In general I’ve found that (most) japanese voice actors are easily sumarized as such:
Girls-
2 Types
Annoying little girl type
Sultrey dominant bitch type
Guys-
Young boy still scared of girls who want in his pants… type.
Too cool for his own sunglasses and ciggarette type.
You guys know what I’m talking about… No variance? Yeah… I bet it’d be different if I spoke Japanese too. Too bad I’m english.
Subtitles.
I tend towards subs but have no problem with good-quality dubs. There can be no general decision on whether dubs or subs are better. Take for, instance, the case where you can’t really translate the meaning or effect of one language into another. You can’t reproduce the sound of the meter used by Homer in the ancient epics in English for example, so now I’m always looking for cases of things like that.
I can like both. Depends on which sucks the least.
Y’know what, I’m with Nulani on that one.
That was… probably the least funny, least accurate, most offensive thing I’ve heard this month. Unless it was meant to be that way, but that still doesn’t make it funny.
Aaaaaaaaanyway, I watch subs when I can in order to practice my Japanese comprehension. The accent point is pretty good. They need to make some kind of dub-sub hybrid where all the native speakers are kept in their original voices and subtitled, but all the characters with accents are dubbed. 
Ranting Gryphon always sounds like a committee got together and wrote a hip and edgy angry young man rant.
When I was listening to the clip, I wondered if someone was thinking “So, if I add enough obscene language, will it sound as if I’ve make an excellent, ‘everyone should check this out’ point?”
I mean, speech loses its effectiveness after a while. It’s sort of why I tune out Jay in Kevin Smith films.
2 may be vulgar, yes, but oftentimes he DOES make good points. At least, I think so.
I’ve lost faith that anyone who speaks English naturally will ever have a good voice.
Since English is an inferior language both syntactically and phonetically since it was designed by the devil for the sole purpose of offending sophisticated ears rather than, say, being implemented as a fancy way to explain to the other simians where the food is. OBVIOUSLY!
Alrighty, then.
It all depends really. If the voices dubbing are going to sound like they came off of Iron Chef, then just let it be subtitled.
Personally, I don’t care much if it’s a sub or a dub. Normally I’ll choose a dub, if only because I don’t want to read as I watch, but if the voice acting in the dub is BAD, I’ll happily watch a sub.
One thing I’ve noticed recently in some dubs is that they have DUMBED DOWN the dialogue for a kid’s audience. One of the reasons I don’t watch Rave Master or Duel Masters (both currently running in Cartoon Network) is that almost EVERY SINGLE LINE OF DIALOGUE is a PUN, and usually one that refers to American rather than Japanese culture, so I doubt it was like that in the original (at least not completely.) That annoys me, it’s like they’re saying, “This is kids stuff, make it sillier so they’ll like it” and totally ignore any older potential audience (which is dumb.) So much for Anime finally having been accepted as more than cartoons around here. > <
I hate to break something to you, but jokes and puns do not translate. Ever. If a character says a joke in Japanese, keeping it referencing Japanese culture is about the worst thing that can be done. If it’s a culture joke, it must be translated to an American culture joke so that it makes sense. That’s not dumbing down, it’s good localization.
Indeed. For instance, in Excel Saga, at one point Excel says “This is a few lillies short of a shoujo-ai!” Only through several coincidences did I know that “lily” (“yuri” in Japanese) and “shoujo-ai” (lit. “girl love”) were both terms which figuratively refer to lesbianism. Or there’s that one part in the subtitled version of FLCL where they refer to something incomprehensible about mackerels while, in the dubbed version, they were making a joke about robots and cyborgs being different. (I wasn’t really paying attention; I had the audio set to “English” but with subtitles on as well.)
What a lot of anime series do is present the joke in its original form and then make a cultural note at the top of the screen: I’m sure you’ve seen it. I prefer that to localization since I then learn something more about Japanese culture.
Some people prefer to look at foreign media through the lens of their own culture, giving something closer to the same effect that the work has on its original language audience. Others prefer to see it without that lens – I fit into this category. The fact that it is foreign and weird is actually part of the appeal.
Having to annotate a TV series is pretty ridiculous, unless it’s already subtitled. If you watch movies like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, there are no annotations. If it’s something visual, fine, let the viewer figure it out. But dialogue must be understandable. That’s why it’s called “localization”, not “translation” - it has to appeal to the new target audience in a similar way that the original appealed to the original audience. Serious stuff tends to be okay, but humor, especially puns, simply isn’t funny if it only references the original culture.
I don’t really have an opinion on whether or not Subtitles or Audio is better. I know that when I watch anime, for example, I use English Audio AND English Subtitles. This is because sometimes, the text differs slightly from the dialogue; sometimes, the text will make more sense, and sometimes, the audio will make more sense, so you can infer the best meaning from things. Granted, it’s usually never as complicated as I make it sound, cos both of them make sense. I just enjoy having and using the option.
Other times, like in movies wherethe Subtitles and Audio are like, exactly the same, like Run Lola Run, I just leave the audio in its original language. I don’t really have much of an explanation for this, since I don’t do this with everything where the Subtitles and Audio are the same, like Video Games (Video Games where you get the option for English or Japanese VA’s). I just simply do it on occasion.
I guess, in conclusion, I like both equally. I usually prefer to have my stuff in English, though.
When it comes to foreign live action movies, I prefer the original language with subtitles. I’ve tried watching an English dub of Run, Lola, Run or The Seventh Seal, and it’s too weird. This is probably because of lips not matching up. However, with heathen anime, the lip movements aren’t quite so realistic, so it’s a little bit easier for the lines to synch up.
However, I shall always watch dubbed Godzilla. That’s just frickin’ awesome.
I agree, since most of the time, when a joke is translated literarily, it makes no sense without a foot note (Which is nice, like Kero said). The problem with the cases Wil presented is that, when it comes to “kiddy shows” almost every single dialogue is turned into some kind of (usually lame) joke that has nothing to do with what a character originally said.
The most clear case of this bastardization was Digimon. Believe it or not, the characters had a relatively good level of depth and distinctive characteristics, which were replaced by unnecessary lame jokes. That’s how “So be it… if that is the only path you leave me then I will have to show you your own foolishness” turned into ”Well, it seems it is the time to fight! I’ll kick your ass!”. Way to turn a disturbed foreshadowing dialogue into a simple thug taunt.