How will they fix the writing problem that Super had?

[PFM18]

I mean I am not trying to accuse you of saying that DBZ is flawless it just appears that you are more willing to ignore the flaws within Z than you are with Super.

It seems that way because you're establishing a false equivalency between the two series. You're looking at the surface and saying "hey, they do the same things, right?" whilst ignoring the execution. Besides, this is a thread about Super, why would I criticize Z?

Z having problems doesn't negate Super's problems as much as you want to act like it does. If it was bad in Z, it's bad in Super. The only reason Z "gets a pass" is because its problems are fewer and aren't as blatant.

Agree to disagree, this is a waste of time.

See the bolded is what I have been trying to dispute. I am not saying that Z has problems negates Super's I just think that acting as though Super having these sorts of problems,or atleast having these problems to this extent, is some kind of anomaly within the franchise is misguided.

But yeah agree to disagree I guess.

[Asura]

Super Saiyan God was always portrayed as a much larger boost than to Potara.

Except SSG Goku gets destroyed by base form Kefla.

Once achieving Super Saiyan God Goku absorbed that power and that is how his base form went from being weaker than Namek Freeza to stronger than SSJ3 Gotenks.

If he absorbed the power of Super Saiyan God then how can he use it again during the ToP arc? Vegeta never "absorbs" this power and yet his base form is also stronger than SSJ3 Gotenks by a massive amount.

Once he has achieved the form, going from Super Saiyan to Super Saiyan God isn't a particulary massive boost.

Says who? How do you know it's not a particularly massive boost? Goku goes from not being able to handle both Caulifla and Kale at the same time in SSJ2, to destroying them in SSG. Considering that was from SSJ2 to SSG and not even SSJ to SSG, the boost in power certainly does seem massive.

Trunks became much stronger but there isn't neccessarily anything contradicting his increase in strength.

What exactly does that mean? Trunks goes from getting obliterated by base Black in his SSJ form, to somehow holding his own against him in his Rose form as SSJ2. What is the explanation for that MASSIVE increase in strength? There is none.

Super literally has barely any more, if at all, more power scaling issues than Z did.

That's a flat-out lie. Hell, Z is so easy to tell who is stronger than who during the Saiyan and Namek arcs because they literally assign numbers to the characters that tell you how powerful they are in relation to each other. It's always obvious who is stronger than who.

Cell Arc:
Gohan
Perfect Cell
Goku
Trunks (technically more powerful but slower)
Vegeta
2nd Form Cell
1st Form Cell
16
Piccolo = 17
18
Krillin
etc.

Buu Arc:
Vegetto
Super Buu (Gohan Absorbed)
Super Buu (Gotenks Absorbed)
Gohan
Super Buu
SSJ3 Gotenks
SSJ Gotenks
Kid Buu
SSJ3 Goku
Fat Buu
Gotenks
SSJ2 Goku = SSJ2 Vegeta

Now lets compare that to the FT arc:

Vegetto Blue
Spirit Sword Trunks?
Merged Zamasu
Goku? He's able to damage Merged Zamasu after all
SSR Black? Who is shown to be stronger than Vegeta at first, then he's weaker than Vegeta after RoSaT, and then stronger than him again, but Vegeta is stronger than Goku since he does better against Black where Goku gets bodied by Black in 56, so Vegeta is stronger than Goku right? But he couldn't damage Merged Zamasu where Goku could, so Goku is stronger? But Vegeta trained in the RoSaT whereas Goku only learned the Mafuba so doesn't this all add up to Vegeta being stronger?
Rage Trunks? He could fend off both Zamasu and SSR Black at the same time where SSB Goku and SSB Vegeta failed, so how strong is Rage Trunks? Is he at SSB level? Higher? Lower?
SSJ2 Trunks?
Vegeta before RoSaT? (Trunks in SSJ2 somehow does better than Vegeta in SSB against Black so that means SSJ2 Trunks is stronger than SSB Vegeta?)
Zamasu?

It's an absolute clusterfuck, you honestly can't tell who is stronger than who most of the time, and we haven't even gotten to the ToP arc yet, which is almost undecipherable as to who is stronger than who in some cases, and I'm only focusing on the big name characters.

