DT's Sub/Dub Comparisons - Yugioh

[DarkToph]

I've been interested in finding differences between the original Japanese version of anime and the dubbed version since reading a lot of the Pokemon comparisons on Bulbagarden. However, I'm really on interested in anime with heavy edits, like Yugioh, Cardcaptors (blech), DiC's dub of Sailor Moon and 4Kids dub of One Piece. I'm also tempted to do Tokyo Mew Mew/Mew Mew Power, but those episodes are so messed up it'd be difficult to try and do side-by-side comparisons.

And now, because I'm a big geek, enjoy the sub/dub comparison of Yugioh episode 1.

Note that these comparisons also contain a mini-review or nitpicks of the episode in question.

Episode summary:

Key characters:

Yugi Mutou/Moto: A cheerful kid with a passion for the card game Duel Monsters. He spent eight years putting together the legendary Millennium Puzzle given to him by his Grandpa. His motivation throughout this season is saving his grandfather’s soul from Pegasus. Deck theme: Ancient warriors, spellcasters and beasts.

Yami: Ancient spirit that lies within the puzzle and frequently takes over Yugi’s body to chea—help him in duels. He has no memories of who he was before he became trapped in the puzzle.

Joey Wheeler/Jounouchi Kazuya: A rookie to the game of Duel Monsters, Joey has a rough method of speech, but a heart of gold. He’s Yugi’s best friend and is the underdog for the series.  His motivation throughout this season is getting the tournament prize money to pay for a surgery to save his little sister, Serenity’s eye sight. Deck theme: Swordsman, warriors, beasts.

Anzu/T’ea Gardner: Not as good as Yugi, but not as green as Joey/Jounouchi (At least initially...), T’ea/Anzu is mostly support throughout the course of the series. She has a strong belief in friendship (to the point of sheer annoyance in the dub) and is a ‘love interest’ for Yugi and Yami. Deck theme: Cutesy cards, fairies, females.

Honda/Tristan Taylor: Tristan/Honda is by far the most useless main character in this show. He does quite literally nothing for ages and when he does do something, it’s nothing important or is reversed later. Though he is shown to have Duel Monsters’ cards, he very rarely ever duels in the show. He is mostly support for Joey/Jounouchi. Deck theme: Never really shown, as the only times he really duels it's with decks that aren't really his, but judging from outside sources, I’d wager it’s military themed, soldiers, guns and such.

Seto Kaiba: The CEO of Kaiba Corp, one of the most powerful companies in the world, Kaiba is the world champion in Duel Monsters and believes cards are about power not heart. His motivation throughout the entire show is mostly beating Yugi and saving his kidnap-prone brother….Deck theme: Powerhouse lineup and dragons, lots of dragons.

…Mokuba Kaiba: Seto’s younger brother has a deep devotion to his brother. However, Mokuba is mostly Kaiba support in moral support and technical support. Mokuba frequently gets kidnapped which drives Kaiba through various scenarios. Deck theme: None. He very, very rarely duels and when he does, it’s not with his real cards.

Yugi’s grandpa – Solomon Moto: Solomon is Yugi’s supposed caretaker in the dub (since his mom is edited out) He used to be an archeologist as well as a very skilled duelist. He gave Yugi his Millennium Puzzle after finding it on a dig. Solomon holds the fourth Blue eyes card, which Kaiba destroys. Deck theme: Identical to Yugi’s since he uses that unchanged throughout the first season.

Plot: Yugi and his friends love playing Duel Monsters, but when the world champ, Seto Kaiba, overhears that Yugi’s grandpa has a super rare card at his game shop, he believes it to be the card he’s been searching for for ages. When he arrives, lo and behold, it’s the Blue Eyes he’s been looking for. However, Solomon won’t sell it or trade for it because it’s so precious to him. Kaiba later kidnaps Yugi’s grandpa and duels him for the card. Solomon falls ill after losing to Kaiba and Yugi goes to save him. Kaiba rips up the blue eyes to prevent it from ever being used against him and challenges Yugi to a duel as his grandpa goes to the hospital. Yugi struggles with Kaiba for a long time, believing he’ll lose. Will one card be the difference between triumph and defeat?

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

I don’t completely understand Kaiba’s reasoning for kidnapping Yugi’s Grandpa. I know he wanted the Blue Eyes, but why did he want it so badly? 1) It’s pretty clear his Grandpa was never going to sell it to anyone or trade it. 2) He also didn’t show a desire to use it in a duel. 3) Even if it was ever used against you, you have three Blue-eyes, you have a huge advantage. In addition, tearing up a card doesn’t mean it can’t be used in anymore duels. I mean, maybe in duels using the holograms (because the system probably couldn’t ‘read’ the card that way) but it’s still usable. If you wanted it gone so badly, you should’ve burned it.

Why does Joey mention that Yugi has the Millennium Puzzle when he’s listing off reasons as to why he can win? He doesn’t know at this point that that thing has magical powers to help him win duels, so basically he’s saying “Hey Yugi, you can win this card game because you have a giant necklace!” In the subbed version he talks about how Yugi helped change him from a fight-loving thug.

In order to make it a surprise that Kaiba has the other three Blue Eyes, they omit the part of Kaiba’s speech before the duel where he mentions that a deck can only have three copies of the same card and he destroyed the fourth because he couldn’t use it and didn’t want it used against him. So when Blue Eyes shows up in the dub, it’s a huge reveal even though in the Japanese version they state it before the battle even begins.

