Do you still enjoy non-canon Dragon Ball content?

[Matches Malone]

Minus is supposed to be the actual canon, or whatever, but I still prefer the Bardock special. The quality of it is far better than Minus. Give me asshole Bardock any day of the week.

As divided as we can be over certain opinions, this is probably the only one everyone can agree on. Despite it being 6 years, I still can't believe Toriyama put out something as bad as Minus.

[SupremeKai25]

I mean, I enjoyed some of Super Dragon Ball Heroes at the time. The Universal Conflict arc was quite promising at the beginning and some of its concepts are very good and should totally be introduced in the canon Super. But that's about it. You can't expect much from a promotional anime of 10 minutes.

[ABED]

I would like to hear from people in their own words, those who place importance on canon, why they care so much about it.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Well considering the fact there is no definitively defined canon for Dragon Ball and there are things I enjoy in all content outside the original 1984-1995 manga, I'd have to say yes.

Bardock special is definitely a standout for being a story which Toriyama admitted he wouldn't have written himself but absolutely deserves to be a part of his story.

[LoganForkHands73]

The only reason I put any stock into "canon" is because whatever is currently canon is usually what's talked about. Otherwise, I couldn't and wouldn't care less, but it's just the way things go. I prefer to just view things on their own merits.

In recent times, "canon" has been appropriated by the writers and corporations who try to present these concrete lists of "acceptable" work that should be used as an absolute basis for all future media. However, this usually only ends up proving how fluid and inconsistent canon really is. So many film franchises have tried this "ignore x number of poorly-regarded sequels and just follow on from the original film" re-quel formula as I call it, where they desperately try to form a blank slate while still keeping a rudimentary continuity with the most popular, nostalgic movies. Halloween has done it a bunch of times. Season of the Witch was an anthology film that had nothing to do with the first two Michael Myers movies. The H20 trilogy ignored the post-Carpenter trilogy. Then the 2018 reboot came along and ignored all of the other sequels, including the original Halloween II by John Carpenter, completely bringing things back to square one (including retconning Michael's relationship to Laurie Strode, arguably a good thing imo). But then... are all of the other sequels, including the well-regarded ones, now just completely irrelevant? I liked the 2018 one, but fuck that noise.

In short, keeping up with "official" canon is pretty futile in my view. It should really be something that individual fans decide, not the creators. That's how it began with Sherlock Holmes readers trying to keep track of the stories Arthur Conan Doyle actually wrote. Hell, that's what those funny Bible blokes have been doing for millennia.

Companies and writers didn't appropriate canon, they are the ones that ultimately determine what is an what isn't canon as their works are the basis of what constitutes what's in continuity. I don't know why anyone cares about it beyond the trivia aspect. Canon doesn't really matter. Canon by its nature is official. Official canon is redundant.

When it comes to collaborative franchise media, who can definitively decide what's canon and what's not? The corporations, the directors, the writers? Everyone declared that Genisys was gonna be the base for a new official Terminator canon, acknowledging only the first two movies as in continuity. Then Dark Fate comes along and does the exact same thing, but ignores Genisys. Everyone was saying that Dark Fate had higher authority because James Cameron was producing, but it turned out to be mediocre at best. People shouldn't have to acknowledge it just because of some arbitrary "the creator was kinda involve sorta so it counts". The wheel will keep turning and eventually a new one will come out, now with Cameron as like executive producer or whatever. With Dragon Ball, I don't care what other people want to acknowledge or not, but I'll just enjoy whatever I want regardless whether or not it's currently "canon"... and what that word means in this franchise is even more debatable.

Creators declaring things in or out of continuity is fine, but throwing around the word "canon" holds a different weight. Things can have a canon without sharing a narrative continuity.

[ABED]

Canon changes. Why does it matter what anyone acknowledges?

Creators declaring things in or out of continuity is fine, but throwing around the word "canon" holds a different weight. Things can have a canon without sharing a narrative continuity.

In this context what does that mean?

[LoganForkHands73]

Canon changes. Why does it matter what anyone acknowledges?

Creators declaring things in or out of continuity is fine, but throwing around the word "canon" holds a different weight. Things can have a canon without sharing a narrative continuity.

In this context what does that mean?

