Is original Dragon Ball really that unpopular?

[MCDaveG]

All the more reason to think I have a good point. Most people don't (or didn't, not so sure that holds true these days) start shows from the first episode, but that means that something that happened later drew their attention. If they go back to the beginning, they KNOW for certain that they will get to something they liked.

The first episode I ever saw of Community was the paintball episode. The show had a good pilot, but it took some time to find its footing, but because I knew it would become great, it allowed me to trust that my patience would be rewarded.

I completely agree. It's completely different nowadays also with streaming and abundance of home releases.
It would be definitely hard to recommend DB to people nowadays, as they will watch it on stream from episode 1, the show looks dated even more than it should be (thanks to the lackluster handling of remastering and edits in the western releases – while shows like Z Gundam had more production value back in the day and when remastered, it looks awesome) so you have to catch the audience from the first episode, if the characters click from the get go, if the visual design is appealing etc. It being product of different times in this fast paced era, doesn't help either, as it has different pacing than it would if it was adapted now.

But as ABED said, I owe my love for the show thanks to me seeing bits from 23rd Tournament, Freeza and Buu arcs on TV, around the same time on different TV channels after completely ignoring Dragon Ball at first and while I said this story many times, it hooked me on through the Buu arc and then I went back and rewatched the others, giving the old looking and weird slow paced kung fu show a chance on RTL II as well.
It was rare to watch a show from beginning on TV without any extensive promotion (on-screen and offline through magazines), more so on foreign channels. It was mostly switching through channels and see if you stumble upon something at the right place and time and it sticks or getting recommendation from your childhood friend (and most of my friends were watching Pokémon and Digimon).

All and all, as I said, in Germany, Dragon Ball was already a hit before the Z part and rest of the Europe ran Dragon Ball first as well.

[Cure Dragon 255]

All the more reason to think I have a good point. Most people don't (or didn't, not so sure that holds true these days) start shows from the first episode, but that means that something that happened later drew their attention. If they go back to the beginning, they KNOW for certain that they will get to something they liked.

The first episode I ever saw of Community was the paintball episode. The show had a good pilot, but it took some time to find its footing, but because I knew it would become great, it allowed me to trust that my patience would be rewarded.

I completely agree. It's completely different nowadays also with streaming and abundance of home releases.
It would be definitely hard to recommend DB to people nowadays, as they will watch it on stream from episode 1, the show looks dated even more than it should be (thanks to the lackluster handling of remastering and edits in the western releases – while shows like Z Gundam had more production value back in the day and when remastered, it looks awesome) so you have to catch the audience from the first episode, if the characters click from the get go, if the visual design is appealing etc. It being product of different times in this fast paced era, doesn't help either, as it has different pacing than it would if it was adapted now.

But as ABED said, I owe my love for the show thanks to me seeing bits from 23rd Tournament, Freeza and Buu arcs on TV, around the same time on different TV channels after completely ignoring Dragon Ball at first and while I said this story many times, it hooked me on through the Buu arc and then I went back and rewatched the others, giving the old looking and weird slow paced kung fu show a chance on RTL II as well.
It was rare to watch a show from beginning on TV without any extensive promotion (on-screen and offline through magazines), more so on foreign channels. It was mostly switching through channels and see if you stumble upon something at the right place and time and it sticks or getting recommendation from your childhood friend (and most of my friends were watching Pokémon and Digimon).

All and all, as I said, in Germany, Dragon Ball was already a hit before the Z part and rest of the Europe ran Dragon Ball first as well.

I was just about to make another pointless thread about ask if people did get into Z via the Frieza arc. I want to ask because Namek doesnt look very interesting and the hype of it comes from seeing the Saiyan saga and knowing there is a need to resurrect everyone and that Freeza is someone even the powerful Vegeta fears.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

All the more reason to think I have a good point. Most people don't (or didn't, not so sure that holds true these days) start shows from the first episode, but that means that something that happened later drew their attention. If they go back to the beginning, they KNOW for certain that they will get to something they liked.

The first episode I ever saw of Community was the paintball episode. The show had a good pilot, but it took some time to find its footing, but because I knew it would become great, it allowed me to trust that my patience would be rewarded.

I completely agree. It's completely different nowadays also with streaming and abundance of home releases.
It would be definitely hard to recommend DB to people nowadays, as they will watch it on stream from episode 1, the show looks dated even more than it should be (thanks to the lackluster handling of remastering and edits in the western releases – while shows like Z Gundam had more production value back in the day and when remastered, it looks awesome) so you have to catch the audience from the first episode, if the characters click from the get go, if the visual design is appealing etc. It being product of different times in this fast paced era, doesn't help either, as it has different pacing than it would if it was adapted now.

