IT'S TIME TO D-D-D-D--D-D-D-D-D-D-DUB!
A peculiar phenomenon where a foreign product will get a localization in a region or language, and then get a different localization in the same language in the same region (or another where the same language is spoken). And another.
Why does this happen? Perhaps the first try was a hackjob, was comically rewritten, the mouth movements didn't match what was being said at all, or there was a demand for a significantly better localization. Perhaps some new company got the rights and can't use the previous group's resources due to some licensing hell. Perhaps the previous dub wasn't kept around to be reused again.
A lot of times, different English dubs are made for different international audiences – sometimes to go along with an alternate-language dub in the same region; for instance, different English dubs for North America vs Europe or Asia. In these cases, there is an attempt to prevent even the knowledge that other dubs exist from being in the hands of the common audience. This doesn't always work.
For some reason, a lot of alternate dubs tend to not get released in a home video format, and thus fall into obscurity. If that isn't the case, then it may lead to odd scenarios where two of what is basically the same program are in direct competition.
This trope does not cover fan-made material, so no Abridged Series or fandubs here. A sub-trope of redubbing, in which a production receives a new dub.
Since a few dubbing companies actually make multi-language dubs for the sake of covering the languages available in that region, that'd probably cover a different trope and wouldn't apply here. This also doesn't cover different variations of the same dub (like when certain lines are redubbed for television broadcast for content reasons).
Compare One Work, Many Dubs, when several dubs are made because the work's installments are recorded at different studios.
NOTE: When possible, please note which people and companies did the dueling dubs, to prevent confusion and to clarify that the examples are examples.
Examples:
Examples - Multiple English dubs
- Tinga Tinga Tales, a British-Kenyan co-production, was originally produced in British English, with voice actors of African descent. When the series came to Disney Junior in 2011, it was redubbed into American English with white voice actors (however, a few characters were left intact such as Lion and Elephant). This is a bit strange, considering the show takes place in Tanzania and is based around African folk tales. The North American English dub is hard to come across ever since the series stopped airing in America.
- Micro Commando Diatron-5 was dubbed twice, first under its original title and again as Space Transformers.
- Yoohoo And Friends loves this trope:
- The original series has two English dubs. One is an incredibly bizarre Gag Dub from the creator of Cow and Chicken starring Flavor Flav (yes, you read that correctly), while the other is a more faithful version that was available on Netflix and Amazon. The Feiss version was nearly completely lost for a while until all 52 segments were eventually found in English.
- Two Arabic dubs of the series exist; one on Baraem, and the other on Basma that has a completely different theme song.
- The history of the show in Latin America is a little confusing, but to sum it up: There was a Venezuelan Spanish dub of the Gag Dub that aired on Cartoon Network and Boomerang in 2012 (that also served as the worldwide premiere of that version), and then in 2015, a more faithful Mexican Spanish dub of the original was aired on Canal Once in Mexico. THEN in the same year as the Mexican dub, Boomerang decided to air "the second season" of the Gag Dub. The only problem? The Gag Dub didn't get a second season. The solution was that the Venezuelan dubbing studio would have the actors reprise their roles (except for Roodee's who was replaced) to dub the second season of the original show, despite the two versions being completely different.
- (Turning) Mecard, a South Korean show, has two English versions. One was (literally) produced in Hong Kong as commissioned by the South Korean companies. The other was produced by Studiopolis for Mattel, the toyline's American distributor. In addition, many foreign language dubs outside of South Korea and Mainland China note used the BTI Studios Hong Kong English dub as the basis for their scripts and some Western countries translated the Studiopolis dub too.note
- Happy Friends has a few English dubs. The most well-known of these is the dub of the first two seasons from Lookus, though the other dubs are considered more accurate to the original Chinese version.
- There are two English dubs of Pleasant Goat Fun Class. The first dub was put on the Mandarin-learning app Miao Mi and the second dub was released on YouTube.
- Simple Samosa has two dubs for each language it's dubbed in (Hindi, English, Tamil, and Telugu), with both sets of dubs having multiple differences that primarily have to do with changes in dialogue (for example, Jalebi mentions saving a fly in the first English version of "Jalebi's Birthday"; this is a Continuity Nod to the earlier episode "Makkhi Makkhi!". This reference is removed in the second dub). The first set of dubs, for unknown reasons, was eventually replaced in all televised airings with the second set of dubs, and the second set of dubs is the one available on Disney+ Hotstar.
- Baby Shark's Big Show! has 2 English dubs: the original American version, and a British version for Nick Jr. UK.
- Pororo the Little Penguin has over three English dubs. The first dub was done in South Korea for release in most English-speaking countries, while the second dub was done in the UK for airing in the UK on Cartoonito and CITV, and the third dub was also done in South Korea for remastered versions of the first two seasons.
- Rainbow Bubblegem has 2 English dubs, one that airs on MediaCorp Channel 5 in Singapore and another released on the show's YouTube channel.
- Smeshariki was first brought to English-speaking audiences by 4Kids Entertainment under the title GoGoRiki in 2008. Later, a different dub (under the name KikoRiki, which eventually stuck for most foreign adaptations) was commissioned to Studio 100 by Riki Group, the current producer of the show. The 4Kids dub is notable for being almost completely lost until a certain point - Lost Media Wiki provides an extensive coverage.
Neither 4Kids nor Studio 100 dubs cover the entire series, though. Later, when the rights to the series were obtained by FUN Union, they began producing a new dub featuring some returning members of the 4Kids cast.
- Ultraseven had two different dubs: The first was produced in the mid 1970s using local Honolulu actors when the series aired on Hawaii's KHON-TV, and the second was done by Cinar in 1985 for Turner Programming Services. Despite its rather amateurish voice acting, some fans believe that Hawaiian dub is the better of the two; however, only a handful of dubbed episodes survive. However, on the other side of the coin, some fans think that the Hawaiian dub wasn't all that good, and the Cinar dub was actually better.
- Ultraman Tiga also has 2 dubs: an edited Gag Dub produced by 4Kids Entertainment that only lasted 25 episodes, and an uncut Asian-English dub that currently has only the first 2 episodes publically available.
