Goku and Vegeta as Marital Artists

[ABED]

I haven't read the Super Manga, but I've seen the all the shows and movies and will undoubtedly watch the upcoming shows, and one thing struck me - it seems like Super is trying to reframe Vegeta as the technically superior fighter. Maybe I'm wrong, but it doesn't mesh with my understanding of the characters. Sure, Vegeta has probably put some of his stubbornness aside and grown as a result, but Goku was always shown to not just be prodigious, but an incredibly driven and disciplined warrior. Am I missing something? Am I offbase? What say you all?

[Kenji]

I mean, the general consensus among those who watched/read Super is that Goku has taken quite a large hit in character intelligence, his discipline as a martial artist included. The Super manga goes as far as confirming that Goku has indeed forgotten all the lessons he had learned with his masters prior to Whis.

Whether this is intentional framing or not, or whether it was in Toriyama's plans, I'm not so sure. But if Goku is indeed becoming less disciplined in contrast to Vegeta as some sort of big character arc the writers are moving towards, I would say it wouldn't be exactly against Dragon Ball's overall theme of not letting your ego get to your head, because there will always be someone stronger.

Goku is letting his ego get to his head, Vegeta isn't. Ergo, Vegeta is technically stronger than Goku. Makes perfect sense to me. But again, I am not so sure this was Toriyama's or the writers' intention. Could just be plain old bad writing and mischaracterization, not like there's a lack of that in modern material.

[BernardoCairo]

Yeah, it’s a bit weird, especially considering how far ahead Goku was back in Z. But my take isn’t that Vegeta is necessarily better, just that he finally reached Goku’s level. Now it feels like the story is trying to present them as equals with different strengths and weaknesses. Vegeta may be more tactical, he was always a prodigy, but he lacks some of the lessons Goku has been learning ever since his training with Muten Roshi. That’s probably why he can’t use Ultra Instinct.

Also, Goku works as a stand-in for the audience. A lot of the weird moments are probably the writers trying to have Goku “learn alongside us.” Of course, that doesn’t always land very well (Super Hero).

[Koitsukai]

The vibe I get is the opposite, after both going after Ultra Instinct for a while, and only Goku managing to unlock and master it, while Vegeta had to go the "simpler" route".
If we go by how they ended up doing with their new techniques, Goku aimed and is mastering, and improving upon, the main technique.
Vegeta failed to even unlock that same technique, had to learn another one, but also failed to make it his own.
The same could be said about mastering SSB, Goku was the one that mastered it first.

All of this while making Goku look less experienced than Vegeta, and extremely dumb as well. He gets farther while being clueless, yes.

[Zephyr]

The Super TV series made Goku dumber on the whole, but I don't remember that ever affecting his martial prowess. The Super manga and Super Hero, on the other hand, try to make Vegeta out to be better at training and fighting than Goku, which to me is a pretty damning misunderstanding of both of their character arcs from the original manga. It's a phenomenon I call "vindicating Vegeta's own hype in himself"; it goes back at least as far as the Kanzenban's revised ending, has continued into Daima, and I think it's lame as hell.

Granted, despite what is said in the Super manga, Goku is still shown to be the better one, so I guess it's not that big of a deal. Characters' words being at odds with what is clearly shown on the page is nothing new for Dragon Ball.

[tinlunlau]

Vegeta has certainly become a better marital artist than Goku over the years. He treats Bulma better than how Goku treats Chichi.

[Skar]

It was always seemed like an odd choice to have the main character need to relearn the basics of martial arts like paying attention during a fight, conserving energy, and the importance of meditation this late in the series. Imagine if amother anime had a midquel years later taking place before their final timeskip and having the main character forgot basic lessons they learned in the first saga.

They ultimately didn't matter for any fights and only made Goku look stupid in the moment of discussing those lessons. The only one was lowering his guard enough that Sorbet almost killed him. I'm still not sure where Freeza got the idea that would work since Goku was dodging every cheap shot Freeza attempted on Namek. Freeza was caught off guard a few times because he couldn't sense ki but it was just a minor inconvenience not almost killed by it.

[ABED]

Goku lowering his guard in certain situations doesn't bother me. He does strike me as a person who given how powerful he's gotten he might not be as careful around a peon like Sorbet. The issue I have is he has God Ki and a pea shooter nearly kills him?

Otherwise, I agree. While I like Super a lot, it's exaggerating things for the sake of a plot point instead of having it stem from character.

[90sDBZ]

It does feel very weird in Superhero when the historically hot headed Vegeta is the one who sees the value in meditation, while the once level headed battle genius Goku handwaves it as a waste of time, and doesn't even know what it is despite practicing it at length in the past.

Another thing that felt weird was Goku not training for several months pre-RoF, because Chi Chi forbade it. It felt out of character for both of them, and took the joke of Chi Chi being a control freak way too far.

Super does tend to show Vegeta in a more positive light; having him openly care for his family, swallowing his pride on multiple occasions for the greater good, and being more mature in general.

Meanwhile Goku is verging on Homer Simpson territory.

[Koitsukai]

Another instance where Goku was shown to be better than Vegeta (although with some help) was vs. Hit in the anime. He managed to read Hit's movements and bypass the time skip. Who knows if Vegeta wouldn't have been able to do so if he knew that before hand, but the story chose to have Goku be the one to do it.
It's weird because the writers give the dumb, ignorant, amateur lines to Goku but they also give Goku the lead.

Also, he is more aware of SSB's drawbacks than Geets. Now, this one makes Vegeta look dumb because they spent 3 years in the ROSAT, and yet couldn't see that using SSB haphazardly wasn't a good idea?

[super michael]

Goku learned meditation from Mr Popo, which greatly increased his skills as a fighter. Then in the ROSAT he used meditation to unlock SSJ Grade forms. In the Buu Saga Goku used meditation.

In DBS Granolah chapter he used meditation to unlock TUI.

[JulieYBM]

The issue with Gokuu in Dragon Ball Super is that he is largely written as if he is still a shounen protagonist in their teens, because the audience of the series is that younger demographic. Why not trade Gokuu for an actual younger character for him to guide? Popularity and whatever stubbornness that Toriyama has a writer.

Dragon Ball Super would have worked a lot better as a ground-up reboot, with Gokuu as a kid again and learning all these transformations and Ultra Instinct, but that would have probably not appealed to international audiences, who view Gokuu as a 'man'.

Basically, there's a balance of multiple factors that the IP holders were trying to maintain and they, unfortunately, did not do a good job of it. This is largely why I've always been such an advocate of just bringing in new writers and ignoring whatever preconceived notions they have, but unfortunately, playing things safe is just the name of the game with these big merchandise franchises.

[BernardoCairo]

I think Goku is popular enough to have his own show and still learn new techniques without needing to rely on a younger protagonist or being stupid.
Toyotaro did this much better in the manga than Toei did in the anime. The Buu saga also had a very likeable Goku, who seemed like a true master at his peak and was still fun.
I'm not against him becoming a master, of course. It's a great idea. But I also like the direction Toyotaro is taking the manga (with the various levels of Ultra Instinct, for example).