Macross TV Dub

[Apollo Leader]

Wow, they actually used one of my questions....what a crazy time we live in!

349483[/snapback]

They used three of mine!

[Agent ONE]

Wow, they actually used one of my questions....what a crazy time we live in!

349483[/snapback]

HG is now making money off of you (people will buy the DVDs because of the question you asked). You are a corporate slave of the HG machine and you have no soul.

[Roy Focker]

I know isn't ironic that through Keith's actions he's helping Harmony Gold.

[Agent ONE]

I know isn't ironic that through Keith's actions he's helping Harmony Gold.

349739[/snapback]

Yes, he is such a corporate whore.

[bsu legato]

When did you sell out, Keith? You used to be so cool, but now....now I just don't know you anymore!

[bsu legato]

Oh, and since Steve is (as of the time I type this) here on MW reading this thread, maybe he could take the time to answer my questions from last page. I know you'll BS about the "Robotech as the only dub of Macross" thing, but maybe you could answer me about the Mospeada dub? Should I start putting money aside yet?

[Agent ONE]

When did you sell out, Keith? You used to be so cool, but now....now I just don't know you anymore!

349786[/snapback]

I don't know what got into me... Its probably all the Southren Cross.

[Keith]

Bah, you're just jealous you didn't get to ask Mari questions! Besides, I consider what I've done far more to be wasting HG's bandwidth, and as such taking money from them, than anything.

[wolfx]

I suppose this was already posted?

http://www.robotech.com/news/viewarticle.php?id=257

[uminoken]

Hikaru2 asks: In what ways is the production of the voice acting different in Japan in comparison with how it is done in the United States?

Mari says: When we were doing the original Macross series in Japan, the actors were all together in one studio, watching others act, waiting for their turns. We quietly walked to the microphone, and did our lines. It was a TEAM work. Now I'm in the studio, having my own monitor screen with completed animation (of course!) and dialogs, working with a director and a sound engineer.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Do you think having the whole crew in the studio helps enormously with interaction? Even on well-done anime dubs, there is still that theatricality while most japanese dubs seem have a natural feel.

[Hikuro]

It's like that back in the early 20th century with radio, all the actors and actresses where together doing their lines for what ever they were acting in.

But I think its better to do this in an English production rather than having 2 or 3 people scheduled thru the day to come in and do lines.

I personally like to know the actor or actress way of dialouge for their character so I can properly do my lines.

But you can't have it that way sadly. But the directors are very helpful and if they feel like it wasn't good enough than you redo it, and they'll help you on how you should express your emotions thru the lines.

Also crack alot of jokes for the hell of it.

[khyronic]

i wonder if Mospeada and Southern Cross are going to get dubbed too. Why not!

If you're going to fire bullets at yourself, you might as well die. As much as I like ADV and how they've helped anime grow in their way, it should not be dubbed. Of course i will still by it because...i'm a hypocrite?...

[Shin Densetsu Kai 7.0]

Its a good thing since the macross stuff will still have subs, that means that for those who did not get the animeigo sets, and for those who are new to macross, its a fresh start.

[treatment]

Just an fyi to my fellow MW-members.

Ok, so Geoduck of AnimeOnDVD-forum provided some dub-clips of the english-Macross and I listened to it.

Here was my response to the AOD-thread that was featuring the new english-dubs of Macross :

http://forums.animeondvd.com/showthreaded....w=&sb=5&o=&vc=1

uhmm, call me extremely underwhelmed by those dub-clips.

It seems that:

[*] Vic's too eager and too angsty. He sounded more like a better Amuro Ray than a Hikaru Ichijou.

[*] Brett's too gruff and policeman/detective-like to be a Roy Focker.

[*] Mari's kinda kewl since her english-Minmay now sounds like an authentic Chinese-girl with the accent, something that was unintentionally lost in the original japanese-dubs.

Honestly, as much as I dislike the old Robotech-dubs, these clips of the new Macross english-dubs are not much of any improvement.

Click the link above to get and listen to the ADV dub-clips yourself. I don't think Geoduck's gonna keep it up for long.

[Keith]

Ok, listened to one of the clips (Hikaru Meets Minmay), and wow, they completely missed Hikaru. What's so wrong with having a soft spoken hero?

As for Minmay, Mari does sound a bit old for the part now, but she does come off a bit sexy. Only thing about her is she sounds more natural speaking Japanese than English (as expected). Doubt I'll listen to the dub for much more than occasional curiosity, but Mari there alone makes it worth collecting.

[Graham]

Just listened to those dub clips.

Oh dear me!

Mari sounds OK, but yes a little bit old to be playing a 15 year old.

As for the voice acting for Hikaru and Roy....WTF!!!!! All I will say is that's further proof that anime should remain in it's original Japanese language with English subs.

