Anime Dubs Aren't Cringe, Anime Is

I watch mostly sub instead of dub. But it is for a good reason, and it is: watching sub guarantees the original VAs and some golden or at least very decent voice acting, while the dubs... are kind of hit n' miss, some are good, some just trash, and very few, are amazing (for example, Komi can't communicate, Spanish dub)
but the good and amazing ones are few, and only the amazing ones are worth watching for me over the originals (most of the time, there are bound to be outliers somewhere)

I prefer dub personally and it’s partly because I don’t really just sit down and watch stuff a whole lot, I mostly like to do other stuff while I have the tv on in the background, there are of course exceptions to this, but it’s pretty much impossible to watch something in subbed while you’re doing the dishes for example, plus I don’t watch many things anyways, and the things I have watched I personally believe to have a fairly solid Dub.

I'm with you on this one, now if we can only get the modern dubs to suck less we'd be in business.

knowing English makes it easier to spot when the localizers are too lazy to get a distinct voice for side characters and they have to drag out a very unique voice like Yuri Lowenthal or Tod Abercorn out to do them despite them already playing a major role in the same story. God bless them, but you really need to have someone with better range if you are unwilling to hire new voices

"i will not let you destroy this world"

Dub if it's available, Sub if it's not. I prefer dubs, but I don't mind subs. Sometimes, it's annoying to take your eyes off the fast-paced action of some animes to see what the characters are actually saying. I don't care if it's cringy. Like the title says, it's just how anime is.

ultimate sub fans speak in subtitles too!

modern dubs suffer from one 2 one translations and don't really adept things for a foreign market. The old days of anime did this to a point (they sucked in other ways back then) but This I think contributes to the "cringe" of modern dub.

Watching subbed is way more about making sure others don't overhear the cringe than I'd like to admit.

I like the concept of having native languages in fiction not being translated at all times, especially if there's supposed to be multiple languages present in the setting. Like in one of my favorite games, Halo Reach, one of the members of the team has to translate what some of the civilians are saying to the rest of the team, because he's a native of the planet Reach and speaks the language... That language being Hungarian, as in the lore, Reach has a heavy population that descended from Hungary when they left Earth to colonize that planet. Something a lot of scifi future settings neglect. Cultures are stubborn, we'll never unify under a single culture or language, not even if/when we leave our world or even solar system. There will be colonies that are majorly dominated by other cultures and languages, there will still be culture shock and language barriers, that'll never go away, if anything it'll likely grow with entirely new languages and cultures being born given enough time.

FELLAS... help a guy out.

This is copied from my post on r/rant. No luck there, so I'll post it here instead.

I absolutely despise anime girls. I don't know why. Jesus, I can't even explain it.

Now, I don't actually watch anime, though I do want to start at some point. The problem is that this little thing in my head, like some instinct or defense mechanism, makes me involuntarily cringe and look away from anime.

I don't know why I'm feeling this way. It's not just because they're overly sexualised, nah, not really. You cans sexualise anything with enough imagination. No, this hate is primal... irrational, illogical. Aniphobia.

This is a problem for me. Because I am a person that prefers logic and rationale over anything else. Even if it's against my better judgement, I always turn to these two. This parasite in my head, though...

I hear that anime has a lot of genres and, as a result, a large audience it can appeal to. I've always regarded it has cringe, I don't know why. It's worth noting that I'm a total military nerd, and this already narrows down the number of animes that I can feasibly enjoy quite a lot.

Now, discussing the latter statement. There are very few shows that I believe I can enjoy. I've found two candidates so far: GATE, and GuP.

What's tragic is that the premise for GuP is actually really good. I like it. The problem? Anime girls. Who could've guessed? It's like being lactose intolerant, and your favourite food is ice cream. This one thing - this one REALLY STUPID thing - acts as a roadblock from me genuinely being able to enjoy it. I mean, seriously. Whenever I look up GuP and go to Images on Google, I have to actively resist the urge to put my fingers under my chin in the form of a gun. If there were actually guys in the show, I'd watch it. No cap. Not gonna lie, I've always despised the concept of mixing cutesy girls with military equipment. It feels wrong; like an insult, which is dumb. I know.

I know what you're thinking. This is ridiculous! Stupid! Absolutely foolish! Are you a mysogynist?

Yes, yes, yes, and no. This is why I come here. To seek advice. If I can't remedy it, I want to at least pinpoint the cause of my rooted hatred for this... oh, and as for GATE, I'm considering watching it, but I don't really know where.

I'm 16, and I feel like I should explore these things. But this thing is one massive roadblock, and I don't know what to do. Please do not hate me for saying this, I know some fans and weebs will make logical counterarguments as to why this is dumb. To them, I say: WELL NO SHIT, THAT'S WHY I'M MAKING MY RANT IN THE FIRST PLACE!

