High School of the Dead Dub Cast Revealed!

As I'm sure you've all realized previously, I'm a bit pro-fanservice. Interestingly enough, I've actually been anti-zombie for a while after watching a particular zombie movie and discovering that there was a limit to the amount of gore a man can take in before he loses his taste for it. (The scene in question involved a lawnmower and quite a few zombies. Gooey ewwie.)

When I heard about High School of the Dead, I found myself at first not interested. Then I read a bit about it and started getting interested. Then I heard who the artist was and I just HAD to check it out. I was quite happy when Section23 decided to do an English dub for it. I've wondered for a while who would be cast.

Well, we've got the answer now!



Additional details claimed in this post on Mania.com's AoD section, official status unverified.

I think this is one of best casts I've seen in a while. I especially like seeing Illich Guardiola for Kouichi Shido. His voice was the very first one that came to mind when I started thinking about an English voice for that character. (No offense whatsoever for Mr. Guardiola, I just think his voice will be perfect.)

I'm also extremely pleased by the casting of Taylor Hannah as Saeko Busujima. Having enjoyed her voice work in a number of other series, I think she's going to just kick ass in this role. Listen to a clip here. Check out all the clips and decide for yourself!

My only negative is for Hisashi Igo being voiced by David Matranga. I don't know exactly why but I REALLY thought Chris Patton would be superlative casting for that role. Sadly, I think he's dropping off the anime radar a bit. (Mr. Matranga is very talented though. I'm sure he'll achieve something great with this.)

I hope to see some High School of the Dead DVDs or Blu-Rays before too long.

So what do all of you my dear readers think about the casting? Are you pleased or pissed? Comment before They get you!

Bye-ni!

Strike Witches Contest + Predictions

No, I'm not dead, just got lazy again. I have an excuse though, I gave blood recently! The turn out was pretty low. Kinda depressing.

Depressing like my predictions for the future but we'll get to that in a second.

Everyone, I am officially opening a contest to win a copy of Strike Witches on DVD! When this series was first licensed by Funimation, I made a vow to buy 3 copies to support it. (I considered this license a very bold move and one I wanted to support.) I now have 3 extra copies of Strike Witches on hand.



I'll post photographic proof of such later on. Every blog post until the contest's end will include a minor contest update from now until July 4th. This contest will be open for ANYONE to enter. I will ship to any location ON EARTH! (That can in fact be reached by some postal service.)

Contest Disclaimer and Baseline Rules:

Although highly unlikely, I reserve the right to cancel this contest at any time. This contest is open to any person with a mailing address, prizes will be shipped anywhere! Winners' names will be posted here at Blog Of A Heretical Dub Lover but mailing addresses will be provided only to professional postal staff of my choice. No one else will be told.

Winners' addresses and E-mail addresses will be erased once the prizes have been shipped. Non-winners' names, E-mail and mailing addresses will not be given out to any one and will be erased when the winners have been confirmed. Non-winners will not be contacted, spammed or harassed in any way. I am not interested in ordinary humans! I reserve the right to retroactively add new rules in the unlikely event that they become necessary.

One entry per person/mailing address.

The DVDs are Region 1.

The DVDs include both English and Japanese dubs, English subs and a commentary track. And you might even get an iron-on patch. Of course, you're also getting this:



Sexy girls, sci-fi alternate history plot and plenty of action with a healthy dose of fanservice. Want to get all of that? Send an E-mail to my E-mail with Strike Witches Contest in the subject line. Include your name and address. Also, please post a comment with your thoughts on this contest or my future predictions! There will be 3 winners so you've got a great chance of getting some free anime!

Now, on to my predictions for the future.

First, VIZ will drop the Shonen Jump magazine, leaving us with no monthly manga anthology magazines of note. I believe this will happen before the end of next year, possibly before the end of this year. Why? Well, VIZ layoffs mainly and the growing trend in that direction in general. VIZ already killed Shojo Beat and Yen Press recently made Yen Plus a soon-to-be online magazine rather than a physical media title.

I believe the trend is clearly against Shonen Jump's continued publishing in the US. I have seen it removed from store shelves in numerous places, primarily Wal-Mart, providing anecdotal evidence.

My second prediction is that Bandai Entertainment will cease to exist. It may hold up until after the new Haruhi releases come out (they recently announced Haruhi-chan and Churuya-chan shorts) but I wouldn't take bets at this point. I've been convinced they were going downhill for quite some time, in fact I started thinking about it right after they started doing more sub-only. I thought that would be a coffin nailer.



My evidence? Well, they've become the sultans of delaying tactics, with virtually every anime they've released since last year being delayed multiple times. We've seen their number of licenses drop significantly, their sub-only catalog grow by leaps and bounds and now they are apparently selling off some of their licenses to Section23! Although these were formally Bandai Visual licenses, Bandai Entertainment did more or less take over Bandai Visual's holdings when it died. Clearly these license were sold for quick cash. (To fund the Haruhi franchise or a mysterious other new license? Only time will tell!)

