How would you rank Dragonball compared to other Shonen?

[JulieYBM]

Goddamn, ten years is so long.

*Reads Hajime no Ippo and watches Pokemon every week*

I have no clue how for some series I get so exhausted but with those two I don't.

[MasenkoHA]

My justification is there no reason for an allegedly serialized story to be that long no matter how badly one wants to pretend there’s some carefully laid out plan where every element matters. Even Pokemon essentially hits the reset button every time there’s a new generation of games to advertise.

Dr.Who, to my understanding, doesn’t expect you to watch from the beginning.


And while I generally lean towards anime that’s in the 26 episodes or less category there’s a big difference between “incredibly short” and “over decade long”

You failed to provide any objective reason as to why a story being really long is a bad thing, especially since there's no objective universal limit to story length.

And its a well known fact that Oda does plan out every single plot element in One Piece months in advance, even causal readers/viewers know this. He isn't like Toriyama who just makes things up as he goes along, which is the main source of plotholes and retcons in Dragonball.

There’s no “objective limit to story length” but you’re deluding yourself if you think any story needs 900+ episodes to tell its story.

It’s funny you tried comparing it to Sopranos but Sopranos was only 86 episodes. It wasn’t airing new episodes/releasing new chapters on a weekly basis.

[Polyphase Avatron]

My justification is there no reason for an allegedly serialized story to be that long no matter how badly one wants to pretend there’s some carefully laid out plan where every element matters. Even Pokemon essentially hits the reset button every time there’s a new generation of games to advertise.

Dr.Who, to my understanding, doesn’t expect you to watch from the beginning.


And while I generally lean towards anime that’s in the 26 episodes or less category there’s a big difference between “incredibly short” and “over decade long”

It's not "pretending", it literally is like that. You would know that if you actually read/watched it. There's no 'reset button', no dragging on the story with new arcs that were never originally meant to exist, etc. Just because you don't have the attention span for that kind of storytelling doesn't mean that it's not very rewarding for people who do.

[UI Peter]

My justification is there no reason for an allegedly serialized story to be that long no matter how badly one wants to pretend there’s some carefully laid out plan where every element matters. Even Pokemon essentially hits the reset button every time there’s a new generation of games to advertise.

Dr.Who, to my understanding, doesn’t expect you to watch from the beginning.


And while I generally lean towards anime that’s in the 26 episodes or less category there’s a big difference between “incredibly short” and “over decade long”

You failed to provide any objective reason as to why a story being really long is a bad thing, especially since there's no objective universal limit to story length.

And its a well known fact that Oda does plan out every single plot element in One Piece months in advance, even causal readers/viewers know this. He isn't like Toriyama who just makes things up as he goes along, which is the main source of plotholes and retcons in Dragonball.

There’s no “objective limit to story length” but you’re deluding yourself if you think any story needs 900+ episodes to tell its story.

It’s funny you tried comparing it to Sopranos but Sopranos was only 86 episodes. It wasn’t airing new episodes/releasing new chapters on a weekly basis.

Some stories have more to say and tell than others. Your personal laziness shouldn't determine whether or not a series is too long to get into lmao.

But Sopranos went on longer than 6 years, debunking the 6 seasons argument.

[Matches Malone]

Some stories have more to say and tell than others. Your personal laziness shouldn't determine whether or not a series is too long to get into.

I don't think it's laziness as much as hesitation. I got into One Piece as the anime was entering the Fishmen island arc, which was around 500 episodes, and even back then I considered it a lot. The anime has nearly doubled in episodes since then. Once I actually started watching it I understood why it was as long as it was, however, even a fan such as myself has to admit it's a long story. Although I haven't gotten into the post-time skip arcs yet, based on what I've seen and heard, I give Oda major credit for making it all come together, as anyone else would've been crushed by such a story's weight.

Back to the question, should a story be this long ? I think a better question should be, should a story not written by Oda be this long ? I don't think there's a clear objective answer to this, but I think most, if not all will agree that an author has to have something worth telling for that long, and to be able to avoid burning out half way through. Oda and One Piece are the exception, not the rule. DB for example has proven time and again that it just doesn't have what it takes to continue indefinitely past its original ending. Naruto was on shaky ground with its war arc, which was around the 450 chapter mark. Bleach's anime and manga were more or less cancelled due to its reputation and sales taking a major nose dive following its 400th or so chapter.

