About
4Kids Entertainment are an American licensing company, responsible for dubbing a variety of different anime, such as Pokémon, One Piece[1], Yu-Gi-Oh! and Sailor Moon[2]. They have become infamous on the English-speaking web due to their Americanization of anime.
History
4Kids was originally founded In 1970 as Leisure Concepts Inc, as an independent licensing agency. The company changed to 4Kids Entertainment, Inc in 1995, and started to license popular anime and bring them to the U.S. One of the companies first major success’ was their work on the popular Pokemon anime, based off a Nintendo video game series of the same name, helping to build on the popular Pokemon craze growing at the time. Due to the success of the show, 4Kids also moved to dub other popular anime, most notably Yu-Gi-Oh!. On December 21 2012, 4Kids was turned into 4Licensing Corporation due to the company’s recent bankruptcy[3].
Reputation
4Kids has an overall negative reputation of the English-speaking web, due to their Americanization of their anime series. The different dub edits are often the subject of ridicule among anime fans, due to the nature of the edits, most infamously the removal of rice balls in the Pokemon anime. Many anime fans argue that 4Kids over-editing ruins anime, and many of the edits are unnecessary.
Sub-memes
What if 4Kids got X?
“What if 4Kids got X?” is a series of video parodies revolving around what would happen if 4Kids were to dub a number of different anime. The videos usually show the anime being dumbed down and made more basic and kid-friendly.
4Kids National Anthem
The 4Kids National Anthem is a video made by 4Kids showing different characters singing the American national anthem. The video was subject to ridicule, due to the amount of anime characters used in the video.
4Kids hates Rice Balls
4Kids hates Rice Balls is a phrase used to represent the editing-out of Rice Balls and other Japanese food within the 4Kids Pokemon dub. It is often use to represent the absurdity of all 4Kids edits and Americanization
Search Interest
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External References
[2]Wikipedia – Sailor Moon
[3]Wikipedia – 4Kids – Yu-Gi-Oh! lawsuit and bankruptcy