MistareFusion's Dragon Ball Dissection! (Updated 5/19/25!)

[WittyUsername]

Just wanted to copy/paste this from the comment I left on the video this morning.

I'll say it because I need to vent this frustration every time I'm reminded of it.
Even when I was a kid & this part of the show aired on Cartoon Network dubbed & it got to the part where Uub learned what the Fusion Dance was & wanted to fuse with someone, I questioned why at least Goten & Trunks didn't wanna fuse into adult Gotenks. It gets even worse when you take into account that the writers more than likely brought Gogeta into the fold for fanservice. Why not repeat the other thing Fusion Reborn did as well when Goten & Trunks felt their fathers' fused energy & decided to fuse themselves? It's so weird. Even if Gotenks couldn't beat 1-Star, he could've at least provided decent back-up for their dads. Such a wasted opportunity in a series full of tryhard fanservice to not do the most obvious bit of it.
Hell, in Battle of Gods, they fuse into Gotenks to fight Beerus when he starts going all destroyer on them. Because that at least makes sense even if they ultimately didn't do jackshit.

Also, something I got reminded of. I wanted to point out in the comments of your review of Fusion Reborn that the English dub pronounces Veku as "Veh-ku" rather than how the Japanese pronounced it "Vee-ku." I know you don't watch the dubs, but I thought that was funny you unintentionally made a joke at that.

I always assumed the reason we never saw adult Gotenks in this show was because they couldn’t figure out how the character was supposed to look. Even in the case of Super Saiyan 4 Gogeta, they basically just did a pallete swap on Super Saiyan 4 Goku and slapped a Fusion outfit on him.

[Scsigs]

I always assumed the reason we never saw adult Gotenks in this show was because they couldn’t figure out how the character was supposed to look. Even in the case of Super Saiyan 4 Gogeta, they basically just did a pallete swap on Super Saiyan 4 Goku and slapped a Fusion outfit on him.

SS4 Goku & Vegeta weren't even designed by Toeiyama, yet they designed & used them anyways. Same with other characters from after they got started that Toriyama helped them design. If they really couldn't figure it out, though, they could've & should've asked Toriyama for help. That comes off either as lazy, or not thinking out of the box.

[Gaffer Tape]

GT's Goku Is a Hero - Dragon Ball Dissection: The Evil Dragon Arc Part 9

Merry Christmas! Dragon Ball Dissection December continues with the finale of the Yi Xing Long fight! A surprise guest pops straight out of Goku's head, Vegeta loses his tail, and Yi puts a hole through Vegeta's shoulder. It's lots of body parts. It's also a redo of the end of The Majin Boo Arc but with a twist. Has this Goku changed since then? And has GT earned this shift?

[AliTheZombie13]

It's interesting see you frame the final Genki Dama as Goku having earned it since he's had no intention of helping these people while in Space. Pan had. Goku just followed along and beat people up because he likes to do that.

[jcogginsa]

Re: Goku being invulnerable to the attacks when charging the spirit bomb, Team Four Star posited a theoy during their rewatch, that in that moment Goku was already dead. He made a deal with Shenlong to last long enough to form the Genki Dama, then had to go away with him at the end because of it.

I haven't seen the series in a long time, so I dunno how well that holds up, or if it's just more of the Fan's fixing the show in their own minds. But I thought it was an interesting take.

And it is interesting in light of the "What is Goku doing differently" thing that you note in this video

[AliTheZombie13]

I think the show is pretty unambiguous as to what happens to Goku in the end.
He's dead. He died. The producers said so. Nozawa said so. Numerous characters ask him, "Goku, are you...?"
Missing word here being: DEAD!

On top of that, we have the Dragon Ball merging scene, and Pan literally saying while Goku keeps tanking One Star's attacks, "Look at Grandpa, he looks like a God now!"

So basically: Goku died, something mystical with Shen Long happened off-screen, he's a god now.

[coola]

I think the show is pretty unambiguous as to what happens to Goku in the end.
He's dead. He died. The producers said so. Nozawa said so. Numerous characters ask him, "Goku, are you...?"
Missing word here being: DEAD!

On top of that, we have the Dragon Ball merging scene, and Pan literally saying while Goku keeps tanking One Star's attacks, "Look at Grandpa, he looks like a God now!"

