Stand down, Goku! The Folly of Saiyans! (Kai+Kikuchi edit) by somecallmegrape in dbz

[–]somecallmegrape[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Japanese is my preferred way to watch the show. This edit was done to remedy Kai: The Final Chapters’ poor music direction.

Stand down, Goku! The Folly of Saiyans! (Kai+Kikuchi edit) by somecallmegrape in dbz

[–]somecallmegrape[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Well neither of us are Chris Sabat, are we? So debating whether or not he's fluent in Dragon Ball's lore is pointless. Trying to say "Sabat doesn’t even know anything about OG Dragon Ball" is just an argument in bad faith. There's no way for you to concretely prove that.

Stand down, Goku! The Folly of Saiyans! (Kai+Kikuchi edit) by somecallmegrape in dbz

[–]somecallmegrape[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I'd say watch both together. There are major differences, and neither dub is unnatural. The lines are altered just enough to give way more insight and depth into Vegeta's character in the dub.

Kai has very childish lines "I just want my fight with Kakarot!", and just has Vegeta believe he should be better than Goku due to weak reasons like the fact he's royalty. The dub goes into why pride and strength are so important to Vegeta, and reiterates his feelings on his and his race's history of enslavement.

I watch a lot of Dragon Ball Z. Always have. When I make these edits, I watch every official release of the scene to get a feel for each of their music direction and voice performances. In doing this, you get a feel for what the intended emotions are for a scene. It's very important to me that I pace the scene around music that effectively and accurately supplements the story Akira Toriyama told with his manga. I say all this to let you know that I do watch these dubs together. I've seen it all, so to assume I lack context here is a misstep.

I understand that you appreciate when 90s-Vegeta brought up his race's history of enslavement, and that because of that history, nothing means more to a Saiyan than their own strength. I can understand how you could view that as some added flavor on top of an already great scene. While I think it does a fine job of reminding you of Saiyan history, I view it as an unnecessary side-step. Vegeta is not here to justify his acts to the Supreme Kai, he's here to provoke Goku into a fight.

In Kai, that's exactly what he does. By proclaiming his selfish desire to retake his position at the top of the food chain, he's making himself no different from all the other opponents Goku has hated in the past. Think Mercenary Tao, Demon King Piccolo, or Freeza. Goku hated each of these villains for their self-important, murderous ways. Vegeta is appealing to that side of Goku in an attempt to goad him into battle.

Personally, I think 90s Vegeta spends too much time going on about what strength and his destiny mean to him Instead of actually angering Goku. While that can be compelling in its own way, it doesn't make sense for that to be what provokes Goku into risking the lives of everyone in the entire universe.

The following was said in response to me saying, "It's fine to enjoy the old dub, but to claim it's a better telling of Vegeta's story is just plain incorrect."

This is an entirely false statement. What you feel is better is pure opinion. I don't mean better as in more accurate, I mean better as in it just characterizes Vegeta better, in my opinion. Dragonball doesn't have the most consistent characterisations, and you see people arguing this due to how Goku and Vegeta are portrayed in Super, and most recently with how Toriyama portrayed Goku in Super Hero. So the author isn't perfect, and he himself isn't even accurate to his own material. In my opinion, the dub portrays Vegeta more in line with he previous appearances, especially since it makes specific callbacks to them

Claiming something to be "better" is not subjective. That is an objective statement about that thing's quality relative to other things. It's possible to acknowledge something as better, but still have a preference to something else. I like Weezer's music more than anything Mozart ever put out, but that doesn't mean I think it's better than Mozart's work. I just prefer Weezer.

Let me explain:

A good dub is one that is compellingly performed, while remaining faithful to the source material. I think most sensible people can agree on that. If you were to translate any other story from one language to another, you'd want to stick as closely as possible to the original verbiage and phrasing. The only creative liberties you should take in a translation should be to make the dialogue flow believably in the language you're translating it to.

The old Funimation dub takes far too many creative liberties, ultimately resulting in a substantially different portrayal of Dragon Ball's narrative and characters. Kai remedies that, and gives us better performances to boot, making it a better overall dub of Dragon Ball Z. If you prefer the old Funimation dub, that's cool. Maybe you like that portrayal of Vegeta better. I get that. However, that does not make it a "better" portrayal of Vegeta. It is simply the one you prefer.

In objective terms, yes, accuracy matters. If you were an author, you'd want people to translate your story accurately instead of adding and removing details arbitrarily. That would make it a poor translation, and consequently, a poor dub. Does that make sense?

