Why do some have a dislike of the climax of the Zamasu/Black arc?

[Skar]

I had other issues with the arc but it's in the past now so I try to forget about it. What makes it easier is that there being two Zenos in the present is the only lasting consequence. Trunks and Zamasu were never brought up again aside from one panel in the manga. I would definitely skip it in a reread or rewatch but that's only my opinion and nothing against those who enjoyed it.

The Future Trunks arc has the darkest ending in the franchise, because Zamasu actually WON. He completed Project Zero Mortals by eradicating the entire mortal population of the Future multiverse.

I know you say this before but I don't think it counts as a win for either side. Zamasu's goal to kill all the mortals was completed but he failed to preserve nature or any planets since they were all wiped out as well. He also was killed which wasn't part of the plan. At best it could count as a consolation prize because he at least prevented them from winning but I don't think he would consider it a victory.

[Jiren The Alpha]

Fans don't like when Dragon Ball is predictable and also don't like when it's unpredictable, so you can't win.

No one has an issue with an unpredictable ending, we just want one that isn't a convoluted mess. This is modern DB we're talking about, so asking anything of it is asking too much. If I were to ever write a story I'd kill to have such a loyal fan base that has 0 expectations and praises everything I put out for them.

How was it convoluted? (legit question).

[Matches Malone]

How was it convoluted? (legit question).

My original comment explains my issues with it. To be clear, Trunks' timeline getting destroyed for good isn't one of them, I just don't like how they handled what came before and after.

[Jiren The Alpha]

How was it convoluted? (legit question).

My original comment explains my issues with it. To be clear, Trunks' timeline getting destroyed for good isn't one of them, I just don't like how they handled what came before and after.

I see, I'm just thinking that Trunks got a bullshit power up so now he gets a tragic ending, it evens it out .

[UpFromTheSkies]

They waited for the Super Dragon Balls to recharge and wished for everyone to be brought back and sent to Trunks new universe at the point in time when he arrived there. Problem solved.

What a weird turn of events.

Because the Super Dragon Balls would again be used in the Universe Survival saga one year later. So the characters would only be able to do what you say in AGE 781, two years after Future Trunks saga, and who knows how long has passed in Trunks' timeline since then. Bit of a stretch, don't you think?

By now, the characters probably don't even remember Trunks anymore. They never even reacted to his absence when picking members for the tournament: "Damn! If only Trunks had stayed here with us. He definitely would be of a great help!".

I mean we're already talking about time travel, multiple universes, and evil time clone gods stealing bodies and trying to destroy all mortals, so it's not that much of a stretch But they could literally use the Dragon Balls at any point in the future to have that wish granted, even twenty years later, and for Trunks it would seem like the wish was granted instantly.

[Dbzfan94]

The Spirit Sword makes absolutely zero sense from a writing standpoint, but I can forgive it cause its honestly a really nice scene.... if that was where it ended.

Trunks' entire timeline getting erased and then Trunks being sent off to live with an unseen copy of himself was just a slap in the face.

[precita]

Vegetto isn't a big deal to me because we know how much Vegeta hates fusing with Goku in general which is why he never wants to do it. Since they also have Gogeta now from Broly movie onward, they can technically fuse at any time without potara earings but of course they still won't do it since they want to win with their own power (this is the same thing they said in the Boo arc, they could have easily fused again to kill Kid Boo but they both crush the earings instead)

Trunks getting an unexplained rage power up doesn't really bother me either, since it feels like one of those strange off-shoot Super Saiyan forms that's not a proper form (like the muscle forms in the Cell arc...basically Super Saiyan 1.5 so to speak), that isn't quite the next level. I also think Trunks was unknowingly gathering energy from everyone on Earth when he was charging at Zamasu, it isn't so different than Goku taking energy from the planet even though he was asking.

