Dragon Ball Z -- "Rock The Dragon Edition"

It was a waste of money, I admit it; a DVD set that I'll watch five or six episodes from and then never touch again. But a burning curiosity consumed me and I just had to have it. Besides, I want this set for posterity. It is, after all, the only good DBZ dub. And what's more, I don't mind owning a million different versions of DBZ... I'm kind of proud. DBZ may not be as good as Evangelion or ATLA, but it will always be the best show of all-time. Not exclusively for what it is, but also for what it was, and what it will always represent.

I tried to deny it for over a decade; tried to rewrite my childhood in accordance with the superior version of events. But deep down there was some sort of muscle memory that simply wouldn't be fooled. And when I saw Dragon Ball Kai making some of the same decisions (admittedly only a handful), that Pioneer had with their version of DBZ fifteen years earlier, I just couldn't play dumb anymore. This Pioneer version, this ocean dub that aired on Toonami and boasts the "Rock The Dragon" opening theme, this is the Dragon Ball Z I grew up with.

My brothers and I tended to fight some, as most brothers do. But this DBZ thing, that my eldest brother had procured, and had seen fit to introduce us to like the gift of the magi, this was undoubtedly -- certainly not the only, but undoubtedly the last moment of true unity between all three of us as kids. After this, I would become depressed and withdrawn, and my eldest brother, in his latter teens by then, would busy himself with the typical trials of teenagedom: friends and mischief and so forth.

But we were left with this one spectacular moment of complete oneness between us, where we three were in perfect agreement: this is the greatest fucking thing we'd ever seen. I'll always remember that intense anticipation as we'd turn off all the lights in preparation for a new DBZ vhs. I'll always remember, watching an episode of Gohan's training in our eldest's room, when our middle (my elder) brother was standing by the door. "Come in, sit down, watch Dragon Ball Z" the eldest said. And we became three. There was just something autonomous about DBZ, something exquisite, amazing, unlike anything any of us had seen.

And yet I've completely ignored this show for probably 14 years, so you can imagine how curious I was to check it out today. Well... it's not *quite* as amazing as I hoped it would be, but it *is* quite amazing.

It's crap compared to the real Z, but all the production qualities of the show are excellent: voice, music, dialogue. It's a well-crafted piece of work. Plus the editing isn't as bad as common lore & legend would tell you. It's often said that all references to death have been removed in favor of "the next dimension," but that's an enormous exaggeration. The words "kill," "die," and "death" are used probably 15 times in those first 4 episodes. And I don't mind that they edited it for time, that's what Kai did and both shows are made better by it.

You can criticize them for the heavy editing, but you have to understand: this was a different era entirely. The idea of preserving the original wasn't a concept back then, look at the version of Sailor Moon that almost made it onto US airwaves! And that's only one of countless examples.

And the interesting thing is, this is actually why the Ocean dub is so excellent. It's not the over-dramatic, slapstick style of FUNimation's dub, and it's not the over-contemplative, spaced-out stoned dub that "serious" anime are unfortunately given. The Saban/Ocean version of Dragon Ball Z is an American cartoon, and it's a fucking great American cartoon in the tradition of shows like X-Men: The Animated Series or Aeon Flux. A show that takes itself seriously. The voice cast is composed of legitimate North American voice actors who know how to voice a character without sounding bush league or constipated (feel free to compare for yourself, here are two vids which compare the ocean dub with FUNi's original dub and Kai's dubs.) and the beautiful, atmospheric, somber soundtrack is by Shuki Levy, venerable composer for the likes of Power Rangers and Inspector Gadget (you probably haven't watched Inspector Gadget in 15 years, but I bet you can instantly recall the incredibly iconic theme, this guy is a great composer.)

It's almost sad, you know? The Ocean dub version of Dragon Ball Z is a great fuckin' show, but because it's astronomically inferior to the Japanese version of Dragon Ball Z, the Ocean version is essentially worthless. But if it had been its own show, if it had been an early work by Michael DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko or something, this could definitely be one of my favorite shows. I once had a dream where I found old VHS tapes (impossibly, from the 80s, before DBZ was a TV show), of a Dino Riders-esque pre-Ocean U.S. show based on DBZ, where the animation from DBZ had been used to create an entirely new show. It was set in space, Freezer was the antagonist and Vegeta (or what LOOKED like Vegeta) was this morally ambiguous space pirate protagonist. I kind of wish they had actually done something like that, because then I'd have two great shows to watch instead of just one.

But, whatever. It was a fun trip down memory lane. And now, I'll probably never in my life rewatch the Ocean Dub. But I do have a craving to rewatch Dragon Ball Kai immediately, even though I've just finished it.