General "Canon/Filler" Debate/Discussion

[Grimlock]

Neither of Cooler movies fitting in the anime timeline. Movie 5 would be almost fine, if Gohan didn't have a tail and looked older than he was. Also Goku was having too much difficulty turning SSJ in there.

I subscribe to what MasenkoHA said. Sometimes things are done for the sake of drama or for whatever other plot device. None of those things strike as a major contradiction in the grand scheme of things, to be honest. And seeing as the movies take place in another dimension, these differences/details are what set them apart from the "main continuity", but still within the logic applied and seen before in the series.

[ABED]

It's not like we WANT them, but that's just the easiest way to explain away everything that was made separate from the manga like the first 17 DB films, filler, & other stuff. It's the current official stance of the franchise anyways, so it's not like it's coming out of nowhere. Especially as they're cherry-picking things to reboot in the main one they depict nowadays.

Or we can accept that these things don't have to line up or explained or be in some sort of canon or continuity. Does everything not happening in some sort of continuity really bother anyone?

[Psajdak]

Such as?

I don't know.

Ask Toriyama, and Toei.

[ABED]

Such as?

I don't know.

Ask Toriyama, and Toei.

That's an evasion. Clearly you see potential in alternate realities and you can't name one hypothetical example? If you don't actually know or can't think of anything, there is no potential.

[Scsigs]

Such as?

I don't know.

Ask Toriyama, and Toei.

That's an evasion. Clearly you see potential in alternate realities and you can't name one hypothetical example? If you don't actually know or can't think of anything, there is no potential.

If I can offer one, the Star Trek '09 pre-boot-squel, which spun off a new timeline so they could soft reboot the franchise in a time when it was in a coma after 2+ decades of TV shows & movies. I know some people don't like that film series, but I liked a lot of what they did, minus Into Darkness, which had a lot going for it...until it devolved into being Wrath of Khan towards the end.

[ABED]

So your grand idea is for an animated show to use alternate realities so it can do a slightly different version of what it did decades ago?

[emperior]

I completely agree on every point ABED has brought up in his last posts here. It makes no sense to try and connect to the main story the stuff that they created with the purpose of not being connected to the main story.
At best they can ask Toriyama to reboot some movie antagonists like he did with Broly, if Toriyama has any interest in doing another “canonization”.

And it’s silly to suggest new ideas if you have no idea how you would handle your own concept in the first place.
Also, why the heck should they even reboot a series such as Dragon Ball in the first place? It’s arc-by-arc structure is such that it needs no reboot, as it can easily change things up with a new arc.

[Scsigs]

So your grand idea is for an animated show to use alternate realities so it can do a slightly different version of what it did decades ago?

I mean, we can also go with what Rick & Morty does with alternate realities/timelines where it uses them for storytelling & character development of the titular characters.
And, I wasn't arguing that's what Dragon Ball needs to do or anything, though it already does with Heroes. My point with saying everything not in the manga, the last 3 movies, or Super is an alternate reality is to say that that's most likely what the filler or earlier movie material is, since it has very little bearing on later material because, y'know, it's not from Toriyama himself.

[SuperSaiyaManZ94]

So your grand idea is for an animated show to use alternate realities so it can do a slightly different version of what it did decades ago?

I mean, we can also go with what Rick & Morty does with alternate realities/timelines where it uses them for storytelling & character development of the titular characters. And, I wasn't arguing that's what Dragon Ball needs to do or anything, though it already does with Heroes. My point with saying everything not in the manga, the last 3 movies, or Super is an alternate reality is to say that that's most likely what the filler or earlier movie material is, since it has very little bearing on later material because, y'know, it's not from Toriyama himself.

For the most part, i see the earlier Z movies pre Battle of Gods as more or less what-if type of deals which happen to contain elements of certain arcs that were concurrently airing on TV at the time of release. Now the three DB films on the other hand, those i would say especially with Sleeping Princess and Mystical Adventure to be more like alternate universe given how much different they are in adapting the manga's events with going off in their own direction story wise. The only ones of the former that could even come close to fitting is movie 1, since it is clearly intended to take place at some point prior to Raditz's arrival on Earth in the first episode (though there is that discrepancy about Gohan) then actually gets brought back with the Garlic Jr. arc and possibly movie 12 since it does sort of align with the Majin Boo arc in the sense that Goku and Vegeta are both in the Next World and the Fusion technique having already been introduced by the point of the film's release.

As for the majority of the rest, they just have too many differences to really be placed in the same overall continuity as the manga's and anime's events.

[Dbzfan94]

So your grand idea is for an animated show to use alternate realities so it can do a slightly different version of what it did decades ago?

I mean, we can also go with what Rick & Morty does with alternate realities/timelines where it uses them for storytelling & character development of the titular characters. And, I wasn't arguing that's what Dragon Ball needs to do or anything, though it already does with Heroes. My point with saying everything not in the manga, the last 3 movies, or Super is an alternate reality is to say that that's most likely what the filler or earlier movie material is, since it has very little bearing on later material because, y'know, it's not from Toriyama himself.

