Non-thread-worthy discussions

[JulieYBM]

For other modern projects, we're always hearing lines about sticking to Toriyama and very rarely seeing or hearing about letting a director lead a project. The least bland piece of Super Hero—aside from the Piccolo-heavy dialogue scenes, which would have been scripted by Toriyama—was the decision to ask Toriyama if the production staff could change Gohan's first fight to have it involve rain fall. There should have been more decisions like that on a bigger scale.

I got the opposite impression - that the production changed Super Hero into a retread different from what Toriyama originally intended. Wasn't it originally intended to be more of a slice of life movie with Piccolo as the star before Iyoku pushed for Gohan to be a co-star, and thus we got a retread of the same Gohan story they always tell about him forgetting how to fight and then remembering? I would have loved to see the original concept realised without that interference.

Iyoku Akio asked Toriyama to include Gohan, but that would have been at the story planning stage, before production had fully begun. Iyoku doesn't work for the production itself, he just oversee it as an employee of first Shueisha, then later Capsule Corp.

The director of the film isn't really getting to lead the project like a normal director would.

[Tian]

One thing I've learned from being a Dragon Ball fan is to never be surprised as the most unlikely things can eventually happen. The idea of Broly returning was always something people laughed at.... until it happened, same with Evil Goku Goku Black.

Ah, I remember the old times during the GT up to the 2008 special hiatus period where we imagined all kinds of stuff with this franchise. Those vids of fanmade transformations with Evanescence music in the background are have been a part of my formation as a Dragon Ball fan.

I wish I had that good old uncertainty but I feel that in recent years this franchise has become a bit predictable, specially with the treatment of the Z portion of the franchise.

I love Z but I sometimes feel that OG DB fans also deserve more stuff than mere flashbacks and scenes in recaps.

On the dub side most fans thought alternate English dubs were a thing of the past.... until Bang Zoom Super happened. I never thought we'd get a Brian Drummond cameo in a future Funimation dub, but it happened with Copy Vegeta.

That's understandable. As the Ocean Kai has been gathering more and more dust in the storage where it is, it was normal to think that the Dragon Ball franchise was definitely divorced from Ocean Productions.

But I am glad it wasn't the case and Ocean is still a part of the franchise. Maybe no longer in the production sense but in the nostalgia one.

[super michael]

I don't mind the change with DBS Super Hero movie including Gohan in the movie, it is too bad that no one was against the idea with turning Goku into a mindless bossy clown in the movie. Goku was completely out of character and badly written.

Goku is a genius when it comes to training and coming up with ideas on how to train, yet Goku wasn't written like that in DBS Super Hero. They had Broly who could fill in as the characters that has no idea, but no it had to be Goku just because.

[PhantomSaiyan]

I don't mind the change with DBS Super Hero movie including Gohan in the movie, it is too bad that no one was against the idea with turning Goku into a mindless bossy clown in the movie. Goku was completely out of character and badly written.

Goku is a genius when it comes to training and coming up with ideas on how to train, yet Goku wasn't written like that in DBS Super Hero. They had Broly who could fill in as the characters that has no idea, but no it had to be Goku just because.

It has once again been 0 days since super michael hasn't commented about Goku being dumber in Super

But yeah I gotta agree here, they could have easily avoided the whole "Goku forgot meditation" bit, it was a goofy mistake to make

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Ah, I remember the old times during the GT up to the 2008 special hiatus period where we imagined all kinds of stuff with this franchise. Those vids of fanmade transformations with Evanescence music in the background are have been a part of my formation as a Dragon Ball fan.

I wish I had that good old uncertainty but I feel that in recent years this franchise has become a bit predictable, specially with the treatment of the Z portion of the franchise.

Yeah, I remember in the late 2000s after Toonami UK stopped airing Dragon Ball content reading all sorts of crazy Dragon Ball AF rumours online like Goku turning evil, Super Saiyan 5 and 6, fusions of Trunks and Vegeta, Tenshinhan and Yamcha, Broly being resurrected and becoming one of the heroes. Of course these were all made up, but it was fun to imagine as an early teen.

I don't hate Dragon Ball Super, but in a weird way it has made me not crave new Dragon Ball material anymore. Maybe part of that was how the series had already ended in Japan by the time it came to Ireland and the desire to follow a new series as it was airing was fulfilled, or that at least some of those wacky story concepts came to fruition so I no longer had to wonder what it would be like if those ideas were animated.

