In my opinion, after the Namek arc, DBZ was a let down

[ekrolo2]

Yes it should ave with Goku and Freeza both ying n Namek due to their mutual hubrises. Toriyama would never it but I would've loved it. Then again, I'm a weirdo who wouldve loved the bittersweet version of ROTJ.

[ABED]

Yes it should ave with Goku and Freeza both ying n Namek due to their mutual hubrises. Toriyama would never it but I would've loved it. Then again, I'm a weirdo who wouldve loved the bittersweet version of ROTJ.

Goku's hubris?

[Super_Divine_Genki]

How else was the series to follow-up a one-on-one battle to the death on a planet that's about to explode? Goku VS Freeza felt like the final fight to that series, so yeah, how could Toriyama/they top that?

To think that some good stuff came afterwards and went on to do different things is a mark in post-Freeza arcs favor. What followed the Freeza arc is completely justified as it went on to create some tense and imaginative stories while introducing several more memorable characters, imo.

I would say that once the race for the DB's section of the arc wrapped up, the Namek arc began to fizzle out and lose its way/momentum. So, let's not pretend that the arc was a flawless masterpiece, as it very much had less-than-stellar execution. There's a noticeable drop in quality from the time the arc started up through to around the time when Goku begins fighting Ginyu, imo. It never really recovered after that (anime adaptation).

[ABED]

I would say that once the race for the DB's section of the arc wrapped up, the Namek arc began to fizzle out and lose its way/momentum. So, let's not pretend that the arc was a flawless masterpiece, as it very much had less-than-stellar execution. There's a noticeable drop in quality from the time the arc started up through to around the time when Goku begins fighting Ginyu, imo. It never really recovered after that (anime adaptation).

It's not flawless, but the Ginyu fights are really entertaining and what do you mean by "lose its way?" I don't think it's fair to say that the fight against Freeza is where the quality drops. It's a LONG fight, but there are many high points that match the high points in the rest of the arc.

Two problems the rest of DBZ had were Cell and Buu. Both arcs drag considerably and the characters aren't that interesting. The mystery around Cell is dissipated quickly and he's not as interesting once he absorbs 17. Buu keeps going on and on and on and on and he keeps transforming. It gets irritating, so much that even Goku says he got tired of it.

[Super_Divine_Genki]

I would say that once the race for the DB's section of the arc wrapped up, the Namek arc began to fizzle out and lose its way/momentum. So, let's not pretend that the arc was a flawless masterpiece, as it very much had less-than-stellar execution. There's a noticeable drop in quality from the time the arc started up through to around the time when Goku begins fighting Ginyu, imo. It never really recovered after that (anime adaptation).

It's not flawless, but the Ginyu fights are really entertaining and what do you mean by "lose its way?" I don't think it's fair to say that the fight against Freeza is where the quality drops. It's a LONG fight, but there are many high points that match the high points in the rest of the arc.

Two problems the rest of DBZ had were Cell and Buu. Both arcs drag considerably and the characters aren't that interesting. The mystery around Cell is dissipated quickly and he's not as interesting once he absorbs 17. Buu keeps going on and on and on and on and he keeps transforming. It gets irritating, so much that even Goku says he got tired of it.

Lose its way, as in there came points where the story didn't seem to know what to do with where it was taking its characters. Goku lands on Namek(after already having been sidelined) and then is taken out for a dozen more episodes almost as soon as he gets there. The story didn't seem to entirely know what to do with Freeza either -- he just pulled out a new form whenever someone arrived and gave him a challenge. The nonsensical leaps in power all over the place within minutes got out of control. Goku VS Freeza comes off as a fight that didn't seem to have a defined way that it was going at times or how it wanted to end. The conclusion turned out great though. A rewatch is extremely difficult on my end.

I don't care much for the Commander Ginyu fight (the one that I was referring to), but I enjoyed the others. Everything surrounding the race for the DB's section was solid and maintained its momentum very well.

I agree about Boo -- the first 1/3 is ace, but then...
And you know that I disagree about the Cell arc. That one holds itself together well from start to finish, imo. Not flawless, of course.