- Tots TV has two different English dubs: the original for the UK and another for North America. In the British version, Tilly speaks in basic French, while the North American version had her speak Spanish. The original British dub tends to be the more well-known version, whereas the North American version (which aired on PBS) is hard to find save for three rare VHS releases ("The Tots Find A Treasure Map", "The Tots and the Great Big Light", and "Lovely Bubble Surprise") and an episode uploaded to the website Understanding 9/11: A Television News Archive. note
- The Noddy Shop had a rather odd example of this. In its' British dub, only the Noddy's Toyland Adventures segments were changed in the show, and everything else remained the same. However, according to a showreel for the actress in question, a British version of the second season was planned with Susan Sheridan redubbing all of Noddy's lines in the live-action segments, but it was left unaired.
- Yo Gabba Gabba! has a British dub that aired on Nick Jr. in the UK, with new voices for DJ Lance Rock and the costumed characters.
- Oh My Goddess! has two known English translations. This is odd because one of those is the highly-regarded Dark Horse/Studio Proteus translation that ran from 1996 to 2015 (and received significant revisions when DH reprinted the first 20 volumes from 2005 to 2012); the other is a much more recent translation for the UK market.
- Both Azumanga Daioh and the first 5 volumes of Yotsuba&! were originally released by ADV Manga, with AzuDai even made available in a slightly revised omnibus edition. Then ADV collapsed and went bankrupt (the anime side resurrected, but the manga line did not), and Yen Press picked up the licenses. When Yen reprinted both series, they opted to completely retranslate them to fit with their house style (near-literal accuracy, as opposed to ADV's tendency toward Woolseyism). Interestingly, Yen's Yotsuba reprints, as well as the next 5 new volumes, were handled by one of ADV's former translators (volumes 11 and onward were not because that translator passed away during the hiatus between volumes).
- Deadman Wonderland was originally published in English by Tokyopop, but they only released 5 volumes before their closure. The series was left in limbo until the anime found surprise success on Toonami, and the manga was rescued by Viz Media, who restarted the series with a new translation.
- Fist of the North Star had two official translations that never got finished. The Viz version started as a monthly comic series in 1989, which was canceled due to low sales (lasting only eight issues), but was resumed years later in 1995 (due to the popularity of Streamline's dub of the movie), only to be canceled again in 1998. Viz would eventually lose the license to Gutsoon Entertainment, Coamix's short-lived English division, which published the Master Edition version of the series that lasted nine volumes from 2002 until Gutsoon's departure from the market in 2004. Whereas the Viz version featured flipped artwork and has a heavily localized translation with different names (most notably the martial art schools of Hokuto Shinken and Nanto Seiken became the "Sacred Martial Arts of the Great Bear" and "Southern Cross" respectively), the Gutsoon edition retained the right-to-left orientation and had a more literal translation, but features fully colorized artwork. Viz eventually regained the license and began releasing the series in hardback with a new translation in 2021.
- Fruits Basket was published by Tokyopop in the early 2000s, and was highly successful, becoming the #1 selling shojo manga of all time in the US. However their editions went out of print following their closure. Yen Press picked up the series in 2016 and began reissuing it in omnibus volumes with a new translation. Much like Love Hina below, there was also a short-lived 'bilingual' edition and one from Chuang Yi (mostly marketed to Singapore and Australia), brining the total count up to four. This blogger has started a comparison series on how they stack up to one another
.
- Unusually, Kaiju No. 8 has two simultaneous digital translations: one on the Viz Media website and Shonen Jump app by David Evelyn, and one on Manga Plus under the title Monster No. 8 by Tiffany Miyoshi via Medibang Inc. (a localization company that translates most Manga Plus works that Viz hasn't licensed). The former is used for the collected print release, while the latter is not for sale (as MANGA Plus original translations are considered promotional) and speculated to be a result of contractual guarantees made after Medibang was taken off the release of SPY×FAMILY.
- Kimagure Orange Road was originally released digital-only in 2013 by Hivelinx before transferring to Digital Manga's eManga service, featuring a heavily panned translation that was very literal in style and accused by fans of reading very dry on top of its sloppy presentation and numerous typos. In 2016, a successful Kickstarter campaign was raised for a physical release and a digital reissue featuring a newer, and far more professional, translation that was released in 2018-2019.
- Love Hina has had four English translations. There was a short-lived "bilingual edition" from Kodansha meant for the Japanese market; there's Tokyopop's 2002-3 translation for North America; there's the Chuang Yi translation for Singapore (done at the same time as Tokyopop's); and now there's the Kodansha USA omnibus translation. For the record, Tokyopop's translation is fairly liberal, usually flows well, but has serious copy-editing issues (especially in Volumes 2-5 and 9). The Kodansha USA translation is, typical for them, much more accurate but rather dry as a result.
- Maison Ikkoku was originally released by Viz beginning in 1993 in both flipped comic book and graphic novel format before the same translation, with slight revisions, was reissued between 2003 and 2006 in unflipped volumes. In 2020, Viz began reissuing the manga in collector's editions with a brand new translation. This despite them recycling old translations for other series, such as for Ranma ½.
- Pokémon Adventures has four different English translations:
- Viz Media began translating the manga for the Western market in 1999, releasing the first 7 volumes in a left-to-right reading order. In 2009 they re-released those volumes with a new translation and the original right-to-left format, then went on with the rest of the series.
- Meanwhile, Singaporean company Chuang Yi did a translation for the Asian market beginning in 2000, initially just using Viz's translations of the first 7 volumes before continuing with their own translation. After volume 41, Chuang Yi went bankrupt, so Shogakukan Asia took over in 2014, initially pushing out their own translations of chapters 42-45 before settling on using Viz's translations after that.
- The Sailor Moon manga has three complete English translations. There's the original 1998 one from Tokyopop (then known as Mixx), which made use of DiC's localized character names (except Usagi, who was called "Bunny" instead of "Serena") and was a very liberal adaptation. When Kodansha USA rescued the series in 2011, their releases featured a new, far more literal translation using the original Japanese names/terms. It was frequently criticized for being too literal to the point of being awkward to read (essentially the opposite criticism of Tokyopop's version). They also translated Codename: Sailor V, which Tokyopop never touched. Kodansha reissued the series beginning in 2018 in special "Eternal" editions with a brand new faithful translation that read far more naturally. This translation is also used for the cheaper "Naoko Takeuchi Collection" editions with slight revisions.