Frankly, I think a combination of the fansub leeches and the poor economy (which the federal government keeps insisting is getting better) is responsible. I believe that with several of their licenses being series with strong fansub communities (and thus larger leech populations) and with the drop in people's personal incomes due to job loss, higher taxes and general economic depression, they're simply destined to die. I fear for the future of all of the companies but they are currently the most vulnerable in my opinion.

While I believe they will complete their work on Haruhi-related projects, I'm not sure about anything else. By next year's end, possibly sooner, I think we'll be talking about closure plans. I believe Bandai Entertainment as the US branch of Bandai Namco Holdings, will not see the 2012 elections.

My third prediction: I have a feeling that Section23 will announce another English dubbed production before the end of the year. This is just a hunch. Evidence suggests they are recovering from the ADV fragmentation trauma, which surprises me a little (though they are still in need of outside capital, suggesting they remain vulnerable to death.)

Well, that's it for this blog post! I'm Richard J., your Navigator, signing off!

Look for next week to make up for my laziness from this week! No lies!

Bye-ni!

23 + 13 = Dub Sniper.

After a long week of cleaning, hauling garbage, moving furniture and suffering a few pulled muscles, another exciting and fat-free addition of Blog of a Heretical Dub Lover is here! (We apologize for the wait on a previously mentioned planned segment. Please join me Sunday, April 25th for Fan Love vs. Fan Hate.) I'm Richard J., navigator for the blog and sole writing talent. (Any use of plurals such as "we" is solely for a cheap effect.)

Anyway, after returning home today from a long clean-up and having a lovely dinner with my family, I found out that Section 23 had licensed the Golgo 13 TV series! In the past, their licenses meant little to me but this one adds another planned dub to their short (but growing!) list of bilingual releases!



Golgo 13 is a 50 episode series from 2008-2009 and the first set will appear at fine online retailers (and perhaps by divine grace at Best Buy and other brick and mortar stores) in July, meaning that this deal has likely been in the works for a while and production may very well be under way already. Plus as a bonus there's no mention of outside partners from the info I've read, suggesting this is Section23's baby all the way.

The series has clear appeal beyond the average anime fan as well, giving this license and release a distinct chance of actually kicking butt in sales. The series is about an assassin for the love of cookies! People LOVE stories about assassins! I mean just look at how many movies, video games and books there are about them. I expect Duke "Golgo 13" Togo, the assassin lead, to do well over here. (Heck the manga's been in circulation since 1968 with 156 volumes so far in Japan and VIZ has started putting it out over here with 13 volumes out.)

All that's really left to do is settle on the marketing methodology. (I'd highly recommend trying for a TV deal with this one.) Oh and give us a really sweet cast!



Crap. He'll wipe out the Texas VA pool by tomorrow. ;)

One way or another, I think this is a good move by Section23 and while my money issues are slowly (very slowly) working themselves out, I've been hearing about Golgo 13 for years and am interested in the anime. My family's legal/financial issues are continuing to threaten everything but I'm increasingly confident that this nightmare will end happily and the problems caused by one jackass con artist will end well. (Too bad I can't hire this guy to take care of the problem for me!)

Bye-ni!

Of Dubs and Men

Hello all of my 11 followers! Are you doing well? Are you happy? Are you bored?

Are you still out there reading my ramblings? Please say yes, you're support is all that keeps me alive. (Okay, respirating a mix of O2, N2 and other gases plus regular caloric intake keeps me alive but your support makes mere survival enjoyable.

Anyway, I'm here to blather yet again about some great news in the English dub world and to let you know my thoughts on what is going on.

First, lets have a yippie for VIZ getting Kekkaishi on to Adult Swim!





Yeah, funny how Adult Swim was all "we're getting rid of anime!" a while back and now they're all "dudez, we's gots some animuz fur yer!" Perhaps they found out that anime fans, while not giving them quite the ratings they wanted, are critical to the late night programming succeeding? Who knows, who cares, more anime on TV is ALWAYS A GOOD THING!

Some exceptions may apply, void where 4Kids is applicable.

Let us also rejoice at Funimation licensing Black Butler!



Gee, that doesn't quite look like my kind of show but it could be awesome. Many expect the dub to cast Brina Palencia as Ciel. Apparently they wish to conveniently ignore the existence of Maxey Whitehead! Defy expectations in dubbing!

Anyway, lets talk about some fully confirmed English dub casts!

Do you remember that Bandai licensed the second season of Haruhi? Did you know there was great uncertainty about the English dub cast? Well, that's been cleared up and we now know that the original English cast is back to show us the awesome again!



In case you don't like to click links, here's the cast that's been confirmed:

Haruhi Suzumiya: Wendee Lee
Mikuru Asahina: Stephanie Sheh
Yuki Nagato: Michelle Ruff
Kyon: Crispin Freeman
Itsuki Koizumi: Johnny Yong Bosch

Sorry Asakura, you're going to have to wait a bit. Who knows, maybe you'll get to be in a future dub?

