Detective Conan in the Arab World

Detective Conan in the Arab World
Info
Language:	Arabic
Continents:	Asia and Africa
No. of Episodes:	551 (405 JP) (TV) 71 (Season 25)
Dubbed by:	Venus Centre

The Detective Conan anime was first dubbed in the Arab World in 1998 and was aired on Qatar TV, and on March 31st 2000, the first episode was broadcast on Spacetoon. Currently, new seasons show first only on streaming service SpaceToon Go and on the TV channel SpaceToon not too long after, and in the past, on its now-defunct sister channel Space Power. The series is dubbed by the most famous anime dubbing centre in the region, Venus Centre (مركز الزهرة Markaz Az-Zuhra).

Detective Conan in Arabic is called المحقق كونان Al-Muhaqqiq Konan, which literally means Detective Conan.

The Detective Conan series has became very popular in the Arab world and is one of the best ranked animes of all time. Venus Centre continues dubbing Detective Conan. As of June 2025, up to 500+ episodes were dubbed.

Most of the characters kept their main names, but names with four syllables are often reduced to two syllables (i.e. Mitsuhiko is called Mitsu). Most of the characters only have a given name and not a family name or vice versa. Most of the cases characters kept their original Japanese names as well, but some are changed because they sound similar to another character (e.g Yuuko from Episode 3 was renamed شوكو Shuko because it sounded similar to Yoko Okino's name. All of the TV specials are always divided into two or four episodes (except for if it’s on the Space Power streaming service) and most of the films have been dubbed aa of June 2025. On 2018 the 22th movie was also dubbed and released in Dubai cinemas on November 29th, and many other movies have released on theaters such as The One-Eyed Flashback, The Million Dollar Pentagram, and the Ai Haibara’s Story special.

Timeline

1998-2000

The anime started being dubbed and was airing episodes on Qatar TV.

2000-2013

On March 31st 2000, The (at the time) new children’s TV block on Bahrain TV called Spacetoon started airing Detective Conan, the block got really popular and it became a TV channel, Detective Conan was and still is one of Spacetoon’s biggest hits and the show quickly gained a community and Conan’s name became so big that to some places, it even surpassed Sherlock Holmes’ popularity, Conan even had his very own live show called “Conan On Air” where Conan tests kids’ logic.

A 3D model used frequently for advertisements in the 2000’s.

Though the show had some minor censorship; it was mostly kept intact, but Spacetoon was involved in some big controversy surrounding the possible dangers of anime and starting episode 124, the anime became heavily censored with things such as rewriting criminal’s motives and changing certain Black Organization codenames due to the alcohol references, but the large community criticized Spacetoon for the changes calling the dub childish, around that time; a heavily rewritten illegal dub using the same voices from the original Arabic dub started airing on another channel called Basma TV that focused on religion and often replaced certain scenes with narrations of Hadiths; the Basma dub also changed characters’ names (such as Conan being renamed to Kamal ibn Al Qadi Mansour) and removed Shinichi; 15-20 episodes were dubbed before it stopped being dubbed and mysteriously briefly aired again a few years after, The dub was produced by Tihama Advertising and Public Relations in Saudi Arabia. the Spacetoon dub eventually went back to how it was before starting episode 235.

2013-2014

The dub took a year long hiatus from July 29 2013 to September 10 2014 before returning with JP episode 345 (Kaitou Kid’s Miraculous Mid-Air Walk).

2014-2019

The dub had taken another, much longer hiatus lasting from November 27 2014 to May 29 2019.

2019-Now

The dub comes back with it’s 9th season on May 29 2019 with JP episode 379, the dub has no changes except for the new intro and outro themes.

