The Story Behind One of Anime’s Most Controversial Dubs

Summary

The Ghost Stories English dub is famous for its dark humor and script overhaul, but the idea that the original anime bombed in Japan is a myth.
ADR director Stephen Foster, known for his liberal adaptations of anime, was responsible for the unique script and humor in the English dub.
The rumor that the Ghost Stories dub saved a failing show likely originated from Foster's misunderstanding of the series' performance in Japan.

Ghost Stories is an anime with one of the most unique background stories of the medium. The usual story goes that Ghost Stories did terribly domestically, leading to ADV Films being granted the chance to bring the title to a new market through its English dub and a script overhaul. The result would go down as internet legend as the English dub of Ghost Stories was a far cry from the original Japanese version that seemed to take itself very seriously.

To this day, the Ghost Stories dub remains the point of much fondness and controversy, due to the dark nature of the comedy, some of which has aged poorly. A lot of stories have been told about it, but what is the real story behind the Ghost Stories English dub?

Plot and Background

Gakkou no Kaidan (Ghost Stories) began as a series of ghost stories and Japanese folklore written for children by author Tōru Tsunemitsu and published by Kodansha, with a four-part film series being released between 1995 and 1999. The story follows Satsuki Miyanoshita, who moves to her deceased mother's hometown with her father and little brother. On the first day of school, Satsuki, her little brother, one of her neighbours and an upperclassman visit the now-abandoned old school building that is next to the new one, and come to understand that the place is haunted. Satsuki then learns that her mother had once sealed away the apparitions that plague the old school building, leaving behind a book containing detailed instructions on how to do it again, should they ever be freed.

The anime series produced by Studio Pierrot and directed by Noriyuki Abe (Yu Yu Hakusho, BLEACH) aired on Fuji TV from October 2000 to March 2001, running for 20 episodes – it's listed as 19 by some sources due to the loss of episode 3, which was about the urban myth of Kuchisake Onna and earned backlash from Japanese parents. Due to the positive reception of the original books, as well as the production of various forms of media based on them, the commonly told story of the series' domestic failure may have been an attempt to further mythologize the English dub. Ghost Stories actually did well enough domestically to be broadcast in other countries – the premise that a supposed failure of an anime series would somehow be expected to do any better in English makes little sense as the associated corporate entities behind the production of the series would most likely pursue more profitable titles over failures.

Not Bad

On the Japanese website anikore (comparable to MyAnimeList), Ghost Stories has a score of 67.3 (out of 100) and a 3.7/5 star rating, indicating a decent level of enjoyment from Japanese fans. Nonetheless, the idea that it bombed domestically remains part of the folklore surrounding the production of the notorious English dub. There's also the fact that the English dub is the only one that has a complete overhaul of the series' script, which means that the original version was distributed in various countries, mostly by the Animax television channel in South-East Asia. In a rigorous interrogation of the supposed origins of the Ghost Stories dub, /Film writer Deshawn "Dela Doll" Thomas found that the well-accepted story comes with several holes, and this story itself seems to originate from famous ADR director Stephen Foster.

Fosterization

The basic story we've been told is that the higher-ups at Fuji TV, who had the rights to distribute the series in the west, did not have much instruction for the team producing the English dub, except to retain the characters' names, the manner in which the ghosts were defeated, and the core meaning of each episode. The dub would go on to feature pop-culture references, dark humour, fourth wall breaks and frequent moments in which the show criticizes its own quality. In the article by Thomas, ADR director Stephen Foster was quite notorious for his liberal adaptations of the titles he was asked to work on, including famous comedy anime, Cromartie High School, even before the creation of the infamous Ghost Stories dub. The job of the ADR director in the case of anime is to convert the script into the target language, and localize it so that cultural references are altered to appeal to the target audience.

It is for similar reasons that 4Kids Entertainment versions of anime would end up having a totally different opening and ending theme, or moments like Pokémon character Brock's infamous jelly donut controversy. The reputation Foster garnered for making various strange changes to the tone, story or dialogue of the shows he worked on ended up spawning the word "Fosterization" to describe the process of taking various liberties with the localization, dubbing and general expression of a story. The person for whom the term was coined has expressed pride about becoming a "cult legend" for his liberal takes on various anime, but particularly for the dub that he considers a success for having "saved a failing show"; however, the idea that Ghost Stories had been a failure at all comes directly from him. It could be that he misunderstood what he was tasked to do, but his reputation and pride in Ghost Stories suggests something else.

Broken Telephone?

The English script for Ghost Stories was written by Stephen Foster and Lucan Duran, with voice actors being told that they can ad-lib. Foster was told by Griffin Vance, an attorney at ADV Films and producer of various anime titles, that he'd be working on a series that utterly bombed in Japan and didn't have many requirements for the dubbed product.

With knowledge that Ghost Stories did quite well in Japan, a possibility outlined by YouTuber MercuryFalcon makes sense: Vance misunderstood Fuji TV's explanation that the series didn't do too well in Asia, referencing the distribution of the series via Animax, and that went on to influence the myth behind Ghost Stories.

The series itself had been created for Fuji TV to maintain a time-slot after the ending of the G.T.O. Anime, to replace one Kodansha product for another having seen the dwindling ratings of the Rurouni Kenshin anime after its studio and time-slot change. Ultimately, one of the most widely distributed stories about the Ghost Stories English dub, that it tanked in Japan and the dub was a saving grace, isn't true.

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