If I really did hate anime girls, and especially anime girls x military with genuine hatred, I would keep it to myself. But I don't want to feel this way. I want to know why I do, and I hope some of you can at least relate or give me advice.

TL;DR: My brain physically won't let me watch anime, even though I'm interested.

I am a Dubbed watcher and I regret starting The daily life of the immortal king in English because it as like an extra half a season dubbed but the characters sound different subbed

I disagree with this. I think it’s just anime in English that’s cringe and I don’t know why. Anime in Italian slaps, and it’s just as good and non cringe as the japanese dub.

This was overly long and the title was misleading: all you covered was basic subs v dubs shit, and you never really said anime was cringe. Clickbait.

Damn the original Akira dub has got to be some of the worst voice acting I've ever heard

source for thumbnail pls

I first started out with Anime downloading episodes of Naruto from Dattebayo, a group subbing the anime. Back in 2004 or 5. And from there it kept going to this day. I don't care what people use, dub or sub. I prefer sub.

I never actually started out watching dubs, because my anime beginning was basically watching a ton of Naruto episodes a friend had downloaded.

The culture thing is real. I preferred Trigun and Cowboy Bebop in English, and those are more Westernized. Naruto sounds cringe in English because it is essentially Japanese. Never considered all this. Even the moves aren't fully translated. You STILL have to learn that Jutsu means technique or that the names are pronounced the Japanese way like SA-ku-RA instead of how I used to say Sa-KU-ra like an American 😂

Personally, I listen to everything in the original language, there are some things that you lose when translating, the nuisances of the language get lost. If it was intended for an English audience with the original language being English, I’ll watch it in English, if it’s Japanese I’ll watch it in Japanese, Chinese anime (or donghua) such as scissor 7 I watch in Chinese/Mandarin.
I also feel that’s why dubs sound so weird, because what might sound normal to a Japanese audience (because anime has been a massive part of their culture for much longer) just sounds weird in English, which is why they need to be localised when dubbed. The only good dubs are ones which localise the references and stereotypes and jokes and all that because otherwise it just sounds weird hearing some American voice actor whose never been to Japan try to talk about Japanese norms in an anime, it just makes it sound unnatural such as if you saw the body British looking kid but then he started speaking with a heavy Asian accent, it would seem weird.
Edit: I also agree with your take on the setting of an anime

Steins;gate, 91 days, baccano are all way better dubbed. Also its annoying when characters like karen in kiniro mosaic, who is half english, grew up in england, have a heavy japanese accent when speaking english. They should fine english va's who can speak japanese to do these voices so it sounds legit.

All good points, however, there's only a specific group of dubers who make me cringe, if I don't cringe when I watch Kingdom Hearts cutscenes in english but I do cringe watching anime dubs from the same era that I should by all account have the same level of nostalgia for I cringe.
And that's crazy because Kingdom Hearts is objectively cringe.

Japanese voice actors are the lebrons of their industry, but in the west, our anime voice actors are like the second string high school team
For anyone that speaks another language, they know that something can mean technically the same thing in another language but have a million different connotations because that is how language works

You should have taken and promoted a VPN sponsor for this video since torrenting requires a VPN or else your internet will get suspended for a day, then a week, then a month, and eventually, your internet account will get terminated and you will be blacklisted with all the ISPs in the area or in general or you will catch a ridiculously huge lawsuit you couldn't ever begin imagining being able to afford, nevermind pay. I'd recommend ExpressVPN but even they fuck up at times. They've just fucked up the least while NordVPN fucked up with me immediately, by lying to me about a free trial which will get you caught very quickly, almost like it's a trap.

Both are good, but I do sub first then dub for fun because the sub tends to be more accurate and sometimes dubs are done cheaply, if its a localized anime and it has a good dub I'll watch it first because I feel more at home hearing the voices in english.

Reject English, reject Japanese, Arabic superiority rises till no end.

"Ask anybody who hates English dubs to name a single anime with bad Japanese voice acting." I wouldn't say I "hate" dubs though I generally prefer the Japanese, but I can do this easily: Dragonball Z. I can't take that show seriously in Japanese because Goku sounds like he's huffing helium every second he's not on camera. Then again half the cast are named after vegetables so...

I do think that Japanese names are part of the reason I generally prefer the Japanese versions to dubs. Yes, that's not how actual Japanese sounds when spoken in real life, but it's internally consistent. Hearing dubbed voices mispronounce Japanese names in the middle of conversations is always a punch to the gut. For me at least I don't think it's an issue of the surreality scanning more in English because I don't have the same problem with theater or musicals or even American TV shows (people on TV and movies also don't speak English the way most real people speak English either). If anything I think it's that the surreality of the anime itself matches the surreality of the Japanese voice actors better than most dubs. I don't think you always have to watch shows in their original language, but I think it is an important thing to consider that people don't have the same complaints about anime-style shows made here (like Avatar). Perhaps it's a shared cultural understanding between the writers and the voice actors that tends to get lost in translation. I think there are plenty of perfectly passable dubs, but it doesn't escape my notice that the ones I've enjoyed the most were ones where the scripts were basically torn down and rebuilt from the ground up (yes, I'm counting DBZA and SAO Abridged as dubs and the voice work is fantastic).