Cast

Character		Voice actors
Picture	Name	Name	Notes
	Conan Edogawa	آمال سعد الدين Amal Sa'ad Adin
	Shinichi Kudo	مأمون الفرخ Mamoon Al-Farkh	Seasons 1 and 2 and Movie 22
		زياد الرفاعي Ziad Rifai	Seasons 3 to 5 and Movie 1
		كامل نجمة Kamil Najmah	Seasons 7 to 8 and Movies 2 to 4
	Ran Mouri	سمر كوكش Samar Kokush	Episodes 1 to 355 and movies 1 to 4 and Movie 22
		نور أبو حسون Nour Abu Hassoun	Episodes 356 to 376
	Kogoro Mouri	مروان فرحات Marwan Farhat
	Ayumi Yoshida	رندة جيلات Randa Jileto
	Mitsuhiko Tsuburaya	رغدة الخطيب Ragdha Khatib	Episodes 188 onwards and movies
	Genta Kojima	أمل عمران  Amal Omran.
	Ai Haibara	فاتن عيدو Faten Eido
	Shiho Miyano	فاتن عيدو Faten Eido
	Hiroshi Agasa	مروان فرحات Marwan Farhat
	Sonoko Suzuki	آمنة عمر Amna Omar
	Heiji Hattori	رأفت بازو Raafat Bazo	Episodes 48 to 78, 189 to 221, 277 onwards and movie 3
		زياد الرفاعي Ziad Rifai	Episodes 117 to 174
		عادل أبو حسون Adel Abo Hassoun	Episodes 222 to 224
		فادي وفائي Fadi Wafai	Episodes 238 to 263
	Juzo Megure	محمد خير أبو حسون Mohamed Khair Abu Hassoun
	Wataru Takagi
	Kaitou Kid	مكسيم خليل Maxim Khalil	Episode 76
		زياد الرفاعي Ziad Rifai	Episode 134
		رأفت بازو Raafat Bazo	Episodes 219 and 356
		رائد مشرف Rayid Musharaf	Movie 3
	Ginzo Nakamori	مأمون الفرخ Mamoon Al-Farkh	Episode 76 (part 1)
		أيمن السالك Ayman Al-Salek	Episode 76 (part 2)
		عادل أبو حسون Adel Abo Hassoun	Episode 219
		محمد مصطفى Mohammad Mustafa	Movie 3
		محمد خير أبو حسون Mohamed Khair Abu Hassoun	Episode 356
	Saguru Hakuba	عادل أبو حسون Adel Abo Hassoun	Episode 219
	Gin	زياد الرفاعي Ziad Rifai	Episodes 1–230
		منصور السلطي Mansour Al-Salti	Episode 309–311
		مأمون الرفاعي Mamoon Al-Rifai	Episode 345
	Vodka	علي القاسم Ali Al-Qassim	Episode 1
		واصف الحلبي Wasif Al-Halabi	Episode 128
		مروان فرحات Marwan Farhat	Episode 129
		منصور السلطي Mansour Al-Salti	Episode 176–178
		رأفت بازو Raafat Bazo	Episodes 230 and 345
		مأمون الرفاعي Mamoon Al-Rifai	Episodes Episode 309–311

The First Logo

Theme song

The opening and ending song from season 1 to season 4 is an original song made for the Arabic dub. The opening and ending for season 5 to season 8 is a rock cover of the original song. The opening for season 9 to season 25 is an original song, similarly to the ending song for season 9 to season 25. The first four seasons used a logo which is simply "Detective Conan" in Arabic in red on a cross-hair. The logo for season 5 to 8 was very similar with a different crosshair, the logo for season 9 resembled the Japanese logo but in Arabic while the current logo resembles the international logo but in Arabic.

Speculation

It is possible that in 2013, the Arabic dub had another theme song covering the main theme, but this is only supported by certain viewers' memories and an upload of the theme that does not specify the season

Theme Trivia

The dubbed show sometimes used Japanese themes:

• An instrumental version of Mune ga Dokidoki accompanying a creditless version of the opening of the first episode aired unedited.
• The introductory 30-second parts of episodes with the first, third and fourth opening themes were left in, then cutting before the Japanese vocal part directly to the episode. Those introductory parts were removed from episodes using the second.
• Insert songs in the first three seasons (episodes 1-127) were left in using their vocal versions. Subsequent episodes would lower the volume of the BGM or replace it, or in the case of endings edit that part out entirely.
• The movies kept the endings, using instrumental versions. An exception is the third movie's ending which had the B'z song start normally, then fading to the first movie's ending theme.