But as ABED said, I owe my love for the show thanks to me seeing bits from 23rd Tournament, Freeza and Buu arcs on TV, around the same time on different TV channels after completely ignoring Dragon Ball at first and while I said this story many times, it hooked me on through the Buu arc and then I went back and rewatched the others, giving the old looking and weird slow paced kung fu show a chance on RTL II as well.
It was rare to watch a show from beginning on TV without any extensive promotion (on-screen and offline through magazines), more so on foreign channels. It was mostly switching through channels and see if you stumble upon something at the right place and time and it sticks or getting recommendation from your childhood friend (and most of my friends were watching Pokémon and Digimon).

All and all, as I said, in Germany, Dragon Ball was already a hit before the Z part and rest of the Europe ran Dragon Ball first as well.

I was just about to make another pointless about ask if people did get into Z via the Frieza arc. I want to ask because Namek doesnt look very interesting and the hype of it comes from seeing the Saiyan saga and knowing there is a need to resurrect everyone and that Freeza is someone even the powerful Vegeta fears.

I can't remember what was the first episode of this series I saw, but my earliest memory is when I was living in Arizona in 1999 and seeing the episode during Goku and Freeza's fight where Freeza is cut in half by the Kienzan (Destructo Disc) on Cartoon Network. I probably got hooked because of the relief of a battle of the titans coming to an end, the adrenaline rush Goku must have got having barely any time to get off Namek while his friends and family urgently await his safe return to Earth. It was by far the most thrilling thing 8-year old me had ever seen. I was so excited when I came back home to Ireland that Christmas and seen the promos for Dragon Ball Z coming to our Cartoon Network.

Something from original Dragon Ball probably would have hooked me had I seen it first, it's anyone's guess whether I would have been hooked to the same extent though. As pro-Dragon Ball as I am I can understand why kids would be more drawn to Z though even if watching it first isn't ideal.

[ABED]

Does a show from the 80s look that much more dated than a show that started in the 80s? DBZ doesn't exactly look contemporary, and given the shit job that FUNi has done remastering it, I don't see how this is a factor at all.

Granted streaming does allow you to start at any point you want, but I don't think that changes anything in this instance since starting with DBZ wouldn't be the beginning. It gives the illusion of a beginning which is the source of the issue.

[GhostEmperorX]

the show looks dated even more than it should be (thanks to the lackluster handling of remastering and edits in the western releases – while shows like Z Gundam had more production value back in the day and when remastered, it looks awesome)

Just about all of the shows in that franchise from 1979 till 1999, UC or AU, have gotten just the kind of treatment that DB/Z was robbed of.

[8000 Saiyan]

Like where? In the US?

In other places like in Europe and Japan, it IS extremely popular.

I'm sure Americans do like the original series, but not as much as Z, because it's more adventure than action.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Like where? In the US?

In other places like in Europe and Japan, it IS extremely popular.

I'm sure Americans do like the original series, but not as much as Z, because it's more adventure than action.

It's moreso the failed Harmony Gold run and the intentional or otherwise sabotage of the BLT dub has led fans over the years, particularly in the US to assume original Dragon Ball always performed poorly. In actuality, no one has ever substantiated claims post-Harmony Gold original Dragon Ball got poor ratings, and considering it received very early timeslots ratings were never going to be stellar either, but since the show got a TV deal on YTV, merch from Bandai and home video releases its likely it did fine in spite of its circumstances. While we've never been given an official reason why Funimation skipped 140 episodes, there's been clearly an apathy for the original series. Gen Funkanaga himself admitted in an interview they "Begged to see if we could skip past [the original series]". Maybe because Saban offered Funimation a better deal for Z than Seagull did for original Dragon Ball, although their lack of willingness to actively market the latter like they marketed the former with countless home releases, HD treatments, anniversary editions screams they clearly had a bias.

Indeed original Dragon Ball has done well in plenty of European countries. In the UK Bandai had the confidence to give the Dragon Ball : Advanced Adventure game an appropriately original Dragon Ball cover:



Compared to the US where it got a Z-ified cover, possibly out of fear it wouldn't sell otherwise:

[kemuri07]

I mean anything compared to the zeitgeist that was DBZ in the late 90s/early 00s looks like a failure I guess.