- Slam Dunk was originally translated in North America by the now-defunct Gutsoon Entertainment for their manga anthology Raijin Comics published from 2002 through 2004. This version of Slam Dunk lasted only five volumes before the publication folded. Viz Media later rescued the license and proceeded to translate the whole manga from 2008 through 2013. A comparison of both versions can be seen here
.
- SPY×FAMILY originally received a digital translation by Medibang up through chapter 12 (including the first extra chapter), released simultaneously with the Japanese version. The series then got licensed by Viz Media, who took over the simulpub translations from chapter 13 and did their own translation of the previous chapters.
- The Tokyo Mew Mew manga has three English translations. Tokyopop's translation was the original, but it was ditched for a new one from Kodansha USA (like Yen Press, Kodansha has a house style that favors near-literal translations). There's also one from Singapore-based Chuang Yi for Southeast Asia.
- Urusei Yatsura was originally published in English by Viz Media (then called Viz Communications) beginning in 1989 under the title Lum * Urusei Yatsura, but was canceled after eight issues. Years later, it was resurrected in Viz's Animerica magazine under the title The Return of Lum * Urusei Yatsura, and 9 graphic novels were released, skipping some chapters, and covering roughly the first 11 volumes. However, Viz dropped the series again in 1998. 21 years later, Viz relicensed the series, and began releasing it in 2-in-1 omnibus volumes with a brand new translation. The first volume was published in February 2019.
- Baby Shark Live! has two English-language productions under the same name: the North American one by Koba Entertainment Group and the Asian English one by SmartStudy themselves featuring the original kids from the video.
- Not quite the same, but a lot of video games in British English for Europe and Australia have different localizations from the American English version for North America for reasons besides simple differences in spelling.
- The Advance Wars and Fire Emblem series have a few notable examples, despite the former being for handhelds (which are traditionally region-free). While Fire Emblem is usually limited to a few name changes and bug fixes here and there, Advance Wars Days Of Ruin (Dark Conflict in British English) has a completely different script between the American and British versions.
- While both American and British versions left the Japanese voice track on, it's quite apparent that US-based Aksys Games' localization of Agarest Senki is far superior to UK-based Ghostlight's localization.
- Most of the Ape Escape games have been released in the UK with a different English voice track than North America.
- Inazuma Eleven on the Nintendo DS was released in Europe with a translation based on the Animax Asia anime dub, using a completely new cast of British VAs. Fast forward a few years, when Inazuma Eleven was re-released on the 3DS, it was given an entirely new dub featuring LA voice actors. Interestingly enough, other than changing "football" to "soccer", the script was almost entirely unedited from the EU release, which had the strange effect of mingling American accents with British colloquialisms and slang.
- Kirby's Epic Yarn changed the voice of the narration, as well as some of the lines in the opening narration.
- A special example could be Professor Layton, in which Luke's voice actress is different in the American and the British versions (though the rest of the cast is unchanged).
- The first Splatoon has separate English localizations for North America and Europe. While the British English version from NoE is more-or-less a direct translation from the Japanese version, the American English version from NoA is more of a Woolseyism that takes greater liberties with some of the dialogue. In particular, the American English version turned the Big Bad DJ Octavio into much more of a Large Ham, gave Spyke a Cockney Funetik Aksent, and made Marie much more of an acerbic Deadpan Snarker. Future entries would use the same English dialogue for both versions of the game (regional spellings notwithstanding).
DJ Octavio (British English): Time...to...put an end...to you!DJ Octavio (American English): I'MA DUBSTOMP YOU INTO OBLIVION!- Starting in the 2010s, the Super Mario series and its spinoffs started seeing some discrepancies between the American and British translations. For example, while the American versions refer to the spell-casting Koopa sub-species as Magikoopas, the British versions call them by their Japanese name of Kameks, which is also the name of their most prominent member in all English versions (although the series is no stranger to this). In addition, several British sources routinely refer to Birdo as a male, even though the American branch has firmly settled on her being female by now.
- In Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS and Wii U, both genders of Wii Fit Trainer have different voices between the American and British versions (who in turn was voicing them in the respective versions of the Wii Fit games) and most trophy descriptions are different, as is some text (like Event titles and the characters' titles on the Boxing Ring stage). Additionally, in the British version, the character Duck Hunt is known as "Duck Hunt Duo".
- The American English version of The Legend of Zelda: Tri Force Heroes became notable for containing several references to memes and internet culture that weren't in the original Japanese script or the British English translation.
- Castlevania: The Dracula X Chronicles includes a relocalized version of Castlevania: Symphony of the Night with a new dub which removes most of the over-the-top narm (or, for some, epic hilarity) from the original PS1 version's dub. Bizarrely enough, the PSN and XBLA versions of SOTN still use the classic PS1 dialogue, making this trope more apparent, rather than attempting to hide it as is usually so when a "replacement dub" happens.
- Chrono Trigger got a new translation for the DS version that removed many of the SNES version's Woolseyisms and rewrote Frog's dialogue so that he no longes speaks in Ye Olde Butcherede Englishe. While it does end up somewhat more faithful to the Japanese script, many fans prefer the punchier and wittier SNES translation.
- The Contra series was changed into the Probotector series on consoles in Europe due to German censorship laws. The human characters were changed to androids, and the story was rewritten. However, European computer ports (most of which were UK only) were allowed to keep the original characters and story, hewing closer to both the original Japanese and the North American console versions.
- Crusader of Centy had two entirely different translations: one for Europe, titled Soleil and published by Sega, and one for North America, titled Crusader of Centy and published by Atlus. The North American version gives unique names to each animal companion and adds in extra jokes and pop culture references, but censors out the many allusions to Christianity and contains plenty of typos and formatting errors. Meanwhile, the European version keeps the religious references and is more directly faithful towards the original Japanese, but almost all of the animals are directly named after their species. The ending is also different, with the North American version having the hero banish the monsters back to the darkness, while the European version has the monsters willfully return to the darkness after the hero clears the way.
- The original Death to Spies has a different dub for the North American and European versions of the game.
- The Dragon Quest series had this happen twice. After the original NES localizations used Ye Olde Butcherede Englishe, the Game Boy Color rereleases went for a more faithful translation...and then from Dragon Quest VIII onward, the official translations were done in a much Denser and Wackier fashion, adding jokes, puns, and Woolseyisms not present in the Japanese script, even going so far as to add the Elizabethan dialect back in for the Switch and mobile releases of the first two games.