So basically: Goku died, something mystical with Shen Long happened off-screen, he's a god now.

Probably not dead, no halo But something did happen, and i kinda like how it was Roshi, Piccolo and Vegeta who noticed it, showing how close they were.

[AliTheZombie13]

In the world of Dragon Ball, Goku had already died multiple times, and up till then, each time he appeared with a halo over his head. However, I didn’t want to go with the usual concept of, “even when he dies, he comes right back to life”. I wanted the viewers to picture “death” in that way, and feel a sadness close to it in reality. So I had a “change” come over Goku.

Take it as you will.
My own personal interpretation is that he died, then became a god.

[KorgDTR2000]

Vegeta's transformation never made sense to me even as a child. Seriously, why did he not transform into a SS4 in the Saiyan arc? What is different this time?, with Goku, it makes sense. He turns into a mix of Oozaru with SS, with golden fur. Controlling that new form, that he would never had access to before because he didn't have both SS and a tail, gives him SS4. It's simple. It's effective.
Then Vegeta archives the form by...controlling the nornal Ozaru form. The same one he could control back in the Saiyan arc. Why?

I always thought that since Vegeta could control his Oozaru form, and the key to SSJ4 is having control over the Oozaru form while being a SSJ, he just went SSJ as the ape and it automatically triggered SSJ4.

[Koitsukai]

SS4 Vegeta is not only the ugliest form, also the least earned form in the entire franchise, no build up(the guy wasn't even in the show), not even a proper achievement (a machine?), just a vessel for another character to appear and NOT get the job done.
It was so unearned that they chose to remove the tail altogether once he ran out of juice, unlike Ohzaru VB who kept his tail even being KO twice. They really didn't want Vegeta to be the only SS4 left... he didn't even deserve to keep the tail or have one up front? come on...
Lovely character development, though, being the one bringing up fusion. Something Revival Vegeta could pick up instead of acting like he gets his memory wiped after every fusion. Also, a good thing was to see Vegeta put his pride aside and agree to do the least Vegeta thing possible to transform.

I still feel Gogeta was just fanservice that could be taken off the story and things would remain the same (Manga SSB Vegito much?), he got nothing done, everything he did got reversed immediately. He had the power to end it all at once but chose to dance around and act like a fool. I was expecting, since Toei Gogeta was always more to the point and stoic, and Vegeta was so commited to the act now, something a little less Piemon-ish.
There's this excuse going around, saying he was just trying to punk Omega into using his Negative Energy attack so he could kick it with his positivie energy leg and clear up the sky, but killing the dragon was supposed to do that as well... so why fool around so much?

The same goes for the Sun dragon, that whole friend/foe shtick was not needed. Trim, trim, trim...

Once that stupid fusion/revived dragon stuff is over, the arc picks up immensely. The sense of dread after Goku is considered dead and Vegeta is ordering people around to leave the planet, train and avenge Goku... pure magic.

[Gaffer Tape]

You Do Know GT! - Dragon Ball Dissection: The Evil Dragon Arc Part 10

The 12th annual Dragon Ball Dissection December comes to a close, and so does Dragon Ball GT. So let's talk about that ending. What does it mean? How does it compare to the Toriyama ending? And what next??? Let's go!

Thanks so much for watching this year. I hope you've enjoyed it as much as I have!

[jcogginsa]

Count me as someone who is interested in coverage of Neko Majin, though I wouldn't know where to find it.

Looking forward to the prototype video

[AliTheZombie13]

You Do Know GT! - Dragon Ball Dissection: The Evil Dragon Arc Part 10

The 12th annual Dragon Ball Dissection December comes to a close, and so does Dragon Ball GT. So let's talk about that ending. What does it mean? How does it compare to the Toriyama ending? And what next??? Let's go!

Thanks so much for watching this year. I hope you've enjoyed it as much as I have!

I appreciate your honesty and fair assessment of this series.
Although I didn't agree with some of your takes, I did find myself agreeing on a lot of them.

GT is a heavily flawed product, but at the same time, we can say the same about the original manga, though I respectfully disagree with the take that "GT's lows are lower." I know that's your opinion and I can't change it. That may be because I have zero affective memory for the original work, but to me, nothing, and I mean nothing in GT ever made my blood boil more than the Cell and Boo Sagas. To each their own.

