How 4KIDS Censored SONIC X | New World Saga 

4Kids: Oh no, we can’t have kids hear gun sounds My old neighborhood: Gunshots, helicopters and cars exploding

Japanese version: (has words) 4KIDS: we don't do that here.

the reason for the "You like it rough joke" is because sonic wasn't originally made 4kids it's supposed to be a shonen anime, which are more commonly aimed at teenagers

Sonic is infamous for calling piccolo a saiyan XD

Sonic is family friendly Also sonic: Sh*t

To be fair about the sonic boom explanation, Sam outright explains it when Sonic speeds past him. "A sonic boom!? He's moving faster than the speed of sound!"

"Is that a scene of children having fun on the beach?! Cut that, it could give kids dangerous ideas, like going outside is fun" Like seriously, why cut that tho? It makes no sense at all

What I hate about the dub the most is that they changed the great soundtrack to terrible annoying repetitive music.

The jp version of cosmos death is the closest I have ever come to crying at a show.

Of course 4Kids censored Sonic. They censor everything that "IsN't KiD fRiEnDlY!!" They made Luffy a pirate who thinks hitting is bad

Eggman's base being named "Chaos Control" in the dub is one of the most ridiculous translation errors I've ever heard of. It goes to show that 4Kids didn't have anyone familiar with Sonic lore working on this thing.

12:24 I am deeply offended . . . I cannot forgive 4Kids for this

Once I discovered the Japanese dub, I hated 4kids, 80 perception of their censorship was unnecessary

The whole thing about all the text being removed was because the president of 4kids at the time stated in an interview that "kids don't read when they watch cartoons so why keep it in" something like that. It angered and insulted so many people back then lmao

i belive the reason this anime had swearin and certain adult jokes is because actually wasnt aimed for kids and a more teenager audience instead

Japanese ost is better because during the bio lizard fight they straight up play LIVE AND LEARN AND IT THE MOST HYPE SHIT EVER

I get why they removed Sonic swearing, but him saying "Cream! Hang on!" doesn't make a lot of sense since he's the one who's holding on to her. They could have had him say "Shoot! Let's go!"

10:35. No, that’s not weird. Stretching is a very common animation technique.

Him: the 4kids dub changed the opening Me: so ur saying the opening in my child hood is a lie? Man I'm sad I actually enjoyed the opening

The text removals are actually not "done" by 4KidS, not directly at least. It's actually the "clean" version for international markets by the anime studios. 4KidS actually does nothing instead of something, when the point is these is to fill in something that's culturally relevant to where you're localizing the show. This is rather sensible, as the text in the original Japanese broadcasts may be unintentionally offensive, incongruent, or confusing in other cultures.

This was great. I wish you brought up how 4kids received the international masters from TMS that has (most) of the Japanese text changed to english already. AKA 4kids cut out an english translated sonic boom screen instead and various examples too throughout the series. I wonder if you will catch infamous blank sign censor that was changed again to no sign at all coming up

I still like show, even with its flaws But the Japanese version is extremely amazing.

11:12 I know this isn't really about censorship. But if you look closely at the painting when the teacher stares at it. For a split second, it turns back into the original painting from the Japanese version. I was watching the UK release of sonic X on DVD. And it happens at exactly 15 minutes into the episode.

all anime should have an uncensored versions for all languages. change my mind

I really liked Japanese Sonic X. It's the best Sonic show in terms of character interactions. They didn't need a whole lost on Earth plot and I think it could have been even better if the show took place on Mobius.

It’s not just that TONY is close to SONY. The anime explicitly chose that as a parody of Sony.

I thought that Dr. Eggman named his base Chaos Control because it was created to induce chaos control. At least, that's how I always interpreted that name.

4kids removes text from their shows no matter what language it is in so that they can more easily localise the shows to languages other than English. 10:37 That's because you are looking at smear frames, which are primarily meant to convey motion. That's exactly why Sonic looks so stretched, because the frames weren't meant to be seen as still images.

F now i want an actual dubbing of Sonic X which doesnt change anything because GOSH DARN MAN the Japanese Version is leauges above the 4kids one the only thing better I believed 4kids did is Gotta Go Fast.

Comparing 4KIDS English Dub of Sonic X and the Japanese Sonic X is pretty much spot the difference at this point lmao

You forgot the scene in Cracking Knuckles where Amy swings her piko piko hammer into the cage robot. The scene with electric lighting? 4kids shortened it because Amy's underwear is shown.

For some reason on Netflix some original Japanese episode titles are kept.

Honestly, The Gun/Laser Thing Never Bothered Me.

4kidz being so stuck on taking out _text_ in the backgrounds is almost funny, if not pitiful

When you see a character changing shape between frames of animation, it's not an error, it's a stretch or a squash or a smear. It's ear to ease your eyes or to comunicate speed/hardness/squishyness/etc... You're not really suppose to see those. But we live in the internet age now... And reviewer are going in slowmotion...