This season is well-known for the utmost disregard of the rules of the game. In the Yugioh game, each player starts out with 8000 life points. What you can summon depends on how many stars the monster has. If a monster has 4 stars or below, it can instantly be summoned. If it has 5-6 stars (I believe) it requires one monster to be sacrificed from the field. If a monster has 7 or more stars, it requires 2 sacrifices. In this season, incredibly powerful monsters can be summoned from the start and each duel requires only 2000 life points on each player. You’d think this would make duels go faster. Hehe, you’re so cute. That being said, I can side with the fans that actually like this season for the disregard of the official rules because it made the duels more interesting to watch. Later on, the duels get so bogged down by rules that it's suffocating. However, this disregard for the official rules creates a lot of WTF moments later on.

You also hardly ever see direct attacks in this season. In the game, if you have no monsters on the field, but your opponent does, they can attack your life points directly causing damage equal to the number of attack points a monster has. Take the duel in this episode for example. Surely Kaiba has other monsters that he can summon from his hand when Saggi is on the field. If he did, Yugi’s one monster per turn defense would fail and he’d win in a matter of a couple of turns, yet he doesn’t. In addition, it doesn’t seem to matter if you have more than one monster out. If your opponent has one defense monster, I guess you’re barred from using the other monster to attack. Pegasus mentions that this is an official rule in the Duelist Kingdom tournament, so he gets a pass, but why no direct attacks in this duel?

Also, Kaiba states that the Swords of Revealing Light card only affects monsters that are currently on the field during activation. A new monster won’t be under the same spell. This is entirely wrong; new monsters are just as affected by Swords as the others.

Subbed, dubbed, that friendship smiley face thing is still uber cheese.

Quick edit: Exodia comes out of a pentagram in the original. They added more lines in the dubbed version to avoid controversy.

Name Changes: I honestly don’t understand why they chose to change only some of their names. 4kids changes names a lot in order to Americanize their shows, but only a handful are changed in Yugioh. Jonouchi is changed to Joey, Honda is Tristan and Anzu is Te’a (I’ve never even heard of that name before. Why change her name to sound just as foreign?) Pegasus also had a slight name change. In the sub he’s Pegasus J. Crawford. In the dub he’s Maximillion Pegasus. This is yet another name change I just don’t get. Why change it so that his first name is his last name? Either way, both the sub and dub characters call him Pegasus. Though, I do have to say, at least the dub makes Pegasus’s parents look better. Max is a fairly normal first name and you can’t do much about your surname. His Mom and Dad must’ve hated his guts to name him Pegasus….

Entire show edit: The dubbed version never shows the title cards. Which is weird. I’m sure 4Kids could’ve come up with all sorts of puns.

Entire show edit: The opening and ending themes have been replaced for the entire run……Though, the be completely honest, I prefer the Dub version’s better. :/

Entire show edit: All of the cards had to be edited for the American release to not look like the TCG cards. Instead of showing them as they look as the real-life TCG cards, they only show the picture, level, attack and defense points. This causes a lot of confusion during the series as the characters seem to read cards several times, but there’s no text to read. It also makes you wonder how you know what they do at all.

Entire show edit: Though Kaiba is still an **** in the series, he’s is much more respectful in the subbed version. Dubbed Kaiba slings insults and treats people like crap while subbed version Kaiba is more subtly condescending and uses honorifics.

Entire show edit: As typical 4kids fashion, a lot of the music is replaced and there is hardly ever any silence.

Entire show edit: Names and pictures of certain cards have been changed to suit the English version of the TCG…or vice versa. Some for censoring issues, others for pbbbtttwhatthehell.

Voices: I’ve brought this up before and I might as well do it again, Dubbed Yugi never sat well with me. I can partly understand if his friends don’t realize his eyes, demeanor and height change when he duels, kinda….But Yami’s voice is so deep compared to Yugi’s in the dub that it’s completely unbelievable that they wouldn’t notice that. In the Japanese version, Yami sounds just like Yugi only using a deeper, smoother voice. It’s a very subtle change. Don’t get me wrong, Dan Green does an awesome job as Yami, but they really should’ve give Yugi a better voice so it didn’t sound so drastic. …Also, why is it they all seem to notice when Yugi gets encompassed by light but no one bothers building on that?

Entire show edit: Obviously any references to death or religion, gods, devils etc. was 4kids-ized.

[Doru]

I don't think this has much to do with the comparisons as much as it is just a yugioh thing but, one thing that always irked me when it first started coming out was freaking Flame Swordsman. In the show Joey just summons him like he's a normal monster but when I finally got the card it was a damn fusion, wth? Also whenever I played yugioh back in the day I went by the anime rules and it was pretty fun, but when I went to playing like it should be I was a little lost at the beginning.

[DarkToph]

I don't think this has much to do with the comparisons as much as it is just a yugioh thing but, one thing that always irked me when it first started coming out was freaking Flame Swordsman. In the show Joey just summons him like he's a normal monster but when I finally got the card it was a damn fusion, wth? Also whenever I played yugioh back in the day I went by the anime rules and it was pretty fun, but when I went to playing like it should be I was a little lost at the beginning.

I haven't gotten to the episode where the Flame Swordsman is debuted (Well, I have, but I haven't posted the comparison yet), but here's the deal. The original version seems to have changed The Flame Swordsman to a normal monster, as it's color is changed to yellow in the anime. In the dub, 4Kids changed the color back to purple for fusion, which is surprising. Looking online, I see that there is a regular version of the card and a fusion version, however, I don't know which came first the fusion version or the regular monster. Judging from some things I found, I'm guessing the original anime made that change for whatever reason and a regular version of the card was later released. I was always under the impression that it was a fusion monster as well. I commend 4Kids for changing it back, but anyone familiar with the game would get confused as to why Joey could summon a clearly marked fusion monster like a regular monster. Does that even get changed in later seasons? Because I know Flame Swordsman is like Joey's mascot.

