Does Dragon Ball have the largest, least toxic, fandom in existence of fictional franchises?

[zarmack]

Kale and Caulifla are nowhere near as bad as their haters say, but they could have been written way better. I would actually like to see these 2 again in a later story arc, with better writing and character development.

Pan never becoming a SSJ in GT was a stupid missed opportunity, same with Bra being a non-fighter (another half-saiyan with high-potential wasted). Bra & Pan could have served as the female foil to Goku & Vegeta and Goten & Present Trunks. It would have been interesting seeing these 2 pair up and interact on the battle field.

[Waluigiman]

So far only in this website because no one is bullied for having different opinions

[Hulk10]

So far only in this website because no one is bullied for having different opinions

Yeah the wiki is awful.

[SpiritBombTriumphant]

As zarmack said, it's mostly PC people/SJWs who instantly jump to "misogyny" rather than consider for even a moment there is something else we like/dislike about a character.

This just isn't true and is revisionist history surrounding the "discourse" out there about these characters and their transformations.

An overwhelming amount of commentary (thankfully not here) was related specifically to their gender and was littered with pejorative epithets.

I'm sure there were plenty of people who genuinely disliked the characters based on whatever they disliked the characters for. These reasonable people were not the ones making the noise, as they rarely are.

I honestly think what you are saying is revisionist history. I saw the discourse and it had nothing to do with their gender but merely farting from no transformation to SSB. We were the ones making the noise because it was the issue at hand. I even specifically remember someone trying to say it was that Caulifla is a girl and that was the reason for our hate. We shut her butt down.

I can tell already that you and I are going to disagree on this. Perhaps we should just meet in the middle and say something along the lines of "this is just what I saw" or something? As far as Dragon Ball communities go, what I've said here is the exact reason we disliked her for a bit. After the s-cells explanation and Caulifla not going SSB, everything was fine and she's one of my favorite characters.

[ClutchBangstrip]

That's a key aspect that reflects on the community, at large; IMO. In Most large communities, the hate for Kale and Caulifla would Still be pretty damn prevalent, even now. It seems once the 4Chan crowd speaks, it's sorta what the larger community becomes known for.

There's even anti-PC stuff that SJWs shrug off after a while and just keep watching. This sorta thing isn't unheard of, but for a fandom this size, it seems pretty remarkable.

I jus knew Toyo was gonna lose his job or his life would be threatened, based on fan outrage on Twitter, a month ago. But it just seems like it dusted over pretty quick and most are hyped/curious about the new saga...Toyo is still in charge of.

[Soppa Saia People]

, but if Gohan were just now introduced and did what Caulifla has done, I'd call him a cheap Gary Stu (and it'd actually fit since he's literally the son of the main character and a princess, whom even enemies respect, unlike Caulifla who is just an overpowered punk/outlaw). I don't much like Caulifla more because she's the personification of some major narrative problems with Dragon Ball, not because she threatens my already nonexistent masculinity.
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The problem with Mary Sue/Gary Stu is the term is so grossly overused and misapplied that it just stopped being a valid critique a long time ago

yea in the past few years it's just been lobbied as a criticism to like, literally any (but especially women characters) that is strong who doesn't have a ton of back story or whatever. its become one of the most lazy criticisms.

[ABED]

It's why I don't like terms/insults like Mary Stu. The idea is valid, but the term itself is little more than an insult and doesn't lead to constructive criticism or dialog.

[Robo4900]

Here's my take...

This fandom is not particularly better or worse than basically any other fandom online. Kanzenshuu is, I would say, a particularly nice sub-community, but there are some particularly bad sub-communities. Just depends where you go, who you interact with, etc., just as is the case with most other fandoms.

We've got a bit of a Whovian quality about us in terms of consensus generally being an alien concept to the fandom as a whole, which means there's a lot of disagreement about, but there's a right way to handle that, and I find generally Kanzenshuu, and other healthy sub-communities, tend to take this approach: Disagreement is an interesting point of discussion, not a reason for us to be divided and hostile. Not that discussions don't sometimes get heated, of course.

[Cipher]

I'd say Dragon Ball is confirmed to be a really pleasant fandom, especially compared to what it could be.

I think you can think a handful of individuals for setting a really good precedent. Mike, Herms, and the rest of the Kanzenshuu staff, and the community Terez has built up with her policies on r/dbz have set the tone for a lot of current discourse, and it's just ... really good. The tone is set by people who are extremely knowledgeable about the content and professional in their standards for delivery. YouTube could be a disaster, and is in a lot of ways, but even there a lot of the most prominent tone-setters--people like Ajay and Geekdom and Lance (and more) for example--likewise take their cues from the tone established by Kanzenshuu and the Reddit. For what it's worth, most of the visible super fans on the Japanese side conduct themselves with similar standards, and indeed several of them are in contact with Kanzenshuu staff or friends of the site as well, and everything feeds into everything else.