Mastered Ultra Instinct Goku
Jiren
Ultra Instinct "Omen" Goku
SSJ2 Kefla
Anilaza
SSJ Kefla?
SSBE Vegeta?
GoD Toppo?
SSB Vegeta? (he does better against Jiren than Goku does in x20 Kaioken, which makes zero sense)
17? (Also does better against Jiren than Goku does?)
SSBKKx20 Goku
Super Light Speed Dyspo or whatever that mode was called? But maybe he's technically stronger than SSB Goku and SSB Vegeta since Golden Freeza couldn't handle his speed alone, and Golden Freeza is equal to SSB... uh, right?
SSB Goku?
Golden Freeza?
Hit? Or maybe Base Kefla?
Ultimate Gohan?
SSG Goku
SSJ3 Goku
SSJ Kale? (But Kale is able to tank SSB Goku's kamehameha, and is yet also shown to be weaker than SSG Goku)
SSJ2 Caulifla
Piccolo?
18?
SSJ Vegeta?
Ribrianne
Roshi
Krillin?
Tenshinhan?

Who the hell even knows? I can't make sense of most of it. Not to say that watching the ToP arc wasn't fun as hell even with these blatant power inconsistencies, but there's no ignoring how broken this shit is.

[PFM18]

Super Saiyan God was always portrayed as a much larger boost than to Potara.

Except SSG Goku gets destroyed by base form Kefla.

Once achieving Super Saiyan God Goku absorbed that power and that is how his base form went from being weaker than Namek Freeza to stronger than SSJ3 Gotenks.

If he absorbed the power of Super Saiyan God then how can he use it again during the ToP arc? Vegeta never "absorbs" this power and yet his base form is also stronger than SSJ3 Gotenks by a massive amount.

Once he has achieved the form, going from Super Saiyan to Super Saiyan God isn't a particulary massive boost.

Says who? How do you know it's not a particularly massive boost? Goku goes from not being able to handle both Caulifla and Kale at the same time in SSJ2, to destroying them in SSG. Considering that was from SSJ2 to SSG and not even SSJ to SSG, the boost in power certainly does seem massive.

Trunks became much stronger but there isn't neccessarily anything contradicting his increase in strength.

What exactly does that mean? Trunks goes from getting obliterated by base Black in his SSJ form, to somehow holding his own against him in his Rose form as SSJ2. What is the explanation for that MASSIVE increase in strength? There is none.

Super literally has barely any more, if at all, more power scaling issues than Z did.

That's a flat-out lie. Hell, Z is so easy to tell who is stronger than who during the Saiyan and Namek arcs because they literally assign numbers to the characters that tell you how powerful they are in relation to each other. It's always obvious who is stronger than who.

Cell Arc:
Gohan
Perfect Cell
Goku
Trunks (technically more powerful but slower)
Vegeta
2nd Form Cell
1st Form Cell
16
Piccolo = 17
18
Krillin
etc.

Buu Arc:
Vegetto
Super Buu (Gohan Absorbed)
Super Buu (Gotenks Absorbed)
Gohan
Super Buu
SSJ3 Gotenks
SSJ Gotenks
Kid Buu
SSJ3 Goku
Fat Buu
Gotenks
SSJ2 Goku = SSJ2 Vegeta

Now lets compare that to the FT arc:

Vegetto Blue
Spirit Sword Trunks?
Merged Zamasu
Goku? He's able to damage Merged Zamasu after all
SSR Black? Who is shown to be stronger than Vegeta at first, then he's weaker than Vegeta after RoSaT, and then stronger than him again, but Vegeta is stronger than Goku since he does better against Black where Goku gets bodied by Black in 56, so Vegeta is stronger than Goku right? But he couldn't damage Merged Zamasu where Goku could, so Goku is stronger? But Vegeta trained in the RoSaT whereas Goku only learned the Mafuba so doesn't this all add up to Vegeta being stronger?
Rage Trunks? He could fend off both Zamasu and SSR Black at the same time where SSB Goku and SSB Vegeta failed, so how strong is Rage Trunks? Is he at SSB level? Higher? Lower?
SSJ2 Trunks?
Vegeta before RoSaT? (Trunks in SSJ2 somehow does better than Vegeta in SSB against Black so that means SSJ2 Trunks is stronger than SSB Vegeta?)
Zamasu?