I have similar feelings about Xiaolin Chronicles, the pseudosequel/reboot to Xiaolin Showdown as a lot of fans like myself used to imagine a season 4 back in the day, then we finally had a new series and I made peace with the fact while it may have had its good points I didn't need it.

Oh and the irony is not lost on me that the franchises unpredictability in recent years has made it more predictable, especially with Z fan service being the priority while anything for the original series takes a backseat. Like if a new Cooler movie was announced it would not be that surprising anymore especially since Broly happened.

But I am glad it wasn't the case and Ocean is still a part of the franchise. Maybe no longer in the production sense but in the nostalgia one.

Agreed, and definitely one of the good things about Super existing.

I kinda wish Funimation got Peter Kelamis to play Goku Black, but I guess Sean Schemmel's performance was good enough.

[ZeroNeonix]

I wish they could've saved the Orange Piccolo form for a hypothetical film set in new Namek as some kind of Ancient Namekian power to use against Lord Slug.

I'm not fond of Slug at all but, I feel there are still some elements of Namekian history to explore and it would've been a good chance to give Piccolo his long deserved spotlight rather than share it with Gohan.

I like the Lord Slug movie, but if you think about it, Slug is basically just King Piccolo 2.0, but from space. He starts off as elderly, uses the Dragon Balls to make himself young again, and makes himself giant. For some reason, being in giant form doesn't come with any drawbacks, unlike Piccolo. But yeah. I've noticed a lot of Dragon Ball movie villains are basically canon villains, but tweaked enough to make them seem original.

Turles? Vegeta. Cooler? Frieza. Android 13? Cell. Janemba? Buu. Kinda. He's mostly similar to Kid Buu, but he's pretty distinct. Chilled? Well, Frieza, of course.

Heck, the OG Dragon Ball movies are like alternate retellings of Dragon Ball arcs. Like an alternate universe kinda thing. One had Chiaotzu as a bad guy, I think. That was kinda weird. lol

[Tian]

Yeah, I remember in the late 2000s after Toonami UK stopped airing Dragon Ball content reading all sorts of crazy Dragon Ball AF rumours online like Goku turning evil, Super Saiyan 5 and 6, fusions of Trunks and Vegeta, Tenshinhan and Yamcha, Broly being resurrected and becoming one of the heroes. Of course these were all made up, but it was fun to imagine as an early teen.

I still remember when here in LatAm, a lot of people thought the original Hatchiyack OVA was Dragon Ball AF.

How naive and stupid we were back then when there was no new content

I have similar feelings about Xiaolin Chronicles, the pseudosequel/reboot to Xiaolin Showdown as a lot of fans like myself used to imagine a season 4 back in the day, then we finally had a new series and I made peace with the fact while it may have had its good points I didn't need it.

I understand the sentiment. As a kid, I was always wishing for new episodes of SpongeBob SquarePants but now as an adult, I wish it had ended years ago because it's barely recognizable from what it was in the beginning.

I kinda wish Funimation got Peter Kelamis to play Goku Black, but I guess Sean Schemmel's performance was good enough.

Not sure if Schemmel would have allowed that...

[Mr Baggins]

Broly was a visual spectacle, no one will argue against that, but what did it bring to the table in terms of the story ?

Broly is a movie about generational influence and the importance of having independence from that influence. This theme has been pointed out and discussed ad infinitum over the years, and is rather easy to identify because mainline Dragon Ball is written to convey its morals through the juxtaposition of its characters and in simplistic, digestible ways. Dissecting it all would require some lengthy posts, several of which I've already made myself, but LoganForkHands73 posted a good distillation of it here.

All of this is straight from Toriyama's script, by the way. I like Nagamine and find that he gives the movie a more "filmic" vibe than other material (for lack of a better word) but to its detriment, his directing does occasionally clash with the dry comedic timing that makes DB's humor work. But it's the story/script that truly carries it, for me.

On the other hand, Super Hero is a funny one because it has my favorite direction of all the revival movies and yet probably my least favorite script.

I would have loved to see the original concept realised without that interference.

Same, frankly. What we got, I enjoyed well enough – especially coming off the back of a manga arc I found egregiously disappointing – but the actual story is a surprising letdown compared to most of the scripts we got from Toriyama.