Graham

[Keith]

I'm scared to hear Max...

[EXO]

OMG... I'm not against dubs... but this one is really bad... Man I'm tired of ADV messing up all their dubs. The Gatchaman dubs were incredibly stupid and totally didn't match the Japanese voices, this is worse. I'll be passing it up for sure and maybe I'll just get the Aneimigo sets. Sorry Mari... I'm glad you got paid but not with my money!

[Sundown]

They sound like... Robotech. Except...

And I should probably invest in picthfork and torch stocks before I say this but...

I might actually prefer Robotech's version.

Roy here sounds like a hammy Disney character without the realistic nuances, and I'm not sure I particularly like Mari's accent for Minmay in an english dub. I'm probably the only one here that thinks Mari's accent is going to be a weak point of this dub as much as she adds to its legitimacy... the way she sounds makes the chemistry between her and Hikaru a little hard to believe, and the directing probably won't be good enough to inject the subtleties now required. And for what it's worth, she sounds nothing like a Chinese girl with a Chinese accent, not one I've ever heard. She sounds like a Japanese girl who's pretending to be Chinese but somehow speaks with a Japanese accent, which is pretty much what's going on. At least the her singing'll be a marked improvement over West's.

Hikaru's pretty much an excitable channelling of Tony Oliver's Rick Hunter, so that's mostly a wash. And looks like they got in some semi-swear words for "flavor".

At any rate, I'm not one that thinks characters in a dub should sound exactly like the originals. In fact, most of the time it just won't "work" because different cultures often expects different voices for a particular face. Quality of acting and believability is much more important... and both here are slightly meh.

Edited December 13, 2005 by Sundown

[Keith]

I honestly don't think Minmay should have a Chinese accen't, she is half Japanese, and lives in Japan.

[Shin Densetsu Kai 7.0]

Roy seems more like a deranged perverted dumbass rather than a hardcore beer hangover jet fighter jockey womanizer in action. And hikaru? WHAT THE HELL!

Thank God for subs!! Geez wouldn't it have just been CHEAPER to just leave this subbed to begin with?>

[treatment]

I'm not sure I particularly like Mari's accent for Minmay in an english dub.  I'm probably the only one here that thinks Mari's accent is going to be a weak point of this dub as much as she adds to its legitimacy... the way she sounds makes the chemistry between her and Hikaru a little hard to believe, and the directing probably won't be good enough to inject the subtleties now required.  And for what it's worth, she sounds nothing like a Chinese girl with a Chinese accent, not one I've ever heard.  She sounds like a Japanese girl who's pretending to be Chinese but somehow speaks with a Japanese accent, which is pretty much what's going on.  At least the her singing'll be a marked improvement over West's.

Actually, the way I heard it was Mari's a japanese-girl trying to speak english with a chinese-accent.

Mari, we <3 you already and we <3 you even more with the unintentional funny you did in the english-dubs.

[Sundown]

I'm not sure where all the shock over Hikaru's voice selection comes from. It's pretty obvious that Harmony Gold had made up its mind on how an English speaking Hikaru should sound like 20 years ago...

And I actually agree with Keith here-- Minmay "should" have a Japanese accent being that she's half Japanese and lives in Japan. But given the way the dub's directed, and the fact that Hikaru, who's full Japanese, doesn't have any accent, it'd probably be better if she didn't have one at all either.

I'm not sure the dub should introduce a barrier between the characters that didn't exist in the original unless it can really pull it off.

Oh, and apparently, the songs won't be dubbed, because the tracks for the music without vocals is no longer available. Poop.

Edited December 13, 2005 by Sundown

[Agent ONE]

Listened to the clips. I am all for this dub, but I didn't like the clips. Roy sounded like a gay construction worker (flamboyantly trying to sound tough), and Hikaru sounded like he was 5 years old.

The RT voices actually sound better, but whatever, maybe when I see it I will like it.

[bsu legato]

And looks like they got in some semi-swear words for "flavor".

351915[/snapback]

Really? Damn, did Agent ONE call that one or what? The dude is prescient. Anyway, I'm stuck at work and can't give these a listen 'till I get home tonight.

[ChrisG]

After listening to the clips, I would say that with the exception of Minmay, the old Robotech voice actors were better. Given HG/ADV's relationship and the fact that Carl Macek works for ADV, I wonder why they didn't try to round up the old Robotech actors. Maybe that's been answered in another thread somewhere, but I haven't been keeping up with Macross dub news.

[Mechamaniac]

Minmay sounds great, and why wouldnt she considering it's Mari and all. Hikaru isn't too bad, a little higher pitch than I would prefer, but he is supposed to be 16 after all.

Roy on the other hand...sounds too much like Randy Macho Man Savage to me.