- Final Fantasy:
- The first six games got retranslated when they were remade for later systems. This is usually a good thing since the original localizations were often rife with "Blind Idiot" Translation and censorship problems (especially with spell and monster names, as well as anything that had to do with sex, booze, death or religion), but for titles that became originally famous for their Woolseyisms, most notably the SNES version of Final Fantasy VI compared with its GBA re-release, some fans felt that the later more accurate translations lost some of the charm the the older versions had.
- Final Fantasy I has three different translations: the NES version, the Origins PS1 version, and the Dawn of Souls GBA version, which was also used for the PSP and Pixel Remaster versions. Final Fantasy II got the same treatment, except that the English NES version was never actually released, and was only later leaked onto the Internet.
- The Pixel Remaster version of Final Fantasy III had to get a new translation due the only prior translation of the game being for the 3D version, which differs a bit when it comes to the protagonists.
- Final Fantasy IV has the most translations of them all: there's the SNES version, the PS1 version (which fixes some of the mistakes and censorship from the SNES version), the GBA version (which was also used for the Pixel Remaster version), the 3D version (which introduced a bunch of new story elements and terminology), and the PSP version (which is essentially the GBA version but with some names and terminology from the 3D remake).
- Final Fantasy V's first English translation, first seen in the PS1 version, contained plenty of mistakes and gave Faris a heavy pirate accent, which was poorly received. As such, the game had to be completely retranslated for the GBA version, which was much more well received.
- Final Fantasy VI had its first English translation for the SNES version done under heavy time constraints by Ted Woolsey, which resulted in an uneven script full of mistakes, but also plenty of Woolseyisms, which etched themselves into the minds of many gamers. The translation was redone for the PS1 version in order to fix some mistakes and revert some censorship, and the game got yet another retranslation for the GBA version by Tom Slattery, which is much more faithful to the original Japanese version but keeps many of the Woolseyisms. The Pixel Remaster version also uses this translation, but altered a scene between Edgar and Relm to remove any pedophilic implications.
- Final Fantasy Tactics also had several errors in its original English translation, and as such, it was heavily rewritten for the PSP remake.
- The NES Kunio-kun titles that made it to the West were divorced from each other and heavily Americanized, with character names, locations and graphics changed. In 2020, the Double Dragon and Kunio-kun Retro Brawler Bundle would be released, containing new and more faithful translations of the Kunio-kun titles with their original names, setting and franchise title. That said, the franchise is still officially known as the River City franchise in the West, after the American title of the third game in the series.
- The Super Famicom port of Magical Drop 2, after more than 20 years of not being available in English at all, has two wildly-different localizations. Retro-bit, who was granted a license to Data East's SNES catalogue for their retro products, decided to officially adopt a translation from noted Fan Translation group Aeon Genesis. However, not long after that, a test cartridge for a cancelled European release surfaced; this version was added to the Nintendo Switch's SNES Online service. The Aeon Genesis version is a more faithful translation, while the NSO version - for better or worse - resembles the edited translation that the arcade versions of Magical Drop II and III received.
- Metal Gear:
- The original Metal Gear 1 has three official English localizations. There's the British MSX2 version, which due to space constraint issues only kept 86 of the Japanese version's 155 radio messages and suffered from obvious Engrish. Most notably it refers to the player's cigarettes pack as "CIGAL" and constantly misspells the word "destroy" as "destoroy" due to the use of preset keywords to compose most of the text. The second and better known translation was the NES version, which was a reworked port which had a wider release. It kept all the radio messages, but still suffered from Engrish and the game itself had some drastic changes from the MSX2 original. A more faithful conversion of the MSX2 version was later included in Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence, with this new version having a completely revised translation. Despite the existence of the other translations, it is the NES version that gets quoted in Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty during the crazed A.I. Colonel sequence and later on by Miller in Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes.
- Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes for the GameCube was originally planned to retain the voice track from the original PlayStation version. However, the voices from the PlayStation version were not recorded in a soundproof studio, causing certain traffic noises in the background to become audible when the master files were processed on the GameCube's more advanced sound chip, resulting in the need for a new voice track. The differences between the two dubs include the lost of certain characters' accents (namely Mei-Ling, Dr. Naomi and Nastasha), the replacement of Greg Eagles with Rob Paulsen as the voice of the Cyborg Ninja (Eagles still voiced the DARPA Chief in the new version), updated playing instructions (due to the different button layout of the GameCube controller and the addition of updated mechanics from the sequel), and certain lines that were localized in the original script were replaced with more literal translations, resulting in some questionable changes that were considerably unnatural sounding.note
- The PC Engine version of Ninja Ryukenden (aka Ninja Gaiden) has an English language setting with a translation that is completely different from the earlier NES version. Notably, Joe Hayabusa keeps his original name (he was renamed Ken Hayabusa in the NES version) and the Jaquio becomes the "Devildoer".
- Revelations Persona's first English translation was considered a hackjob and an embarrassment, so the PSP remake got a completely new dub that didn't try to change the setting from Japan to the USA.
- The 2002 game Resident Evil (Remake) completely replaced the voice acting from the original 1996 version out of necessity due to the addition of new plot events and changes to the tone and delivery of the existing ones. Specifically the original voice acting was done in an intentionally slow and stilted matter since the English versions of the game did not have subtitles and lead developer Shinji Mikami said that he did not want players to miss out on important clues during cutscenes. Additionally, the script for the 1996 version was written by the developers themselves, who were not exactly fluent in English, resulting in weird lines that has since become iconic to the series, most notably Jill Valentine's grandiose title of "Master of Unlocking", which have been referenced in later games in the series. Ed Smaron, who voiced Barry Burton in the remake, wanted to retain the narm aspect of the dialogue, but the developers of the new version insisted on a more serious tone for the script.
- Rune Factory: Natsume and Xseed have been fighting over the American translations of the series, with Natsume having translated Rune Factory 1 and 2, and Xseed translating Rune Factory Frontier. After Xseed got Rune Factory Frontier, however, Natsume got the Rune Factory series back and translated Rune Factory 3 and Rune Factory: Tides of Destiny. Then, Xseed managed to get Rune Factory 4.
- The original SNES translation of Secret of Mana was severely hampered by technical limitations and time crunch, which resulted in some plot points getting Lost in Translation. The 2018 remake contains a redone translation that is more faithful to the original Japanese.