I keep seeing comments like "I hope (insert manga here) is as long as One Piece" and "I hope (insert mangaka here) can last as long as Oda has", both of which are unrealistic expectations. What fans don't realize is that not every story is structured in a way that allows it to be that long. 1300 chapters works for One Piece because that's the number of chapters it's built around, but another story may be built around 500 or even less.

[MyVisionity]

Some things are just meant to last as long as possible. The entire point of network television is to go for as many seasons as possible without getting cancelled. It's less about telling stories and more about keeping the stories going on and on and on.

Anime and manga on the other hand depends upon the author's vision or style. Is it a series that needs 1000 episodes or just 26? Is it a drawn out tale or a swift one? What's the proper pace for this story? And many more questions.

All of these various shonen series are different enough from one another that the resulting lengths will naturally vary.

Many accuse Dragon Ball of being too long and drawn out ("Drag-on Ball Z"). So which is it really?

Naruto is long but I believe that it needed to be as long as it was in order to tell the kind of story it was telling. Some of the plotting was flawed, perhaps, but the author knew what kind of story he was telling. Unfortunately, the War arc suffers from some very poorly conceived filler sagas towards its end that hurt the anime.

Some might argue that Dragon Ball had "overstayed its welcome" after the 23rd Budoukai. If not, then certainly by Majin Boo.

One Piece apparently having 1000 episodes to me seems like one of those things that actually attracts new audiences. Like "1000 episodes? Wow this series must truly be something special to last that long! Can't wait to watch!" Or maybe "1000 episodes? That sounds like quite the undertaking... Alright then, challenge accepted! Let's do this!!" Plenty of different angles potentially at play there I imagine.

[Brodes]

The original run of Dragonball/DBZ is probably the pinnacle of anime storytelling. It's the Citizen Kane of anime.

I'm utterly fascinated by the thinking behind this statement and must know more. Because, ultimately, it's not even close.

Legit the only show I’ve seen go past 6 seasons and still be good is Buffy and even then season 7 is mediocre and from my understanding the comics are god awful.

I couldn't make it past the first season when I tried watching it in my twenties. That apparently it is filled with homophobia and transphobia and the like kills any interest I have in picking it back up, too.

It's... not, though.

[Matches Malone]

Many accuse Dragon Ball of being too long and drawn out ("Drag-on Ball Z"). So which is it really?

I think the difference here is that Z was padded beyond the author's intention. The Z part of the story only covers around 325 chapters, which isn't long by shonen standards. Had DB been adapted after the manga ended, Z's length would've been closer to Kai's.

[ABED]

I'm of the opinion no show should go past the 6 season mark, and no matter how serialized the story is each chapter or episode should be about solving some single issue. In DB, each episode or chapter is some phase of the battle.

The longer a single story goes, the more obstacles have to be put in the path to the characters' goals, and no matter how talented the writer is, after a certain point, the obstacles inevitably become more and more convoluted after a certain point.

The Simpsons' peak years was its 1st 8 seasons. The Sopranos, which is widely considered the greatest drama ever, is basically 7 seasons long, and best of One Piece consists of 10 years worth of content.

I have no intention of watching One Piece, The Simpsons did peak but even that is just a bunch of one offs and could go on forever as long as it's good, but it ran into another problem - the change in pop culture which spawned it. It started off as a satire of the family comedies that had come before, but that was no longer the case by the 2000s. The Sopranos did go on way too long. 8 seasons just to tell us Tony was a dirtbag and would never change?

And its a well known fact that Oda does plan out every single plot element in One Piece months in advance, even causal readers/viewers know this. He isn't like Toriyama who just makes things up as he goes along, which is the main source of plotholes and retcons in Dragonball.

Planning everything out doesn't make it better and the plotholes don't really matter to people to near the extent many would assume. Hitting a bunch of plot points planned out years beforehand doesn't equal quality. See Game of Thrones final season. Toriyama's way of doing things may have lead to more plot holes, not that they matter, but it also lead to a bunch of interesting organic developments for the characters.

