4Kids Kinda Sucked - Localisation and Censorship

Is this interesting to anyone? Let's hope so!
(near the end my mouth got significantly moister and I don't know why so I'm sorry about that)
Support me on Patreon: www.patreon.com/MelonTeee?fan...
My Twitch: / melonteee
My Twitter: / melonteee
My Instagram: / mel_melon_mel

[@SuraimuWasTaken]

Melon: I know how your health system works Any American: We have a health system?

[@MelonTeee]

OOF

[@Nagatem]

It’s a system, but it’s in no way healthy for anyone involved.... except rich people.....

[@flyingscout3205]

Thanks alot Obama.

[@traplover6357]

But there's no waitlines!.... (because those who are poor know they'll be overcharged)

[@meep9231]

If it wasn't for 4kids censoring the shit out of everything, I might've liked all of them

[@slendyshow]

Face reveal confirms Mel is not in fact a melon. Cool vid fam

[@mariaevens8969]

omg, she is to pretty to directly look at her x3 ah she ist so pretty!

[@neopixelosu]

I feel betrayed by her not being a melon

[@renaiya1666]

ngl same i’m a little traumatised

[@FourteenthAngel]

I was cheated and lied to! XD

[@darkhorseman90]

she ain't no melon, but she's certainly bringing the tea

[@vasilgeorgiev5859]

Ah yes Sonic one of the greatest american heroes

[@mainmanstan7405]

You joke, but honestly Sonic is much more of an icon in the U.S. then he is in Japan.

[@wickedtwister186]

The 4Kids cast was the best Cast For Sonic

[@mainmanstan7405]

@@wickedtwister186 I agree. Not so much Sonic X, but later on with games like Black Knight and Unleashed, the 4kids VAs had an amazing grasp of the characters.

[@mainmanstan7405]

@Casswury They were. They absolutely were.

[@RoronoaZoro-ur6hr]

Mainman Stan, Sonic the Hedgehog just like Sora from Kingdom Hearts has always been more of a huge Japanese gaming icon in the West that has a huge fan base of Western players that buys everything Sonic and Kingdom Hearts related.

[@Linkhood]

Please let me forget that 4Kids decided to make characters from Japan sing The Star Spangled Banner, 4Kids has already annoyed me enough without that fact

[@lpfan4491]

Good thing I am one station further because I am german.

[@jraygoza5742]

I on the other hand hope I never forget it

[@nothingmorethanageminiboar4929]

*One of them is from Italy.

[@React2Quick]

I literally had pushed that out of the furthest parts of my mind and then I saw the clip. I immediately wanted to forget again that it happened.

[@granzedora]

If the developers of 4Kids are alive, I hope they burn

[@meko98743]

'A child should be able to grow up knowing of and being able to pronounce names from other cultures. Which helps to respect them'. Every kid with a non-white sounding name wishes this was true.

[@MissAnglewolf]

Many uncommon names have the same issue. There are sounds in certain languages that just don't exist in English. Chinese is a prime example of this. with Zh, Xi, Qi sounds that don't exist in English and are near impossible for people who don't speak Chinese to pronounce and Chinese speakers to explain in an understandable manner to non-Chinese speakers.

[@SaberToothPortilla]

This is true, but at the same time, "Next closest" is reasonable, I think. It helps to have, maybe, heard Chinese being spoken for an extended period of time to get a feel for how it *should* sound, even if you can't quite make the sound with your mouth yet. This goes both ways of course, my own name has a couple hard Rs in it, which a lot of non english speakers, or even english as second language speakers, have a lot of trouble with.

[@traplover6357]

@@SaberToothPortilla OK there are exceptions when some sounds don't exist in a language but I dont think those are the most criticized examples.

[@SaberToothPortilla]

@@traplover6357 You're completely right, it's usually names that are perfectly within someone's capability to say, but they either don't know how it's said, or worse, don't care. Both of which are definitely helped by having a healthy exposure to what the language sounds like.

[@jeeology8574]

SUGE-WIN?!

[@alfabusa]

FUN FACT THAT I ALWAYS LIKE TO POINT OUT!!! The Swedish dub of Yugioh kept the Japanese names to be consistent with the manga that had been translated and released earlier. 4kids script but Japanese names. No trouble remembering em. Albeit by like episode 4 they decided to shorten Jonouchi's name to 'Jono'......

[@vintheguy]

Bro wtf Wtf are you doing here??? I'm tripping man

[@granzedora]

Ahaha...

[@KremBotop]

So this is the inverse of the Singapore dub, which uses Japanese scripts + OST with 4Kids dub names. I recall the same thing happening in the Mexican dubs of the first 4 Digimon series, only with better voice acting of course.

[@woundedzilla1517]

Well now I know why the emperor and the golden cat played children’s card games that one time

[@jakirakumahata5701]

Melonteee playing Inquisitor Greyfax confirmed?

[@thefinalskarm1754]

Meanwhile now in Australia "This media isn't liscenced for your region"

[@haruhisuzumiya6650]

this video is viewable in australia

[@Quick-Silver206]

Doesn't Australia ban like every video game?

[@thefinalskarm1754]

@@Quick-Silver206 Yeah we have to pirate everything with our Drop Bear hackers. They don't particularly like incentivised drug use, but we've seen those things get the proper r18+ rating over time. Usually the government makes a big stink over a game or a piece of media and then it gets investigated, so even if something is banned, it usually isn't banned for long.

[@Quick-Silver206]

@@thefinalskarm1754 oh well that's good. I am firmly against censorship because I think it's insulting to individual's intelligence. As a Murican the only things that generally get censored over here are boobs and butt.

