DB and DBZ: Parts vs Whole

[BlazingFiddlesticks]

Well, I own Z, I do not own Dragon Ball. I guess that shows where I stand; I do not think I am attached enough to the first six arcs as a whole to feel compelled. Should probably nab the 21st (and thus the first arc, with Funimation's Seasons) and 23rd Tournaments, at least.

Thinking back to when I watched the Toonami airings, though, I never went into Dragon Ball with the idea that it was on "borrowed time", as if everything it did had to play into setting up the Z era in some way. I just let the earlier stories do their own thing and half the time I absolutely loved it. Though it certainly helped that I did not follow DBZ regularly until the Other World Tournament and Buu; you were in effect watching the series go back to its roots for twenty minutes and then experiencing the bygone days for the first time for next twenty minutes!

[Shiyonasan]

Don't get me wrong, the first half has iconic moments as well. Most notably Goku punching a hole through Piccolo Daimao. But comparing the two, it''s clear that the original DB never reaches the same heights that Z reaches. Why do you feel that is? Do feel that may also be the reason why most people gloss over the first part of the series?

As many have already said on here, I think most people prefer Dragon Ball Z because of the action element in it (putting aside nostalgia). Yeah, sure, Dragon Ball has action too, but Z brought that action to another level with it's own style of fighting. Dragon Ball has the movie-like martial arts style of fighting mixed with the energy beams and fast movement in it. Z, on the other hand, focused more on the mid-air, god-like battles with everything about the battles being brought to a higher level than Dragon Ball did. I think that intrigued people a lot because, to my knowledge, there wasn't a series with battles like Dragon Ball Z had beforehand (not counting Dragon Ball). I suppose you could count Superman or one of the superhero shows, but even then, Dragon Ball Z went into a league of its own (no pun intended). People liked and still like the battles in Z because they are so absurdly actiony.

Plus, Dragon Ball was more about gags (at least early on) than Dragon Ball Z was. Dragon Ball Z has humor too, but I think it balances the humor and action in a way that pleases more people than Dragon Ball does. I think people who have only seen Z would enjoy the Tenshinhan arc to the 23rd Tenkaichi Budokai arc because it does have more action than humor in it. A lot of people love a good fight, and late Dragon Ball into Dragon Ball Z arguably provides those good fights.

I can't speak for everyone though since there were a lot of people who did enjoy watching Dragon Ball on Toonami as much as Dragon Ball Z (including myself), but I guess Z had more of a lasting impact on people because it did have more action than humor, but still had enough humor in it for people to like.

For the record, I do enjoy Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z evenly and don't really prefer one over the other.

[sintzu]

I'm of the opinion that if you think the 1st part of the story is just supplementary, not only do have a very warped view of Dragon Ball, but you probably are blind to its themes and character arcs.

I love DB and will always watch it before Kai but to me it feels like Z's part of the story was written to stand on it's own rather then be a direct sequel to DB which it probably wasn't but it just turned out that way.

[Kuririn Fan]

Z has everything that fans love about the franchise.

It has the epic battles, the fan favorite characters, the classic moments & the transformations.

To me the original DB feels like a prequel that was written after Z. does anyone who's seen Z 1st see it like that as well ? a prequel that isn't required to watch before Z ?

It doesnt feel like a prequel at all, you only say that because you saw Z before DB. You can see natural story and character progression from the first hunt for dbs to the 23rd tenkaichi final moments and Saiyan arc feels natural next step after that, not te mention its not a prequel at all in the first place, 1-519 are all one fucking story with first half being much better than the second one, saiyan arc being the peak of the whole franchise. Freeza, Cell, Boo arcs are good ofc, i like them, but you can see that it was going because of the popularity, with endless transformations and fights and all that. Mystical adventure mixed with martial arts of the first half is unbeatable for me.

[sintzu]

You can see natural story and character progression from the first hunt for dbs to the 23rd tenkaichi final moments and Saiyan arc feels natural next step after that, not to mention its not a prequel at all in the first place, 1-519 are all one fucking story.

I know that I'm just saying that the 2nd half of the story (Z) is written in a way that makes it feel like it's it's own thing that doesn't require watching or reading what came before it.

Which is why I think Toie changed the anime's name when they reached that point because they felt like it could stand on it's own and it does.