[JulieYBM]

Game of Thrones went on too long, too. Then again, the who series is rotten from the core because Martin is apparently such a creep, racist, misogynist and transphobe and the television series show runners didn't just not try to change things for the better, they saw fit to make the series even more misogynistic.

Spending eight years just to end like that sure was a fucking waste of time, though. Oof.

[SupremeKai25]

Game of Thrones went on too long, too. Then again, the who series is rotten from the core because Martin is apparently such a creep, racist, misogynist and transphobe and the television series show runners didn't just not try to change things for the better, they saw fit to make the series even more misogynistic.

Spending eight years just to end like that sure was a fucking waste of time, though. Oof.

If anything it's the opposite, it should've gone on for longer to better develop the various storylines. Instead they decided to cramp everything up in 6 episodes. The result is that you have a character who in one episode helps save the world from the apocalypse, and in the next commits genocide. It's obvious that the producers rushed to the end because they wanted to move on to another project. Both HBO and the original author GRRM wanted the show to go on for a few more seasons, I believe HBO even gave the two writers the money to make a 9th and 10th season.

[JulieYBM]

Game of Thrones went on too long, too. Then again, the who series is rotten from the core because Martin is apparently such a creep, racist, misogynist and transphobe and the television series show runners didn't just not try to change things for the better, they saw fit to make the series even more misogynistic.

Spending eight years just to end like that sure was a fucking waste of time, though. Oof.

If anything it's the opposite, it should've gone on for longer to better develop the various storylines. Instead they decided to cramp everything up in 6 episodes. The result is that you have a character who in one episode helps save the world from the apocalypse, and in the next commits genocide. It's obvious that the producers rushed to the end because they wanted to move on to another project. Both HBO and the original author GRRM wanted the show to go on for a few more seasons, I believe HBO even gave the two writers the money to make a 9th and 10th season.

I don't see how extending the length is more favorable to just...changing the ending. Then again, you'd need to change huge swathes of the series in general for the bad taste to go away. Less gratuitous and unerotic rape, less women getting treated like shit while telling the audience at home that it's their shitty, traumatizing experiences that make women develop, etc.

Honestly, it's time we stop giving privileged rich white men the money and attention to do whatever the fuck they want like. This is the sort of heartless drivel this make.

[SupremeKai25]

Game of Thrones went on too long, too. Then again, the who series is rotten from the core because Martin is apparently such a creep, racist, misogynist and transphobe and the television series show runners didn't just not try to change things for the better, they saw fit to make the series even more misogynistic.

Spending eight years just to end like that sure was a fucking waste of time, though. Oof.

If anything it's the opposite, it should've gone on for longer to better develop the various storylines. Instead they decided to cramp everything up in 6 episodes. The result is that you have a character who in one episode helps save the world from the apocalypse, and in the next commits genocide. It's obvious that the producers rushed to the end because they wanted to move on to another project. Both HBO and the original author GRRM wanted the show to go on for a few more seasons, I believe HBO even gave the two writers the money to make a 9th and 10th season.

I don't see how extending the length is more favorable to just...changing the ending. Then again, you'd need to change huge swathes of the series in general for the bad taste to go away. Less gratuitous and unerotic rape, less women getting treated like shit while telling the audience at home that it's their shitty, traumatizing experiences that make women develop, etc.

Honestly, it's time we stop giving privileged rich white men the money and attention to do whatever the fuck they want like. This is the sort of heartless drivel this make.

Not necessarily changing the ending (though I wouldn't mind it since it was awful), more like fleshing it out more. Regardless, since we're talking more about single, bad scenes, I'll agree that there are several scenes/dialogues from the show that are trash. In particular, I remember one scene where Sansa Stark said something like "that time I was raped made me stronger", which is yikes. It is therefore not a surprise that the final season was so badly received.

[LoganForkHands73]

Game of Thrones went on too long, too. Then again, the who series is rotten from the core because Martin is apparently such a creep, racist, misogynist and transphobe and the television series show runners didn't just not try to change things for the better, they saw fit to make the series even more misogynistic.

Spending eight years just to end like that sure was a fucking waste of time, though. Oof.