[@mfenjoyer9678]

"THIS IS NO TIME TO START SPEAKING AUSTRALIAN JIM" What was 4kids even THINKING 💀

[@Ascender_Grey9]

That there was no time for Jim to start to speaking Australian

[@emileyclark5175]

Not much apparently

[@duba9018]

Jim crocodile cook is absolute perfection just wanted to remind everyone that.

[@seqka711]

Jim is literally the nicest character in GX. In fact, everyone in that show is a little bit of an asshole except for Jim, Asuka and Johan.

[@juanreynaldo1041]

@@seqka711 Asuka tho?

[@Missing-Ace]

He is too perfect and 4kids would become enemies of the world if they altered him

[@eatyourcereal2293]

Thanks man

[@granzedora]

Facts

[@d.a.u.d]

If she breaths She's a TEEEEEEEEEEE

[@KaosSakana]

why did she change her name btw? The old one was funny.

[@doro2226]

Sakana She posted about it on Twitter. Apparently her mom would tell others about her channel and she didn’t want her saying “thot” to those people LOL

[@KaosSakana]

​@@doro2226 that's hilarious, but kind of a shame. The word isn't that bad, but I understand.

[@hiwiechakib]

@@KaosSakana what was the original name ?

[@KaosSakana]

@@hiwiechakib melonthott (I think it was two Ts)

[@ame-bi]

So I'm a Turkish person. I grew up watching Yugioh and Pokemon Turkish Dubbed. But the company that dubbed it didn't use the original version. They took the 4kids version and translated that one. Watching a Japanese show Americanized and then dubbed to Turkish was honestly jarring. Since I knew what anime was because we had a channel called Kidz/Animez that aired subtitled Anime. I watched American cartoons and Animes simultaneously and those two confused the fuck out of me because I knew they were animes but they had English names and refused to acknowledge any Japanese culture that we saw. Watching Brock call rice balls donuts was one of the weirdest experiences of my childhood.

[@mariksebastianishtar207]

This is no time to start speaking English, Ame!

[@yurichtube1162]

Vote erdogan out, thnx

[@lefteron6804]

Me too, though I'm Greek.

[@shyoss2671]

Me too,watching the italian dub of the american version of yu gi oh and not understanding where the character are from

[@kerrychristensen7204]

It was one of my most beautiful~

[@mario-oc2if]

When the face cam hits Clears through WHAT

[@dabuff1319]

My brain shut down and I was like "who are yo-waait" then I realised it was melonteee

[@neksnek2032]

The most casual face reveal ever

[@Dwarfenthusiast1874]

Them making Luffy sing the national anthem is actually criminal. He would NEVER 😭

[@lucascunha4465]

Johan: Hey Judai, do you want to come eat some oniguiri with me? Jesse: Howdy Jaden, what do you say we go eat some fine BBQ and watch a football game?

[@l.t.hennessy6307]

LMAO THIS WAS TOO PERFECT😂😂😂😂

[@RoronoaZoro-ur6hr]

Lucas Cunha, the Japanese translation that you used to make fun of 4Kids sounds something like what Luffy would say to Zoro whenever they first met.

[@ronuchiha1987]

It’s johan

[@neksnek2032]

YEEHAW **shoots someone**

[@artemis-kinkyboikirby5539]

I think you missed the part about how they deleted Akiza's clevage

[@Nathan_the_mighty]

Now this is the real victim of 4kids censorship.

[@assassingoose3984]

@@Nathan_the_mighty bruh not just that even the real life yugioh cards and the finger gun aswell like as a kid it confused the hell out of me why the pointed the fingers at the main protagonist and i was like "bruh just use a freakin gun" and even on 5ds they used laser weapons instead of just normal guns wich it made some sense cuz they were in the future but still like in season 1 of yugioh where joy faced bandit keith when he summoned barrel dragon they turned him into nerf gun dragon and imo as kid i hated that design and i think they used to star wars sound effect whend bandit Keith attacked

[@rafaelcastillo1480]

I was JUST wondering about that yesterday while watching 5ds

[@KaosSakana]

@ULGROTHA The dreaded "male gaze". *rolls eyes* Yeah, hopefully she just wouldn't be offended at any of that.

[@KaosSakana]

@ULGROTHA It's annoying when people equate any enjoyment in the female figure with a "fetish". If people do it to (real or fictional and still young looking) underage girls, that's wrong. But women everywhere, in any situation, will be found attractive by men. There is no point in throwing shade at that.

[@kawaki4441]

4Kids censorship is really weird since they made one of the darkest cartoons of all time in form of 2003 Ninja Turtles. Leo flat out beheads Shredder, they show torture, mutilation, genocide, main characters flat out dying on screen. There was even one episode where they go to Hell and battle Cthulhu. But I suppose guns are bad.

[@itsjustme-_-9621]

I need to watch this show, it sounds so good

[@kawaki4441]

@@itsjustme-_-9621 You have all episodes on youtube, but here is the clip of Leo vs Shredder kzbin.info/www/bejne/n6uzlWOqfb2Bibs

[@dundazupa]

Yea, its actually impressive how they censored such minor "violent" things but then made TMNT. Nobody would guess that the same people could make such a great cartoon and censor so much from another one.

[@lakyak]

What episode where they go to hell? You mean that one in season 3 with angel where they are looking for her brother also don't forget the cancelled episode nightmares recycled where they would talk about conjoined twins if it was fully animated

[@StargazerYo]

No riceballs = no problem

[@baddragonite]

When are we getting an American translation of this video? I can't understand anything being said.

[@StargazerYo]

I was so lost but thankfully she held up that jelly donut and I felt back in my safe space

[@revolvingworld2676]

She needs to stop speaking Australian and learn American.