My massive hatred for 4Kids grows more each year, even if they don't exist anymore.

How on earth is Sonic "controversial" now especially with having the highest grossing film based on a video game of all time?

We need a sonic x Kai of sorts. It could keep the Japanese ost, billboard text, and proper text translations for signs and such, but keeps the swears and sex jokes censored, as sonic is still a kids franchise, which could be very jarring to most people.

4kids, "How's the editing?" Animator, "I found we can cut 5 seconds of this fight scene to allow better motion." 4Kids, "And what about the text in the background?" Animator, "...Why do we need to remove the tex..." 4Kids, "GET OUT!" Animator, "W-What?!" 4Kids, "We can't have kids reading! What good are cartoons if kids could just stare in the background?"

why does your channel have under 10k oh and since you like shaman king, do 4kids and shaman king

4KIDS: Oh no, the kids, are in danger, *censores everywhere Cuz he's the mother or the childs* Cartoon Network: Bro, let's add an Regular Show episodes with gun and war

Not sure if this video series will reach the space arc section (with cosmos, robot aliens, etc.), but what shocked me was that they showed flashbacks of the alien creatures dying with blood leaking out and sonic was gravely injured with blood coming out. This was on 4Kids. As a kid watching that and used to having censorship, seeing blood made me realize that arc was way more serious than previous arcs.

I remember hearing the reason why all the text is removed is because 4Kids sells their license to other countries and so they don't want anyone to be confused.

Stuff like crude language, violence and suggestive content appear to be typically accepted/standard in Japanese kids television. That probably explains the rather adult stuff in the original Japanese dub. It’s still kinda weird that they did that weird seduction joke with Cream in that baseball episode though.

Luckily the Netflix version has the recap parts

I remember watching this. The entire time I was just thinking: "this is weird. I love it."

15:44 because the Japanese aren't so easily offended apparently. That and probably because kids wouldn't get it anyway.

4Kids would flat out remove Rouge from the entire show if she wasn’t so present

Some of these I can understand, even if I disagree with a lot of it. I don't understand why they felt the need to remove literally any text they could find.

15:31 in the JP version she actually says “So you’re into S&M huh. You better look it up because I’m not saying it

With the scene of Cream calling the robot cute, technically the robot is way younger than her lol

the "you like to play rough" joke is on the same level of a lot of family oriented movie jokes that go over kids heads but become very clear as an adult (seriously, go back to some kid friendly movies you watched as a kid. you will never be the same)

Well, whenever April hits. Happy 20th anniversary to Sonic X

Lol I remember I laughed so hard when I heard Sonic saying “shit”

14:23 R34 artists: Notes taken. Another thing: I didn't remember what Rouge said in the Japanese Dub of episode 11, So I legitimately kept saying "No!" For 10 seconds.

Thank you for the comparisons! Fun fact: discotek media re licensed both the USA and the Japanese version now recently on blu ray (separately for each version) 💙💙

10:33 It's not actually weird, this is one of the animation principles called squash and stretch! Sonic in this shot is stretching, so the animators exaggerate his movement to stretch out. To balance this when as he hits the ground he also squashes! It is also mixed with anticipation. This is not an error.

The saddest thing about the audio changes is that the final hazard bio lizard fight is generic sonic X music for the English but Japan got live and learn

6:53 That's a parody of Dunlop tires which also might be why it was removed. I don't think it would cause a legal issue with how different it is but they might not have still not wanted to reference real brands.

12:02 "We cordially invites you" is Engrish, but 4kids could've just blanked out the s in "invites" and it would've been fine Edit: Actually, I guess there's other issues with it

I still love the dub, mainly because it's a strong childhood memory

afaik, japanese culture just isn't as ashamed of sexuality as most western cultures are. that's not to say that they are more prone to perversion (i think we all know exactly just how degenerate we can be), they're just less apprehensive about expressing it.

Imagine you're walking on a city and you see a lot of blank signs around you

Imagine if Omega was in Sonic X

I always thought Knuckles' line from the beginning of Episode 1 that 'it used to be Chaos Control' was an implication that something interfered with the initiation of Chaos Control causing the built up energy to do something other than what it's supposed to do. I never got the impression that it was a misuse of the term.

The direct translation of what Sonic says in the infiltration episode is "Shit... Let's go!"

I feel like you forgot to mention how in the Japanese version, Eggman's robots are just called "E-whatever", while in the English dub all of Eggman's robots save the E-90 have creative names.

Any japanese animations: (has words) 4Kids: WE DONT READ!

I grew up watching the latin spanish dub of Sonic X in Mexico, and I loved it but I honestly cannot go back to it or the 4kids dub once I saw the superior japanese version. I love Sonic X and the story it tries to tell with these characters.

HOODZ: This was a great look into the changes 4Kids made. However, some of the text and image edits I don't think were the doing of 4Kids. The Japanese episodes I saw on Hulu also had text removed, yet still left in some things 4Kids DID change. So I think TMS provided masters with no text so the dubbers could add in their own more easily. The problem is that most of the time, 4Kids did nothing and it lead to some awkward moments in the dub. Anyway, great video, left a like and we will subscribe to you as well.

