PAGE TOP

About Us

Fans often confuse a batch of words: notably “Kanzenshuu” (the name of this website), “Daizenshuu” (a series of Japanese guidebooks from the 1990s), “Chouzenshuu” (a decades-later slight update and republish of the Daizenshuu), and sometimes “Kanzenban” (an early-aughts re-release of the manga)… so let’s break it down and explain who we are!

What is Kanzenshuu?

Kanzenshuu is the name of this website. Right now, you, the person reading these words, are on the website named Kanzenshuu. This website is owned and operated by a few American folks that are fans of the Dragon Ball franchise and have dedicated their ever-dwindling free time to documenting information about this series. The website’s origins date back to 1998 with VegettoEX’s Ultimate DBZ Links Page; the site expanded to VegettoEX’s Home Page and then to Daizenshuu EX from there, all followed by a merge with Kanzentai in 2012 to form Kanzenshuu.

There is no such thing as a “Kaizenshuu”, and the spelling of our website name is “Kanzenshuu” — not Kazenshuu, not Kanzeshuu, etc. Also, it’s just “Kanzenshuu” — there is no “the Kanzenshuu,” and you certainly can’t possibly have “kanzenshuu scans” (unless you’re physically printing pages of our website to then scan back in, which seems absurd!).

While this website itself is not “official” — we do not work for or answer to Shueisha, Toei, etc. — we primarily focus on documenting, translating, and sharing “official” material: that is, written material from actual, published, tangible works from the original Japanese rights-holders. This includes a large body of translated interview archives, but also extends both to regular news reporting and original curated guides (like our popular “Intended Endings Guide“). We don’t ourselves make up or theorize about “power levels,” but we can certainly tell you what all the official statements about them are (AND where they actually come from)!

We believe information online should be free, readily available, well curated, and maintained by people who care, looking ahead to the future and ensuring long-term preservation. It’s perhaps no surprise to learn that we also believe text (not video) is the best format to achieve this goal — thus, we continue to maintain a full-fledged traditional website.

Site History

Kanzenshuu launched 01 April 2012 as a combination of two prior Dragon Ball fansites: Daizenshuu EX (founded 1998) and Kanzentai (founded 2005).

We had been jokingly using the name “Kanzenshuu” as a fusion-esque name for our collaborations for a few years, with its first documented use coming from co-founder Hujio in podcast episode 163, and the names do work together even better than anticipated. The (zen) — present in both daizenshuu and kanzentai — means “whole” or “complete”, something both sites had always strived for in their all-encompassing coverage. We took the (kan) from kanzentai (meaning “perfect”) to start with and took the (shuu) from daizenshuu (meaning “collection”) to end the name. All together, the new name of 完全集 (kanzenshuu) refers to a sort of “perfect collection”, which is what we always envisioned the site to be.

The name “Kanzenshuu” is ours and ours alone, a uniquely original word that we ourselves created.

Our mission and goal continues to be to spread our love and enjoyment of the original Japanese version of the Dragon Ball franchise — the single version that can be and is enjoyed across the entire planet by all types of fans — with the most accuracy and cited documentation that we can, all wrapped up in an entertaining package. We do this through our global news coverage, extensive guides, our podcast, expert commentary, and our community collaboration.

Kanzenshuu is very much a relic of the Internet past: we are not a company, this is no-one’s job, we do all of this in our spare time, we do not run advertisements on the website, there are no salaries, we do not work for or with any companies/rights-holders, and all of our “job titles” are completely meaningless and made up on the spot. We are just a small group of friends that believe in and love doing what we do, which is documenting the rich history of Dragon Ball for ourselves and for others, but enthusiastically doing so to a degree above and beyond what it may perhaps even warrant.

This is just a fansite, and we wouldn’t have it any other way.

Kanzenshuu Site Staff

The staff of Kanzenshuu bring decades worth of combined experience, expertise, and fandom from their prior work on Daizenshuu EX and Kanzentai.

(Note: our “job” titles are arbitrary and meaningless — we all do everything!)