It's an absolute clusterfuck, you honestly can't tell who is stronger than who most of the time, and we haven't even gotten to the ToP arc yet, which is almost undecipherable as to who is stronger than who in some cases, and I'm only focusing on the big name characters.

Mastered Ultra Instinct Goku
Jiren
Ultra Instinct "Omen" Goku
SSJ2 Kefla
Anilaza
SSJ Kefla?
SSBE Vegeta?
GoD Toppo?
SSB Vegeta? (he does better against Jiren than Goku does in x20 Kaioken, which makes zero sense)
17? (Also does better against Jiren than Goku does?)
SSBKKx20 Goku
Super Light Speed Dyspo or whatever that mode was called? But maybe he's technically stronger than SSB Goku and SSB Vegeta since Golden Freeza couldn't handle his speed alone, and Golden Freeza is equal to SSB... uh, right?
SSB Goku?
Golden Freeza?
Hit? Or maybe Base Kefla?
Ultimate Gohan?
SSG Goku
SSJ3 Goku
SSJ Kale? (But Kale is able to tank SSB Goku's kamehameha, and is yet also shown to be weaker than SSG Goku)
SSJ2 Caulifla
Piccolo?
18?
SSJ Vegeta?
Ribrianne
Roshi
Krillin?
Tenshinhan?

Who the hell even knows? I can't make sense of most of it. Not to say that watching the ToP arc wasn't fun as hell even with these blatant power inconsistencies, but there's no ignoring how broken this shit is.

Beerus explained that his power was "absorbed" and again, that is how his base went from weaker than Namek Freeza to stronger than SSJ3 Gotenks. Goku went from having difficulty in SSJ2 to putting a beating as a SSG, yes this is true, when I say "particularly massive" I mean in terms of attaining Super Saiyan God and Fusion, which in the context of those "particularly massive" would have to mean several hundreds to thousands of times stronger. If Goku got even 10x stronger from SSJ to SSJG then that would be plenty to go from losing to dominating the two girl saiyans.

And actually, that boost that Trunks received that you are referring to was pretty explicitly mentioned to be as a result of training with Vegeta. It was even in the episode description. And I can't help but think that "holding his own" against Super Saiyan Rose is an exaggeration.

But like was established earlier, we may have to agree to disagree

[Asura]

Beerus explained that his power was "absorbed" and again, that is how his base went from weaker than Namek Freeza to stronger than SSJ3 Gotenks. Goku went from having difficulty in SSJ2 to putting a beating as a SSG, yes this is true, when I say "particularly massive" I mean in terms of attaining Super Saiyan God and Fusion, which in the context of those "particularly massive" would have to mean several hundreds to thousands of times stronger. If Goku got even 10x stronger from SSJ to SSJG then that would be plenty to go from losing to dominating the two girl saiyans.

And actually, that boost that Trunks received that you are referring to was pretty explicitly mentioned to be as a result of training with Vegeta. It was even in the episode description. And I can't help but think that "holding his own" against Super Saiyan Rose is an exaggeration.

But like was established earlier, we may have to agree to disagree

Yes, Beerus explains that it's absorbed, but that's later directly contradicted by him using it again during the tournament with no explanation. Poor writing.

So Trunks goes from getting destroyed by Black in his base form, to holding his own against him in his Rose form, after a single day of training with Vegeta? It's no exaggeration, he does much better than SSB Vegeta does. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dN3EAWkD47E

Then we have Rage Trunks taking on both Zamasu and Black at the same time, and doing much better on his own than even Goku did when he was 2v2ing with Trunks: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQuFaxX9Anc

What about the rest of my post? If the scaling is fine as you say it is (or at least fine in the context of saying it's just like Z) shouldn't you be able to easily decipher the power scaling and tiers of the characters in the FT arc and ToP arcs like I easily did for the Cell and Buu arcs?

[Dagon]

Yes, Beerus explains that it's absorbed, but that's later directly contradicted by him using it again during the tournament with no explanation. Poor writing.

Nope. The POWER of SSJG was absorbed into Goku. The FORM of SSJG is still something separate. Thus when Goku loses the form against Beerus, his SSJ state is the same power level and even surpasses SSJG. After training to control god ki at will, he then has access to the SSJG form on top of his yellow SSJ forms.