As for Trunks/Mai living in an earlier timeline before Zamasu kills Gowasu, it is what it is. Trunks lives with the failure that his world and everyone he knew is gone besides Mai, and has to live with it. So it's tragic in a way. As for the rest of the modern cast never bringing him up again after he leaves, well they didn't in the Boo saga either so it doesn't really matter.

[ZeroNeonix]

Fans don't like when Dragon Ball is predictable and also don't like when it's unpredictable, so you can't win.

It's not the predictableness that's the issue. When Cell returned at the end of his arc after self-destructing, because his core survived the blast, and he got a zenkai boost allowing him to not only transform back into his Perfect form, but also come back stronger than before... That was unpredictable and complete BS. But it was saved by the fact that it led one of the most memorable scenes in Dragon Ball: the Father-Son Kamehameha. Plus, it allowed someone other than Goku to be the savior for once.

When Zamasu come back out of nowhere, it didn't lead to anything cool like that. In fact it invalidated the cool moment Trunks just had. Sure, we got to see Zeno delete an entire timeline, but that builds up the stakes in the next arc. It didn't help the current arc feel any more satisfying. Imagine if after Cell came back, he killed everyone except Gohan, who jumps in a time machine to go back in time by one hour and destroy Cell before the Cell Games begin. That's basically what they did with the Future Trunks arc. It's just...bleh.

[precita]

Zamasu was likely going to jump timelime to timeline to erase all life everywhere after Trunks timeline. I don't think it's the same thing at all. The way the anime did it allowed Trunks to have a big victory and essentially kill the main villain, then Zeno erased his immortal counterpart and set up the stakes for the next arc and let us show Zeno was the real deal and really could erase everything.

There was no place for Trunks/Mai to go essentially after. Sure some would have likely wanted them to stay in the present timeline, but then the same issues would occur when kid Trunks eventually grows up in EOZ and we'd have "double Trunks" in this timeline too eventually especially when they both would be adults.

[Kinokima]

Fans don't like when Dragon Ball is predictable and also don't like when it's unpredictable, so you can't win.

No one has an issue with an unpredictable ending, we just want one that isn't a convoluted mess. This is modern DB we're talking about, so asking anything of it is asking too much. If I were to ever write a story I'd kill to have such a loyal fan base that has 0 expectations and praises everything I put out for them.

Actually I prefer a somewhat predictable but well earned ending that ties all its themes together to a bad plot twist

Sadly I feel modern DB goes for the bad plot twist a lot. I mean I don’t mind a good plot twist but the best ones are ones you didn’t see coming but can look back and see the foundation of it.

The issue is with so many people discussing the series it’s kind of hard for people to not guess things so I don’t think if an ending is guessed it’s necessarily a bad one.

[LoganForkHands73]

I'm iffy on it. On the one hand, the idea that Zamasu simply refuses to die is intriguing to me -- seeing how much magical bullshit he toyed with throughout the entire arc (Time Rings, Potara, Super Dragon Balls), it only makes sense that it backfires and he becomes this paradoxical Giygas-esque abomination. However, it feels like a nakedly try-hard attempt at creating yet another false climax. Trunks slicing Zamasu in two was an excellent conclusion, everything could have easily ended there, but nope. And even if it does help set up for the next arc, you can't get much less satisfying an ending than summoning a literal Deus Ex Machina to solve the problem. In doing this though, they somehow missed an awesome opportunity for Trunks to stay in the main timeline for the Tournament of Power. If he stayed on, he had a perfect motivation to win -- to restore his timeline with the Super Dragon Balls.

The nonsense of Trunks and Mai being ferried off to an identical future timeline felt the most contrived and despicable. It feels like a cheap consolation prize. Not just the fact that it happens, but the fact that Whis goes to the effort of providing it, which utterly goes against Whis's neutral character and his desire to see the timelines keep their integrity as per the divine laws (i.e. by not unnecessarily creating more). Why does Whis even give a shit about Trunks? If nothing else, it sets up an effective emotional scene for Trunks' farewell to Gohan.