VegettoEX

VegettoEX (Mike LaBrie)

News & Marketing Manager / Podcast Host

Having been aware of the franchise for years via the back of Electronic Gaming Monthly, it took prodding from a friend in high school for Mike to be bothered to actually check the darn thing out, and subsequently catch the second episode of FUNimation’s original English dub of Dragon Ball Z in September 1996. Before getting his own Internet-ready computer in 1997, he spent countless hours and days absorbing everything he could from BBSes and early websites such as Wuken’s Suushinchuu.

Mike started VegettoEX’s Ultimate DBZ Links Page on AOL in January 1998 at the ripe old age of sixteen. The goal at the time was not to reinvent the wheel by duplicating the efforts of other Dragon Ball fans that already shared news, information, and media, but to simply link to the best-of-the-best and act as a sort of jumping-point. He moved into producing original content a few months later, though, and expanded the site into VegettoEX’s Home Page. The site re-launched in 1999 yet again as Daizenshuu EX with a new name and a new focus on great content with a great personality. The site re-launched yet again in 2003 with a greater focus on documentation and engaging content, which included the weekly podcast beginning in November 2005.

Mike lives in New Jersey with his wife and cats. The name “VegettoEX” came from wanting to choose the strongest character as a representation in crummy AOL chat rooms, combined with some extra letters to at least differentiate the name from the gazillion other terrible screen names — the “EX” came from a then-current-obsession with Street Fighter EX, which Mike defends to this day as an excellent game.
Hujio

Hujio (Heath Cutler)

Content Manager / Website Development & Maintenance

After being made aware of Dragon Ball Z on TV by a childhood friend in mid-1997, Heath quickly ran to his family’s Windows 95 PC equipped with 56k dial-up internet and absorbed as much information about the series as possible (and there really was not much available at the time). Over the next few years he bookmarked every fansite you could find, including Planet Namek, Greg Werner’s Ultimate DBZ Information Site, Vegeta Insane, VegettoEX’s Home Page, and several others lost to time.

Inspired by these great fansites of the past, he set out to learn the ways of website development. After teaching himself HTML and JavaScript, he created his own run-of-the-mill Dragon Ball fansite to document the series for his own personal reference, which to this day remains anonymous and buried deep within the bowels of the internet. He eventually closed the website, but continued to maintain it locally on his personal computer. As the Dragon Boxes were being released in Japan in 2003, Heath (now in college) decided to purchase these glorious products and eventually dusted off his old website files to begin reworking the site to revolve around them, and the Kanzenban manga releases. In early May 2005, after the age of large fansites had all but entirely passed, he launched Kanzentai to bring his detailed and well-researched information to the masses of the internet. And the rest, as they say, is history.

Heath was born and raised in Nebraska’s largest metropolitan, where he currently resides with his wife and two children. He is better known online by his nom de plume, “Hujio”, a name he made up far too long ago to even recall what it is actually based on. But hey, it starts with an “H”, so it works! His passion for Dragon Ball and website design/develop have been a perfect marriage to establish one of the series’ most authoritative fansites, something that he is very proud of!
SaiyaJedi

SaiyaJedi (Julian Grybowski)

Translator / Senior Japan Correspondent

Julian’s fandom began in earnest with reruns of the first two “seasons” of FUNimation’s early Dragon Ball Z dub in syndication, but he quickly moved on to bigger and better things. Wanting to know what happened next, and being annoyed at the incredibly obvious censorship, he eventually turned to the Internet. Once there, he cut his teeth on sites like Chris Psaros’s DBZ Uncensored, Greg Werner’s Ultimate DBZ Information Site, and (of course) Mike’s own Daizenshuu EX.

Becoming a regular poster on the alt.fan.dragonball newsgroup, he wound up writing a petition to reverse the censorship of Viz Comics’s release of the manga, which garnered the attention of the company, as well as the English-speaking online fandom. Soon enough, Julian and Mike (who had taken a break from the site) were corresponding with each other semi-regularly, and he came on board for the relaunch of Daizenshuu EX in 2003. Banking on his enthusiasm for the Japanese language, he became the site’s official translator and fact-checker, and eventually managed to be able to understand and speak Japanese for real. He studied in Japan in 2006 and moved there outright in 2007, becoming the “Man in Japan” who keeps everybody informed about the latest developments in the Land of the Rising Sun—at least when the aforementioned Internet does not beat him to it. Briefly moving back stateside, he now lives with his wife and three children in Osaka, the latter of whom he hopes to groom as his successors. (After all, they are already native Japanese speakers…)

“SaiyaJedi” is a whittled-down form of his old Usenet handle, “The Super Saiya-jin Jedi”, which combined his two loves as a teenager: Dragon Ball and Star Wars. He has thought about getting rid of it before, but eventually decided to keep the name as a badge of honor (and a reminder that everyone was 13 once). You can still call him “Julian”, though.

