How would you make a Hollywood adaption ?

[sintzu]

If a Hollywood studio announced that they're going to try and bring this to the big screen again with a decent budget, say 100 million, how would you want them to do it ?

Would you want them to go full live action with real actors again ?

Would you want a CGI movie that's similar to the video game openings ?

Or would you want a serious, realistic CGI movie that's similar to this ?

Spoiler:

Spoiler:

Spoiler:

And what would the story be ? should they adapt the manga's story ? if so, should they adapt all of it or just Z's part ? or should they tell completely new stories with the characters like how comic movies do ?

[jjgp1112]

Marvel movies, especially Guardians of the Galaxy, have proven that you can pull off a series as bizarre as Dragon Ball in live action as long as it's done right. What I would do is start from the beginning, but take a Path to Power approach. Rather than focusing on a 1:1 adaptation, create a story that gets across the themes, important moments, and characterizations.

The first movie I'd make a composite of the Pilaf and Red Ribbon arcs. Or really, Path to Power but with Krillin, Ox-King, and Chi-Chi included as well, and with the final act basically being how the original arc ended rather than Path To Power's ending. Since Commander Red's real motives were already pretty ridiculous to begin with, I think it would be a good idea to model his character after Emperor Pilaf.

From there, the second movie would be the Marial Arts Tournament, only in this it jumps straight to Tien and Chiaotzu, ad similar to what happened with the Buu saga, the tournament gets crashed by Tambourine and kicks off the Piccolo story.

And then the third movie would be the 23rd Tournament 3 years later with Piccolo Jr. and from there, more movies that pragmatically adapt the Z story.

[Gyt Kaliba]

The first movie I'd make a composite of the Pilaf and Red Ribbon arcs. Or really, Path to Power but with Krillin, Ox-King, and Chi-Chi included as well, and with the final act basically being how the original arc ended rather than Path To Power's ending. Since Commander Red's real motives were already pretty ridiculous to begin with, I think it would be a good idea to model his character after Emperor Pilaf.

From there, the second movie would be the Marial Arts Tournament, only in this it jumps straight to Tien and Chiaotzu, ad similar to what happened with the Buu saga, the tournament gets crashed by Tambourine and kicks off the Piccolo story.

And then the third movie would be the 23rd Tournament 3 years later with Piccolo Jr. and from there, more movies that pragmatically adapt the Z story.

I'm sitting here in awe right now, because that is pretty much exactly what I've always had in mind! I've always thought too that a first movie showing a little boy who can take out an entire army, would make Piccolo Daimao's reveal in a second movie all the more shocking. You show a little boy just completely tear through a military force in a first film, and then turn around and show them that that isn't anything special after all in the second one, and it has all the more additional of a 'wow' factor IMO.

I've never been entirely sure how far to take a film series after that though. The Saiyan arc and then the Freeza arc would be easy enough to do as films, but the Android/Cell arc is a little unwieldy, as is the Boo arc, in different ways though. I suppose with the current Hollywood style one could easily do a 'Part 1' and 'Part 2' film where needed, but I'm not big on that recent style personally though, so...not really sure.

[sintzu]

Starting from the beginning would benefit the story but from a business point of view it'll be better to start with the Saiyan arc in the 1st movie, have it end with them going to Namek which continues in the 2nd movie and that should end with Freeza going to earth with his father.

After the franchise is established with everyone, then they could go and do 2-3 prequels before moving on with the androids and Buu arcs.

Marvel movies, especially Guardians of the Galaxy, have proven that you can pull off a series as bizarre as Dragon Ball in live action as long as it's done right.

Guardians of the Galaxy was only known to a very small group of people before it's movie was released so if something that unknown can get a 200+ million dollar movie, then there's no reason to why a pop culture icon like Dragon Ball can't.

We live in a day and age where anything can be turned into a movie if the people behind it try hard enough so we know it can be done and if done right, people will run to it.

[Hellspawn28]

I would like to start with Piccolo again, but I don't think people want to see the movie with a similar again twice. Saiyan saga seems like a good choice for a hollywood movie, but I feel like most causal people will think it's a rip off of Man of Steel.

[sintzu]

The Saiyan arc and then the Freeza arc would be easy enough to do as films, but the Android/Cell arc is a little unwieldy, as is the Boo arc, in different ways though. I suppose with the current Hollywood style one could easily do a 'Part 1' and 'Part 2' film where needed.