[lancerman]

To me the Namek arc was a natural place to end it for two reasons.

1. It was the first meaningful Dragon Ball Hunt since the Red Ribbon Army arc. Gohan was playing the role of his father Goku, Bulma was Bulma, Kuriren was Oolong, and Vegeta (ironically) was the Yamcha outsider/enemy who helped them in the end. Freeza was a more serious Pilaf. So you took the Dragon Ball search and lore to it's highest extension by taking it into space with higher stakes because their friends were dead and the Earth's Dragon Balls were actually gone.

2. It completed the story of Goku trying to surpass all his limits to become as strong a fighter as possible. First Goku was fighting to try to beat Roshi and become the strongest Martial Artist, it took him years but finally he defeated Piccolo to become the strongest fighter on Earth. The natural escalation was to bring in aliens that Goku could fight. That's where the Saiyans come in. Then Goku finally ends his journey by becoming a legendary super warrior and defeating the strongest person in the universe.

To me you could have ended it there with Goku dying on Namek and when they try to wish him back he just says he is at peace as reached his limits in this world and wants to continue fighting and training in the other world to see what strong guys are there. Meanwhile Gohan now as a brave fighter takes up his father's mantle and goes on his own journey. That to me is the perfect way to end it.

[Bullza]

It got better to me.

Namek was visually boring. They spent 60 episodes in a place that looked the exact same. Half of the whole Namek saga was just the right with Frieza. Most of the fight with Frieza was pure filler. The other filler which included stuff with Bulma was just plain poor.

I always thought the Cell Saga was the best because they at least moved around so we didn't just see the same setting constantly. It made use of a much wider amount of characters. I think the story was generally more interesting because of the Time Travel and the filler vastly improved around this time.

[ABED]

. Goku lands on Namek(after already having been sidelined) and then is taken out for a dozen more episodes almost as soon as he gets there. The story didn't seem to entirely know what to do with Freeza either -- he just pulled out a new form whenever someone arrived and gave him a challenge. The nonsensical leaps in power all over the place within minutes got out of control. Goku VS Freeza comes off as a fight that didn't seem to have a defined way that it was going at times or how it wanted to end. The conclusion turned out great though. A rewatch is extremely difficult on my end.

His forms were set up before hand. We know he could transform several times. And I have no idea what you mean by the final battle not having a defined way it was going to go or how that's a bad thing.

Lancerman, Goku wasn't dead and it wouldn't be a retcon. Goku living after that fight doesn't feel tacked on. He earned that victory. Gohan taking over Goku's role at the end of the Freeza arc would feel tacked on and unearned.

I always thought the Cell Saga was the best because they at least moved around so we didn't just see the same setting constantly. It made use of a much wider amount of characters. I think the story was generally more interesting because of the Time Travel and the filler vastly improved around this time.

That's your big issue - geography? I honestly don't know how you can claim the Cell arc made use of a wider ranger of characters. A huge knock against it is how damn passive Gohan is through the whole thing. He constantly gets pushed along in the story - even the end. That's not a great trait in a central protagonist.

[Hawk9211]

I don't know about ending there,but the story definitely went downhill.The narrative of martial artist are strong changed to strong people are martial arts.The adventure aspect was gone along with humor, story seemed to drag on unnecessarily.The story kept narrowing down the focus to saiyans,till no one without golden hair could compete.The fights changed the focus to flying and ki blasts(with very little actual variations).

[Lord Beerus]

To be honest, I think as far as a consistent story goes, Dragon Ball peaked in the Saiyan arc. As I said before, the Namek/Freeza starts off great but loses its unique narrative as the story goes on.

Care to go deeper on that point? How does it lose its uniqueness?.

I'm doing a write up on the series and I cover what makes the Namek/Freeza arc, at least in the beginning, quite distinct from other arcs in narrative sense before it becomes just like nearly every other arc in Dragon Ball. I'll elaborate on that point later, if you don't mind waiting a bit.

[ABED]

Could you give me bullet points or a summary? I'd rather not read an essay.