Going back to Infinite Zamasu, I liked the manga's presentation more than the anime. The manga has him clone himself infinitely which sets up a scene recreating the Meta-Cooler, which while not hugely original, feels threatening and overwhelming. The anime version looks like a cheap screensaver in the sky. The anime generally struggles to depict these grand, epic concepts.

[PerhapsTheOtherOne]

I dunno, I personally really loved the anime's take.

The raw emotion felt throughout it all easily eclipses any kind of "logic" that the manga purports, at least for me. In the anime, this is the story of TRUNKS, not Goku or Vegeta. It's his story, his struggles, and the anime really feels like the best send-off to the character out of the 2 mediums.

Despite all his hard work, his best attempts to save everyone as the hero he is, he still ultimately fails because it wasn't enough; to me, it was a starkly contrasting point to DB's usual message of screw-ups being able to fix everything in the end. Sometimes, no matter how hard you do your best, you just fail because that wasn't good enough.

[SupremeKai25]

I dunno, I personally really loved the anime's take.

The raw emotion felt throughout it all easily eclipses any kind of "logic" that the manga purports, at least for me. In the anime, this is the story of TRUNKS, not Goku or Vegeta. It's his story, his struggles, and the anime really feels like the best send-off to the character out of the 2 mediums.

Despite all his hard work, his best attempts to save everyone as the hero he is, he still ultimately fails because it wasn't enough; to me, it was a starkly contrasting point to DB's usual message of screw-ups being able to fix everything in the end. Sometimes, no matter how hard you do your best, you just fail because that wasn't good enough.

I agree and see your point. Fiction is about entertainment in the end, not logic. If a story is perfectly logical, but fails to create any emotional reaction, then it failed. Suspension of disbelief will be required in a story, always.

[precita]

The manga version with Zamasu just making 100 copies of himself and Trunks not having any big victory along with Goku/Vegeta being pummeled constantly doesn't feel as interesting to me. Not to mention all the other stuff like the kids, future Yajirobe, etc. is all not in the manga so you don't even know who Trunks is fighting for in that version.

In the anime it actually feels like a climatic finale, both with Trunks getting the "win" and then Zamasu turning into a huge creepy trail of dark energy that consumes the entire planet. Zeno destroys everything in both versions anyway, so the final result is still the same.

[Jack Bz]

But what I really don't like is Trunks going to a duplicate of his own timeline. It's just... it's almost a black mirror-esque modern horror story, having to live in a universe identical to your own that you know isn't actually yours. But it's not treated like that at all, it's treated like a genuine solution that you can just copy and paste your old universe if your old one is ruined. Like damn, Trunks, your mom is dead! That's just a very similar copy of her!! Her soul is less than dust! It's utterly bizarre and isn't given enough emotional weight, probably just because of the nature of Dragon Ball. I'd have preferred if Trunks goes off to find a way to restore his old timeline perhaps.

The Goku, Gohan, Vegeta and Bulma of the main timeline aren’t “his” version of those characters either, but they’re still real people, and real alternate outcomes for “his” versions, who are grateful he gave them a chance.

That’s what he’s doing by creating another timeline at the end, splintered off from his own recent, pre-Black past. The presence of an alternate Trunks and Mai is just enough to drive home that he’s doing so in spite of his own comfort, because that’s the moral imperative he’s accepted/the kind of hope he brings. In the original series, his time-travel does save the present, but it’s ultimately for his own gain as well, in either finding a way to defeat the androids or bringing Goku along to do it for him. His choice at the end of his Super arc is a purely altruistic use. Of course it would be easier for him to stay in the present, but that’s not the kind of character he is/has become.

I’m not against Trunks’ timeline being restored in, for example, a future arc. But I think leaving this particular one off where the story does was absolutely the right choice for it, in that it was both surprising and affecting/fitting.