[@HollyWarlock]

in the words of jaiden yuki "this is no time to start speaking australian"

[@HowlYaDoin1999]

I laughed when you commented that it needs an American translation despite the fact that the characters are speaking the same language but different accents.

[@Joniness]

It's so frustrating that us Americans refuse to import media over here. Imagine how much more we would know about the world if we had shows from all other countries on our networks.

[@KaosSakana]

We probably know as much as other countries truthfully know about us tbh. I think the point of this video was exaggerated.

[@Joniness]

@@KaosSakana I had a German exchange student friend who learned how to speak English from watching The Simpsons and he knew so much more about America than even I did at the time because of that so that's really not true

[@KaosSakana]

@@Joniness Nice anecdotal experience, but you don't speak for all Americans when you say that and your statement really isn't evidence on it's own. And if he knew MORE about America than a native, he didn't learn it all from just The Simpsons anyways. It's cool that he learned the language from it though.

[@Joniness]

@@KaosSakana provide me evidence that the american populace is at about the same level of education about other countries as another country then so I can learn more about it

[@KaosSakana]

@@Joniness I absolutely don't have to? You made the initial claim. The burden of proof is on you. I'm not doing a book report to debunk your out of touch sounding claim. I'm just sick of people saying this shit about Americans over what are essentially stereotypes made up by the media, because a lot of those stereotypes come from equating different (conservative) beliefs with lack of knowledge.

[@mayisaythatsasmashingblous5876]

11:04 You fool. Clearly that rice ball is actually a cheeseburger. The shrimp is also a cheeseburger. You see, it's the added dairy that makes it truly American.

[@andreagourley]

Chumley's dad in the original Japanese: *chugging sake at an alarming rate* Chumley's dad in the English dub: *chugging HOT SAUCE at an alarming rate* Both are concerning

[@RoronoaZoro-ur6hr]

Zoro and Kaido are both alcoholics in One Piece only difference is that Zoro can’t get drunk at all like Kaido, and I honestly wouldn’t know how 4Kids would censor out Kaido and Eustass Kid from the story of One Piece.

[@mayac69]

I grew up in Mexico and watched anime basically uncensored, when I moved to the US I was shocked how much had changed. I was utterly crushed by how the american Cardcaptor anime got all it's gay ripped out.

[@raina1848]

Cardcaptors. I remember that fiasco. They ruined just about everything else in that localization, too. Like the whole thing about Sakura's crush on Yukito. Tons of episodes were not even shown and they just started it with the episode where Syraon shows up, and when he comes to class, they even censored out the teacher writing his name on the chalkboard and just showed him writing nothing to introduce. Luckily, the subs were brought to the US (I think through Pioneer.) I don't know why Yugioh couldn't get that treatment too and how 4Kids got some special claim to all of it. Same with Pokemon.

[@dcb99filmz]

that mess is Nelvana's fault y'know, Toronto's greatest animation studio? they apparently dubbed anime too. In this case they made the edits but for once outsourced the voices to Ocean, in Vancouver.

[@BunnyfriendMX]

@@raina1848 I found their useless attempts to turn Syaoran (excuse me, "Li Showrun") into the main protagonist of the series rather amusing, since "how dare you to broadcast a 'cartoon' in which a little girl is the most powerful human being of the whole city, and the cool kid is just some annoying antagonist who develops a crush on her"? No, no, that would be too much for the little minds of american kids!! Let's nerf Sakura, give "Li" more protagonism and show them as a duo of equally-powered kids rather than showing the real Card Captor doing her stuff and some magic boy from Hong Kong who just makes things harder for Sakura until he falls in love like a fool! Oh, and there isn't a single gay character out there, oh no, how could you dare? What is being gay anyway? /s

[@ZevsMika]

Luffy singing the American National Anthem is the most un-Luffy things ever 😭

[@marsproductions7484]

Fun fact: the creator of Yugioh refuses to give us some dark magian girl support because he doesn’t want any more cards to be censored

[@luiddmonteiro4912]

Holy molly, seriously? Wow... I didn't know about that... That's a real shame...

[@StargazerYo]

God I totally forgot about that, I remember a card I really wanted Magi Magi Girl had no plans to come to the TCG and I think that's when it began

[@theblan1k0ne]

Thanks 4kids, you really are a big help protecting the pure innocent minds of the youth. You know what? I'll just use the lost art versions instead when I get into the DM archetype, at least they keep the original content.

[@theblan1k0ne]

@@StargazerYo If she did come to the tcg, then that would be a good pair with the reskin of Black Magician (At this point I might as well use the original names).

[@InvaderWeezle]

Kazuki Takahashi doesn't directly create the cards outside of the ones that appeared in the manga. He's just occasionally drawn some of the artworks for promotional cards, and it's those specific artworks that he refuses to allow be released in the English version of the game unless they can be released uncensored. It has nothing to do with giving Dark Magician Girl support. That being said, the Dark Magician Girl artwork that was previously unreleased in English is finally being released this year uncensored. The TCG for the past few years has been doing "Lost Art Promotions" where they're releasing uncensored art versions of cards, such as Monster Reborn.

[@crystalbreaker947]

The amount of times "AMERICA" was said caused Bandith Keith to like this video.

[@myfaceisstuckpleasesendhel1255]

In America

[@RoronoaZoro-ur6hr]

crystalbreaker947, Bandit Keith’s voice actor in the English dub is Canadian and not born in the United States, so I guess that’s another thing MelonTeee should have brought up in this video whenever she said America so often that the persons liver would die of alcohol poisoning if they were doing a drinking game.

[@UltanOfficial]

There was no need to torture us with a bit of the American anthem during this. We did not deserve that.