I think the androids and Buu arcs have too much content for one movie but is there enough for 2 ?

The 1st android movie could be about the androids only but it should include Super 13's story in it's final act and after the battle, Trunks, Gohan & Bulma find Cell's time machine and it ends there.

The 2nd movie would cover everything about Cell.

Buu's 1st movie would cover the start of the arc up until Goku goes back to other world and it ends with Piccolo deciding to train Goten & Trunks how to do fusion and the birth of Janemba.

Buu's 2nd movie would start with Goku and Vegeta's fight with Janemba followed by Gotenks and Buu's fight and the rest of the arc's story.

[Bullza]

It's have to be live action because that's where the money is.

Dragon Ball Z is what's popular and not Dragon Ball so they should do just the one movie to cover the entirety of Dragon Ball which would be very easy.

They'd have to cut out Pilaf and the Red Ribbon Army which people don't generally care for anyway and Tournaments don't work well in movies.

You'd have Goku meeting Bulma. Going on an adventure, meeting Yamcha and Roshi, Goku going off to train with Roshi and he meets Krillin, they train, Piccolo is revived and then it would play out like the rest of the Piccolo arc except the final fight would end more like how Goku beat Piccolo Jr.

Throw in a fight scene with Goku against Roshi and Tien in place of not having the Tournaments. Fuse King Piccolo and Piccolo Jr into one character rather than two separate characters.

Then the sequel would cover the Saiyan Saga but because there's hardly anything storywise to that saga they'd have to expand on it so perhaps the movie could start with scenes inspired by the Bardock movie.

Then the third movie would cover the Frieza saga. Some things would have to be cut but that'd be easy enough too. Remove the Ginyu Force, cut Freeza's transformations down to two, less fights etc and it'd fit easily.

[sintzu]

I feel like most causal people will think it's a rip off of Man of Steel.

Casual people just want a good movie to watch so they won't care what it resembles as long as they enjoy it.

The sequel would cover the Saiyan Saga but because there's hardly anything storywise to that saga they'd have to expand on it so perhaps the movie could start with scenes inspired by the Bardock movie.

It cold be like MOS's 1st 20 minutes but instead of covering Jor-El and Krypton, it would cover Bardock and Planet Vegeta and set up Freeza for the next movie.

[Hellspawn28]

$100-150 million budget can work for fight scenes. Matrix 3 was able to pull off DBZ style fights with a similar type of budget back in 2003. I would have characters like Freeza, King Kai, Cell, Zarbon and most humanoid characters be done with motion capture. Christoph Waltz would make a pretty good Freeza in my opinion. I would love to see Danny Devito as King Kai because I find him to be a funny actor and his humor could fit for King Kai.

[Gyt Kaliba]

I always see the Man of Steel comparisons brought up, but...considering I couldn't even get past the first 30 or so minutes of that one...well, let's just say that's not the style I hope a live action DB would go for. Not the grim-dark-ness of it, nor the going way overboard on random flashback scenes all completely out of order and transitioning without much visual cue that you're switching scenes and dear Kami do I not like that movie.

[Cipher]

It is the year 2525. Nuclear war has ravaged the planet, reducing once-great civilizations into rubble. The people are frightened. America stands on the brink of destruction, the current administration maintaining infrastructure from a series of underground tunnels beneath the White House.

These are the circumstances under which Goku Jones was raised. This is his world. And when Chinese emperor Chun-Lin proposes to grant one wish to the victor of his tournament and share his country's water supply with theirs, Goku has to make the journey across the sea with the help of his friends. Armed with technology supplied by governor Kami and the bio-experiment Oolong, Goku has just ten days to get to the tournament grounds, seduce his childhood friend, Bulma, and gather the seven Dragon Balls--mechanical spheres containing passwords designed to stop the deadly warhead Chun-Lin plans to unleash during the distraction, codename: Kamehameha.

Time to hold onto your Dragon Balls. There's only one wish to be had, and this summer, it's going to be Goku's. Now the boy becomes a man. He's going to make it by his rules ... or die trying.

[jjgp1112]

It is the year 2525. Nuclear war has ravaged the planet, reducing once-great civilizations into rubble. The people are frightened. America stands on the brink of destruction, the current administration maintaining infrastructure from a series of underground tunnels beneath the White House.

