November 24, 2000
Well, I know it's been a couple weeks since the airing of the OAV series, but I just didn't have the time to sit down and write about it until now, with school and all. So, let's get started!
Overall, the dubbing job they did on Endless Waltz was pretty much the same as the TV series. Since it was shown during the day, it was the cut version. They also showed the OAV version instead of the movie version, which I found a bit disappointing because I wanted to see those extra scenes in English so I could understand them better (I only have the movie unsubbed [when this was written, anyway]). Anyway, because it was the cut version, there were a bunch of blood edits and some dialogue changes so obvious that I don't even need to see the uncut version to know what they originally said ^_^ I will, of course, eventually get around to doing my full episode comparisons of the OAV series, but that will be after I finish the TV series (which will take awhile :P). Anyway, aside from the edits and dialogue changes, the translation was dead on almost all of the time...there was, however, one tiny inconsistency that I'm not sure how managed to slip by. In the scene where Trowa (all buff and shirtless ^o^) beats up those men at the circus, he was looking through their stuff and said something about how they might be working for Leia's daughter (In other words, Mariemaia). However, moments later when it switches to Heero looking up information on Mariemaia, he says that her mother's name is Lisa. I'm not sure how this could have happened, since Gundam Wing is usually so good about being consistent, unlike certain other dubs (*cough*Sailormoon*cough*). Why, in other dubs, (*cough*Sailor*cough*Moon*) a character will be given an English name, oh, let's say "Coby" for the first half of an episode, yet characters will call them a distinctly Japanese name, maybe "Kobayashi", in the second half of the episode (In case you haven't seen the absolutely wonderful *cough*sarcasmoff*cough* dub of the Sailormoon S and SuperS seasons, things like this have actually happened in more than one episode...). Ahem, but enough about that, like I was saying, this inconsistency confused me because usually the Gundam Wing dubbers do such a good job of making sure things like this don't happen, especially when they happen within seconds of each other. Oh, and there was another thing that could have been done better. It was nice of them to keep the original title cards, but the majority of the audience watching the episodes couldn't read Japanese, and therefore had no idea what the three episode titles were (Silent Orbit, Operation Meteor, and Return to Forever). It would have been better if they had Heero say the episode title as it appeared on the screen like they did for the TV episodes. But that's just another nitpicky thing ^_^ After all, I'm definitely not going to say they should have played an English version of "White Reflection." No one can compare to Two-Mix as far as it goes for singing that song (I know I can't...I've tried to at a karaoke place in Japan...it just can't be done like Takayama Minami does it ^_^). I'm so glad they played that song two out of the three times it was originally played in the series. Japanese music is managing to sneak into American households, as during the TV series, both "Just Communication" and "Rhythm Emotion" were played in the background of some Gundam Wing episodes...and lets not forget later today during the airing of the DBZ movie "The World's Strogest" everyone will get to hear the absolutely adorable song by Gohan called, "Piccolo-san Daisuki!" ("I love Mr. Piccolo!"). As I'm getting off the subject again, I'll move on to the next topic.
This is unrelated to the rest of this RT, but I just have to mention it anyway. With the Toonami movies now airing each Friday, Toonami has changed it's schedule yet again. This includes the return of Ronin Warriors (Yay! I finally get to see how it bagan!), Gundam Wing being moved to 6:00...and a change to the Midnight Run. Instead of showing uncut Gundam Wing at midnight and Dragon Ball Z at 12:30, they are now showing DBZ at midnight and Tenchi Muyou at 12:30. This means no more uncut Gundam Wing! So, it seems my page now really does have a purpose. Now all those who can only see the cut version can learn about the uncut version here ^_^ Woo hoo, I feel so special ^o^ Anyway, I'm tired of typing, and I got lots of turkey to eat (Gobbles!) so Jaaaa na!