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NEWS: 4Kids Descends from Summit

No. It's because of the overalls. I like Yu-Gi-Oh!.

4Kids is not responsible for the failure of One Piece, but rather, One Piece itself has failed to attract a mainstream audience in America, or rather, it has yet to do so. I cite the first (butchered) version of Dragonball Z as evidence of successful start despite serious edits.

Years ago, Shaman King was projected to be the "next Pokemon", yet even with a responsible dub (with a few choice moments of actual cursing) in addition to, uh, the concept of an afterlife (ergo, an implication of death), Shaman King was relatively unspectacular and has not attracted the massive audience of something like Naruto.

I will consent, putting One Piece on an outlet like 4Kids.tv was probably a bad idea, and KidsWB should have been the one to shoulder the show...but it's unlikely the niche core of fans who so loudly bash 4Kids on the internet (teens->young adults) would be likely to pull the weight of the series (in terms of massive gross income) that Toei expects of its "new Dragonball".

4Kids did everything in its power to make the show a success, and since people are not buying into One Piece, I guess we can call its failure on appeal, not presentation. People (including myself) criticize/satirize 4Kids for their hilariously bad edits...but Toei makes equally laughable mistakes in their "budget cutting" efforts. I'd call things a 50/50 split.

And lastly...why do people care if One Piece isn't popular? Obviously, the vast majority of the people here who talk about the series have seen the illegal subtitles/manga scanslations, so what's the deal with bashing 4Kids for trying to turn a (small) profit for Eiichiro Oda, who might respect the spirit but clearly does not benefit from internet piracy?

Oh, and for a final note.

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest will clearly raise more interest in One Piece. In economic terms...ehh, I'd call them "complementary goods".

10 years ago, you could air a show aimed at the kids' demographic, and usually, even despite it being horribe, kids would sit through it for lack of anything better to do.

I guess someone would've said something similar to this, but One Piece kind of wasn't going to be a big hit as far as I saw. Even if it were accurate and not dumbed down, the idea of pirates, very diverse, flamboyant pirates with special powers wouldnt go over well with people. Lets face it, the art style is just plain ol' weird, when compared to something more streamlined such as Naruto or DBZ.

I mean, this is part of the cultural difference. Japan has had fourty years of continually changing styles and development, whereas in America, when animation changes, it's usually in a larger, more direct fashion. Japan generally will blend into each other, whereas the US would work like chapters.

Or I have no idea what I'm talking about.

*edited out "sympathetic words"*

Mohawk52 wrote:

potassium wrote: ..... and Elfen Lied promotes lying. I think "Lied" is pronounced "leed", not lied as in "she lied in court".

that's obviously the joke.

that's the second time now in this very thread you've taken seriously something i said that wasn't meant to be.

The thing is, 4Kids never advertised the show, bar a couple of spots on primetime reruns, where the majority of the people watching wouldn't really, well... care. 4Kids has proven that they are totally able to get ads on Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon, and have a decent relationship with them as it stands, so there's no reason why One Piece couldn't have received the attention it deserved, and there's also no reason why they should have taken over a YEAR to get any merchandise on shelves.

Except Shaman King was on an obscure Saturday morning block with, like One Piece, zero marketing and merchandising campaigns. Naruto on the other hand had a big promotion before its premiere (print ads appeared in gaming magazines, there were TV spots everywhere, heck, GameFAQs once devoted an entire skin to Naruto's premiere - clearly Viz knows their audience), and aired on a fairly decent slot.

Making a comparison between the success of any 4Kids TV show and Naruto, and pinning all of the problems on the show itself is faulty, because 4Kids has never put any effort into making sure people hear about a show, and they probably never will.

I don't think anyone ever said that the existing fans would be able to make the show a big hit, but they would have helped. Spitting on the faces of the dedicated fans is not the best way to start out, and as far as achieving that goes, I'd say they did a pretty good job at that by opting for "YO! Don't give it up Luffy!" over the We Are dub.

No, here's what happened - 4Kids shit up the series, put it on the first time slot they had access to, and sat back and watched it crumble. Never during the show's ill-fated Saturday morning run did they really DO something about it, and it was only when Toonami picked it up - no, only when Naruto premiered that the show started getting some recognition.

I'm tired of hearing that same bs argument. I don't care if I've seen it from fansubs - I was totally willing to buy it legally through uncut DVDs (I already buy the English manga), and 4Kids continues to deny fans that option. Even if we had the crap dub, I would be able to tolerate its existence if some subbed DVDs were released, but no, 4Kids can't do that, they have to "stagger" the series so that the uncuts can't take precedence over the edits, they have to make sure that their product isn't outperformed by the superior version. And when some uncut DVDs come out, god forbid the distributor make some profit from it, so 4Kids throws a shitfit if they don't get more money and ruins it for everyone. Honestly, they're like the shady drugdealers of anime.

A lot of it has to do with the times as well. When DBZ came out, a kid didn't have too many options for cartoons to watch. They could either switch between DBZ, Nickelodeon, and possbily Disney depending on their area. Nowadays, there are too many cartoons airing in the same time slot to keep track of. They have so many choices of cartoons they're often torn between what to watch at what time. 10 years ago, you could air a show aimed at the kids' demographic, and usually, even despite it being horribe, kids would sit through it for lack of anything better to do. Now? They can simply switch on their game system of choice if they don't want to go outside. (all speaking from personal experience as a kid and with kids)

You can't air something that's been edited so much the plot can't coherently be followed unless you know what -should- be happening and honestly expect results.

The anime One Piece is based on the number one, best-selling comic book series in Japan. For it to not only not be a hit, but to FAIL in America is NOT the fault of cultural differences nor the fanbase of the original version.

Are you some 4Kids lackey trying to do damage control, or are you just one big 4Kids apologist fanboy?

Uh, wasn't the former occupant of 4Kids.tv's timeslot FoxKids, which was world famous for starting those nuclear explosion we know as "Power Rangers" and "Digimon"? As I remember things, 4Kids.tv took over immediately after FoxKids dissolved, and with a fairly entertaining lineup of shows, too.