The Dubbing of Death Note
 

This thread is for the discussion of English Voice Actors in the R1 release of Death Note

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• Don't take it personally.
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  Yes, it’s true. They’re human. Therefore, don’t just indiscriminately rip them and their work apart as if they’re inorganic objects. You don’t have to flame praise them non-stop, but be thoughtful in your criticism.

Thanks

Well, I for one am not a big fan of the dubbing. Light's voice is weird. He sounds like he's 15..but he does have that insane laugh down though...Ryuk's voice is probably the best, though when he laughs he sounds like someone who has been smoking for like 30 years. I feel L's voice is the worst...It's so deep! Not like Arnold Swartinegger deep, just deep....It's just weird....and I hate it...

Overall, I'd give the dub a 5/10

I agree with siya for the most part, L sounds way too deep and Light's voice sounds too young, but they both have their good qualities. For instance, both of them have many long monologues, and they usually pull them off with just the right amount of "oomph." I, overall, think they did a pretty good job with the English dubs.

Light and Ryuk are fine, L sounds too generic though, he's supposed to be different.

I just hate English dubs. I used to love them until I heard the Japanese voices and I thought they sounded way cooler. I would say Ryuk sounds the best out of Light, Ryuk, and L but I really don't like English dubs.

I actually dont mind the dub. I think light's could be better, but it kind of grew on me.

I actually kind of like L's, it's Lights that drives me crazy. >.<;;

Raye Penbar's was kind of bad too.

The one thing that drives me insane though, is everyone pronouncing Yagami, yah-guh-me. Isn't it Yuh-gam-ee?

I could be wrong, but I thought it was.

Ryuks I think is pretty good, and in fact had they got his messed up, I had sworn to my friends I wouldn't watch the dubbed episodes XD

So luckily I like his. ^_^

I just can't wait to hear Misa's though :D

I like the english dub! L'voice is cute, Light's one too (even if it's too young, I agree with you ç__ç; ). But I'm Italian, so don't mind; I simply love the english language, so Death Note dubbed in english is a lovely thing. *___*;

I hope the show will be dubbed in Italian too... even if there are voices that speaks about changes of name: Light -> Luce, L -> Elle, Near -> Nino, Mello -> Melina (and he will became a girl..), Rem -> Remigilda, etc. xD

In the english dub, they didn't change the names, did they?

(Anyway... the original dub is better xD)

Unless you count Raito being Light, it's the same names.

Speaking of the dub yesterday...

Actually I thought they did that kinda well, better than some of the things they've done before. *shrug*

The Ray Penber part where is go out of the train station, the dub make a mistake.

If I remember well, Ray Penber said something like "damn kira..." in japanese
In the english version, he said something like "Kira, where are you"

I agree, it should have been much more unique.

Overall it's alright. My expectations is always low, so it evens out.

I just watched the dub of EPIC CHIP EATING and the original back-to-back. The dialogue seems to be consistent AFAIK (I didn't have an eng sub of the JPN version to use as a reference, so I had to use an spanish sub).

i kinda like L's voice too...i like the subtle english hint to it
Light's voice is kinda weird...but who i am waiting to hear is misa

I personally love the unintentional comedy you can get from the overdramatization from the English voice actors.

"With my right hand, I will write names, and with the other. . .<dramatic pause>. . .I WILL EAT A POTATO CHIP!"

And you can hear Light's voice practically gloating at the fact that he's eating a potato chip. It is hilarious.

"And maybe, a in a few seconds. . .<dramatic pause>. . .I WILL EAT ANOTHER POTATO CHIP! You can't stop me L! Just watch as I eat these sinfully delicious slices of spud!"

EP9 just finished airing. Only thing I didn't like was the part where L reveals himself. In the JPN version, he says "私はLです". In the dub, I couldn't make out what he said since I was expecting L to say something similar to the original script.

Ok, so here's my views

Light- I don't mind it necessarily...but as a drama geek, i have to say this. The guy who does his voice doesn't really make the scene believable. He takes each line individually and just says it how it seems like it should be said, instead of looking at the whole scene itself. I don't know... maybe i'm overthinking it

also "i'll take a potato chip.... ... ...AND EAT IT!!!!!!!!" speaks for itself

L- a tad too deep, but you have to remember that L's voice was sort of deep in the Japanese version too. One thing that bugged me is that the voice acting seems...inconsistent... at some points it seems like the actor will make an effort to deepen his voice, and then a sentence later it sounds sort of different, and then goes back to normal.


Ryuuk- i think it fits him perfectly, i love it

on a final note

"I wanted to tell you that I am L."

The way he said it amused me. "I just wanted to tell you... ThatI'mL." That little speed up at the end of the sentence made me laugh, I'm weird.

Anyway, the dub seems fine to me, when I compare them to the subs, I see no real significant change in dialogue. The voices themselves aren't bad either, though Light and Ryuk leave voices to be desired, I think L's is just fine.

I'm generally not a dub fan, for a number of reasons that go into the subtleties of language and how details of characterisation and plot are lost in translation (if anyone ever wants me to go into this in detail, give me a shout ^^). That said, the Death Note dub really isn't bad. I've only seen three episodes of it, but from what I've seen it's pretty high quality. The voices seem a bit off to me, because I'm so accustomed to the original seiyuu, but I actually have a weird fondness for dub!L. No, I don't really understand why, I just do.

It's obviously not perfect, dubs never are, but the dialogue is fairly true to the original and the delivery, if occasionally inconsistent, is pretty good overall. I'm not keeping up with the dub release, because I've seen the entire series in Japanese, but I'd give it 7/10.