Voice Compare » Dragon Ball » Young Krillin

"Never ask a group of DBZ fans which dub they prefer" - TV Tropes profile on Dragonball

EDITOR'S OPINION

Well folks while the little bald dude Krillin is one of the earlier VCs for this site let alone this VC section so this VC shall be for his Kid self. In the 1989 dub of Dragon Ball from Harmony Gold he was renamed Bongo (a slightly crude joke about how his head can be used for a drum). The reception of the voices for this dub ranged from pretty good to lets just say "not-so good" and I would have to say that Kid Krillin is somewhere in the middle in this case. While Krillin's VA in this dub tried perhaps a little too hard on the voice to be fair the performance was actually not that bad as it did fairly suit Krillin's persona pretty well back then.

Krillin's kid self didn't get a chance to have an English voice again until a bit over a decade later in the early 2000s in FUNimation's dub of the Dragon Ball series with Laurie Steele doing the voicework. And Laurie's work as Kid Krillin is probably her most renowned performance IIRC and I can definitely see why. She was definitely able to do a little boy voice and I liked her nasally tone for the role and she had a great performance for the role as well. Whether it was when Krillin was a little smart-alack punk or when Krillin matures and becomes a nice boy Laurie's overall performance was a great one and is easily one of the better performances in the FUNi dub of the show.

And not too long after the FUNi dub of the show there is the Blue Water dub in which Mike "Time Man" Thiessen took over the role. And I must say this performance is kind of a mixed bag, one hand Krillin is still just a little boy at the time and well to be blunt Mike is a bit too old to be sounding like a young boy. Granted not ALL grown men have this problem (as Greg Ayres is perhaps the most known example) but while Mike made a good effort in trying but he is not one of those men whom can do a little boy voice. However other than that detail his performance was pretty good though as his performance did fairly suit the role. So basically I am deeming Mike Thiessen as Kid Krillin to be a miscast (though to be fair he does have decent potential for older Krillin though). Overall I am definitely going with Laurie Steele first, his Harmony Gold dub voice at second and Mike Thiessen at an okay but miscast third.

(Note: Apparently there was a UK dub of one of the Dragonball movies and I was pleasantly surprised by it, apparently even from what little I've seen their work on Dragon Ball has better voice acting than what they do on DBZ. But while I am still going with Laurie Steele the most I am pleasantly surprised with the UK Dub Kid Krillin voice here.)


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