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REVIEW: Dragon Ball Z Kai Blu-Ray Part 8

Your friend is American. When people say 'Japanese' they mean nationality, and being raised in on the culture. No matter what race or ethnicity someone is, if he was born and grew up in the states, he'll have an American viewset. Culture is the big factor when it comes to these, not ethnicity. Even so, one 'friend' isn't a valid sample size for a poll.

Goku bloody sounds like a chick, and don't pull this 'man-child' card because that is a bullsh*t excuse.

I am not sure I've ever heard anyone say they preferred the original Japanese soundtrack over FUNi's. I respect your opinion though, I'll never share it.

I dislike the "Well, it's not like DBZ is some masterpiece, who cares if the dub isn't accurate/well acted/etc?" thing I get sometimes.

For instance, a scene in which, in the Japanese, Goku spares Vegeta's life on Earth because he really wants to fight him again, despite it putting the entire planet at risk, becomes in English a scene where Goku wants to spare him because it's the right thing to do, because "We have to show him there's a different way." One version conveys Goku's overwhelming obsession with finding a challenge. The other? Typical feel-good superheroism nonsense.

Sounds at worst like a lateral movement to me. Either rationale is a little dumb, but the original Japanese would make Goku a reprehensible selfish and irresponsible near lunatic, whereas the adaptation at least gives him some sort of ethical principle, albeit a painfully simplistic one naïvely realized.

the original Japanese would make Goku a reprehensible selfish and irresponsible near lunatic

I chuckled. Titan injecting himself in to a discussion to blast something related to the US once again.

If he's guilty of giving his friend too much credibility then you're equally guilty of not giving him enough. Even if he is an American raised person of Japanese descent, there's a good chance that there is still a great deal of Japanese culture present in his upbringing. Not to mention that as a person who was raised to be fluent in Japanese they are still far more qualified to judge the nuances of a performance in Japanese than your average Joe who doesn't know Japanese or didn't grow up with it to the extent they'll be able to pick up on the little things that a person who isn't fluent would not.

All things are not equal, and your outright implication that he is somehow ethnically cleansed of Japanese culture just because he was raised in the US is a huge leap in logic. You don't know the person or just how truly Japanese his upbringing was. Geographic location doesn't define ones upbringing, the parents and the family and that which is around them does. While he is not likely as definitively Japanese as someone who lives there, living in America and being raised in America still does not magically cleanse the individual of their cultural past. Dismissing their opinion because they're American raised is poor form, not to mention potentially insulting.

It's not whether it's a masterpiece or not, it's what's important to conveying its intent. It's a brainless fighting show, none of that was missed in translation. The only real negatives are your (seemingly arbitrary) complaints and things like the music. What exactly did they do that so trampled over the original's character and spirit, anyway?