I always played by regular rules, but I'd sometimes pretend I was playing by anime rules when I was just screwing around. Sometimes I'd go overboard and be like "That totally sounds like I'm pulling stuff out of my ass to cheat..." But then I'd realize that that's not a far cry from the way the first season is. XD

[Doru]

I don't think this has much to do with the comparisons as much as it is just a yugioh thing but, one thing that always irked me when it first started coming out was freaking Flame Swordsman. In the show Joey just summons him like he's a normal monster but when I finally got the card it was a damn fusion, wth? Also whenever I played yugioh back in the day I went by the anime rules and it was pretty fun, but when I went to playing like it should be I was a little lost at the beginning.

I haven't gotten to the episode where the Flame Swordsman is debuted (Well, I have, but I haven't posted the comparison yet), but here's the deal. The original version seems to have changed The Flame Swordsman to a normal monster, as it's color is changed to yellow in the anime. In the dub, 4Kids changed the color back to purple for fusion, which is surprising. Looking online, I see that there is a regular version of the card and a fusion version, however, I don't know which came first the fusion version or the regular monster. Judging from some things I found, I'm guessing the original anime made that change for whatever reason and a regular version of the card was later released. I was always under the impression that it was a fusion monster as well. I commend 4Kids for changing it back, but anyone familiar with the game would get confused as to why Joey could summon a clearly marked fusion monster like a regular monster. Does that even get changed in later seasons? Because I know Flame Swordsman is like Joey's mascot.

I always played by regular rules, but I'd sometimes pretend I was playing by anime rules when I was just screwing around. Sometimes I'd go overboard and be like "That totally sounds like I'm pulling stuff out of my ass to cheat..." But then I'd realize that that's not a far cry from the way the first season is. XD

Lol

Perhaps they just wanted to have Joey use Flameswordsman as his main warrior after they'd designed the card? iirc The materials for the card aren't exactly something you'd expect to find in Joey's deck and I guess the whole having to fuse to get it out would be tedious so they just let it slide... Actually... were the material monsters in his original starter deck? I remember the cover card was Red Eyes and Flame was in it but I think I got them from booster packs... Heh, it's kinda funny how once Joey gets Red Eyes, Flame takes a backseat.

I think I actually cheated a couple times. I remember somewhat early in the thing, for some reason I had it in my head that if you ever ran out of cards in your hand you'd lose. Haha, and that actually only got me a win once.

[DarkToph]

I don't think this has much to do with the comparisons as much as it is just a yugioh thing but, one thing that always irked me when it first started coming out was freaking Flame Swordsman. In the show Joey just summons him like he's a normal monster but when I finally got the card it was a damn fusion, wth? Also whenever I played yugioh back in the day I went by the anime rules and it was pretty fun, but when I went to playing like it should be I was a little lost at the beginning.

I haven't gotten to the episode where the Flame Swordsman is debuted (Well, I have, but I haven't posted the comparison yet), but here's the deal. The original version seems to have changed The Flame Swordsman to a normal monster, as it's color is changed to yellow in the anime. In the dub, 4Kids changed the color back to purple for fusion, which is surprising. Looking online, I see that there is a regular version of the card and a fusion version, however, I don't know which came first the fusion version or the regular monster. Judging from some things I found, I'm guessing the original anime made that change for whatever reason and a regular version of the card was later released. I was always under the impression that it was a fusion monster as well. I commend 4Kids for changing it back, but anyone familiar with the game would get confused as to why Joey could summon a clearly marked fusion monster like a regular monster. Does that even get changed in later seasons? Because I know Flame Swordsman is like Joey's mascot.

I always played by regular rules, but I'd sometimes pretend I was playing by anime rules when I was just screwing around. Sometimes I'd go overboard and be like "That totally sounds like I'm pulling stuff out of my ass to cheat..." But then I'd realize that that's not a far cry from the way the first season is. XD

Lol

Perhaps they just wanted to have Joey use Flameswordsman as his main warrior after they'd designed the card? iirc The materials for the card aren't exactly something you'd expect to find in Joey's deck and I guess the whole having to fuse to get it out would be tedious so they just let it slide... Actually... were the material monsters in his original starter deck? I remember the cover card was Red Eyes and Flame was in it but I think I got them from booster packs... Heh, it's kinda funny how once Joey gets Red Eyes, Flame takes a backseat.

I think I actually cheated a couple times. I remember somewhat early in the thing, for some reason I had it in my head that if you ever ran out of cards in your hand you'd lose. Haha, and that actually only got me a win once.

Hm....TO GOOGLE!

Yup, the Flame Manipulator and Misaki the Legendary Swordsman are in his starter deck. However, the starter deck doesn't come with a Polymerization card, so it's a little pointless. Kinda funny how the starter deck would give you the fusion monster and the materials to make it but not the card to put them together.

That's actually sad about Red Eyes, because even though Red Eyes is stronger, Flame Swordsman always seemed more badass to me.

You turned Yugioh into reverse Uno. XD

[Doru]

Lol, never saw it that way.

Same here, although I took a bit more of a liking to the blue flameswordsman (anime only) that came out. Well that might've been true before all the support red eyes got... Well I'll let you get on with your comparison

[DarkToph]

Lol, never saw it that way.

Same here, although I took a bit more of a liking to the blue flameswordsman (anime only) that came out. Well that might've been true before all the support red eyes got... Well I'll let you get on with your comparison

Why must you make me work?!?!?1 D8

:p

Yugioh episode 2 sub dub comparison

Episode Summary:

Key Characters:

Weevil Underwood/Insect Haga: A slimy little cheater who is the regional champion. He uses bug cards and combos to overpower his opponents while sometimes cheating to achieve victory. Deck theme: Insects and combos.

Rex Raptor/Dinosaur Ryuuzaki: Taking second place in that same tournament, he relies entirely on the power of his dinosaurs and believes more in powerhouse cards than combos. Deck theme: Powerhouse lineup, dinosaurs.