It wasn't always like that. And the fan community for Dragon Ball will never stop offering up infinitely ridiculous complaints and arguments, as is the wont of large groups of fans. But the fact that some of the series' most active years since I've been around in it have also been some of--in certain ways--their most tolerable, says a lot.

But you can also, really truly, lay that at the feet of a handful of individuals who used their resources and knowledge to establish the kind of atmosphere they wanted to see. You can encounter toxic spots still, but there are a lot of extremely prominent and influential ones that aren't. That was never remotely a given.

[Kunzait_83]

I'd say Dragon Ball is confirmed to be a really pleasant fandom, especially compared to what it could be.

I think you can think a handful of individuals for setting a really good precedent. Mike, Herms, and the rest of the Kanzenshuu staff, and the community Terez has built up with her policies on r/dbz have set the tone for a lot of current discourse, and it's just ... really good. The tone is set by people who are extremely knowledgeable about the content and professional in their standards for delivery. YouTube could be a disaster, and is in a lot of ways, but even there a lot of the most prominent tone-setters--people like Ajay and Geekdom and Lance (and more) for example--likewise take their cues from the tone established by Kanzenshuu and the Reddit. For what it's worth, most of the visible super fans on the Japanese side conduct themselves with similar standards, and indeed several of them are in contact with Kanzenshuu staff or friends of the site as well, and everything feeds into everything else.

It wasn't always like that. And the fan community for Dragon Ball will never stop offering up infinitely ridiculous complaints and arguments, as is the wont of large groups of fans. But the fact that some of the series' most active years since I've been around in it have also been some of--in certain ways--their most tolerable, says a lot.

But you can also, really truly, lay that at the feet of a handful of individuals who used their resources and knowledge to establish the kind of atmosphere they wanted to see. You can encounter toxic spots still, but there are a lot of extremely prominent and influential ones that aren't. That was never remotely a given.

As far as I'm concerned, I agree fully that this all comes almost ENTIRELY down to people like Mike, Julian, Hujio, (and later Herms) etc. from the Daizenshuu and Kanzentai (and later merged) staffs for setting a specific bar, and having the rest of the fandom rise to try and meet it. It isn't always entirely successful, not remotely: but just the fact that this bar is even there at all and that it challenges the broader fanbase to the degree that it does makes a GARGANTUAN amount of difference. One that has had a cascading domino-like effect of possitivity and growth on the entire course of Western DB fandom history from around the early/mid 2000s and onward.

I've said this before in a few other threads, but I haven't the slightest shadow of a doubt that if Mike didn't revive and continue Daizenshuu EX past his college years circa 2003 as both a Podcast and a forum community, the broader English-language Dragon Ball community would be EXPONENTIALLY worse off as a haven for all manner of immensely toxic and grotesque stupidity, ignorance, and unpleasant belligerence. As it stands, the impact that this site and community has had throughout the past 15 someodd years has acted as an imperfect but immensely effective "filtration system" of sorts for all manner of the worst bile in the fanbase.

The pre-dub years were inherently a completely different paradigm that was a time of immensely less baggage and mass misconceptions - both because we were all generally working off of the same cohesive version of the series, and also because (in certain aspects mind you) the broader Western anime fandom of that particular time period was built upon a fundamentally more mature foundation - and that paradigm was nearly totally reset back to scratch with not only the introduction of the dub itself, but also the mass exodus of much of the then-fanbase and the coming of age of the generation introduced by and weaned on both the DBZ dub and the Toonami oeuvre overall.

What's key here is that the foundations of Daizenshuu EX/Kanzeshuu itself are intrinsically tied into the crucial "transition" years right smack during the middle of that overall generation shift in between the dub's initial arrival in syndication and its later mass mainstream popular spread over on Cartoon Network. Mike and most of the core "inner circle" of staff here entered into things just late enough to be of the post-dub generation themselves (and thus have at least some tangible common ground of "we all got started more or less on the same footing" relatability with much of the folks who'd come in later), but also early enough to still have one foot also planted squarely in the remaining holdovers of the pre-dub landscape, with their having their formative experiences of "being educated and schooled" almost entirely by pre-dub fans and sources.

This puts this whole site and its staff the unique position of acting as a rock-solid tether to crucial knowledge, perspective, insight, and context about the series' basic-most fundamentals that would otherwise have been all but almost TOTALLY lost (or at least rendered ultra-obscure apocrypha) and buried underneath a smothering avalanche of precisely the sort of context-bereft and willfully-ignorant nonsensical garbage you generally see on the Dragon Ball Wiki, GameFaqs forums, and the Youtube comments section (and also on the Atari Budokai forums and on MFG, back when those were still a thing).