[@neksnek2032]

Luffy singing the national anthem is so out of character, he would burn the flag down as soon as he saw this country

[@heartnet40]

I think the most painful part about what 4kids was doing is when you happened to be one of those kids who grew up knowing and experiencing tiny bits of the culture they were trying to hide. I used to hang around sushi restaurants and karaoke clubs as a kid not only because my parents love Japanese and Korean cuisine, but because they had friends that shared and indulged in that culture that they grew up with. I've had all manner of foreign foods long before I even knew what an anime was, so when Brock was talking about "Jelly Filled Donuts" all my tiny pea-body brain could think was "Why is he calling a rice ball a donut?" Which is to say as an adult with the benefit of hindsight I can't be anything but be frustratedly patronized by their behavior, as if I was too stupid and needed to be protected from anything that wasn't a product I could get at McDonald's. Don't worry child, we'll protect you from Rice Balls and hard to pronounce foreign names because you're a simple baby-face who couldn't understand! Like, how insulting. Of course, all if it was dumbed down to not challenge American audiences, but if this kind of localization was somewhat baffling to an 8-10 year old me, imagine the parents of Japanese-American children who got second-hand exposure to this censorship. They get the privilege of American media outlets erasing their culture from television because they're convinced the audience will be terrified of something as simple as a rice ball. 4Kids censorship is a joke, which sucks because honestly it's kind of worse than that.

[@maryam-mp5ow]

I'm egyptian and grew up with the arabic dub of the 4kids version of yugioh. something about 4kids changing the arabic names for malik and rishid and us getting marik and odion (which are very non-egyptian/arabic names) instead of the original despite being the same nationality as these characters will always be funny in a sad way to me.

[@justinreid2947]

This is... both sad and *very* ironic.

[@lpfan4491]

I have no real idea about arabic names, but some namechanges will never seize to amaze me. Malik vs. Marik makes some amount of sense, they just did the L/R-twister that sometimes happens between japanese and english. But Isis to Ishizu is appearently based on the japanese spelling of the name, which...is the opposite of what 4kids wanted to do? And Rishid to Odion makes 0 sense, that is just the "lol, random" change of the day.

[@dabuff1319]

I think LK said it the best "look at this rice-ball now it a *burger* Now its a *cheeseburger* !.. Its the added dairy that makes it more American. " Localisation is always annoying but sometimes it's easy to fly over but some like 4kids go too far, yugioh especially I can understand that some things probably wouldn't translate like jokes or nicknames but that doesn't mean you should entirely censor everything that's non American. But we can all agree that the sheer absurdity of the dumb is hilarious but what do I know?.

[@edgarrangel9838]

Don't you mean Americanization?

[@szabok1999]

They censored every written word, even the ENGLISH ones. Like they removed the word STOP from a sign. Why? Children most be protected from reading?

[@dabuff1319]

@@szabok1999 I don't even want to think about how nightmarish localisation meetings where back then.

[@Hewhowantstoknow]

@@szabok1999 If I remember correctly that was FCC regulation

[@l.t.hennessy6307]

LOL-COLIZATION

[@inactive-ot9mj]

Apparently Yu-Gi-Oh: Duel Monsters had an uncut dub at one point but was cancelled.

[@Liliana_the_ghost_cat]

The first time my big bro showed me yu-gi-oh DM it was uncensored but it was dubbed in portuguese (because we are brazilians and portuguese was the only language i speaked but now i'm one of the only members of my family that speak english naturaly) and oh boy i loved it i mean no non-vocal censorship it was awesome

[@xX_Moonluster_Xx]

Can confirm! I don't have the the link but I saw the first episode of it

[@Liliana_the_ghost_cat]

@@xX_Moonluster_Xx i sawed it as a kid thanks to my big bro (when i say big i mean almost 18 years older)

[@whatever1220]

As a Brit, I feel you. What Americans think a British accent sounds like is painful.

[@shyoss2671]

Yes...for all the world my country is just pizza pasta mandolini mama mia,i feel you too

[@RoronoaZoro-ur6hr]

That’s because people in the United States have a hard time trying to imitate an Australian or an English accent whereas people from the UK and Australia seem to imitate people born in the United States accents rather easily.

[@justdl]

Meh, everyone else thinks americans are either surfer people or a person with a southern accent with a gun.

[@SonofSethoitae]

To be fair, hearing Brits do an American accent is also pretty weird. Even most of the good ones set off your Uncanny Valley detector

[@RoronoaZoro-ur6hr]

@Tom Ffrench , Melon Tee’s never made KZbin videos with a fake American accent, but The4thSnake made a KZbin video where he did an American accent perfectly in his video making fun of IGN.

[@kumonojuza7324]

Me: *sees Melon's face for the first time, paired with her beautiful voice* Also me: I'm in love.

[@emoimo4171]

I always took the “Whatever it is I’m holding” as a self-referential joke about the Pokémon jelly donuts, that was already a meme at that point. Though, in GX season 3 English dub, Marcel (Martin) actually refers to the cast as “Americans”, which raised a LOT of red flags for me, even as a little kid

[@mr.luckshot3618]

I live in Germany and here, the American dub was used for the german synchronisation of Yu-Gi-Oh. But since Netflix is a thing, the german translation comes directly from the sub. Hoping for you this development will come for the english translation too

[@dansen2292]

Melonthot: "4Kids kinda sucked." Me: Really? You don't say? Joking here but realistically speaking, 4kids was just a product of the early universal era of media. Its errors were very much not "wrong doing" as much as "protoypyping".

