Did Yū Kondō have any known influence on Dragon Ball?

[MasenkoHA]

Although Toriyama had 3 different editors during Dragon Ball's original run, the editor that seemed to have the most overt influence was Kazuhiko Torishima. He was the one who told Toriyama to make the series more like Fist of the North Star and was apparently indirectly responsible for Dragon Ball getting rebranded as Dragon Ball Z https://www.forbes.com/sites/olliebarde ... gon-quest/ (hiring Kozo Morishita as producer when he didn't think Dragon Ball's current producer was up to task to adapt the manga's changing tone and Morishita came up with the idea to rebrand the series so it could be marketed as "new"). Even after Torishima was no longer Toriyama's editor his influence still impacted the manga, his ribbing on Toriyama's character designs in the Artifical Human arc led to 19 and 20 getting replaced by 17 and 18, who in turn got replaced by Cell.

And yet it was Yū Kondō who was Toriyama's editor during the franchise most prolific years i.e the Saiyan arc-The Cell arc. But as far as I am aware his only real input was telling Toriyama that Cell needed to transform because he was ugly and then having him rush from Semi Perfect Cell to Perfect Cell because the former "looked like a moron"

So my question is did Kondō have any other verified influence on the manga?

[jjgp1112]

After Toriyama came up with Cell, Kondo wasn't keen on the design and said he should have a transformation. And then he hated Semi-Perfect Cell's design and wanted something better for his Perfect form. He also pushed Toriyama to keep escalating the scale of the fights. I think he and Toriyama also implied he was the reason Vegeta stuck around.

[Cure Dragon 255]

I know Yu Kondo didnt really have a huge oral history of his tenure as Editor, but I would praise him for guiding Toriyama so that Dragon Ball would be good but NOT be a tyrant about it. He trusted Toriyama all while probably also reigning him in.

[Majin Buu]

He's rumored to be the inspiration for Freeza, so there's that.

[solid.state.scouter.]

I've often wondered what the working relationship between Kondo and Toriyama must have been like. Of the 3 editors, Kondo is the one who worked with Toriyama the least amount of time. Torishima "discovered" Toriyama, worked with him all the way through Dr. Slump and about 1/3 of Dragon Ball and has continued to be a sort of guiding hand for the franchise on and off over the years (people have already mentioned his influence on the cell arc, but it's well known that the idea for Dragon Ball Kai was his and he also got Toriyama involved with the writing on Battle of Gods). So obviously their working relationship remains good.

Fuyuto Takeda, Toriyama's third editor, has worked in that role the longest of the three editors (I believe he is still Toriyama's editor to this day, although I could be mistaken). And Toriyama has noted in interviews that he's the most hands off of all of his editors, so clearly the working relationship there is good too.

So that just leaves Kondo as this sort of minor anomaly in between the two major (in terms of length) editors in Toriyama's career. And yet under Kondo a lot the elements the series is best known for where introduced; the more angular and muscular drawing style, the longer arcs, the transformations, the more serious tone (relatively speaking) and older staples of the series such as the tournaments were removed all together. It's well known that Kondo's mission when he was tasked with the job of being Toriyama's editor was to make Dragon Ball more popular, and in that sense he clearly accomplished what he was tasked with doing. However, I've always guessed that Kondo wasn't a good fit with Toriyama, hence his sorter tenure. Most of those aforementioned elements started to change/be less utilized once Kondo was out of the picture. Hell, it was around the time that Kondo departed the series that Mr. Satan and the Cell Games tournament were introduced.

Any way that's just always been my assumption.

[VegettoEX]

(I believe he is still Toriyama's editor to this day, although I could be mistaken).

This is not true. Toriyama's editor for Jaco the Galactic Patrolman was Kōhei Ōnishi, for example.

[MasenkoHA]

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So that just leaves Kondo as this sort of minor anomaly in between the two major (in terms of length) editors in Toriyama's career. And yet under Kondo a lot the elements the series is best known for where introduced; the more angular and muscular drawing style, the longer arcs, the transformations, the more serious tone (relatively speaking) and older staples of the series such as the tournaments were removed all together.

The tournaments were probably going to be phased out regardless. Once Goku won a tournament there was no reason to keep doing them. The series was definitely it's most serious under Kondō, but that and the characters being more muscular seemed to be the direction the series was going in anyways due to Torishima's "More like Fist of the North Star" mandate. Goku being aged up to an adult apparently happened because Toriyama didn't believe he could accomplish that with a kid protagonist and was having to cheat to make kid Goku look more muscular during fight scenes.