For the most part, i see the earlier Z movies pre Battle of Gods as more or less what-if type of deals which happen to contain elements of certain arcs that were concurrently airing on TV at the time of release. Now the three DB films on the other hand, those i would say especially with Sleeping Princess and Mystical Adventure to be more like alternate universe given how much different they are in adapting the manga's events with going off in their own direction story wise. The only ones of the former that could even come close to fitting is movie 1, since it is clearly intended to take place at some point prior to Raditz's arrival on Earth in the first episode (though there is that discrepancy about Gohan) then actually gets brought back with the Garlic Jr. arc and possibly movie 12 since it does sort of align with the Majin Boo arc in the sense that Goku and Vegeta are both in the Next World and the Fusion technique having already been introduced by the point of the film's release.

As for the majority of the rest, they just have too many differences to really be placed in the same overall continuity as the manga's and anime's events.

Bojack Unbound and Wrath of the Dragon can fit in almost perfectly.

[SuperSaiyaManZ94]

I mean, we can also go with what Rick & Morty does with alternate realities/timelines where it uses them for storytelling & character development of the titular characters. And, I wasn't arguing that's what Dragon Ball needs to do or anything, though it already does with Heroes. My point with saying everything not in the manga, the last 3 movies, or Super is an alternate reality is to say that that's most likely what the filler or earlier movie material is, since it has very little bearing on later material because, y'know, it's not from Toriyama himself.

For the most part, i see the earlier Z movies pre Battle of Gods as more or less what-if type of deals which happen to contain elements of certain arcs that were concurrently airing on TV at the time of release. Now the three DB films on the other hand, those i would say especially with Sleeping Princess and Mystical Adventure to be more like alternate universe given how much different they are in adapting the manga's events with going off in their own direction story wise. The only ones of the former that could even come close to fitting is movie 1, since it is clearly intended to take place at some point prior to Raditz's arrival on Earth in the first episode (though there is that discrepancy about Gohan) then actually gets brought back with the Garlic Jr. arc and possibly movie 12 since it does sort of align with the Majin Boo arc in the sense that Goku and Vegeta are both in the Next World and the Fusion technique having already been introduced by the point of the film's release.

As for the majority of the rest, they just have too many differences to really be placed in the same overall continuity as the manga's and anime's events.

Bojack Unbound and Wrath of the Dragon can fit in almost perfectly.

I forgot about those two, they indeed fit with the Cell and Buu arcs without too many contradictions or discrepancies to the manga/anime either.

[Scsigs]

Bojack Unbound and Wrath of the Dragon can fit in almost perfectly.

Mostly because they got lucky with a timeskip in between arcs for Bojack & the series was coming to an end with Dragon. However, they're still part of the non-serial movies that weren't even trying to fit into canon. Like, they saw how the manga was going when they wrote them & were able to write them around them. Any time where a movie mostly can fit into the timeline, especially years later when the series came to an end, is one they got lucky on, but were mostly never intending on doing, which explains the blatant continuity errors, retcons, asspulls, & everything else in the movies.

[Peach]

Garlic Jr is canon, right? He was the first movie, and he had a season in the show...

[ABED]

I can't speak to Rick and Morty, but I did see how they used alt realities on The Flash and while fun in the early going it got boring after a while. Alternate realities feel like a way to do big things like kill off characters without having consequences in the main reality.

[MasenkoHA]

Garlic Jr is canon, right? He was the first movie, and he had a season in the show...

Yes, but no.

The first Dragon Ball Z movie does not fit with the series, plain and simple. It has to take place after Goku's friends know about Gohan but before Raditz arrives and kidnaps him which is of course impossible. He still shows up in the anime for his own arc with the events of the movie having happened. Maron, who is introduced in that arc, also shows up later during the Cyborg saga for some anime exclusive padding.

Same thing with movie 3. It's even more removed from the series than movie 1 but it introduces Hiya Dragon who shows up later in the series with the understanding the audience already knows who the character is.

This is why fretting over canon is a fool's errand.

[ABED]

I feel like there's a segment of the audience judges stories like they're RPG's. Stories aren't games, they don't need fully consistent logical rules to work.

[Scsigs]

Garlic Jr is canon, right? He was the first movie, and he had a season in the show...

No. His movie wasn't written by Toriyama & it has a few discontinuities with the main storyline. His seasons of the show was written as filler, so it's not a part of the manga's storyline, nor is he ever referred to again. Generally, if you need to ask what's canon, look at a list of what Kai either cut out of Z or what they didn't cut out for it as well.

[Dbzfan94]

Bojack Unbound and Wrath of the Dragon can fit in almost perfectly.

Mostly because they got lucky with a timeskip in between arcs for Bojack & the series was coming to an end with Dragon. However, they're still part of the non-serial movies that weren't even trying to fit into canon. Like, they saw how the manga was going when they wrote them & were able to write them around them. Any time where a movie mostly can fit into the timeline, especially years later when the series came to an end, is one they got lucky on, but were mostly never intending on doing, which explains the blatant continuity errors, retcons, asspulls, & everything else in the movies.

Jesus Christ, who hurt you? I’m more than aware of all that, I’m not dumb. Not sure why you responded this way or even made this reply at all. Plus, who cares if it wasn’t intended or they “got lucky”? It still fits.

[Scsigs]

Jesus Christ, who hurt you? I’m more than aware of all that, I’m not dumb. Not sure why you responded this way or even made this reply at all. Plus, who cares if it wasn’t intended or they “got lucky”? It still fits.

I didn't type that in a bad mood, I was just pointing that out. Why are you assuming my tone so negatively?