Dive Into the History of 4Kids | Table of Contents

Part 1 – 4Kids as a 4Baby (1970-1997)

Part 2 – Pokemon, I License You! (1998-1999)

Part 3 – 4Kids 2000 (2000)

Part 4 – Entering Unown Territory (2001)

Part 5 – I Summon Yu-Gi-Oh! In Attack Mode! (2001 cont.)

Part 6 – 4Kids 4Ever (2002)

Part 7 – A Fox in a Box and a 4Kids with a Block (2002 cont.)

Part 8 – Miramax Killed the Movie Theater Star (2003)

Part 9 – Be Careful What You Wish For (2004)

Part 10 – One Piece in Pieces (2004 cont.)

Part 11 – Playing Their Cards Wrong (2004 cont.)

Part 12 – Out of the Box (2005)

Part 13 – Pikachu’s Goodbye (2005 cont.)

Part 14 – (The Time Has Come) (2006)

Part 15 – The Chaotic Nature of Rumors (2005/2006 cont.)

Part 16 – Yu-Gi-Oh No! (2005/2006 cont.)

Part 17 – 4Kids TV 2: The Kidsening (2007)

Part 18 – 4Kids is No Longer Foxy (2008)

Part 19 – 4Kids’ Pre-Death Dead Period (2009-2010)

Part 20 – Get Your Game Revved Up! (2011)

Part 21 – It’s Time to S-S-S-S-S-S-S-S-SUE! (2011-2012)

Part 22 – Time 4 Change (2012-2017 | Closure)

Part 23 – Where in the World is Kahnmen Sandiego? (2012-Present)

Part 24 – Everything Changes (Conclusion)

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An Absurdly Deep Dive into the History of 4Kids | Part 24: Everything Changes (Conclusion)

So, class, what have we learned over the past 24 blog posts and 100 pages besides the fact that I desperately need a life?

All joking aside, this wasn’t really a passion project or anything, more of a long-standing curiosity that I wanted to explore, thought would just take a few days to research and write, not two months (even as all the parts were sitting in my scheduled posts queue for weeks after finishing the entire thing, I still went back and edited them many times), and wound up finding so many rabbit holes that I think I literally am a rabbit now.

However, I am very glad that I decided to write this up because it helped me understand a lot about why 4Kids was the way it was, a lot of their business practices, what was happening behind the scenes, why they truly died, and I even got to do some sleuthing and maybe clear up some rumors. Maybe you even learned something and had some fun. I hope so.

I think a big takeaway here, though, is that 4Kids, at the end of the day, wasn’t this big boogeyman of anime, when you get down to it. They were mostly just….grossly incompetent. I know it seems weird to say that of such a big name as 4Kids, but, they pretty much were. They propped up their business on a few big titles with no plan as to what they would do should those titles be taken away, they lucked out with a few huge licenses, especially Pokemon at the start, they greatly overestimated their skills and knowledge in the industry, and then whined that Japan didn’t consistently come up with more merchandisable cash cows for them to license on a regular basis as if that was in their control.

They disrespected their audience, which earned them ire, they disrespected anime and manga as a whole, which earned them ire, they disrespected their peers in the anime (and manga) industry, which earned them ire, they didn’t bother to do proper research on their own licenses before obtaining them or research into Japan and how their economy and content works despite working with their properties for years, which earned them ire, and they constantly wanted a pat on the back for doing so much for anime while also desperately not wanting their audience to know what they were consuming was anime….which earned them ire.

Even their production of merchandise and marketing, two things you’d think a licensing company that has existed for over four decades and has had several massive properties under its belt would be able to do quite well consistently, wasn’t all that good at times. From not properly advertising certain shows to supposedly not getting a toy deal for Mew Mew Power to their ridiculously spotty and frustrating release schedule for DVD and VHS releases, especially in regards to ‘uncut’ releases, to making a deal with Miramax and Harvey Weinstein for the Pokemon movies to the disaster that was Toonzaki. It’s amazing how they were both very good at marketing and advertising while also making some incredibly baffling and poor business decisions.