I'm very curious to see how you handle the rest of this franchise, especially Daima. I've seen enough of your videos to know that you don't hold Super in very high regard, which I perfectly understand.

[nineko]

I still think the most chronological thing you can do is tackle the two "non Super" movies, Kami to Kami and the resurrection of Freeza.

[Almighty Majin]

I most definitely would enjoy seeing videos on Neko Majin Z and the Galactic Patrol stuff (Jaco, but also Jiya and Sachie!)

[Noah]

Another year and a couple of days have passed since the last time I visited this thread, but I am willing to share my thoughts about all the content that has been dissected during this time:

Tournament of Filler:

• Since it’s been like 12 years since the last time I watched GT, I wouldn’t even remember this attempt at a joke with cars crashing all over the place, not to mention it makes no sense that this goes from Papaya Island to Capsule Corp, two locations far apart from each other

• I guess you could consider this a filler episode, yeah, there’s no progress in the story and the characters stay the same, but this made me try to remember if, besides this one, the Driver Licens and the one where Goku is late to a party because he’s trying to save dinosaur eggs, if there are other episodes like this...

A Hero's Clone:

• The last time I watched GT, I always saved this Goku Jr. special for last, but watching it exactly as it was released (post-Baby arc) makes more sense when you consider that the final episode of GT is a progression of this story. It also reminded me that you did reviews of the SSJ Bardock OVA and Minus chapter without following the release order, which is obviously not a criticism—I remember there was a reason for that back then, just saying I always thought it was a nice touch that you followed the release order strictly for all the DB material over the years

• I 100% agree with your criticism about Goku Jr. turning into a Super Saiyan being unnecessary in this story, in fact, it’s what I like the least about the final GT episode, but I’ll get into that more when you reach that part of the story

A Match Made in Hell:

• Maybe the most common criticism of this arc is how they managed to create a new No. 17 in Hell, which for me would’ve been improved if it wasn’t another 17 at all. It could’ve just been an android/machine mutant hybrid skeleton that served as a device for 17 to become Super 17.

• I lol'd hard at your fake excitement (yay) about Goku meeting Freeza and Cell in Hell

Attack of the Member Berries:

• As a harsh critic of Super for overusing the nostalgia from Z moments, I didn’t even remember that they did this in such a nauseating way in this arc too, ugh

• I cracked myself at you trying to find even a bit of logic in this nonsense festival of an arc. By the way, your humor was the best part of this whole review lol

Kuririn the Plot Device:

• Even though I’m a big fan of TFS, I think this is an example of how their approach to the Android arc ended up being harmful for some fans of the franchise. I personally thought that Goku was the one who killed Dr. Gero’s son, which would’ve given a deeper motivation for Gero to seek revenge, but if the real cause of death was just an enemy's bullet in combat, it ended up being an interesting trivia and nothing more. TFS’s version is better in how it handles it, but now I understand why fans get confused about this

• Indeed, Vegeta’s line would’ve been much more impactful if it had been used in the Baby arc. It’s something significant for his character, showing more development beyond what we saw in the Boo arc, but almost no one remembers because this story isn’t about him, and also because this arc is pretty bad

All One Story:

• OMG, I didn’t remember how boring this fight was until you started talking about it. No wonder people criticize GT fights for mostly just being about spamming ki blasts and nothing else. There’s really no choreography or strategy

• Dumbifying Goku to create fake tension was a ridiculous idea too. They basically made the character regress in something he’s an expert at

• Was the “You killed me” shout from Super 17 and 18’s response “Good” from your voice? I almost believed it was the actual dub, lol

• As much as some try to make sense of this arc and the Evil Dragons arc being one story, I’m with your argument that it makes more sense to treat them as two different things, even though one progresses into the other

Corrupting the Dragon Balls:

• I've probably said this a bunch of times in this forum, but the idea of the final antagonist in a series called 'Dragon Ball' actually coming from the Dragon Balls themselves had a lot of potential to be awesome, but unfortunately, it just ended up being another item on GT's list of bad executions

• I really thought you were gonna criticize how they only used Goku and Pan at the start of this arc. One of GT's biggest criticisms is exactly how it barely uses other characters in the plot, and the Evil Dragons arc could've been a great chance to bring in Oob, Vegeta, Gohan, Goten, and Trunks. With Goku and Pan, they could've had seven evil dragons vs. seven warriors from the current Dragon Team