Maximillion Pegasus/Pegasus Crawford: Creator of the hit card game Duel Monsters, Pegasus has a tragic backstory and a mysterious power. His left eye has been replaced by the Millennium eye, an ancient artifact that allows the user various powers, but the key one being seeing what other people see and even influencing their moves. Deck theme: Cartoons and ancient creatures.

Plot: Jounouchi is training with Grandpa to be in an upcoming tournament. He comes in eighth, but still has a lot to learn. After watching the finals of the tournament on TV, Yugi gets a mysterious package containing a glove, some stars and a videotape. As he pops the video in, he sees the creator of Duel Monsters, Pegasus Crawford, on the screen proposing a duel to Yugi. He drags Yugi to play a Yami no game, a game played with real monsters and real consequences. Whoever is ahead within fifteen minutes wins. If Yugi wins, he’s left alone. If he loses, he has to go to Duelist Kingdom for a tournament being held by Pegasus. Will Yugi win or will he lose something precious to him?

Voice notes:Again, I’ve mentioned this before, but Weevil and Rex have much better voices in the Japanese version. Rex’s voice in the dub is insanely nasally and it sounds like he has a throat infection. Weevil’s voice is horrid in the dub. He sounds like a cartoon weasel. Rex’s voice in the Japanese version is very plain, but much less grating than the dub. Weevil’s voice is incredibly fitting in the sub. It’s a very soft and methodical voice that leads you to believe he’s hiding something. Weevil’s not a kind-hearted person and you can tell he’s not trustworthy just by his eyes, but his voice adds some degree of mystery about his true intentions.

Name changes: Dinosaur Ryuuzaki is changed to Rex Raptor and Insect Haga is changed to Weevil Underwood. I find no reason to prod 4Kids about this since they were just taking lame pun names and changing them into even lamer pun names.

Picture edit: The poster for the upcoming Duel Monsters tournament is completely redone for the dub. However, the Japanese poster was incredibly lame IMO and the dub one is far superior. Grats 4Kids I complimented you. ....However, would it have killed you to add text to it?

For a visual comparison, see here:

Subbed: http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa133/Xemone/SUBDUBYGOEP2SCREENCAP1_zpsb539c44b.png
Dubbed: http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa133/Xemone/SUBDUBYGOEP2SCREENCAP2_zps759b4f93.png

Tournament: There’s no real reason given in the dub as to why Jounouchi wants to join that tournament. In the sub version, it’s heavily hinted that it’s because there’s a 3 million (?) dollar reward. Grandpa says he wants to cleanse Jounouchi of his impure intention of simply getting money from dueling by teaching him the heart of the cards. Then Jounouchi screams as they fade out. In the Dub, Grandpa basically starts grilling him about all sorts of Duel Monsters questions.

Tournament Cont.: In the sub version, Jounouchi makes it to the final eight in the aforementioned tournament and most of their conversion on the couch includes mentions of it. In the dub, they act as if he never even competed.

Voice Notes:Pegasus in the sub is very entertaining to listen to. He constantly switches back and forth between English and Japanese. I don’t mind Pegasus’s dubbed voice at all. In fact, it’s pretty fitting. But he does sound immensely creepy sometimes.

I understand Pegasus’s power to see other people’s cards and read their strategies, but he can’t always have the right card in his hand to counter whatever the other player is planning.

I’m honestly surprised LittleKuriboh never brought this up; We have advanced technology to make realistic animated life-sized monster holograms for a CHILDREN’S CARD GAME, but they haven’t advanced past the VHS tape. That’s mind-boggling.

The duel between Pegasus and Yugi is heavily changed, at least dialogue wise. In the dub, Pegasus takes this opportunity to tell Yugi all about the story of Duel monsters. He explains that they’re in a shadow game in the shadow realm and how the game was made using real monsters in ancient Egypt blah blah blah. They even put the final winning attack in the Pegasus vs. Yugi battle in there for no good reason besides it’s the one in the first season that looked the most Egyptian-y. In the original, they only talk about Pegasus’s upcoming tournament and how he’s using his Millennium Eye to win.

In the original, Yugi seems very honorable in that he wants to destroy his controlled Devil Dragon instead of the Piper, which has lower attack points, thus would suffer the most damage. He wants to destroy the dragon first because he has a duty to his cards to not allow them to be under the control of a malicious being. In the dub, Yugi just gloats and mentions nothing about duty. He just attacks the Koumori Dragon and moves on.

Yugi mentions that he could win if he stalls until the time runs out when he’s ahead in life points. However, he doesn’t want to because that wouldn’t be a legit win to him. Dub Yugi makes no mention of this ‘loophole’

[Doru]

WHAT?!? Joey was actually in that little tournament where Rex and Weevil first appear? Never knew that, kind of thought he was a straight up rookie going into Pegasus' tournament.

Sounds like sub Yugi is smarter/more skilled than dub Yugi... why? Japan! XD

[DarkToph]

WHAT?!? Joey was actually in that little tournament where Rex and Weevil first appear? Never knew that, kind of thought he was a straight up rookie going into Pegasus' tournament.

Sounds like sub Yugi is smarter/more skilled than dub Yugi... why? Japan! XD

I think that was 4Kids's intentions. You can tell when they mock Joey more in the dub later on during scenes where, again, they talk about his tournament placing. Maybe to give the message that even rookies can achieve stuff if they try hard enough? Even though Joey's my second favorite main character (So I'm a Bakura fangirl shaddap), he still basically went into the tournament as a psuedo-rookie. You can tell by how many 'rookie' mistakes he still makes in the first season, especially when he duels alone. Like where he fights Kaiba and he keeps attacking a monster with higher attack than every monster he throws out to attack and drains his life points...I was like yelling at the screen, GO INTO DEFENSE UNTIL YOU GET A BETTER CARD, DOOFUS. :0

The dub does try numerous times to make Yugi seem like the underdog in duels. He's OP enough without flaunting it like a new suit. XD

[DarkToph]

Yugioh Episode 3 dub/dub comparison

Episode summary:

Key Characters:

Kujaku Mai/Mai Valentine: Mai works her beauty and her charm to gain advantage over gullible male duelists. She is an extremely powerful duelist who has difficulty putting her heart in the right place. She is Jounouchi’s ‘love interest’ throughout the series and her motivation in this season is simply material things. Deck theme: Harpies and cards used to power up harpies. Later she also gets more cards with female themes.

