My ideas for a Dragon Ball Cinematic Universe

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SouthoftheForest
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My ideas for a Dragon Ball Cinematic Universe

Post by SouthoftheForest » Wed Oct 06, 2021 4:26 am

Hi all,

This is my first post on this forum, although I have been lurking in the shadows for a long, long time. I have been a DB fan for 20 years, and I really like discussing some ideas with you.

I have been thinking about this a lot, but I think DB would make for a great cinematic universe - comparable with the likes of Marvel. Yes, I know adapting manga into cinema is a challenge (to say the least), and I know about the failure that is DB Evolution. But please stay with me.

However, I do think DB has all the ingredients for a great cinematic universe. It has many characters and story lines, filled with magic, different races and planets, gods, different realms of existence, artifacts, science, lore, etc. All the things Marvel has too.

Furthermore, there is a lot of source material to draw from. Manga, anime, movies, games, etc. All things that work from different media can be used to construct a larger cinematic universe.

There are a few disadvantages DB has, and the main ones are that it is Goku-centric and a little repetitive. MCU has many different protagonists and is much more diverse in general, so a universe as big as the MCU is a bit much to ask for. However, I think we can make up something. All we need is some creativity, imagination, and, granted, a little creative license.

Below, I will explain my ideas.

Main themes.
A cinematic story line with multiple films needs to have an overarching plot, in order for the separate entries to be connected. Dragon ball, of course, has many larger story lines. Separate entries can set up plot elements for future movies. I think the main overarching story lines can be:

- The History of the Saiyan race: a story line centered on space travel, destiny, Goku’s heroes journey, Vegeta’s redemption, etc. This story line includes everything involving SSJ, Frieza, Bardock, and maybe even Super Saiyan God and Beerus. But also Golden Frieza, Broly and Tuffles.

- The boy from the future: a story line focused on time travel, science, technology, Trunks, androids, etc. This story line includes everything involving Red Ribbon Army, Future Trunks, Androids, Cell and even Zamasu. We could also add some elements from Xenoverse.

- Battle of Gods: this storyline focuses on our heroes meeting all kinds of deities, gods and demons, like Korin, Kami, Piccolo, Kaio and Kaioshin, Dabura, Buu, etc. Main characteristics of this plot line are magic, other planes of existence, afterlife, surpassing gods etc.

- The corruption of the Dragon Balls: not so much a separate story, but a recurring theme. Although I think DBGT is flawed in its execution, I do think it’s main principle is actually great: when our heroes are over relying on the dragon balls, they have to pay a price in the end. I would like to include such an element in my cinematic universe. It makes the dragon balls less of a deus ex machina, and it makes the stakes higher.

- Rivalry between Goku and Vegeta: throughout the story, Goku and Vegeta have the familiar rivalry we know from the manga. They start out as polar opposites (low born and prince) and will continue to have a love/hate relationship throughout the Saiyan, Frieza, Cell and Buu arcs. This rivalry will be resolved in the (pen)ultimate battle against Zamasu (see below), where they have to become Vegito and finally work together.

- Ragnarok: throughout the story, there will be talks about a prophecy, describing an end-of-the-word like event in which all of existence will be destroyed. Legend foretells a Saiyan being the cause of this apocalypse. This prophecy will be one of the reasons for Frieza to destroy planet Vegeta (of course, his own fears of being overthrown play a major part too), making Frieza some kind of anti-villain (like Thanos). Throughout the story, people (in and out of universe) will think of either Goku, Vegeta or even Broly to be the prophesied angel of destruction. In the end, it turns out to be Goku Black/Zamasu and our heroes are actually the ones to save the galaxy.

Of course, these main plot lines are overlapping each other. I see them culminating in one big endgame like event: a battle between the legendary Super Saiyan God Vegito and the ultimate evil deity from the future (Zamasu, obviously). This cataclysm is the result of all the above mentioned plot lines and will result in the destruction of all life in the universe. Only Goku’s ultimate sacrifice (a la the resolution of DBGT) will restore order. But at the cost of Goku’s life and the dragon balls.

Below, I explain which movies I think can happen. I would built up my cinematic universe like this.

1. Path to Power: like the title says, a movie based on the 10th anniversary special. This movie introduces our protagonists, the dragon world, the dragon balls and the RR Army (which will continue to play a major role). We could even add Dr Gero to the story, foreshadowing the Androids and Cell arcs. I would add a prologue in which the destruction of planet Vegeta is depicted, through the eyes of the likes of Frieza and Beerus and their interpretation of the Super Saiyan of legends and the prophecy of Ragnarok. Goku, Vegeta and Broly are introduced too. The prologue sets the story in motion, and sets up the larger story.