The reason why 4Kids removed the splash screen is most likely because they had Sam say what a Sonic Boom was. "A sonic boom! He's moving faster than the speed of sound!"

I use to watch "Sonic X" when I was a Kid, but now Growing up and watching it again as an Adult, I can see why this Show has so much Negativity over the Years, it's probably because of the Terrible Voice Acting (except for Jason Griffith, Dan Green and Mike Pollen, they were Okay), the annoying Original Trumpet Music that plays every 5 Seconds (makes Squidward's Claranet Musics look like a Masterpiece) and the messy Censorship. Edit: Everything 4Kids has done they always Butcherd the original Japanese Content, I'm so very Glad they went out of Buissness.

I’m glad, as a french, got the real version of sonic X with the true original musics, Japanese opening with French lyrics, the untouched story (Maria is truly dead)... even a few sexual jokes were translated lol, I feel sad and sorry for those poor Americans who grew up with this shitty version of sonic X

I Looked it up and the R, H, E on the baseball scoreboard stand for Run, Hit, and Error.

Have you ever watched the Japanese version on Hulu? It's not perfect, but it's better than the dub. What I do notice from the Japanese version on Hulu is that there's no text during the opening and ending sequences, title cards or eyecatches, the next episode previews are absent, and the moment from episode one that has a screen showing what a Sonic Boom is has English text. I'm not sure what other changes there are between the original Japanese airing and the Japanese version available on Hulu.

Japanese titles: *Are long* English titles: The japanese titles are to long, let's make em' shorter. Ah yes, 4Kids making as much sense as always. At least they kept the guns and didn't turn them into finger guns like they did in Yu-Gi-Oh XD

Sonic said the S word? WATCH YOUR MOUTH SONIC THE HEDGEHOG

You also forgot to point out during episode 5 that in the Japanese version when Amy smacks the robot from the inside it shows her panties but in the Dub it replaced it with shocking flash around the room INCLUDING to cover you know what! Lol

There's a very minor but noticeable edit in episode 3. In the JP version during the scene where the police get beaten by Eggman and tell them their leader is the president, one of the policemen has a burn hole in the back of his pants which was covered up in the English release.

If only funimation or viz media got the rights to this anime instead of 4kids

The last shot of Eggman's tower collapsing was definitely shortened cause of 9/11

The English dub should of stayed true to the Japanese :( I hate that so many things got cut

Amy in the Japanese dub and Amy in 4Kids are two completely different characters

1 Blink 80 fast is a great name for the song.

Did 4Kids have something against words being shown?

JP:Shit Let's Go! EN-US:Cream Hang On! PT-BR: Cream aguenta firme!

On Netflix in Canada they must of used the dub audio and every thing AND I MEAN EVERY THING else is from the uncut Japanese version

The gun sounds honestly make sense. Assuming they knew Americans would be the main ones to see this, I can see how quite a few American children would have trauma or just find gun sounds generally uncomfortable. As a British person I can only assume and go off of the Americans I know though, so yeah.

While I can't say I'm a fan of the Sonic franchise, I recently remembered this anime was a thing I watched back when I was a kid, at the time I didn't know about Anime and assumed it was of American origin. I went digging and found out it's Japanese and my god do I now despise what 4kids did to this show, especially after season 2. They outright changed parts of the story and even used different offscreen character voices in parts compared to the original, and if you liked Cosmo this was especially bad as they removed a key part of the story concerning her demise, completely unneeded, I hate stuff like this. Gonna be rewatching the show in Japanese later, and I'm gonna have a laugh at the dub changes while I'm at it.

5:16 I could've sworn I saw that sonic boom definition screen when I watched the 4Kids dub.

thank you so much for making these videos!!

This is a great series, both Sonic X and your going over its many edits. Great job dude, thanks for all your hard work!

The gunshot sounds in the 4Kids dub sound like pack-a-punched guns from COD Zombies 💀

Ngl this makes me wanna watch the sub now. Never saw it before, but probably will lol

There’s actually a lot of stuff you can show in Japan when it comes to stuff aimed at kids. A good example of this is the Keroro Gunsou anime and a bit of the manga, there’s a lot of.... questionable stuff in it(granted nothing too lewd like nudity) and yet it’s still one of the more popular anime aimed at a younger demographic, at least the anime is, the original 1999 manga was definitely aimed at an older audience but my point still stands.

Honestly the Rouge scene would have flown over most kids heads. I've seen more suggestive things in western shows like Spongebob and ToyStory

I always think Viz Media should do a redub of Sonic X like they did to Sailor Moon

Japanese Words: Exist 4Kids Words: Adios

It's a scary thought of Cream flirting or whatever with a robot.... Super scary

Peter Griffen: There Messing with my Shows!!!