Would you have watched if they were Black?

[Nejishiki]

While Asian roots are prevalent, it doesn't change the characters themselves. Goku is introduced as a weird boy, Bluma is from "the city", and Pteranodon is an animal/monster-based human. Advancing beyond the first arc, the country of origin where Dragon Ball was produced hardly plays a factor in the story itself. So much so that Toriyama begins to drop references to reality to separate Dragon World into its own contained reality. The talking animals would tip one off sooner, I would think. Once again, I have to point out that Goku's backstory, no matter his skin tone, wouldn't subscribe to normality anyway. It's not how he was meant to be written.

If a consistent theme was being followed, it's a bizarre and wacky wuxia adventure. It's different, foreign, but it's not written with reliance to what Toriyama wants to represent. Journey to the West was a starting point that quickly transformed into something else entirely. To go off the rails is the Toriyama way and that's something unique to his character, not his birthplace. Sure, it would be less likely for him to draw from that if he were born elsewhere, but this scenario has our author remain Japanese.

The series is Japanese, therefore specific elements cannot be avoided in this alternate realm. However, I'll have to maintain that Avatar, a series which deliberately pays homage to those particular Asian elements, isn't an appropriate comparison to Dragon Ball, which unconsciously draws from its established backgrounds. To clarify on that statement, Enma exists in Dragon Ball because he's a common figure in Eastern cultures. He's not included to specify a reference. It's just easy to utilize him because it's understood by the original audience. That's what I'm trying to express by claiming Toriyama's background is somewhat incidental. It's a factor, but it's not the factor when you analyze his actions.

In the context of Dragon World, if one keeps everything exactly the same with one alteration, the general soul of Dragon Ball wouldn't be harmed by it. It's weird enough by its own internal logic! The background and tropes used are undoubtedly Asian, but what effect does this have on the characters? I wouldn't wager the author to gain knowledge he wouldn't be familiar with. Martial artists will wear their comfortable gear, citizens will have their "modern" fashion, and villainous masters will don their Chinese-inspired clothing. You craft what you know.

[Dbzfan94]

The way the characters look like now is too ingrained into my brain for me to imagine them any other way (this holds true for dark-skinned characters like Oob, too). If the series were rebooted now and the characters' skin tone and ethnicity were changed to black for no reason, I'd probably be a bit upset. But if the show were originally like that? Sure, I'd probably have enjoyed it the same.

That's where I'm at. That picture just doesn't look right to me purely because of how I'm used to them looking.

[swimtrunks]

I never understood what colour of skin has to do with anything at all..
If its about preferences ,Ya i don't find black people attractive enough to be in a relationship with them, but I don't find white people attractive either..
I am yellow and I find people like me attractive..
I fail to see how this matters to the show though..

It doesn't matter, but now-dead white people oppressed now-dead black people once, so now it has make a difference for some reason. Even with something as harmless and non-offensive as a niche Japanese cartoon, some people think it matters.

Are you freaking serious! now-dead white people oppressed now-dead black people ONCE. You mean the many unarmed black people becoming hashtags everyday after being KILLED by armed white men and those same white men getting a pat on the back and getting to go home without any charges has nothing at all to do with oppression. This is the sole reason blacklivesmatter exists. But yes, continue sweeping racism under the rug as being something our ancestors did but stopped as soon the slaves were freed. Dylan Roof shooting up a church full of black people had nothing to do with skin color at all.

This had nothing to do with who you do and don't find attractive. The question was simple... and stupid. Both of you just made yourselves look like complete idiots.

As to the op. Do black people not go through enough that you now have to ask such a pointless unnecessary question putting them once again up for scrutiny to be trolled.

I'm now reminded of an old thread on this forum that asked why black people like dbz and someone said maybe it was because GT used a rap song for it's theme.

[Bansho64]

*deleted extremely dumb post.

[swimtrunks]

Swimtrunks, I say this as a guy who's made similar mistakes, please do not bring all of that in here. I do think there's a time and place to discuss things like that but I don't think this warrants it. For all we know, Jinzoningen MULE could've meant oppressed once continuously for a long time. I'm not trying to mini-mod or anything of the sort, I'm just trying to stop a huge argument before it happens because I can already see it coming.

