Is EVERYTHING Dragon Ball ‘Z' to you?

[Protege]

I freaking honestly would just prefer if people would stop mixing the entire franchise like it was just a complete story or series, because its not. Dragon ball was originally a light hearted kids comic and it follows a different coloration for originally being a gag, adventure manga, thats why you cant use certain Goku feats like him breaking the fourth wall or flying to a moon on his powerpole while being able to breathe in space because its gag.

Dragon ball Z is where you start to see more substance in the show and its transformation into shounen series in order to compete against saint seiya and sailor moon. Thats why you actually had a plot in the story and cool looking characters and villains showing up like Vegeta, Frieza, Future Trunks, Androids etc

That's why calling someone a dragon ball fan in a way could almost be insulting, as not everyone here gonna love the same thing. I simply prefered the old school DBZ and disliked GT and Super. Original Dragon Ball was great too but at this point its simply just too old and forgotten to me.

Sorry, but all of this is wrong.

Dragonball IS a complete and singular series, with 519 chapters in Weekly Shounen Jump from 1984 to 1995. The first chapter of the the Saiyan arc started the very next week after the 23rd budoukai.

The shift to more dramatic stories was gradual and serious moments are in the earlier arcs. I don't know what "different coloration" is supposed to mean. Humor and "gags" can be found throughout the Freeza, Cell, and Boo arcs. Also, first you say Dragonball was a kids comic and then you say it transformed into a shounen series in Z. Shounen comics are for kids.

As for more substance, many (not me, necessarily) would argue that it is the earlier arcs that have the most character and world development.

Cool looking characters? Like Blooma, Gokuu, Muten-Roushi, Kuririn, Tehnshinhan and Piccolo? All pre-Raditz

And if "Dragonball fan" is an insult, I don't think I can say anything sufficiently inoffensive. Maybe you should reread the series if it's too "old and forgotten"

rant over.

I was talking about the show, not manga. And most people who are fans of DBZ probably heard or know about original Dragon Ball unless they live under a rock. But clearly Dragon ball comics were never that popular in the west compared to its anime adaptation. And i mean its not like the whole Z was just made up. In the interview Toriyama stated that Z was added to indicate to viewers that the series was ending during the budokai 23rd tournament, and thats where anime adaption decided to incorporate that Z part to refer as the end of boyhood Goku and start of the new series.

Shounen shows are usually targeted to young males, not just to kids. You could look up what is shounen audience that can vary from ages 8-18.

[Hellspawn28]

Shounen shows are usually targeted to young males, not just to kids. You could look up what is shounen audience that can vary from ages 8-18.

Toriyama said that he wrote the manga with younger children in mind. The series airs on Sunday mornings which is the Japanese equivalent to Saturday morning cartoons. 62.9% of the Shonen Jump magazine's readers are reported to be under the age of fourteen (http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/20 ... ers-posted).

[Gaffer Tape]

And i mean its not like the whole Z was just made up. In the interview Toriyama stated that Z was added to indicate to viewers that the series was ending during the budokai 23rd tournament, and thats where anime adaption decided to incorporate that Z part to refer as the end of boyhood Goku and start of the new series.

Again, it seems like a lot of personal interpretation is being used to distort this quote into something it doesn't actually infer. Because again, Toriyama did not come up with the idea of changing the name. He didn't want to change the name. He didn't change the name. The TV staff wanted to change the name. They decided to change the name at the point that they did, not Toriyama. They just happened to ask him to come up with a name, and he obliged. He did NOT say he came up with the Z to indicate the series was ending or shifting at the conclusion of the 23rd Budoukai. He said he came up with the letter Z because it was the last letter of the alphabet and indicated that the series was supposed to be ending soon. That is to say, what would come after this supposed split would be the last bits of Dragon Ball (sort of a subtler version of suggesting, say, Dragon Ball: The Final Chapters as a title), not that an ending was being reached before it. Now obviously that is not what ended up happening, and the content after the addition of the letter Z ended up being even longer than everything that had come before. But that's the point: Toriyama was FREQUENTLY mulling over ending the series at various points. He was not fond of the weekly serialization grind and had already been doing it for nearly a decade straight at that point. If Toei had come to him at any of those other points where he was hoping to end the series, chances are he might have come up with Dragon Ball Z then too, and for that same reason: because he wanted to end it.