[TechExpert2021]

I'm surprised no one here has mentioned this yet, and it's slightly unreleated, but Warner Bros. Discovery, which owns Cartoon Network, Adult Swim, and Toonami, as well the rest of Warner Bros. and Discovery's media and IP assets, is currently in a bidding war with Netflix (which won the bidding war when WBD approved Netflix's deal*) and Paramount (which merged with Skydance Media to form Paramount Skydance, with its CEO and chairman being the son of billionaire Larry Ellison, David Ellison). The Netflix deal only includes WBD's Streaming and Studios division, with WBD's Global Linear Networks division being spun off as Discovery Global; the Paramount deal, on the other hand, includes the entire company.

To tie this with Dragon Ball, how would Toonami survive if either acquisition goes through, and how will either Paramount or Discovery Global handle the TV broadcasting rights to DBZ Kai and DB Daima for Adult Swim's Toonami?

*Despite WBD agreeing with Netflix's deal to acquire WBD, Paramount is still aggressively pressuring WBD to have the company approve Paramount's deal in response to WBD agreeing with Netflix's deal, and has even gone as far as to initiate a hostile takeover bid toward WBD (which WBD rejected) and to sue WBD over the Netflix deal after their hostile takeover bids were rejected.

[super michael]

I understand the sentiment. As a kid, I was always wishing for new episodes of SpongeBob SquarePants but now as an adult, I wish it had ended years ago because it's barely recognizable from what it was in the beginning.

I can completely understand that point, when a cartoon or anime stays too long it can go downhill. This happened with Ben 10, however the fault is on the network for interfering and demanding the writers to make Ben goofier. That is why in Ben 10 Alien Force season 2 or 3 there was a big change in how Ben acted and in Ben 10 Ultimate. Then Ben 10 Omniverse got worse. The reboot is even worse than Omniverse.

Sometimes when something stays too long, the network or writers can forget why people became fans of their IP.
Thundercat Roar and TTG were inferior compared to their older IP.


With Digimon Adventure Reboot and DBS they are inferior to what came out before.

[JulieYBM]

In DC K.O. Issue #3 (Writers: Scott Snyder, Joshua Williamson), Superman asks Captain Marvel to share his powers with him so that he can defeat Green Lanterns Hal and Guy and in his newly transformed state, Clark's got Potara earrings! :p

[Scsigs]

I understand the sentiment. As a kid, I was always wishing for new episodes of SpongeBob SquarePants but now as an adult, I wish it had ended years ago because it's barely recognizable from what it was in the beginning.

I can completely understand that point, when a cartoon or anime stays too long it can go downhill. This happened with Ben 10, however the fault is on the network for interfering and demanding the writers to make Ben goofier. That is why in Ben 10 Alien Force season 2 or 3 there was a big change in how Ben acted and in Ben 10 Ultimate. Then Ben 10 Omniverse got worse. The reboot is even worse than Omniverse.

Sometimes when something stays too long, the network or writers can forget why people became fans of their IP.
Thundercats Roar and TTG were inferior compared to their older IP.

With Digimon Adventure Reboot and DBS they are inferior to what came out before.

With AF, it was season 3. Cartoon Network execs saw the ratings being lesser than the original series & requested the writers make the series more like the original series, which included not having a story arc, characters to regress in their developments (mainly Ben because they for some reason thought that the original series got rating because Ben acted like he did), the color pallet to be brighter & more saturated (which I consider an improvement, tbh, as it got rid of the overly shadowy filter they put over the night scenes that made most of the backgrounds hard to see for no reason), & make the tone softer & lighter-hearted. Knowing what Dwayne McDuffie & co were starting to cook up before they got this mandate, though, I wish they didn't do that.

Ultimate Alien had a better balance for the most part of the 2 tones of AF, though there were some episodes where they went too far in 1 of them.

Omniverse struggled to balance the tones properly, especially as the writers focused too heavily on the comedy most of the time because of how dark Ultimate Alien got by the end.

The reboot struggled early on in its writing, mainly because Man of Action had to adjust to writing for 11 minute episodes rather than 22 & to make the series lighter & softer. Eventually, from what I know, they got a better hang on it. Not that the series reaches the height of Classic or the first 2 seasons of AF, but it was just better.

