Al-Shamshoon
Al-Shamshoon (Arabic: الشمشون) was the Arabic dub of The Simpsons. It first aired in September 2005 and was produced by the Middle East Broadcasting Center (MBC). Before the Arab world had an Arabic subtitled version of the English episodes.[1]
Background
It was dubbed in Arabic (with subtitles provided for shots including written English, such as the chalkboards), references to alcohol (Duff Beer and Moe's Tavern), pork (bacon and hot dogs), and numerous other themes have been deleted or significantly modified. For instance, Homer drinks soda-pop instead of beer and eats beef sausages as opposed to pork and all references to Moe's Tavern were cut.[2]
The characters were also given typical Arabic names such as Omar, Mona, Bessa, and Badr for Homer, Marge, Lisa, and Bart respectively as part of the retooling, while voices were provided by leading actors including Egyptian film star Mohamed Henedi as "Omar" and Hanan Tork as Lisa. Their hometown "Springfield" was called "Rabeea" (Arabic for "Spring") and made it look like an American town with a major Arab population. The series did not fare very well and only 34 of the 52 adapted episodes aired.[3]
Amr Hosny served as the writer for the dub.[4]
Episodes
The episodes of the dub were aired out of order, and the following is the broadcast order of the Arabic dub, based on the available episodes online:
Episode 1 = S01 EP07
Episode 2 = S01 EP05
Episode 3 = S01 EP06
Episode 4 = S02 EP15
Episode 5 = S02 EP06
Episode 6 = S02 EP03
Episode 7 = S01 EP12
Episode 8 = S03 EP15
Episode 9 = S02 EP02
Episode 10 = S02 EP07
Episode 11 = S03 EP22
Episode 12 = S03 EP16
Episode 13 = S02 EP14
Episode 14 = S02 EP09
Episode 15 = S01 EP09
Episode 16 = S01 EP03
Episode 17 = S03 EP07
Episode 18 = S02 EP01
Episode 19 = S03 EP17
Episode 20 = S03 EP09
Episode 21 = S02 EP22
Episode 22 = S03 EP05
Episode 23 = S03 EP12
Episode 24 = S03 EP18
Episode 25 = S02 EP12
Episode 26 = S03 EP21
Episode 27 = S03 EP01
Episode 28 = S03 EP23
Episode 29 = S02 EP11
Online Presence
Due to its poor reception, Al-Shamshoon episodes were never released on home video, and the dub has been obscure among Arab viewers since then. Only 29 of the aired episodes out of 34 have been found online.