Bakura Ryou: A mysterious boy with a dark secret. His Millennium Ring holds the spirit of an ancient spirit just as Yugi’s Millennium Puzzle. However, unlike Yugi’s item, Bakura’s spirit is evil and wants nothing more than to steal all of the Millennium items. Bakura himself is rather timid and softspoken, but strong when he needs to be. Deck theme: Demons and dark creatures.

Serenity Wheeler/Jounouchi Shizuka: Jounouchi’s sister who has been suffering from an illness her entire life. Eventually she will lose her eyesight and become irreversibly blind. Jounouchi is dueling in Duelist Kingdom for the prize money to hire specialists to help her. She is a kind, albeit naïve girl with a heart of gold and a true love for her big brother.

Plot: Yugi accepts Pegasus’s invitation to Duelist Kingdom in order to recover his Grandfather’s soul. Yugi helps Jounouchi get aboard by giving him one of his star chips, while Anzu and Honda sneak onboard. While onboard, they meet some of their future opponents, Insect Haga, Dinosaur Ryuuzaki and Kujaku Mai. Haga gets his hands on the Exodia cards and throws them overboard to ensure that they can never be used against him. Jounouchi jumps into the waters below to recover the cards but can only retrieve two before needing rescue. After being rescued by Anzu, Honda and Yugi, Jounouchi tells them of his sister’s medical troubles and they both promise to do their best in the tournament for the people they love.

Edit – In the subbed version, as Yugi’s on the school roof, he sees Pegasus’s face overlayed over the sunset as he thinks about his Millennium Eye and how he could see his cards. In the dub, Pegasus has been replaced by Yugi’s Grandpa and he’s worrying about his grandpa instead.

Entire show edit: All flashbacks need fuzzy white borders because kids are too stupid to realize a flashback is happening without them.

Something that can’t be seen, but…can’t be seen: A running ‘proverb’ so to speak throughout the show is ‘that which can be seen, yet not seen,’ the true shape of the Millennium Puzzle before finishing it, friendship etc. The dub completely omits this.

In the dub, Joey excuses his actions as Yugi’s bully by saying he was trying to toughen him up. In the subbed version, he admits he was just annoyed at Yugi for being indecisive….Over what, I don’t know.

In the sub, a bigger bully named Ushio sorta hired himself as Yugi’s bodyguard to take care of Jounouchi and Honda for him for a lump sum. In the dub version, he’s unnamed and Ushio makes no mention of any bodyguard deal. Also, for some reason they add that they got Ushio expelled….what does this add to anything?

Mai in the subbed version basically ignores Jounouchi entirely. In the dub she’s very mean to him for no reason. I guess this is to prod the JoeyxMai relationship.

Directly after that scene, Anzu is upset that Yugi and Jounouchi are lusting after Mai and calls them perverts. In the dub, T’ea is upset because Mai’s so arrogant and keeps babbling that Yugi’s the best duelist. I guess this is to prod YugixT’ea.

Name change: Mai Kujaku is changed to Mai Valentine (Because that’s so clever and subtle, 4Kids.)

Am I the only one who finds it incredibly arrogant that Joey/Jounouchi barely makes it onto to boat only through Yugi’s kindness and he has the nerve to bitch that he doesn’t get a private room? He does this in both versions.

LittleKuriboh made this infamous, but when Anzu gets up, she’s looking for a toilet and Honda tells her to go pee off the side of the ship. This was probably seen as crass humor by 4Kids so they changed it to T’ea being cold (so warm yourself up by getting closer to the freezing cold ocean in the freezing cold open air.) and then Tristan tells her the sun will rise in another few hours. (I know it’s stupid, but he probably meant the sunlight will warm her up in a few hours and she gets pissed.) Afterwards, before the transition, Anzu actually says she’s cold and shivers, but 4Kids cut this….WHY? That scene actually lends credence to your edit you dumbasses!

Picture: http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa133/Xemone/SUBDUBYGOEP3SCREENCAP1_zpsc9741b08.png

Mai in the subbed version says she’ll do anything (wink wink) if Ryuuzaki wins. 4Kids has their head in the gutter, so they changed it to simply a kiss.

I don’t entirely understand Mai’s perfume trick. First of all, Rex/Ryuuzaki can’t smell that her cards are drenched in perfume? Second, all of those smells would meld together when on top of each other in a deck. How could she tell them apart enough to know which is where?

CENSOR! Obviously the card “Cyber Bondage” with the giant needle nipples needed to be censored to Cyber Shield and the needle nipples went poof.

Visual evidence:

Subbed: http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa133/Xemone/SUBDUBYGOEP3SCREENCAP2_zps9d565018.png
Dubbed: http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa133/Xemone/SUBDUBYGOEP3SCREENCAP3_zps7e807a74.png

It’s pointless, really, but at the end of the Japanese version, before the preview, they overlay a rather intimidating picture of Yami for some reason. In the dub, his face has been removed and only focuses on the sun rising.

[EHW]

I can give you a straight-up answer as to why Joey in the sub gives the puzzle as a reason. In the original manga and season zero, which the subbed version is assuming you read and watched first, Yugi solves the puzzle and then has several plots to derail, which are often a single chapter in length and therefore at most two episodes long. Eventually, Yugi and his friends find out about the spirit of the puzzle, long before they do on Pegasus' island, therefore Joey listing the puzzle as a reason Yugi can win makes sense. Plus, the idea is that Yugi completed something previously unsolvable - therefore if anyone can find a strategy to work around a Blue-Eyes, it would be him.