- A few Sega-developed Game Boy Advance games have English translations in all regions, but with the English script on the Japanese carts differing from the English script on international carts. Notable examples include Sonic Battle (where the English script on the Japanese cart contains mild swearing) and Puyo Pop (2001) (where the international versions exaggerate the heroine's Deadpan Snarker traits compared to the straightforward translation on Japanese carts).
- The Silent Hill HD Collection featured new voice tracks for Silent Hill 2 and Silent Hill 3 due to Konami's refusal to pay royalties to the original actors. The scripts for both games remained the same (despite initial plans for rewrites), with only the performance changed. Ultimately, the released version of the HD Collection retained the original voices for 2 (giving players a choice between the old and new voices), as the cast for that game agreed to drop their royalties demand out of respect for the fanbase, but the original voices for 3 were still missing.
- The first two Star Ocean games got redubbed on the PSP because the dub tracks on the original PS were both poorly done and incomplete.
- Story of Seasons: After the translation fight between Natsume and Xseed over Rune Factory, Xseed officially took over the English localization for the series starting with Story of Seasons (2014), with the Bokujō Monogatari games now renamed to Story of Seasons, because Natsume still owns the rights to the Harvest Moon name. Natsume, in return, started developing their own Harvest Moon games. A more detailed explanation can be read here.
- While the 2023 remake of Super Mario RPG mostly keeps itself faithful to the original 1996 version's English translation, some lines, names and terminology was retranslated, either to fix errors (the Drain spells, the NokNok Shell and the Neosquid were renamed into something more accurate), match the current official Mario terminology (Peach is no longer called Toadstool), remove pop-culture references (Mallow no longer mentions Bruce Lee), stay more politically correct (Dodo is no longer called fat, and the little Toad girl no longer wants to marry Mario), or other reasons.
- Konami's X-Men arcade game got a new voice track (with only two voice actors) for its Playstation Network re-release. However, this dub kept the laughable lines from the original dub ("The White Queen WELCOMES YOU TO DIE!!!") for tradition.
- CLW Entertainment, Thomas Blue, and Rawlou Films all have their own fandubs of Doraemon. Particularly, the episode 'The Happy Cap' was dubbed by both Thomas Blue and Collin to see who could do it better. Despite their competition, they're all still friends who get along well with each other.
Examples - Other Languages/Regions
- Persian dubs are quite possibly the grand KING of this trope, as it's nearly impossible to come across any TV series or movie, popular or obscure, that hasn't been dubbed more than once. Most all Persian dubs, with very few exceptionsnote , are produced illegally due to the nature of copyright in Iran, as well as sanctions. Thus, because of the lack of communication and a fairly oversaturated market, thousands of dubbing studios compete with each other to produce their own dubs for various streaming services such as Digitoon, Filimo, and Namava, in addition to putting them up for download on various free-to-access sites. This also includes dubs that are broadcast on TV channels, such as GEM Junior and IRIB's various networks. Not all Persian dubs are made in Iran either; some broadcasters like GEM have outsourced production of their dubs to Türkiye, using Iranian expat actors. Many of the few official Persian dubs that do exist, especially ones made for and aired by MBC Persia, are also produced in Türkiye, likely due to an abundance of Iranian and/or Persian-speaking talent living in the country.
- Spanish is arguably the second language where this happens the most in a broad general sense, since pretty much all media receives two dubs: one made for Spain, and another for Latin America (sometimes some Latin American country may receive yet another dub specific for them, albeit these cases are rare). And as any Spanish speaker may attest, the "dueling" of these dubs are infamous due to the insane amount of vitriol, and very often even toxicity, that almost always goes along with it.
- Something ironic is that this practice has been around to different degrees since pretty much the invention of sound cinema. However, the rivalry between both types of dubs didn't really exist until the Internet, especially social media, became widespread. This is due to the fact that, before then, people didn't have easy access to both dubs, so the vast majority of people was able to watch just one of them.
- On a different note, also in Latin America, some productions have multiple dubs because of different distributors. These dubs may be made in different countries (most often Mexico, but sometimes the USA, Venezuela, Argentina, Chile or Colombia). One wiki has a category describing the Dueling Dubs trope
, as well as another category for redubs
and slightly modified dubs
.
- In Brazilian Portuguese, some TV shows and movies have separate dubs made by different distributors. Most of these dubs are produced in different cities (usually São Paulo or Rio de Janeiro). Most older productions have at least two dubs because the original audio no longer exists in most cases, or because of alternate rights. Fans are known to ensure the original dubs still exist online if only for nostalgia.
- In the late 2010s, voice actor Sidney Lilla sued almost every distributor, dubbing studio and TV channel he could find. His lawsuits forced the distributors to use a pre-existing dub, or make a new redub - sometimes only Lilla's role.
- European Portuguese dubs are only produced for media with a significant enough child audience. While most mature series/movies are dubbed in Brazil, they are only subtitled in Portugal.
- Most films since 1994 have two French dubs, one for Canada (Quebec, where protection of the French language is Serious Business), and another for Europe (mostly done in France, occasionally in Belgium). However, most TV shows and some movies have a single French dub (usually made in France or Belgium; and occasionally Morocco, Spain or the US). With that said, several Canadian shows have a single French dub done in Canada instead (Canadian broadcasters must air a certain amount of Canadian-made programming). Also, while Quebec is known for its specific accents, usually the local dubs don't feature them.
- Video games as well to an extent. Though one example stood out for averting this: the Ezio Auditore trilogy in Assassin's Creed, the dub of which mixed voice actors from both France and Quebec (such as Gilbert Lachance as Ezio).
- Whenever a movie (animated or live action) is released in Japan, each broadcaster produces its own dub of said movie. Some Japanese dubs may be released direct to video or theatrically. Older movies tend to have more existing dubs.
- In South Korea, the three main broadcasters (KBS, MBC, and SBS) own their respective dubs, which may not air on a competitor's channel. There also seems to exist alternative Korean dubs produced for the North Korean market
.
- Since Chinese is a language with many dialects, most productions have dubs made in Taiwan, China (Mandarin) and/or Hong Kong (Cantonese).
- There exist alternate Islamic Arabic dubs of everything from Dino Babies and Toad Patrol to Cyborg Kuro-chan and Case Closed. The difference? There's no music, the theme song's a nasheed
(being sung a capella), and most of the time characters state religious things about Islam. Some shows have an Islamic dub but not a regular Arabic dub.
