Did Dragon Ball Super set the fanbase on a path of no return? We are feeling the content starvation.

[Majin Man 101]

There was a since of finality about the end of Dragon Ball GT where the fans were accepting of the fact that the series was over with. Please correct me if I’m wrong, but I can’t even remotely remember anything from the end of GT to all the way to Battle of Gods hearing about how their could be a new tv series or even hearing fans talk about how they would like a new series. Even with BOG, I seem to remember everyone saying they can’t wait to see where this story goes in the next movie. Then Super happened and was wildly successful despite its quality.

With the going to be 5 year draught of TV anime from 2018 going into 2023, I think you can hear the hearts and minds of frustrated Dragon Ball fanatics all over the internet and in our workplaces and schools, screaming for more content.

By bringing back Dragon Ball to TV after so many years of being dead, did Toei create a perpetual expectation of this series always having a tv series, and if so, what will be the direction of this franchise once the Super story is finished?

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

I don't recall any of the online discourse between 1997 and 2005, but I was a very active lurker on forums and such from 2005 to 2013. In the latter period, which was after GT had wrapped up in most Western countries the hunger for new Dragon Ball was absolutely there. Dragon Ball AF was this mythical new series that many fans wanted to be real, and many too were disappointed to find out it was not real.

Its slightly different now with Super because everyone expects Dragon Ball to return at some point and see it as a possibility. Back then it was the opposite, no one foresaw a new series coming. I'm sure part of that is the sense of finally GT offered, but also because there wasn't a precedent for the movies becoming massive box office successes (by anime standards) worldwide. I also think the fact Dragon Ball had greater exposure between 2005 and 2013 than 1997 to 2005 only escalated the desire for a new series.

[ABED]

All of that plus we live in an era where no franchise seems to stay dead and people, series, franchises keep coming back. We live in era of reboots and revivals.

[MrSatan2099]

I get the same feeling myself, but I think it has less to do with the specifics of Dragon Ball and more to do with our desire as a society for immediate and constant gratification.

We've gotten to a point in pop culture media whether it's Marvel or DC or Star Wars where there's just something new to consume on streaming every week. So I think people have gotten kind of spoiled.

There's absolutely no content starvation in reality, we've got the Super Manga, we've got new video games and video game content all the time. We're at a healthy diet level right now, people are just glutenous.

[SuperSaiyaManZ94]

I mean, i wouldn’t compare it to say the dry period of a few years in Japan after GT ended it’s run on Fuji TV in late 1997 to roughly 2002 or so when the first Budokai game released on PS2 and the kanzenban version of the OG manga started it’s publication. Sure, there was no new anime on television at the time or a new DB manga in serialization but there was other things for both old and newer fans alike so there wasn’t a starvation from basically 2002 onward even in the absence of a show (not counting Kai 1.0/TFC, at least until Super premiered in 2015) and it basically hasn’t slowed down ever since then.

So no, there’s not really a true starvation of Dragon Ball going on now.

[TheGreatness25]

I know I personally feel like the series never stopped. Since the end of the anime, and gotten two movies and the continuation of the manga. The manga in itself gave the feeling that eventually, the anime would return.

[PurestEvil]

At least there is the promise that the manga is going to eventually come back, and I doubt Toyo is gonna pull a HxH here. Heck, the new film was released over four months ago. Back in the noughties, there was absolutely nothing regarding the anime or manga for a looooong time.

[batistabus]

Aside from the DBS anime, we've been getting a steady stream of DB content. The games are popping off, the manga ran without a break until a few months ago, it seems we can count on a film every few years, and Super Dragon Ball Heroes (arcade game, anime, and manga) is also ongoing. There's plenty without the main-story anime, and even that is heavily rumored to return soon.

Between GT and BoG, we had plenty of video games. We also got "Yo! Son Goku and His Friends Return!!" (which got a simultaneous English-sub broadcast) in 2008.

[JulieYBM]

As a woman who was a young girl between the end of Dragon Ball GT and Dragon Ball Super I remember there being plenty of hopes and desires for a new series. Now that I'm older the fervor has calmed down but mostly because I've developed a lot more patience and a life outside of Dragon Ball. I'm also not really tuned into what others want on the subject, either.