[@lizardlord4k]

Believe me, as someone who grew up in America for most of my life, we know how much of an issue this can be, and more people are becoming aware the US has an obsession with itself and only now are starting to be a bit more critical of that, with the expected backlash. Truthfully I'm thankful to have grown up when anime was gaining popularity in the US. I was an ignorant child who thought everything was made in the US and the rest of world was some backwards wackyland made up of maybe 5 other countries, but the introduction of anime at such an early age taught me other countries have their own art and stories to tell and the world was bigger and more diverse than I could've thought,. While companies like 4kids existed there were also far more faithful localizers like from Funimation and ADV, hell I remember being curious what exactly a "Rurouni" just from seeing the title Rurouni Kenshin. You're absolutely right absolutely right about the power of media, that it's partially why there needs to be steps to make it more diverse and equal. There's been baby steps taken for awhile, with the Oscar win of Parasite being the biggest example yet, but it's still not where it should be.

[@r4gnarok61]

Thank god 4kids never touched dragon ball, can you just imagined what they would do to dragon ball like for example George (goku) vs Felix(frieza) George:i finally landed on this alien planet and now, Felix you fiend you shall be defeated. Felix:come at me bro George: you sent my bff to the shadow realm and now i am a SUPER WARRIOR Felix:NOOOOOO George: and i have beaten you Felix:HOW? George:Because i stared at you for like 5 seconds

[@doodledungit]

So basically Z-Kai dub

[@nellewoodruff6337]

*cringes in blue popo*

[@KaosSakana]

That's just the big green dub. Saiyens were called "space warriors" and what not.

[@wickedtwister186]

"HeY iT's BiG gReEn"

[@Macandbloo11]

They wouldn't have touched Dragon Ball if they knew what it was about. If they knew what One Piece was about, then they wouldn't have purchase the licensing to localize the anime.

[@pelayorock]

So, in Australia..... What does Pot of Greed do?

[@haruhisuzumiya6650]

it draws 2 cards

[@vali_bg5234]

@@haruhisuzumiya6650 It thought it let you gains 10000 LP, summon 20 monsters, do 10 back flips, shoot lasers out your eyes, fart nukes and become SCP-682.

[@haruhisuzumiya6650]

@@vali_bg5234 nah that's card of demise

[@tomiwastaken4938]

It seems that this is not only a 4kids problem, as in Italy too '80s and '90s anime would be "adapted" with name and dialogue changes, and cuts or modifications of the frames whenever something japanese would show up (flags, maps, food etc). They would even completely omit that the anime took place in Japan, making up a new name for it or just not mentioning it at all (like Tokyo Mew Mew became just Mew Mew). The weirdest thing for me was that Japanese names would get changed into not only Italian names, but also _English_ names. More rarely even French or Spanish or Russian names just _not Japanese_ . Strangely enough, it seems that this would happen more often with shoujo anime, for examlle, then seinen. Some other weird thing was how they'd change some names _just slightly_ withouth apparent reason. Chichi from Dragonball? She's Kiki now. Yamcha is Yamcho. Chibiusa from Sailor Moon? Kibiusa now. Only learned about this last week and it's hilarious to me: For some GOD FORSAKEN reason, in the Italian version of Hunter×Hunter (1999) some of the characters names' spellings were changed but were pronounced the same... Killua Zoldyck became Killua Zaoldyeck (??? How does that make it easier to write???) and Kurapika became... Curarpikt. That's not???? even his name anymore???? I do NOT recognize this man

[@PeteThePlayer]

I think it's actually outrageous that 4kids got global licenses for their anime so these particular versions were then exported into other countries and got translated/dubbed into those languages. So here in Germany we got YGO in German, but almost fully based on the 4kids version. It was still advertised as anime so everyone knew it was from Japan originally but it very much felt distinctly less Japanese than say Dragon Ball or Detective Conan (at least in Germany we didn't have an americanized version as basis for those).

[@dingbat3440]

I was pretty young when that first saw that "jelly doughnut" scene in Pokemon, I remember being confused and I ended up processing in my head that in Japan, they filled jelly in balls of rice.

[@jakirakumahata5701]

It was worse for me, as my dad is Japanese and thought it would be hilarious if I kept thinking that well into my teens.

[@haruhisuzumiya6650]

thats why i watch pokemon subbed

[@RoronoaZoro-ur6hr]

Dingbat, Onigiri/Riceballs are balls of rice that are cooked with sugar and have jelly inside of them, and they’re sweets in Japan that they eat as often as Mochi which is another rice sweet that they eat more often than chocolate bars made in the United States because Onigiri and Mochi are cheaper to buy than chocolate bars over in Japan, but their homemade chocolate bars are as cheap as to make as their homemade Mochi and Onigiri.

[@dingbat3440]

@@RoronoaZoro-ur6hr I'm seriously not sure if you're pulling my leg. As far as I'm concerned, onigiri is dominantly a savory food. They put like fish or pickled preserves in it.

[@Quick-Silver206]

WAIT. Hold up. In Code Geass there's a character that makes "Weird rice balls filled with jelly." Did they reference Pokemon...? Holy shit.

[@davigabriel783]

"Hear me, Shmaden?"

[@blanknaemguy]

I love how this turned into a commentary on American society and media presence.

[@turtle_combat]

Scarlett Johansson as Judai is a stroke of genius tbh

[@seqka711]

As a Canadian I really felt the whole “only seeing America on TV” thing. I remember being FLABBERGASTED that one of my favourite shows as a kid was Canadian because at that point I just assumed everything I watched was American.

[@dcb99filmz]

It was amusing finding out how many shows I grew up watching were Canadian or had Canadian casts...and I'm American.

[@deanafaye1064]

Bro, I grew up in Europe. Pls, why did I expect secondary school to be like High School Musical? I felt scammed.