[Asura]

Yes, Beerus explains that it's absorbed, but that's later directly contradicted by him using it again during the tournament with no explanation. Poor writing.

Nope. The POWER of SSJG was absorbed into Goku. The FORM of SSJG is still something separate. Thus when Goku loses the form against Beerus, his SSJ state is the same power level and even surpasses SSJG. After training to control god ki at will, he then has access to the SSJG form on top of his yellow SSJ forms.

That doesn't make any sense. If the power of SSG is absorbed into his base form, then why bother transforming into it? What would it even do? Wouldn't it theoretically be exactly the same? Or are you saying it's basically SSG on top of SSG? SSG inception? Super Saiyan God Super Saiyan God?

[Doctor.]

Yes, Beerus explains that it's absorbed, but that's later directly contradicted by him using it again during the tournament with no explanation. Poor writing.

Nope. The POWER of SSJG was absorbed into Goku. The FORM of SSJG is still something separate. Thus when Goku loses the form against Beerus, his SSJ state is the same power level and even surpasses SSJG. After training to control god ki at will, he then has access to the SSJG form on top of his yellow SSJ forms.

You know what this is? Headcanon. Because the show doesn't bother explaining shit.

And frankly saying that Goku can basically stack SSG on top of SSG is as stupid as the people that argue that Gohan stacked ultimate on top of ultimate.

[SingleFringe&Sparks]

I mean I am not trying to accuse you of saying that DBZ is flawless it just appears that you are more willing to ignore the flaws within Z than you are with Super. .

Seems like I'm reading more of that circular argument against relevance. I don't see how 2 wrongs make a right with this defense of Super, that it shouldn't be criticized for its bad writing and bad structuring because Z had faults you can cherrypick to try and deflect or equate. That's a reactionary outcry to Super being judged narratively than an actual argument. An 'I know you are but what am I' form of thinking. You can easily compare Z's Buu arc being generally seen as its weakest narrative-wise in comparison to the prior arcs, and the closest to Super you can compare (and what people often try to use to defend Super), but the difference is glaring at how the Buu Saga's weak plot but coherent character stories that easily outweighs Super's lack of plot and lack of full character arcs. The Buu saga still fit in the structure that was consistent with the last arc that made the entertainment easily transitioned. Super is episodic, situational and repetitive; even only on its own presentation alone.

- Filler events in the first half.
- Fight in the middle.
- Spontaneous power up or transformation at the end.
- BS ending to fight.
- Feast.

Super is really no different than the Z movies in writing format.

Yes, Beerus explains that it's absorbed, but that's later directly contradicted by him using it again during the tournament with no explanation. Poor writing.

Nope. The POWER of SSJG was absorbed into Goku. The FORM of SSJG is still something separate. Thus when Goku loses the form against Beerus, his SSJ state is the same power level and even surpasses SSJG. After training to control god ki at will, he then has access to the SSJG form on top of his yellow SSJ forms.

Nope, that doesn't make sense. Thats like being able to stack SS1 over SS3 after going through the forms into SS3. The only thing the anime did that ade sense is to not use SSG, claiming it doesn't drain stamina but has a time limit anyway is ridiculous.

[Hugo Boss]

After being challenged to explain how Goku can still put a fight, Beerus told Goku he absorbed god power and made it his own, but it doesn’t have to mean Goku had free access to it whenever he wanted. Strikes me as a good theory that the god power sticked due to extreme tension instead. After the situation cooled down, Goku needed to work to earn that power again. A key part of Whis’ training was strengthening the body and powering up the base.

Kuririn’s recruitment episode was polemic, but excluding the kamehameha moment, which I find a bit stretching, I don’t take issue with it since Goku was intentionally testing Kuririn’s strategies and he used some of what he learnt against Jiren, despite being an useless effort. Also, I never got the impression that Goku needed to transform, I saw it more like a defensive reflex due to not be allowed to use the flight technique and to increase the difficulty bit by bit for Kuririn.

And these are very specific situations that hardly affect the story as a whole. My only beef with the powerscaling in general is the lack of explanation sometimes, but claiming that the series has poor writing because of that sounds like an exaggeration. We don’t know how much freedom the writers have and how much influence they have in certain aspects of the story to be able to hold them accountable.

[Dagon]

Just look at the power scale.