On the subject of the white borders - of course the small children wouldn't know what a flashback is. If anything IS flashback in TV shows aimed at them, it's always in white borders or greyscale, or has massive letters tell them it's in the past, because somehow they can't understand otherwise. But it is true - I've tried to watch films and TV shows which go into flashbacks at regular intervals while with someone younger than me (i.e. small child), and not once without help could they spot a flashback, meaning they asked inane questions which I had to answer and explain.

The whole video tape thing makes sense actually. See, it isn't that Pegasus doesn't have better than VHS, it's that Yugi and Solomon are both pretty poor - the gameshop doesn't make a lot of money until Yugi wins the title King of Games, and then only because it's the shop his family owns and uses. Therefore, they have a VHS but no DVD-player. The other three are in a similar sort of situation money-wise - Joey has a deadbeat dad, Tristan is saving for university and Tea works, something which apparently is unallowed by their school and therefore is incredibly risky. She is doing this to make her way to America to learn dance, so cannot afford nice things either.

Again, the sub presumes that the viewers watched Season Zero. Considering the sub is for Japan, it's good thinking as Season Zero was popular in Japan, though North American audiences disliked it enough so that it never left the Land of the Rising Sun. In the sub, Joey and Tristan are horrible bullies when it comes to Yugi. While their motives aren't the most clear at first, later it is explained that Joey is doing it mainly because he grew up moving around with his deadbeat drunk dad, falling into gangs as a way to fit in. Therefore, bullying is his defensive tactic to work off his frustration and anger. Tristan is friends with Joey, and that's it, so tends to follow Joey's lead in the sub - he starts hanging out with Yugi and stops bullying Yugi simply because Joey chooses to.
Finally, Yugi and Joey in the sub are massive perverts - Yugi is constantly trying to get sneaky peeks at Tea and his crush on her is in part because she's very good-looking, though it was originally based upon the fact that she sticks up for him when he needs the help. Therefore, getting on Yugi's and Joey's case for being pervy over Mai is completely in character with all three of them.

Because Season Zero never got dubbed, a lot of the plot-points and concepts behind the main characters in Season One had to rewritten or scrapped. Yugi is made into a timid young man for no adequately explored reason - since he was a slightly timid but pretty well-rounded character in the sub; Joey is just some weird tough-guy sorta person who happens to be Yugi's best friend without any development into how or why this is the case; Tea just becomes talking boobs for Yugi to be shipped with; and Tristan becomes a tag-along.

It's really unfortunate, because it completely changes the face of the show. I think the most different part is Yugi's reasons to enter the tournament. While both versions have the reason being to regain his grandfather's soul, the dub doesn't explain why he'd believe that this Shadow Game was true as opposed to a hallucination and his grandfather having a stroke. It's an extremely flimsy plot-point that is never really addressed. In the sub, because of the existence of Season Zero and Yugi being more than familiar with the concept of a shadow game by this point, it's perfectly understandable that he'd recognise both a millenium item and how its used, due to his meeting of Shadi about one third of the way into Season Zero.

Mai's perfume trick... I think the idea is because she's female. And no, that's not a slight. Basically, men don't pick up on scents from perfume as well as women do, and while Mai cannot tell what card she'll get next from the deck itself, by placing it facedown she can then pick up the scent and work it out. She probably has an issue with one of her senses to do this, and her sense of smell compensates for it, but honestly its never really looked into, just like how Joey was the one idiot who worked it out is never explained.

Finally, before I finish - the reason that they can go to the tournament, and "skip school" according to LittleKuriboh, is because the original manga addressed the fact that the tournament would take place during the summer - allowing for the truckload of younger players to join the tournament without having pressing matters. Somehow, I doubt school would accept the reason of "trying to save my grandpa's soul" as enough to take time off.

[DarkToph]

I can give you a straight-up answer as to why Joey in the sub gives the puzzle as a reason. In the original manga and season zero, which the subbed version is assuming you read and watched first, Yugi solves the puzzle and then has several plots to derail, which are often a single chapter in length and therefore at most two episodes long. Eventually, Yugi and his friends find out about the spirit of the puzzle, long before they do on Pegasus' island, therefore Joey listing the puzzle as a reason Yugi can win makes sense. Plus, the idea is that Yugi completed something previously unsolvable - therefore if anyone can find a strategy to work around a Blue-Eyes, it would be him.

Joey mentions the puzzle in the dub, not the sub. In the subbed version, he says he can beat Kaiba because he changed him from a thug to a good friend; he never mentions the puzzle there. I just found it weird because it takes them quite a while to accept that the puzzle has powers in the dub. However, you have a good point about the puzzle solving being the reason why Joey would say that in the dub. Then again, they never mention that it took Yugi eight years to complete it in the dub.

On the subject of the white borders - of course the small children wouldn't know what a flashback is. If anything IS flashback in TV shows aimed at them, it's always in white borders or greyscale, or has massive letters tell them it's in the past, because somehow they can't understand otherwise. But it is true - I've tried to watch films and TV shows which go into flashbacks at regular intervals while with someone younger than me (i.e. small child), and not once without help could they spot a flashback, meaning they asked inane questions which I had to answer and explain.

Japan seems to believe their children are smart enough to understand when a flashback is happening without white borders. (Granted, the subbed version adds borders more frequently later on, but I've seen plenty of 'children' anime without them the entire run.) The flash that happens before is enough of a cue, in my opinion. But it's not that big of a deal, I just found it fairly pointless to add them.