Not even gonna watch the video, you are cringe or english language is cringe, not anime!

Me who doesn't even watch anime:

👁️👄👁️

That's such an interesting way to look at it! Nice video!

Any anime with English dub that bitches about GamerGate or "the patriarchy!" is an automatic blacklist for me. PERIOD.

I will never understand anime, it's the cringiest thing ever made I swear. Pokemon was alright because it's nostalgic, but everything else I just have to ask why.

Cromartie high school was probably the most japanese thing that ever aired with a great dub.

I watch sub and dub of the same anime and dub 8/10 times is just more enjoyable

I enjoy both, but I always ask the fans of a new anime I'm about to watch if the dub is any good. I will often watch the first few episodes switching between sub and sub to see which one seems to fit better in my opinion, and majority subs seem to fit, but I prefer watching dub bc of aspect you mentioned about being able to pay attention to what's happening. I've watched Death Note in sub and dub tho, honestly not sure which one I prefer in that sense; both are really good.

“I fight for my friends” took me out. Great video

who is bro talking to

Japanese shows use exaggerated language even in their live actions. I mean, people don't talk like how they do in dorama and tokusatsu.

i dont wanna watch this video because i dont watch anime but i just wanna say the best dub is the 4kids kirby anime

*from someone who's first language is Japanese

the myth that anime Japanese is not regular Japanese is an idea only held by people who are ignorant of the people and language. Sure, its exaggerated but not in the way you may think.
Japanese is still Japanese. the only real difference is the tone of voice (which many Japanese still do especially women) and the substitution or lack of real world terms or "slang".

It seems like it comes from a thought that anime is a "western obsession" and most real Japanese don't watch anime. Which is just completely un-true, Japanese culture was fundamentally changed and warped by anime. If these people knew the scale of impact say Cardcaptor Sakura or PuriPara, a whole lot of visual novels, etc had on the lives of many Japanese this wouldn't be a conversation.

on dubbing,
as someone who speaks English and Japanese natively I can say that not all, but most English dubbing is not very good. Voice acting isn't only about displaying emotion but displaying believable emotion. Most English voice actors are somehow in-capable of projecting that in a believable and immersive way. Japanese voice actors are most of the time much more experienced and skilled at not coming off as "cringe" or "forced" and speak in a more casual or more normal manner that aside from their voice don't sound very out of place in the real world.
But also a very big part of it is the translation between languages that don't share very much in the way of nuiance so many liberties are taken in translating which results in horrible writing.
Translators are skilled at their job for the most part, but they are not script-writers.

It really sucks to see this almost "elitism" that comes from people like this. At the end of the day people are allowed to enjoy what they want. And I hope English dubbing gets better in the future.

i like typing on my keyboard sorry

This does not negate the fact that many dub actors fail to match the level of emotion put into the performance by the original voice actors. It's also not uncommon for dubs to make changes to the original material.

I've thought about this stuff exactly and you fully fleshed it out and made it hilarious

Yes, someone finally understands

I'm with Socrates on this one

Great vid. I don't like the vast majority of anime because of it's presentation and speaking style and I've tried to explain why that is to friends for years. You've done a great job of explaining things in a way that I never could.

Same when I listen to Spanish dubs and I die from cringe

I think in a lot of cases too much literalism can hurt a dub because the viewer knows that’s not how people talk in English. On the other hand, the spirit of the text should be retained. When you get agenda-driven people altering the meaning the author had, that’s wrong.

Although, some things are improved by translation. Particularly comedy. Looking at you, Kaguya-sama. That cast made the show their own, and it’s spectacular.

I’m fine watching some things in sub. Some things though, I just have to stick to dub. Dragon Ball is an example of that.

A reason I didn't see mentioned was Eye Trace. As in directing the audiences eyes with the action. Watch any of your favorite fight scenes and see how the shots flow from one to the next as apposed to having to dart around the screen to follow whats happening. Now imagine every second you have to look away from the skilfully drawn, choreographed, directed, etc. scene to read a translation of the dialog. No longer immersed in in the story, or characters. It is just a lesser experience.

What I find funnier is watching a dubbed version and still seeing kanji title cards or times and not understanding what its supposed to mean. Multiple times in ATOT there were points where it would jump back and forth between past and present to explain some plot. Classic flash back story telling. They always had like 3年前 or something and we're sitting there like, is that 3 days, weeks, months, years? It was a minor inconvenience and it didn't ruin the story all that much, but you'd think a franchise that big would put a little more detail into localization.

i wish jojo would make the main dub of each part the language that the country is set in