I don’t think either version dances around the implications of the ending either. The anime has his breakdown upon seeing Gohan (and the idea of a version of Gohan having been granted a happy life through Trunks’ actions helps reaffirm his choice/the worthiness of what he does), and both versions present the idea of the Trunks and Mai doubles being ... not great, but the two resolving to go through with it regardless because it’s the right thing. The manga’s a little more relaxed, but that’s DB. Plus, they have stopped Zamasu from going after every other timeline, after all.

The issue with the ending isn't that Trunks goes to another timeline to save it, but he specifically creates a new one to solve its problems. And purposefully chooses one juuuust similar to his original timeline but before everything goes wrong. I don't see how any of that is altruistic and hopeful at all, it reeks of denial.

Trunks' story in the original manga works because he is going back in time to save his own present. He goes to a past so different from his future that he learns a lot on a way, and brings new strength back with him to save his future. There's nothing altruistic about creating a new timeline for you to save; it's like breaking a vase so you can glue it back together. It's an utterly bizarre solution.

[Cipher]

Trunks' story in the original manga works because he is going back in time to save his own present. He goes to a past so different from his future that he learns a lot on a way, and brings new strength back with him to save his future. There's nothing altruistic about creating a new timeline for you to save; it's like breaking a vase so you can glue it back together. It's an utterly bizarre solution.

Trunks’ story in the original manga makes his time traveling, in its primary purpose, self-serving. But as a side-effect (and secondary goal, according to his explanation on the plane), it also leaves a world in which Goku, Gohan and brothers all live, and are grateful for the second chance. This is background in the Cell arc, whereas his Super arc chooses to make it the crux of his arc.

People complain about the oddness of the second Trunks and Mai, but aren’t they exactly the element needed to ensure that creating the new timeline doesn’t feel simply like running away?

What is easier, more comfortable for Trunks at the end? Remaining comfortably in the past, and leaving his old timeline gone? Or choosing to restart it, even if it means the odd discomfort of having their alternate counterparts present? (Both versions present the presence of said counterparts as a deterrent that Mai and Trunks accept.)

If Trunks were in search of a retreat, it’s there in the main timeline. If he’s in search of doing good for the people of his own era, it’s in creating a new timeline at his own expense, as he had once done (not at his own expense) for the characters of the present. This is quite explicitly what drives the scene of Gohan’s farewell in the anime, where the site of a version of his master who has lived happily because of his actions both brings Trunks to tears and motivates him.

[Jack Bz]

Trunks' story in the original manga works because he is going back in time to save his own present. He goes to a past so different from his future that he learns a lot on a way, and brings new strength back with him to save his future. There's nothing altruistic about creating a new timeline for you to save; it's like breaking a vase so you can glue it back together. It's an utterly bizarre solution.

Trunks’ story in the original manga makes his time traveling, in its primary purpose, self-serving. But as a side-effect (and secondary goal, according to his explanation on the plane), it also leaves a world in which Goku, Gohan and brothers all live, and are grateful for the second chance. This is background in the Cell arc, whereas his Super arc chooses to make it the crux of his arc.

People complain about the oddness of the second Trunks and Mai, but aren’t they exactly the element needed to ensure that creating the new timeline doesn’t feel simply like running away?

What is easier, more comfortable for Trunks at the end? Remaining comfortably in the past, and leaving his old timeline gone? Or choosing to restart it, even if it means the odd discomfort of having their alternate counterparts present? (Both versions present the presence of said counterparts as a deterrent that Mai and Trunks accept.)

If Trunks were in search of a retreat, it’s there in the main timeline. If he’s in search of doing good for the people of his own era, it’s in creating a new timeline at his own expense, as he had once done (not at his own expense) for the characters of the present. This is quite explicitly what drives the scene of Gohan’s farewell in the anime, where the site of a version of his master who has lived happily because of his actions both brings Trunks to tears and motivates him.

My issue is that Trunks creating a new timeline and saving it only logically makes sense if it is a secondary goal to saving his own original timeline.

