It's important to keep in mind when reading these reviews that the star ratings have to be taken in context. You may recall my review of Lost Universe. That dub was certainly among the poorest I've ever heard, yet it earned two stars, due primarily to the fact that the anime itself was so laughably bad. The anime and dub combined for a camp effect that made me laugh. So while a dub of that quality would get only a single star for almost any other anime, for Lost Universe, it received two. Context, you see.

Something similar is true of ADV's dub of Nadia. I searched for the better part of a day to find the best adjective to describe my impression of this dub, and I finally hit upon "unpolished". The three primary characters in Nadia are all children. ADV took the uncommon step of casting actual children to play the roles. Understandably, there is an air of inexperience in their performances. They rarely nail their lines, though they rarely miss them by much. Their voices stand in contrast to the more experienced performances delivered by the adult actors.

But it works. The end result is a dub with an aura of innocence to it, sort of a "Saturday morning" feel. It's not a sophisticated dub by any means, but it fits perfectly with Nadia's brand of light-hearted adventure. It's all about context.

Let me start with Jean, because how you react to him will play the biggest role in determining whether or not you like the dub. Jean has an accent. It's supposed to be French, but is really just "Jean." When I first heard his accent, I found it annoying. But by the second episode, I'd gotten used to it, and after eight episodes, I can't imagine Jean without the accent. Nathan Parsons (age 12) does an excellent job of portraying Jean's optimism and determination, without ever letting him sound more mature than the boy he is.

Nadia, played by Meg Bauman (age 14), is the hardest of the child voices to review. While I was fairly certain that Jean and Marie were played by children, I was less sure of Nadia. Bauman's voice is sufficiently mature that I wouldn't have been surprised had she turned out to be over eighteen. Her Nadia is a bit grating at first, a little bit of a bitch, but that's in line with the character.

And then there's Marie, played by Margaret Cassidy (age 11). All Cassidy has to do is play a little girl (which she is, although 11-year-olds don't like to be called that), and be cute. Cassidy truly shines in the scene where Marie describes the murder of her parents, breaking into tears. It's utterly believable, and a tricky scene for any actress to pull off, much less one who is eleven.

Grandis Granvar is the leader of the pesky band of jewel thieves who menace our heroes in the early episodes. Sarah Richardson, who has some experience in playing mature villainesses, plays Grandis. (For example, she was Kali in the aforementioned Lost Universe dub.) It's a distinctive voice, over the top with confidence, allowing her to play the dual role of villain and comic relief. It makes her all the more humorous when things go wrong, which they always do.

Anyone has watched a lot of ADV dubs should recognize the voices of Granvar's henchmen Hanson and Sanson, played by Corey Gagne and Martin Blacker (Joe Saeba in City Hunter). Blacker's goofy character voice is especially recognizable, as he's played bit parts with it in several ADV dubs. There's no depth to these performances, but there doesn't need to be. Hanson and Sanson are, at least at this point in the series, pure comic relief. All that is required of Gagne and Blacker is to have good, funny character voices and they pull that off admirably. It's another aspect that lends itself to that "Saturday morning" feel -- Granvar and co. reminded me quite a bit of Team Rocket.

But, of course, the real villain of the piece is Gargoyle, played by David Jones. This voice, I'm sad to say, needs work, but not so much work that it ruins the dub. When in angry, bellowing, mode, Jones is fine as the evil, masked bad guy. But when I watched the scenes where Gargoyle has Nadia prisoner and is lecturing her on how superior he and how he will take over the world, so she might as well hand over the crystal, I couldn't help but giggle. It took me awhile to figure what I was finding so funny, then it hit me: he sounds just like the narrator for NFL Films! It became a little like MST3K. Gargoyle would drone on about how darn powerful he is, then I'd chime in, using the same tone of voice, "The San Francisco 49ers moved inexorably down the field as Joe Montana picked apart the Giants' secondary." Then I'd fall over sideways laughing. If you don't make that connection, however, Jones' Gargoyle isn't all that bad, just a little cartoony, like nearly every other character in the dub.

At this point, I haven't seen enough of the crew of the Nautilus to fairly judge them. I would like to point out one thing, however. I'm not certain whether it was intentional or not, but Nemo sounds a little like Captain Gloval from Robotech. Considering how similar the two characters are in both appearance and demeanor, I wouldn't be surprised if this was a little "nudge-and-a-wink" on the part of ADV. It's up to you whether you find this clever or annoying.

Perhaps my favorite voice in the film, however, is one with no face. Karen Kuykendall plays the kindly old lady (Nadia in later years?) whose voice introduces each episode. If you've seen the popular trailer for Nadia that appeared on ADV tapes and DVDs more than a year ago, you'll immediately recognize her. Her voice is wonderful, the grandmother everyone wishes they had, and sets a whimsical, romantic mood.

The Nadia dub is directed by Charles Campbell, who, as it turns out, also directed the Lost Universe dub mentioned at the beginning of this review. After hearing that dub, I had serious questions about Campbell's competence, but he's laid those questions to rest. It may help that Campbell didn't write the ADR script for Nadia himself, as he did with Lost Universe.

Overall, the dub of Nadia is unpolished, unsophisticated, and a whole lot of fun. Do yourself a favor: try watching an episode Saturday morning while eating a bowl of cereal. I think you'll see what I mean.

Rating: *** (out of 4)

(review based on episodes 1 - 8)

Vital Stats

Released by: ADV

Dub by: Monster Island (ADV)

Director: Charles Campbell

Cast

Nadia - Meg Baumann

Jean - Nathan Parsons

Marie - Margaret Cassidy

Grandis - Sarah Richardson

Hanson - Corey Gagne

Sanson - Martin Blacker

Gargoyle - David Jones

Narrator - Karen Kuykendall

Note: I need to give props to the following website, simply called "The 'Nadia' Page", for confirming my suspicions that Nadia, Jean, and Marie are indeed played by children. The site describes the dub's premiere at Project A-Kon last June.

I couldn't possibly write this column without the help of the Dub Seiyuu Database.

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