I go back and forth between the dubbed and subbed versions. I like to hear the Japanese actors (even if I can't understand the language) and I like to compare the subs' translation to the dubbed dialogue but it does require a lot more focus, having to keep your eyes on the bottom of the screen all the time!

Translating dialogue and then dubbing it means addressing a number of problems:

1. Matching mouth-flaps;

2. Translating the MEANING of the line, not necessarily the words (unless you really, really like Engrish);

3. Getting the emotion right.

ADV did, it seemed to me, a fairly decent job overall, given that the translators had to figure out what scientific concepts were being (ab)used, determine the English equivalents (and find the one that fit best) -- and that was in addition to making certain that they managed 1-3.

I like using subs because I've been curious about names or word use, and I get a kick out of discovering that a movie (anime or live) used English when they had perfectly good Japanese words, or that some terms are borrowed wholesale. (And sometimes, the terms sound even better when pronounced in the Japanese manner. 'Test pilot' sounds even more awesome when spoken with the accent.)

BotP and Gatchaman made the characters different, although it's plain that the characterizations of Mark and Jason were intended to fulfill certain expectations that Action for Children's Television had about characters. Mark was kept from being Mr. Perfect by the imperfections of Ken. (Imagine the sort of boring perfect character that would have been created had they made BotP from scratch!) And Jason never seemed like such a complainer, but he was a bit eager to push that red button or to kick some ass. Not as homicidal as Joe, but you could see he was not allowed to be badass.

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