At this point in time how popular is the Dragon ball franchise

[majinwarman]

To think back in 2011 we thought Kai was the only Dragon Ball content we would get.

When Kai started back in 2009 it was supposed to be a new anime but Toriyama wouldn't do it so they went with Kai instead. The franchise took a 5 year break after GT in 1997 before releasing the Kanzenban and 3 anime on home video starting in 2002 which was all done in February 2009 so they may have intentionally had things that way to lead up to the new anime on April 2009 but it never happened so Kai took its place. With the original material being re-released and the video games at their peak, I wonder how popular DB would've been had that new anime taken off back then.

We can only dream.

[Anonymous Friend]

When y'all's say "It's very popular" it that just popular in terms of people are aware of it and they have a favorable response to the concept in general, or are people actively engaging in the franchise? I have several friends who watch various anime but none watch anything Dragonball related besides Abridged, and sometimes only when I put it on their TV. I have friends with various super hero t-shirts, but they only ever watch superhero stuff when there's a movie at the theater. Heck, I'm heavily into super hero stuff, watching all the movies day-one as well as television shows and animated series and whatnot, but don't own any merchandise.

To me, a good indicator of popularity would be TV ratings, for both the Japanese airings and English dub. I don't know if we can even point to FighterZ to use as an indicator because that's just a really well made game despite the license.

I'm not trying to say the show isn't beloved or well liked, but I do think we seem to gauge popularity with a poll of: Do you hate vs Do you like.

[DBZAOTA482]

When y'all's say "It's very popular" it that just popular in terms of people are aware of it and they have a favorable response to the concept in general, or are people actively engaging in the franchise? I have several friends who watch various anime but none watch anything Dragonball related besides Abridged, and sometimes only when I put it on their TV. I have friends with various super hero t-shirts, but they only ever watch superhero stuff when there's a movie at the theater. Heck, I'm heavily into super hero stuff, watching all the movies day-one as well as television shows and animated series and whatnot, but don't own any merchandise.

To me, a good indicator of popularity would be TV ratings, for both the Japanese airings and English dub. I don't know if we can even point to FighterZ to use as an indicator because that's just a really well made game despite the license.

I'm not trying to say the show isn't beloved or well liked, but I do think we seem to gauge popularity with a poll of: Do you hate vs Do you like.

Well, it's merchandise has sold millions upon millions of dollars this decade on toy sales alone and it's merch is heavily pastered all over the anime section (which was originally a section specifically for Dragon Ball Z) for Hot Topic and other special-interest local stores like GameStop. The international success of Kai (which helped introduce a new generation of viewers to the series) allowed for it to continue onto the Boo Saga. The last two movies did exceptionally well for their limited showings (even allowing FUNimation to start their own movie production studio) sparking a huge reemergence in everything Dragon Ball-related and the upcoming movie is planned to have wide global theatrical release. Various theme parks in Japan exclusively feature Dragon Ball likeness (well one also features Naruto and One Piece) and Goku is the main ambassador for the 2020 Japanese Olympics. . There's an Asian restaurant in Florida and a clothing line in Mexico that are Dragon Ball-themed. Super is extremely successful in terms of ratings and merchandise plus it caused a HUGE increase in trafficking for Crunchyroll because people who aren't even huge anime fans subscribed just to watch Super. Various Dragon Ball video games have consistently sold very well especially by licensed games standards and are popular in their own rights (notably Budokai, Tenkaichi, Xenoverse, and FighterZ)... even the first Legacy of Goku sold over 2 million units in the states despite generally being considered a poorly-made game.