Teen Titans Go, I have no idea why the writers & showrunners are seemingly allergic to good writing. They purposefully make the show as stupid as possible (confirmed in an interview from when the show began) & then they completely bawk against any criticism that comes off as some of the most bitter, narcissistic shit I've ever seen from showrunners of an otherwise successful show that puts the blame of not enjoying a show that was meant to bring back characters & stories from a previous one &, thus, have fans of the older material as its audience as well as having been greenlit because the network ran shorts based on the older show before it & initially marketed the new show as a continuation of the old one, only for it to later turn out to be a more comedic reboot that a lot of said fans didn't like because it's not what they were promised, nor is it that good in its own right.

Thundercats Roar & Digimon Adventure (2020), I can't speak to, as I haven't seen them.

Dragon Ball Super, I'd say has some high highs & low lows. It's not as good as the manga or the first 2 animes, but there's a lot of good in it if you look deeper beneath the surface. It has some good new characters, some really inspired world building in regards to the god hierarchy, & some pretty good ideas for stories. The problems, though, are that Toriyama's writing style of not planning a lot out left certain plot threads established early on not fully coming to full fruition as they should've & the writers of the anime & Toyotaro didn't connect them or bring them up to Toriyama so he could outside of Ultra Instinct being a connection to the stuff set up in Resurrection F in regards to Goku's shortcoming of not being focused enough in battle.

[super michael]

I don't know if this deserves its own topic or not, but I will write it here. In the battle against Kid Buu vs Goku, would it have been possible for Goku to kill Kid Buu if there was a healer in the battle? Maybe Dende stays in Kaioshin world and heals Goku, maybe Dende can hang on to Goku healing him, while Goku is fighting.

Dende healing seems to be more powerful than Kibito.

Think of My Hero Academia when

Spoiler:

Eri heals Deku in his fight against Overhaul.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jKlxg-q6UJ0

[The Dark Knight]

What was the point of Cabba when he was basically a copy of Tarble from the 2008 OVA ? Why not just bring back Tarble, as being Vegeta's brother would've resulted in more interesting interactions and stories. He was referenced in both Battle of Gods and Broly, so it's not like Toriyama forgot about him.

[JulieYBM]

What was the point of Cabba when he was basically a copy of Tarble from the 2008 OVA ? Why not just bring back Tarble, as being Vegeta's brother would've resulted in more interesting interactions and stories. He was referenced in both Battle of Gods and Broly, so it's not like Toriyama forgot about him.

Tarble isn't a young Saiyan from Universe 6 that Vegeta can mentor.

[The Dark Knight]

Tarble isn't a young Saiyan from Universe 6 that Vegeta can mentor.

He wasn't from U6, but Vegeta could absolutely mentor him into becoming stronger, in fact, it makes more sense that Vegeta would want to mentor someone he's actually related to, rather than a total stranger.

[Shaddy]

There's no value in Tarble, tying everything into the heroes' immediate family is lame. Having to explain the mainline connection to a special that was never televised or broadly internationally distributed would be a waste, and Cabba helps ground things between U6 and U7. The most reason I see to keep Tarble around would be to demonstrate that the idea of a docile saiyan can exist outside of just Goku's mom, but I never liked that idea to begin with.

[ZeroNeonix]

Vegeta doesn't seem to like Tarble, for some reason. He's kind of a nothing character. Cabba has the role of representing Saiyans from the alternate dimension of Universe 6. He's way more interesting to me.

[The Dark Knight]

Vegeta doesn't seem to like Tarble, for some reason.

It's because he's weak, which would make for an interesting story of Vegeta stepping up to be someone's mentor for a change. Cabba is basically Tarble in everything but name; he even has a similar design. If you must have alternate universe Saiyans, they should've just introduced Caulifla in the U6 tournament to represent the Saiyan race instead of Cabba. Instead of Monaka, bring Tarble back into the fold and go from there with Vegeta trying to train him.

[JulieYBM]

Vegeta doesn't seem to like Tarble, for some reason.

It's because he's weak, which would make for an interesting story of Vegeta stepping up to be someone's mentor for a change. Cabba is basically Tarble in everything but name; he even has a similar design. If you must have alternate universe Saiyans, they should've just introduced Caulifla in the U6 tournament to represent the Saiyan race instead of Cabba. Instead of Monaka, bring Tarble back into the fold and go from there with Vegeta trying to train him.

Cabba wants to fight and grow stronger, though. Tarble does not. They are different characters with different goals. Let the middle-aged man be!