- Arabic also has different dialects, such as Egyptian, Levantine (Lebanon and Syria), or Peninsular (Saudi Arabia).
- It's common for films to have multiple Turkish dubs, mostly depending on the medium. TV broadcasts (depending on the channel), theatrical release, home entertainment, and streaming.
- In Poland and Russia, it's very common for non-children's productions to have alternate voice-over dubs. Both countries have gradually begun to dub more mature works (and blockbuster films) with full casts.
- Dozens of films have alternate Hindi dubs, mostly for theatrical release, home entertainment, streaming, and TV airings (mostly for different channels).
- In the 2010's, Sony Pictures decided to redub a lot of their old material (ranging from Seinfeld to The Last Emperor) in Argentina, likely to avoid having to pay royalties to the original dub actors. Most of these redubs were done by either Palmera Record or Caja de Ruidos. The Argentine dub of Seinfeld is currently distributed alongside the Mexican dub (with most networks and Netflix having the Mexican dub for the first 2-3 seasons (e.g. Netflix only uses the Mexican dub for just the first 2 seasons; while Warner Channel aired the Mexican dub for the first 3 seasons) then switching to the Argentine dub for the rest of the series).
- The very large differences in accents between Swedish in Sweden and Finland have led to some non-Nordic shows having one dub for Sweden and a different dub for Finland. Instances include Fireman Sam, Isadora Moon, and Super Wings. The accents do remain intelligible enough that shows from Sweden are not dubbed to Finland Swedish in Finland, or vice versa (Moomin (1990) being the biggest case of the latter). That only Yle commissions Swedish dubs in Finland and not any commercial Finland-based channels also reduce the instances where multiple dubs can occur.
- Sometimes a lawsuit from a voice actor can force a studio to redub all of its films. Notable examples include Lucie Dolène (Disney; French) and Tatá Guarnieri (20th Century Fox; Brazilian Portuguese).
- As long as Germany was divided, the West and East produced separate dubs of foreign programs. While it did not overlap often, with rather little public interest in eastern productions in the west and censorship and lack of international currency hindering the east, there are various notable cases, most famously the Olsen-banden.
- After Hollywood studios stopped releasing their movies in Russia after they invaded Ukraine in 2022, the bulk of production of Russian dubs were moved to countries with an abundance of Russian and/or Russian-speaking talent, including Georgia, Kazakhstan, Israel and Latvia. This didn't stop Russian firms from making their own unauthorized dubs, however, even for movies which already have an official dub.
- Docus may be redubbed for broadcasts when Channel Hop happens, or if they air edited versions. As an example, Walking with Dinosaurs and its sequels got many different dubs in Hungary, the record being held by Walking with Beasts: One dub for the VHS release, another one for the TV debut, and a third for the Discovery Channel cut. All completely different. Notably, each version changed the series title. The tie-in books were also published by different companies and based off different dubs, adding to the confusion.
- Same thing with The Future is Wild. The version that Animal Planet aired (along with all its recuts) got dubbed independently from its "more official" broadcast on a public service TV station (whose translations found their way into the book of the series).
- OceanWorld 3D was originally dubbed in Italian by the comedic trio Aldo, Giovanni and Giacomo. The dub was poorly recieved, since it turned a serious documentary about the extinction risk of sealife into a comedic farce. The DVD/Blu-Ray edition redubbed it in a more serious way, albeit keeping the original one as an alternative audio track.
- The Hungarian science channels Spektrum and OzoneNetwork often broadcast documentaries produced by The History Channel or Discovery Channel, which means many of these end up with two or three dubs. Various docus by The BBC also get freely distributed between Spektrum, Discovery/Animal Planet and public service channels, and these too tend to receive several different translations.
- Eyewitness has two Norwegian dubs. One aired on the channel NRK, while the other one was made for home video release.
- KikoRiki in Ukraine were first dubbed by Z Ranku Do Nochi studios for Inter network. Later the series was overtaken by a different studio (Tak Treba Production) with a different cast. However, Noviy Kanal network produced its own dub.
- Masha and the Bear has two Albanian dubs. The first one, done by Jess Discographic, aired from 2014 to 2016 and covered all of season 1 and some of season 2. It was succeeded by the Tring dub, which premiered in 2016 and covers all five seasons, and the Jess dub wouldn't be heard again until 2025.
- The Horrid Henry series has been translated into French by three different publishers (Hachette, Livre de Poche, and Gallimard). Gallimard's translation (Horrible Henri) was used for the live-action film, while the animated series uses a fourth translation (Lucas la Cata).
- The Captain Underpants series has been translated twice into the following languages, each by a different publisher). In the first four cases, the newer translation was used in the 2017 film:
- European French (Le Petit Musc in 2000, Bayard in 2013). Most of the character names are changed in Bayard's edition.
- German (Ueberreuter in 2000, Panini in 2012). Except for Mr. Krupp, all the character names are changed in Ueberreuter's version.
- Norwegian (Cappelen Damm, then Schibsteds)
- Swedish (Egmont, then Bonnier Carlsen). The Bonnier Carlsen translation changed most of the character names, except for Mr. Krupp and the kids.
- Italian (Both by Il Battello a Vapore. The second translation is more of an edit of the original one, giving back to the kids their original English names and fixing stuff, like some translation errors or reinserting the two pages from Wrath of the Wicked Wedgie Woman that were cut in the original release)
- The Little Witch: The book has been translated into Russian by two different people: Маленькая Баба-Яга (Malen'kaya Baba-Yaga, "Little Baba Yaga") by Yuri Iosifovich Korinets and Маленькая ведьма (Malen'kaya ved'ma) and Маленькая колдунья (Malen'kaya koldun'ya) by Elvira Ivanova.
- Where do we begin with Winnie-the-Pooh? The series has been translated multiple times
into several languages, including Spanish, French, Italian, Portuguese, Japanese, and Chinese, to the point of inconsistent names.
- The French and Brazilian Portuguese translations were later revised to give Pooh his Disney name.
- Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. has two dubs each in Mexican Spanish and Portuguese because the rights are split between Disney and the Sony Channel (although in Brazil, the Sony dub stopped on season 2, with the other lasting the entire show). Both Mexican dubs have Carlos Hernández as Lance Hunter, while both Brazilian dubs have Ronaldo Júlio reprising his role from the Marvel Cinematic Universe as Agent Coulson.
