Do New Forms Actually Sell Merchandise?

[AliTheZombie13]

Forest for the trees here. The point is that there is more going on than a stat change in so many of these examples, regardless of whether or not that "more" is something you find good, enjoyable, or worthwhile.

Thank you for clarifying.
In that case: No, I don't think that "more" in most cases is good, enjoyable or worthwhile.
SSJ1, SSJ2, SSJ4, and Majin Vegeta, are the only instances franchise-wide where I think transformations have been justified.
Of course, I'm not everybody.

The second paragraph pertains to the larger point I'm trying to make here. If the writers are being lazy, then sure, the new forms they introduce come across as lazy. They're being lazy with their forms because the whole point of the form is to sell merch. Sure enough. Now expand that thought a little bit: they're being lazy with the show's writing as a whole because the whole point of the show is to sell merch. Sure enough. But wait.....that's just business as usual? Insert "always has been" meme here. It's all for merch all the way down, whether it's good storytelling or bad storytelling. So the observation adds nothing to a conversation, and it's disingenuous to critically ascribe the greed motive to bad stories when it's also applicable to the good stories.

Does that make sense?

Yes, that makes sense.
But here's the thing: "This is what Dragon Ball has always been about!!!!" is a very, very, very weak counter-argument. "But Dragon Ball is a commercial product!" Then improve the commercial product, or I'll keep telling people the commercial product is bad and is not worth their time and money.

If I tell you, "I think this is bad and makes me question why I'm even still watching this." and your go-to-argument is "Well, Dragon Ball has always been like that." That doesn't do the franchise any favors. In fact, it pushes me away farther from it.

Dragon Ball has shown me in the past it can be better. But if it keeps insisting on not respecting the one moral it always hammered down our heads, to always improve oneself, then I'm left with no choice but to abandon Dragon Ball.

I'm not saying Dragon Ball needs to abandon transformations altogether, I'm saying it needs to justify them better.

[BootyCheeksJohnson]

I think in April 2019 the end of year fiscal records from Bandai reported that Dragon Ball was the highest selling franchise in Japan for merch. That would have been post Super Broli, and therefore post Broli merch cycle. So many toys of Super Saiyan Blue Goku and Vegeta (and Super Saiyan God Vegeta since that hadn't been seen before by an anime audience), and all of the new Broli forms would have been in circulation.

Right. But again, I'm always seeing stuff based on pre-GT material out in the wild. So the question is: is the Super merch actually chiefly responsible for it? Maybe! Is there anything that can help us confirm that, or are we left to informed speculation? It's fine if the latter is the case, but if the former is the case it would be very cool to have in the discussion.

Like, it's obviously straightforwardly believable that new stories come out, new forms (and characters) appear, merch of those new things get made, people buy merch of those new things, and sales go way up. It's also straightforwardly believable that new stories come out, DB in general consequently occupies more of the public consciousness, people buy whatever DB merch grabs them (which could be of new stuff or old stuff), and sales go way up; for instance, post-SH merch cycle I saw some mighty tempting 23rd TB-era Goku and Piccolo statues at Barnes & Noble.

That's also a strong possibility. It's possible that the 2018-19 cycle was so strong because Super finished airing and the popularity of Broli within the fandom carried a lot of hype behind it. But, I'm sure that Ultra Instinct and all of the new Broli forms carried a lot of weight in helping reach those record breaking merch sales.

[Metalwario64]

If the forms were made to sell merch, Bandai is certainly dropping the ball. Most of the time new forms are relegated to P-Bandai limited exclusives for things like Figuarts.

[Zephyr]

But, I'm sure that Ultra Instinct and all of the new Broli forms carried a lot of weight in helping reach those record breaking merch sales.

Yeah, that wouldn't surprise me at all.

If the forms were made to sell merch, Bandai is certainly dropping the ball. Most of the time new forms are relegated to P-Bandai limited exclusives for things like Figuarts.

Right. There's a lot of figures and merch I'd love to get, some of them even of new forms. But a lot of them are also outside of my budget, or only available for a limited time, or both. And then once they're no longer being sold, they get scalped to hell and back.

Yes, that makes sense.
But here's the thing: "This is what Dragon Ball has always been about!!!!" is a very, very, very weak counter-argument. "But Dragon Ball is a commercial product!" Then improve the commercial product, or I'll keep telling people the commercial product is bad and is not worth their time and money.