[MasenkoHA]

. While we've never been given an official reason why Funimation skipped 140 episodes, there's been clearly an apathy for the original series. Gen Funkanaga himself admitted in an interview they "Begged to see if we could skip past [the original series]".

We don't have an official reason but given comments about Dragon Ball Z being a better fit for the U.S market we can pretty safely deduced og Dragon Ball wasn't pulling the ratings and toy sales Funimation and Bandai were hoping for. Combine that with Toei's willingness to relent and let them skip ahead to Z, I'd say it's a more than safe assumption.

Of course it probably didn't do well because Seagull couldn't secure as good as timeslots as Saban and also Funimation gave up after airing the most boring portion of the original series instead of waiting to see if kids would be more receptive to the more action oriented stuff of OG Dragon Ball, but that didn't matter to Funi

Maybe because Saban offered Funimation a better deal for Z than Seagull did for original Dragon Ball, although their lack of willingness to actively market the latter like they marketed the former with countless home releases, HD treatments, anniversary editions screams they clearly had a bias.

We know a "pilot" dub of the first Z movie with the Peter Berring score exist. The decision to skip ahead to Z seems to have been made before Funimation partnered with Saban. I doubt Saban had any influence on the decision.

[MCDaveG]

I was just about to make another pointless thread about ask if people did get into Z via the Frieza arc. I want to ask because Namek doesnt look very interesting and the hype of it comes from seeing the Saiyan saga and knowing there is a need to resurrect everyone and that Freeza is someone even the powerful Vegeta fears.

Interesting point of view. What got my attention in Dragon Ball Z and later Dragon Ball, wasn't anything about the story in particular, but I fell in love with the formula. I was already huge fan of martial arts and all the movies and shows from Power Rangers to Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan flicks, plus seeing Digimon and Slayers anime. It was more about the slow pace duels between two fighters (yeah, really!) that were spectacular than what I was used to with classic kung fu and those filler rants inbetween them, when they are just standing calmly and discussing the battles had this weird intelectual aspect to a 11 year old boy, that was used to simplistic plots and monsters of the week.
Combined with awesome and unique artstyle, that caught my eye during the Buu Arc that I mentioned – I was never really a fan of the generic anime look that shows like Sailor Moon, Ranma or Inuyasha sported, it all looked kinda the same to me and still to this day, I prefer different artstyles. Even tho I am not a huge fan of Eichiro Oda, I must appreciate his unique take on manga and find that more appealing for it's originality.
And the third reason was the music. It had this eastern vibe/western movie vibe and small orchestra sound, while most of the shows were crazy synth collages, and that gave the show it's overal atmosphere.
Also, those cliffhangers with the same tense tune playing through the episodes, that is switched after some time! Something we can't really appreciate when bingewatching nowadays.

To adress Namek not being interesting, I found the visuals of the planet itself super interesting and clever, to just switch green and blue between water, sky and grass. I really enjoyed that Ginyu fight with body swapping and fight with Freeza was insane!
Also, the show had some real stakes of characters dying, being seriously wounded and that made it more real through childhood lenses.
But when I rewatched the show later, I get your point, I have to say that after Vegeta leaves after the fight with Goku until Ginyu Force arrives, the show is dragging so hard!

So, design, music, atmosphere and the formula itself is what got me about the show, the story not so much. It was pretty simplistic even back then and it wouldn't work for me if not for the other things. It's the same with Star Wars for me.

[Koitsukai]

I don't think it's unpopular due to being not liked. I think it suffers from being the forgotten sibling of a superstar called DBZ.
I know many people who passed on watching it due to its down-to-Earth nature, and it makes some sense. If you are used to interplanetary villains, transformations and flashy beam fights, then children fist fighting might not be what you were looking for.

However, I've never met somebody that watched DB, before or after DBZ, and didn't like it.

So, I'd say it's not something people die to watch if they haven't done so before, but once they do, they enjoy it a lot. But it's not unpopular because it's awful like in DBE's case.

[Akira]

I got into Dragonball because of that airing of the first story arc back around 1995 or so. What cursed it in the USA was the terrible time slot. It came on at 2pm and ran for part of a year in my area. I did not even know about it because schools did not let out until 3:15 back then. I was home sick one day, channel surfing through the 5-6 broadcast channels we got at that time, and happened upon the show.