The Damaged Dragon:

• DB Legends actually made me appreciate Rage Shenron (Wu Xing Long) more since, despite his bad design, he's a fun character to use in the game, even in PvP matches

• I always crack up at Pan's reaction to Oceanus Shenron (Liu Xing Long) when she reveals what wish she was born. Honestly, I saw a great idea in the YouTube comments that a cool story would be Oceanus hunting down Oolong for making such a dumb wish, and Goku and the others had to save him from getting killed by her lol

• I never really got why she/he had that "true" form that looks worse, just to show that wasn’t really a woman. Like you said, a girl fight is kinda an obvious cliché, but this could’ve been Pan’s big fight

PS: I'm using dub names to refer to the Evil Dragons because I'm more used to those and prefer than the literal version of their names, like 'Five-Star Dragon'

The Midpoint Pan Abduction:

• Naturon Shenron (Qi Xing Long) looking like a mole because he possessed one, but then not looking anything like Pan when he possesses her, always felt weird to me. But what I love about this fandom is that there's always someone who thinks the same and even makes fan art showing how it could have looked

• It's hilarious how GT manages to mess up Goku's character to the point where he seems incompetent at something we know he's good at (fighting), yet also makes him seem borderline psychic by predicting impossible stuff, just to make him look smart

Goku's Biggest Lie:

• Does this scene with Vegeta imply that he recognizes part of why he falls behind Goku is because of his own training methods?

• One common criticism here is how Vegeta drops his pride to use an unnatural method to catch up with Goku. But hey, let’s just pretend he didn’t already do that with Babidi, lol

• Another interesting thing in this scene is how they mention the possibility of a Super Saiyan 5. Not sure if it was just a throwaway line or if GT actually planned to go in that direction if the show's ratings hadn’t tanked so badly

Honor is the New Stupidity/The Freeza We Have At Home:

• I always figured Nuova Shenron (Si Xing Long) acted that way because he came from the Four-Star Dragon Ball, which Goku treasured since he was a kid. Too bad they never gave it any depth beyond that.

• Once again, reading YouTube comments, I saw someone pointing out how all the depth and complexity we wish these Evil Dragons had can actually be found in the Chimera Ants from Hunter × Hunter (2011). Not sure if you’ve seen it, but it’s a really great arc from that anime

The Villain Who Came With the Frame:

• Mate, I totally forgot that Nuova Shenron (Si Xing Long) had eyedrops (stored who knows where), and I can’t even remember if I thought that scene was random back when I first saw it lol

• Not sure if nostalgia’s hitting me here, but Syn Shenron (Yi Xing Long)—even with his generic villain personality—has something about his design and first appearance that kinda earns him the title of the franchise's final boss

• I’ve always thought Toriyama (even if he probably never watched GT) might’ve taken inspiration from how SSJ4 Goku used the other Saiyans as batteries for the Super Saiyan God ritual

• Also forgot that, yet again, Goku came up with the (lame) idea of blowing himself up with a villain. GT’s production team must’ve had some serious creativity issues

Gogeta Minus Gogeta:

• I never really thought about Evil Dragons being tied to the desires that created them in both appearance and personality. It would've been interesting if they'd gone that route—maybe the stories would’ve been better, and their personalities less generic?

• I’ve never read those crazy theories on the DB wiki, but they sound fun. Maybe I’ll check them out later

• Vegeta suggesting fusion when he’s always been against it, and Goku finding it hilarious—honestly, that’s one of the best moments between those two

• I also feel like they could’ve made better use of SSJ4 Vegeta. It really felt like his whole existence there was just to be fusion material for Gogeta

• His reaction to the absurdity of Goku suggesting swallowing the Four-Star Dragon Ball was priceless. Like, where did the writers even come up with that?

• I was just thinking, isn’t the whole “this attack won’t work on me twice” thing from Saint Seiya? And since that’s also a Toei anime, maybe the writers just threw that into DBGT for fun?