Censorship

When the dubs for the episodes 1-125 aired between 1998 and 2002, the censorship was light, mainly focusing on removing excessive gore, and digitally editing scenes with women's clothes to add leggings to shorts and skirts after the same dubbing studio received backlash over Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water dub (1995) which didn't edit the revealing titular heroine's outfit and even kept some scenes with nudity - also midst a general negative perception of anime due to the airing of Dear Brother (which dealt with themes of suicide, incest and lesbianism) and an edited version of Grave of the Fireflies (which dealt with child death in war) as children programs earlier.

The themes weren't affected: the audio generally matches the original unedited version, with a generally accurate translation that creatively replaces some problematic words for the target audience ("Hell" as "Where the Dead Go", "Devil" as "Evil One", alcoholic beverages as "Drinks", "boyfriend/girlfriend” to “fiancé/fiancée”, "drunk" as "needing sleep" or “sick” but otherwise unedited). Unlike several European dubs, the episodes 12 (11 the Japanese way), 35, and the ending of 5O made it to the Arabic dub - references to suicide, romance, characters being unfaithful partners, or nude were kept. Some gory cuts were kept but sped-up. Blood was generally uncensored. Positions of authorities (diplomats, prime ministers, senators) would get translated though as the generic "official". Some religious and occult references were removed.

The show went on to become the center of a controversy surrounding multiple real-life suicide cases involving children imitating the suicide case in episode 26, as well as the Pokémon controversy (originally started by the trading cards being used for "gambling") where local religious clerics would try and associate elements of anime with satanism and degrading youth's education.

The studio would then adopt an ultra-conservative censorship, going as far as editing out entire scenes with women without long pants (skirts, jupes, and clothes exposing top cleavage, while tolerated before, are no longer allowed) and replacing them with long frozen frames, criminal confessions rewritten to have almost the same script about remorse and how awful they are instead of the actual motives stated in the Japanese original, Black Organization code names (save for Gin, and Vermouth who was known as "Bellmoot" similar to the Japanese version) altered or replaced to remove alcohol references starting with episode 126 onward (Vodka becoming Vokka), and even altering plot-relevant episodes featuring them and introducing several continuity errors (like making Gin a "leader of the BO" who "knows about Sherry's (adult) face and that little boy") which wouldn't be fixed until later episodes accurately translating it. Any references to suicide or romance was removed, and romance references were occasionally replaced with "Ran, so when is your wedding taking place?".

Afterwards, the show wouldn't be shown on as much networks as before, most of the high-profile voice actors would go elsewhere, and another channel would start airing an illegal heavily abridged version of the anime with religious preachings and an overall different storyline that involved the original voices of the original dub, Fans would take the Arabic audio and try fitting it on uncensored Japanese raws and upload it online.

Initially dismissing negative fan reception as "overly kiddy", claiming the dub was targeting a children audience, the studio aimed to target a teen audience much later starting with episode 235 onward, where, while some episodes are still heavily censored or outright banned, many darker themes are allowed again, along with women with skirts - ones with clothes not reaching knees or covering enough cleavage would have some colored overlay covering it.

Trivia

• Detective Conan is the longest dubbed TV show in the Arab World.
• Officially, Detective Conan is divided into seasons, although (جزء) is literally translated to part.
• SpaceToon made a TV program called “Conan on Air” where Conan would directly talk with children and give them riddles.
• Season 12-24 of the dub don’t exist as of June 2025, SpaceToon decided to skip hundreds of episodes sometime in 2023-2024 to get directly to where the show currently is, though the show is still progressing through season 11 and getting to the other seasons and season 25 is exclusive to the SpaceToon Go streaming service.
• The show had a sort of “Conan-Mania” in the 2000’s for the Arab world.
• The Arab World has one of the largest fanbases for the series and the show is heavily talked about and seen there.

See also

• Arabic songs