Original audio or the dub you grew up with: which voice is canon?
Choose the voice that is canon in your head: the original performance or your childhood dub. Name a joke, character name, or personality that changed in translation. Accuracy and emotional truth are both allowed; subtitles are not an automatic win.
Discussion
I rewatch with both tracks. The dub restores the room I grew up in; the original reveals a show I did not fully receive. Neither experience cancels the other.
That is the fairest answer, but one voice still appears when you read the character's name. The involuntary voice is probably the real canon.
Sailor Moon is where nostalgia cannot excuse everything. The dub opened the door for me, but cuts and rewritten relationships changed what the story was willing to say.
True, but without that imperfect doorway many viewers would never have reached the uncut version. Access and accuracy were not equally available choices.
Pokémon localization changed names and jokes, yet those changes created a shared vocabulary at school. Accuracy would not have produced the same playground culture.
A good localization should build culture, not just transfer words. The problem is when it changes a character so much that later emotional scenes no longer fit.
The Dragon Ball dub is canon for me because those voices filled the room before I knew what localization meant. The original may be closer, but it does not trigger the same memory.
Memory is powerful, but performance intent matters. Hearing the original rhythm changed which characters felt serious and which scenes were supposed to be funny.