Some things were out of their control, of course, especially the financial crisis and the overall death of Saturday morning cartoon blocks, but many aspects of their downfall were their own doing. If you want to look at the Yu-Gi-Oh! lawsuit from a different perspective, the fact that they said they’d do anything to keep the Yu-Gi-Oh! license, including go bankrupt, was a little on the insane side. I get that Yu-Gi-Oh! was their top earner and losing the license would have been the death of them anyway, but it seems very immature and backwards to basically stamp their feet and say they’d rather kill themselves than let someone else do it. Even if they did rightfully win the lawsuit in the end, they didn’t get anything substantial from it, and they had to have known that.

I won’t really hold Chaotic’s situation against 4Kids because that was also largely out of their hands. It was just a financial gamble that failed in a time of economic turmoil. Again, even without the financial crisis at the time, Chaotic likely would have just been a fairly beneficial property to them through the rest of their years. I sincerely doubt revenue from it would have saved them from their eventual fate. They probably would have just sold it back to CUSA or someone else in the bankruptcy auction. Looking back, maybe one of the reasons 4Kids didn’t want to give up the license to CUSA was because they had injected so much of their own money into it that any offer CUSA gave probably didn’t seem like it was worth it, even though, ya know, it doesn’t make them ANY money by latching onto it forever.

I do think they also had a big issue with their all-or-nothing attitude. They were constantly dead set on finding the next huge thing – the things that would rake in insane profits and make them the top of their field – but they were very bad at long-term strategies. Let me be completely fair and clear – I don’t have a mind for business, much of it goes over my head, but even I can tell that they had a big problem with this. Even when they did say this property or another would be a big earner for years, they either dropped them early because they weren’t being massively successful immediately or they would keep the property but give up on it in spirit, so to speak, by just letting the license rot in their hands.

This reflected very well in their aforementioned attitudes towards Japan in which Al Kahn said anime and manga in Japan were dying because they hadn’t had any generation-defining merchandisable hits in over a decade, which was objectively wrong in a lot of ways. If he thinks an entire country is “over” just because their anime and manga sales were down for a bit, even to the point where he gave up on licensing anime for three years as a result, then it’s not surprising that he views his company in the same way.

This was even reflected when they tried to branch out a bit into female-oriented shows. Winx Club did well, but they had it taken from them because the creator didn’t like what they were doing with it. They gave it another go with Mew Mew Power, which also did well, but dropped it halfway through because they couldn’t get a toy deal for it. Magical DoReMi was good, but it wasn’t good enough so they dropped it. And they didn’t even dub Precure because they likely thought ‘Why bother? If there’s one thing we’ve learned here it’s that there’s no money with girl stuff.’ And then there was whatever the hell they were trying to achieve with Capsule Monsters, which comes off like they gave up on that idea almost immediately while also having no real direction on what they wanted it to be in the first place.

I do concede that a large amount of 4Kids’ edits, as with other child-demographic anime dubs at the time, were a result of FCC constraints and regulations, but I’ll only concede so far with that assessment. Yes, certain edits were necessary to meet broadcast standards, but many of their edits, such as their localization efforts, changing entire soundtracks and removal of all things text, were squarely on 4Kids. As far as I know, the FCC has no regulations about changing foreign content to better suit young American audiences. The only entity that really benefits is 4Kids. In their eyes, it made them more marketable and appealing, and the only people getting offended were the pre-existing fans who knew better, and most of those people weren’t in 4Kids’ target demo, so they didn’t care. Also, let’s not overlook the fact that some of their edits were just entirely nonsensical, and many of their content edits were still commonly present in their movies, which are not controlled by the FCC.

