Funimation licenses Spice and Wolf

by Zirgo
May 24, 2009 1:41 AM | 134 Comments

According to Animenewsnetwork.com, Funimation announced at their panel at Anime Boston on Saturday that they have obtained the rights to the first season of the Spice and Wolf series. Funimation also announced they plan to ship the series towards the end of this year or the early part of 2010.

Spice and Wolf is a series based off Isuna Hasekura and Ju Ayakura's highly acclaimed light novel series and has an impending second season slated to premiere this July.

Source: ANN

Story by MackDaddyHart

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20 of 134 Comments Recent Comments

Does any one know when they gonna publish the 3rd season? I heard they are waiting for the volume 8 and 9 of the novel. Is this true?

Mar 26, 2013 9:21 AM by Nikmark654

really wish they quit licensing every anime possible, lets just hope that the dont screw up too much w/ the dub

Aug 28, 2011 12:54 AM by AresI

lollypatrolly said:

Dark_Puddles said:

ukonkivi said:

AidanAK47 said:
don't say it's crap compared to the sub unless you know Japanese.

Ahahahahahahaha, no.

Extra information added so that my post doesn't get removed.

No someone doesn't need to be able to understand a language to be able to judge if they like the sound in the dub or original better, but by not understanding the language you are unable to judge on anything other than just how pleasant someones voice is, not how they pronounce things, epmhasis on certain words or the way their sentences are timed (as in short breaks between what words, words said slowly or quickly etc.). So judgements over voice acting being good or not are a lot harder to make if you do not know the language, saying "compared to the sub..." or "compared to the original...." really is an unfair comparison.

edit: i should probably actually say something about the main topic.........cool.

This is true, but there's still a quite significant element of character acting that you can compare even without knowing the language at hand. Consider the voice actors for some of the western animation, like Billy West in Futurama. It's fantastic how one actor can change his / her voice to incorporate so many different characters, and while some of it would be hard to pinpoint for someone who doesn't speak English, the voices are still very distinguishable. Granted, actors of this caliber aren't generally available for low production value anime dubs, so they have to make do with less talented people.

Following this, I'll just point out that a lot of the dubbed voices just sound very off, even when they're not poorly acted when it comes to pronunciation and punctuation (though that certainly happens as well). This is due to bad directing, either in casting actors who can only do one voice, or not making them use a suitable one.

It's also worth mentioning that bad acting (pronunciation / punctuation / emphasis-wise) in a language you're not familiar with is much more preferable to bad acting in a language you actually know.

Honestly I can't tell ever if they use the same voice overs in subs. I'm just terrible at recognising the voices when they aren't speaking a language i know (or even sometimes if they are) so I didn't really consider this, but yes it could also be something to judge an overall work by, but I'm not sure how it would go with comparing the sub and dub.

As for your opinions on dubs I have to say I agree with you completely. I find 80% of dubs that I have heard to be average at best and down right terrible at worst, but when I find one of the very few dubs that I think really is something I find watching them, regardless if the sub is just as good, to be more enjoyable.

On the dub of Spice and Wolf after just recently watching it and due to crappy files deciding to freeze some of the time making me unable to watch any of the sub I'll say it was decent but nothing special. Holo's voice I thought was actually a good choice and seemed to fit the character even if on times it bordered on annoying.

Oct 9, 2010 4:47 AM by Dark_Puddles

Ya, I'm mostly interested in the sub version of SaW I might buy the english version of SaW at fry's Electronics

Mar 28, 2010 4:31 PM by WolfTsumeClaw568

I say this as a big fan of the sub.

The dub is actually very well done, Holo/Horo is the only real problem and I can take it with the good dub it has.

Mar 20, 2010 9:30 PM by mitamaking

WolfTsumeClaw568 said:
I haven't seen the dub of season 1 , at all.

You should totally watch it, it's an awesome dub.

Mar 20, 2010 8:00 PM by KidRyan

I've watched bit of it dubbed, and it was great!

