Why was the ToP only 48 minutes?

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Why was the ToP only 48 minutes?

Post by superfan2024 » Mon Mar 04, 2019 8:18 pm

The anime staff obviously knew that it was going to be a very extensive tournament (it was over 30 episodes :lol: ), so why did Toei, Toyotaro, and/or Toriyama only make it 48 minutes? So much happens in the tournament, but it only gets 48 minutes when we have to go through at least 60 characters?

The Vegeta and Napple battle in the Saiyan Arc starts around the afternoon, and ultimately ends around the evening, which, logically would be at least a 2 hour battle. (Yes, I know it isn't wise to apply logic to Dragon Ball, but whatever). The ToP goes through so much more, and we're supposed to believe that it all went down in less than an hour? What was the purpose of it only being 48 minutes? If it was 3 hours for instance, what would have changed?

Just something that I was curious about.

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Re: Why was the ToP only 48 minutes?

Post by MarCas92 » Mon Mar 04, 2019 10:53 pm

The time limit still baffles me. Why have it if it has no relevance to the plot at all? The Tournament ended with 17 being the last man standing so the time limit was pointless in the end. Also, the 48 minute thing was SOOOO distracting all throughout and only emphasized how poorly paced this whole thing was. It's "5 Minutes" bad. They should'nt have had any mention of a time limit whatsoever. If you take that element out of the story NOTHING CHANGES!

The only thing I can think of is that MAYBE the time limit was set up so that the audience would have to keep guessing as to whether the winners would win by timeout or elimination. That idea is kind of interesting and it sets it up so every K.O. matters, but it really backfired imo and gave us one of worst arcs in the franchise.
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Re: Why was the ToP only 48 minutes?

Post by theherodjl » Tue Mar 05, 2019 12:19 am

What's actually wrong with it? Immediately after Namek's core was struck, Goku's fight with Freeza lasted around 10 minutes over the course of 8 episodes. Going by the math of the Namek fight, 48 minutes in-universe may translate to nearly 40 episodes which fits for the ToP's 34 episodes. Additionally, the fastest fighters in the ToP can move over the speed of light(far, far faster than what Goku & Freeza were moving at on Namek) so what is the problem here?
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Re: Why was the ToP only 48 minutes?

Post by Polyphase Avatron » Tue Mar 05, 2019 12:26 am

theherodjl wrote: Tue Mar 05, 2019 12:19 am What's actually wrong with it? Immediately after Namek's core was struck, Goku's fight with Freeza lasted around 10 minutes over the course of 8 episodes. Going by the math of the Namek fight, 48 minutes in-universe may translate to nearly 40 episodes which fits for the ToP's 34 episodes. Additionally, the fastest fighters in the ToP can move over the speed of light(far, far faster than what Goku & Freeza were moving at on Namek) so what is the problem here?
Well there is some fridge logic involved for why the characters standing around and talking, and the audience commenting on things, etc. wouldn't really make sense if everything was slowed down for our benefit.
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Re: Why was the ToP only 48 minutes?

Post by theherodjl » Tue Mar 05, 2019 12:43 am

Polyphase Avatron wrote: Tue Mar 05, 2019 12:26 amWell there is some fridge logic involved for why the characters standing around and talking, and the audience commenting on things, etc. wouldn't really make sense if everything was slowed down for our benefit.
I'm convinced, at least for the characters who are actively fighting and others who sense it in real-time, that fighters can 'talk' through their Ki. Sound should be far too slow to keep up with various hypersonic-FTL characters who are chatting away while trading blows so I don't think it's too farfetched that their Ki sends messages to one another quicker than sound can. They wouldn't slow down just for the sake of hearing their own & other's words when they're having an intense battle.
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Re: Why was the ToP only 48 minutes?

Post by Polyphase Avatron » Tue Mar 05, 2019 1:22 am

theherodjl wrote: Tue Mar 05, 2019 12:43 am
Polyphase Avatron wrote: Tue Mar 05, 2019 12:26 amWell there is some fridge logic involved for why the characters standing around and talking, and the audience commenting on things, etc. wouldn't really make sense if everything was slowed down for our benefit.
I'm convinced, at least for the characters who are actively fighting and others who sense it in real-time, that fighters can 'talk' through their Ki. Sound should be far too slow to keep up with various hypersonic-FTL characters who are chatting away while trading blows so I don't think it's too farfetched that their Ki sends messages to one another quicker than sound can. They wouldn't slow down just for the sake of hearing their own & other's words when they're having an intense battle.
But then you have stuff like tracking fighters by smell and sound (Majora and Anilaza). It's inconsistent.
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Re: Why was the ToP only 48 minutes?

Post by Kataphrut » Tue Mar 05, 2019 2:15 am

It's completely bonkers. I maintain with how the tournament ended up playing out, 3 hours would have been a better timeframe. Although really it's much of a muchness.

I honestly thought it was going to be leading up to a joke taking the piss out of the 5 minutes on Namek. They even had Freeza there! But it just never came up and played the announcer's updates totally straight.

My theory is it was something Toriyama included in his napkin scratchings (right next to "does the grey guy talk? I'll come up with something later") and nobody at Toei wanted to tell him how infeasible it would be so they just kind of ignored it.

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Re: Why was the ToP only 48 minutes?