These are the circumstances under which Goku Jones was raised. This is his world. And when Chinese emperor Chun-Lin proposes to grant one wish to the victor of his tournament and share his country's water supply with theirs, Goku has to make the journey across the sea with the help of his friends. Armed with technology supplied by governor Kami and the bio-experiment Oolong, Goku has just ten days to get to the tournament grounds, seduce his childhood friend, Bulma, and gather the seven Dragon Balls--mechanical spheres containing passwords designed to stop the deadly warhead Chun-Lin plans to unleash during the distraction, codename: Kamehameha.

Time to hold onto your Dragon Balls. There's only one wish to be had, and this summer, it's going to be Goku's. Now the boy becomes a man. He's going to make it by his rules ... or die trying.

Well Goddamn, if it weren't for character limits I think I'd have a new signature!

[Hellspawn28]

I would kept the movie PG-13. It will have a similar tone to the MCU films, light hearted but can still be taken seriously with a serious story line. Having Dragon Ball be R rated would be stupid when the series was never meant to be around that level.

[Cetra]

First I would show people a trailer of a naturey mountain area. Waterfall, an old Asian-style hut. And a cliff.

You see only the lower part of purple pants. And then they jump down into the water. The camera switches to a close up of a giant piranha. It gets blown out of the water up the cliff. The boy jumps. up next to it. And slowly the camera rolls higher and higher. It shows a monkey tail. A red staff. And stops at the mouth, smiling, with a bit of the spikey, wild hair visible.

Then I would make a movie about 12 year old Goku meeting his friends and looking for the Dragon Balls. They find them, he transforms Great Ape. They part ways and he searches for Roshi.

[Nejishiki]

Well, I want to give the audience something unique to follow while keeping with the spirit of Dragon Ball. My approach would be similar to the movies: base the script around elements from the source but putting a completely new spin on it. Most importantly, this has to be written as an action comedy. Playing it straight would stifle the fun out of everything, in my opinion. With that in mind, I think the safest first adaption would be a plot revolving around summoning Shen Long, which Goku gets caught up with due to having Gohan's Dragon Ball. Three is the magic number, so the groups would be Yamcha & Bulma whom Goku gets stuck with, an adaption of the Pilaf gang to force unintentional help and harm to drive events, and of course the serious and dangerous group, who are the stand-ins for the Red Ribbon Army. Hm, I guess I'm just describing Path to Power at this point.

Assuming a sequel, we can write a plot about the Ultimate Tenkaichi Budokai which combines the 21st-23rd events from a cliffhanger from my first film where Goku vows to improve himself for his grandfather and drops a line about travelling to the Turtle Hermit's Island. Have a couple of years pass by and we're set with a tournament that isn't what it seems as the second movie's plot. Perhaps I should adapt Piccolo Daimao here as the tournament mastermind and his plan to tire out the world's best fighters, kill them all and seemingly Goku as he wishes for an eternal fighting prime? I'm not sure if I like that so much, but I'm just bouncing off ideas, ahaha. I haven't even incorporated Goku's training or the Crane school rivals in this diatribe of thoughts! Maybe I should be a bit more daring from using the source elements.

[jjgp1112]

I think a neat way to foreshadow the Piccolo movie would be ending the first movie with a small scene either directly before or after the credits of somebody stumbling upon an Electronic Rice Cooker conspicuously marked with the "Demon" symbol.

[Nejishiki]

That's certainly a great sequel hook, jjgp! This is why films have development teams.

[Esfír Dedragón]

Oh, goody! I was waiting for someone to start a thread like this.

I'm sympathetic to the idea that it can be made into live-action.

First of all, I think it should take the approach of what Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows did when dividing the story into several parts, although I think it appliers more to the Z-portion of Dragon Ball. Here's my opinion on how the movie can be made. Note that there may be some mistakes and some things that may not be specified. I have my own biases and own ideas that you may disagree with but others may sympathize:

Cast:
Goku needs to be Asian. I'm sorry but I don't want to see this character be another statistic of whitewashing AGAIN!
Bulma can be White. I've always viewed her as some white girl from "the West" exploring the Eastern-inspired parts of Earth while searching for the Dragon Balls.
The rest of the characters in the early era of Dragon Ball should be performed by Asian actors. Some secondary characters may have some obvious ethnic features that require certain types of actors/actresses.
Let Demon-King Piccolo/Kami/Piccolo, Jr. be Black.
Obvious Mr. Popo is obvious... or maybe not.
The announcer is a blonde white guy.
They should also include the anthropomorphized animals. CGI or practical, I don't care.
Anyone who is a Saiyan should at least have Black hair and dark eyes. This may sound wrong but I think that the "racial/ethnic makeup" of Saiyans should be: Asians, Black-haired Whites, Dark-skinned Hispanics, Native Americans, and Indians.
In general, they should avoid choosing big name actors but I wouldn't mind a tiny handful being part of it. (example: Samuel L. Jackson or Morgan Freeman being Demon-King Piccolo or Kami, respectively. )
Music/Soundtrack
I imagine the music starting out being very Oriental, specifically Chinese but as the movies progress, modern genres start to be incorporated, such as metal, rock, synthesizer, orchestra-type, etc.
I would also like there to be an International team of composers working on it. Sort of like a spectrum from Kikuchi to Scott Morgan working together. I know how unlikely that sounds.
Production Company
Should be a Japanese-American joint media company but I wouldn't know which ones.
Locations
Haha. there's a reason I started a thread on the geography of Dragon Ball.
Director
I have no idea. God have mercy on that guy if the fans don't like his work.
Screenwriter
I have no idea, either. However, Toriyama should be part of it and be given veto powers if he doesn't like the script.
Dragon Ball portion:
The first 6 arcs should be their own movies, but I can see the Red Ribbon Army arc being divided into 3-4 parts. Some characters may need to be cut out or appear later. There should also be some effort being put in avoiding plot-holes. I would also like some inherent, mystical elements of Dragon Ball before Z be given emphasis and a more detailed explanation.
Dragon Ball Z portion:
Saiyan Saga is divided into three parts: 1st- Goku and Piccolo fight Raditz and is climaxed by the death of Goku and Raditz. 2nd- Gohan and Piccolo train, Vegeta and Nappa kill off most of the Z-fighters. 3rd- Goku and Vegeta fight.
Frieza Saga is divided into three parts: 1st- Gohan, Krillin, and Bulma arrive on Namek while Vegeta rebels by killing off Frieza's soldiers and ends with Goku's arrival. 2nd- Frieza fights with Vegeta and Co. and ends with Goku's rejuvenation. 3rd- Goku vs. Frieza.
Cell Saga is divided into three parts: 1st- Trunks appears and kills off Frieza. Androids appear and ends with Piccolo fusing with Kami in order to fight Imperfect Cell. 2nd- Piccolo fights Androids and Cell, Vegeta and Trunks join the fray later on and ends with Cell announcing tournament. 3rd- Goku vs. Cell, Gohan vs. Cell, Goku dies and Gohan wins against Cell.
Majin Buu Saga is divided into four parts: 1st- Goku visits living world, Babidi appears, Goku vs. Majin Vegeta, ends with Majin Vegeta sacrifice and the audience sees bits and pieces of Buu left wiggling around. 2nd- Majin Buu becomes Super Buu and fights Gotenks. Ends with Ultimate Gohan appearing. 3rd- Gohan puts up a good fight but loses, Goku and Vegeta fuse to become Vegito. Ends with Goku and Vegeta rescuing the absorbed from Buu, while Kid Buu is born. 4th- Goku and Vegeta vs. Kid Buu. Spirit Bomb occurs. Ends with the 28th Tenkaichi Budokai occurring.

Extra thoughts: I wouldn't mind changes here and there, as long as they make sense. I would also love to see some filler from the anime and iconic art from the manga incorporated together, giving it a complimentary role in the movie.

[jjgp1112]

With Goku and the Saiyans, I'd actually cast Pacific Islanders/Polynesians (Hawaiians, Samoans, Tongans, New Zealand for Vegeta, etc.). Tan, dark-haired, English speaking folks with a proud warrior heritage (and massive eating habits!). I'm mainly basing this off of Toriyama giving Vegeta English attack names to make him appear "foreign."

[Esfír Dedragón]

With Goku and the Saiyans, I'd actually cast Pacific Islanders/Polynesians (Hawaiians, Samoans, Tongans, New Zealand for Vegeta, etc.). Tan, dark-haired, English speaking folks with a proud warrior heritage (and massive eating habits!). I'm mainly basing this off of Toriyama giving Vegeta English attack names to make him appear "foreign."

Shoot, I forgot to mention them! Nice idea, man.
Maybe there should be a Fan-Cast thread later.

Funny thing is, I've always viewed Vegeta and Nappa as being these up-tight, evil-looking White Invaders. Think of it as a British/French pirate-colonial mindset. It sounds weird, I know.