[@Nenilein]

Dude, I'm a Japanese Studies MA and there's so many parts in this video I wish I could quote in my next thesis, you make some great points about the concept we generally call "cultural odor".

[@snowballeffect7812]

I always feel so lucky when I find an awesome channel and watch it grow from babby days to the big time. Keep it up MelonT!

[@randomguy6932]

I will always love the Yu-Gi-Oh GX dub for Chazz. Having said that, you raise valid points about the nature of localisation/censorship, which tends to erase references to harmless things from other cultures. It's jarring to see Jaden refer to a rice-ball as "whatever this is" even though he should know because he obtained it from the school.

[@lpfan4491]

Jaden having no clue what he is even talking about is weirdly funny to me.

[@Monochrome2004]

@@lpfan4491 yea like in a vacuumn that shit is hilarious but then knowing what they were trying to do kinda sucks the fun out of it. like i love the idea that a character just has a major brainfart and forgets what they're holding in their hand and cant be bothered to remember so just says "whatever this is" even though they very clearly should know

[@phylasvell]

i wouldn't mind the 4kids yugiohs dub existence if it wasn't for the fact I cannot legally buy the subbed version of yugioh in my country thanks to 4kids. thats why I hate it so much.

[@InvaderWeezle]

4Kids back in the day released a few "uncut" DVDs of Yu-Gi-Oh that had the original sub as well as a more direct translation dub. It only lasted 9 episodes though.

[@phylasvell]

@@InvaderWeezle they still used dubbed names and with all due respect I cannot stand the name Joey wheeler nor the obnoxious Brooklyn accent. It's irritating

[@InvaderWeezle]

@@phylasvell It was even weirder than that actually, they called him "Katsuya Joey" in the uncut dub.

[@gregoryfuller9736]

4kids also did those behind the original studio back and got sue for them after that and is actually way 4kids went under their Pokémon dub was only dub that is worth watching and it actually better than the company that dub Pokémon after them but the current people dubbing Pokémon are better than 4kids

[@peepsg]

Gregory Fuller my opinion I like 4Kids Pokemon anime dub

[@marthlucky7669]

Amazing video. I started following you for your hot GX takes, and now you show how much thought and care you put into the things we as westeners are used tot consuming.

[@andrewfarias4118]

Honestly, with the Evangelion translation, I still feel that "i like you" still gives you those romantic and loving vibes as "I love you". They just met so I feel the "I love you" would be so out of place compared to 2 boys just meeting and realizing their feelings for each other in brief moments and figuring out that they "like" other guys in the same way.

[@vandagylon2885]

"Suki daiyo" mean "I like you" anyway.

[@frozenandchosen]

This was such a smart and well constructed video!! As an American myself I love how you explain how important it is for people to be exposed to other cultures especially at a young age

[@algonuevo5232]

Yes, thank you I've had this sentiment for years. Look, I myself am an American and my upbringing was as american as I got but when I got old enough to know better (and internet access) I could never understand why it was such a bad thing to let children know other cultures exist.

[@RamenCupBMG]

I’ll never forgive 4kids for tripping one piece at the starting line when it comes to its cultural impact in the west.

[@Ballslover18]

Crazy thing is 4kids didn't even want One piece. To my knowledge they wanted a show called Ultimate Muscle but Toei wouldn't give them the rights of the show unless they dubbed One piece.

[@peepsg]

Lordplex people telling me they were blind to do it, but I think it not true. So is that really 100% true because I am actually agreeing with you.

[@28stabwounds91]

@@Ballslover18iirc they had bought the rights to a whole bunch of Toei anime, One Piece included, as a package, but they didn't want to dub one piece because they knew it wouldn't go well, however they had to dub it according to the deal they had made with Toei

[@Ballslover18]

@@28stabwounds91 yeah that's basically what happened

[@lpfan4491]

I love it when companies are tricked into doing something(in this case dubbing one piece) because they never checked the deal.

[@Laguzrick]

I really liked this video! I’m a new subscriber, so I’ve been watching your catalog of content for only a week or so now, but I’ve really enjoyed all of it! Keep being you and making the content you do~

[@bandalodyugitube]

I've always seen 4kids as necessary at the time they were around They brought a ton of anime to an entire generation of kids who wouldn't have been exposed to it otherwise, as studios such as Funimation targeted more mature audiences. While they changed names and certain words (rice balls to donuts/pastries), they made the source material pass the censorship laws in America. It sacrificed any reference to anything edgy, but it didn't change the story itself, with very few exceptions. I remember watching pokemon on toasted TV, seeing Brock do the whole donut line, then ask my Japanese teacher about it.

[@FiveStringC]

I always remember being confused by the jelly doughnut thing in Pokemon I legit thought they didn't know what a rice ball was

[@InvaderWeezle]

I hear people say "Jonoochi" and "Jonichi" all the time because they apparently still don't know how to pronounce "Jonouchi", no doubt because they don't have a lot of experience hearing the name be said.

[@TiztasticallyWicked]

Ripped my headphones off as soon as Guffy started singing... UUUUUUGGGGGH!!!!

[@layals]

this was incredibly insightful and touches on so many things that are just swept under the rug. as a canadian, i definitely had a lot of american influence and still do, unfortunately. i also loved that you brought up how controlled kpop is - like you, ive completely withdrawn from fandoms and just listen to the music now because i don't feel that it's healthy for me to buy into that model of perfection. instead, ive immersed myself into the haikyuu fandom and im a lot happier lmao. im happy to see you uploading again, mel! ♥️

[@muffinworks]

Ahhhh!!! Yes a new Vid!! I love you so much!!! Your videos make my days better! 💖💖💖✨✨✨✨

[@cherie4590]

Thank you for sharing your thoughts on this!! I'm working on my dissertation/thesis and really helped me put things into perspective

[@Pip_231]

I really loved this type of media analysis video from you! You should def do more on any other topics you’re interested in

[@sakuraanime122]

Can someone explain to me the attack on titan thing where shes zooming in on the first second or so of the opening?