Does that mean I like DB any less ? of course not, it's still a great story weather it's watched before or after Z or even on it's own because like Z it tells it's own story that doesn't require watching what comes after it.

[MozillaVulpix]

I honestly do enjoy the Z-era more than Dragon Ball, even if the earlier sections had more of a coherent story and better foreshadowing.

Obviously, in terms of pure scale, the Z-era outclasses Dragon Ball by a huge margin. That's one thing that still makes DBZ stand out from the countless other shonen action series out there. There aren't many other series where "destroying a planet" becomes a relatively simple feat halfway through the series. It's what got the Western fanbase interested in the series in the first place, and it's the thing that Toei and Toriyama are still focusing on in their newer materials.

That, and Dragon Ball has a much larger focus on gag humour, which makes the situations a lot less believable, and thus a lot less relatable.

Let's put it this way: Dragon Ball may have an objectively better story, but there's a reason people still focus on the Z-era. It's not just that "everyone in the world has terrible taste". It's that the Z-era did things with its story and characters that people really connected to. I don't think its success is purely because the Z-era had a larger focus on individual, climactic moments.

[LowRyder2005]

In Europe, for one, we got Dragon Ball first. And I think it was great, because it gave everyone a chance to grow up with the series like it was probably intended to. After all, Z is supposed to be darker and grittier because you, the original Dragon Ball viewer, are supposed to be older.
I remember, back when I was a little one, that I was totally engrossed in Dragon Ball way before Z, which only contributed to set the bar even higher with the Saiyan Arc in particular (I was in the later years of elementary school by that point). Good memories.

[Draconic]

Half of the punch the Z era has doesn't exist if you don't watch/read the story from the beggining. Goku is an alien? Zero impact. Goku has to team up with Piccolo? Zero impact. All the fighters get killed? Zero impact, which in turn makes the Namek saga hard to care for, since you don't care about the characters who are to be ressurected, since that is the ultimate goal. Piccolo fusing with Kami? That conflict pretty much doesn't exist (especially in the manga, where there are no flashbacks and the such).

Watching Z without experiencing the first portion of the series, in my opinion, can't allow you to truly enjoy the series above anything other than a superficial level. Yes, the latter half has much more iconic moments, but those pack less impact if you don't care about the characters.

The coherence of the story present in the first half allows you to go wild in Z, which is pretty much what Toriyama did. I mean, Goku literally dies in the 5th (?) episode of Z and by the next one, everybody is all like "well, we will bring him back anyway". Pretty shitty way to start a series, if you ask me, since that ruins all the stakes latter portions of the series would have, especially for something going for action. However, if you watch the less serious first half of the story, you understand that this world is not about the action or the stakes, but for having weird guys put in even weirder situations, so the lack of stakes is excused by that.

To summarize: From a writing stand point, watching only half of the Dragon Ball story kinda ruins what already is the poorly written part of it making it even less enaging.

[ABED]

I mean, I like Dragon Ball (anime), but it's not that particularly exciting or interesting to me. It simply doesn't warrant a rewatch (I've watched the important parts of the series twice). The best part of Dragon Ball is the Piccolo saga. Guess what? This is the saga that most closely resembles DBZ, and whenever people claim DBZ has no differences from DB, they use the last arc as an example as though it encompasses 100% of the series, which it does not.

If Toriyama had split DB and DBZ in his original manga, I feel many people who view them as one story (i.e. not halves of each other) would not. The distinctions between the two halves are as clear as day, even if they are completely unintentional, and the split makes perfect sense imo.

Who claimed it's not different? That's not been the issue people bring up. Our point of contention is simply that they aren't so radically different that it justifies treating them like they are two completely different shows. The show changed over time. It's not like Z doesn't change either. Toriyama introduces some scifi elements, but it still goes back to mysticism. The show's lineage is apparent even to the end. The changes happened gradually. It's not like all the changes happened in DB and then Z was either a radical departure or never changed. That part of the story had a lot of differences as well.

[Soppa Saia People]

Since a lot of people are bringing the action in Z, does anybody else feel like Dragon Ball has better fights and Z has better action ? I hate the fights in Z and I love almost all the fights in Dragon Ball.

[Shiyonasan]

Since a lot of people are bringing the action in Z, does anybody else feel like Dragon Ball has better fights and Z has better action ?