- In socialist Hungary, it was a common practice for public service network MTV to dub a select few episodes of various western TV shows to give viewers a taste of media outside the Iron Curtain, never finish them, then move on to something different. Some of the more popular unfinished shows would be broadcast in full later. The first 14 episodes of 'Allo 'Allo! for example were dubbed between 1987 and '88, then the full series was dubbed in 2001 by the Duna television network. About a third of the cast kept the same voice actors between the two versions.
- The Big Bang Theory: Some episodes of Season 2 were dubbed twice in Italian. In the original dub Sheldon had a different voice actor in the episodes 2.15 and 2.19-23. When the old one came back for season 3 he also redubbed all of Sheldon's lines in Season 2. DVD release has the redub.
- El Chavo del ocho has been dubbed into Brazilian Portuguese many times (most memorably at the Maga studio). The only consistent voice was Martha Volpiani as Florinda.
- Chespirito had its 90's seasons dubbed in Brazilian Portuguese by the BKS and Parisi Video studios. These were then redubbed in 2001 by Gota Mágica.
- The Day of the Doctor had three different Italian dubs in the span of a single year. During the various redubs, they fixed a lot of translation goofs here and there, as well as replacing Tom Baker's voice actor in the ending cameo with the original Fourth Doctor voice actor. The first dub was aired once on TV in the original worldwide airing, while the second dub is available in the The Day of the Doctor single DVD release and the third one is in the 50th Anniversary boxset.
- In Latin America, Goosebumps (1995) (known as Escalofríos) has been enjoyed by Latin American fans, including Mexico where it was dubbed in Latin Spanish by Audiomaster 3000. It aired on television and released on home video. That's all they wanted, right? One consistent dub, yes? Well, you are wrong. In 2015, when Netflix got the rights to have the series in Latin Spanish dubbed format, they did not get the rights to use the audio. SDI Media México was contacted to redub the episodes with a new translation and new voice actors. Some fans didn't like this because the original dub was considered to be a childhood classic. And to top that off, this dub is only available in the United States towards Latin American Spanish speakers. The first season was also redubbed into French, German, Polish, Japanese, and Brazilian Portuguese.
- Lost has received two Czech dubs. One for AXN and the other for TV Nova. Hurley and Walt Lloyd have the same voices in both dubs.
- After "the pod" of season 3, the Brazilian dub changed from São Paulo to Rio de Janeiro. Once the show hit streaming The New '20s, the first two seasons plus those eight season 3 episodes were redubbed with the Rio cast for consistency's sake, meaning the old dub only remains through previous home video releases.
- Buffy the Vampire Slayer got a new Brazilian Portuguese dub on Star+, mostly keeping the same cast.
- Rescue 911 has at least three Brazilian Portuguese dubs: one for SBT by Herbert Richers, one for AXN, and one for CBS Broadcast International by Delart which aired on TV VIVA.
- 24 was partially redubbed in Brazilian Portuguese because Jack Bauer's first voice actor, Tatá Guarnieri, sued Fox for not giving him proper credit. He was replaced by Márcio Simões in season 4, and later releases of seasons 1-3.
- Thunderbirds has two Italian dubs. The first one was made in 1974, covered only the first season and was heavily edited to make each episode 20 minutes long. The season got a new dub (this time with no cuts) in 1993. In 2003, this second dub was aired for the last time along with season 2 being finally dubbed. For some reason, later airings used the first dub, with subtitles on the scenes that were missing back then.
- The X-Files has at least three Russian versions. The first one was made by REN-TV and included many mistakes such as mistaking a word for a name. Then there's the ORT version which, despite having minor flaws, is regarded as the best one from The '90s. And most recently, there is TV3 (the Russian one, not the Irish one) dub which not only dubbed the show (both REN-TV and ORT were voiceovers), but also had credits in Russian and Russian captions for onscreen texts. None of these cover the entire series, though - even TV3, which includes the feature films and event seasons, only did seven seasons of the original series.
- In 2019, the first two seasons of The Crown were redubbed into Brazilian Portuguese, moving from Miami to Rio de Janeiro.
- Season 1 of The Umbrella Academy was dubbed twice in Brazilian Portuguese, once in Curitiba and once in Rio de Janeiro.
- There are two Italian dubs of Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide, which are basically identical except for Cookie's voice. On Nickelodeon's broadcast he was voiced by Davide Garbolino. When the show premiered on Italia 1, he was re-dubbed by Monica Bonetto. The first dub has been used only for airing on the Italian Nickelodeon channels. In 2020 the Nickelodeon dub aired for the first time on free TV.
- There are two Polish dubs of The Sarah Jane Adventures: the first one was made in 2008 and aired on Cartoon Network, covering the first 2 seasons, while the second one was aired on teleTOON+ in 2012 and covered all seasons. Lucyna Malec voiced Chrissy in both dubs; several other voice actors from the first dub also appeared in the second one but never reprised their roles - in particular, Carla Langer's 2008 dub VA went on to voice Sarah Jane in the 2012 dub.
- Young Sheldon: There are two Hungarian dubs. One for HBO, and another for Comedy Central. Máté Szabó reprised his role as adult Sheldon (from The Big Bang Theory) in both dubs.
- Hogan's Heroes only saw release in Germany in the 1990s, yet immediately saw two different dubs when it finally aired there. The first dub, Stacheldraht und Fersengeld, aired on Sat.1, and was a relatively straight dub; it was not well-received and was quickly pulled from broadcast. The second dub, Ein Käfig voller Helden, aired on Kabel Eins and was a Gag Dub that gave characters a wide variety of regional accents, added a character that didn't exist in the original (Colonel Klink's Silesian cleaning lady and mistress Ms. Kalinke), and even changed the context of certain scenes for comedic appeal (such as the titular group's sabotage targets being more innocuous things, like schnapps and toilet paper factories and "a transport of counterfeit Coca-Cola"); this version was far more successful and earned the show popularity in the country.
- Barney & Friends has received two German dubs: the first one was made by FFS Film- & Fernseh-Synchron GmbH in Munich for Polygram, and the newer one by Deutsche Synchron Film GmbH in Berlin for HIT Entertainment. Interestingly, both aired on Super RTL (with the latter dub airing on the channel's Toggolino block). The translation of the Poly Gram dub seems to be more faithful to the original English version.