[@firelifeblizzard8782]

18:30 this scene sure has some themes

[@ryandmc4877]

fun video to watch! nice to see you branch out and talk about more things that mean alot to you keep up the good work!

[@SawadaTsuna0]

love the new format never looked at localisation from this view, keep the good work

[@joshakins4923]

I agree with most of your points but I'm not sure localized names like you showed is about making them "white" like in the sailor moon anime the main characters given name is usagi but changed for America to Serena. I get the feeling it may not have been as popular in the 90s if certain things where not changed like names. Weather good or bad that may just be how it is. That sonic scene was super cringe tho lol

[@shikabaneconga]

"kinda" is an understatement..

[@bunnihunni]

Just subscribed to you after seeing your one piece video when you first had watched it and having the exact same experience as you did. Then I saw this video and was blown away by how much of these exact words I have said too and how much this kind of american washing pissed me off especially. Glad I found you and i am so pleased you have made a video like this!

[@cherrycreamsoda4253]

tbh this was a great video going into these kinds of practices. well done, melon

[@NessaHD]

The fact that they actually had the characters sing the USA anthem... i hate it. Another example of awful american companies ruining things is when Fox Kids took the Digimon ova's and tried to make a movie (and somehow promoted another different show in the process??) wich ended in a complete mess. God that made me so mad.

[@roge2342]

I am south american, actually brazillian, and i grew up with american shows and their culture, and so did my family, and this happened on a scale where even my own culture seems a bit strange for me. Like i know a lot about north america indigens ( i probably wrote it wrong, sorry), but only what was show on screen, only by their sides, and i barely know the culture of the indigens of my region. Srr if are lots of wrong words in there, im just 13 year old so i havent finished english learning.

[@Fab27531]

sim mano, é incrível como a cultura americana sempre prevalece na maior parte dos lugares do mundo. o Brasil é o país em que eu mais vejo gente que "cospe no prato que comeu", que desvaloriza 100% a própria cultura só pra pagar pau pros gringos. e mesmo eu desprezando isso, admito que também sou alguém que conviveu muito mais com mídias e cultura estrangeira e que por isso sou mais habituado a elas. até as "séries" que tem surgido no brasil e tal são pura influência do modelo norte-americano. e seu inglês tá bom mano, parabéns

[@ericsierra8053]

Your videos get better and better. Learned a lot from this one.

[@MidnightO42]

I clicked on this video to have it play in the background so I could listen to you dunking on 4kids while doing something else. 10 minutes later, I'm glued to the screen getting lessons in geopolitics and a how-to of developing the travel and hospitality industry in your home country. A+, no notes

[@star_man2740]

Hearing luffy sing the star spangled banner had me shivering so bad.

[@psychotictye-dyetrex1895]

Kinda weird how 4kids was super obsessed with "Americanizing" anime, but keep using a lot of Canadian voice talent... Makes ya think

[@bigfish5544]

Every video you make is better than the precedent one, that's godlike

[@miguelmata4557]

Here in Mexico they used the 4KiDS version of Pokémon and Yu-Gi-Oh! as a basis for their dub (Pokémon is quite notorious cause the voice actor for James added a lot of lines referencing mexican culture).

[@TheSHIELDCap]

4Kids' cheapness and overall incompetence is the reason why a truly unreasonable number of people treat terrible joyless literal translations of Japanese media as a gold standard to aspire to. I have paid for and subsequently been disappointed and horrified by manga translations I can only describe as having been written by people with a vendetta against the English language. I lay the blame at 4Kids' feet for convincing a generation that localization is the devil.

[@lpfan4491]

Even outside of 4kids-style nonsense, some localisation just sucked and that is why people, including me, hate the concept.(Videogame localisations were done out of context and not proofread for example) Of course, there is still a diffrence between stonecold literal translation and the super-literal nonsense you got. That's just a scam. But I guess it comes from the pains of japanese being less compatible with western languages than say german and english are to each other.

[@annalawson1714]

I love all the points you made here. This is exactly why I tell people to watch more subbed anime or other shows from different countries if they can here in the US. The US is soooo particular about what cultures come into our media and keeping things American, that it's like these big companies just want to avoid the rest of the world all together; unless they randomly want to. I was never a stupid kid, and neither was any other kid I knew growing up. I knew a lot of people from other cultures, and that was never something hard to understand. Something that was confusing to me as a kid was the fact that these rice balls and ebi fry clearly weren't corn dogs or doughnuts/popcorn balls, and I was confused as to why these shows called them that. I can't explain enough how this topic gets me crazy.

[@jasonarreguin1047]

"To all you Americans I know how your schools function" So she knows that we don't learn anything important, the English teachers are always foreign, the pe teachers are fat, and the art funds are always the first to get cut lmao. I wish I was joking but my school checks all these boxes

[@RoronoaZoro-ur6hr]

My High School that I went to cut funds for Greek Mythology classes instead of art classes, but it seems that my High School experience is almost identical to yours.

[@jasonarreguin1047]

@@RoronoaZoro-ur6hr lmao close enough

[@RoronoaZoro-ur6hr]

@@jasonarreguin1047, yeah, I had a High School experience close enough to your High School experience.

[@clayxros576]

13:50 Anyone else chuckling to themselves that this is 4kids implying Australia is smarter than the US?

[@haruhisuzumiya6650]

i mean, they werent wrong

[@DuelaDent52]

I do think the joke there was at Jaden’s expense more than Jim’s.

