Censorship is the act of removing content deemed immoral, offensive or morally objectionable by certain individuals and an act of suppression of speech or other public communication as determined by a government, media outlet or other controlling body.
Sailor Moon (Violence, Nudity and Homosexual Couples)
Most of the Western audience probably grew up with the dubbed version, and so they probably didn't realise until much later just how much was changed from the original. Sure there were the typical visual censorships, which made sense since the show had a fair amount of 'nudity' in it (Even the sparkles and rainbow coloured body outlines weren't enough to cover them up apparently).
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| Eh. |
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| The series' famous androgynous lesbian, Haruka Tenoh, later renamed Amara. |
In an effort to avoid the controversy that a lesbian character in a cartoon aimed towards a younger audience would cause, given the contemporary social mores in the United States, the dub also states that Amara (Haruka) and Michelle (Michiru Kaioh) are cousins (HAHA!) - even going so far as to occasionally state this through characters who should now know such information.
However, whether in an attempt to be more faithful to the original Japanese or through sheer failure to edit consistently, several episodes of the English dub retain a noticeable amount of their casual flirting. Due to the censorship and problematic dubbing, some viewers of the English dubs inferred not only a homosexual relationship between the two girls, but also an incestuous one, due to the unusual amount of flirting between these so-called 'cousins' (Still laughing here).
However, it should be noted that in Japan, there were also some controversies around the character. Many other international dubs also either toned down or censored the character to reflect similar social mores in other countries. For example, the French dub showed Frederique (Haruka) was deliberately disguising herself as a man to hide her identity as Sailor Uranus, going so far as to cast a male actor to play her, while a female one placed her later on once she was revealed to be female. While Mylene (Michiru) was rewritten as merely pretending to be "his" girlfriend to maintain the charade (This actually sounds a lot more creative if you ask me... I kinda like it?).
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| Zoisite and Kunzite (Later renamed Zoycite and Malachite in the Dub) |
Before Haruka and Michiru came along in the later seasons however, there were these two. Seeing how obvious it was that these two were a couple, the more effeminate looking one (Being Zoisite), was rewritten as a female character... though this censorship probably did a lot better than what they tried with Haruka and Michiru.
Several death scenes were also censored or removed completely. In the second last episode of the first season, none of the Sailor Scouts' death scenes were shown. Instead, they were all said to have been "captured" by the series' antagonist. This censorship pretty much ruined one of the most emotional moments in the series... But I suppose it had to be done so that the young ones wouldn't be traumatised by this episode.
Bleach (Even more Violence and Nudity)
With more 'recent' anime shows, in "Bleach's" case, Tite Kubo had a tendency to illustrate really over-the-top violence, which had to be toned down when it was adapted into an anime series. It probably doesn't look as bad when seen on a still black and white image, but considering the fact that shonen anime shows like these are meant to be rated at least PG-13, they definitely had to remove these gruesome scenes that you would only see in animes like "Ghost in the Shell" and "Afro Samurai".
Much like "Sailor Moon", female characters had their outfits altered to cover up more skin, and once again in this case, it's understandable. Female characters were definitely drawn in far more skimpy outfits in this series as compared to "Sailor Moon", and truth be told, these censorships look more believable, especially when you see these well endowed characters fighting (Wear a bra, please). We wouldn't want the young ones to be... too interested in these attractive characters either, now do we?
You can read an interesting write up here about the changes made between mangas and its anime adaptations.
In the original 80s series, the UK were absolutely crazy over ninjas. The idea that everyone was about to put on black pajamas and overthrow the monarchy however terrified the authorities, and this poor series ended up paying the price. Since ninjas were not actually allowed to appear in cartoons and the British still wanted to let their children watch this classic-to-be, they reached a compromise by removing the word "ninja" from the theme song... and the show was retitled "Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles".
Because of this, Michelangelo's screen time was cut down immensely, while many scenes involving weapons were toned down or cut entirely - Mikey and his nunchakus were for some reason given the most attention. The reason for this is unknown... especially if they thought that nunchakus are much dangerous weapons as compared to swords. Anyway, Mikey's signature weapon was hence replaced with a grappling hook called the 'turtle line'...
Michelangelo remained one of the most useless characters until the series' cancellation. Thankfully later versions of the series weren't given such treatment later on, even reverting back to the original name and weapons.
There were some other ridiculous censoring of 80s and 90s cartoons, such as the 90s "Spider-Man" cartoon, where no punching was allowed to be shown at all throughout the show's run... go figure.
Mortal Kombat and Australia (Too Violent For Me)
The Australian government has always been known for their ridiculous video game censorships, apparently having a mindset that video games are only meant to be for kids, denying the existence of older gamers. That was until a new game rating system was introduced about a few years back.
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| Trust me, there are better ones. |
The company has always been aware of the negative reaction it tends to get from parents, and that was probably one of the best things about Ed Boon and his crew, their sense of humour.
The introduction of the Friendship finishing move in "Mortal Kombat 2" was intended to mock the parental outcry in 1992 over the first game's violent content. However, they were sadly dropped from later games as controversy diminished and was redirected to newer games. It did however allow the series to return to its darker roots from "Mortal Kombat 4" onwards. While Babalities (The finishing move that turns the loser into a baby) were included in the most recent game, Friendship was sadly not included despite what Ed Boon said on Twitter.
Oh and let's not forget this (Way before Australia unbanned the game):
While censorship is necessary (Especially when it comes to television, that parent lock is not going to work forever), it gets pretty ridiculous, or worse, even worse content goes over the heads of the people in charge of censoring the show.
I must confess that Asia's HBO and Fox channels have done a horrible job when it comes to properly censoring their shows, as mentioned before, numerous jokes (Even visual ones) apparently go over the heads of these editors (Such as that gay orgy in "Family Guy"), and some movies or shows are censored so heavily that there was no point even watching it after (Like "Tenacious D in the Pick of Destiny").
Again, it is understandable that censorship is required for the sake of the young ones (And the painfully sensitive), considering how easy it is to influence them when it comes to the content they see on TV. But when editors blow, they really blow...
