Super indeed has good characters and villains. Beerus, Whis, Champa, Vados and Zamasu are some of the best things about it. But focal characters are all treated super safely; we don't have new arcs for them to go along with the storylines these villains feature in. (Again, that's why I'd be interested in seeing what these plots would have been like had they picked up straight from a slightly less final Boo arc during the manga's original run, but it's not to be.) If they were similarly static in GT, they were at least in new phases of their lives, which we got to glimpse for the length of a prolonged epilogue. Their being old and frumpy, interested in things other than fighting (in addition to just being a radical take for a sequel) played thematically toward an ending that stripped away nearly all the fantasy elements in favor of some fairly grounded themes. Even if it's a happy coincidence, that pattern is present, and that makes it kind of worth having as a sequel or extra ending.RedRibbonSoldier#42 wrote:But Super, not GT, is the one with fresh ideas. The only original villain in GT was Baby, Super has Beerus, Whis, Champa, Vados, and now Zamasu and himself. It also expands the Dragonball mythos way more than GT, which only added the dark star balls. There's also more choreography and strategy in the actual fights in Super.
Super has rapidly expanded the universe; GT made an almost impressively consistent effort to shrink it. There really isn't much badder than Boo in space; the second arc is all about villains from the past; the final enemies are punishment for the use of the Dragon Balls on Earth, which has gotten quietly aesthetically realistic.
Universe-expanding and fun villains are candy; I'm looking more for what they add to the story, which is already complete in the 42 volumes of the manga. GT works with fewer elements, but builds toward a different ending worth having, and that's evident right from the start with its tone and treatment of characters; everything is very different from what we knew, maybe a little past its prime. Right now Super feels like "And then eight more things happened between the Boo arc and the end! But not in ways that really impact the characters or story."
That's without touching on the episode-by-episode execution of either; just the premises. It could easily be overcome through execution, but in terms of direction and scripting, I also feel GT has won out at this point in Super's run, and by a fair amount (on average; Super has some stellar highs with action scenes, and the rare times it manages to sell a Toriyama-esque joke are damn funny). It's evident most others disagree with me on that point, or just don't care as much about what they add to the overall narrative, and that's fine; I just wanted to clarify since the first part of your post seemed to be asking what I meant. It's also admittedly unfair, since Super hasn't ended yet.