If I tell you, "I think this is bad and makes me question why I'm even still watching this." and your go-to-argument is "Well, Dragon Ball has always been like that." That doesn't do the franchise any favors. In fact, it pushes me away farther from it.

Dragon Ball has shown me in the past it can be better. But if it keeps insisting on not respecting the one moral it always hammered down our heads, to always improve oneself, then I'm left with no choice but to abandon Dragon Ball.

I'm not saying Dragon Ball needs to abandon transformations altogether, I'm saying it needs to justify them better.

Well, let's not cross the wires here. Again, what "Dragon Ball has always been this way!" means regarding this specific conversation is that "it exists to sell merch!" is a vapid observation and a truism. Semantically empty. Of course it exists to sell merch, and its quality is irrelevant to that observation. So, trotting that out as a dunk when the quality is bad, as if the truth of it is conditional on the quality, comes across as really strange to me, upon years of reflection.

As for the tangential conversation you keep gesturing at: we both know I'm not saying "Dragon Ball should just be bad", and we also both know that we do not agree (at least not entirely) on what is "bad" in Dragon Ball (and art and storytelling in general) in the first place. So it feels kinda moot to me to try and force it into here. I'm not trying to mini-mod here, or police the thread and say that a topic isn't allowed to spawn interesting sub-conversations, but.....this ain't one of those. We've had this one a lot, and we have had to agree to disagree every time. What else is there for either of us to say on that topic at this point?

[Luso Saiyan]

In the case of SSGSS Vegetto, I think that one is something the story called for. That story prominently featured the Potara, and its ultimate antagonist was a Potara fusion. Vegetto appearing only made sense, and since both of his halves use SSGSS as their standard state in combat, it also only made sense that he too would use it. An instance of Chekov's Gun™ nearly on the level of the Zeno button.

Obviously any appearance of Vegito at that point in the story would mean SSGSS Vegito. But the very idea of adding Vegito is a nice excuse to feature SSGSS Vegito. That was my point.

I disagree that just because the story featured Potara it means it called for Vegito.

[AliTheZombie13]

As for the tangential conversation you keep gesturing at: we both know I'm not saying "Dragon Ball should just be bad", and we also both know that we do not agree (at least not entirely) on what is "bad" in Dragon Ball (and art and storytelling in general) in the first place. So it feels kinda moot to me to try and force it into here. I'm not trying to mini-mod here, or police the thread and say that a topic isn't allowed to spawn interesting sub-conversations, but.....this ain't one of those. We've had this one a lot, and we have had to agree to disagree every time. What else is there for either of us to say on that topic at this point?

That one is on me, I simply misinterpreted your post.
Please, forgive me.

Well, let's not cross the wires here. Again, what "Dragon Ball has always been this way!" means regarding this specific conversation is that "it exists to sell merch!" is a vapid observation and a truism. Semantically empty. Of course it exists to sell merch, and its quality is irrelevant to that observation. So, trotting that out as a dunk when the quality is bad, as if the truth of it is conditional on the quality, comes across as really strange to me, upon years of reflection.

What people mean with that as they throw out that argument is that the people behind the show must be prioritizing profit over art and thinking their audience is stupid and will just consume whatever if the quality of what they're consuming comes across as bad, lazy and/or unnecessary.

Nothing more, nothing less.
You may argue about the semantics all you want, but you know well this is what they actually mean.
Whether you think that is accurate or not, is a whole 'nother issue entirely.

Transformations are just a really easy target for that criticism because, as years of anime have proved, they are a frequent target of corporate greed. If I recall, Digimon Adventure 2020 had numerous instances where the writers were forced to change the story to accommodate the producers rushing out new forms to sell new merch off of.

It's natural that as anime viewers, our reactions whenever we see something come across as lazy or forced, especially in Toei-produced shows, we think. "Someone up there must've shoehorned this in just to sell new merch." Because we do have evidence of that happening.

[Zephyr]

I disagree that just because the story featured Potara it means it called for Vegito.

