Toriyama should follow the Harry Potter movies' example and continue DB in a spin off

[Jord]

For those who don't know, after the Harry Potter movie (and book series) ended, WB used a guide book written by the excellent JK Rowling, the author of the Harry Potter books to spin the off the Fantastic Beasts movie series. Using the existing world but not focusing on the main characters and create new and original stories with new characters. Aided by the familiarity of the existing world, it's a comfortable way for readers both new and old, to meet these new characters.
It also gets rid of stale characters or characters that have completed their arc so it's a win for the writers as well.

[MasenkoHA]

For those who don't know, after the Harry Potter movie (and book series) ended, WB used a guide book written by the excellent JK Rowling,

Excellent is a highly debatable term here. It’s become more apparent with her non-Harry Potter attempts that she’s not much of a writer and she isn’t going to capture lightning in a bottle twice.


Also her personal character had been a bit ....hmmmmm

the author of the Harry Potter books to spin the off the Fantastic Beasts movie series. Using the existing world but not focusing on the main characters and create new and original stories with new characters. Aided by the familiarity of the existing world, it's a comfortable way for readers both new and old, to meet these new characters.
It also gets rid of stale characters or characters that have completed their arc so it's a win for the writers as well.

Those movies are also terrible. And Rowling/Harry Potter is like the golden example of why an author needs to just stop when they said they finished a work and not continuously retroactively add lore on social media and sign off on an expanded universe.

[ABED]

Not being able to recapture lightning in a bottle is not the same as saying she's not a good writer. But yes, I wouldn't be using Harry Potter or Rowling as a glowing example of continuing a story by setting it in the same world but a story all its own. There are so many better examples one can choose from.

I'm not even going to say much about Rowling's personal beliefs as I don't think it's relevant and as we are seeing, great art is often made by awful people.

[Adamant]

But he's literally done that.
Multiple times, even.

[mute_proxy]

He did with Jaco the Galactic Patrolman

[Planetnamek]

Fantastic Beasts movies were godawful IMO, if there was one franchise that should not have come back it was Harry Potter, it ended perfectly and didn't need these lousy prequels that added absolutely nothing to the series.

If there's one franchise DB shouldn't take any ques from, it's that one.

[Matches Malone]

I think Toriyama and the staff currently working on the franchise would've been better off having the BOG movie be a grand send off to DB, and instead start a completely new work from the ground up. They're all talented people, and I think working on something like DB which ended decades ago is just limiting their creativity.

[SupremeKai25]

Any reason why Toriyama and co. "should" do as you say, instead of continuing with the Super format which, needless to say, was incredibly popular and profitable?

[Matches Malone]

Any reason why Toriyama and co. "should" do as you say, instead of continuing with the Super format which, needless to say, was incredibly popular and profitable?

The same reason why Toriyama left Dr. Slump behind and tried something new with DB in 1984, because moving on is the only way we can get new products. Had Toriyama not done this, we never would've gotten DB, as Dr. Slump was, as you put it, " incredibly popular and profitable".

[marumuju]

As previously said, Jaco the Galactic Patrolman is the spin off that Toriyama created already. It is quite okay, but not at DB's level.

What I'm wondering a bit is why Toriyama would even need to create a spin-off. I do not know if he had any grand creative ambitions left after Dragon Ball. He had done two hugely successful series back-to-back, for 15 years. His later, short series' are OK too, but he clearly did not look for new avenues of expression with those. Most of them follow the same humorous adventure pattern.

My guess is that about the only reason why he is even involved with the franchise now with Super is that he doesn't want to see his creation float totally on the mercy of the cash-grabbers (the live-action movie seems to have left a mark on him). Toriyama seems quite happy to just give some directions and let Toyotarou do the heavy lifting. Although, he does still correct quite a many of the visuals and other stuff in the manga, so at least his professionalism hasn't diminished.

But a totally new kind of masterpiece after this? I must say that Toriyama is about the last mangaka that would do it. There are examples of mangaka that just can't stop drawing even in their old age, but I think that Toriyama is more sane than them.

[SupremeKai25]

Any reason why Toriyama and co. "should" do as you say, instead of continuing with the Super format which, needless to say, was incredibly popular and profitable?

The same reason why Toriyama left Dr. Slump behind and tried something new with DB in 1984, because moving on is the only way we can get new products. Had Toriyama not done this, we never would've gotten DB, as Dr. Slump was, as you put it, " incredibly popular and profitable".

Just as you can find one positive example, I can find a negative one, like Kishimoto trying to spice things up with Samurai 8 and flopping spectacularly, to the point that he's back to writing the Naruto sequel.

So No, there's really no reason why Toriyama and co. should just drop Super out of nowhere. There wasn't a valid reason to do so back in 2015, there isn't one in 2021, and there won't be one in 2022.

[Matches Malone]

Just as you can find one positive example, I can find a negative one, like Kishimoto trying to spice things up with Samurai 8 and flopping spectacularly, to the point that he's back to writing the Naruto sequel.

So No, there's really no reason why Toriyama and co. should just drop Super out of nowhere. There wasn't a valid reason to do so back in 2015, there isn't one in 2021, and there won't be one in 2022.

