Reno ands the Robot circus

[avatargirl]

I love both ASTRO BOY and DR. WHO- BUT my favorite is of course ASTRO BOY- AFRAID YOU RIGHT ALITTLEACORN- THE 1ST THREE REASONS YOU GAVE were sad and cute- and should not been cut out- the 4 th one was so sad

[Lalapalooza]

THANK YOU MANGABOTTLE!!! I was feeling the same way. I was watching with my brother and we were both wondering "so what a couple more lines and little more to look at and what you take it out!! WHY!!!!????" I love listening to the voice of Astro in english, but I want to know the stuff that's in the japanese version. No happy medium? Darn.

[Bigdog]

[QUOTE=jeffbert;102197]But that job was to take entertainment aimed at the whole family & make it appeal to little boys to the exclusion of others. The program was aired between 7 & 8 pm in Japan, a time when the whole family would be watching, but they put in in the Saturday morning kiddie time slot. Fred Patten writes about this in reference to more than a few series that were wrecked in this way.

Like I once said in one of my Toontown articles...

"Astro Boy was Sony's hot stuff back in 2004. Sony and Cartoon Network edited it down and used it in a Hot Potato-esque scheduling switch-up that was so erratic, no one who liked the show got a chance to see it consistantly. After being cancelled, the series was doomed to suffer on a badly-manufactured DVD set. Viz Media would have been better handlers, given how awesome they treated Zatch Bell (reasonable editing, widespread release and completely untouched manga), but they probably didn't have room for another property. [...] The dub is so manufactured and soulless that it's unbelievable. This anime was originally as dignified as Neon Genesis Evangelion, and Sony made it into a cheap Megaman clone."

Now that I think about it, Astro Boy 2003 was marketed in Japan at the same sort of family demographic that watches Doctor Who in Canada/England. Both programs have the same amount of action, peril, emotional moments and comedic moments.[/QUOTE]

Zatch Bell was an amazing show, a second Digimon if you will. Had Viz gotten it , no doubt it would have been famous here. And for all we know, we could have gotten an Atom2 like how MMPR got Zyu2: original episodes especially for the American market based around Tezuka's other stories from the Astro canon. I'd have preferred Elefun making the parents , giving them an arc of their own revolved around the original anime's Frankenstein robot (outer space robot episode which was the third one) and tieing it to Elefun's bundling of all the Ministry's work. In my conception, the parents would have more of an impact in the series as I've gotten from some points in the manga, and a tragic/macabre creation. The mother would be the rebirth of Hoshie while the father would be some banker.

The biggest problem I have with this series is that they never had a name for the project to revive people as robots/cyborgs. Wouldn't it be suiting if it was called Osiris, with all its mythological connotations?

Imagine if this redux was actually marketed to a family demographic like Avatar. That show is well liked by most age groups and if Astro was pulled off like that , it might have succeeded. Sony ruined it and should've stuck with their plans to make a high budget live action film.

[Dragonrider1227]

You know, in the Japanese version you see poor Reno break down crying in that scene. But yeah you guessed it they censored like they did eeeeeeeeeeeeverything else. Same with that episode on that robot dolphine Reno appears in too, but in the English one they covered it as hiccups.

Note to self: do art piece on hatred for censors @_@

Not censoring so much as trying to make the series "hip" and "boy friendly." And I guess emotion isn't popular with boys

[Androids101]

PLEASE DO NOT get mad at the censors- they are just doing their job

I think the problem here is that the job is pointless. I don't see why Japanese kids can see something and Western children can't.

[fafner]

[QUOTE=avatargirl;102152]PLEASE DO NOT get mad at the censors- they are just doing their job

I think the problem here is that the job is pointless. I don't see why Japanese kids can see something and Western children can't. [/QUOTE]
That thing exists and is called "culture" Japanese boys have been accustomed to see things that Western ones haven't, and therefore grownups are afraid the poor little things won't be able to suffer them :d evil:

[jeffbert]

True, & especially after the devastation of WWII, how could they shield their kids from the knowledge of suffering, evil, & death? While in America, no city was even touched, much less annihilated.

[Lalapalooza]

You know I really can understand some differences in culture, but to censor feelings and small things like "playing with toys" is horrible. I mean it's not like the one episode only aired in Japan where an evil villan takes refuge in a church and scratches out the eyes of Jesus. I mean really! Isn't that a little more "censory" sensical then Astro playing with Toys and having bad memories?

[jeffbert]

Lalapalooza, it was apparently cut to be more appealing to boys. They could not afford to make soft in any way. I do not know if they could have saved it by any other method, other than the [gasp!] unthinkable, simply translate it as it is, & run it in prime time, or just before prime time.

fafner, I think it is a bit more complex than that, though. American parents, & I suppose, mothers, especially, want their kids to remain innocent. I recall this one friend, who simply could not bear the thought of her kids losing their belief in . They lived in an apartment, & one of the kids (both girls), asked how got into their home, since it lacked a fireplace. Mom was ready with: " goes to the rental office, gets the master key," etc. The elder was about 10, the younger, 8; both were about old enough to at least have begun questioning the thing, whether it could be, or was flatly impossible. But, though they had reached the age of reason, their reliance on their mother's authority was still strong. Though it could be that they merely pretended to believe, thinking that pleased mama.

I cannot possibly recall, but there were far fewer intense news stories during the family viewing time, then, than there are now. Now they blatantly advertise things that they would not have dared to even mention even using euphemisms, no matter how late at night back then. I remember begging my mom to let me stay up until 9 pm, since I was (at the time) 9. We did not fall asleep in school, back then.

Anyway, in his book, Fred Ladd says that they had to be especially careful with the content they allowed, since the show was syndicated. Thus, they relied on acceptance by individual stations, & could not afford to have too many reject the series. They therefore had to be more selective about what was cut & what remained.

[Dragonrider1227]

You know, in the Japanese version you see poor Reno break down crying in that scene. But yeah you guessed it they censored like they did eeeeeeeeeeeeverything else. Same with that episode on that robot dolphine Reno appears in too, but in the English one they covered it as hiccups.

Note to self: do art piece on hatred for censors @_@

emotion and depth in an action series? NOT ON OUR WATCH!!!!