I'm gonna take a stab and posit that this article is sensationalist bollocks. So he innocently mispronounced some names and nerdily rambled about some authors he grew up with, and suddenly he's a racist, misogynist transphobe? A bit of an awkward, tonedeaf weirdo, definitely. But whatever, he's rich, he'll survive, just like almost everyone else who's been cancelled.

Considering how vastly divergent the direction of the novels went compared to the TV show, there's no way the books are going to end the same horrendous way (if Martin lives long enough to complete them). While I'm not a massive D&D hater since they can both be decent writers (recommend Benioff's City of Thieves) and contributed some good ideas, they undoubtedly made a lot more poor decisions throughout the show. Martin wanted them to let the show go on a bit longer to cover everything he was setting up, but they weren't having any of it -- they just wanted to bulldoze through so they could get to their precious Star Wars trilogy.

[JulieYBM]

If anything it's the opposite, it should've gone on for longer to better develop the various storylines. Instead they decided to cramp everything up in 6 episodes. The result is that you have a character who in one episode helps save the world from the apocalypse, and in the next commits genocide. It's obvious that the producers rushed to the end because they wanted to move on to another project. Both HBO and the original author GRRM wanted the show to go on for a few more seasons, I believe HBO even gave the two writers the money to make a 9th and 10th season.

I don't see how extending the length is more favorable to just...changing the ending. Then again, you'd need to change huge swathes of the series in general for the bad taste to go away. Less gratuitous and unerotic rape, less women getting treated like shit while telling the audience at home that it's their shitty, traumatizing experiences that make women develop, etc.

Honestly, it's time we stop giving privileged rich white men the money and attention to do whatever the fuck they want like. This is the sort of heartless drivel this make.

Not necessarily changing the ending (though I wouldn't mind it since it was awful), more like fleshing it out more. Regardless, since we're talking more about single, bad scenes, I'll agree that there are several scenes/dialogues from the show that are trash. In particular, I remember one scene where Sansa Stark said something like "that time I was raped made me stronger", which is yikes. It is therefore not a surprise that the final season was so badly received.

Yeah, that Sansa scene is exactly what I was referring to. It also doesn't help that women are so often portrayed as 'deceivers to men', which is...yikes.

Also, just, like, yikes. Dany spends the series getting raped or being called a crazy bitch and then the series ends with Dany being the stereotype everyone said she was...just...wow. Wow.

[Polyphase Avatron]

Then again, you'd need to change huge swathes of the series in general for the bad taste to go away. Less gratuitous and unerotic rape

Maybe I'm missing something here, but are you implying that there's such a thing as 'erotic rape', and that it's a good thing?

[ABED]

Stuff like One Piece that have a definitive goal don’t need this long to get to the point. Dragon Ball’s goal is intangible- it is to be the best martial artist you can be. It is a story engine that lends itself to a longer series

[JulieYBM]

Then again, you'd need to change huge swathes of the series in general for the bad taste to go away. Less gratuitous and unerotic rape

Maybe I'm missing something here, but are you implying that there's such a thing as 'erotic rape', and that it's a good thing?

Erotic fiction, sweetie! The point of Game of Thrones™ isn't to make the reader/viewer #masturbate, it's to simply serve as a Mark of Seriousness™ for their Very Serious Story™.

[Polyphase Avatron]

Then again, you'd need to change huge swathes of the series in general for the bad taste to go away. Less gratuitous and unerotic rape

Maybe I'm missing something here, but are you implying that there's such a thing as 'erotic rape', and that it's a good thing?

Erotic fiction, sweetie! The point of Game of Thrones™ isn't to make the reader/viewer #masturbate, it's to simply serve as a Mark of Seriousness™ for their Very Serious Story™.

But getting off on rape? That's disturbing.

[Hellspawn28]

Dragon Ball is a good series, but I do think there's better Shonen stuff out there. First of the North Star, Jojo, Devilman, Area 88, The Drifting Classroom, Tomorrow Joe, Appleseed, etc. are better made series in my opinion. I don't mind long series, but stuff like One Piece, Cased Close, Naruto, etc go on for way too long for my taste and their stories go nowhere. I stop reading Naruto during the Pain Arc and One Piece during the Marineford Arc because I felt like I had enough of their stories.