Julian has passed the highest level of the Japanese Language Proficiency Test (JLPT).

Kanzenshuu Admin Emeritus

Herms

Herms (Jake Schutz; aka. Todd Blankenship)

Translator / Head Researcher

Jake “Jacob Schultz” Schutz was born in a previous century somewhere around the American Midwest, the same place that gave the world “Cashew Chicken” and Harry S. Truman. In retrospect, the warning signs were obvious: while still in grade school he imported a Digimon Wonderswan game from Japan and learned katakana in a vain attempt to understand it. In high school he finally took a crack at learning the other 99.9% of the Japanese language, as part of a ridiculously intense summer school course that compressed a semester or two of college Japanese into two months. In college he took a bunch more Japanese courses and eventually spent a year living in Tokyo, where he wandered around the suburbs aimlessly and climbed Mt. Fuji, in that order. Since graduating college he’s continued to study Japanese on his own, but has a bad habit of focusing only on the parts that interest him, which is why he knows five different words for “magic” but has trouble remembering how to say “you’re welcome”. He currently lives by the Pacific Ocean, working for “The Man”.

Rewinding a bit, around the turn of the century he caught a few scattered clips of Dragon Ball Z on TV, which left him with the impression that Goku was a spaceship captain and/or some sort of Catholic saint. To clear the matter up he turned to the Viz manga, and before he knew it he was tracking down the daizenshuu guide books and collecting kanzenban. The middle step is still kind of a blur. In college he started posting up information from the daizenshuu on the Daizenshuu EX forums (appropriately enough), when Hujio offered him the recently vacant translator position at Kanzentai. He accepted and obligingly translated a few daizenshuu, but still put more effort into posting random guides on the Daizenshuu EX forum than on doing anything for Kanzentai. And so plans were hatched to merge Kanzentai and Daizenshuu EX together…

“Herms” is simply the name of the Greek god Hermes minus the second ‘e’. Back during that fateful summer school session, he had originally signed up to take a class on Greek mythology before switching to Japanese at the last minute, and so he still has trouble spelling the names of the Greek gods. OK, so there actually is a reason behind this spelling, but it’s long, makes little sense, and still just boils down to “it seemed like a cool-sounding screen name”.

Jake has passed the highest level of the Japanese Language Proficiency Test (JLPT).

Site Contributors

The following contributors, while not responsible for owning and operating Kanzenshuu, dedicate and volunteer their own time and talents to help assist in developing various aspects of content creation, and help keep our sanity.

sailorspazz

sailorspazz (Stacey)

Translator

Stacey has been a friend of the site since before Kanzenshuu itself was even a twinkle in our collective eye! Stacey is certified at the N1 level of the Japanese Language Proficiency Test (JLPT), and along with the occasional day-to-day news coverage assistance, dives into our archives to help share interviews and articles that have yet to be translated. There are very few people whose language and translation proficiency we have full confidence in to live up to our completely unreasonable standards, and with the addition of Stacey to our family, they all work on Kanzenshuu.
Ian

Cipher (Ian)

Translator

Ian’s biography coming soon!
José

Zénpai (José)

Translator

José’s biography coming soon!
Terez

Terez (Theresa)

Wiki Administrator

Joining our forum community in 2016, Theresa became an immediate friend of the site and has since been working with us behind-the-scenes on development of Kanzenshuu’s wiki. She has been instrumental in finalizing content structures and helping to oversee its eventual launch! In addition, Theresa serves as an administrator on the /r/dbz sub-Reddit.
AnimeAjay

AnimeAjay (Ajay)

Animation Production Documentation

Ajay quickly became a great friend of the site after joining our forum community in 2013, as well as a well-versed authority on the production process and going-ons as Dragon Ball Super ran through to completion. In 2016, Ajay took on a bit of formal responsibility as a moderator on our forum. Alongside that existing role, Ajay works throughout the “Animation Production Guide” and various episode pages to cite concrete, verifiable information about specific animators, production anecdotes, and more.