Both this concrete tie to the Japanese version and sources of information and moreover the general adult-level maturity, college-educated intellect, and general common sense wisdom that the Kanzenshuu staff has brought into the wider English-language fanbase in the post-dub, post-Toonami, post-social media, and post-Youtube world... THIS is what has kept the Dragon Ball fandom of the last 15 years almost single-handedly in check from falling into an inescapable death pit of disinformation, wild rumors, outright fanon, and juvenile flame wars.

Even as things stand today currently, things are far, far, FAR the hell from ideal, and the fanbase still contains an immense number of permanently-embedded holdovers from the absolute worst of the late 90s/early 2000s era that still make it plenty frustrating and tedious at times to deal with. But nonetheless with all that having been said: without this stabilizing influence brought by Kanzenshuu and its core staff, the Western DB landscape as we know it today would undoubtedly be DRASTICALLY different, and far infinitely worse off.

[Bebi Hatchiyack]

I think that our fandom is divided into many groups.

You have the hardcore fan who love the early part of Dragon Ball where it was more adventure and less battle, you have the Z hardcore fan where you can find two subgroup the power scaling fan and the others who saw other thing than the power scaling. You have the Dragon Ball GT Fan and Dragon Ball Super. The Fan who stay stuck on the manga only.

And so on with the video games and other stuff.

So with so many layer into this fandom you can't expect everyone coming along, there will be loud argument sometimes insult sometimes threat or wrost, because people sometimes that their view are the righteous one. Of course I generalize a bit, but I don't think it's not far fetched to see thing like that when you see how divided our fandom is.

You can mirror that with Star Wars and Sonic The Hedgehog those three fandom have so much similarities.

[Robo4900]

I think that our fandom is divided into many groups.

You have the hardcore fan who love the early part of Dragon Ball where it was more adventure and less battle

I would say this is a flawed way of looking at it. Dragon Ball is not that different from Z. The first ~20 episodes largely feature the show finding its feet, and at that stage, it's very different, but by the time you've reached the 22nd Tenkaichi, anyone who's seen Z will feel at home.

The people who refuse to watch DB past the very early parts are the people who create this perception that it's not like Z. The problem is, because Funimation's dub of DB had much less of Funi's attempts at making it feel like you're watching a dumb '90s kids' action show, if you're watching dubbed, DB and Z have quite a different feel.

[Bebi Hatchiyack]

I think that our fandom is divided into many groups.

You have the hardcore fan who love the early part of Dragon Ball where it was more adventure and less battle

I would say this is a flawed way of looking at it. Dragon Ball is not that different from Z. The first ~20 episodes largely feature the show finding its feet, and at that stage, it's very different, but by the time you've reached the 22nd Tenkaichi, anyone who's seen Z will feel at home.

The people who refuse to watch DB past the very early parts are the people who create this perception that it's not like Z.

Just read Dragon Ball from the begining to the end of the first martial tournament and now times skip a bit from the Saiyan Arc to the Cell Arc you will feel a huge difference the first part filled with humour and other light hearted stuff as for the later quasi non humourous thing, serious feeling. It's like you read two different thing.

Heck even how Goku deal the Red Ribbon armies never felt so dangerous for me for Goku's & Co (Poor Ninja Murasaki receiving Nyoiboo into his butt lol) but during the Frieza and Cell part there I felt fear I felt anxious for the characters, I even got my blood boiling because I wanted the heroes to punch hard Gero at some point for how he was boasting himself.

There is a clear contract between early DB and later DB as a whole. I know I was being broad with my way of thinking but I can mirror what I am saying with Sonic The Hedgehog for exemple.

For exemple the early Dragon Ball fan would be the classic Sonic The Hedgehog fan.

[ABED]

I think that our fandom is divided into many groups.

You have the hardcore fan who love the early part of Dragon Ball where it was more adventure and less battle

I would say this is a flawed way of looking at it. Dragon Ball is not that different from Z. The first ~20 episodes largely feature the show finding its feet, and at that stage, it's very different, but by the time you've reached the 22nd Tenkaichi, anyone who's seen Z will feel at home.

The people who refuse to watch DB past the very early parts are the people who create this perception that it's not like Z.

Just read Dragon Ball from the begining to the end of the first martial tournament and now times skip a bit from the Saiyan Arc to the Cell Arc you will feel a huge difference the first part filled with humour and other light hearted stuff as for the later quasi non humourous thing, serious feeling. It's like you read two different thing.

Heck even how Goku deal the Red Ribbon armies never felt so dangerous for me for Goku's & Co (Poor Ninja Murasaki receiving Nyoiboo into his butt lol) but during the Frieza and Cell part there I felt fear I felt anxious for the characters, I even got my blood boiling because I wanted the heroes to punch hard Gero at some point for how he was boasting himself.

There is a clear contract between early DB and later DB as a whole. I know I was being broad with my way of thinking but I can mirror what I am saying with Sonic The Hedgehog for exemple.

