Are all these retcons ruining Dragonball ?

[TrunksTrevelyan0064]

Kataphrut pretty much nailed it on the head.

Also, new material produced long after the original material has wrapped up NEVER "ruins" said original material, if you ask me. We still have, and will always have, the original manga and the first anime adaptation of that manga, and everything else is pretty much just optional bonus stuff. The original material will always still be there, beginning to end, and you can always still enjoy that in a vacuum. This goes for any kind of fictional content that you reread/rewatch/replay: you are completely and utterly free to enjoy the parts you do like, and skip the parts you don't like. It really is that simple.

[Tavarano]

No, unless you except good story, consistent writing, themes and proper character development from DB, but that ship has sailed long time ago, or perhaps has never been at the port to begin with.

[Ssjcell]

I'm sorry the new material is cool but these retcons are aburd imo. First off bardock, the scene where bardock confronts frieza is IN THE MANGA, yet appearently it never happened.

That's false. Who said it didn't happen?

Db minus, and I think broly movie

[ABED]

No, unless you except good story, consistent writing, themes and proper character development from DB, but that ship has sailed long time ago, or perhaps has never been at the port to begin with.

I don't think that's a fair assessment of DB. There is plenty of great writing and proper character development.

[Bebi Hatchiyack]

I don't see any retcons in Dragon Ball personally.

[ABED]

I don't see any retcons in Dragon Ball personally.

I would argue Super for the reasons I mentioned. Buu is reincarnated as Uub because Goku wants to fight the strongest being he had ever faced without worry of the universe being destroyed. The reason the ending works is because of that promise. Taking Super into account, Buu is nowhere near the strongest and Goku quickly surpasses him, so the original ending doesn't work thematically.

[Hugo Boss]

I'm sorry the new material is cool but these retcons are aburd imo. First off bardock, the scene where bardock confronts frieza is IN THE MANGA, yet appearently it never happened.

That's false. Who said it didn't happen?

Db minus, and I think broly movie

Did you watch the movie? Bardock actually tried to stop Freeza’s ki blast.

[Luso Saiyan]

Db minus,

Wrong. Minus is set one month before Freeza destroys planet Vegeta.

and I think broly movie

Wrong again. The Broly movie adapts Minus and also shows Bardock's last stand because the two aren't, and never were, mutually exclusive.

[Grimlock]

I think he is referring to a proper Bardock vs Freeza, you know. With Freeza getting to see Bardock so that that scene in the manga during Freeza saga doesn't become awkward. And with Bardock going outer space, also seen in the manga. That was a proper confrontation.

What Bardock did in the movie was just trying to send Freeza's attack back, no actual confrontation between these two was depicted in it.

[Luso Saiyan]

I think he is referring to a proper Bardock vs Freeza, you know.

Who gets to define "proper"? And he's referring to Bardock making a stand against Freeza, as established in the manga. What's in the manga is not contradicted by Minus (as he erroneously implied) and is adapted in the movie.

And the logic applies to the rest of his post. It's a rant against his own baseless assumptions.

For example, Goku is still an infant when he's sent away. There's nothing in Minus or in the movie that contradicts that. It's not established what his memories were or weren't during his time with Gohan for him to claim that it's a retcon or a problem.

[Grimlock]

Who gets to define "proper"?

Not a matter of "who", but "what". There is a Bardock vs Freeza in the TV Special, the former decides to defend everything by going outer space, calling out for Freeza, they see each other, Bardock utters some words and attacks him directly. There is not a Bardock vs Freeza in Dragon Ball Super: Broly, Bardock does not go out of planet Vegeta, he just sees a huge attack coming and flies to repel it, that's all that is to it, no actual confrontation, no rebel, just a sheer act of defense without a prior judgement/intetion of attacking the attacker.

[Luso Saiyan]

There is not a Bardock vs Freeza in Dragon Ball Super: Broly, Bardock does not go out of planet Vegeta, he just sees a huge attack coming and flies to repel it, that's all that is to it, no actual confrontation, no rebel, just a sheer act of defense without a prior judgement/intetion of attacking the attacker.

Of course there is a Bardock vs Freeza. He's already up there in space before Freeza comes out of his ship and fires against the planet, to which Bardock fires back only to be overwhelmed. That it's not like the TV special doesn't make it a retcon, nor does it make it improper.

The fact that he's up there making a stand is consistent with what Freeza said on Namek.

[Grimlock]

I don't remember seeing the outer space when Bardock makes his move, he is still in planet Vegeta, you can see the ground and other Saiyans in the background.

Yeah, it is not a retcon because the manga depicts the TV Special version, so I can pretty much ignore this movie's take on the matter. But it does bring a problem because Freeza does not see Bardock, so there wouldn't be a way for Freeza to remember that there was a Saiyan who stood against him until the very moment.