Well, I'm not sure what makes something "called for" in a story to you. I don't think it was absolutely essential that Vegetto show up, or that the story couldn't function at all without his presence (so maybe I had a poor choice of words there). But I do think his presence was beneficial to the story, and hardly an unexpected thing. With the Episode Discussion Threads from that arc being lost to time, I can't go back and confirm, but I definitely remember a lot of posts expecting him to show up, largely because of the heavy emphasis the story put on the Potara. Further, as of the Black arc, there was no precedent for Goku using something that was stronger than SSGSS (+KK), so fusion made sense there as a last resort. He had a narratively organic presence in that story.

Now let's compare that to SSGSS Gogeta in DBS: Broly. By the time that film takes place, there absolutely was precedent for Goku using something better than SSGSS (+KK): Ultra Instinct in the Tournament of Power, one story ago. So it makes less sense that someone would write in that they fuse, rather than that Ultra Instinct activates again. Or, at the very least, fusion would would feel a more natural inclusion if UI was already tried and failed. Fusing into Gogeta in particular would especially make sense to write in if it was in a story heavily featuring the Metamorans or something. Instead it comes across like someone in the Dragon Room really wanted to make the Budokai 3 intro a thing in the main story (and also make SSGSS Gogeta a thing).

That one is on me, I simply misinterpreted your post.
Please, forgive me.

Not a problem, it happens.

What people mean with that as they throw out that argument is that the people behind the show must be prioritizing profit over art and thinking their audience is stupid and will just consume whatever if the quality of what they're consuming comes across as bad, lazy and/or unnecessary.

Nothing more, nothing less.
You may argue about the semantics all you want, but you know well this is what they actually mean.
Whether you think that is accurate or not, is a whole 'nother issue entirely.

Transformations are just a really easy target for that criticism because, as years of anime have proved, they are a frequent target of corporate greed. If I recall, Digimon Adventure 2020 had numerous instances where the writers were forced to change the story to accommodate the producers rushing out new forms to sell new merch off of.

It's natural that as anime viewers, our reactions whenever we see something come across as lazy or forced, especially in Toei-produced shows, we think. "Someone up there must've shoehorned this in." Because we do have evidence of that happening.

Don't get me wrong, I definitely get why it's a natural criticism to make. It wouldn't be the cliche it is were transformations not useful in this way. Indeed, there is much precedent for new forms existing just to sell merch. At the same time, though, this thread has also seen numerous examples of that not being the case. It's easy to think they made a form for merch, only to turn out that someone just wanted a helpful storytelling shortcut.

That said, I do place value on knowing and addressing what people mean to say even if that's not precisely what they say, so I appreciate you bringing this point up. For instance, it now bothers me quite a bit when folks are keen to remind that "there is no official canon", pretending that they don't know exactly what others mean when using the term in a very informal sense.

But I do also think it can be fruitful to put old adages under a microscope sometimes. Sure, people aren't required to engage in topics super thoughtfully and carefully and be more precise with language while voicing criticisms, but if Kanzenshuu isn't the place to try and motivate people to do that while discussing Dragon Ball, I don't know where is.

[WittyUsername]

I don’t think the Future Trunks arc called for Vegetto to show up, especially when they had to retcon the way the Potara earrings work to justify his inclusion. Besides, it’s not like he really accomplished anything. He wasn’t even the one who stopped Zamasu. He was there for fanservice. They couldn’t even bother changing his outfit to incorporate Vegeta’s Saiyan armor.

[dbgtFO]

If the forms were made to sell merch, Bandai is certainly dropping the ball. Most of the time new forms are relegated to P-Bandai limited exclusives for things like Figuarts.

As long as more merch is sold in general as a result of the increased spotlight granted to the franchise by new forms, it's all the same.
This is why I could never buy that figure obsessed guy, who always ran this argument, that "clearly they don't make new forms to sell merch, because they have barely released new merch with that new form!"

That is not how it works.
The new forms invariably increase the hype around the franchise, which in turn makes fans far more susceptible to engage in the fandom and thus buy more merch.
It doesn't HAVE to be just the new forms of characters they are buying, as long as it makes them buy more merch in general, then the new form has done its job as revenue generating tool!

[WittyUsername]

It’s worth pointing out that new forms doesn’t just mean selling more physical merch. It also means providing additional content for video games, which is a big deal in a franchise like Dragon Ball.

[Zephyr]

Besides, it’s not like he really accomplished anything. He wasn’t even the one who stopped Zamasu.