At least there is the promise that the manga is going to eventually come back, and I doubt Toyo is gonna pull a HxH here. Heck, the new film was released over four months ago. Back in the noughties, there was absolutely nothing regarding the anime or manga for a looooong time.

Hunter x Hunter is literally publishing new chapters right now. Furthermore, Togashi is disabled, so this is no appropriate way to speak about his hiatuses.

[PurestEvil]

Furthermore, Togashi is disabled, so this is no appropriate way to speak about his hiatuses.

Oh...well, sorry, I didn't know about that...

[LoganForkHands73]

Long-ish breaks can be good. Part of my problem with Dragon Ball Heroes (and other related games) was that it often spoiled us on some interesting concepts that should've been left for the main series to flesh out, most damningly when Goku skips straight to the Grand Priest for Ultra Instinct training in one Heroes arc. That sort of twist should be reserved for endgame material, not a promo for an arcade game. The Super manga later had him train with Merus, who's much lower on the pecking order, though in both cases their training doesn't bring Goku much closer to mastering the technique. Admittedly, seeing Goku in GP robes is cool, but it could've been much cooler if we had more build-up to it in Super over the course of several years. Either way, pumping out more content for the sake of more content isn't always the solution. To go further, I'd say it rarely ever is.

[Ashur]

I certainly do remember the anticipation for more from many DB fans after GT, especially in the US, where most were left disappointed at the show, and Spanish speaking countries, where DB fandom is way too strong, to the point we always need more, so from both sides the DBAF rumour became stronger and stronger to the point it reached Japan with Toyotaro and Younjiji's DBAF mangas, i personally think there was a divide between those who wanted to see the continuation in an official sense and those who were content making up the stories that followed the infinite possibilities of what happens after GT, in some cases going after the 100 year time skip, like Prince Gas Vegeta's version.

I personally encountered the former a lot both in the real world, as a 10-12 year old boy, and in the internet from 12-14, people who legit believed DBAF was going to be a thing because Dragon Ball can't end, and fought them relentlessly for the perfection that was GT's ending of course that didin't stop me from making up my own post-GT fanfic but it's okay, i can accept my hypocrisy.

Then you have other DB fan manga/comics that aren't exactly AF or post-GT at all but still surfaced as a result of this hunger for new Dragon Ball stories, such as DB Multiverse

The big difference between that hunger and today's is that then it was the work of fans who finished consuming or knew the entire series their entire lives up to that point, were nostalgic of it, and simply wanted more for the sake of having more, or, in the case of GT's most ardent detractors, to get something that "erases" their hated series, meanwhile, in the post-DBS fandom, it is more of a sense of the anime leaving us hanging rather than an actual lack of new content and longing for more, we are getting Heroes anime, manga storyline and movies, yet the end of the DBS anime felt unsatisfactory, and with the longer period of waiting in between movies (especially if they end up experimental like Super Hero) compared to the manga, it feels like there's a void left in the schedule that started in 2015, so it kinda affects both fans and detractors, because neither even know if Super, as a series, is truly done, or it's simply taking a break for another season.

So it's not really a starvation, we are getting far more newer material than in the years between GT and BoG, it's just that it feels half-baked because of the gap the absence of the anime in the schedule and the inconclusive ending left us, it's less of a "i want more of this" and more of a "get on with it already!".

What i find funny is that even though it is a different phenomenon, it still gave us the same result: we got a new wave of fan-created content like Dragon Ball Kakumei, to pick up where Super is sort of slacking.

[SuperSunnyDee]

Dragon Ball has gotten a steady flow of new “canon” content since Super ended with manga, games, and movies. DB fans are eating even without the anime, and I’m not entirely sure why so many fans have been wanting an anime when there’s already so much new content continuing the story.

I think fandoms in general have gotten too used to new things coming out in television and movies. Super will come back. It’s just a matter of time. I think after long enough the community will let up or catch onto this.