Yes. I think the choreography of the fights in Dragon Ball are superior to the ones in Z. Goku vs. Tenshinhan, for example, I think is one of the better fights in any series of Dragon Ball. It seems like at that point in the series, the fights are more interesting because how powerful characters are is not entirely contingent on transformations and also because the gap between power levels is a lot smaller. First-time watchers probably have a harder time predicting who will win fights in Dragon Ball for those reasons. Plus, you have more variety in who fights each other, especially in the Tenkaichi Budokais.

Z, on the other hand, has everything on a much grander scale. Up to Piccolo Jr., the fights were more for the safety of the Earth. When Raditz comes in though, you realize that safety circumstances go beyond the Earth. Once the Saiyans come in, everything goes to a more universal scale. Because of that, the fights are more epic and grandiose and as such, have more action than Dragon Ball does. I mean, there's more explosions and fast-paced battles in Z, so already you know from that that there is more action in Z. So, if by "better action" you mean more grandiose action, then yes, I do think Z has better action. However, I don't think the fight choreography in Z is as good as it is in Dragon Ball.

[trick007z]

It largely comes down to one simple, singular, point. Most people in North America saw Dragon Ball Z first.

That's it. We can argue all day about the merits of the early portion of the series over the latter. But for the most part, people fell in love with Dragon Ball Z, then were introduced to Dragon Ball. That gave the pretext that one singular series was actually two distinct ones. Which they aren't. So all the analysis about how "this" was better than "that" is largely window dressing to mask favoritism. There were big dramatic battles with cool attacks in Dragon Ball, literally every tournament finale had them. The fight with Tao was the first battle that introduced the formula that every major fight from that point on was based around. The Piccolo arc's (both) were serious, the Red Ribbon arc at times got as serious as any Z arc, the Buu arc got as light hearted as any early Dragon Ball arc at points.

In fact, it's weird to me to even talk with the pretense of them being two different things. They aren't. So when someone says one anime is better, they are the same anime. The entire story is progression, that's why the latter end seems grander.

It's not like after writing Goku vs Piccolo, Toriyama just sat down and thought, "hmm this series needs to completely change, I need bigger battles, with bigger consequences, with stronger characters". He'd been doing that since day one. The series in a nutshell is about this kid who constantly wants to fight and prove himself, and he grows fighting all the best fighters in the world, then he becomes the strongest human, so he fights a demon, becoming the strongest on Earth, then he finds out about aliens and the Saiyan race, so he eventually becomes the strongest of his race, and eventually the universe. Then once that happens they literally have some guy create stronger people for him to fight. And AFTER THAT, they pluck out the strongest monster in history for him to fight. Constant progression. It's all the same thread line.

[trick007z]

You can see natural story and character progression from the first hunt for dbs to the 23rd tenkaichi final moments and Saiyan arc feels natural next step after that, not to mention its not a prequel at all in the first place, 1-519 are all one fucking story.

I know that I'm just saying that the 2nd half of the story (Z) is written in a way that makes it feel like it's it's own thing that doesn't require watching or reading what came before it.

Which is why I think Toie changed the anime's name when they reached that point because they felt like it could stand on it's own and it does.

Does that mean I like DB any less ? of course not, it's still a great story weather it's watched before or after Z or even on it's own because like Z it tells it's own story that doesn't require watching what comes after it.

As others have said, it really doesn't though. Just off the top of my head:

-the mystery of Goku's lineage and his great ape transformation are developed as early as the very first Dragon Ball arc. The payoff is nearly all in the Saiyan arc. You lose so much right there for not having the rest of the series precede it.
-Goku dying. This is huge if you watched Goku since he was a kid. The protagonist who grew up in front of you died. It's momentous. Not so much if you just met the guy. Now it's closer to Yu Yu Hakusho, where it's now the premise of the series initial arc as opposed to a dramatic event.
-Goku teaming up with Piccolo. It means next to nothing, if you are going in cold. If you saw what happened before it, then you saw the main demon villain who Goku has fought in some form since childhood, finally budging an inch for a mutual cause.
- it should come off as a bit strange that you have all these unique characters with pre existing relationships and history that is just brushed over and taken for granted.
-The revelation of Piccolo as a Namekian has some roots in the last arc.

It really doesn't stand on it's own.