Let’s also not forget that many of their practices were a result of just being terribly condescending to their audience. From making things way too obvious through dialogue changes/additions, editing scenes around or even having new animation created to drive certain points home to thinking every single second of a show needed to have music or talking in it to keep kids’ attention to making mistakes in their dubs and not fixing them on purpose just because they didn’t care and then later claiming it was on purpose as a little weird Easter egg thing.

4Kids, as much as it sucks to say, weren’t entirely wrong when it came to those views, either. Looking back as fully grown anime fans, yeah, we see how bungled the dubs were for a variety of reasons, and we feel rightfully disrespected as fans, but, back when we were kids, most of us didn’t care. The fact that 4Kids, by design, made their shows to trick viewers into not thinking they were watching anime (which failed after a while) definitely had a hand there, but I can’t honestly say that my experiences looking back at enjoying these shows is in any way tarnished knowing what I know now because 4Kids, despite their backwards best efforts, helped make me an anime fan, and they wound up being a significant part of the anime boom in the late 90s and early 2000s.

I don’t attribute my being an anime fan to 4Kids because other shows dubbed by other companies, such as Sailor Moon (DiC), Digimon (Saban) and Dragon Ball and DBZ (Ocean/Funimation) and a slue of others certainly helped push me there too, but they were a big part of it. Plus, many of the shows that they dubbed are now available in high definition subbed versions (not all of them, admittedly), the ones that aren’t weren’t made unavailable or obscure because of 4Kids (It’s likely some people only know of a few obscure shows because 4Kids dubbed them once upon a time) and they also helped pioneer anime streaming options with 4Kids.tv, Toonzaki and even their Youtube channel.

4Kids isn’t even really special when it comes to them mangling their properties. As I’ve already covered in my Sub/Dub Comparison series, companies like DiC, Saban and Nelvana were awful in their own rights with similarly awful and confusing changes, but what makes 4Kids special was that they were the best damn manglers who left a trail of shows and movies in their wake. All of those other dubbing companies had rather limited libraries of anime compared to 4Kids. They wanted that kid anime market cornered, and they cornered it as much as they could. They were the kings of mangling, and I say that with legit praise because they were so much better at digital paint and editing magic than any of the aforementioned dubbing companies.

Even on Cartoon Network where they were more lax on that stuff because their anime was geared towards older kids and teens, and adults with Adult Swim, they had to make edits to suit airing. Some famous examples include Naruto and Yu Yu Hakusho. I specifically remember sloppy paint edits on Yu Yu Hakusho where you’d see the digital paint very obviously shaking as it was covering up wounds and middle fingers. And obviously there were awkward edits to replace Yusuke’s swearing. Even on Adult Swim there was some instances of editing for content. I remember Blue Gender had a sex scene hinted at in the next episode preview with a few clips between Marlene and Yuji, and it just wasn’t there in the episode on Adult Swim where it is there in the Japanese version.

This stuff happens. Sometimes, their dubs were just legitimately entertaining because the cast and writers were having a ball with the show. Their music could even be legitimately good. It was a crap shoot with them sometimes.

Speaking of the cast and crew of their shows, I really do want to emphasize that, in my opinion, they were the best parts of 4Kids. I poke fun at some 4Kids actors’ acting abilities and even just their voices sometimes, and I make fun of a lot of writing choices, but as far as I’ve seen the regular 4Kids cast and crews typically had a blast doing what they did and were proud of their work. For many of them, 4Kids productions were their first foray into mainstream voice acting work, and for some of them it was their first venture into voice acting period. They also seem to be good with the fans, happy to talk about their experiences and were understandably upset whenever a project they were working on fell through, especially in the situation with Pokemon where the rug was pulled out from under them from all angles. The main problem in 4Kids’ wheelhouse were almost always the executives, especially, yes, Al Kahn.

That being said…..there’s a reason 4Kids died when many other dubbing or licensing companies went through similar hardships and came out on the other side with their feet on the ground. As I just mentioned, 4Kids was terribly pigeon-holed. They were exclusively, well, for kids. Older kids and even teens and adults may have had a place in their audience, but their demographic was kids.