Well, broadly speaking, you could say anything "officially" labelled Dragon Ball and widely distributed should be counted as canon. Everything from Super to GT to Heroes, but they clearly don't share continuity with each other. I don't think there's any dictionary definition of the word "canon" that's at all synonymous with in-story continuity in the way that fans conflate the terms. The closest is "an authentic body of works by a writer", but that doesn't indicate anything about continuity between their works. So for some, the only valid canon is the manga written and drawn by Akira Toriyama, nothing else. But then, by your definition, if Toriyama came out and declared the entire Dragon Ball manga except for Minus "non-canon" for everything moving forward, would everyone have to accept it? That's what I mean by creators potentially abusing the word canon.

The thing is, whenever a piece of media is officially declared "non-canon", fans just take that as meaning that that media is now completely worthless. GT still has some fans, but you still get haters who smugly dismiss it and everything it contributed purely because it's not canon and therefore not relevant. When Disney bought Star Wars and put out the new Word of Canon which dismissed everything except for the movies and The Clone Wars, people got angry because they felt that all of the expanded universe stories they loved were now completely worthless. It is of course a pretty ridiculous mentality, but it's understandable and it's what you get when you rely purely on the creators and corporations to count things for you.

I fully agree that canon is a trivial gatekeeping matter and I don't get the huge fascination. But this is how I view the whole situation.

[Matches Malone]

The thing is, whenever a piece of media is officially declared "non-canon", fans just take that as meaning that that media is now completely worthless.

This is probably why no one will ever state outright what's "canon", as that could potentially cost them sales.

[Vijay]

90's non-canon DBZ contents? Absolutely yes

But recent over the past 20-30 years...

[LoganForkHands73]

The thing is, whenever a piece of media is officially declared "non-canon", fans just take that as meaning that that media is now completely worthless.

This is probably why no one will ever state outright what's "canon", as that could potentially cost them sales.

Probably. So long as they can still get merch money off Super Saiyan 4 action figures, anyway.

[Grimlock]

The fourth panel here is the most important one. Read it, read it again. Then keep reading until you realize you finally understood it.




That being said, if you mean content that merely takes place in other continuities, yeah I do. Just the fact that the movies and Dragon Ball GT happen in another dimension is an interesting concept because it brings a lot of possibilities and ideas to explore (which is being explored in Dragon Ball Heroes), thus making me enjoy them.

[ABED]

But in continuity is exactly what people mean when they are talking about Sherlock Holmes stories.

Regardless, I agree that it's stupid. I don't know why anyone cares about this stuff and places more importance on it than a good story.

thus making me enjoy them.

So unless they were in some alternate dimension, which could presumably be visited by the characters in the regular dimension, you wouldn't enjoy it?

[Matches Malone]

The fourth panel here is the most important one. Read it, read it again. Then keep reading until you realize you finally understood it.

The topic of canon was a lot easier pre-2008, as everything outside of the original manga was essentially left up to the fans to decide if they counted or not, be it GT, the movies, or the various anime original content. This also applies to the majority of other franchises based on a manga, such as One Piece.

Now though, things are very different, as we no longer have a manga that's the center of everything. There's no longer that center piece that guides everything, but instead everyone's just doing their own thing based on some vague notes. It even goes a step further, as not only do we have different tellings of the same stories (BOG having 3 versions for examples), but now older stories are outright being rebooted, such as Minus and Broly replacing their original counterparts.

[ABED]

Also, it's nonsense. You don't need to explicitly define what's canon. The original story is implicitly canon. And canon changes. I feel like some fans want canon to be this clearly defined set of events in the story and for it all to fit together like a puzzle.

[JulieYBM]

I very much enjoy 'non-canon' Dragon Ball, because 'canon' can screw off. All that matters to me is whether or not a book, comic, film, television episode et cetera is a good piece of work unto itself.

[Grimlock]

So unless they were in some alternate dimension, which could presumably be visited by the characters in the regular dimension, you wouldn't enjoy it?

It's not that "I wouldn't enjoy it", I would be mostly neutral. There's nothing really remarkable about the movies. So, like Dabura, one piece of information/lore made them interesting. In this case, the fact that the movies happen in an alternate dimension means we could see characters reacting to things and interacting with their counterparts. That does make movie stuff, their existence and their content a lot more interesting, as it also provides a lot more to work with.

The topic of canon was a lot easier pre-2008, as everything outside of the original manga was essentially left up to the fans to decide if they counted or not, be it GT, the movies, or the various anime original content. This also applies to the majority of other franchises based on a manga, such as One Piece.

