@Pants-eater:
Wow, 4Kids is getting disowned amongst their peers.
Since I wasn't old enough to remember the turnover of FUNi can you tell me what happened and on what magnitude? Like protests outside their headquarters with those signs?
FUNimation started out as a pretty small company. I don't know of its origins but I DO know that, for some time, they have owned the rights to any Dragonball-related anime.
In the Fall of 1995, FUNi brought the original Dragonball series (featuring young Goku) to the States, with the help of Seagull Entertainment. I should also mention that this is the same Seagull Entertainment company that worked with DiC as the TV distributor for Sailor Moon (before Cloverway). Unfortunately, DB shares another similarity with Sailor Moon… BOTH shows were stuck in shitty timeslots, due to their syndicated airings. In the mid-'90s, syndication meant anime purgatory. Thus, DB never made it past 13 episodes (canned JUST before Krillin showed up).
Then, in the following Fall of 1996, hoping for an instant hit, FUNi brought the more action-packed Dragonball Z to the States. This time, they had Saban Entertainment as their distributor. However, Saban had FUNi on a VERY SHORT LEASH when it came to the edits. All of the blood edits, episode splicings, episode removals, and sugarcoating of death was the result of Saban's strict censorship policies (though, it now pales in comparison to 4Kids' handywork)! This infuriated countless people, who were fans of the original Japanese version. One of the most noteable amongst those people was Chris Psaros, creator of the website, DBZ Uncensored.
DBZ Uncensored did for DBZ what the OP Episode Comparison Guide currently does for OP. Needless to say, it's a very informative website when it came to learning about the edits, but lots of Chris's time was spent bashing FUNi to no end. However, he did learn that FUNi wasn't entirely to blame. As a matter of fact, it was stated on an old DragonballZ.com FAQ that Saban was responsible for most of the edits.
As badly as the DBZ fans were getting screwed over, I think the biggest kick-in-the-teeth was when Pioneer (who owned the VHS/DVD distribution rights) refused to release the original Japanese episodes. Yes, FUNi gave them full permission to release subbed episodes, but a Pioneer representative said that it would be pointless, because of all the bootlegged fansubs floating about.
Nice going, Pioneer! You may have the technology to produce VHS cassettes with DVD-quality picture and sound, but that was a douchebag move!
I can't possibly imagine how many complaint letters and hate mails were sent to FUNi, but I actually remember sending a complaint e-mail of my own (I didn't flame or even swear). Evidently, those angry fans actually accomplished something, because FUNi eventually broke ties with Saban after season two (which was the first half of the Namek Saga). You can tell this, because once DBZ started airing on Toonami, the Saban logo disappeared from the ending credits of every episode.
I almost forgot to mention that DBZ also got stuck in syndication and was dying a slow, but certain death. If it wasn't for Cartoon Network picking up the first and second seasons, it would've ended up dying from lack of exposure, just like Sailor Moon did. The good thing about DBZ airing on Toonami was that the series was getting MASSIVE exposure. The bad thing is that fans were stuck watching reruns from the Summer of '98 to the Fall of '99!
Back to the fact that FUNi was a small company, they could no longer afford the Ocean Studios VA's (bye-bye Scott :sad:), so they had to relocate to Ft. Worth, Texas. Then, they had to hire a brand new staff and new VA's, in order to continue making new, uncut episodes. They were obviously on some kind of budget, because the newly-casted VA's SUCKED HARD (I clearly remember my joy turning into horror when I watched my uncut Ginyu Assault VHS for the first time)!!
However, unlike Dub Piece, the voice-acting in DBZ got MUCH better with time.
Hell, even Bruce Faulconer began composing some damn good BGM after awhile!
Whew! Well, that's pretty much the story of how DBZ got liberated from the censorship ball 'n' chain, and how FUNi grew from a tiny children's entertainment company, to an anime-licensing GIANT! Oh, and thank God for the Ultimate Uncut DVDs! FUNi had to wait until Pioneer's video distribution rights for the season one and two episodes expired before they could begin work on them.
I tend to ramble whenever I notice talks of DBZ's censorship days, it's a force-of-habit from the peak of my DBZ fandom that'll probably never break.