I think that actually accomplishes adding to the sense of despair. They really tried just about everything they could have possibly thought of, and it still didn't work. Not trying fusion as a last ditch effort in a post-Boo arc story would feel about as weird as not using Super Saiyan in a post-Namek story. In that sense, it's arguably questionable that they didn't at least try fusion against Beerus when Super Saiyan God alone turned out to not be enough to defeat him.

I don't think cooking up a reason to keep Vegetto from sticking around makes him showing up in the first place any less organic. The point about the armor is fair, but it also seems obvious that "new Vegetto outfit!" would have been good for fanservice (as would having him "get the kill") and a good merchandising opportunity; strikes me as Toriyama not wanting to cook up a new design for a character he didn't care about including in the first place.

Like, no, there's no denying that he was there for fanservice, that's the gist of what Toyotaro said about the matter. But multiple things can be true at the same time, which is another thing I'm trying to hammer home here.

[JulieYBM]

I'm reminded of how much I wish Toriyama's original plan for Gokuu and Vegeta to defeat Zamasu without merging happened. Vegetto and Gogeta just aren't as cool as Zamasu or Kefla, because there's just no solid story to them. I absolutely would not be surprised if a Bandai executive was like, "Let’s do Vegetto Blue instead!"

[SupremeKai25]

I'm reminded of how much I wish Toriyama's original plan for Gokuu and Vegeta to defeat Zamasu without merging happened. Vegetto and Gogeta just aren't as cool as Zamasu or Kefla, because there's just no solid story to them. I absolutely would not be surprised if a Bandai executive was like, "Let’s do Vegetto Blue instead!"

They know their fandom. Nostalgic, nostalgic to no end.

Funnily enough, they didn't even change Vegito's outfit from the Buu saga even though Vegeta no longer has his gym tank top in Super.

Why did they do this, if all they care about is merchandise? Think of all the figurines of Vegito in Saiyan armour that they could have sold. What a missed opportunity!

[TheSaiyanGod]

What changed in him when he acquired Super Saiyan Blue, etc? Answer: Nothing. These transformations are completely empty, character and story-wise. And worse, they're magic ass-pulls to kill a seemingly impossible conflict quickly and effortlessly to the detriment of the story.
.

I understand people's gripes about Super Saiyan Blue, but as far as autor's intention and what the transformation is supposed to convey (since it's usually discussed by fans this form's lack of purpose or necessity), we know from Toriyama's himself his intentions when creating this form:

I made his hair light blue to express how “by overcoming a certain limit he has become both strong and tranquil, able to keep his composure in a fight”

- Akira Toriyama, Dragon Ball Volume “F”

Despite the harsh complaints about the Resurrection F movie (I personally think the movie is fine and better than what people give it credit for, it feels more like Toriyama than a lot of the old DBZ movies that people love), it introduced some concepts that became very important later in the Super series. Freeza's return, Goku and Vegeta's training with Whis (building their dynamic with Beerus / Whis which led to pretty much every other story arc after it), Super Saiyan Blue (the staple form for the series despite being very divisive), the concept of Ultra Instinct, etc.

While Battle of Gods introduced the cast to a multiverse of possibilities, Resurrection F brought relevant changes to them that were further explored later

[AliTheZombie13]

I understand people's gripes about Super Saiyan Blue, but as far as autor's intention and what the transformation is supposed to convey (since it's usually discussed by fans this form's lack of purpose or necessity), we know from Toriyama's himself his intentions when creating this form:

I made his hair light blue to express how “by overcoming a certain limit he has become both strong and tranquil, able to keep his composure in a fight”

- Akira Toriyama, Dragon Ball Volume “F”

OK, but, "becoming strong while calm and composed" has happened in this franchise like 3 times already.
Once when Goku was training with Kami, once again when he was training with Gohan to master SSJ1's rage factor, now this.
I guess Toriyama really likes to make Goku relearn the same lessons he learned as a child.