One flop isn't a reason to stop trying. For every Samurai 8 you've got countless new series flourishing right now.

Obviously they shouldn't drop it now when it's in the middle of the story, my point was for BOG to be a one off movie back in 2013. The only reason franchises like DB are milked into shells of their former selves is to satisfy fans who simply can't let go and move on, it has nothing to do with a creative vision.

[WittyUsername]

I have no comment about the controversy surrounding J.K. Rowling as a person, but the Fantastic Beasts films probably aren’t the best example of something Dragon Ball should strive towards. I haven’t even seen the second one, but I hear it’s pretty messy.

[Adamant]

What I'm wondering a bit is why Toriyama would even need to create a spin-off. I do not know if he had any grand creative ambitions left after Dragon Ball. He had done two hugely successful series back-to-back, for 15 years. His later, short series' are OK too, but he clearly did not look for new avenues of expression with those. Most of them follow the same humorous adventure pattern.

He's specifically said he doesn't want to do any more long series, which is why everything he's done after Dragonball has been one-shots and short serials which length was already decided ahead of time.

[JulieYBM]

I don't think there is anything of value to learn from Rowling. Bare in mind I have no read her works but I hear they are really awful (to say nothing of being full of really nasty bigotry and shit). There are plenty of other, not-horrible creators to take examples from.

[Shaddy]

The first few Harry Potter books are decent enough children's fantasy fare. The last couple range from really boring to Christian propaganda, complete with antisemitic goblin caricatures (well, okay, those are there from the start, but it's definitely worse in the last one).

The first Fantastic Beasts movie has a couple fun moments in a mostly boring plot, and the second one is hot fucking garbage.

I wholeheartedly support Dragon Ball getting more spinoffs in the same universe, I love Jaco the Galactic Patrolman for example, but if your example is JK Rowling, then I'd rather the series stay dead forever.

Also, if you want a nice recap of Harry Potter with a real-time view of JK's descent into batshit lunacy, I highly recommend The Shrieking Shack podcast, a critical reread of the series that also clowns on various aspects of the franchise and its fandom.

[Kataphrut]

I mean...a spin-off isn't inherently a bad idea. You picked a bad example because those movies were garbage, and so is JK Rowling.

But, you know...Jaco was a good example. It was also pretty original despite being set in the DB universe- I wouldn't want some lame obvious spin-off like, I dunno, the advetures of Bardock.

[Jord]

I don't think there is anything of value to learn from Rowling. Bare in mind I have no read her works but I hear they are really awful (to say nothing of being full of really nasty bigotry and shit). There are plenty of other, not-horrible creators to take examples from.

So you have no way to form your own opinion on her works and base your judgement on that. Gotcha.

I mean...a spin-off isn't inherently a bad idea. You picked a bad example because those movies were garbage, and so is JK Rowling.

But, you know...Jaco was a good example. It was also pretty original despite being set in the DB universe- I wouldn't want some lame obvious spin-off like, I dunno, the advetures of Bardock.

Jaco was a great example. It didn't detract from the story and gave us new and interesting characters. I was actually hoping that that was the way DB was headed.

[Shaddy]

I don't think there is anything of value to learn from Rowling. Bare in mind I have no read her works but I hear they are really awful (to say nothing of being full of really nasty bigotry and shit). There are plenty of other, not-horrible creators to take examples from.

So you have no way to form your own opinion on her works and base your judgement on that. Gotcha.

That's not really fair. It's inevitable that someone acting in bad faith is going to incorporate, whether consciously or unconsciously, pieces of their bad behavior within their work, and Julie understands this. I certainly am not disagreeing, even if obviously she doesn't have the experience of having read them directly. But you don't need to have seen, say, Birth of a Nation to know it hasn't got the greatest politics. I also haven't played through Ride to Hell: Retribution, but it's okay for me to call it a bad video game based on everything I've heard.

And sure, when it comes to quality, I can't declare myself objectively correct for thinking that, but neither can people who have played the game. My take is probably less-sound than theirs, but it's not less valid. I'm not going to not think the thing I think just because someone else had a different experience.

That was part of the reason I recommended a critical reread podcast, because it can teach a lot about the text and subtext of the story, to the point where I, as someone who hasn't read the series fully in years, have changed my opinions and formed new ones, both positive and negative, about the story.

[ABED]

I think Julie was commenting on the quality of the work itself, not merely the politics. There are plenty of works of art that are good but have problematic ideology.

The last couple range from really boring to Christian propaganda, complete with antisemitic goblin caricatures (well, okay, those are there from the start, but it's definitely worse in the last one).

I don't know if I would consider it propaganda, but I will say this regarding her depiction of goblins. The portrayal is antisemetic but I wouldn't condemn Rowling as antisemetic, nor anyone else who used the trope. There are a lot of tropes with problematic origins that many people including artists don't seem aware of. Rowling borrows heavily from common fantasy tropes.

As for Jaco, I wouldn't use that as a great example of a DB spin off. It feels like a completely separate universe that someone decided to crossover with DB and instead of letting it be a novel one off, they kept doing it. It makes little sense. They don't feel like they fit together, and Jaco is not only useless, he's not even funny.

The best spin offs are centered around a character from the story they are spinning off from.