FUNi Acquires Dragon Ball Kai
FUNimation has confirmed its acquisition of domestic distribution rights to the current Dragon Ball Kai anime television series, which will be released in America under the revised title “Dragon Ball Z Kai.” The domestic release will debut in this fiscal year, which may be as late as spring 2011.
The ongoing Dragon Ball Kai, which premiered on Japanese television on April 5, 2009, is the 1989 Dragon Ball Z television series recut to adhere closer to the pacing of Dragon Ball creator Akira Toriyama’s original manga. Dragon Ball Kai includes remastered high definition video cropped to widescreen, digitally enhanced effects & select re-animated footage, newly recorded Japanese dialogue, new theme music and credits sequences, and select censored shots of graphic violence that were not censored in the 1989 broadcast.
I suppose new acquisitions are always a good thing, but after releasing the archival Dragon Box edition in America, I don’t see the advantage of following it with the censored version. Proof below.
Source: Anime News Network
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I’m guessing the appeal lies in people who just wanna get through it without enduring the filler episodes. Though it’d be nice if we at least got an extended version of that ep where Goku tries to get his license. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oo5rQsVK98M
Maybe it’s just me,
But I always thought a BIG part of the current anime problem in the US were all these continuous re-releases of older shows?
It’s not even 2 months AFTER they do a previous release and a bunch of these companies do full set releases or “newer, better REMASTERED” editions after you just got done buying the last single volume release or previous edition of a series!
Now, I don’t really care about Dragon Ball because A) it’s overrated and definitely NOT the best anime ever released but I wish the industry B) could move away from so many darn re-releases and just continue onward with C) economical releases of new AND classic series and perhaps slow some things down.
Even with the collapse and shrinkage of the market, there’s still too much being released now to keep up!
(Wish we could get more of Macross, Gundam, and some of the cult classics like Dirty Pair TV over here, too….)
P.S. — I definitely think within a few years, Funi will be in trouble… Can’t rely on that Dragon Ball gravy train forever. I see a repeat of ADV in their near-future unless they get smart!
The re-releases are poison, but they’re part of the distribution culture. A necessary evil.
Distributors have to re-release titles under new labels or banners because retailers will dump existing, unselling SKU if they (distributors) don’t. If FUNimation says they are distributing a certain title for the third time, one of the largest benefits is that it forces retailers to make shelf space in order to stock the new inventory. The alternative is to announce a generic re-price on existing inventory (which has slipped in sales priority). Not that I don’t think this isn’t a stupid and troublesome model to begin with…
Also, more DBZ? Who cares?
I agree it would be a waste of time to remake DBZ-Kai, but hey, it’s there already. Which makes me think, will they release it in Spanish too?