- There are also two Japanese dubs: one for Kids Station and one for Playhouse Disney Japan.
- Bear in the Big Blue House was dubbed into Polish twice, the 1st dub aired on Canal+ & Mini Mini, and the 2nd dub aired on TVP 1.
- Dinosaurs has two Latin Spanish dubs: one in Mexico and one in Venezuela.
- Fraggle Rock:
- The series was re-dubbed into Polish sometime during the 90s. The original 1985 dub is now extinct.
- It was also dubbed into Hebrew twice. The first dub was made to the first 15 episodes in 2012, while the second dub was made for the entire series in 2017.
- LazyTown:
- The series has received three dubs in Latin Spanish. The first dub was made in Chile for Discovery Kids, covering the first two seasons. A second dub was made in Venezuela for the American channel V-Me and later aired on Boomerang, which re-dubbed the second season. The third dub was made in Miami for Boomerang, covering the first season and the two revival seasons (Turner's distribution of the show has used the Venezuelan dub for the second season).
- There are two Brazilian Portuguese dubs. one for Discovery Kids that was made in São Paulo, and one for Boomerang and Cartoon Network that was made in Miami.
- The series has two Dutch dubs: the first was made in Dutch-speaking Belgium for Playhouse Disney covering the first two seasons, and the second was made in the Netherlands covering all four seasons.
- The series also has two Croatian dubs, the first by Novi Mediji, which covered the first season, and the second by Livada Produkcija, which covered the entire series.
- The Muppet Show was dubbed into Hungarian twice. The original was done by MTV around 1980-1983, while the new version was made by Film Mánia (formerly known as Filmmúzeum at the time) during 2003-2004.
- It was also dubbed into Latin Spanish four times. The original dub was made during the show's original run (1976-1981) by CINSA and leaves all the songs in English The second dub was made for the two VHS volumes of "It's the Muppets" in 1993, and the third dub was made in Argentina during 1999-2001 by Palmera Record. The fourth dub from 2020-21 was made in Mexico for Disney+, although some episodes on the platform have the first or third dubs.
- There are also three and a half European Spanish dubs. Following the original 1978 dub for TVE, a second dub was commissioned during the 1980s for video compilations originally made by Playhouse Video. When the series was repeated in the 90s on Antena 3 and select episodes aired on Canal + in 1999, twelve previously undubbed episodes were adapted for the Canal + broadcast. Finally, another dub was made for Disney+.
- The show has three Italian dubs. The first is the original one from 1977. The second one is a partial redub done in 2007 for the DVD boxsets, covering only four episodes of the second season whose original audio tracks have been lost since then, and was done with the same voice cast used in the movies. The third one was done in 2022 for Disney+ since the original audio tracks were all too damaged by then and covers the entire series (outside of the few episodes that have been banned for various reasons and as such aren't available on streaming), done by the current voice cast.
- Sesame Street also has multiple dubs in certain languages, often as a result of package programs (like Play With Me Sesame or Open Sesame) airing after local versions have ended or other package programs. A few examples:
- Poland has two (there was a local version with dubbed American segments in 1996 and one with only dubbed American segments in 2006)
- Denmark has three (A dubbed version of Open Sesame in 1992, a dubbed Elmo's World in the late '90s/early aughts, and a packaged block in 2009)
- Sweden also has three (a local production with dubbed American bits in 1981, Open Sesame in 1996 - which retained the original Swedish voices of Grover and Cookie Monster, and more recent dubs of several American spin-offs, which have the second dub's Ernie and Bert).
- Spain had a package dub in the late '70s, three iterations of the local production, and a few dubs of the American spin-offs.
- Bizarrely enough, on the (now-cancelled) Russian production, despite only having one local production with dubs of American bits (taken from Open Sesame), dubs of later segments (like Play with Me Sesame and Global Grover) re-cast the majority of the American Muppets with completely different voices (save for Bert and Elmo), even with the Open Sesame bits still being included in episodes.
- Italy had an early version of Open Sesame in the '70s and package dubs in the aughts.
- Portugal had an early Open Sesame in the '70s, a local production in the late '80s and early '90s, and two dubs of Play with Me Sesame (2007 & 2012).
- Teletubbies: The 2014 revival of the series has two different Italian dubs, with the second one made for the 2022 Netflix recut.
- The Book of Pooh:
- The series was re-dubbed into Dutch sometime during the 2019. The original 2002 dub is now extinct.
- The series has two Greek dubs, one made for the DVD release and for airing on Mega Channel and the other one for airing on Disney+.
- F-Zero in Spanish is a weird case. The series went on hiatus a couple years before Nintendo's first Latin American Spanish translation, Super Mario Galaxy. However, as the series made cameos in more games with separate Castilian and Latin American versions, anything that wasn't a person's name (titles not withstanding) would generally go translated in the Latin American version but use Gratuitous English in the Castilian version. The Latin American version has Capitán Falcon, Gran Azul, Halcón azul, but the Castilian version has Captain Falcon, Big Blue, and Blue Falcon.
- Super Mario Galaxy was the first Nintendo title to be released in French for the Quebecois market, featuring a different French translation than the one released in Europe. However, the translation's heavy use of Joual dialect provoked controversy, and from then on Nintendo just used the standard European French translations worldwide, with the exception of Paper Mario: Sticker Star, which also used some Joual in its Canadian French translation.
- The Amazing Digital Circus:
- The Korean dub was completely redone due to backlash against its poor translation choices, with the old dub being taken off YouTube in favour of the new one, which is also on Netflix.
- The show has two Vietnamese dubs; an unofficial one by Jenka Studio (which nevertheless got Approval of God from Glitch Productions), and an official one from Kantana Post Production Vietnam, which contains several translation errors.
- There are three Persian dubs, all of them unauthorized. One of them, namely the one by Sayna Studio, has gotten a push from its creators to become the official Persian dub for the series.
- Murder Drones:
- The series has two French dubs. The first one was done in Brussels for the YouTube release, while the second one was done by Deluxe Media Paris for the Prime Video release.
- There were two Turkish dubs; the Orion Records dub for YouTube, and the Dell'Arte Media/Astral Sound dub for Prime Video. Uzi, N and V have the same voice actors in both dubs.
- Two Russian fan dubs exist for Vinesauce Joel's Blue Shell Incident, available here
and here
. The second of them was streamed in its entirety on Joel's twitch channel and met with Approval of God.