In that same ANN article, Vampire Knight's main English dub cast was presented!



Perennial fan favorite Vic Mignogna, the lovely Mela Lee and rarely heard but often loved Ethan Murray join together in a cast that has left many fans saying "what the heck?" A few in a good way, many in a negative way but then poor Vic seems to have a personal hatedom to go with his fangirls. (He has lots more fangirls than haters though so he probably doesn't care too much.)

I haven't seen Vampire Knight so I don't know if the casting works or is horrible but personally, I like all three of these VAs. I'm eager to give this dub a listen. (Assuming I can buy the DVDs down the road.)

Still, VIZ is being much more creative with its English dubs lately. That should be praised considering how much some fans complain about "assembly line dubs" and such.

Last but far from least, let's talk about the Clannad dub!



Awesome! I've been unable to fully watch the first episode in English due to Section23's Anime Network hating my computer. (My computer seems to be hated by many streaming sites. I think it has to do with my local ISP sucking and being on an over-burdened line.) However, there are some great clips of the English dub online at YouTube and they've given me a chance to enjoy the show a bit.

I will have this one even if I have to eat dust and misery for a month to afford it! Here's the cast!

Tomoya Okazaki: David Matranga
Nagisa Furukawa: Luci Christian
Kyou Fujibayashi: Shelley Calene-Black
Botan: Melissa Davis
Ryou Fujibayashi: Brittney Karbowski
Tomoyo Sakagami: Kaytha Coker
Kotomi Ichinose: Emily Neves
Fuko Ibuki: Hilary Haag
Youhei Sunohara: Greg Ayres
Mei Sunohara: Serena Varghese
Akio Furukawa: Andrew Love
Sanae Furukawa: Kara Greenberg
Voice of "I": Shannon Emerick
Girl: Melissa Davis
Yukine Miyazawa: Maggie Flecknoe
Misae Sagara: Elizabeth Bunch
Naoyuki Okazaki: Chris Hutchison
Kouko Ibuki: Stephanie Wittels
Yusuke Yoshino: Illich Guardiola
Junior Male (from Ep 24): Josh Grelle

That's a very nice cast. Especially awesome choice for Fuko. I love Hilary Haag's voice so much. I've really missed her.

Plus the character I've been the most curious about in this show is Fuko due to the whole "loves starfish" thing.

I find the oddest things interesting in series huh?

Well, that's all there is for me to talk about today. Hopefully, I won't be venting my spleen any time soon about negative or unhappy things. Currently I'm waiting to learn more about several situations before raging and working on a few reviews, maybe even an "official" one. (Now if Zac will just get back to me.)

I'll post again soon! In the mean time, check out the new English dubs hitting the market, keep loving what you love and never forget that you are a human being who deserves respect! Never accept flak from the haters!

And no matter how much you love English dubs, don't pretend you can get people into them.



Trust me, this can not turn out well.

Bye-ni!

Section23/ADV To Dub Clannad, Ghost Hound & MORE!

Ah, it's nice to be proven wrong about a company.

Richard J. here to add my voice to the legions of fans who are currently filling the world with their squees of joy.

From the very beginning, I thought Clannad and Ghost Hound were EASILY the titles that would sell the best and would benefit the most from English dubs. Now, we're finally getting those dubs we should have had from the beginning! (Pass the Hilary Haag please!)

Plus we're getting dubs for Blue Drop, Tears to Tiara and Fist of the North Star: Legends of the Dark King. (Can't say I'm interested in all of those but dubs are always a welcome addition.)

Hopefully these dubs will improve Steven Foster's image with some fans. (While he's not as awesome as Kyle Jones, he's hardly the menace some fans make him out to be.)

I may have to skip meals for it but I'm getting Clannad no matter what! Just when I was starting to convince myself that I really wouldn't have liked it anyway, they go and do this. Thanks guys.

Now can we please dub more? Pretty please?

Bye-ni!

Personal: I May Be Out

Well, after I rallied my faith for that last post, things just went straight down the toliet for me today. First the disappointing Hell Girl license by Section23 and then, literally minutes after I finished venting a bit about it, I found out that my family is in serious trouble.

I have a warning for everyone out there: do not ever do any kind of work for, associate with or in any way that involves money connect yourself with dishonest people. Thanks to a con artist, my family may now end up in complete financial and social ruin.

Normally I wouldn't share something this personal with anyone even in such a vague way but, hey, if everything is FUBAR anyway, why not? Since the situation is ongoing, maybe it will get resolved in a way that doesn't destroy my family completely but for right now, the government is threatening us and likely our business is just history.

So, while I still intend to try and stay a part of fandom, I may be forced to leave it due to not having any extra money for it. I may have to give up on law school but I've decided to fight for that as much as I can.

Just don't trust people that don't deserve to be trusted my friends. It's not worth trusting anyway.

Bye-ni. I hope this won't be the last time.