Mar 19, 2010 5:41 PM by Animefan710

I haven't seen the dub of season 1 , at all.

Mar 3, 2010 4:02 PM by WolfTsumeClaw568

the dub was awesome, I hope they dub season 2.

Mar 3, 2010 2:56 AM by KidRyan

I would love to watch the third season of spice and wolf.I hope the third season should be created earlier.

Feb 28, 2010 9:14 PM by WolfTsumeClaw568

Dark_Puddles said:

ukonkivi said:

AidanAK47 said:
don't say it's crap compared to the sub unless you know Japanese.

Ahahahahahahaha, no.

Extra information added so that my post doesn't get removed.

You're right! Specially if you have fallen in love with the voice actress and her acting skill. It's just love man!

Jan 17, 2010 2:15 AM by sidekick

Dark_Puddles said:

ukonkivi said:

AidanAK47 said:
don't say it's crap compared to the sub unless you know Japanese.

Ahahahahahahaha, no.

Extra information added so that my post doesn't get removed.

No someone doesn't need to be able to understand a language to be able to judge if they like the sound better in the dub or original better, but by not understanding the language you are unable to judge on anything other than just how pleasant someones voice is, not how they pronounce things, epmhasis on certain words or the way their sentences are timed (as in short breaks between what words, words said slowly or quickly etc.). So judgements over voice acting being good or not are a lot harder to make if you do not know the language, saying "compared to the sub..." or "compared to the original...." really is an unfair comparison.

edit: i should probably actually say something about the main topic.........cool.

Couldn't have said it better myself. Thanks Dark Puddles.

Jan 16, 2010 8:25 AM by AidanAK47

lets just all agree that the dub is superior to staring at the bottom of the screen the whole time to understand what the people are saying

Jan 16, 2010 7:29 AM by supersonic124

ukonkivi said:

AidanAK47 said:
don't say it's crap compared to the sub unless you know Japanese.

Ahahahahahahaha, no.

Extra information added so that my post doesn't get removed.

Jan 16, 2010 5:35 AM by Dark_Puddles

AidanAK47 said:
don't say it's crap compared to the sub unless you know Japanese.

Ahahahahahahaha, no.

Extra information added so that my post doesn't get removed.

Jan 16, 2010 3:58 AM by ukonkivi

I just watched the funimation dub and I got to say that I am fairly impressed. True I never seen the subbed version of spice and wolf, however I feel the voices suited the characters perfectly. Especially Holo.

I still think that whatever version you watch first will be the version you prefer but I got to say that Dub voice actors are judged harder than Sub voice actors. After all for a sub voice actor to be good they just need to have a voice that does not sound like nails on a chalkboard. They could be saying the lines incorrectly or not expressing emotion right and we wouldn't know the difference. I don't think it's fair to compare English and Japanese dubs unless you can understand both languages.

So to put it simply, I thought the spice and wolf dub was brilliant and please don't say it's crap compared to the sub unless you know Japanese.

Jan 15, 2010 8:10 PM by AidanAK47

Jigero said:
I find it kinda funny the people bitching about the Dub, probably never or hardly watch dubs or will ever buy the DVD release, even if they will probably just watch Japanese audio.
It's like people who bitch about the president and didn't even vote.

I don't know about others but that's not the case with me. I spend 4-5 hundred dollars a year on anime and try to avoid dubbed products.

Jan 14, 2010 11:53 AM by hot

Seannn said:
I've never seen spice and wolf, but I'm sure funimation will ruin it....

Actually, they did a pretty good job. And the dub is decent. I kinda ♥ Horo's English voice actress, very haughty and precise.

Jan 14, 2010 9:41 AM by the_seventh_l

the dub is good you guys need to stop bitching

Jan 14, 2010 9:26 AM by supersonic124

Seannn said:
I've never seen spice and wolf, but I'm sure funimation will ruin it....

They didn't. I saw it. I know.

Dec 29, 2009 6:32 PM by Florete

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