Again, I say this as the idiot who put BLM in his sig without knowing what I was doing.

I'll just ignore this thread from here on out.

[Jinzoningen MULE]

For all we know, Jinzoningen MULE could've meant oppressed once continuously for a long time.

For the record, I was referring to American-African slavery, Jim Crow, and the like, when people of different races were legally oppressed. Also, since this is derailed anyway, my personal message to everyone on the internet: Stop taking everything hyper-literally.

[TheGreatness25]

Oh god and here comes the politics. Look, this isn't CNN or Fox News. Black Dragon Ball characters have nothing to do with that.

For the record, if anyone thinks that one of the darkest notions in societal history -- slavery -- is to be disregarded so easily, that does show ignorance. On the other hand, going the complete opposite way doesn't heal anything. The point is to find a happy medium. If not, everyone keeps getting angry with one another and there will never be any progress, which is sad.

Anyway, back on track; I still would like to know how anyone thinks that the series would change if the characters were black.

[Bansho64]

For the record, if anyone thinks that one of the darkest notions in societal history -- slavery -- is to be disregarded so easily, that does show ignorance.

Oh no, of course not! I hope you don't think that's what I meant. I mainly meant that, like you said earlier in your paragraph, it doesn't have anything to do with DB characters. I sincerely apologize if you or anyone else got the impression that I was disregarding it and that I don't care. I'm not that kind of person. I myself am African-American and I really didn't mean it the way I came off.

[kinisking]

I never understood what colour of skin has to do with anything at all..
If its about preferences ,Ya i don't find black people attractive enough to be in a relationship with them, but I don't find white people attractive either..
I am yellow and I find people like me attractive..
I fail to see how this matters to the show though..

If its about character design, there is really nothing to worry about, uub is black isn't he, he is one of the fan favorites..
Even naam is black..

Being black only can change one thing and that is character designs..
Nothing else can change..
After all why would a Japanese person make anime about anyone other than Japanese characters..

And don't pay heed to YouTube chat man..
Nearly everyone behaves like little fucks there as they are pretty much anonymous it dosen't matter..

Nam and Oob are definitely not black. They're indian or middle eastern.

It would be very weird for an anime to feature an all black cast, you think?

Not really, it doesn't have to take place in Japan. They'res plenty of animes featuring an all white cast or having a majority of characters look white.

[TheGreatness25]

Honestly, if for Super, the just decided, "Hey, we'll make them black!" sure it would be jarring and I wouldn't like that. But if it started with an all-black "cast," then what excuse would someone have for not liking it? If it's created by the same person/people, the characters' skin color would not affect the story.

Why do you think that aspects of the story would have to change to accommodate a black "cast?"

Look, even though the question itself is not really racist and doesn't automatically mean that you're promoting racism, there is a lot of room for racist responses, whether they're intentional or not. For example, I think that saying "Well obviously the story would be different" sounds pretty racist because what comes to mind is that the person writing that response thinks that the story would play up to the stereotypes that have been created for black people. Like do you think that the cast would do Hip Hop Kedo? Do you think the music would be more funky (late 80's, early 90's here)? Do you think that they'd speak differently?

I have no problem with an all-black cast, and like many people (I'm sure), I'd welcome new black characters. Important ones too. I think that having everyone look the same in the series shows that it was created in a bubble. But I'm like that with anything. I wish that DB would have a powerful and important female character -- hero or villain.

Then again, I understand that it is a Japanese series made in Japan by Japanese people, so that's why I'm not exactly "rally in the streets" over characters that aren't "Asian-influenced." However, you're asking a "what-if" and if you're asking "what if they were black?" I'd answer that it would not faze me one bit.

[precita]

Tenshihan is the only one of the current cast I could see "re-invented" into a black man with little to no difference.

[Ki Breaker]

Nam and Oob are definitely not black. They're indian or middle eastern.

Actually the OP's linked images had similar designs to them, so I mentioned their names
Just Some extra knowledge, India is in reality a very vast county, there are not a single mould one can distinguish them with..( not saying people everywhere have same moulds, but India's kind of a bit too vast in this )
Some look like Chinese, some black, some even look white and they have yellow people too..
Naam and uub could very well be Indian no doubt about it though..

