GoRa and Studio GoHands’s K made it’s debut on Neon Alley. AnimeEmily and Justin gave their thoughts on its premiere episode.
Emily: Though I unofficially started my anime career with dubs (Ghibli movies!), the more I got into anime, the less I cared for them. My main problem with them is usually that they always sound a bit forced. not that I’m an expert at Japanese, but I’ve always liked the way emotions came across in Japanese over its English-speaking counterpart. That in mind, I don’t avoid them completely and do still enjoy most of my movies dubbed as well as the occasional series, like K. The dubbed version (as well as the episode itself) was a pleasant surprise for me. It’s been a while since I actively listened to an English dub of something, and I’m happy to say that, aside from a few voices here and there, I enjoyed listening to it.
One of the reasons I probably enjoyed the dub so much is that it opened with some of the better voiced characters. Admittedly, Makoto and his lackeys don’t say a whole lot, but I remember their voices as being relatively pleasant to listen to. Makoto, especially, had a really good voice that seemed to match his character pretty well. I can’t quite remember which one, but either Reisi or Saruhiko also had a voice that I liked, though, again, he only spoke for minutes, if that.
Everyone else was pretty okay. I’m pleased to say that the only cringe worthy voices came from some of the background characters at the school and, again, from either Reisi or Saruhiko who had a laughably deep voice that felt way out of place. Yashiro had a neat voice and one that I actually recognized, from Yu-Gi-Oh! of all things; it didn’t always fit, for me, but, in general, I think the voice fit the character fine. I, honestly, can’t remember anything about Kuroh’s voice besides a mild feeling that I didn’t care for it much.
Though I’m not a dub person by any means, I enjoyed K’s dub more than I expected to and wouldn’t mind listening to more. Heck, it would probably make understanding the show’s confusing plot easier.
Justin: When I watched K last year, it seemed almost like a breath of fresh air. Well, at least it’s first episode did. After that I’m not even 100% sure it knew where it was going aside from me knowing where it is going. However, it apparently did well enough for people to buy it in Japan and it’s even getting a movie adaptation. And also apparently, it did well enough for Viz to decide to not only stream the show last year, but to license it. And now it’s made it’s debut on Neon Alley. Well, it’s first episode at least.
And there’s a lot to say about K’s first episode: mainly the fact there’s at least a horde (or at best, maybe 4-7) of questions that the anime gleefully brings up while attempting to distract everyone with blue filters. But in simple summary: There’s a war between two kings in the area that’s not explained at all, we have a young high school student named Yashiro Isana who ends up becoming the target of the Red King’s group because he resembles the face of the Colorless King(the man who killed one of their members), and just when we think he’s saved, he ends up meeting Kuroh Yatogami, who manages to save him from getting killed by the Red King, but as it turns out, Kuroh wants to kill him too.
I think viewing this again has lessened the surprise and style K displayed when I watched it last year. Last year it basically showed and didn’t tell, and at best, I could respect it for that. But since I’ve seen it already, this wasn’t going to work again. It basically came down to how the dub was handled, and I would have said for the most part that the English dub was fine, and in fact, some characters so far stand out (like Tara Platt, who voices Seri and Matthew Mercer as Kuroh). But the big elephant in the room for me was Sam Regal, who voices our main protagonist, Yashiro, and it did not sound good at all. In attempting to remember how Yashiro sounded in Japanese, I realized instantly that the fun Daisuke Namikawa injected in Yashiro was removed in favor of a lower tier, kind of dry, voice. Sam has been around a while, but in Ep 1, I just don’t see a fit; heck, I don’t even see the fit for whoever the voice of the Colorless King is. Since this anime revolves around Yashiro, for this part to be pretty mediocre is really a let down. Hopefully improvement is made on that front, or as more characters appear the pressure is taken off.
Otherwise, it was a pretty standard opening episode, and for the dub premiere, it was decent enough. We’ll see how the scripting in English goes from there.