Did the anime's TOP feel like a spectacle to you?

[SSJgogeto]

To me? Yes, absolutely.

[TheShadowEmperor8055]

I don't have nice things to say about the anime TOP as a narrative.

But was it a spectacle? Yeah, I'd say so due to its greatly improved art and animation from the other arcs. If you don't give a damn about narrative and all you want is fights, this arc is for you.

[PFM18]

we got no indication of growth from Goku or Vegeta.

Compare Goku and Vegeta circa Saiyan saga going up against Goku and Vegeta circa Namek saga. That's a single arc difference, but it's very clearly understood that Namek saga Goku and Vegeta are on a different level of power.
Now compare Goku and Vegeta circa Multiversal Tournament saga vs. Goku and Vegeta vs. Tournament of Power saga. Which one wins? Obviously the Goku and Vegeta from the ToP saga, right? Except why? What can they do that they couldn't before? Can you show this to me? Or is it just blatantly stated that they're stronger and you have to accept it at face value?

Nothing like some good ol' fashion necro posting.

We got no indication of growth from Goku and Vegeta? What can they do that they couldn't before? Seriously?

Well, I don't know there's the fact that Goku powered up and broke Hit's time dimension where before he needed Kaioken x10 to do it. Or Vegeta, who trained for 3 years in the ROSAT prior to the Universe 6 Tournament, had powered up during the Zamasu Arc and literally destroyed the entire alternate dimension that is the Room of Spirit and Time. Or Vegeta, who, was stated to have grown more in the 6 months in the ROSAT during the FT arc, than the 3 years in the ROSAT before the Universe 6 Arc. Went from getting dominated by Goku Black to dominating him. Why? as stated by Black, he used the anger towards Black for hurting his future son and killing his future wife to amplify his training. Frankly, to say there is no sense of progression during this time is downright ridiculous. Especially since you are comparing it to the 1 arc from the Saiyan Arc->Namek Arc where you can just kinda tell Goku got stronger since he could now handle 100x gravity. To say this is some great sense of progression compared to DBS during the era of U6/Zamasu Arc is just irrational, and reeks of a strong bias.

They didn't really overcome anything— going back to my statement that Dragon Ball suffers from a runaway case of hyperescalation— and it didn't feel like they grew. We already knew Vegeta loved Trunks; him extending his rough compassion to Future Trunks was more for Future Trunks's sake than his own, and if anything, he almost seemed to revert to his Android saga characterization when dealing with Future Trunks at times.

Compare Vegeta's time training Trunks in the gravity chamber during the Buu Arc with training Future Trunks during the Zamasu Arc and tell me there isn't a gigantic difference. Vegeta in the Buu Arc showed absolutely no interest in training Trunks he just wanted to stroke his ego by claiming Trunks can't hit him, then instead of being happy for Trunks actually hitting him, he gets angry and hits Trunks back. That shows he was just frustrated that he was weak enough to let his son hit him, rather than the sequence actually being about helping Trunks in his training. Contrast that with Vegeta saying the same thing to Future Trunks and Vegeta being happy that he was able to hit him even if it was a cheap shot. And, prior to that, in true Vegeta parenting fashion, he gets in Trunks's face and tells him he needs to get stronger for his own sake to protect himself and his future and carry on Saiyan pride. There is far more sense of love for Trunks during that scene that during the Buu Arc. To say he had his Android Arc characterization just isn't grounded in reality.

So if you cut those 30 episodes out, you don't really lose anything. Then you get to the ToP part of the show, which is almost half the series. We spend nearly half the entire series building up to what was supposed to be a grand battle royale started because of Goku's insatiable lust for a battle, and it seems at first to be building up well because U7 is being treated as the villain and Goku's not even denying it.
It falls apart because this plotline goes nowhere.

So did you not see the scene where the Kaioshin of Unvierse 9 is talking to the rest and plotting against Beerus and Universe 7? And they villainized them and agreed to focus on them during the Tournament and that is exactly what happened during this Battle Royale?

there isn't really all that much other universes can offer in terms of a challenge because the U7 senshi are just so damn strong.

Well not to the strongest of the U7 senshi of Freeza,Goku and Vegeta. The rest were thoroughly challenged. Even the top 3 were challenged by the best of Universe 6,11 and Universe 3.

And we also get to see the worst problem of modern Dragon Ball put front and center

This is not a "problem" of modern Dragon Ball. If this is a "problem", it is a problem within the entire Dragon Ball franchise. Can you really honestly say that this happened any more often than the most iconic fights in Dragon Ball Z like Goku vs Freeza and Goku vs Cell? It frequently happened throughout the entirety of DBZ and to say this is exclusive to DBS, or even to say it happened with more frequency in DBS, is disingenuous.

Can you honestly sit here and tell me that Jiren vs Goku isn't the single greatest fight in the entire franchise? Whether it be the stakes of the fight being the entire Multiverse, the animation, the epic feel, the choreography, or the contrast in character, it is far beyond anything we saw anything else we saw in the rest of Dragon Ball. Not to mention Goku vs Kefla, Gohan, Piccolo vs Saonel and Pirina, The U7 senshi vs Universe 3, Vegeta vs Toppo also being great fights. (Especially Goku vs Kefla.)

[SsjCookie]

I don't have nice things to say about the anime TOP as a narrative.

But was it a spectacle? Yeah, I'd say so due to its greatly improved art and animation from the other arcs. If you don't give a damn about narrative and all you want is fights, this arc is for you.

If this is the case, this was definitely not my arc.