I really found the art style, humor and action elements interesting, and the fact that the story continued from episode to episode was not commonplace back then. You never knew what was going to happen next. I had to go back to school the next day, so I began setting my VCR to record this wild new show I had discovered.

I watched through all of it, and I recall after Goku transformed and demolished the castle I was highly intrigued in discovering what the secret behind his origins was. More than anything though, that old master who blew up the mountain on fire with the Kamehameha had offered to take Goku as a student, and that had me highly interested. He was headed there to take the hermit up on his offer in the very next episode!

Imagine my dismay, when the show cycled through the same 13 episodes on repeat twice more, and after that, the second “season” never materialized because the show was cancelled. I was 14 at the time, their ideal demographic, and I was highly interested in the show, so what went wrong?

It was in the time slot that was a bad fit for it, as I mentioned previously. 2pm was a time when almost all children were still physically at school and finishing up for the day. So one, nobody in the target age demographic could possibly see it. The ideal time window would be 4-5pm back then to reach the most children. 11am-2pm was the domain of daytime talk shows and soap operas. 2-3pm was the domain of paid advertisements, in other terms, “infomercials.” They had cartoons for pre-k children to watch if there were no paid advertising that day. So that was strike two, if someone was even randomly home to see it, there was almost a 50-50 chance there would be an infomercial on instead anyway advertising anything from knife sets or food dehydrators to exercise equipment or miracle solution products.

They were their own self defeating plan. I don’t know if they couldn’t get a better time slot, or wouldn’t get a better time slot. That much I will leave to the detectives among you who track down the type of info. I am just giving a first hand account of the time, and my opinions on why it failed. I was the target age at the time, and I was highly interested in the product. I would have gobbled up the 21st Budokai arc and become a definite fan at the time.

Even the edits they had to do and their own version of the intro song wasn’t that detrimental, for the time. It had the potential to be big all its own. The time slot, and the chance of even being seen in that time frame was why it “failed”, in my opinion. I was surely interested, and would have watched more, as would most children and early teens at the time.

It would be some time later in high school when I made contact with people who had access to fan subs and discovered that there were more episodes to that show and it wasn’t just “cancelled” and that was that. Keep in mind, this was very early dial up internet days, and it wasn’t like it is today. Information about Dragonball was not as common as one might think.

I made every attempt to get my hands on those next episodes and see what happened next once I found out about it. That should say something about interest level that a group of teens were making copies of VHS tapes and distributing and sharing with each other. It would have done just fine with western audiences.

It was timing, circumstances, and possibly planned failure that stopped it from taking off at that early date. There was nothing wrong with product itself. If anyone has any other questions about that time period, I will gladly share whatever I remember.

[Akira]

Edit: Accidental double post.

[Civic]

I grew up with the 2000's era dub, so Z was the only version I knew originally. But as I learned more about the series and became a big fan, I found out what happened in DB. Having known the story, I never had much of a desire to go back and experience it. I've only read the DB and DBZ mangas for the first time this year (already re-reading DB and will go straight to DBZ after that) and I've enjoyed it a whole lot. I have the DB anime ready to go too, when I can find some time to watch it.

I think DB might be 'unpopular' with some of the older fans simply because the opportunity to watch it in the beginning wasn't there. I'm personally glad I've gone back, the Demon King Piccolo saga is fantastic especially, and I've loved watching how the story progressed and evolved to what I saw beginning with Z.

[GhostEmperorX]

A bit of a late addition (and realization) since the thread has gone 18 days without any posts, but...

Production order is really the only valid order to approach this franchise with. And apparently, even the original DB is still being referenced out there, with the most recent example I know being Edens Zero by Hiro Mashima. That first chapter is practically lifted straight out of Dragon Ball's, it checks all the right boxes.

[MasenkoHA]

A bit of a late addition (and realization) since the thread has gone 18 days without any posts, but...

Production order is really the only valid order to approach this franchise with. And apparently, even the original DB is still being referenced out there, with the most recent example I know being Edens Zero by Hiro Mashima. That first chapter is practically lifted straight out of Dragon Ball's, it checks all the right boxes.

It's funny because while Toei and Shueisha can be almost as bad as Funimation in treating the pre-Saiyan Dragon Ball as expendable, it's not like they completely ignore it. Z only viewers would have no reason to know who the fuck the Pilaf gang are and the Mafuba makes a comeback in the Zamasu arc. We even have the Red Ribbon army as focal point of Super Hero and even though Z only viewers would be familiar with them via the Cell saga it still has a reanimated montage of the Red Ribbon saga proper from original Dragon Ball.

