The Namek Saga is the second season of DBZ for the North American syndication television market as produced by FUNimation. The episodes released on those discs are as-is from their original syndication run on American television beginning in 1996 (although in the original run episode 26 was considered part of season one, it is included on the first disc of season two). This means they are edited, English-dubbed ONLY (with the Ocean Studios cast, as opposed to FUNimation's in-house cast, which did not yet exist), and were distributed by Pioneer Home Entertainment. The Japanese episodes listed with these discs in this guide indicate which original Japanese episodes these dubbed episodes correspond to based on their visual content due to edits and episode splicing. FUNimation's sub-licensing agreement with Pioneer (later renamed to Geneon) expired on 31 August 2003, resulting in a complete return to FUNimation's control. For more information on the Pioneer/FUNimation licensing agreement, please refer to the "Newbie Guide".
FUNimation announced plans to go back and re-dub the first two seasons with their own in-house actors (which had already done the rest of the series), and release this re-dub uncut on DVD with the Japanese version (and amazingly, the Spanish version), as well. These discs had been in-process of release under the "Ultimate Uncut Edition" line. The dub version of these episodes were aired "uncut" (in visual content only; FUNimation's English dub of the series runs the gamut in terms of accuracy to the original Japanese script) on Cartoon Network beginning in fall 2005.
In mid-2006, FUNimation abruptly (and silently) halted the release of the "Ultimate Uncut Edition" line after the ninth volume, which left the remainder of a second "season box" for the "Vegeta Saga" left to fill. Images and SKUs of an additional "Complete Vegeta Saga" had leaked online, with the official word from FUNimation being that more information on the set (supposedly consisting of five DVDs and becoming available in February 2007) would be available soon, and that other "major announcements" concerning the release of the series will follow.
Continuing onwards with their success of Season One, FUNimation's "remastered" DBZ Season Two box set saw its release to DVD (entirely replacing the original run of "Series #2"). Touted as a complete remastering, this release was produced in a (cropped) widescreen presentation with a "remastering" process by Video Post & Transfer in Texas. Despite FUNimation's claims, the set is indeed cropped (missing approximately 20% of its vertical resolution while only gaining approximately 5% of its horizontal resolution), it is not remastered frame-by-frame from its original film, and the color has been adjusted. Of note is the inclusion of a new audio track, featuring FUNimation's traditional voice track (with minor line alterations where appropriate) played alongside the original Japanese musical score. FUNimation continued with this release style for the entirety of the DBZ TV series, marking the first time it had ever received a "consistent" release from beginning to end in North America. This release also negated the original numbering of episodes for their dub, and would provide a complete run of 291 episodes. |