Goku says not even fusion would work against Beerus. Later, Goku says SSJG is far beyond what he could have ever imagined possible. He has memories of being Vegetto, so he'd know the limits of that power. So:
SSJG(ritual) >> SSJ3 Vegetto(Z)

Beerus sees SSJ Goku can still fight on the level of SSJG even after losing the form. Both Beerus and the narrator say that Goku will surpass SSJG before the end of the fight.
SSJ Post-God = SSJG(ritual), and later SSJ Post-God > SSJG(ritual) >> SSJ3 Vegetto(Z)

Krillin says the battle with base Goku and 4th form Freeza is more terrifying than the battle with Beerus. When Goku lost the god form against Beerus, it turned back to mortal ki. The Z fighters could sense how strong Goku was from that point on.
Thus, Resurrection 'F' Base Goku > SSJ Post-God Goku > SSJG Goku(ritual) >> SSJ3 Vegetto(Z)

When Beerus is forced to pretend to be Monaka and fight Goku to protect the secret that Monaka is actually weak, Beerus gets carried away with the fight and fights more ferociously than he did in the fight against SSJG Goku. Thus:
Beerus(Monaka fight) > Base Goku(Monaka fight) > Resurrection 'F' Base Goku > SSJ Post-God Goku > SSJG Goku(ritual) >> SSJ3 Vegetto(Z)

And of course we have base Copy-Vegeta(who equals Vegeta) tanking a hit from SSJ3 Gotenks, Goku getting 10x stronger due to fighting Hit to a standstill in their rematch whereas previously he needed Kaio-Ken x10 to face him, so much more. I could go on forever, baby. None of this is headcanon. That is a scale directly plucked from statements and feats from the series. I can provide screen caps of the episodes if need be.

Due to all this, Goku's use of SSJG after the BoG arc must be a "stacked" form that raises his power from his lower forms. It cannot be the same or similar power level from the BoG arc. When I see people saying that there's been a retcon regarding the god ki absorption or that goku can only use this super strong base power periodically, and they have the nerve to call my scale headcanon, I laugh because the notion of a retcon is headcanon.

Goku absorbed the POWER LEVEL of SSJG into his mortal forms. So if Goku's levels were 1-400(base to SSJ3), then when he turns SSJG for the first time, his ki shoots up to, say 10 million(arbitrary number), then when he loses the SSJG form, his SSJ state = 10 million. He later trains to the point that his base form would be 10 million and can turn SSJ on top of all that. When he masters god ki to the point that he can use the two god forms freely, the SSJG form is a multiplier on top of his mortal ki, in-between SSJ3 and SSJB in power.

[Hugo Boss]

[...]None of this is headcanon. That is a scale directly plucked from statements and feats from the series. I can provide screen caps of the episodes if need be.

[...]

When I see people saying that there's been a retcon regarding the god ki absorption or that goku can only use this super strong base power periodically, and they have the nerve to call my scale headcanon, I laugh because the notion of a retcon is headcanon. [...]

You are theorizing as much as the people you are criticizing. We just need to respect each other opinions.

By the way, is there any problematic aspect besides powerscale that deserves to be fixed?

[Doctor.]

By the way, is there any problematic aspect besides powerscale that deserves to be fixed?

Messy structure. Rehashed character arcs. Plot points that go nowhere. The bad execution of drama.

[ekrolo2]

Yes, Beerus explains that it's absorbed, but that's later directly contradicted by him using it again during the tournament with no explanation. Poor writing.

Nope. The POWER of SSJG was absorbed into Goku. The FORM of SSJG is still something separate. Thus when Goku loses the form against Beerus, his SSJ state is the same power level and even surpasses SSJG. After training to control god ki at will, he then has access to the SSJG form on top of his yellow SSJ forms.

You know what this is? Headcanon. Because the show doesn't bother explaining shit.

And frankly saying that Goku can basically stack SSG on top of SSG is as stupid as the people that argue that Gohan stacked ultimate on top of ultimate.

Wait, people actually think Gohan can stack Ultimate on top of Ultimate? How the balls does that even work?!

[Grimlock]

Wait, people actually think Gohan can stack Ultimate on top of Ultimate? How the balls does that even work?!

Like this. We know he's using Ultimate form on top of the Ultimate form because the bang grows even more. Oh, and there is Ultimate Ultimate Ultimate as well. A bang grows like Super Saiyan 3 form, on his back.

