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Essay: Butchering of a Classic While I really enjoyed watching the Sailormoon dub every day on the TV when I got home from school years and years ago, it wasn't until I was introduced to the Japanese version that I began to hate the DiC dub. So many changes were made to the series that Sailormoon became Sailor Moon, a completely different version from the Japanese one. Scenes were editted and entire episodes were cut out. Later on, Sailormoon S and SuperS would be picked up by Cloverway. Cloverway may have kept the original soundtracks in, but they still made many mistakes and the dub is still far from perfect (or even decent for that matter). In my opinion, the voice acting is worse than what it is in the DiC dub. Serena sounds like a boy going through puberty with a cracking voice, Luna sounds like an old woman (like she always has in the dub), the Amazoness Quartet sound like valley girls, and the use of "kewl speak" ensues throughout every episode. My major problem with the voice acting, kewl speak aside, is how monotone Amara and Michelle's voices are. I suppose that the voice actors were told to sound mysterious and aloof... but they sound horrible. Amara sounds as if she has absolutely no emotion whatsoever. Michelle is a little better but not by much. On top of that, they both talk in "kewl speak." The talented and reserved Michiru is reduced to being a valley girl Michelle and the swave and aloof Haruka is reduced to being a teeny bopper Amara. In some way, I could almost make sense of the inner senshi talking in "kewl speak" and acting like airheads. Maybe it's just because they're young and they have typical girly personalities. But having Haruka and Michiru acting airheaded when they're not talking about their mission is completely out of character. At least Makoto is still a tomboy, Ami is a bookworm, Rei is hot-tempered, etc. The one thing that stood out about Haruka and Michiru (to both the audience and the inner senshi) was their calmness and their maturity. Hearing them talk like twelve year old teeny boppers is disturbing if not just plain wrong. The other major problem I have with the dub is what Cloverway did to Haruka and Michiru's relationship. Haruka and Michiru are lesbians; it was confirmed by Takeuchi Naoko herself and there's a plethora of evidence from both the anime and manga to back it up. I think it's quite sad that most of North American society condemns homosexuality so much that they have to censor it from everything. It's not evil: it's not going to corrupt children. Cloverway attempted to deny the fact that Haruka and Michiru are lesbians by making Amara and Michelle cousins. I can't say if Cloverway really wanted to do this or if they had to because they were afraid of the feedback they would get off of angry parents... but they really didn't give much effort in sticking to their story. Aside from making the two women cousins, they also make Michelle oogle "hunky" guys (especially Darien for some reason) to give the impression that she is heterosexual. They also occasionally try to explain the relationship between Amara and Michelle as being really close friends. .... Ehrm, right. The weirdest thing of all is that most of the scenes that imply Haruka and Michiru's loving relationship are left intact. The comments may not be as suggestive or as coy, but there are still scenes that imply that Amara and Michelle aren't just "close friends." While I think it's good that they leave these scenes intact, I think it's rather silly. If they say that Amara and Michelle are just good friends, they should stick to it right through the series. The dis-continuity of a series shows just how crappy the company who produced it is.
...With that in mind, isn't it funny that, in cases like these, incest is more acceptable than homosexuality? :p
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