[coola]

Namek Saga felt like finale to me as well, Goku become legendary SSJ and beat strongest evil being in the universe. It also doesnt help, that in Cell Saga, most of characters act like complete idiots for sake of story, because otherwise, story would be end with few chapters.

[ABED]

Namek Saga felt like finale to me as well, Goku become legendary SSJ and beat strongest evil being in the universe. It also doesnt help, that in Cell Saga, most of characters act like complete idiots for sake of story, because otherwise, story would be end with few chapters.

They aren't acting stupid for the sake of plot. The characters drove the plot. They are fighters seeking a good fight as they always have. This isn't like a Bond movie where the bad guy has him at his mercy and doesn't just pull the trigger because Bond is the main character.

[coola]

Namek Saga felt like finale to me as well, Goku become legendary SSJ and beat strongest evil being in the universe. It also doesnt help, that in Cell Saga, most of characters act like complete idiots for sake of story, because otherwise, story would be end with few chapters.

They aren't acting stupid for the sake of plot. The characters drove the plot. They are fighters seeking a good fight as they always have. This isn't like a Bond movie where the bad guy has him at his mercy and doesn't just pull the trigger because Bond is the main character.

It make sense for Goku or Vegeta to be like that, but why Yamcha and others? They were outclassed many times already.

[ABED]

Namek Saga felt like finale to me as well, Goku become legendary SSJ and beat strongest evil being in the universe. It also doesnt help, that in Cell Saga, most of characters act like complete idiots for sake of story, because otherwise, story would be end with few chapters.

They aren't acting stupid for the sake of plot. The characters drove the plot. They are fighters seeking a good fight as they always have. This isn't like a Bond movie where the bad guy has him at his mercy and doesn't just pull the trigger because Bond is the main character.

It make sense for Goku or Vegeta to be like that, but why Yamcha and others? They were outclassed many times already.

But they love fighting.

[Lord Beerus]

Could you give me bullet points or a summary? I'd rather not read an essay.

Oh, no, it won't be essay. Just a couple of paragraphs. You know, the positives, the negatives and then a brief summary of my thoughts on the arc as a whole.

[Michsi]

I do think the Namek arc is DBZ's best arc, but I wouldn't say everything that came after it was a let down. It had too many great moments for me to wish the Cell and Buu arc hadn't existed.

[Super_Divine_Genki]

And I have no idea what you mean by the final battle not having a defined way it was going to go or how that's a bad thing.

In the original anime adaptation, the battle suffers way moreso than the other big fights from excessive cutaways to other happenings going on. There were times when Goku and Freeza were shown fighting from the midpoint to the end and it didn't seem like anything was really progressing with that. More time was spent on what was going on with everyone else. Kai completely fixed this pacing issue and removed so much of the unnecessary. It then becomes more coherent. My theory is that the battle suffers because Toei was padding it out as much as possible so that Toriyama had time to come up with new story ideas (even having a ten episode filler arc follow all of this).

It also doesnt help, that in Cell Saga, most of characters act like complete idiots for sake of story, because otherwise, story would be end with few chapters.

This same criticism could be said of Freeza during the Namek arc as well. He could've ended it all any time he felt like it once the DB's were back to stone. When any character has the big advantage in this series, they tend to get careless and toy around. The Cell arc just flipped that around on our protagonists this time.

It made use of a much wider amount of characters. I think the story was generally more interesting because of the Time Travel and the filler vastly improved around this time.

Agreed with that, especially the filler part, plus the character interactions were generally done better here because the arc made good use of downtime. And it's the only time in the series that we get to see the Goku and Gohan relationship going on throughout an entire arc. Bulma, Chi Chi, and Kamesennin, while being secondary characters, were probably at their best overall characterization throughout this arc as well for the Z half. Vegeta's story was very interesting here, imo. Much more tolerable than the Vegeta we got during the fight with Freeza (coward Vegeta). Plus, the power scaling had its best sense of natural and believable progression.

Need I even mention that "Perfect" Cell happened during all of this. That character has so much more going on that we didn't even get to see, it's unfortunate that he didn't get a longer run and become more acquainted with the universe around him.