[Zephyr]

From the Shenlong Times 2nd Issue, we can at least glean:

Torishima: Goku grew up, and then during Kondō-san‘s time, Vegeta appeared and the number of female fans increased. (laughs)

Kondō: It’s because before I came to Jump, I worked at a shōjo manga magazine. (laughs) After I became editor, we decided what direction things should advance in. In a story manga the fights have to escalate, that’s all it was. I don’t think there was anything extra.

In addition to this, a tweet from Derek Padula mentions that he was responsible for the additions of "content that appealed to girl readers, such as Vegeta, families, and relationships". Not sure which interview the thing about "families" and "relationships" comes from, though.

But it seems that Kondo, a man used to working with shoujo-demographic comics, helped introduce elements that proved popular with female readers. We got Vegeta, and characters began hooking up, pairing off, and having kids. With how popular Future Trunks is with the ladies, I'd speculate that he was also Kondo's doing, to an extent.

[Majin Buu]

The series was definitely it's most serious under Kondō, but that and the characters being more muscular seemed to be the direction the series was going in anyways due to Torishima's "More like Fist of the North Star" mandate.

This is the sticking point for me in regards to Kondo.

Those changes stem from decisions that were made before Kondo's tenure so the results can't be attributed to him; and that makes me wonder if he was mostly the beneficiary of things that were set into motion before he came along more so than the series' massive popularity being the result of anything he specifically did. Yeah, he told Toriyama to increase the series' popularity, but the series had already become popular by the time he became Toriyama's editor so it feels like his mandate to Toriyama just amounted to "Do more of what made this popular".

[JulieYBM]

After Kondou took over we also got the men looking more handsome—especially with the introduction of Zarbon and Jheese, as well as Vegeta and Gokuu taking on slightly more masculine forms. I have to wonder if at the very least Zarbon, Jheese, and Trunks were ideas from Kondou, just as Perfect Cell was?

[Cure Dragon 255]

After Kondou took over we also got the men looking more handsome—especially with the introduction of Zarbon and Jheese, as well as Vegeta and Gokuu taking on slightly more masculine forms. I have to wonder if at the very least Zarbon, Jheese, and Trunks were ideas from Kondou, just as Perfect Cell was?

I think this theory sounds legit, I think Toriyama knew Kondo's tastes and pandered accordingly.

[Vhanos]

He's rumored to be the inspiration for Freeza, so there's that.

Did he also not like the second and third forms of Freeza just like with Cell? I've wondered about that.

[Majin Buu]

I don't know if there's anything on record about Kondo's thoughts on that form, but Toriyama himself has said that complex transformations like Freeza's third form were a pain for him to draw for weeks on end and admits to having Freeza quickly move on from that form for that reason.

He also admitted that he should have given Freeza two transformations instead of three.

[MasenkoHA]

I don't know if there's anything on record about Kondo's thoughts on that form, but Toriyama himself has said that complex transformations like Freeza's third form were a pain for him to draw for weeks on end and admits to having Freeza quickly move on from that form for that reason.

It's funny how much development in Dragon Ball amounts to Toriyama being done with drawing that shit. Pretty sure he also said he introduced bukujutsu because he was tired of drawing vehicles all the time. He was so fed up with drawing Saiyan tails he didn't even bother giving a reason why Gohan and Vegeta's didn't keep growing back and just decided Trunks and Goten never had them. Man turned lack of drive into a skill.

[M16U3L2015]

I don't know if there's anything on record about Kondo's thoughts on that form, but Toriyama himself has said that complex transformations like Freeza's third form were a pain for him to draw for weeks on end and admits to having Freeza quickly move on from that form for that reason.

It's funny how much development in Dragon Ball amounts to Toriyama being done with drawing that shit. Pretty sure he also said he introduced bukujutsu because he was tired of drawing vehicles all the time. He was so fed up with drawing Saiyan tails he didn't even bother giving a reason why Gohan and Vegeta's didn't keep growing back and just decided Trunks and Goten never had them. Man turned lack of drive into a skill.

I think he even made the Super Saiyan's hair blonde just because he was too lazy to ink Goku's black hair.

[MasenkoHA]

I don't know if there's anything on record about Kondo's thoughts on that form, but Toriyama himself has said that complex transformations like Freeza's third form were a pain for him to draw for weeks on end and admits to having Freeza quickly move on from that form for that reason.

It's funny how much development in Dragon Ball amounts to Toriyama being done with drawing that shit. Pretty sure he also said he introduced bukujutsu because he was tired of drawing vehicles all the time. He was so fed up with drawing Saiyan tails he didn't even bother giving a reason why Gohan and Vegeta's didn't keep growing back and just decided Trunks and Goten never had them. Man turned lack of drive into a skill.

I think he even made the Super Saiyan's hair blonde just because he was too lazy to ink Goku's black hair.

Yep, one of the most often cited and well known cases of Toriyama cutting corners.