It's a good break in the series. Dragon Ball is relatively continuous in plot, and then comes to a complete storyline break at the end of the 23rd Tournament. There's no dangling plots like before. Then The Saiyan arc picks that up until about the conclusion Freeza arc (well Cell arc depending on how much credence you put into machine Freeza being a retcon of sorts). But that's really it. It's just the first arc with an adult Goku that doesn't start with any lose ends from previous stories.

[DanielSSJ]

I think it's because Dragon Ball Z is just more epic. The stakes are higher, the battles are more spectacular, and the plot is more dramatic. Another reason is that Dragon Ball is a lot weirder than Dragon Ball Z and that weirdness can be hard to market, especially in the west. I love Dragon Ball, silliness included, but I can see why some people may not get behind the quirkier aspects present in the early parts of Dragon Ball.

[ABED]

Stakes are higher, arguably, though I don't think that's enough to make it better. I also wouldn't consider the battles more spectacular. I don't love most of the fights in Z nearly as much as I loved the fight between Tenshinhan and Jackie Chun or Goku vs. Kuririn at the 22nd TB. I don't think there's as much character or emotion in most of the fights in Z as there are in those two. Also, part of the problem is that the sense of scale becomes difficult to demonstrate after you have characters who can destroy planets with a flick of their finger. In DB, the escalation could be shown and not simply talked about.

[IDreamtIWasABee]

Z is pretty much The Ballad of Goku and Vegeta, with a subplot about Gohan. None of that's in the Dragon Ball anime. I wonder, if Z had begun with the Piccolo arc, would it have been as popular? Probably. But would English-speaking fans be more accepting of the Pilaf/Red Ribbon stuff? Or would it be even easier to ignore them?

[DanielSSJ]

Stakes are higher, arguably, though I don't think that's enough to make it better. I also wouldn't consider the battles more spectacular. I don't love most of the fights in Z nearly as much as I loved the fight between Tenshinhan and Jackie Chun or Goku vs. Kuririn at the 22nd TB. I don't think there's as much character or emotion in most of the fights in Z as there are in those two. Also, part of the problem is that the sense of scale becomes difficult to demonstrate after you have characters who can destroy planets with a flick of their finger. In DB, the escalation could be shown and not simply talked about.

When I said the battles are more spectacular, I didn't mean that they were better. I meant that they were more of a spectacle, as in they were bigger and flashier. I think Dragon Ball had the better fights, since the outcomes weren't determined solely by who could hit harder. Anyways, I was trying to explain why Dragon Ball Z in more popular than Dragon Ball, not why it is better. In my opinion Dragon Ball blows DBZ out of the water.

[omaro34]

Most of the fans of this series are in their 20's now, and many watched Z first before they watched DB. I'm one of the older few that got to see how Dragonball all started, and believe it or not in the mid to late 80's Dragonball was viewed as observing the adventures of a little kid with a tail on a cloud, and how it evolved into overpowered supreme beings that can destroy planets by blinking is beyond me. I do remember the first Arc where Goku, bulma, and Oolong hunt for the Dragonballs as

The original's DB's combat as well had showcased a plethora of interesting techniques. It had some dark moments too. I'll never forget when Mercenary Tao killed Bora and Goku who was outraged tried his best to fight back but was completely outmatched.

Z is more popular because of the fighting, and the way it narrates its story-telling, particularly the English Dub.

[ParkerAL]

Draconic won the thread. Seriously, that was a mic drop worthy post there. It perfectly illustrates how "Dragon Ball Z" does not work as a stand-alone narrative -- especially during the Saiyan arc.

[Soppa Saia People]

I mean, I like Dragon Ball (anime), but it's not that particularly exciting or interesting to me. It simply doesn't warrant a rewatch (I've watched the important parts of the series twice). The best part of Dragon Ball is the Piccolo saga. Guess what? This is the saga that most closely resembles DBZ, and whenever people claim DBZ has no differences from DB, they use the last arc as an example as though it encompasses 100% of the series, which it does not.

If Toriyama had split DB and DBZ in his original manga, I feel many people who view them as one story (i.e. not halves of each other) would not. The distinctions between the two halves are as clear as day, even if they are completely unintentional, and the split makes perfect sense imo.

Really ? If you ask me both Piccolos sagas suck and next to Cell saga are the worst arcs, what do you think is so good about them.