(With March 17, 2022 Addendum)

Since I started watching Asian dramas, I’ve become increasingly curious about the world of subtitles, translators, and voice dubbing. The popularity of Netflix’s Squid Game has spurred a lot of interesting discussions around these issues. If you’re unfamiliar with the backstory, here are a couple of articles to bring you up to speed:

• Netflix’s 'Squid Game' Subtitles Mar the Pride of Seeing a Korean Show Succeed

• Lost in translation? The one-inch truth about Netflix’s subtitle problem

I’m not here to do another deep dive into the deficiencies of Squid Game’s translation though or even subtitles in general (I’m saving that for another day). Instead, I wanted to highlight a slightly different issue: voice dubbing in Chinese dramas. 

In Western culture at least, you may come across voice dubbing for foreign films and now — thanks to Netflix — foreign TV shows. These dubbed shows are turning voice artists into global stars, according to Bloomberg. 

But you would never have a separate English-speaking voice actor dubbing over say, Sir Patrick Stewart’s Captain Picard in Star Trek. Stewart’s voice and crisp English accent is a distinct part of that character. You also wouldn’t get Stewart to dub over his own voice either. In China, however, many dramas will employ separate voice actors to do just that. Some actors, including Luo Yunxi (罗云熙) and Xiao Zhan (肖战), have also dubbed their own voices.

It’s a curious subject I’ve been wanting to explore for a while now, but just never got around to it (time flies during a pandemic!). But as it turned out, someone else blogged about it already. I stumbled across the post and thought it was fun primer on the industry and why the practice is so popular: “Dubbing in Chinese Dramas: How did I Come to Love It?”

I generally don’t like dubbing (even for foreign content), especially if I'm familiar with the actor's real voice, but there are definitely a few distinctive voice actors (Bian Jiang (边江), for example) who are instantly recognizable and help make the characters memorable. And some of my favourite dramas, like The Untamed, used voice dubbing artists.

An interview with a voice artist in Sixth Tone from several years ago also highlighted some of the reason why it’s done: excessive background noise on-set, the need to change dialogue in post-production due to orders by Chinese media regulators, and the “substandard deliveries” of “poorly trained actors”. Ouch. There’s also an interesting bit about the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film, and Television requiring words on television be spoken in a uniform, standard Mandarin accent to avoid regional variations. This article is from 2017 though, so I’m unclear if this still applies today since I do hear tiny snippets of regional accents on occasion. Dramas that are only streamed online also have less stringent rules than those airing on television. You can read the interview here.

* * *

“At Hengdian, in one place there might be someone shooting something about the war of resistance against Japan, while in another area, a crew might be filming an old romance, while over here is something else, and over there is another — it’s an awkward situation. Hengdian is a tourist spot, and every day it welcomes lots of tourists. Frequently, when dubbing a film you will hear the tour guides shouting on the recording, because Chinese tour guides use loud speakers.” — Jiang Guangtao interview with Sixth Tone

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If you’re curious to learn a little more on the subject and happen to enjoy Chinese dramas, there have been a couple of modern rom-coms recently about China’s voice dubbing industry: Poisoned Love (恋爱吧，食梦君!) and You Are So Sweet. (The quality of the dubbing for Poisoned Love, however, is ironically not … great.) Amy Sun, the lead actress in You Are So Sweet (你听起来很甜), dubbed her own voice in that drama. A new one from 2021 is Forever and Ever (一生一世), the second of a two-part drama starring Allen Ren (任嘉伦) and Bai Lu (白鹿) (part 1 is set in ancient times). I haven’t watched this one yet, so I’m not sure how much time they actually spend talking about the industry. (September 2022 Update: Some interesting details about the profession are sprinkled throughout Forever and Ever, but it’s not really the focus of the drama.)

While voice dubbing in China remains popular and will not be disappearing any time in the foreseeable future, it does feel like they are sloooooowly moving away from the practice in some genres. I've watched quite a few modern dramas over the past year or so that use live audio instead and it just sounds so much better and more natural. You can also hear the actors’ voices crack with emotion during an intense scene, and if you understand the language, appreciate the cultural diversity of local dialects or pick up cues when a regional accent creeps into the dialogue. I just started watching Dear Diary, an over-the-top, fun, modern/time-travel fantasy romp, and hearing the wide range of regional accents from the main and side characters really give depth to the setting and enrich the viewing experience.

What about you? Even if you don’t watch Chinese dramas, do you consume foreign content in its original language with subtitles, or do you go with the dubbed version?

Addendum (March 17, 2022)

In the months since I first wrote this post, the trend of using live audio appears to have accelerated; nearly all of the new dramas I’ve watched have retained the actors’ original voices, even historical ones. I’ve gotten so used to this shift that the dubbing in a drama like The King’s Avatar (全职高手) can be extremely distracting. The King’s Avatar clearly had a sizeable budget and high production values, yet they use voice actors for almost the entire cast. (Gao Hanyu (高瀚宇) seems to be among the few who at least dubbed his own easily recognizable voice.)

I recently watched The Autumn Ballad (嫣语赋) with Jeremy Xu Zhengxi (徐正溪) and Bridgette Qiao Xin (喬欣). It was my first drama for both actors and I was immediately struck by Xu Zhengxi’s deep and distinctive voice (which reminded me of Zhang Chao’s (张超) equally distinguished tone). I mentioned it to my friend Wuulongcha who said she was surprised the first time she heard Xu speak in an interview as he had always been dubbed in the older dramas she had watched. This was the interview, given around the time The Legend of Dugu (独孤天下) aired (sorry, no subs): (They even specifically discuss his “mesmerizing voice”, even though he is dubbed in the drama.)

The Autumn Ballad finished airing not too long ago and my friend and I had hoped that going forward, we would always hear his real voice. Well, another Xu Zhengxi drama just premiered this week (Be My Princess (影帝的公主)) and let me state for the record that it is criminal (and a tragedy for viewers) that he is once again dubbed over.

Some additional reading:

• China Daily interview with voice artist Bian Jiang

• Every movie and TV show could soon be dubbed into any language you want

• Love Between Fairy and Devil: the voice behind Dongfang Qingcang

Correction 2022/09/25: An earlier version of this post misidentified Allen Ren, not Allen Deng, as one of the stars of Forever and Ever.