I wish they would have used a better voice for Claudia. They could have at least tried to find someone who sounded black. I don't want Wanda Sykes or anything, but I prefer the RT Claudia with the deeper voice to the plain vanilla chick they have there.

Oh, and for those of you at work (like me) and stuck behind a freaking proxy server (like me)... I downloaded them on my laptop, and uploaded them to my web space...

Hikaru Meets Minmay

Homeward Bound

Minmay's Priorities

Roy the Humanitarian

Bonus Clip

Edited December 13, 2005 by Mechamaniac

[Pat Payne]

Minmay sounds great, and why wouldnt she considering it's Mari and all.  Hikaru isn't too bad, a little higher pitch than I would prefer, but he is supposed to be 16 after all.

Mari's sounds pretty good, although there are times you can tell that she's struggling a little with the language -- they should have given her just a bit more coaching on English sentence inflection to make her lines sound a bit more natural. Other than that, she does a great job. (I would have given Yocchan an accent as well, though, to make it more believable that they're relatives, since Mari's accent is pretty pronounced.) I actually like Hikaru's dub voice for the most part, although we certainly could have done without the "frickin" when he discovers the battroid mode. Roy's, I'm blowing hot and cold on. He sounds like a bad ass, but is overdoing it a lot. They really should have gotten (if possible) they guy who played Spike Seigel in Cowboy Bebop. And, I hope that "pudknocker" business was an alternate take they thought was funny.

And Tiffany Grant as Misa was OK, although I kept thinking of Chidori from FMP every time she talked. As long as she keeps the acting on that level, though, I think it might grow on me (won't replace Mika Doi, though )

Edited December 13, 2005 by Pat Payne

[Agent ONE]

And looks like they got in some semi-swear words for "flavor".

351915[/snapback]

Really? Damn, did Agent ONE call that one or what? The dude is prescient. Anyway, I'm stuck at work and can't give these a listen 'till I get home tonight.

351969[/snapback]

Hells yeah I did.

[Hurin]

I get the feeling that if I weren't already a Macross fan and/or I showed this to my fiance or someone else who was only a casual Macross viewer, they wouldn't have much of a problem with the voices.

Having said that, I do. Hikaru's voice bothered me the most. Misa's (on the radio) was a close 2nd. The others weren't so bad.

Do you think it's possible that they may "age" Hikaru's voice as he gets older and a bit more mature? Dear Lord, I hope so. . . because if he still sounds like that while commanding Skull Squadron, it's gonna be sad.

H

[Sundown]

Having said that, I do.  Hikaru's voice bothered me the most.  Misa's (on the radio) was a close 2nd.  The others weren't so bad.

352016[/snapback]

I don't know you. Those were the two I could actually tolerate... although Misa just didn't sound as professional as I'd have liked, and I couldn't feel Misa Hayase nor Lisa Hayes from what I heard.

Hikaru is just too breathy, but I don't hate his voice.

Claudia sounded fine, and in fact, sounded really, really similar to the original RT Claudia. The translations suck though... her calling Roy's performance "lame" just seemed completely out of place in the middle of combat with an alien menace. "That's pretty weak, Roy." "Frankly, I'm a little dissapointed, Roy." "You're slipping, Roy." are all better options. I dare say that at least some of RT's writing was actually better, if not completely word for word accurate to the original.

This all just begs the question... if everything sounds like an even cheesier Robotech, why didn't they just get the original RT voice actors in the first place?

-Al

[treatment]

This all just begs the question... if everything sounds like an even cheesier Robotech, why didn't they just get the original RT voice actors in the first place?

-Al

352099[/snapback]

Most likely reason is that HG wanted it cheap so they opted to have ADV do the dubbing in-house, rather than HG paying the going rate of the Animaze/BangZoom (the RT voice-actors) stable.

[bsu legato]

"Pudknocker?" Did I just hear Roy call Hikaru a "Pudknocker?" This is actually worse than A1 predicted. Not only did they try to make the dialog sound edgy by adding unnecessary swearing, they used a 5th grader's idea of swearing. "Frikken" lame, if you ask me.

Other than that, Misa made little or no impression on me, Claudia does indeed resemble her earlier RT incarnation (which in hindsight was actually fairly close to the Macross original) Roy sounds like a ninja turtle, and Hikaru sounds like a reaaaaally forced impression of a generic pimply faced teen. That leaves Mari. What can I say? In some respects she sounds almost the same as her 20 years younger incarnation. The accent suits the character (something the original never really bothered with).

[Agent ONE]

I have been thinking about this all day, I think now that I have heard it... I don't want it. And I WAS planing on getting it.

[valk1j]

I was going to get this, but I am not impressed at all. Maybe the RT voice actors aren't that bad, at least compared to this I will wait to hear more before I make a firm decision.

Edited December 14, 2005 by valk1j