In Z, Trunks went back in time to save his own future but as a consequence created an entire new timeline that was threatened by the androids. Eventually he is strong enough to destroy the Androids in his own timeline, but stays to help beat Cell/fix the timeline that he created. This makes sense, because Trunks had to create that timeline to save his own, and now that it exists he has a duty to help it before he leaves.

In super, there is no reason for him to create a new timeline other than to find a more appropriate place for him to live. Whether he thinks it altruistic or not, the timeline didn't need saving because it didn't exist. He is creating evil so that he can stop it. It being uncomfortable for him is irrelevant, really. It's a plan entirely based on himself and his own specific failures. He's not content to help in a universe or timeline that already exists and has evil and other problems, but rather create a new universe, a new zamasu, so that he can save it. I don't think that's altruistic at all, fundamentally. It's noble suffering that didn't need to exist. There's even a chance, however small, that it could have all backfired when he went back in time and resulted in Zamasu actually achieving his plans and travelling between universes/timelines, killing mortals.

I think we will just have to agree to disagree here. I find the implications too unnerving to see as hopeful at all, and it also didn't sit right with a huge number of people. The idea needed tweeking in my opinion.

[Koitsukai]

I'm not happy with either version of the arc.
The manga had interesting stuff in order I didn't like at all.
You can remove Vegito and everything stays the same(the anime at least hinted at him being needed to weaken Zamasu), he was thrown in at the middle of the fight, with Goku still having one more ace up his sleeve(PB), instead of saving it for last as an actual trump card. It would've been better to have a serious Vegito fight the Zamasu Army rather than a useless one-sided fight, and they nerfed him for no good reason because blue fusion came back just great for the Broly movie.
They didn't exhaust all alternatives before calling daddy Zeno (which could've been accidental), potara + hakai was still a possibility, and you don't even need blue fusion to try that (SS Gogeta> SSB Goku), but they had already wasted the fusion resource earlier, so...
I ended up feeling the ending was the first thing they had and everything had to accomodate itself to it.

The anime has so many weird things, but the ending felt cathartic, Trunks earned that W, I just wish Zeno could've destroyed the timeline without needing Zamasu to come back fused with the universe. Zeno could've just erased the timeline because he felt nobody was still alive or whatever. But it made sense for the anime to call Zeno because Zamasu was consuming everything, for the manga I just felt Goku threw the towel.

[Akira]

I did not enjoy the arc very much. The story had some neat ideas, but dropped the ball on the execution, in my opinion. I believe the manga presented the more concise and superior version of the arc in this case though.

Aside from individual nit-picks about things that were worse in the animated version, my biggest gripe is the decision to go and create yet another timeline to “solve” the problem of what to do with Trunks and Mai. They even discuss what that could possibly mean, and yet Whis just hand waves away the laws of messing with time by mortals for their sake. When previously Beerus stated that he “should” Hakai them for such an offense, they’re willing to risk the anger of the higher ups to do it again?

They had a golden opportunity to wrap this up in a way that was satisfying AND could have brought full circle closure to the Cell arc. They were using Cell’s time machine, originally from his timeline. A timeline that was the true original timeline before any alternates were created. He killed Future Trunks there and stole the time machine. So Bulma there woke up, found her dead son and the time machine gone with no clue where it went or who took it. Why didn’t this Future Trunks go there, to a world with no protector, and where a version of his mother no longer had her son? That world’s Cell traveled to the past and was defeated by Gohan in the main series timeline, and he could be there to aid the gods if Babbidi or Zamasu there ever started down the paths he had witnessed elsewhere. Bulma would have a version of her son back and Trunks a version of his mother that was closest to the world he lost.

That, in my opinion, would have been a more satisfying conclusion, and one more believable that Beerus and Whis would have tolerated.

[ZombieVito]

Fans don't like when Dragon Ball is predictable and also don't like when it's unpredictable, so you can't win.

THIS.

For years people have bitched about Dragon Ball being too safe since they can always fix things with the Dragons Balls. Here comes the Zamasu arc and finally gives us the opposite and what do people do? Bitch again.

They simply can't win indeed.