Site Layout Version History

The main Kanzenshuu website has been developed to operate on the WordPress platform, which is an open-source content management system (CMS) utilizing PHP scripting and MySQL databases. Since the website’s launch in April 2012, it has featured a customized layout (WordPress theme) developed in-house around our pre-existing content and for our exclusive use. The layout has undergone various updates and revisions throughout the years, as outlined below.

Version 1: “Fusion!” Design

In preparation for the website’s launch, this layout was designed to incorporate elements from both the previously established Daizenshuu EX and Kanzentai layouts and is aptly named for the fusion of said former websites. Development of the layout was somewhat limited due to the exhaustive time necessary to port over all previous content into the newly established database. Its main intent was to provide a fixed-width container to fit the already established content, with minimal adjustments and styling of the content itself. This theme was utilized for just over a year, receiving minor style updates throughout its use.

Version 1.0
Version 1.0Debut: 01 April 2012

The initial incarnation of the “Kanzenshuu” theme.

Primary Changes: First Release
Version 1.1
Version 1.1Debut: 15 January 2013

Updated sidebar panel styles, incorporated additional search functionality for news, performed minor revisions to news post headers, and added “Google+” social media link.

Primary Changes: Minor styling alterations

Version 2: “Kami” Design

Having survived the continual onslaught of “Battle of Gods” coverage, the website was now fully established with the majority of the previously existing content imported. Named for the aforementioned movie’s Japanese title (“Kami to Kami“), this layout’s focus shifted toward content presentation. Primary changes from Version 1 include removal of the left sidebar, expansion of the right sidebar with new panels, revised main site navigation menu, and a new footer featuring a change log of recently edited pages.

Version 2.0
Version 2.0Debut: 01 May 2013

Based on the Version 1 layout, the main functionality components have been updated as described above.

Primary Changes: First Release
Version 2.1
Version 2.1Debut: 17 January 2014

Replaced the feature character image in the website banner, updated sidebar user panel and news post styles, and revised the bottom page navigation.

Primary Changes: News stylings and user panel functionality
Version 2.2
Version 2.2Debut: 17 June 2015

Revised internal components of the main site navigation menu, including section descriptions, links, and images.

Primary Changes: Main site navigation menu styling and functionality
Version 2.3
Version 2.3Debut: 13 February 2016

Unveiled new website logo and favicon image, which were carried across the entire network of sites. Added “Podcast” to the network links in the left side of the website banner.

Primary Changes: Updated branding
Version 2.4
Version 2.4Debut: 01 April 2016

Updated sidebar, compiling the “News”, “Content”, and “Podcast” panels into a single tabbed container, as well as moving the upcoming episode preview to the sidebar. Added “Latest News” ticker and updated news post styles.

Primary Changes: Sidebar functionality
Version 2.5
Version 2.5Debut: 28 April 2017

Updated the website footer, began minor implementation of new CSS3 and HTML5 features, revised the bottom page navigation, and widened the main content area.

Primary Changes: Footer styling and site coding updates
Version 2.6
Version 2.6Debut: 17 November 2017

Replaced the feature character image in the website banner with Bulma in honor of Hiromi Tsuru’s passing.

Primary Changes: Minor styling alteration

Version 3: “Omni” Design

With the Dragon Ball Super TV series in full swing, it became clear that some upgrades were needed to the website, especially as the number of mobile visitors continued to soar. While the main focus of Version 2 was content presentation, the goal of Version 3 was to increase the user interface and cement a more robust mobile user experience around the site’s content. However, as older versions were not built with mobile use in mind, this version was developed as a complete rebuild and was entirely recoded from the ground up.

Version 3.0
Version 3.0Debut: 01 April 2022

A complete rebuild based on the Version 2 layout, although in appearance only. This is the first layout to utilize original banner artwork designed exclusively for Kanzenshuu by @saber_breaker.

Primary Changes: First Release
«
»