Dragon Ball Daima Brings Back Iconic Goku Actor 15 Years After Shock Funimation Removal (2024)

Stephanie Nadolny, the English-language voice actor best known as Kid Goku in Dragon Ball, has revealed that Toei Animation was responsible for her epic return in Dragon Ball Daima. Nadolny’s reprisal of Kid Goku comes 15 years after her removal from the franchise by Funimation.

Nadolny opened up about her emotional return to the Dragon Ball franchise on X (formerly Twitter). "Tonight [Nov. 11, 2024] Dragon Ball Daima’s first three episodes will be in movie theaters," she said. "I'm humbled and honored to be back to voice the nostalgic Goku Mini! Huge thanks to Toei Animation for facilitating my return after 15 years. @/RetroJono [Jonathan Rigg] (voice director) has been a delight to work with! Thanks to all the fans!"

Toei Animation Brings Back Stephanie Nadolny as Kid Goku in Dragon Ball Daima

Although Nadolny first debuted in the Dragon Ball franchise as the voice of Kid Gohan in Dragon Ball Z, she quickly became synonymous with the role of Kid Goku in the English dub of the original Dragon Ball series from 1986. She continued to voice Kid Goku in Dragon Ball GT and even voiced Goku Jr. in the series finale and Dragon Ball GT: A Hero's Legacy. However, to the disappointment of longtime fans, Nadolny was nowhere to be found in the English dub of Dragon Ball Z Kai or Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot. Her absence was never fully explained, but an interview from 2019 sheds some light on what might have happened.

On Feb. 11, 2019, Nadolny was interviewed by Jason Lee Rosa, the CEO of the YouTube channel Maven Collectibles. While the video is no longer available, Bounding Into Comics transcribed the interview. In the interview, Nadolny talked about her sudden removal from the Dragon Ball franchise by the now-defunct Funimation and how a messy breakup with her ex-boyfriend might have caused it. "I had been seeing somebody romantically back from 2003-2009," she said, “and when we split, he absolutely, completely freaked out, and his ego was affected, and he said, 'I’m going to ruin your career!' [...] aired my business or whatever. My personal life, some of it true, some of it wasn’t. And so, I think that’s what kind of led to me not being able to reprise my character, was that."

Funimation's "Clique" Culture and an Ex-Boyfriend Were Responsible for Dragon Ball's Sudden VA Change

Nadolny also opened up about the "clique" culture at Funimation at the time and how it prevented her from receiving additional roles. "It’s a clique," Nadolny said. "Some people run around with these people, some of these people have kids together now, and they play together, they go to the state fair together. It wasn’t on purpose, but over time, I kind of got pushed out of that whole clique. And I was trying to just be professional and make it about business, but there’s a lot of people, from what I understand just from making some appearances and things like that, that are still flat-out doing this, like 'Hey these are my friends, I’m working with my friends.' I’m happy for them, but I completely feel like I was unfairly pushed out and that my personal life should have had no effect on not being able to come back. Because it really hurt, I had no idea what was going on. I was abused and threatened by this man and he said 'I’m going to ruin your career!' and 'I’m going to call everybody you ever worked for and just dog you out and brought you out.' So I think that’s why, if there’s any other reason, I guess they call that irreconcilable differences."

Although there are allegations online about who Nadolny’s ex-boyfriend might have been or who might have had the power to sideline her at Funimation, the only thing confirmed by the actor is that her removal from the role of Kid Goku in Dragon Ball wasn’t voluntary. However, it seems Dragon Ball fans have Toei Animation to thank for Nadolny being able to reprise her iconic role 15 years later. Interestingly, Nadolny shared an image of Kid Goku from Dragon Ball: Sparking! Zero, suggesting that the character will be dubbed in English after it was confirmed that he would only be voiced in Japanese for the game’s launch period.

New and previous episodes of Dragon Ball Daima are available on Crunchyroll, Hulu and Netflix. The English dub of the first three episodes is currently screening in theaters for a limited time. A streaming date for the English dub has yet to be announced.

Dragon Ball DAIMA

PG-13

Action

Adventure

Animation

Fantasy

Martial Arts

Due to a conspiracy, Goku and friends are transformed into children. They intend to travel to a mysterious new world to undo this change

Seasons

1

Story By

Akira Toriyama

Writers

Akira Toriyama

Franchise(s)

Dragon Ball

Source: X (formerly Twitter), Bounding Into Comics