For exemple the early Dragon Ball fan would be the classic Sonic The Hedgehog fan.

It's all organic growth. Look at a photo of someone when they are toddlers then when they are in their late 20s. There's a huge difference, but it's still the same person.

One of the things the bugs me is the push back of dub fans who just have no interest in understanding Toriyama's actual story. I can understand if you're a casual fan and don't have an interest beyond watching the dub as it aired on TV, but there are people who have seen all of DB all the way through and balk when you try to politely explain things to them. I end up getting called a "weeb" for something as simple as explaining that Goku isn't a superhero or the correct pronunciation of Saiyan.

[Bebi Hatchiyack]

It's all organic growth. Look at a photo of someone when they are toddlers then when they are in their late 20s. There's a huge difference, but it's still the same person.

Yes I know what you mean but there is people who are not the same for my case for exemple I have become cynical to several thing, my young self was carefree airheaded and dumb. Today I am more grounded, cynical sometimes angsty because of how my country is ruled. I know the value of life when I was young for me life was eternal but sadly it's not.

So I am kind of not the same person I was. Doctor Who translate that well

We all change, when you think about it, we're all different people; all through our lives, and that's okay, that's good, you've gotta keep moving, so long as you remember all the people that you used to be. I will not forget one line of this, not one day, I swear. I will always remember when The Doctor was me.

For Dragon Ball it's the same.

[ABED]

It's all organic growth. Look at a photo of someone when they are toddlers then when they are in their late 20s. There's a huge difference, but it's still the same person.

Yes I know what you mean but there is people who are not the same for my case for exemple I have become cynical to several thing, my young self was carefree airheaded and dumb. Today I am more grounded, cynical sometimes angsty because of how my country is ruled. I know the value of life when I was young for me life was eternal but sadly it's not.

So I am kind of not the same person I was. Doctor Who translate that well

We all change, when you think about it, we're all different people; all through our lives, and that's okay, that's good, you've gotta keep moving, so long as you remember all the people that you used to be. I will not forget one line of this, not one day, I swear. I will always remember when The Doctor was me.

For Dragon Ball it's the same.

I'm not sure what point you thought I was making. I was saying that people look different as adults than they did as toddlers, but you're missing the intermediate steps. DBZ is different, but it was a gradual change that happened over 100s of issues. This point seems lost on some.

[Dr. Casey]

I would say this is a flawed way of looking at it. Dragon Ball is not that different from Z. The first ~20 episodes largely feature the show finding its feet, and at that stage, it's very different, but by the time you've reached the 22nd Tenkaichi, anyone who's seen Z will feel at home.

To be fair, the beginning of the 22nd Budokai is roughly 60 percent of the way through the original anime. Thinking back to the first half of the 2000s, the stereotypical dub fan who loved DBZ for how 'hardcore' it was, and mostly cared about the series for the Super Saiyans plus Piccolo while thinking that every other character was lame and superfluous, probably would have had a hard time with the entire run of the childhood Goku era except maybe the 21st Budokai. The Red Ribbon saga is very different from the Pilaf arc, but it's also significantly different from everything that comes beyond. There's plenty of action, yes, but of a very different sort from the prolonged multi-episode fights that (with a small handful of exceptions like Jackie Chun and Grandpa Gohan) are almost completely absent from the anime until close to the 100 episode mark. The Red Ribbon arc is largely Goku just effortlessly trouncing everyone who isn't named Tao Pai Pai, often to the point of OHKO'ing them. For the stereotypical dub fan of 1998-2004, I could see the original pre-22nd series largely not being their thing, with only the occasional "Oh yeah, this is the Dragon Ball I know" moments during fights like the 21st finale, Tao Pai Pai, and Grandpa Gohan.

Averaging things out, I think the original anime is a significantly different entity from Z if you weigh the first 60 percent the same as the latter 40. That's not a bad thing. A story slowly and organically developing and maturing into something very different is a great thing and an interesting process to see unfold. Not to mention that Dragon Ball could easily be considered the superior series, given that the story is more tightly-plotted and cohesive and that the fights from the latter half are some of the best choreographed in the series (though in practice, I don't really enjoy Z any less whenever I actually sit down and watch it; 22nd Budokai through Buu are all mostly equal for me, despite whatever advantages certain story arcs might have on paper).

[Waluigiman]

So far only in this website because no one is bullied for having different opinions

Yeah the wiki is awful.

And youtube is a convention of all the worst parts.

[VegettoEX]

Let's not ruin what we're saying by then turning around and disparaging other specific sites by name please and thank you!

[Majin Buu]

Pan never becoming a SSJ in GT was a stupid missed opportunity

Agreed. Perhaps the biggest missed opportunity in GT (along with not bringing Uub along for the "Grand Tour").