[@DemonClaus]

Thanks for making this thought provoking video. I knew 4kids was bad but I hadn't thought of it as deeply from the lens of culture erasure as you explained. I'm American and grew up with them so that's probably why I never gave it much thought. Keep up the good work, your vids rock!

[@MagnitudeReviews]

Honestly my first serious introduction to other language’s media was from Anime. With the likes of Attack on Titan and Death Note being the first two real anime I ever watched outside of Pokemon. Where from there I grew a love of foreign film with the likes of Parasite and Portrait of a Lady on Fire being two big such examples along with hundreds more.

[@EspeonMistress00]

I love this video essay! My favorite video from you. Also you are so beautiful! Keep up the good work.

[@arrianah5080]

13:04 *"roy bakura"* **silent sobbing**

[@mario-oc2if]

Most people be like Other language: EXISTS People in the US: EW NOT AMERICANS IT WEEB BE WEEB BAD ME NO WATCH THE WEEB SHOW But the movie was a Mexican

[@SaberToothPortilla]

Ooo, I'm hype! It'd be nice if you wanted to keep making things like this. Of course, GX stan vids work just as well.

[@marianateixeira9251]

Oh I didn't know a video could inform me so well and make me cringe so hard. I really wasn't ready for some of these clips. Thank you\\

[@toaoffire4418]

Really enjoyed this video. Looking forward to more stuff like this!

[@jeslynbong1963]

Also, did you changed your channel name?

[@dreamyliamy2537]

she changed it cuz her mom kept telling her friend about the channel without knowing what thot meant appartently

[@jeslynbong1963]

@@dreamyliamy2537 i- jssjsjsj

[@JustJoeKing5]

12:46 you mean Shmaden Shmuki?

[@shaggyleegaming7068]

Oh God, hearing Luffy sing the Pledge of Allegiance literally hurt my soul.

[@supersushi2139]

Is it just me or is she gorgeus? She is genuinely so beautiful

[@alannahhegarty1482]

Great video, I completely agree with all of the points you made. It is so frustrating that most Americans are seemingly incapable of consuming any media that isn't from their own country. A pretty recent example I remember is when I saw an announcement for an American remake of the movie "Intouchables" which is an incredibly loved movie from my country- France. I was so pissed and just perplexed as to why Americans couldn't just watch the original movie subbed or even dubbed, which is what we have to do when watching any of their movies. The movie is already perfect!!! Please leave it as is ;-; Side note: can someone explain the attack on Titan joke to me, I don't get it 😂 is it to do with the parallels to world war?

[@brandonadrien3476]

I find it amusing how 4Kids censored death from a duel in Yugioh by coming up with the Shadow Realm... basically hell. You don't die... just go to hell 😂

[@genetlm7104]

Going to hell is way better than dying!

[@lpfan4491]

And then they have characters die anyways. Spoilers below: Like Zorc or Guzaburo or the big 5 or Zane(Aka, one death that DIDN'T exist in the japanese version) or even Yami Marik funnily enough. Because that guy was literally ripped apart by the Shadows in both versions. Mission failed successfully on that last one.

[@RoronoaZoro-ur6hr]

@@lpfan4491 , I thought that Zane died of a heart attack in the original Japanese dub and the manga of GX too, but if he didn’t then the only further proves that him, Mai, and Bakura are the only people in Duel Monsters that follows the rules, and are alive throughout the entire series.

[@lpfan4491]

@@RoronoaZoro-ur6hr The Manga of GX couldn't be more diffrent from the anime, so it doesn't really count. But yeah, he didn't die in japanese....but died in the dub. Onscreen. 🤣

[@TKnHappyNess]

4Kids didn't even bother doing their research on properties that were already established, which is why Pokemon had so many errors such as Pokemon not being able to learn certain moves at all in the game, getting type match-ups wrong, and of course that infamous Trainer's Choice from 2005

[@bwezil]

Thanks for making this video, seriously. I mostly watched American cartoons and shows growing up, but I remember when I started watching My Hero Academia- the first thing that struck me, even back then, was that they’d kept the original names. It was my first anime, and because of the very phenomenon you were talking about here, I was both A.) super intimidated by trying to remember them all, and B.) at the idea that I might have have two different media experiences based off of whether I watched sub or sub (I didn’t understand all this back then, but I figured it had to be important if people were arguing about it all the time). But it’s weird that it would be “hard to remember” an entire group of names from one culture. It’s really weird that however many years ago that was, names that are entirely different from each other were just, like, generalized in my head? I don’t know how to put it, but i remember thinking about it when I was in the middle of reading some article how weird it was that /names that do not sound similar to each other at all/ prompted that reaction when I started watching anime because /they simply weren’t American/, and it’s utterly /bizarre/ to me now. This video definitely explains why. And yeah, it’s kinda terrifying that literally hundreds of thousands of other people might have grown up similarly regarding how they view non-American media, and the names and culture and places in it. I think this is probably also why representation of other countries in American media is a big deal- when American media is gonna be your main media, whether you like it or not, you want them to see you right. But most often than not, it doesn’t. Maybe things are changing- a lot of the media I consume nowadays are fan creations, and I was never a pop culture head before, so I can’t speak to it- but it’s also frustrating and kinda scary that “make your own stuff and watch your own stuff alongside American media” is something that (namely, English speaking countries) just. Can’t push the same way the United States does. You talk about how it’s cheaper for companies outside of the United States to broadcast what’s already made rather than make their own stuff- that’s what I’m talking about. I dunno if I’m making sense, or if anyone will read this, but this is a very good video with a lot of important discussion to be had from it, and I am saving it. Thanks again for putting all this stuff into words.