GT's Goku is a Hero:

• I get why Toriyama wasn’t pleased with how the anime producers never really captured the “poison” traits his character had in the manga. But honestly, I never saw that as a bad thing—like, even in the anime, Goku was far from being a Superman type, you know? I feel like in DBS they tried to make Goku’s personality closer to what Toriyama wanted, but there were moments where he acted so annoying and immature, just because he wanted a “good fight.” Not saying his personality in GT was much better than in Super, but at least it still felt consistent with how he was in Z

You Do Know GT:

• For me, the ending of GT will always be the definitive ending of the franchise, even if it doesn’t make much sense (when you try to fit all the animated series together). But the fact that, after all these years, they’ve never tried to do anything else within that same timeline feels like a form of respect for the work. Plus, I think Toei sees Dragon Ball as more profitable without needing another definitive ending

• Wow, I had no idea they made a point of redrawing the scene of Goku meeting Goten. But it makes sense now, seeing as that’s the moment the narrator starts highlighting his qualities and virtues

• One thing that REALLY bothers me about this ending is that I get they want to show the future being about the fight between two descendants of Goku and Vegeta, but damn, do they really have to go Super Saiyan? Maybe it’s just the headcanon I have in my head that the amount of Saiyan blood/genes in a hybrid could affect that, since a lot of people thought Pan, being 1/4 Saiyan, wouldn't be able to transform. But damn, Goku Jr. and Vegeta Jr. are like 1/16, right? It would be even more ridiculous if they were born with tails. But honestly, I don't think Toriyama or the GT writers ever thought about that—it's just like you said, the classic: "Hey, let's make these characters do that thing with golden hair, or no one's gonna think this is Dragon Ball." Ugh

• The other thing that always bothered me is how they start a clip of DB’s iconic scenes, going from the beginning all the way to Piccolo Daimao, and then suddenly skip to No. 16? Like, they could’ve just followed the chronological order, even if it was more compact to fit the episode’s time

• It’s basically beating a dead horse to say GT had the potential to be something way bigger than it was. There’ve got to be fanfics out there trying to “fix” it, but I’ve never really been interested in checking those out



The Future of DB Dissection:

• From the time I’ve been following this series, I never imagined the day would come when you’d complete GT. I’m really happy I got to witness that. I saw you’re planning to dive into the materials that came after—Dragon Ball: Yo! Son Goku and His Friends Return!! (2008), Dragon Ball Evolution (2009), Battle of Gods (2013), Resurrection F (2015), and finally Dragon Ball Super (2015). Just thinking about hearing your thoughts and insights on this modern era of the franchise has me hyped!
But like you said, between that gap from 1997 to 2008, there might’ve been some lesser-known materials released that you’d also be willing to dissect. I’m curious to hear about those too!

[nineko]

I'm putting this here because there isn't a topic for Dragon Ball Daima January.

The "backwards katakana" thing was already noticed by many people in the very first episodes, when the first plane was stolen, though this does open a small inconsistency: one of the cards held by Tamagami #2 during the math riddle, which you actually used as a still in your video, displays a very much straight question mark, they should have mirrored it for consistency, in my opinion, though I'll admit I didn't notice until now, because it was right there while you were taking about the reversed glyphs.

[Gaffer Tape]

Thanks, everybody, for the feedback! I'm right now hard at work cleaning up the scans for Dragon Boy and The Adventure of Tongpoo!

2024 Recap

I loved this, getting to go back and see the whole year laid out. It had all become something of a blur, a faded memory, so it was fantastic getting to see it reconstructed. Thank you.

It also reminded me that you did reviews of the SSJ Bardock OVA and Minus chapter without following the release order, which is obviously not a criticism—I remember there was a reason for that back then, just saying I always thought it was a nice touch that you followed the release order strictly for all the DB material over the years

I didn't go back and check, but if I had to guess my motivation from (goodness!) eight years ago, it was probably because (besides just being a fun concept grouping) at the time Bardock didn't really appear anywhere else in the story, and I didn't have any specific plans to move beyond the original series, so it seemed like it wouldn't really interfere with anything.

• I cracked myself at you trying to find even a bit of logic in this nonsense festival of an arc. By the way, your humor was the best part of this whole review lol

Thank you! Some people liked it, some people were put off by it, as it is with everything. Regardless, it's nice to hear!