I freaking honestly would just prefer if people would stop mixing the entire franchise like it was just a complete story or series, because its not.

And the reason people are refuting you on this is because, well, it's just not correct. It IS one story. It IS one series. That's why people get frustrated about this. It would be the same thing if you said, "I honestly would just prefer if people would stop acting like Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part I and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part II were one story, because they're not." Just because someone else came along and split it into two parts doesn't change the fact that the original work was one book. And it's the same thing with Dragon Ball. It is one, continuous work from 1984-1995. Raditz appears in Chapter 195 of Dragon Ball. There is nothing otherwise special about that chapter. It arrived the week after Chapter 194 in the same place, at the same scheduled time, with no differences in presentation or titling or anything else. Hey, Dragon Ball GT, Battle of Gods, Super, I'll get behind you on that because those are clearly delineated works, which were made separately, and were originally presented with different titles. The Dragon Ball/Dragon Ball Z split, however, does not fall into any of those categories. It's nothing more than an adaptational preference.

[MetaMoss]

Here's the terms I use and what I generally mean by them:

Dragon Ball - Entire series/franchise and the manga

Classic Dragon Ball - Original TV series, pre-Z era of the manga

Dragon Ball Z - Z-era of the series (TV/Manga), including the recent movies

Dragon Ball GT or Dragon Ball Super - the respective TV shows


Now, "Dragon Ball" is probably my most used term these days, but that's because I often discuss the series with my close friends (who've been briefed on what I'm generally talking about). Out and about in general American society, if the series comes up, I will tend to use "Dragon Ball Z" or its shorthand "DBZ", because most likely that's what people here have actually had exposure to. I've said "Dragon Ball" to random folks, and the get what I mean relatively quick, but that Z really kicks in their recognition.

[Captain Space]

I was talking about the show, not manga. And most people who are fans of DBZ probably heard or know about original Dragon Ball unless they live under a rock. But clearly Dragon ball comics were never that popular in the west compared to its anime adaptation. And i mean its not like the whole Z was just made up. In the interview Toriyama stated that Z was added to indicate to viewers that the series was ending during the budokai 23rd tournament, and thats where anime adaption decided to incorporate that Z part to refer as the end of boyhood Goku and start of the new series.

Shounen shows are usually targeted to young males, not just to kids. You could look up what is shounen audience that can vary from ages 8-18.

The Z was added just cause he thought the show would end soon, and so he just randomly grabbed the last letter of the English alphabet; nothing more significant than that, no statement on Goku growing up--he'd already grown up by the start of the 23rd Budokai.

And the entirety of Dragon Ball is shonen. All of it.

[Cipher]

No. Everything is Dragon Ball to me.

The only time I use Z is if I'm speaking/writing about something specific to that particular anime series.

If I want to talk about something specific to the first anime series, I just specify it like that: "the anime" (if it's already clear which portion I'm talking about), "the original anime series," "Dragon Ball (the first anime series)," etc. Whatever makes sense at the time.

[floofychan333]

I always call it Dragon Ball or Dragon Ball/Z.

[ChahikoDBZ]

I always use the term Dragon Ball when referring to the general franchise. I agree it's annoying as hell when people refer to all of it as DBZ or Dragon Ball Z but oh well I guess.

[TheBalishChannel]

I pretty much associate anything Dragon Ball, whether it's Dragon Ball, Dragon Ball Z, Dragon Ball GT, etc, as being part of the "Dragon Ball Z" franchise. Look at how neat that "Z:" drive is.

[Kuririn Fan]

Thats so cool, bro, but Z is only 1 out of 5 anime series, and there is also manga and the movies.

[floofychan333]

It pisses me off. It annoys me even more when people say DB is just a prequel and is not important.

Thank you. I like it better because it's got actual comedy and decent animation.