[Kunzait_83]

*Ignoring and brushing right past the obligatory heated argument up top there*

Worth pointing out (as I already did in the Wuxia thread):

Wuxia and Black culture in America have a VERY tightly connected pop cultural history. In the 1970s, one of the earliest known periods where Wuxia was starting to creep its way into modern America, it was predominantly Black Grindhouse audiences in ghetto neighborhoods who fell in love with and embraced the genre most strongly, and latched heavily onto its anti-authoritarian, "power and raw talent in the hands of the oppressed individual fighting back against corrupt governments" themes. Black youth and hip hop culture to this very day still shows its share of callbacks and nods to the genre's place in American Black cultural history.

Wuxia featuring black characters (or even starring black protagonists) in more modern works HAS been done, a relatively decent number of times, and with very clear cut, totally logical reasoning: Black culture has historically, more than any other subset of people within America, have traditionally shown the most openness and enthusiastic love towards the genre than anyone else. If any group of people in America (outside of the Academic realm of course) can lay true claim to being some of the first (or earliest) "average people" on our shores to "discover" Wuxia and provide some of the most aggressive push in getting it out further and further into the mainstream public eye, its unquestionably African American culture.

Furthermore, there's even at least one VERY notable precedent for noteworthy black characters in even ancient Wuxia lore and writing.

One of my all time favorite and one of the most endlessly fascinating of the more ancient Wuxia stories is The Slave of Kunlun (or The Kunlun Slave, depending on your translation preference). Written by Pei Xing sometime circa 850-ish A.D. (Tang Dynasty), The Kunlun Slave tells a romantic tale of Cui Sheng, the son of a top military officer in the royal court of Tang Emperor Daizong, who falls into a forbidden love with Hong Xiao, an alluring member of the royal court's harem.

Their relationship frowned upon by status, Cui enlists the help of Mo Le, his own Negro slave (yes, ancient China did indeed dabble a bit in African slave trade back then, though it was fairly uncommon) to sneak into the royal palace and whisk Hong Xiao away into the night into the waiting arms of Cui so they can run off together.

Here's the twist: Mo-Le is no ordinary Black slave: he is, unbeknownst to many, an amazingly powerful and skillful martial arts master, a Youxia of the mystical Wulin kung fu world, whose incredible speed makes him without question one of the single fastest warriors in all of the canon of great classical/literary wuxia tales.

His past remains shrouded in mystery throughout the story, but there are hints: he was trained long, long ago from a very early age by great masters and has attained the long-lived, quasi-immortality of a Taoist Xian. He currently occupies the role of a slave willingly (as his incredible, near-god-like supernatural martial arts abilities would more than easily allow him to escape and go free anytime he chooses), in order to repay a mysterious, unknown "debt" from an incident in his distant past (possibly even a previous life entirely, in the Buddhist sense).



The Slave of Kunlun, while very obviously still "problematic" in many ways under a modern lens (Mo-Le in the very earliest tellings/renditions of the story was by no means completely 100% immune to some racial stereotyping of the most antiquated sort), was nonetheless overall INCREDIBLY ahead of its time at the time of its writing: placing a Negro Slave in not only the lead role, but the lead Action Hero role, given a great deal of prominence, dramatic weight, character nuance, agency, nobility/dignity, and narrative consequence to a story written at a time in human history when almost NO ONE in "civilized" societies thought of Africans as anything other than subhuman, animal-like cattle and in a genre that was absolutely almost 100% devoid of any other race beyond Chinese and at times a few other east Asian cultures like the Japanese and Mongolians (the latter of whom were almost always grotesquely stereotyped usually).

In the original telling, Mo-Le fights his way to Hong Xiao and brings her to her beloved Cui, and the two ride off together... only to eventually be tracked down and caught up to by court officials years later. Both are arrested and Cui sent to be executed. Mo-Le is also found and the royal soldiers attempt his capture... but he easily defeats them and escapes, a free man now, with an epilogue taking place many decades later showing one of the now-very-aged royal soldiers who fought Mo-Le running into him now occupying the role of a medicine man in a large city... Mo-Le having not aged one single bit since they last fought.