So many criticisms are thrown at post-Freeza arc material, but some of those same criticisms apply to Freeza arc as well as it was presented in the anime. The individual stories themselves (Freeza. Cell, Boo) all have strong concepts going for them -- it's all in how it's delivered. If not for the Fusion stuff in the Boo arc, I would probably rank that arc ahead of Freeza as it was presented in its anime form. However, even with all of its problems(from the midpoint to conclusion), the Freeza arc has too strong of a story going for it to put it at the bottom.

Anyway, I'd rather just enjoy the series. Each arc has its share of problems. I don't have the manga to compare any of this to, so I don't know if that affects anyone's view of certain arcs. For example, I've read that the anime adaptation of the Boo arc far exceeds its manga counterpart, while the opposite is said for the Freeza arc.

[ABED]

the battle suffers way moreso than the other big fights from excessive cutaways to other happenings going on.

That's just filler. And it never lacked coherence. You can tell what was going on. The issue was pacing, but that's every fight. Perhaps it stands out more because it's a longer fight. How does that equal "ill defined"? I will give you the pacing issue, but even the fight filler was still sufficiently intense and interesting. It's the cutaways to Bulma and Earth that were the issue.

The Cell arc just flipped that around on our protagonists this time.

Except the good guys wanted to fight. It's not the same thing. They didn't think "I can't lose, so I'll take my sweet time". They wanted a challenge.

In the Freeza arc, even though Freeza was so much stronger, Bulma, Vegeta, Gohan, and Kuririn all contributed to the story in VERY important ways because of the hunt for the DB's allowed for reversals that had nothing to do with battle power. That alone puts their contributions above anything in the Cell arc. Plus, Gohan is very passive throughout that whole arc, whereas he's active in the Freeza arc. Vegeta showing cowardice was a new and interesting dimension for him. I don't know why anyone would consider it a negative. It's so unexpected.

[lancerman]

And I have no idea what you mean by the final battle not having a defined way it was going to go or how that's a bad thing.

In the original anime adaptation, the battle suffers way moreso than the other big fights from excessive cutaways to other happenings going on. There were times when Goku and Freeza were shown fighting from the midpoint to the end and it didn't seem like anything was really progressing with that. More time was spent on what was going on with everyone else. Kai completely fixed this pacing issue and removed so much of the unnecessary. It then becomes more coherent. My theory is that the battle suffers because Toei was padding it out as much as possible so that Toriyama had time to come up with new story ideas (even having a ten episode filler arc follow all of this).

It also doesnt help, that in Cell Saga, most of characters act like complete idiots for sake of story, because otherwise, story would be end with few chapters.

This same criticism could be said of Freeza during the Namek arc as well. He could've ended it all any time he felt like it once the DB's were back to stone. When any character has the big advantage in this series, they tend to get careless and toy around. The Cell arc just flipped that around on our protagonists this time.

It made use of a much wider amount of characters. I think the story was generally more interesting because of the Time Travel and the filler vastly improved around this time.

Agreed with that, especially the filler part, plus the character interactions were generally done better here because the arc made good use of downtime. And it's the only time in the series that we get to see the Goku and Gohan relationship going on throughout an entire arc. Bulma, Chi Chi, and Kamesennin, while being secondary characters, were probably at their best overall characterization throughout this arc as well for the Z half. Vegeta's story was very interesting here, imo. Much more tolerable than the Vegeta we got during the fight with Freeza (coward Vegeta). Plus, the power scaling had its best sense of natural and believable progression.

Need I even mention that "Perfect" Cell happened during all of this. That character has so much more going on that we didn't even get to see, it's unfortunate that he didn't get a longer run and become more acquainted with the universe around him.


So many criticisms are thrown at post-Freeza arc material, but some of those same criticisms apply to Freeza arc as well as it was presented in the anime. The individual stories themselves (Freeza. Cell, Boo) all have strong concepts going for them -- it's all in how it's delivered. If not for the Fusion stuff in the Boo arc, I would probably rank that arc ahead of Freeza as it was presented in its anime form. However, even with all of its problems(from the midpoint to conclusion), the Freeza arc has too strong of a story going for it to put it at the bottom.