[Luso Saiyan]

I don't remember seeing the outer space when Bardock makes his move, he is still in planet Vegeta, you can see the ground and other Saiyans in the background.

He's in the stratosphere, with the planet in the background, same as in the manga and TV special.

But it does bring a problem because Freeza does not see Bardock, so there wouldn't be a way for Freeza to remember that there was a Saiyan who stood against him until the very moment.

How do you know he doesn't see Bardock? Just because we only see Bardock after Freeza fires doesn't mean Freeza hasn't seen him before he comes out of the ship. We don't see when he got up there to begin with. And considering the damage he has, clearly something happened in between.

[Ssjcell]

So wait the scene with bardock vs frieza is different from the manga now...your right not a retcon I'm an idiot my bad SMH it's a fucking retcon get over it

[Tavarano]

No, unless you except good story, consistent writing, themes and proper character development from DB, but that ship has sailed long time ago, or perhaps has never been at the port to begin with.

I don't think that's a fair assessment of DB. There is plenty of great writing and proper character development.

The direction itself is problematic to me, the characters aren't believeable because of it, literal genociders hang around with everyone else and are treated just like another guy, all the immoral actions go unpunished and forgotten, Goku can throw a senzu to Cell but Gohan won't ever say anything about it, or can abandon his wife for 7 years and she will wonder if she's looking good when he comes back. Gohan can get everyone killed due to his laziness and not learn anything from it, or shoot his wife while drunk almost killing his unborn daughter, treat the situation nonchalantly and nobody will care. They never seem to take the threats over their lives with adequate seriousness, the greatest example being the ToP where the characters refuse to join because they are more interested in their daily lives even when they are directly threatened with a fate worse than death. The conflicts in DB often happen in a very weird way, characters from time to time act like proper antiheroes except they seem to not do it out of malice, they just become temporarily dumb and illogical so that their goal becomes harder to reach. For example, why should one emotionally invest into Goku and Vegeta's genki dama struggle with Kid Buu if the only reason it's happening is because they just crushed the potaras and won't call Gohan nor Gotenks for help due to... reasons. And this is supposedly the charm of Toriyama's "poisonous" writing or however he calls it, to me it's just plainly bad. Toei (old school Toei anyway) did a lot better, by trying to get you to genuinely care about the characters so that you'd be invested, even though the anime technically missed the intention by being wholesome, and because of this direction discrepancy seems to be rather unfocused when it comes to morality and perception of the characters.

Aside from the direction, DB is a prototype of how a proper battle shonen should be done. The fighting aspect is nothing but waste, environment, weapons, items, techniques are used almost never, it all boils down to that pesky hidden number and everyone who doesn't have it high enough is worthless, the villains need to be massively overpowered and be able to defeat all the good guys at once just to be a threat, DB is really one of a kind that works that poorly. There are a lot of things that happen just because Toriyama needs something to happen and damage the integrity of the story, Goku can speak telepathically because why not, he can read minds because why not, Cell is suddenly perfect again because why not, Goku doesn't need to put his fingers on his forehead to teleport with kamehameha because why not, the rules of ressurection constantly change because why not, and of course there is no sense of consistency when it comes to strength portrayal because since 21st Budokai when Roshi destroyed the moon, every fight should leave massive dent in Earth whenever a character uses ki attacks, if not destroy it entirely, you can perhaps suspend your disbelief for all of this, but objectively it's terrible writing. Anything unique that appears gets inevitably watered down to being meaningless, kamehameha, flying, kaioken, super saiyan, god ki, all ki techniques get replaced by regular ki blasts, attention to detail is pretty poor, it still bothers me how the tails disappeared just like that. Motivations behind most of villains don't really work, Piccolo wants to conquer the world but fights in the tournament, the saiyans want to recruit Goku to conquer a planet with strong inhabitants, but then it's forgotten and Vegeta kills Nappa for no real reason, Vegeta wants to become immortal and then conveniently forgets about his goal, Frieza and saiyans are in the business for money except there isn't any interplanetary market of goods, Androids are supposedly programmed to kill Goku but don't act that way at all, Cell wants only to test his abilities just to destroy the ring he protected before and then try the same with the Earth. Well, I personally don't see this great writing.

[Luso Saiyan]

So wait the scene with bardock vs frieza is different from the manga now...your right not a retcon I'm an idiot my bad SMH it's a fucking retcon get over it

You make false assumptions, and when proven wrong you not only ignore it all but decide double down on it?

How exactly was it different than the manga? Minus doesn't change anything (as you originally claimed) and Broly shows the two panels from the manga (and then some). Nothing was retconned. Unless you are going to double down some more and start grasping at straws by mentioned his costume.

[ABED]

No, unless you except good story, consistent writing, themes and proper character development from DB, but that ship has sailed long time ago, or perhaps has never been at the port to begin with.

