I just feel a need to comment on how mostly everyone seems to have a very ignorant attitude towards the North American Dragon Ball Z dub. I am getting really sick of constantly seeing "American DBZ sucks!". Not to say that the dub is superior, or even equal to its original form, but it is very impotant to getting true DBZ available here. The dub is very bad for the show, but, I think; good for the future of the show.

First I should probably state that I was first introduced to Dragon Ball Z by the american dub; by my 9 year old little brother no less! My point being that without the dub being run, there would be so many people (including me, and alot of you) who would not be exposed to this great anime. I have since seen gotten a few fansubs of the show, emailed Funimation with my comments on getting subbed DBZ, and signed the petition at Toriyama.org, as well as encouraged others to do so. The more people who see the dub, the more people who will become interested in the original show; and subsequently more people will demand to see the Japanese DBZ. Even though the new tapes will be uncut, I just refuse to purchase the dub of the show, even if it is better then it has been so far, it will just never be able to compete with the original voice actors and score. I wouldn't mind having the dub on a DVD when I purchase the subs (wishful thinking), but the dub alone is just not good enough.

My message to people who are intolerant of the dub is to do everything in your power to get the show commercially subtitled, I know I hate the quality of fansubs. It makes it harder to let someone understand my obsession with the show when the fansubs are so obviously inferior in quality to the other anime that I have, and the dub; well I just don't want to expose them to the dub and let that be there first impression of the show. It may have been my first impression of the show, but I saw it as an anime aimed towards children at first, so even the dub surprised me. My friends would hold the dub to the standards of anime that the dub just can't compete with. With only my fansubs in hand I have (sort of) gotten a couple of friends interested, but again the flaws of fansubs almost negate this interest. So to sum this up, I think that the more that you complain that the dub sucks and bash people who (unfortunatly) can only see it on Cartoon Network and not encouraging the popularity of the show, the more you hinder yourself from being able to own the show in its purest form. Hopefully we can get rid of all of the "American dbz sucks" comments, or whatever,cause most of us already know; and those who don't will eventually find out.

And by the way, even my 9 year old little brother prefers the fansubs of the show, the sound and picture are in lower quality; because even he can recognize the inferiority of the dub. He is not damaged in anyway by any of the violence, or seeing Gohan urinate, or even the concept of death. For some odd reason the whole next dimension thing did not bother him at all, I think he just sort of always saw it as a euphamism for death. If only I could be that tolerant.

- Ryan
<Dvdad@netscape.net>