Later tellings however would give Mo-Le an even MORE front and center heroic role: later versions of the story have Hong Xiao and Mo Le falling in love during the latter's rescue of her from the palace, and the two running off together (bumping Mo-Le up from Action Hero to Romantic Action Hero), only for the two factions of both an enraged and jealous Cui Sheng (now a villain/antagonist) and a small band of warriors loyal to him and the main royal palace guards, all giving chase to the two interracial lovers.

Of course there's also a sad, depressing history of many later revisions to the story that whitewash (er... or rather “yellowwash” I suppose?) the character of Mo-Le into being a regular Chinese peasant slave (oftentimes with only vaguely “foreign/exotic” subtle physical features), thoroughly defanging much of the power behind what the character originally represented.


Hong Xiao and Mo-Le, the latter looking suspiciously much more pale-skinned than he should.

The story has been so enduring that over 600 years later, sometime in the late 1590s, Ming Dynasty playwright Mei Dingzuo would pen an unofficial "prequel" to the story for the stage, centering on Mo-Lei's background history and origins, titled "How the Kunlun Slave Became Immortal". The story details not only Mo-Lei's training as a youth, but also fills in some of his adventures in the decades between the climax of the original Slave of Kunlun story and its flash-forward epilogue (that's right, a many years belated interquel to a famous and much loved wuxia story that's set during a time gap at the very end of the original story that lead into its epilogue: now stop me if THAT doesn't sound at all familliar). It goes into how he met and befriended great Chinese Xian masters and studied their teachings to become the immortal warrior of inhuman speed and agility that audiences of the original story knew him as.

But yeah, point being, wuxia and black culture have quite a rich and lengthy history (most of it on the whole being generally very positive), and black wuxia characters, both historically and especially in more modern times, very much have a precedent and a place within the genre.

[DBZAOTA482]

Goku, Vegeta, Chi-Chi, possibly Bulma, and the Saiyans in general I can see as black people. Not sure about the rest.

Definitely not Gohan, though. Not likely.

[Jinzoningen MULE]

Goku, Vegeta, Chi-Chi, possibly Bulma, and the Saiyans in general I can see as black people. Not sure about the rest.

Definitely not Gohan, though. Not likely.

In my ideal version of BoG, there's a scene after the credits in which (Black) Pan is born. This will cause Gohan to team up with Zamasu, leading him to become the infamous Kylo Re Gohan Black.

[TheGreatness25]

Definitely not Gohan, though. Not likely.
In my ideal version of BoG, there's a scene after the credits in which (Black) Pan is born. This will cause Gohan to team up with Zamasu, leading him to become the infamous Kylo Re Gohan Black.

What? Like... a real Black Pan or... the way that Goku Black was (not actually black)?

[Beyond]

If he just changes their skin tone, I guess I would. If he tries to make them in line with his image of actual black people, I'd expect the worst and hope for the best. It would probably be bad to be blatantly honest.

[Jinzoningen MULE]

Definitely not Gohan, though. Not likely.
In my ideal version of BoG, there's a scene after the credits in which (Black) Pan is born. This will cause Gohan to team up with Zamasu, leading him to become the infamous Kylo Re Gohan Black.

What? Like... a real Black Pan or... the way that Goku Black was (not actually black)?

Pan is legit black, Kylo Gohan is just a salty emo douche.

[Draconic]

Assuming the story doesn't change at all, except the skin color of the characters, I can't imagine the outrage in depicting black people as violent, moronic monkey-people. I'd much rather stay clear of that.

[ShadowBardock89]

I never understood what colour of skin has to do with anything at all..
If its about preferences ,Ya i don't find black people attractive enough to be in a relationship with them, but I don't find white people attractive either..
I am yellow and I find people like me attractive..
I fail to see how this matters to the show though..

If its about character design, there is really nothing to worry about, uub is black isn't he, he is one of the fan favorites..
Even naam is black..

Actually, they are more Indian based rather than African. Just saying.