When you’re dealing with a kid demographic, you have to work in a landscape that is probably the fastest changing landscape in media. Kids grow up super fast. They outgrow Kids WB and move on to Toonami. They outgrow Toonami and move on to Adult Swim. They may not move on to other anime at all. Within a few years you have an entirely new audience of kids you have to impress with things that are new and exciting, and in the world of licensing, especially when you’re primarily licensing imported shows, you’re chained to whatever is being offered/is available in other countries.

It’s true that trying to make certain properties more fitting for newer audiences helps keep properties alive for years, just look at some of the American kids’ properties that have existed for decades without changing a whole lot, but when you’re dealing with licensing other properties that you don’t have a whole lot of creative control over, you need to find different avenues to evolve.

The thing is that they recognized this. Their problems with having few big properties holding them up and focusing on a demographic that practically demands constant change was in nearly every single financial document as concerns about their company, but they very rarely presented anything that would help solve that issue.

They did create 4Sight, which would’ve been a fantastic move to branch out into older audiences and get a more stable income stream, but, as all-or-nothing attitudes go, they pretty much went the ‘nothing’ route with 4Sight. They didn’t make any big moves with it. They barely made any small moves with it. It pretty much just sat in a corner collecting cobwebs for half a decade.

Toonzaki was a weird outlier in this regard because it’s almost like they went too far in the other direction by having a streaming site where a lot of graphic titles were offered alongside uncut 4Kids properties with no parental controls or age confirmation that I could see. This would have been the perfect project for 4Sight, but they didn’t give it to them. It was entirely a 4Kids website.

Localization is an issue too, but not fully. Yes, some references and jokes need to be changed because they just don’t translate well in English, but that usually not the problem. They were worried their audience would be put off by foreign things. Or, for some reason, an American audience would never be able to connect with Japanese characters and settings. But then again, you’ll never know if the localization is what killed it in the States either. It was largely a matter of gambling with pretty much any property 4Kids acquired.

They were also largely stuck on broadcast TV. They had trouble with releasing movies after a point, and their DVD production and sales were incredibly inconsistent and lacking, something that got exponentially worse when they attempted to release uncut DVDs. Other companies also took to TV a lot, but they tended to be better about releasing uncut DVDs. For example, people complained a lot about Naruto’s censored airing on Cartoon Network, but the uncut version was made readily available as the series aired, starting when the series premiered and completing the DVD releases when Naruto ended its run on TV.

By the time 4Kids broke out into streaming, they just handled it badly. Streaming their edited shows on 4Kids.tv? That’s great. Streaming those and some uncut stuff on their Youtube channel? Awesome. Toonzaki, however, was a great idea that was also somehow a massive mess in practice. As I mentioned, it’s just weird to have a 4Kids streaming service that had so many graphic titles with seemingly no parental blocks or age confirmations. If they were comfortable streaming uncut Yu-Gi-Oh! titles on their Youtube channel, why did they feel the need to use that as a tentpole for Toonzaki? Why not just release the episodes on 4Kids.tv, maybe with a warning or something, and keep all non-4Kids stuff on Toonzaki?

Their official promotions, few of them as there were, didn’t push it as the place to get uncut Yu-Gi-Oh! episodes, just anime in general, but literally everywhere online that’s what it was being hyped as because the little information available, again, mostly from Mark Kirk’s interview, was that it was a 4Kids website for their uncut shows for general audiences. When you don’t have any other frame of reference, that’s what people are going to run with.

They also didn’t seem to realize that just being an aggregate site for anime sourced from other websites with only Yu-Gi-Oh! titles being unique wasn’t a good long-term plan. They acted as if they’d host more stuff directly on their website in the future, but they never did. Everything was hosted from Hulu, Crunchyroll, Funimation, Viz or other places for the entirety of its life.