The whole video tape thing makes sense actually. See, it isn't that Pegasus doesn't have better than VHS, it's that Yugi and Solomon are both pretty poor - the gameshop doesn't make a lot of money until Yugi wins the title King of Games, and then only because it's the shop his family owns and uses. Therefore, they have a VHS but no DVD-player. The other three are in a similar sort of situation money-wise - Joey has a deadbeat dad, Tristan is saving for university and Tea works, something which apparently is unallowed by their school and therefore is incredibly risky. She is doing this to make her way to America to learn dance, so cannot afford nice things either.

Ah, never thought of that. Good point. I can't remember any other instance of them watching any video in the series, so for all I know, later on they could have them.

Again, the sub presumes that the viewers watched Season Zero. Considering the sub is for Japan, it's good thinking as Season Zero was popular in Japan, though North American audiences disliked it enough so that it never left the Land of the Rising Sun. In the sub, Joey and Tristan are horrible bullies when it comes to Yugi. While their motives aren't the most clear at first, later it is explained that Joey is doing it mainly because he grew up moving around with his deadbeat drunk dad, falling into gangs as a way to fit in. Therefore, bullying is his defensive tactic to work off his frustration and anger. Tristan is friends with Joey, and that's it, so tends to follow Joey's lead in the sub - he starts hanging out with Yugi and stops bullying Yugi simply because Joey chooses to.
Finally, Yugi and Joey in the sub are massive perverts - Yugi is constantly trying to get sneaky peeks at Tea and his crush on her is in part because she's very good-looking, though it was originally based upon the fact that she sticks up for him when he needs the help. Therefore, getting on Yugi's and Joey's case for being pervy over Mai is completely in character with all three of them.

I haven't gotten that far in the sub version. I've compared 18 episodes so far, so I'm just barely getting up to Para and Dox. I feel bad for Joey, though. Why'd he get stuck with the deadbeat drunk dad while his sister got to go with their (I'm guessing) relatively nice mother? I say relatively nice because I'm assuming she doesn't make a big effort to go out and see Joey.

Because Season Zero never got dubbed, a lot of the plot-points and concepts behind the main characters in Season One had to rewritten or scrapped. Yugi is made into a timid young man for no adequately explored reason - since he was a slightly timid but pretty well-rounded character in the sub; Joey is just some weird tough-guy sorta person who happens to be Yugi's best friend without any development into how or why this is the case; Tea just becomes talking boobs for Yugi to be shipped with; and Tristan becomes a tag-along.

Yeah, they also cut out that character that Honda had a crush on. I liked Season Zero. Sure the art was even worse than the remade series, but I liked the atmosphere better. I plan on reading the manga sometime, so hopefully I can get my fill there.

It's really unfortunate, because it completely changes the face of the show. I think the most different part is Yugi's reasons to enter the tournament. While both versions have the reason being to regain his grandfather's soul, the dub doesn't explain why he'd believe that this Shadow Game was true as opposed to a hallucination and his grandfather having a stroke. It's an extremely flimsy plot-point that is never really addressed. In the sub, because of the existence of Season Zero and Yugi being more than familiar with the concept of a shadow game by this point, it's perfectly understandable that he'd recognise both a millenium item and how its used, due to his meeting of Shadi about one third of the way into Season Zero.

It's another instance of 4Kids hoping kids just won't notice that stuff, but even I questioned that as a kid. After watching more episodes, however, I assumed that Yami just knew about the shadow games from the start, but then we realize he has no memory, so even that doesn't work. However, 4kids prods at his past so much, there are numerous time when you really question whether he remembers or not in the dub.

Mai's perfume trick... I think the idea is because she's female. And no, that's not a slight. Basically, men don't pick up on scents from perfume as well as women do, and while Mai cannot tell what card she'll get next from the deck itself, by placing it facedown she can then pick up the scent and work it out. She probably has an issue with one of her senses to do this, and her sense of smell compensates for it, but honestly its never really looked into, just like how Joey was the one idiot who worked it out is never explained.

But she does guess them from the deck in this episode. Rex takes the cards right from the deck one by one after she makes the guesses. Since they never really go into details, though, I have no clue about the rest.

Finally, before I finish - the reason that they can go to the tournament, and "skip school" according to LittleKuriboh, is because the original manga addressed the fact that the tournament would take place during the summer - allowing for the truckload of younger players to join the tournament without having pressing matters. Somehow, I doubt school would accept the reason of "trying to save my grandpa's soul" as enough to take time off.

Okay, guess I have this left to say. Would it have been so hard to include a line that said so? "It's a good thing summer vacation started or else we never would've been able to go!" Original creators? 4kids?.....Stay in school, Kids.  .......Except when it's summer vacation.....Then go play magical card games using souls as the bet.

[DarkToph]

Yugioh Episode 4 sub dub comparison

Episode Summary:

Key characters:

None are introduced in this episode

Plot: Duelist Kingdom is underway and Yugi has his sights trained on Insect Haga for revenge for throwing his precious Exodia cards into the sea. However, Haga has plenty of tricks up his sleeve by using the new tournament rules to his advantage. Can Yugi exterminate Haga from the tournament? Oh God, now I’m using puns. Damn you 4Kids!

In the sub, when Pegasus makes his speech, he explains the rules of the tournament games (You must use Duel Monster cards, 2000 Life Points and no Direct attacks.) Pegasus in the dub just tells everyone to be at their best….Kinda lame to report, but this episode has been fairly changeless (barring the inclusion of a ton of dialogue over silence) so far. Pegasus also mentions that they have 48 hours to get ten star chips or they go home in the subbed version. In the dub, there’s no mentioned time limit.

I will never understand this; later we see that the security guys around the island are incredibly strict when it comes to star chips. When you’re out, you’re gone. No exceptions; not even if your chips were stolen. So how is it that T’ea and Tristan (and Bakura) are able to fly under the radar? Just the fact that they have no dueling glove should be a dead giveaway. It just baffles me that they never get thrown out even when they meet several officials. Hell, when they enter the finals, one of the guards actually points out that they’re not duelists and yet they do nothing about it.

