Dub Talk Presents: Studio Stories 002 - 4Kids Entertainment

0:00 hello and well did the Deb talk the chana where a group of nerds come together to talk about English duds for anime both old and new my name is jet and I'm here for another episode of city of stories a short video series where we highlight some of the studios and companies to have helped to shape that landscape of anime dubs any impact their work is left on the industry as a whole for today's video we're looking at one of the most well known and rather infamous distributors for kids anime in the United States good old 4kids entertainment [Music] whether you grew up with their dubs or even seeing all the mains about what if they're in the forças version of fatted I would say killa kill this company's reputation but a cable look was a shame

0:46 pretty much speaks for itself however while for kids is widely known for their work during the late 90s and the 2000s their order did that's we go back much further than that all the way back to the 1970s long before they were noticed for kids the company known as leisure concepts was founded in the year 1970 had a business centered around pitching toy and cartoon ideas to companies one of which led to the creation of Thundercats of all things if you can believe it in 1991 a man by the name of Alfred J Kahn was named CEO of the company and over

1:32 the course of the decade the company shifted focus towards producing TV shows including English stones for anime in 1992 the companies split into two subsidiaries for kids productions and submit media well for kids productions getting renamed to 4kids entertainment in 1995 summit media would later go on to acquired a license of the bunk about anime which really shifted hands a little for kids side of the company and in September of 1998 the dub against it occasionally us elevate in its name is Pikachu it's so cute it's the best of all you'll see Pikachu

2:19 it's usually shy but can sometimes have an electrifying personality shock following the Pokemon anime the massive success of the stage for kids continued to get bored bored vol with an anime licensing and over the course of the next few years they acquired the rights of several series including Evo ultimate muscle cranberry back atcha and Sonic X each of these shows are the top suffering from varying degrees of sensitive for broadcasts and underwent heavy localization which aids us some music character names and occasionally plot elements rocket ya Detroit emoji to

3:07 Akron anger you can excuse alike you open the door we'll break it down let's go Kaiba on your feet mr. Pegasus would like to have a few words with you I bet he would but it'll take more than you two goons to grab me this can go easy or we can snap in two wiseguy you'll never take me alive while somebody share was so found sub the grieves success despite these issues the biggest marker for kids infamy went around for 2004 when they acquired the

3:54 rights to one piece from telly animation and again aired the dub in September of that same year like many of work is done for that I Arab that does suffer from a lot of issues well it didn't have the same degree of uber localization that some of their other dubs did in other one heavy amounts of such would say put nuts in the blood smoking and firearms being removed for broadcast and combined with the lessons cellar voice direction given to a lot of the actors involved with the project they died bethod up with a very decadent reception [Music] a desert a lovely way to describe it

4:39 strong well for kids eventually lost the license in 2007 and it's it's been handed over to Funimation Entertainment this stuff is still considered to be what is the biggest factories behind the franchise in some limited popularity of the States and it's a pretty large part of my four deeds is sort of largely heated by the anime ironically well for kids was pretty despised my fast report ranganatham a they didn't make a couple of attempts to try and reach again to them funny enough one of these cases also happens in the year 2004 as four kids began experimenting without don't

5:24 releases of some of their titles had partnered with Funimation to put out DVDs of yugioh and challenging the dual audio and unedited footage [Music] oh I must eliminate the dastardly bugs [Music] however these releases that a bit of a catch to them I said I never to maintain some consistency with the edited dubs he's caught a quote I've got the so retained before the westernized names for the characters for example Judy T

6:12 Katya from ukyo or better known to folks in the US as Joey wheeler he came to me Katya and mother Oh Yamada a cave or D from Chongqing became more deimata this is far from the only probably the Leafs has had as it does themselves are pretty stilted and a subtitle track for the Japanese ow to use the same script of the gems which it didn't exactly go over very well with fans unfortunately these releases ended up being pretty short-lived and were cancelled in 2005 out there are only three volumes the company made a few more tries and pleasing fans later ninety years well if that's out of subtitle release of UVA which advocating for streebek on YouTube and they even made their own dedicated a debate streaming site in 2010 talked to jockey which offered some releases of Yukio 5ds anybody I'd cut

6:58 does whether anime my sister said to the ATV to have tobacker Ross they're armed ads however so were made heavily edited and in time to jockey eventually shut down well four kisses were generally better known for their edits and localization choices and their acting the company's so worked with many different actors and directors some of people minded up being pretty iconic that are so involved with the industry today what are these individuals with Jim Malone who worked with a recording studio noticed ha studios and sir that the first ADR director for the Pokemon anime and it is to the tackling voice direction for series such as the Slayers here at sports well captain Tyler and a revolutionary girl utena Jacob swingers toss to do his work on the series that's we hope to play a part in how the first english voice actor

7:44 brass got em veronica taylor managed to land that role all she was working at taw studios recording for Amelia from Slayers she was given the opportunity to audition for the role of Ash Ketchum since the producers were looking for a voice similar to reek about turbo-toes original performance and after whether the role she has since gone on to become a prominent voice actor both a debate Western animation planks us character that's April O'Neill from the 2003 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Sailor Pluto and advised me to redouble Sailor Moon and most recently River add for Dragon Ball super I'm destined to be the world's number one Pokemon master I can't be defeated by the likes of you I'm going to capture and defeat you all

8:32 you hear me did you go inside the pokeball it's the only way another big name for the forecast uh being seen is Eric Stewart he was best known for his roles as such a Kyber from yugioh and James from the early seasons of Pokemon however in addition to his acting work he also had a lot of ADR direction for forcas dubs and the divorce direction for both of you gave early episodes as well as ultimate muscle tij tikka 6 and seasons 3 through 5 for Pokemon my latest invention I call it the Sigma suit here take a look it seems like a normal body suit looks cool but trust me its appearance is definitely deceiving see it uses a