[super michael]

Lets assume that new forms are for selling merchandise, then we have to question why these things didn't happen:

- Why didn't Pan get Super Saiyan in GT.
- Why didn't Goten and Trunks fuse in GT.
- Why didn't anyone gain SSJ3 in GT.
- Why didn't Majoob fuse with anyone in GT.
- Why didn't they turn Gohan, Goten, Trunks and Pan into their Oozaru form to fight Omega Shenron in GT.
- Why doesn't Vegeta have Ultra Ego in the anime/movie of DBS, why is it manga exclusive at the moment.
- Why didn't they do SSG Ritual on the other Saiyans to gain SSG.
- Why didn't they allow C17 & C18 to fuse.

There are more examples, but I think that is plenty. Basically those were potential forms, which they could sell as merchandise but they chose not to do it.


Although here is something that never made sense. Vegeta has a armor in DBS, how come Vegito doesn't have any armor at all. Why does Vegito have the same clothes as the Boo Saga, when DBS Vegeta and DBS Goku has different clothes and has Whis symbol.

[Zinnia]

- Why didn't Pan get Super Saiyan in GT.
- Why didn't Goten and Trunks fuse in GT.
- Why didn't anyone gain SSJ3 in GT.
- Why didn't Majoob fuse with anyone in GT.
- Why didn't they turn Gohan, Goten, Trunks and Pan into their Oozaru form to fight Omega Shenron in GT.

Because S.H. Figuarts didn't exist back then. Now you have SS3 Vegeta Mini figure announced on the same day he made his debut in. Figure companies weren't THIS pushy in the 90s, they were there for some sales but not to that extent. Said figures were also of much lower quality as they were mostly for children too, while now they're aware of the older collectors audience.

Figuarts even had Gomah figurine announced and up for pre-orders before the series aired, now it's been half a year and that guy did absolutely nothing so far.

- Why didn't they allow C17 & C18 to fuse.

Kefla was the new thing and they didn't want to overshadow her that fast.

[MasenkoHA]

Lets assume that new forms are for selling merchandise, then we have to question why these things didn't happen:

- Why didn't Pan get Super Saiyan in GT.
-

We know why Pan didn't get Super Saiyan per the producer.

Bandai also is notorious for thinking girl toys don't sell and that boys don't want to buy toys of girl characters (seriously look at any of their IPs with a mixed gender cast ane see how often the girl characters are suddenly non existent in their commercials and toylines) so they weren't about to push for a Super Saiyan Pan toy on a "boys" show

[AliTheZombie13]

Lets assume that new forms are for selling merchandise, then we have to question why these things didn't happen:

- Why didn't Pan get Super Saiyan in GT.
- Why didn't Goten and Trunks fuse in GT.
- Why didn't anyone gain SSJ3 in GT.
- Why didn't Majoob fuse with anyone in GT.
- Why didn't they turn Gohan, Goten, Trunks and Pan into their Oozaru form to fight Omega Shenron in GT.

I don't know about the Super ones, but the higher-ups behind GT have proven themselves to be quite sexist in regards to how they view Pan and how her role is to be rescued so her grandpa looks better in the end.

On top of that, they made a "creative" decision to not feature characters other than Goku too much, because apparently, kids in Japan get tired and turn off their TV's if there's no Goku around. Their words, not mine.

On top of on top of that, GT was supposed to be much longer (the creators saying they wanted GT to keep going for 10 years), but a lot of what they planned got tossed out of the window after only 3 episodes (or maybe after 8 episodes, if MistareFusion's theory is correct) due to bad reception.

So maybe, for the most part, the people in GT just didn't want to commit to anything other than their "best hits" and rushed the fuck out of it.

[BootyCheeksJohnson]

But, I'm sure that Ultra Instinct and all of the new Broli forms carried a lot of weight in helping reach those record breaking merch sales.

Yeah, that wouldn't surprise me at all.

If the forms were made to sell merch, Bandai is certainly dropping the ball. Most of the time new forms are relegated to P-Bandai limited exclusives for things like Figuarts.

Right. There's a lot of figures and merch I'd love to get, some of them even of new forms. But a lot of them are also outside of my budget, or only available for a limited time, or both. And then once they're no longer being sold, they get scalped to hell and back.

That last part upsets me to no end. That comicon exclusive pack of Goku and Gohan as they appeared in the first version of Cha-La Head-Cha-La should not be a limited release. That head sculpt and those face parts are the single best any base form Goku figuart has looked. But I couldn't justify spending the 100+ buying it second hand since I don't live in San Diego, or wanted to spend several hundred big ones to drown in a sea of sweaty people.