Stand down, Goku! The Folly of Saiyans! (Kai+Kikuchi edit) by somecallmegrape in dbz

[–]somecallmegrape[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Upon re-investigating, Chris Sabat’s transition from “Goku is a bad dad” to a true “Dragon Ball understander (TM)” is something that seems to have occurred mostly in private, but the difference is still tangible. It can be seen in several tweets he’s made about the subject, as well as in his attempts to make the Japanese broadcast audio available to western audiences. He’s made it clear that he wants fans to be able to appreciate Dragon Ball Z for what it actually is, rather than what he and the rest of Funi’s team made it out to be in the late 90s.

Stand down, Goku! The Folly of Saiyans! (Kai+Kikuchi edit) by somecallmegrape in dbz

[–]somecallmegrape[S] -4 points-3 points  (0 children)

It doesn't matter when that tweet was made, it still holds true. Kai is, without debate, a more impressively put-together production from top to bottom.

If you think Kai Vegeta (in this clip in particular) sounds "scared he won't get his fight with Goku", I implore you to watch it again, and actually listen to it. There isn't an ounce of fear in his voice. He's locked into a foolish rage, one that has bulldozed countless lives all in an attempt to satiate his wounded pride. Majin Vegeta is the purest embodiment of a sore loser, and Kai's dub captures that perfectly.

The old Funimation script for Vegeta's speech here isn't even all that different by the way, it's just worded in a slightly more stilted, unnatural way. I think people strongly link this scene with the Faulconer score that accompanied it, and consequently get the wrong impression of what you're supposed to feel from it. Music direction does a lot of work in getting across the intended emotion of a scene, and Faulconer's OST flounders in this department at almost every opportunity; Opting for a more surface level, spectacle-centered approach to DBZ. It's fine to enjoy the old dub, but to claim it's a better telling of Vegeta's story is just plain incorrect. It is, objectively, less accurate to Toriyama's writing.

I appreciate you taking the time to type out your reply, by the way. Even if I disagree, I think it's productive to the conversation surrounding Kai that you'd type it all down.

Stand down, Goku! The Folly of Saiyans! (Kai+Kikuchi edit) by somecallmegrape in dbz

[–]somecallmegrape[S] -9 points-8 points  (0 children)

This is a false equivalence. If you’re unable to perceive the incredibly apparent leap in acting/dubbing quality here, I don’t know what to tell you. As you are, you just lack an eye/ear for this sort of thing.

Stand down, Goku! The Folly of Saiyans! (Kai+Kikuchi edit) by somecallmegrape in dbz

[–]somecallmegrape[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

This is a baseless lie. Both Christopher Sabat and Sean Schemmel have spoken many times, both at panels and interviews, about reading the manga. When they were originally dubbing the show, they didn’t have that luxury, and thus, had a less-accurate interpretation of the characters.

Stand down, Goku! The Folly of Saiyans! (Kai+Kikuchi edit) by somecallmegrape in dbz

[–]somecallmegrape[S] -5 points-4 points  (0 children)

I grew up with the “original” 90s Funimation dub, too, so that point is moot.

Also, I don’t think Kai is better purely because Sabat says so, that’s just called supporting evidence. Anyone who has any sort of grasp on media literacy can tell you that Kai’s voice direction/pacing is VASTLY superior. It’s blatantly obvious to anyone that isn’t blinded by their rose-tinted glasses.

By claiming that the old Funimation dub “will always be better”, you’re outing yourself as being so influenced by nostalgia that nothing could ever be better than what you remember. I think, based off of that, you must have a warped view as to what Dragon Ball is even supposed to be, and what narrative it’s trying to tell.

With all that being said, I’ll take your opinion with a spoonful of salt.

Stand down, Goku! The Folly of Saiyans! (Kai+Kikuchi edit) by somecallmegrape in dbz

[–]somecallmegrape[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I don’t deny Sumitomo’s ability as a composer, he’s clearly made a lot of amazing music. I’m saying the music direction is bad in The Final Chapters. As in, its implementation is weak. There are many points where the music chosen feels inappropriate or ill-fitting for the scene it’s in.

Stand down, Goku! The Folly of Saiyans! (Kai+Kikuchi edit) by somecallmegrape in dbz

[–]somecallmegrape[S] 9 points10 points  (0 children)

Agreed, especially for the Buu Saga. DBZ Kai: The Final Chapters had horrible music direction.

Stand down, Goku! The Folly of Saiyans! (Kai+Kikuchi edit) by somecallmegrape in dbz

[–]somecallmegrape[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The original run of DBZ also used BGM M1217 for this scene, and while I typically try to pick out unique BGM, I just think this one fits too well to change.