[Doctor.]

Wait, people actually think Gohan can stack Ultimate on top of Ultimate? How the balls does that even work?!

Some people think that Gohan was using ultimate back in the Resurrection 'F' arc, and stacked Super Saiyan on top of that to defeat Tagoma/Ginyu. Let's ignore how the entire arc hammers down the point that Gohan is rusty and got weaker. Since Gohan got ultimate back in the ToP recruitment arc, those people instead of just admitting they misinterpreted the previous arc, they double-down and say Gohan can somehow stack ultimate on top of ultimate.

To be fair, I've only seen this viewpoint on Youtube, which is known for ridiculously stupid headcanon.

[Hugo Boss]

By the way, is there any problematic aspect besides powerscale that deserves to be fixed?

Messy structure. Rehashed character arcs. Plot points that go nowhere. The bad execution of drama.

Can you give a few examples to illustrate those problems? And specify the plot points?

[Doctor.]

By the way, is there any problematic aspect besides powerscale that deserves to be fixed?

Messy structure. Rehashed character arcs. Plot points that go nowhere. The bad execution of drama.

Can you give a few examples to illustrate those problems? And specify the plot points?

Sure.

The messy structure is visible all throughout the tournament. An episodes showcases a fight and, in the next episode, those characters are in entirely different locations. There's no sense of progression from point A to point B, they just change arbitrarily from one place to another with no reason. You have Lavenda fighting Gohan's circle at the start of the tournament, for instance, only for him, later in the same episode, to be fighting Goku and Vegeta. Why did he give up on Gohan? How did he get to Goku and Vegeta? Did Bergamo and Basil call him over? I'm aware that this is a battle royale, but the manga is also one and it showcases how characters transition from one point to another very clearly. Even later in the tournament, when it had devolved into mostly 1v1s, Toppo vs Vegeta just ends abruptly with no explanation; the next episode Vegeta is fighting someone else for no reason. There is no coordination between the writers, which leads to the same moments being repeated over and over again: how many times did Freeza get smacked around, only to come back in the next episode as if nothing happened? I count at least 3: against Toppo twice, then against Jiren.

There's also the fact that rules in the tournament are arbitrarily changed to suit Zeno's need for a spectacle.

In regards to the character arcs, you have, of course, Vegeta making the same speech 4 or 5 times in the course of the entire tournament. You have Kuririn and Gohan regaining their fighting spirit like two or three times throughout the entire series. You have Toppo forsaking justice twice in the tournament (one time it does nothing, the other time it apparently gives him a power-up for no reason). You have Goku going through the same "don't let your guard down" lesson a billion times throughout the entire series. You have Trunks regaining his motivation like 3 or 4 times throughout the Zamasu arc. So on and so forth.

#130 is an example of bad drama because of the way it verbalizes something that was always clear subtext and how it appropriates modern, lesser Shounen tropes and dialogue for its conflict. The drama is lacking in identity.

Plot points that get dropped: Hakai is an energy that destroys everything; it just gets punched away. GoD Toppo will have to be defeated with strategy; brute force is all that's needed. Goku is a troublesome individual and a danger to the universe due to his selfishness; turns out he just gave all the universes a chance to survive anyway. The Gods are dicks that take advantage of the mortals (Zeno's reckless behavior, Champa and Beerus stating that they're the ones in charge back in the last tournament, Goku telling Hit they won't be pawns in the future, the teases about "the work of the Gods ending here" for UI); turns out the Gods were always good and just wanted to test the goodness of the mortals, making this tension between the Gods and the mortals that permeated the entire series absolutely pointless. I could go on and on.

[ekrolo2]

Messy structure. Rehashed character arcs. Plot points that go nowhere. The bad execution of drama.

Can you give a few examples to illustrate those problems? And specify the plot points?

Sure.