Post by PFM18 » Tue Mar 05, 2019 3:51 pm

Not any different from Freeza vs SSJ Goku being only 5 minutes or SSJ Gotenks vs Super Buu being only 5 minutes. If anything, this is less jarring because it is showing events sequentially that are actually occurring In-Universe simultaneously.

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Re: Why was the ToP only 48 minutes?

Post by SpiritBombTriumphant » Wed Mar 06, 2019 10:56 am

No idea about the time limit, but I've heard that in storytelling, talking/dialogue is considered a "free action." Meaning that it doesn't count for time or anything similar in the story being told. The rest can be kind of justified by the fact that they're fighters fighting at impossible speeds. Think back to Battle of Gods when Beerus attacked Goku while in the underground cave. They exchange a few blows before some water that splashed up into the air landed back down in the water.

It's weird and really requires thinking about such justifications when it should just come naturally to the viewer. But alas, that's not what happened so... just go with it. It's the best arc in the franchise, IMO. Plenty of tension, awesome fighting, and the highest production values we've had outside of the movies. I love it.

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Re: Why was the ToP only 48 minutes?

Post by Lord Beerus » Fri Mar 08, 2019 9:39 am

My guess is that the 48 minutes time limit for the Tournament of Power was to add a sense of urgency to the plot, but that's never made a major factor at all in the tournament itself. The main cast, as well as the rest of the fighters in the Tournament of Power, treat the whole event with an incredible amount of aloofness when it comes to actually eliminating people and moving the plot foward; with Jiren being the absolute worst offender of this.

The 48 minute time limit was pointless, and in all honesty, a narrative crutch.

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Re: Why was the ToP only 48 minutes?

Post by The Patrolman » Fri Mar 08, 2019 11:05 am

Because they were trying to build tension I guess
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Re: Why was the ToP only 48 minutes?

Post by JulieYBM » Sat Mar 09, 2019 10:18 pm

I'm sure it was to build tension but it's also worth keeping in mind that kairological time is a thing. Let me copy a post I made in another thread:
JulieYBM wrote: Mon Sep 04, 2017 10:36 am Ah, shit, I forgot to point you in the direction of Beautiful Fighting Girl by psychiatrist Saitou Tamaki. There's a section of the book that discusses how Japanese stories make use of a phenomenon known as manpu, taken from koudan storytelling. In koudan, "time and space are grossly exaggerated according to the passion and expressivity of the characters."
"The koudan 'Kan'ei Sanbajutsu' (Horse-rising in the Kan'ei era), for example, is a long and extremely detailed description of how Magaki Heikurou climbs up a stone staircase on a horse. This kind of unlimited extension of a single privileged moment is typical of the atemporality of koudan storytelling..."
This sort of thing was typically done in gekiga comics, but then Nakajima Norihiro's Astro Kyuudan came around and decided to whip out its fifteen inch cock. アストロ球団 (Astro Kyuudan) is a 183 chapter comic that literally covers only one baseball game. Twenty collected volumes...two thousand pages-plus...only one baseball game. That's way bigger than anything Dragon Ball tries. And according to Saitou's book, with exception for a few raised eyebrows, Shounen JUMP readers had no problem with it. The comic lasted from 22 August 1972 to 01 June 1976. The closest I can think of is Bleach Chapters #237-422 covering a single day.

Ishinomori Shoutarou was a big fan of western films, so his comics would follow suit and match the 'consistent' speed of western films as part of its flow. Nagai Gou, however, was different. Nagai was different, he set what is now the standard of Japanese comics by having time no longer flow. Nagai had time contract and expand with the reader's subjective view point. Action scenes are draw with large panels and run for many pages. This is why Nagai's work seemed to be adapted more so into animation, rather than Ishinomori, who saw most of his works adapted into live action: Nagai's works have a sort of 'atemporality' to them.

I suggest picking up Beautiful Fighting Girl, not only for the information about koudan, but also how it delves into other aspects of Japanese comics, animation, characters, queer theory and Otaku sexuality.

EDIT: In this Twitter thread I tried taking photos of the pages I was referencing here. I couldn't type all of the information, so if you can somehow read these shoddy pictures you'll see what I was getting at with more information. I also suggest looking into kairological time.
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Re: Why was the ToP only 48 minutes?

Post by Bebi Hatchiyack » Sun Mar 10, 2019 1:00 pm

Was looking in the wikipedia for the 48 number

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/48_(number)

And found this:
In Chinese Numerology, 48 is an auspicious number meaning 'determined to prosper', or simply 'prosperity'; which is good for business.

A good meaning for the ToP for whomever win the ToP ensure the prosperity of his/her Universe.
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Re: Why was the ToP only 48 minutes?

Post by sunsetshimmer » Sun Mar 10, 2019 5:19 pm

Maybe Toriyama didn't know that anime would take such shitty route and that instead of making it as it should be (DBS manga), TOEI would give entire episodes about Gohan and Piccolo dodging some sniper or Ribrianne transforming for half of episode.

If you read manga then 48 minutes makes sense because all of irrelevant and forgettable characters lose quickly so story can focus on what's really important. And it actually works. Meanwhile, 3/4 of anime ToP seems like a filler because of that. Basically "fighter of a week" formula. It took like 10 or more episodes after Kefla's defeat for something interesting to happen. No to mention tons of unnecessary dialogues in episodes that made things even longer. Entire tournament could be easily shortened to 15-20 episodes and you wouldn't lose anything important.
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