Voice-Overs!

[Goldenboko]

Let's talk about voice overs and voice actors!

So today, I just realized that Tom Hanks played Woody and Tim Allen played Buzz Lightyear in Toy Story. Upon this realization, I went and began to look up tons of voice actors for Pixar, and cartoons that I watched when I was young! I still didn't find a cast and crew that I liked better than Toy Story, I probably wasted all of fifth period.

I've also compared the difference between Japanese and American voice acting in a few animes and games. Lots of people swear the difference is enough to justify watching it in Japanese over English (where I can understand what the hell they are saying, which is a pain to me), but the only show I enjoyed the Japanese voice acting more was Eureka seveN, but I basically knew the lines of that show at one point anyway.

I think my favorite one voice over goes to James Earl Jones for doing Darth Vader (bet you didn't know he also played Mufasa).

[charliepanayi]

Uncle Phil in Fresh Prince of Bel-Air also being the voice of Shredder in the animated Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles series is my favourite bit of voiceover trivia.

[Freya]

Christan Bale in Howl's Moving Castle He made a good howl.

[Aerith's Knight]

German dubbed porn.

/thread

No, but seriously, Cowboy Bebop had some great dub.

[NorthernChaosGod]

Lol, I knew James Earl Jones did Mufasa and Darth Vader before I was 10. I shat a brick when I found out.

Also, I hate subs. Localizations are superior in that they actually allow conversations to make sense rather than literal translations in which all inflection, context, humor, wordplay, and flow are lost. Subs also distract from the visuals.

Why is being closer to the original preferable? Literal translations are an approximation of meaning, subtitles can rarely express puns or culture specific terms or verbal gestures that have no equivalent meaning, the more literally accurate you attempt to be in a translation the less likely you are to convey the intended meaning. There's no reason to prefer the original language at all unless you can understand perfectly without subtitles on.

[charliepanayi]

Also, I hate subs. Localizations are superior in that they actually allow conversations to make sense rather than literal translations in which all inflection, context, humor, wordplay, and flow are lost. Subs also distract from the visuals.

Subs detract from the visuals? Think I'll go chuck out my Kurosawa DVDs then...

You also seem to assume that any translation by subtitles will be overly-literal. Any bad translation will certainly, but then that's the skill in being a good translator.

For the record, when it comes to anime I usually choose whether to watch subtitled or dubbed into English depending on what show it is (I'll always watch Cowboy Bebop dubbed). And obviously I'd sooner saw my own leg off than watch anything live-action dubbed into another language.

[Freya]

Subs also distract from the visuals.

I feel that way too. Sometimes I turn my subs on if i'm watching a movie at night so I don't wake people up and I always just get distracted by reading tv that I miss what's actually happening.

[Goldenboko]

Subs also distract from the visuals.

I feel that way too. Sometimes I turn my subs on if i'm watching a movie at night so I don't wake people up and I always just get distracted by reading tv that I miss what's actually happening.

Chain! I think so too, I tend to play my games with Subs on a second playthrough though so I can read what I missed the first playthrough.

[Shlup]

Who didn't know James Earl Jones voiced Mufasa? Or that Tim Allen and Tom Hanks were the voices in Toy Story for that matter? You're weird, Boko.

I love voice over stuff. I wanted to do voice over work when I was younger, but I can't really do funny voices so it would just be me talking and I don't think I have a decent voice to do it anyway!

[NorthernChaosGod]

Subs detract from the visuals? Think I'll go chuck out my Kurosawa DVDs then...

You also seem to assume that any translation by subtitles will be overly-literal. Any bad translation will certainly, but then that's the skill in being a good translator.

For the record, when it comes to anime I usually choose whether to watch subtitled or dubbed into English depending on what show it is (I'll always watch Cowboy Bebop dubbed). And obviously I'd sooner saw my own leg off than watch anything live-action dubbed into another language.

You're kidding, right? If you're sitting there reading what is being said that is less attention you are paying to anything going on.

Secondly, that's the entire point of subtitles. If you're being liberal with translation you might as well not half-ass it and just dub instead.

[Momiji]

If most anime dubs weren't painfully horrible, maybe I wouldn't rely on subs as much. However, this is not the case-- and besides, I can pick up on some Japanese vocabulary at the same time! It's killing two birds with one stone for me.

[Jessweeee♪]

It's always interesting to see one actor do two totally different roles. Did you know Keith Ferguson voiced both Basch of FFXII and Bloo of Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends? O:

As far as the whole sub vs. dub debate goes, I typically go with dubs. It's just a better experience for me watching the show in a language I'm fluent in. Especially during stuff like FLCL's manga scenes. There is a lot going on and the subtitles just make it even harder to keep up. In the case of poor dubbing (and by poor I mean actually bad. Not just dubs that aren't extremely well done.), poor translation, excessive censorship, and especially plot cuts, I go with the sub.

[~*~Celes~*~]

Tara Strong, the voice of Rikku for FFX and FFX-2 (English, of course) also did Tommy from Rugrats, Timmy Turner from Fairly Odd Parents, Dil from All Grown Up (Rugrats sequel show), Raven from Teen Titans...Her list goes on and on. She is truly talented. Here's her IMDB page: Tara Strong

[bipper]

Tara Strong is the . I am so in love right now (for about five minutes).

[JKTrix]

I can read pretty fast, so the whole thing about subs taking away from the visual quality isn't really an issue for me.

I also watch a lot of stuff that isn't available in localized form, so I kind of take what I can get. It's not uncommon for me to watch things in a different language without any kind of subtitling, but then again people like me are uncommon.

The Ghibli movies that Disney brings over tend to have Hollywood casting. Nausicaa had names like Patrick Stewart and Uma Thurman. Castle in the Sky had Mark Hamill (a VA vet) and James Van Der Beek (hey he was popular at the time...). Freya already mentioned Bale in Howl's Moving Castle, which also had Billy Crystal in it (who's worked with Pixar before). Ponyo had Liam Neeson and Tina Fey. It's not always a good idea though, because some Hollywood actors don't take voice acting as seriously as a 'usual voice actor' would. Few animation companies can demand a level of seriousness as Disney, though.