2. Demon King Piccolo: this movie is an adaptation of the TB22 and Piccolo arcs. Our heroes face Piccolo the Demon King and on their way, they are introduced to Gods like Kami. The movie ends with Goku killing Piccolo, but not before Piccolo reincarnates himself. Our heroes are preparing for an eventual next encounter with Piccolo.

3. Vegeta origin movie: we need some creative license here. This movie introduces Vegeta, Raditz, Nappa and a few other surviving Saiyans in their quest to overthrow Frieza. During the movie, the Saiyans conquer a planet where they face great resistance of the natives. These natives are based on the Tuffles and have captains like Dr Raichi and Baby. They use weird, dark magic-like techniques (like possessing enemies) or using illusions (for instance an illusion of Frieza or King Vegeta, making this movie about Vegeta’s inner demons). The Saiyans are victorious in the end, but at the costs of the lives of the other surviving Saiyans. They are possessed by the Tuffles, and Vegeta had to kill them to be victorious. After the loss of their comrades, they decide to try to recruit Goku.

4. Saiyan Saga: the next movie is an adaption of the Saiyan Saga, introducing characters like Gohan, King Kai and more Saiyan lore. The planet Namek is mentioned for the first time. Goku is an adult now, and teams up with Piccolo jr. The movie ends just as the Saiyan saga does in the manga, with our heroes venturing to Namek. In an epilogue, Frieza is reintroduced, setting up an eventual encounter with the Galactic emperor.

5. Disaster on Namek: this is the second movie where we need to have some creative license, since it’s an original story (based on source material, of course). This movie introduces us to the Planet Namek before the cataclysm. Over the course of the story, we follow the original Child of Kataz and his life on Namek and Earth, facing inner and outer demons like Garlic jr. and Piccolo the Demon King. The movie ends with Kami creating the dragon balls. The point of this movie is introducing more lore about Namek (which we will visit next) and the dragon balls. This is the first instance where we learn about the negative consequences of overuse of the dragon balls, foreshadowing a Shadow Dragon like storyline in the far future.

6. Legend of the Super Saiyan: mainly an adaption of the Namek/Frieza arc. Our heroes search for the dragon balls on Namek, face Vegeta and Frieza and eventually team up with Vegeta. Goku turns SSJ, fulfilling the legend, defeats Frieza and Namek gets destroyed. The movie ends with Goku being lost, somewhere in space.

7. Bardock, father of Goku: the first phase ends with a movie that functions as a bridge between the first phase (about the legendary SSJ) and second phase (about time travel). This movie takes elements from the Bardock special, DB minus and Episode of Bardock. The movie tells the story of Bardock, a Saiyan who foresees the destruction of planet Vegeta. He fails to stop Frieza, and gets warped back in time. There, he faces Frieza’s ancestor. He defeats him while turning Super Saiyan, thus creating the legend of the SSJ in the first place. The movie ends with Bardock meeting Chronoa, the God of Time, explaining to him that Bardock caused the first temporal paradox. This sets up the next phase, which is mainly about time travel.

8. History of Trunks: this story starts with Frieza and Cold arriving on Earth, with Goku there to stop them. Later, Goku dies of the heart virus. The Trunks special unfolds as we know. The androids arrive, kill everyone, Gohan trains Trunks, etc. The story ends with Trunks going back in time and defeating Frieza and Cold.

9. Cell Games: basically the story of the Androids and Cell arcs we know form the manga. Trunks arrives in the past, helps our heroes defeating the Androids and Cell. The story ends with Goku sacrificing himself, Gohan taking up his mantle and Trunks defeating Cell in his time line. Here, we can have Chronoa make her second appearance. She warns Trunks about causing many temporal paradoxes, just as she warned Bardock two movies earlier.

10. Majin Buu: the Buu arc. Kaioshin comes to earth, warning our heroes about Buu. Everything proceeds as we know. The main point of this movie is that our heroes (mainly Goku, and to a lesser extent Vegeta) are able to achieve God like powers in order to defeat Majin Buu. I think its best not to include Vegito (yet). The rivalry between Goku and Vegeta will be resolved in movie 13. The movie ends on a cliff hanger, with Goku watched over by Beerus. Beerus starts to fear that Goku or Vegeta are actually the ones that cause Ragnarok

11. Broly - the Super Saiyan of Destruction. Another movie that is loosely based on source material. A few surviving Tuffles regroup, and discover the existence of Broly, a lone wolf with unimaginable powers. The Tuffles fear his power, and decide to resurrect Frieza - the only being they know of who was able to defeat Saiyans. They collect the dragon balls on New Namek, and resurrect him. Frieza, who is able to turn Golden Frieza, joins the Tuffles. Battle with Broly starts. Goku, Vegeta and Piccolo are warned by the Namekians, and join the battle. First, the three of them defeat Frieza and the Tuffles. In an epic conclusion, Broly loses his mind and turns into a blind rage. Through trickery (mafuba) our heroes imprison an all powerful Broly.