Name change? Yugi’s full name in the Japanese version is Yugi/Yuugi Mutou. In the dub, it’s Yugi Moto. I’m not entirely sure if this is a change or just a mispronunciation….

In the sub, Pegasus told Insect Haga of the new rule. Why? I don’t know. It could’ve been a special gift for winning that other tournament from episode 2. In the dub, Weevil says he stole the new rules.

This is prevalent in both versions. Mirror force doesn’t affect your opponent’s life points at all. It just destroys all of the monsters on your opponent’s side of the field.  But, in this season, that’s really the least of their worries.

In the dub, Weevil foreshadows his Ultimate Moth Cocoon by taking a scene from the next episode. In the sub, the episode ends at Yugi calling Weevil weak. I guess this can be forgiven seeing as how the Japanese preview basically does the same thing, but still.

All in all, this episode was fairly uneventful and boring. It was mostly focused on learning the new rules of duelist kingdom.

[DarkToph]

Yugioh Episode 5 dub sub comparison

Episode Summary:

Key Characters: None are introduced this episode

Plot: Yugi is continuing his duel with Haga as Haga prepares for his ultimate power, the Ultimate Moth. Yugi uses the new rules to his advantage and wins out, defeating Haga and eliminating him from the tournament. But that is only the first bump on the road to victory.

4Kids seems to be making an effort at making Mai very mean. Mai’s not really humble by any means in the sub, but she’s constantly throwing out “losers” and “geeks” while overall mocking the group in the dub. Mai’s first dialogue is also changed slightly. She seems to believe Yugi can’t win against Weevil in the dub, while she simply says you can’t judge the duel due to one turn as one turn can be all that it takes to turn a duel around, as Yugi showed with his Mirror Force.

Okay, why the hell did Yugi attack the cocoon? He knew the defense power was 300 points greater than Gaia’s attack points. That’s like a rookie level mistake…..*cough* Though, technically Weevil made an even rookie-er mistake because he clearly summons the cocoon in attack mode instead of defense mode, which means Gaia would’ve easily won since the cocoon’s attack is 0. While we’re on the subject, Yugi cheats by using Fusion, a magic card, during Weevil’s turn.

I don’t know why this matters, but in the sub, the great moth sounds like, well….a donkey. In the Dub it sounds like a bird. Neither is really…uh, accurate (How does a giant moth sound?) but the dub sounds better.

They edited out a flashback of Yugi and the group running through the forest as moths flew overhead. The flashback was to trigger Yugi’s epiphany that the Great moth was poisoning Gaia. In the dub, Weevil just tells him what’s going on. To be fair, though, it’s not like the moths were giving off poison scales to begin with, so even the sub doesn’t make much sense sometimes.

Another mention of Jounouchi’s eighth place win in the regionals is cut. Poor Joey, can’t catch a break. I guess they really wanted to show his as a naïve little underdog.

For some reason, in only this episode, a picture of the loser of the duel (in this case, Weevil) pops up on screen and an X goes through his picture signifying that he’s been eliminated.

[DarkToph]

Yugioh episode 6 sub dub comparison

Episode Summary:

Key Characters: None are introduced this episode.

Plot: Jounouchi prepares for his first duel in the tournament. His friends urge him to go after someone easy, but the ruthless Kujaku Mai challenges him first to weed out the weakest duelists. She uses a card trick to make it seem like she has psychic powers and can see her cards even when they’re face down. Psyching out the rookie, Mai easily takes the lead in the duel. Can Jounouchi come out a winner or will he lose his only chance at saving his sister’s sight?

Jounouchi’s first speech right before he starts his duel with Mai is pretty deep and insightful. In the dub, Joey just babbles on about how he has to prove himself even though he never got much training, isn’t very experienced etc.

Mai mentions in the dub that the field they’re playing on is 40% mountain, 40% forest and 20% meadow. In the sub it’s 40% mountains 40% grassland and 20% wasteland. This is a fairly glaring error since they make a point early on in both versions that Joey/Jounouchi’s home field is grassland. It doesn’t matter all that much, but still.

This bugs the crap out of me. Hey 4Kids, it’s Harpy Lady, not The Harpy’s Lady! GAWD.

Yami Yugi in the sub helps Jounouchi by bringing up the “Something that can be seen, yet cannot be seen” thing again. (In this case, scent) In the dub, he says Mai’s just trying to divide and conquer; a strategy that’s been used for centuries. Then as he says “Believe me, I know” they edit in a closeup of Yami’s face and impose a Millennium Eye mark on his forehead….So, 4Kids remembers that Yami has no memories of his life as an ancient pharaoh, right? Right?

In the sub, when Jounouchi has his eyes closed, he wonders if this is what people ‘see’ when they’re blind. Then he says he doesn’t want her sister to live like that. 4Kids, sadly, omits this sad bit of dialogue.

Another omission of “Something that can be seen etc.” (This time it’s….Time.) They also edit out a shot of the Sennen (Millennium) puzzle’s box since that no longer has bearing on the scene.

In both versions, they completely ignore a primary aspect of the Time Wizard (but it’s fixed later) Time Wizard works by flipping a coin. Call it right, all opposing monsters die (and in Baby Dragon’s case, turns it into a Thousand Dragon, I’ll give the anime a pass for this. Thousand dragon is actually a fusion of Baby Dragon and Time Wizard) call it wrong, and all your monsters die. In addition, you take damage equal to half of the lost monsters’ attack points. In this instance, the Time Magician just uses Time Magic with no gambling involved (which makes it pretty OP)

More cheating: Joey/Jounouchi uses Thousand Dragon to attack three monsters at once.