4Kids Entertainment is a company headquartered in New York City that licenses children's television shows in the United States and in other countries.

Titles

It produces several shows in the English language, including translated anime. Its distribution services are handled by FUNimation. All programming on the Fox Box is licensed by 4Kids.

A list of shows that it produces includes:

• The Cramp Twins
• Cubix
• Funky Cops
• F-Zero GP Legend
• Incredible Crash Dummies
• Kirby: Right Back at Ya!
• One Piece
• Pokémon
• Shaman King
• Sonic X (A joint effort between 4Kids and ShoPro Entertainment )
• Tama and Friends
• Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
• Tokyo Mew Mew (as Mew Mew Power)
• Ultimate M.U.S.C.L.E.
• Ultraman Tiga
• The Winx Club
• Yu-Gi-Oh!

In addition, 4Kids has an agreement with the American Kennel Club and sells Cabbage Patch Kids toys.

Criticism

Many anime fans in the US are highly critical of 4Kids because of its policy of extensive Americanization of the anime titles it licences. On one hand, such alteration alters the series from what they originally were, and some feel that it defaces the original work and demeans the original author. On the other hand, 4Kids tends to licence only titles targeted to preteens, and is modifying the titles to appeal to the same demographic in the US - leaving the title as is would limit its access in the US, as well as potentially raising the ire of parent groups.

However, in order to combat the complaints, 4Kids has allowed FUNimation, their DVD distributor, to release unedited versions of Shaman King and Yu-Gi-Oh! on DVD as a test (similar to how DiC allowed ADV to release unedited versions of Sailor Moon and Saint Seiya). If the unedited releases do well, 4Kids may expand them to its entire lineup.

External link

• 4Kids Website