That’s not entirely on them since the landscape for streaming was in its infancy back then, especially when it came to licensed properties, but still. It was a decent idea sitting on a bad execution. And while it came during a time when 4Kids really needed that opportunity to grow, it also came at the worst time because this was just a year before the Yu-Gi-Oh! lawsuit. If they had a longer lifespan, maybe they could have ironed out the kinks with Toonzaki, but I really doubt it.

A part of their downfall was also the death of Saturday morning cartoons. Animated shows were no longer something only available on Saturday mornings, making their inconvenience a bother. Why would I wake up early on a weekend to catch an anime that I can watch anytime streaming? Or get on DVD later? Or catch on syndication on another network? Or why watch those shows when cartoons are constantly on Cartoon Network, Disney Channel and Nickelodeon? Or why watch those cherry-picked kidified anime when I can watch a big variety of less edited shows on Toonami or Adult Swim, or, hell, even blocks like Anime Unleashed on G4 Tech TV?

They were also prisoners of their merchandise. They treated every property as a merchandise machine. Al Kahn and Mark Kirk said it straight out – if they can’t merchandise it, they’re not interested in it. A large portion of their money came from toys and other kids merchandise, which was also evolving at a breakneck speed as Al Kahn pointed out several times. The problem there was evaluating it improperly a good chunk of the time. I don’t really think they allowed a lot of these shows to have enough time to secure an audience before they decided the merchandise wasn’t worth it. They dropped so many shows because of merchandise when they barely had a few episodes to a full season under their belts.

Honestly, the lawsuit really was just the straw that broke the camel’s back. 4Kids was already on the ropes, they were teetering on the edge, and that lawsuit pushed them over and they couldn’t recover. If it wasn’t the lawsuit, it would have been something else very shortly, I guarantee it. It may seem overly pessimistic, but I just didn’t see 4Kids having a significant future anymore. They were consistently going down for years and could barely even glance up a few times. Either they would have died shortly on their own anyway or they would have stumbled into some miracle property that would save them from the Shadow Realm (and Tai Chi Chasers was not going to be it), and even then I can imagine that would only eek out a few more years for them. They just didn’t have the steam to go on.

At the end of the day, when everything is said and done, 4Kids was and still is an icon….an icon of what, is up to you, but it’s still an icon. Let’s be honest, we still have a blast with 4Kids shows just in poking fun at their ridiculousness, and some still enjoy them legitimately. I won’t deny for a second that, even though doing my SDCs of 4Kids shows chips away at my soul sometimes, the shows still commonly wind up being fun either because I’m legitimately enjoying it or I’m just laughing at the 4Kidsisms.

I’m not going to dance on 4Kids’ grave, but I’m also not going to mourn it. 4Kids was, somewhat fittingly, a product of its time. There’s just no way a company like 4Kids could survive today. There are too many sources of good, loyal dubbed anime, and there are plenty of kids anime that are dubbed just fine and made readily available to children because many dubbing companies today will dub a wide range of anime for a nearly endless demographic from kids to adults to every gender and across every genre. And if you don’t like dubs, subtitled anime, official or fansubs, are readily available at thousands of sources.

Maybe we could have seen an entirely different 4Kids over time, but I doubt it. Also, there was a certain charm with shows being on Saturday morning lineups that you really can’t get anymore, and I think 4Kids thrived on that one very specific area that we can’t replicate now. 4Kids cut out a niche for itself and dominated in that one area, and there just wasn’t a place for it once that niche was gone.

It’s an entirely new world for kids, and it’s not a world for 4Kids.

4Kids will always have a special place in my heart for helping me discover some of my favorite shows and helping spark my love of anime. I won’t excuse what they’re guilty of, and I won’t overexaggerate any good they did. I’ll just say “Thank you, 4Kids. As much for dying as for living.”

Part 23: Where in the World is Kahnmen Sandiego?

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