[quote[• Even though I’m a big fan of TFS, I think this is an example of how their approach to the Android arc ended up being harmful for some fans of the franchise. I personally thought that Goku was the one who killed Dr. Gero’s son, which would’ve given a deeper motivation for Gero to seek revenge, but if the real cause of death was just an enemy's bullet in combat, it ended up being an interesting trivia and nothing more. TFS’s version is better in how it handles it, but now I understand why fans get confused about this[/quote]

I still feel shame over this. Haha, and Scott actually apologized to me for inadvertently making me think that (not that it's at all his fault).

[quote[• Was the “You killed me” shout from Super 17 and 18’s response “Good” from your voice? I almost believed it was the actual dub, lol[/quote]

No, that's from one of the CD-i Zelda games, Zelda: The Wand of Gamelon.

• I really thought you were gonna criticize how they only used Goku and Pan at the start of this arc. One of GT's biggest criticisms is exactly how it barely uses other characters in the plot, and the Evil Dragons arc could've been a great chance to bring in Oob, Vegeta, Gohan, Goten, and Trunks. With Goku and Pan, they could've had seven evil dragons vs. seven warriors from the current Dragon Team

I think many have brought that up. It's a fair point, but it's something that's never bothered me. It's certainly more logical, but I don't know if I would have preferred it narratively. I'd rather the show use its characters well than use them for the sake of using them. After all, we see how boring and pointless those guys are when they actually do show up later. Goku, Pan, and Giru seem more like GT's identity to me, so I don't mind focusing on them. Or at least in theory I don't. Besides, if everyone split up to do this simultaneously, it seems like the arc would go by way too fast!

• Naturon Shenron (Qi Xing Long) looking like a mole because he possessed one, but then not looking anything like Pan when he possesses her, always felt weird to me. But what I love about this fandom is that there's always someone who thinks the same and even makes fan art showing how it could have looked

I love that. So much better.

• From the time I’ve been following this series, I never imagined the day would come when you’d complete GT. I’m really happy I got to witness that. I saw you’re planning to dive into the materials that came after—Dragon Ball: Yo! Son Goku and His Friends Return!! (2008), Dragon Ball Evolution (2009), Battle of Gods (2013), Resurrection F (2015), and finally Dragon Ball Super (2015). Just thinking about hearing your thoughts and insights on this modern era of the franchise has me hyped!
But like you said, between that gap from 1997 to 2008, there might’ve been some lesser-known materials released that you’d also be willing to dissect. I’m curious to hear about those too!

As always, if you think I'm missing anything, please let me know what you want to see covered!

I'm putting this here because there isn't a topic for Dragon Ball Daima January.

The "backwards katakana" thing was already noticed by many people in the very first episodes, when the first plane was stolen, though this does open a small inconsistency: one of the cards held by Tamagami #2 during the math riddle, which you actually used as a still in your video, displays a very much straight question mark, they should have mirrored it for consistency, in my opinion, though I'll admit I didn't notice until now, because it was right there while you were taking about the reversed glyphs.

Oh, I don't doubt it. That's the fun thing about a new series is that everybody is noticing different things! Especially if you've only seen it once (like I have) you're not going to pick up on everything. Discourse hasn't yet settled, and all that stuff. I did not notice the question mark, so thanks for pointing it out. To your point, though, I don't know if I agree it should have been flipped. I don't think demon script is supposed to be backwards Japanese from a diegetic standpoint, any more than I believe the reversed audio of the 23rd Budoukai is meant to imply that spoken Namekian is actually backwards Japanese. They're just there to look and sound foreign. Other languages in real life use the question mark as is, so I don't see any reason why the demon question mark would need to be a mirror version of ours.

[Gaffer Tape]

Dragon Ball Dissection is back for 2025, baby!

Toriyama's Dragon Ball Prototypes - Dragon Ball Dissection: Dragon Boy and The Adventure of Tongpoo

Dragon Ball Dissection continues forward by going all the way back to the beginning. Before the beginning! When Toriyama began brainstorming a new martial arts series, he drew two stories, Dragon Boy and The Adventure of Tongpoo. From characters to plot points to jokes, these one-shots should feel eerily familiar to anyone who is experienced with Dragon Ball. Today we dive into those stories and explore where Dragon Ball came from. Hope you enjoy it!

[Vegeta th3 4th]

I've been following your reviews for years, so it's great to see your opinion on some of Toriyama's other works. I'm definitely looking forward to the Neko Majin review/analysis. Do you plan on reviewing the new movies, Super, etc... once you're done covering these smaller projects ?