The messy structure is visible all throughout the tournament. An episodes showcases a fight and, in the next episode, those characters are in entirely different locations. There's no sense of progression from point A to point B, they just change arbitrarily from one place to another with no reason. You have Lavenda fighting Gohan's circle at the start of the tournament, for instance, only for him, later in the same episode, to be fighting Goku and Vegeta. Why did he give up on Gohan? How did he get to Goku and Vegeta? Did Bergamo and Basil call him over? I'm aware that this is a battle royale, but the manga is also one and it showcases how characters transition from one point to another very clearly. Even later in the tournament, when it had devolved into mostly 1v1s, Toppo vs Vegeta just ends abruptly with no explanation; the next episode Vegeta is fighting someone else for no reason. There is no coordination between the writers, which leads to the same moments being repeated over and over again: how many times did Freeza get smacked around, only to come back in the next episode as if nothing happened? I count at least 3: against Toppo twice, then against Jiren. The rules in the tournament being arbitrarily changed to suit Zeno's need for a spectacle..

Just to build on Doctors critique, there are a couple more issues worth talking about. First is the abuse of cinematic time, Dragon Ball is no stranger to this but it's arguably the worst example here. There's no way this happens in 48 minutes, flat out no way and for one simple reason: the cutaways. More often then not, characters will stop fighting to listen in on background commentary that goes on sometimes for a few minutes a piece, how has the tournament not run out with so many of them around? Hell, Jiren's backstory gets dumped at a point where everyone stops to listen to it and where there are only 2-3 minutes left in the tournament and it takes just about that time for Belmond to finish the damn speech! You can maybe say the fights happen faster than are presented but this excuse does NOT work for the exposition cutaways.

Also, the cutaways are worthless. The vast majority of them either say nothing of value and just pad out the time or they explain shit we already know. Like we cut away to Cabba when Kefla powers up to the max so she can take out Omen Goku, we know what she's doing, we've seen people power up dozens of times already, even the ones who've only ever seen Super and not the other stuff know what a fucking power-up sequence is at this point! It's pointless padding.

Then there's how the fights work, Doctor already pointed it out but here's another problem: for the most part, every episode focuses predominately on one fight alone. This creates the impression that nobody else is doing anything while we're focused on a particular character. For a battle royale, this is pretty damaging. We're supposed to feel like there's a dozen thing happening at once but we mostly don't get that, it feels more like everyone not on camera is frozen until the camera decides to look back on them.

[SingleFringe&Sparks]

Wait, people actually think Gohan can stack Ultimate on top of Ultimate? How the balls does that even work?!

Some people think that Gohan was using ultimate back in the Resurrection 'F' arc, and stacked Super Saiyan on top of that to defeat Tagoma/Ginyu. Let's ignore how the entire arc hammers down the point that Gohan is rusty and got weaker. Since Gohan got ultimate back in the ToP recruitment arc, those people instead of just admitting they misinterpreted the previous arc, they double-down and say Gohan can somehow stack ultimate on top of ultimate.

To be fair, I've only seen this viewpoint on Youtube, which is known for ridiculously stupid headcanon.

Thats only because in the BOG movie he used Ultimate, (corrected by Toei because Toei seems to just hate that form apparently) so people just assumed he was using it all the time after that. Toei at least made it clearer when he is though now but adjusting his base form hairline. The only dumb headcanon is how people try to scale this like a Zenkai boost or something, when its just bad inconsistency and people trying to rationalize it to the point of insanity instead of accepting it as circular writing.

Then there's how the fights work, Doctor already pointed it out but here's another problem: for the most part, every episode focuses predominately on one fight alone. This creates the impression that nobody else is doing anything while we're focused on a particular character. For a battle royale, this is pretty damaging. We're supposed to feel like there's a dozen thing happening at once but we mostly don't get that, it feels more like everyone not on camera is frozen until the camera decides to look back on them.

Its also bad pacing on Toei because they've done battle Royal type fights before. The Tree of Might henchmen vs. the main cast, or the World's Strongest henchmen vs. Goku, all of them were paced as a battle royal because of the time they had for the movie. With the TOP being drawn out to painfully dragging levels, they probably never had the urgency to squeeze things in, or someone just doesn't know how a royal should work there. Thus the misconception people have about all the disposable characters needing character development because of the 1v1 format they had. Where as the manga just did what we expected by having the disposables tossed out and Jiren not just sitting around for no explainable reason.

[perucho1990]

Keep Toshio and Tomioka, fire the rest of the writers.

Get writers that worked in series like Gintama or Hero Academia, at least the comedy relief scenes/gag characters would be much better. They wouldve made someone like Ribrianne a fun character.