Freeza Saga Filler

[jpranevich]

I just finished episode 92: Goku is powering up a genki-dama and the Ginyu Force has just arrived on Kaio's planet. And it strikes me... Why is the Freeza Saga filler done so poorly?

There is a lot of *good* here. In fact, there's been three recurring B plots winding through the last twenty or so episodes.

• Chi-chi on Earth, worried for Gohan and trying to mount a third expedition to Namek.
• Bulma meeting and being taken over by the Ginyu frog, and his attempts to battle Piccolo/Kuririn/Gohan.
• And now, the remainder of the Ginyu Force on Kaio's planet.

All of these have great promise. With Chi-chi, we get some great scenes of her "recruiting" Kame-sen'nin, Yajirobe, Puar, and Oolong. We get Dr Brief building the ship, and some "domestic" scenes with her father. It all comes together well enough that I wish they actually WERE going to Namek because it would have made the whole thing a bit more varied. I especially love the way it riffs on the ending to the Red Ribbon Army arc where the Turtle Hermit and friends go "rescue" Goku only to find that he has everything in hand. The scenes with Bulma and Ginyu are also good. After dozens of episodes where she either doesn't appear or has nothing to do, we finally get to see some Bulma-smarts with the translation collar followed by Ginyu taking over her body. There could have been some interesting drama, maybe an actual side-story where Kuririn/Gohan/Piccolo have to fight Ginyu to keep him from linking up with Freeza. Instead, we get a 2 minute "battle" where Bulma's lack of battle prowess makes Ginyu ineffectual.

These scenes, almost unique within Dragon Ball up to this point, are also structured as traditional "B-plots". We don't need a fully Bulma-Ginyu episode, but we get several updates on them in five-minute bursts over a half dozen episodes. That there are three recurring plot lines is excellent.

But... seriously... nothing hangs together at all. The editing is scatter-shot. They build up to scenes and then fail to deliver. They could have fleshed out all of these arcs by simply not having so many unnecessary flashbacks. (Some of which are literally to 1-2 episodes ago.) There are some really decent ideas, executed very poorly. I WANT to see the team try to deal with Evil Bulma for a bit more than 30 seconds. I WANT to see Chi-chi's rescue mission. I suppose I'm probably the only one, but it would have been a heck of a lot better than Goku-Freeza powering up and feeling each other out for ten episodes. And how many times must Gohan almost run off to fight with his father, only to have Piccolo tell him that he has to stay. Too many.

(That said, I did enjoy Piccolo complaining that Kaio kept the Genki-dama from them. That's at least in character. It would have also been a nice time to comment on how no one else learned Kaio-ken...)

[KBABZ]

It's probably because it's all ultimately filler. Unlike something such as the Wedding Dress arc, Garlic Jr. or GT (which had more room to tell their tales), these episodes don't exist to tell compelling stories, they exist to stall for time, so storytelling takes a backseat. There isn't really any intention to keep them around (watch as Chi-Chi's attempts to go to Namek never get brought up when they meet up with Gohan at the end of the arc), so they exist on a "Oh, and this too I guess" level.

[Xeogran]

It's probably because it's all ultimately filler. Unlike something such as the Wedding Dress arc, Garlic Jr. or GT (which had more room to tell their tales), these episodes don't exist to tell compelling stories, they exist to stall for time, so storytelling takes a backseat. There isn't really any intention to keep them around (watch as Chi-Chi's attempts to go to Namek never get brought up when they meet up with Gohan at the end of the arc), so they exist on a "Oh, and this too I guess" level.

But the frog Ginyu filler lived long enough to see relevance in Kai and even in Dragon Ball Super

[ABED]

It's probably because it's all ultimately filler. Unlike something such as the Wedding Dress arc, Garlic Jr. or GT (which had more room to tell their tales), these episodes don't exist to tell compelling stories, they exist to stall for time, so storytelling takes a backseat. There isn't really any intention to keep them around (watch as Chi-Chi's attempts to go to Namek never get brought up when they meet up with Gohan at the end of the arc), so they exist on a "Oh, and this too I guess" level.

All filler exists to stall for time, some do it better.

The Namek filler is pretty much uniformly awful with the exception of the mirrored ship and some stuff here and there. I don't recall everything that's filler and everything that's not, but Kai's pacing was SO much better. I hate the Ginyu/Bulma stuff, Fake Namek is boring, and any cutback to Chichi spoil momentum.

[Lord Beerus]

The filler in the Freeza arc is mostly abysmal. It gets especially bad when Goku and Freeza finally fight. That arc is one of the main reasons I'm thankful that Dragon Ball (Z) Kai exists. That's not say that Kai alleviates all of the pacing issues with that arc, but it at least makes that arc watchable.