Anyway, I'd rather just enjoy the series. Each arc has its share of problems. I don't have the manga to compare any of this to, so I don't know if that affects anyone's view of certain arcs. For example, I've read that the anime adaptation of the Boo arc far exceeds its manga counterpart, while the opposite is said for the Freeza arc.

Well that's because when Goku and Freeza were fighting there were other events impacting the fight. It was very clever to use the Earth Dragon Balls to bring back the Namekians to bring back Guru to bring back Porunga to get the third wish to get everyone off the planet. At that point in the fight with Freeza the stakes were to just make sure Freeza didn't get wind of the plan and mess it up. Afterwards it was a pretty clear cut personal fight with Goku where Goku was pretty satisfied that he had surpassed Freeza. However, Freeza's hubris kept extending the fight to his detriment. It's not that hard to see direction in the fight. Also everything before that is just an escalation of characters one upping each of Freeza's forms until his final form where they can't beat him and Goku comes in and saves the day.

I also disagree that Freeza could have ended it anytime he liked. He had no idea how strong the guys he was fighting were and his second form SHOULD have been enough to beat Gohan/Vegeta/Kuriren. So he was actually correct. Piccolo just came in and then outclassed his second form. So Freeza immediately went to his third form where he took the lead. He instantly got the advantage back, Gohan gave him a little trouble, and then he just decided to go for broke and go into his final form. Vegeta got his power up but it was no match. Also keep in mind that at this point Freeza was pissed that all his time had been wasted searching for the Namekian Dragon Balls and that all his elite forces on Namek were wiped out. He was clearly stronger than them and measured the fight correctly he just didn't account for Piccolo and Goku (who were the most recent fighters on the planet) he also had to deal with Dende healing everyone without him knowing it (who he killed the minute he discovered what was going on). Freeza generally gauged that battle correctly in a realistic fashion and adjusted when new information became available. He toyed with Vegeta but at that point it didn't matter, Goku was about to be on his way and he would have had to deal with him anyways. In summation, for the first three forms the characters used clever strategy to survive and then in his fourth form the first two things he did was kill the magic healer and Vegeta who was the strongest fighter in his way at the time. Then once it got to Goku, he was strong enough and a clever enough fighter to extend the fight to the point of the spirit bomb. The one dumb thing Freeza maybe did was killing Piccolo and Kuriren first after that. If he killed Goku he would have one. But again, at that point, Freeza was about to kill Goku in a matter of seconds anyways, he didn't know Super Saiyan was going to happen.

By comparison with Cell, Vegeta and Trunks easily could have killed second form Cell and Vegeta flat out let Cell go perfect. Kuriren got love sick and didn't blow up a killer robot. Cell also gave everyone time to prepare for the tournament when he could have ended it right there. Cell could have killed Gohan well before SSJ2 but he felt like it was better to goad Gohan into it by torturing all of his friends and making him watch. Then Gohan could have killed Cell instantly after that, and decided to take his time and make him suffer. And that's just the stupid crap that had to do with Cell.

As far as using the characters. Gohan didn't do anything in the Cell arc until the last fight. Kuriren's only real contribution was not blowing up 18. Goku was sidelined most of the arc except for a meaningless fight with Cell. Yamcha did relatively nothing but find the Androids first and get sidelined immediately. I'll give you Tenshinhan for like a cup of coffee. Vegeta and Trunks were actually the most active characters throughout that plot and they have very little to do in the climax. Throughout the whole Freeza arc Kuriren, Gohan, Vegeta and Bulma are pretty much always active in some capcacity. Goku does a hell of a lot more fighting the Ginyu's than he did in his half fight with 19 and his fight with Cell, and then his fight with Freeza is one of the longest and most pivotal fights in the arc. Also even when Goku is sidelined one of them is useful because he's at least training to a point where he gets incredibly powerful and we see it. Piccolo does show up and has a significant use, probably less than Cell, but his Resurrection is more pivotal to the end game of that arc than anything he did in the Android arc. Dende is used effectively as a guide and healing mechanism.