[YoungDefender]

I personally think the original Dragon Ball is largely unrivaled for the kind of anime it is. As an adventure story action comedy it's just brilliant and few other series capture that magic for as long and as consistently as Dragon Ball did.

But it is impossible for it to not be overshadowed by Z in comparison. The stakes get higher, the scale gets bigger, the drama and intensity start taking an exponential curve with Raditz's arrival and they largely do not let up for close to 300 episodes. There is no shame in the original series being overtaken by one of the most successful animes in history which has become a mainstay in global pop culture and will likely continue to be for a very long time.

That said, everything comes back to Dragon Ball in the end, the original manga specifically and were it not for that genius formula Toriyama caught fire with none of the rest of this would exist. Aside from it's own popularity and merit as an anime/manga in it's own right Dragon Ball also enjoys the distinction of being the pioneering series, the heritage of the Dragon Ball property, and that sets it already way ahead of the vast majority of popular anime/manga series.

[MCDaveG]

Like where? In the US?

In other places like in Europe and Japan, it IS extremely popular.

I'm sure Americans do like the original series, but not as much as Z, because it's more adventure than action.

It's moreso the failed Harmony Gold run and the intentional or otherwise sabotage of the BLT dub has led fans over the years, particularly in the US to assume original Dragon Ball always performed poorly. In actuality, no one has ever substantiated claims post-Harmony Gold original Dragon Ball got poor ratings, and considering it received very early timeslots ratings were never going to be stellar either, but since the show got a TV deal on YTV, merch from Bandai and home video releases its likely it did fine in spite of its circumstances. While we've never been given an official reason why Funimation skipped 140 episodes, there's been clearly an apathy for the original series. Gen Funkanaga himself admitted in an interview they "Begged to see if we could skip past [the original series]". Maybe because Saban offered Funimation a better deal for Z than Seagull did for original Dragon Ball, although their lack of willingness to actively market the latter like they marketed the former with countless home releases, HD treatments, anniversary editions screams they clearly had a bias.

Indeed original Dragon Ball has done well in plenty of European countries. In the UK Bandai had the confidence to give the Dragon Ball : Advanced Adventure game an appropriately original Dragon Ball cover:



Compared to the US where it got a Z-ified cover, possibly out of fear it wouldn't sell otherwise:

I think it might also be that Z was more action-like and "mature" and cool in the eyes of the rights holders... more fighting in short, which we can always debate about, if that is really a true statement. Second reason might be, that Dragon Ball got quite late into the US and similar to Gundam Wing, let's at least market the newer show, that is only like 4 years younger than the OG and even more the other way around - to catch up with the global phenomena where DB already aired and Z was either finished (France) or currently airing. I don't know, would love to know the reasoning.

But coming from the cover comparisons, I remember how all the US video game covers were more edgy than the originals, like the OG cheerful Kirby cover being frowny and hellbent on action on the US one. Mostly with stuff marketed at 10 like year old kids. Don't wanna derail the topic with ton of off-topic pics.

On the other hand, lot of US and western covers are actually better than the originals. For example Zelda or Metal Gear Solid. While as a kid, I was kinda angsty and pissed off about all the censorship, editing and in case of covers, losing the gorgeous original art, from design standpoint, the composition, typo and overall appeal work great with different western design standards.

In case of Castlevania Symphony Of The Night, I prefer the Japanese/EU PAL tho, which merges the original art and overall design really well. But all an all, the practice of "maturing" up the covers and maybe to put it next to other multimedia is quite widespread.

[GhostEmperorX]

But coming from the cover comparisons, I remember how all the US video game covers were more edgy than the originals, like the OG cheerful Kirby cover being frowny and hellbent on action on the US one. Mostly with stuff marketed at 10 like year old kids. Don't wanna derail the topic with ton of off-topic pics.

It's material like this that further convinces me that the corporate overlords of the USA^TM really want the country to live in its own world.
And a microcosm of massive problems in its culture concerning propaganda in marketing, depending on what the times are. All of their opinions on "what American kids like", for example, are entirely issues of their own making.

[Jord]

I guess it's more unknown than unpopular. Lot's of markets started with Z and then went on with GT. When you like a fighting show like Z or GT it can be tough to go to Dragon Ball next, since the tone is so different. I can see the more childlike tone putting off a lot of people.
Dragon Ball is a great series but I do think it works best as part of a trilogy, since what happens escalates in Z and then GT.