[jpranevich]

The Namek filler is pretty much uniformly awful with the exception of the mirrored ship and some stuff here and there. I don't recall everything that's filler and everything that's not, but Kai's pacing was SO much better. I hate the Ginyu/Bulma stuff, Fake Namek is boring, and any cutback to Chichi spoil momentum.

It is awful, but as far as spoiling momentum, the writers did that one filler or no. The Goku/Freeza fight is BORING. There is essentially only one action per episode, one new attack or technique used. Lots of staring at each other. LOTS of unnecessary flashbacks to things we just saw an episode or two ago. Lots of cutting back to Gohan/Kuririn/Piccolo just looking scared or having the same conversation over and over again. Compare this to any of the fights from earlier in the series, even as recently as Vegeta, and it's night and day.

I personally found the Chi-chi and Ginyu segments to be welcome respites from drudgery, as flawed as they were. But frankly Kai could have been justified just by cutting this fight better.

(The earlier Namek filler, like "Fake Namek" and such, I agree with you that they killed pacing. But pacing is broken during the Goku/Freeza fight already.)

[ABED]

But the cutaways to Piccolo, Kuririn, and Gohan are also very often filler. Much of the staring and flashbacks are also filler. The fight is long in the manga, but it's not for those reasons.

I don't care about Chichi at all. If I have to deal with filler during the battle, I'll take even staring over whatever the hell she's doing.

[ekrolo2]

I think it sticks out poorly thanks to the filler in the Saiyan arc which felt far more meaningful in showing how everyone prepared for the Saiyan's. Even the Arlia detour was a good showcase of what Goku & co would deal with once Vegeta and Nappa landed on Earth.

The Namek filler doesn't really do anything like that. It doesn't add to the story or the characters, it's very obviously JUST there to stall for time and nothing else.

[ABED]

A big difference is the stuff in the Namek arc doesn't go anywhere. In the Saiyan arc, the manga goes from A almost straight to Z. The anime expended by showing B, C, D... (i.e. the incremental progress the characters made).

[KBABZ]

The filler in the Freeza arc is mostly abysmal. It gets especially bad when Goku and Freeza finally fight. That arc is one of the main reasons I'm thankful that Dragon Ball (Z) Kai exists. That's not say that Kai alleviates all of the pacing issues with that arc, but it at least makes that arc watchable.

I feel really bad for Japanese fans watching it as it came out on a weekly basis. Here in NZ we got a new episode each afternoon and it was still a bore.

[Lord Beerus]

The filler in the Freeza arc is mostly abysmal. It gets especially bad when Goku and Freeza finally fight. That arc is one of the main reasons I'm thankful that Dragon Ball (Z) Kai exists. That's not say that Kai alleviates all of the pacing issues with that arc, but it at least makes that arc watchable.

I feel really bad for Japanese fans watching it as it came out on a weekly basis. Here in NZ we got a new episode each afternoon and it was still a bore.

Real talk: I'd never recommend watching Dragon Ball Z unless you have a lot of time and patience. The pacing of the show once the cast to Namek and beyond that is just intolerable.

[Robo4900]

The filler in the Freeza arc is mostly abysmal. It gets especially bad when Goku and Freeza finally fight. That arc is one of the main reasons I'm thankful that Dragon Ball (Z) Kai exists. That's not say that Kai alleviates all of the pacing issues with that arc, but it at least makes that arc watchable.

I feel really bad for Japanese fans watching it as it came out on a weekly basis. Here in NZ we got a new episode each afternoon and it was still a bore.

Real talk: I'd never recommend watching Dragon Ball Z unless you have a lot of time and patience. The pacing of the show once the cast to Namek and beyond that is just intolerable.

Honestly, I would say the filler is only actually a problem during the Namek/Freeza arcs. If you haven't seen the first Z movie, the Garlic Jr. mini-arc will probably be a little bothersome for you too, but as soon as everyone realises Freeza's heading to earth, things really pick up, and the whole Cell/cyborgs arc really works.

[ABED]

I do agree about the filler being insufferable after the Saiyan arc. That was the last time when I felt the filler was an overall benefit. I do however have a lot of patience and time, but DBZ's pacing in Kai is far better from the Freeza arc onward. Excising over 40% did wonders.

[Desassina]

I felt that Majin Boo filler was the most stylish and fitting for the arc after Dragon Ball and the Saiyans without the occasional Mr. Satan scene. I also appreciated some of the anime corrections to the manga that made it easier for me to not get distracted. Cell and Piccolo's hands were one of those things that I had to remember and the overall color direction was better. Granted that the manga was shown without it except for the covers but Toriyama wasn't masterful at it. Kaio-sama's color scheme comes to mind.