Now though, things are very different, as we no longer have a manga that's the center of everything. There's no longer that center piece that guides everything, but instead everyone's just doing their own thing based on some vague notes. It even goes a step further, as not only do we have different tellings of the same stories (BOG having 3 versions for examples), but now older stories are outright being rebooted, such as Minus and Broly replacing their original counterparts.

It was probably easier but it was still a topic of discussion based on opinion. Dragon Ball lacks an official canon to this day, so everything is still up in the air, there are only opinions that shouldn't be treated as if they were facts.

[ABED]

It's not that "I wouldn't enjoy it", I would be mostly neutral. There's nothing really remarkable about the movies. So, like Dabura, one piece of information/lore made them interesting. In this case, the fact that the movies happen in an alternate dimension means we could see characters reacting to things and interacting with their counterparts. That does make movie stuff, their existence and their content a lot more interesting, as it also provides a lot more to work with.

How does anything subsequently done with those characters retroactively make the movies more interesting?

[Robo4900]

Canon status has precisely zero relevance to whether a story is good or not.

Meanwhile, whether a story is actually good or not, on its own terms, juged purely as what it is (plus all the other factors like my own tastes, nostalgia, etc.), is what determines my enjoyment of it.

Therefore, something being "canon", and me enjoying something, are two entirely unrelated categories.


I enjoy much of the filler that's generally considered "non-canon" these days, I enjoy much of GT, I enjoy the two TV specials (the Trunks special contradicts the manga, the Bardock special contradicts Minus and Broly; neither is "canon"), I enjoy many of the movies, I enjoy much of Super's filler/breather episodes (which seem to be ambiguous, canon-wise), I enjoy many of the video games, I enjoy many of the spinoffs ("That Time I Got Reincarnated As Yamucha", Toyotaro's Victory Mission manga)...

To be honest, I don't see how this question is something anyone could answer "No" to, unless their tastes are quite specific, and result in it just so happening that all the "non-canon" material happens to be all the stuff they don't like. (Which is unlikely, given the sheer volume of good stuff that isn't "canon" anymore)
Honestly, at this point, the only conclusion I can come to about this fandom's obsession with "canon" somehow mattering is that a lot of people are still hung up on the fact they can't accept that they didn't like a piece of Dragon Ball media from over 20 years ago (GT), so they've decided it's okay, because it's an inferior, "non-canon" story that wasn't written by Toriyama, therefore it can be disregarded. It's a stupid attitude, though. Canon doesn't matter, never mattered, and never will matter, to anything beyond "Which stories does this story that I'm currently watching follow on from?"


... This probably would have been a good "Hill to die on" post.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Another question along the same lines should be this. Does it really matter whether or not a story within the Dragon Ball world is written by Toriyama?

Some might say of course it does because Toriyama is the creator and the definitive experience is his vision, but really if other writers, artists and animators can work in the same sandbox and create, illustrate and animate stories that appeal to you and potentially millions of other fans does it really matter?

Taking the above example of Star Wars you have an abundance of stories that diverge from the original source material (in this case the original trilogy) that a range of fans either loved or would like to see. To this day there are huge fans of the Thrawn Trilogy from the old EU, obviously Disney's sequel trilogy which went in its own post-ROTJ direction has it's fair share of fans, and while we'll likely never see it there are also those who have been advocating to see George Lucas' ideas for Episodes 7-9 brought to life. If somehow the Lucas sequel trilogy came to be, even in animated form would it really invalidate the other two versions of the sequel trilogy? Of course not, if you like them more power to you.

Similarly with Dragon Ball, we have GT, Super, DB Online, or even unofficial products like Zeroverse and New Age. GT and Online had some input from Toriyama, Super to some has that creators seal of approval, because unlike the other two it is marketed as such, but now we have people who prefer GT to Super, although the latter is more closely tied to the creator. That doesn't mean the GT fans or fans of Online or any of the unofficial continuations are wrong, but I would say whether the creators seal of approval (which even with Super is up for debate) is important is really up to the individual fan to decide.

[LoganForkHands73]

Agreed. I really believe that the recent push for all big media franchises to have universe bibles and solid canons is why fans have become even more dogmatic and obsessed with forcing it into everything. If anyone tries to shame you for liking GT purely for whether or not it's "canon", you have a god-given right to tell them to stfu.

It gets really ridiculous when you've got cunce claiming that Toriyama's outline for Super is somehow the one true canon. An unpublished series of fucking napkin notes that nobody except for the creators has ever seen somehow has more value than either the manga or anime, purely because Toriyama wrote it. Canon can be whatever you want but get the hell out with that.