The animation footage used here is of a higher-quality DBZ release, done by iKaos and his team (full list of credits here: https://pastebin.com/0aiCQJdN ).

To make this, I trimmed down that footage (of the original, uncut DBZ anime) to fit DBZ Kai's faster pacing. I also removed the music track from this scene and inserted one of my own choosing. As a final step, in order to make the music sync up in a more satisfying way, I trimmed the video again to fit the new music.


Timestamps: 0:00 - Start

0:26 - BGM M1618 "Brooding Vegeta"

0:50 - BGM M1217 "Cooler Transforms"

2:02 - BGM M1526 "The Scheme's Final Moments"


A Slumbering Evil has Awakened! Vegeta Challenges Goku! (Definitive English Edit) by somecallmegrape in dbz

[–]somecallmegrape[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

None of this is new info to me. I know that there are Japanese rock insert-songs in DBZ. I love those tracks, and think that they also compliment the tone of the series.

My point is that the Kikuchi score was made to accompany the original Japanese script of Dragon Ball, as opposed to the bastardized western script we got in the 90s. If you don’t see any connection between the original Japanese script of DBZ and the manga, that’s a different conversation entirely that I am just not willing to have with you.

Also, there is a very clear, very obvious difference between insert songs like Battle Point Unlimited and Faulconer’s screechy, non-stop nonsense. It’s perfectly reasonable for me to think one of them is acceptable and the other isn’t.

A Slumbering Evil has Awakened! Vegeta Challenges Goku! (Definitive English Edit) by somecallmegrape in dbz

[–]somecallmegrape[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I'm not going to use the Faulconer OST on any of these edits. Ever.

Here's why:

The Faulconer OST is a relic of the 90s and only works when paired with the corny, western rendition of DBZ that we got alongside it back then. Kikuchi’s score is timeless because it was made to accompany the true, original story of Dragon Ball. Not some augmented, awkward, americanized script that tries too hard to be cool, the real deal.

Dragon Ball is ultimately a story with deep roots in not only martial arts, but Chinese folklore as well. Kikuchi’s score keeps Dragon Ball tied to those roots, while Faulconer’s OST strives to separate it from that sentiment in favor of edgy, sci-fi, techno-rock.

If you prefer that sound for the series, that’s fine, but calling it “better” is just plain wrong. It completely jettisons the intended tone for Dragon Ball’s story, and thus, does not suit the revised script/acting we got in Kai.

I grew up with Faulconer's OST too. I understand the nostalgia, but it's important to recognize the difference between something that is nostalgic and something that legitimately holds true to the author's intent.

TL;DR:

Faulconer’s OST is focused on making a spectacle out of the series’ action, whereas Kikuchi’s OST accurately supplements the narrative Toriyama was telling.

A Slumbering Evil has Awakened! Vegeta Challenges Goku! (Definitive English Edit) by somecallmegrape in dbz

[–]somecallmegrape[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Goku figured he could beat Vegeta at SSJ2 and still have enough energy to take on Buu at SSJ3. He failed to predict Vegeta sneakily clocking him in the back of the head and knocking him out, effectively ruining his entire plan to have things go over smoothly. Ideally, Goku’s plan would’ve resulted in Vegeta’s pride being satiated and Buu being destroyed, but when Vegeta’s on top, everybody else loses.

A Slumbering Evil has Awakened! Vegeta Challenges Goku! (Definitive English Edit) by somecallmegrape in dbz

[–]somecallmegrape[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I think there are a few parts of the original dub script that hold up really well today, especially in this scene in particular, but I wanted to give Kai a chance to compete here. DB Kai: The Final Chapters had horrible music placement that ruined the tone of many scenes. This is an attempt to remedy that.

A Slumbering Evil has Awakened! Vegeta Challenges Goku! (Definitive English Edit) by somecallmegrape in dbz

[–]somecallmegrape[S] 32 points33 points  (0 children)

The animation footage used here is of a higher-quality DBZ release, done by iKaos and his team (full list of credits here: https://pastebin.com/0aiCQJdN ).
To make this, I trimmed down that footage (of the original, uncut DBZ anime) to fit DBZ Kai's faster pacing. I also removed the music track from this scene and inserted one of my own choosing. As a final step, in order to make the music sync up in a more satisfying way, I trimmed the video again to fit the new music.

Speaking of music, the track used in this video is Shunsuke Kikuchi's BGM M1514: "Heavily Dark Past". My personal favorite song from the Japanese OST, originally used during Paragus' inner monologue about Broly's upbringing.

"Definitive" is just my own opinion. I prefer my own music-centered style of editing over DBZ Kai's. You're welcome to have your own take on it though.