12. Battle of Gods: With Broly imprisoned, an opportunistic Beerus - who is by now convinced that Broly is the bringer of Ragnarok - decides to train Goku and Vegeta, aiming at achieving Super Saiyan God. Beerus has some old scores to settle, and he needs strong warriors. Beerus recruits both Goku and Vegeta, so that he has a team to fight in some kind of multiversal godlike tournament (based on both the Champa and Tournament of Power arcs). During the tournament, Goku and Vegeta surpass Godlike power leves. The tournament also causes further rifts in the fabric of the multiverse.

13. Zamasu Arc: After hearing about Goku being able to surpass the gods, Zamasu sets his zero mortal plan in motion as we know form DB Super. Here, we are being reintroduced to Trunks and his timeline. Trunks goes back in time again, to ask Goku and Vegeta for their help. They gladly accept, and accompany him to his time line were they are able to defeat Zamasu. But the damage done by Zamasu is great, almost all living beings are dead. Our heroes collect the dragon balls to bring them back. This is the Ragnarok like event that was foretold. Broly is released from his imprisonment.

14. Shadow Dragon Arc: Our heroes wish to restore the damage done by Zamasu, by using the dragon balls. That backfires, as our heroes were over relying on the dragon balls. Furthermore, all the temporal rifts have created instability. The shadow dragons emerge, breaking down reality and existence. Our heroes fight and defeat the shadow dragons, but at a great cost: Goku has to sacrifice himself and the dragon balls in order to restore order (based on the ending of GT). Broly learns to control his powers and is instrumental in defeating the shadow dragons. Vegeta and Broly carry on the Saiyan legacy.

That's how far I came. I an still a little unsure about the Vegeta origin story and the Broly plot line. I like Broly, both for being a red herring for Ragnarok and for the fact that he can be a third companion to Goku and Vegeta. Without him, the story works too I think.

What do you guys and girls think? Looking forward to discussing a potential Dragon Ball Cinematic Universe, thanks in advance!

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Xeogran
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Re: My ideas for a Dragon Ball Cinematic Universe

Post by Xeogran » Wed Oct 06, 2021 7:00 am

Just don't repeat the same arcs because people would get bored. Things like History of Trunks, BoG or Zamasu arc don't need to be retold, especially not with full movies all over again.

SouthoftheForest
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Re: My ideas for a Dragon Ball Cinematic Universe

Post by SouthoftheForest » Wed Oct 06, 2021 9:01 am

Xeogran wrote: Wed Oct 06, 2021 7:00 am Just don't repeat the same arcs because people would get bored.
Thanks for your reply. I don’t get it though. Are you saying that a theoretical DB live action movie shouldn’t be an adaption of existing work, because people would get bored by something they already know? I don’t agree with that.

With the same logic, you could argue that there is no need for movies based on existing IP in general. No Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter-movies because there are books already that cover the same story. Or no games based on books or shows. The great many (repetitive) Dragon ball games out there prove that there is a market for new interpretations of existing stories.

Heck, even the DB and DBZ animes are adaptions.
Last edited by SouthoftheForest on Wed Oct 06, 2021 10:11 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Saiya6Cit
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Re: My ideas for a Dragon Ball Cinematic Universe

Post by Saiya6Cit » Wed Oct 06, 2021 9:03 am

Welcome brother. It's a nice topic of discussion.

I've been saying the same thing for years: If marvel comics got it, dragon ball can get it. On my Devianart I once posted a journal that said this:

"Ok, disney if you are reading this.... if you don't want to screw the new dragon ball live action movie you should do the following.
*Have a all asian cast. We don't want famous guys, just someone who can act decently.
*Don't try to say all dragon ball and dragon ball Z story in one movie, make it a trilogy at least.
*Start dragon ball story since Freezer and mostly the Cold Family galactic empire times, before he would even destroy the Vegeta Planet. Give bigger roles to the saiyans like Bardock, Radditz and Nappa.

Invest good money on props and make up, we have the technology to make Piccolo look great, look at the characters in gardians of the galaxy for example.
Have freaking good music composer.

Any dragon ball out there reading this, give your own ideas, let's make this list bigger. They did a good job with the Avengers, why not with our beloved Dragon Ball? let's Bury deep down dragon ball evolution, let's bury it in a desert like that E.T. videogame. Thanks for reading"

Now I think the biggest problem would be to get fans to agree on where and how to continue after Cell saga... I mean... taking Super in consideration? the way I see you did. And what about Original DB? I mean I would like the story to start at DBZ times because DBZ is what got the franchise global success. But that's just my opinion, let's not forget that.

