AstroBoy Online Forums

What's your opinion on each of the series' English dubs? ×

1963 series

Very good for the time, though you could easily tell that it was a low budget dub. I do like that they kept the Japanese music but don't like that they cut some things

1980 series (US version)

It's decent, but they cut a lot. Again, like that they kept the Japanese music. On a side note, this is one of the few English anime adaptations in which the actors use proper diction.

2003 Series
Not that good. This used the Cardcaptor Sakura method and cut it down to make it more action oriented. Also, this is the first dub of Astro Boy/Tetsuwan Atomu that didn't kept the Japanese music. The voice acting ranges from okay to bad. Astro Boy's voice is too scratchy for my tastes, and Dr. Tenma is okay but a bit to bassy for me. However, they did start using the Japanese names....kinda.

So, what are your thoughts?

The 1963 series was dubbed by Fred Ladd who was very familiar with the works of Osmau Tezuka. He rewrote the story scripts and edited the film to "westernize" the appearance of the work. To make the show suitable for American audiences some of the cartoon violence had to be cut down, noticeably many of the scenes showing Astro's "butt guns" were removed! Also removed were references to characters dying. Frames containing Japanese language writing were also removed to hid the Asian origin of the show. Despite these changes, the story line of the ELV closely follows the original. The original Japanese theme music was NOT accompanied by song so the ELV overdubbed the theme with original song content. Tezuka was impressed by this and a Japanese children's choir provided a theme song for the second and third seasons of the Japanese version of the show!

The 1980 series was not badly edited either and once again the story lines of the ELV are very similar to the Japanese. Here the theme music was changed to provide an English language theme song. The same background music was used within the show for both the ELV and Japanese versions, however Uran's Japanese theme song was cut from the ELV and nothing was substituted for it. Also the Uran centric episodes did not have the unique ending for them in the ELV. The only major edits and cuts were to combine the first two episodes eliminating a good part of Atlas's story. (WHY?)

The 2003 ELV edit was a butcher job. First, the show WAS filmed in wide screen (16:9), but was transferred to DVD in a "pan and scan" conversion to a 4:3 aspect ratio (This when wide screen DVD transfers in anamorphic mode were common). Second, the original background music was overdubbed. The original Japanese production had references to the original 1963 Astro Boy theme music played at a slow tempo which highlighted the somber mood of certain scenes. This was lost in the dub. Third, the death of both Tobio and the human Dachi were removed from the plot. Tobio had only 'ran away', and Dachi was always a robot. Again WHY? Tobio's demise had been known in both of the previous ELV's of the earlier series. Still, the quality of the animation is rather good throughout the 2003 series, and the story line aside from the above points is still true to the screenwriter's intent. The dialog is corny at times, I admit. Some of the Japanese character names are used (I guess O'Shay is a contraction of sorts for Ochanomizu), while some 'new' names were invented.

I like the 1963 dub a lot, but the 1980 one gives me a headache... "It's not a dubbing, it's a clubbing!" The 2003 one was okay, but I didn't like Astro's voice. I didn't know about all the stuff they cut when I saw them for the first time so those were my first impressions.

I quite enjoy the 1963 dub. I think that's part of it's charm. Plus, they did the best they could with like what, 3 voice actors?

1980 is okay. It's passable for me since it could have been much worse. And yeah, they didn't butcher it with editing like 2003.

2003 is definitely the worse. Oh man, speaking of Cardcaptor Sakura, I had decided to watch an ep of the dub since I was rewatching the sub and oh my god it's not even the same show anymore. 2003 Astro Boy was pretty bad, but I think Cardcaptor Sakura suffered a worse fate. I couldn't believe how much they edited it. And the awful voice acting, man.

Dubbing of anime has gotten a lot better, thank god. Not all of it is amazing, but it's definitely miles better than it used to be. It makes me hopeful that anime that I love will get good dubs. (looking at you Hunter x Hunter)

Yeah. I do wonder if any of the previous Astro Boy anime could be reduced accurately and uncut

i don't know, and i don't care if one's better then the other, i think that dub vs original arguments are stupid, and i don't wanna be part of that...

^
If you don't wanna be a part of it....don't be a part of it.

I think it's fascinating to analyze how the franchise has been adapted for an English speaking audience.

"gokaiblue" wrote:Yeah. I do wonder if any of the previous Astro Boy anime could be reduced accurately and uncut

Unfortunately, Tezuka Productions holds a tight grip on Astro Boy and doesn't seem to want to release the full Japanese versions of each series internationally (with the exception of Little Astro Boy, which wasn't entirely made by them). If I remember hearing correctly, a lot of the Japanese version of the 1963 series was lost in a fire many years ago. Tetsuwan Penguin or F-Man could explain things better than I could about that. So, it's understandable why we only have bits and pieces of the Japanese version of that series.

However, I would love to see a full Japanese release of the 1980 series and 2003 series internationally one day.

As for the topic at hand, I've only really delved into the 2003 series' English dub, which was many years ago on Toonami. I remember not being a huge fan of it, especially Atom's voice. I wouldn't say it was absolutely terrible, but it certainly wasn't worthy of any awards.

I wouldn't mind watching the English version of the 1963 series one day. Just haven't gotten around to it yet.

^
I heard about that. Shame that home video recorders hadn't been invented. There's bound to be other copies of the film masters, though.

But yeah, I think it's probably more likely that we'll get uncut releases of the 1980 and 2003 series at this point, despite Tezuka productions not wanting to release it in that form for some reason. It's strange that certain anime only have edited releases over here (and some uncut anime aren't in their proper aspect ratios....looking at you DBZ).

60s: has awkward moments but given the time and I think being the first anime dubbed for American television, I think it's not as bad as it could've been. It's actually rather charming in its flaws. And I like Astro's voice. It's often what I hear when I read the manga.
80s: aside from the edits to the first two episodes, my only real gripe about this dub is the acting. It's SOOO bland. And for the record, the Canadian dub had the best voice for Astro. When I don't hear the 60x voice, I hear him.
2003: *eye twitches* every major dubbing mistake you COULD make, this one did