I don't think that's a fair assessment of DB. There is plenty of great writing and proper character development.

The direction itself is problematic to me, the characters aren't believeable because of it, literal genociders hang around with everyone else and are treated just like another guy, all the immoral actions go unpunished and forgotten, Goku can throw a senzu to Cell but Gohan won't ever say anything about it, or can abandon his wife for 7 years and she will wonder if she's looking good when he comes back. Gohan can get everyone killed due to his laziness and not learn anything from it, or shoot his wife while drunk almost killing his unborn daughter, treat the situation nonchalantly and nobody will care. They never seem to take the threats over their lives with adequate seriousness, the greatest example being the ToP where the characters refuse to join because they are more interested in their daily lives even when they are directly threatened with a fate worse than death. The conflicts in DB often happen in a very weird way, characters from time to time act like proper antiheroes except they seem to not do it out of malice, they just become temporarily dumb and illogical so that their goal becomes harder to reach. For example, why should one emotionally invest into Goku and Vegeta's genki dama struggle with Kid Buu if the only reason it's happening is because they just crushed the potaras and won't call Gohan nor Gotenks for help due to... reasons. And this is supposedly the charm of Toriyama's "poisonous" writing or however he calls it, to me it's just plainly bad. Toei (old school Toei anyway) did a lot better, by trying to get you to genuinely care about the characters so that you'd be invested, even though the anime technically missed the intention by being wholesome, and because of this direction discrepancy seems to be rather unfocused when it comes to morality and perception of the characters.

Aside from the direction, DB is a prototype of how a proper battle shonen should be done. The fighting aspect is nothing but waste, environment, weapons, items, techniques are used almost never, it all boils down to that pesky hidden number and everyone who doesn't have it high enough is worthless, the villains need to be massively overpowered and be able to defeat all the good guys at once just to be a threat, DB is really one of a kind that works that poorly. There are a lot of things that happen just because Toriyama needs something to happen and damage the integrity of the story, Goku can speak telepathically because why not, he can read minds because why not, Cell is suddenly perfect again because why not, Goku doesn't need to put his fingers on his forehead to teleport with kamehameha because why not, the rules of ressurection constantly change because why not, and of course there is no sense of consistency when it comes to strength portrayal because since 21st Budokai when Roshi destroyed the moon, every fight should leave massive dent in Earth whenever a character uses ki attacks, if not destroy it entirely, you can perhaps suspend your disbelief for all of this, but objectively it's terrible writing. Anything unique that appears gets inevitably watered down to being meaningless, kamehameha, flying, kaioken, super saiyan, god ki, all ki techniques get replaced by regular ki blasts, attention to detail is pretty poor, it still bothers me how the tails disappeared just like that. Motivations behind most of villains don't really work, Piccolo wants to conquer the world but fights in the tournament, the saiyans want to recruit Goku to conquer a planet with strong inhabitants, but then it's forgotten and Vegeta kills Nappa for no real reason, Vegeta wants to become immortal and then conveniently forgets about his goal, Frieza and saiyans are in the business for money except there isn't any interplanetary market of goods, Androids are supposedly programmed to kill Goku but don't act that way at all, Cell wants only to test his abilities just to destroy the ring he protected before and then try the same with the Earth. Well, I personally don't see this great writing.

This is neither a superhero tale or a morality tale. This is a martial arts show in the pure sense. It's a skewed code of honor, but it is the ethics that permiates the show. They may not have our code of ethics, but they do have a code. I can't speak for Super. Just because we don't agree with the ethics of the characters doesn't make it bad writing. You are mistaking the two.

Piccolo wanted to fight in the tournament because he wants to fight Goku. When he was reincarnated, he became more of a warrior than his former pure demon self. Vegeta kills Nappa because he thinks he's worthless after losing. He doesn't care about immortality anymore because his overwhelming desire becomes surpassing Goku. And did you really complain that there aren't any interplanetary market for goods in DB? There are so many fundamental misunderstandings you have about what DB is at its core.

If you have this many fundamental problems, why do you watch? What are you getting from it?

[Lord Beerus]

For a topic like this, the question has to be ultimately asked:

Are any of the changes coming from any of the new and modern Dragon Ball stories leading to the original manga being modified to accommodate them?

If the answer is no, then any harm the retcons being made to the perspective to how you view the original story are superficial at the best. The 42 volumes of the original still exist, unchanged and unperturbed, despite whatever retroactive creative decisions Toei, Toriyama or Toyotaro wish to introduce with new Dragon Ball stories.

This certainly doesn't mean that any rectons can't be criticized for the harm they may have to the themes of Toriyama's original story*cough*Dragon Ball Minus*cough*.

[ABED]

Harm is a strong word. While I agree that the originals are still in tact, much like most original works still exist along with the adaptations or sequels, I still wish bad sequels and adaptations wouldn't get made.