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Xeogran
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Re: My ideas for a Dragon Ball Cinematic Universe

Post by Xeogran » Wed Oct 06, 2021 9:06 am

SouthoftheForest wrote: Wed Oct 06, 2021 9:01 am Thanks for your reply. I don’t get it though. Are you saying that a theoretical DB live action movie shouldn’t be an adaption of existing work, because people would get bored by something they already know? I don’t agree with that.

With the same logic, you could argue that there is no need for movies based on existing IP in general. No Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter-movies because there are books already that cover the same story. Or no games based on books or shows. The great many (repetitive) Dragon ball games out there prove that there is a market for new interpretations of existing stories.

Heck, even the DB and DBZ anime’s are adaptions.
Your comparison is quite flawed, because DB already is a manga that has been adapted to anime. Heck, Battle of Gods and Ressurection of F was even done like thrice already (Movie, Anime, Manga). There's no need to adapt one anime into another one just for the sake of it.

Imagine telling the fanbase to wait a whole year just to watch a History of Trunks retelling or something.

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Re: My ideas for a Dragon Ball Cinematic Universe

Post by SouthoftheForest » Wed Oct 06, 2021 9:49 am

Saiya6Cit wrote: Wed Oct 06, 2021 9:03 am Now I think the biggest problem would be to get fans to agree on where and how to continue after Cell saga... I mean... taking Super in consideration? the way I see you did. And what about Original DB? I mean I would like the story to start at DBZ times because DBZ is what got the franchise global success. But that's just my opinion, let's not forget that.
Agreed. Frieza and the coming of the Super Saiyan is a natural apotheoses. It’s not difficult to come up with a interconnected story all the way from Goku’s birth to the defeat of Frieza. Androids/Cell Saga is unique too, with time travel, dystopian futures etc. After that, most villains are just more powerful versions of each other.

That’s why I decided to write towards an epic conclusion, that resolves all story elements like Legend of the Super Saiyan, achieving Godhood, overuse of the Dragon Balls and Time travel. With some creative license, other stories can fit into this frame.

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Yuji
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Re: My ideas for a Dragon Ball Cinematic Universe

Post by Yuji » Wed Oct 06, 2021 10:20 am

I think multiple subseries focusing on the different aspects of the lore will be the way to go in the future once Toriyama retires. I don't doubt Toyotarou will handle the main Goku & co plot while Toei will handle various subseries focusing on fan favorites like Freeza, Bardock, Trunks and so on. This would all be animated though, I doubt we'll ever have a live action universe.

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Re: My ideas for a Dragon Ball Cinematic Universe

Post by SouthoftheForest » Thu Oct 07, 2021 5:26 am

Yuji wrote: Wed Oct 06, 2021 10:20 am I think multiple subseries focusing on the different aspects of the lore will be the way to go in the future once Toriyama retires. I don't doubt Toyotarou will handle the main Goku & co plot while Toei will handle various subseries focusing on fan favorites like Freeza, Bardock, Trunks and so on. This would all be animated though, I doubt we'll ever have a live action universe.
I doubt that too, but I think it would be a missed opportunity. As someone said earlier, if Marvel can do it so can Dragon Ball. Admittedly, Marvel has a lot more source material to draw from. Still, DB is huge.

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Re: My ideas for a Dragon Ball Cinematic Universe

Post by Yuji » Fri Oct 08, 2021 6:21 am

SouthoftheForest wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 5:26 am
Yuji wrote: Wed Oct 06, 2021 10:20 am I think multiple subseries focusing on the different aspects of the lore will be the way to go in the future once Toriyama retires. I don't doubt Toyotarou will handle the main Goku & co plot while Toei will handle various subseries focusing on fan favorites like Freeza, Bardock, Trunks and so on. This would all be animated though, I doubt we'll ever have a live action universe.
I doubt that too, but I think it would be a missed opportunity. As someone said earlier, if Marvel can do it so can Dragon Ball. Admittedly, Marvel has a lot more source material to draw from. Still, DB is huge.
Dragon Ball can do it but Marvel only did it because it had a bigger budget to pull from. DB's revenue is nothing to scoff at but unless it's all allocated towards this singular purpose, I doubt it will get the necessary marketing and attention to make it a powerhouse in the film industry.

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Re: My ideas for a Dragon Ball Cinematic Universe

Post by KingVegetto » Fri Oct 08, 2021 3:44 pm

I've been wanting a DBZ cinematic universe for quite some time and I like this idea quite a bit.

SouthoftheForest
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Re: My ideas for a Dragon Ball Cinematic Universe

Post by SouthoftheForest » Sun Oct 10, 2021 4:21 am

KingVegetto wrote: Fri Oct 08, 2021 3:44 pm I've been wanting a DBZ cinematic universe for quite some time and I like this idea quite a bit.
Thanks! I am still trying to improve my general idea. Not everything works in a live action movie (I am still doubting on the many SSJ forms for example - probably best to keep things simple and only introduce SSJ and SSJGSSJ)

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