9:19 positron network to generate a feed attack yeah Duke Scott you Duke on the opposite end of things dan green who is best known for his role as yogi bow from you do also did a lot of force directed I did not the script work but both way outside of four kids had to enforce direction for such losses samurai da Braccio murchison and gonna mute accordin as well as doing adoptuskids for such series is giant Robo Queens way to and also revolutionary girl new to that yeah it's a pretty small world he also may or may not have been involved in some had died Tuesday now unfortunately he largely retired her voice addict in 2011

10:04 after a personal family tragedy and has continued to reprise the role of Yugi in new games and movies were to you know French and was originally in the dr. marcozzi infinity as such as ruby fake brought the two of us together for a reason and we fulfilled our destiny we protected mankind from the return of the shadow games and we've both grown tremendously along the way I'm gonna miss you you do realize we'll never truly be apart right the gift of kindness you've given me and the courage I've given you will remain with us and that will forever bind us together a name you might not have known about though was a late Mattie blasting who made her debut with the atom a void

10:50 Center for kids doing various voices for the early episodes of Pokemon before Levin the role of meow for everything past episode 29 and continuing to voice a character a to 2006 she was one of the very first openly trans actresses to be involved in voice acting and after her tenure as behalf she continued to be a very active voice of the transgender community and helped to organize support groups through the platform second wife where she was known for being a great voice of encouragement to others sadly in 2008 Mattie blossom passed away but she left behind a legacy of positivity answer to the voice of inspiration for other trans artists hmm you're right we don't have a lot in

11:35 common the same voice the same yeah the same sky maybe if we started looking at what's the same instead of always looking at what's different well who knows well for kids rate of infamy spanned across the to thousands and into the 2010s their time but eventually come crashing to an end and their eventual downfall was complicated the first of their troubles began around 2006 when four kids lost the rights to the Pokemon anime and it reverted back to the Pokemon company who it says been handily de production for the dub this was a pretty big blow for them and it was a blow that would be followed by several financial woes over the course of the next few years well for kids might have lost the rights of

12:21 the Pokemon anime they sold quite a bit of money to the book about company and they weren't the only ones as they also owed some money to TMS for Sonic X as well as some of the rights holders for some of their other licenses they also lost quite a bit of money when their original franchise chaotix imploded and that's what all eventually leads to the company getting B we've suited for the new york stock exchange in 2010 after the company's market value far below fifteen million however the real death sentence for for KS came in 2011 when four kids found up so Scott my legal battle with TV Tokyo and a DK over the appeal licensed TV Tokyo when a TK canceled for Keith Watson to yugioh claiming the forças had violated several agreements in their contract during that

13:06 time the two companies attempted to market and distribute the franchise in the West themselves but for kids disagreed with their claims and said that their contract was so Faolain he eventually leading today I'm filing a lawsuit against them while this legal battle was going on TV Tokyo when ATK continued to work on marketing the franchise and even began recording their own dub of the appear zexal which was recorded in California as approach to New York like the previous Udyr series and even surd popular actor Johnny Yong Bosch as the protagonist is that my enemy as well you know watch out want to protect backs and henchmen is beside you oh that's just a costume please get fine in the end oh no for kids ended up winning the lawsuit

13:51 because while TV till Q&A decays reasons for interpretation to license were pretty sound it did say without going to the right amount of paperwork and the proper procedures although well for kids what the battle here it would ultimately lose the war as a cost we're paying for this lawsuit hurt them pretty severely and the 2012 the eventually ended up transferring to rights for several days series of Saban including Sonic X chaotix and broadcasting rights were Dragon Ball Z Kai as for the you get license that ended up going to Konami who have continued to handle the production adults for the franchise for their 4k media branch and for kids also so the recording facilities of any continuing the use of the New York whose talent and later UVO dubs what was left of the company with

14:38 rebranded into the name for licensing corporation and a 2016 4 lights thing filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy before vanishing into the void the legacy of four kids with a dark ordinary eyes of dedicated anime fans and anyone following the company's be dead and buried the burning hatred a community have swords Ennis or the tenth as ever at the same time though it's hard to know the impact their work has had in creating a new generation of anime fans and it's right of all too heavy edits their dub sisters like Pokemon and UVO are so father remembered by a lot of people a lot of their worst businesses it really came down to the concert that's handling my outcome we didn't have a whole lot of respect for the anime and manga market and who also conveniently retired right before the

15:24 debut be a lawsuit and a lot of other folks working there from the staff to the actors that's we cared a lot more about the anime they were working on to be my thing regardless of how you feel about them though in the end well a lot of their work with the product of its time for better or worse it's work that we won't be forgetting about anytime soon [Music] [Applause] thanks everyone for checking out this video and an extra special thanks to our friend John Paul aka Indies know for helping the fact that some of the research but also out to give a quick shout-out to my patreon scripts at Echidna Michelle Travis de Carabas but with Yowie hands Karl West Aikau Jacob

16:10 Wilson Jared Bronco boob you Dez virzal NT and we be that's what it's supporting us guys are seriously awesome feel free to let us know when you thought the comments below and if you'd like to see more content for my channel feel free to subscribe to us and check out the done top podcast where we do in-depth reviews of anime dubs if it also followed up talk on Twitter to Instagram whether the named podcasts and if you'd like to support anything we nerds are up to feel free to donate to our patreon or our cofee once again thanks for watching this video until next time or taco on my friends