How do you feel about the trope where everyone waits for Goku?

[super michael]

People absolutely LOATHE Gohan ending up with a nice, kind, badass girl who loves him and is the first serious student of Ki outside of Master Roshi's students.

Who loathes that? As far as I know, people love Videl. What people loathe is her disgusting sexist treatment in the story.
"Girls are allowed to be strong- No, not that much. Look at this poor delicate little flower being brutalized by the bad guys! Isn't this horrifying? Doesn't it make you angry that a MAN is hitting a WOMAN?! There, she should sit aside and leave the rest to the real heroes, the men!"

Videl didn't lose to Spopovich and get brutally beat up for being female, she lost because she is a regular human being, fighting a super human. It is no different than Gohan getting beat up by Recoome.

Videl only learned to fly in the short time she trained with Gohan. Every Z fighter needed more time to train to become super human and beyond.

[Kenji]

Videl didn't lose to Spopovich and get brutally beat up for being female, she lost because she is a regular human being, fighting a super human. It is no different than Gohan getting beat up by Recoome.

Videl only learned to fly in the short time she trained with Gohan. Every Z fighter needed more time to train to become super human and beyond.

Tone and context matters. The Videl scene is played in a way to evoke sympathy for her and to establish Spopovich as irredeemably and horrifyingly evil. The story makes sure to point out that Spopovich is beating her up just enough to not kill her, which would cause him to lose the match.

This is a tournament where the way to win is to beat the ever-loving-crap out of your opponent until they can't get up anymore without killing them, which is exactly what both Spopovich and Videl are trying to do (I will remind you that at one point, Videl attempts to break his neck). And yet, you have the characters, heroes included, questioning only the male contestant in this situation for a supposed lack of morality.

None of this works unless you give in to the notion that men beating women up is morally repugnant and Spopovich should've been more delicate with "the weaker sex." This in a franchise where human biology mostly doesn't matter and characters are either just born that strong for no particular reason or get stronger through gags and other contrived means. A character is exactly as strong as Toriyama wants them to be, and Toriyama wanted Videl to be a damsel.

Take note on how after this fight, Videl is ejected entirely out of the narrative and she never fights again or strives to become as strong as the other Earthling characters. All her build-up as a powerful girl who liked fighting, beating up bad guys, and who strived to become stronger through training went nowhere as soon as she served her one true purpose: Be beaten to motivate the male character and fall in love with him for saving her. If Toriyama had any sincerity with the way he wrote her all the way up to the Spopovich fight, she would've used that event as a wake-up call and an opportunity to get better, but that's not what happens in any of the sequels.

At the end of the day, Videl vs. Spopovich is just Namu vs Ranfan if you removed the gags, but didn't remove any of the underlying sexism of Namu going "Ohhhh nooooo, a womaaaaaaaan, I can't beeeeeaaatt a womaaaaan, it's wrooooong "

[JulieYBM]

God, I wish Videl had awakened as a half-demon and gotten a new transformation and kicked the shit out of Spopovitch in that fight, just to expand on her character more and keep her in the story.

[Kid Buu]

God, I wish Videl had awakened as a half-demon and gotten a new transformation and kicked the shit out of Spopovitch in that fight, just to expand on her character more and keep her in the story.

That would certainly suit her name being an anagram for Devil.

[Jord]

Videl getting pounded is one the more powerful scenes in the show, for better or worse.

[super michael]

Videl didn't lose to Spopovich and get brutally beat up for being female, she lost because she is a regular human being, fighting a super human. It is no different than Gohan getting beat up by Recoome.

Videl only learned to fly in the short time she trained with Gohan. Every Z fighter needed more time to train to become super human and beyond.

Tone and context matters. The Videl scene is played in a way to evoke sympathy for her and to establish Spopovich as irredeemably and horrifyingly evil. The story makes sure to point out that Spopovich is beating her up just enough to not kill her, which would cause him to lose the match.

This is a tournament where the way to win is to beat the ever-loving-crap out of your opponent until they can't get up anymore without killing them, which is exactly what both Spopovich and Videl are trying to do (I will remind you that at one point, Videl attempts to break his neck). And yet, you have the characters, heroes included, questioning only the male contestant in this situation for a supposed lack of morality.

None of this works unless you give in to the notion that men beating women up is morally repugnant and Spopovich should've been more delicate with "the weaker sex." This in a franchise where human biology mostly doesn't matter and characters are either just born that strong for no particular reason or get stronger through gags and other contrived means. A character is exactly as strong as Toriyama wants them to be, and Toriyama wanted Videl to be a damsel.

Take note on how after this fight, Videl is ejected entirely out of the narrative and she never fights again or strives to become as strong as the other Earthling characters. All her build-up as a powerful girl who liked fighting, beating up bad guys, and who strived to become stronger through training went nowhere as soon as she served her one true purpose: Be beaten to motivate the male character and fall in love with him for saving her. If Toriyama had any sincerity with the way he wrote her all the way up to the Spopovich fight, she would've used that event as a wake-up call and an opportunity to get better, but that's not what happens in any of the sequels.

At the end of the day, Videl vs. Spopovich is just Namu vs Ranfan if you removed the gags, but didn't remove any of the underlying sexism of Namu going "Ohhhh nooooo, a womaaaaaaaan, I can't beeeeeaaatt a womaaaaan, it's wrooooong "

Videl didn't break Spopovich break on purpose, she was only thinking of winning the match. She couldn't ring him out, so she counted on a KO. When she thought she killed Spopovich, we could see that she regretted it and felt bad.

Spopovich even though he sent Videl flying, almost winning by ring out, Spopovich stopped Videl and continued the beating. Spopovich could have won by ring out, but he wanted to beat her up. The only reason Spopovich stopped was because his partner told him to stop wasting time, otherwise the heating would continue just for his amusement.

That is why Videl is seen as innocent and Spopovich as the villain. It is the same as when Tenshinhan broken Yamcha leg when he was knocked out.

It has nothing to do with male or female, but their intention. If Videl and Spopovich roles were reversed, then people would feel bad for Spopovich, if Videl beat him up for her amusement.

[Kenji]

Spopovich even though he sent Videl flying, almost winning by ring out, Spopovich stopped Videl and continued the beating. Spopovich could have won by ring out, but he wanted to beat her up.

Just want to add here: The "Spopovich stopped Videl from getting a ring-out" scene was added by the anime, it wasn't there in the manga.

[JulieYBM]

God, I wish Videl had awakened as a half-demon and gotten a new transformation and kicked the shit out of Spopovitch in that fight, just to expand on her character more and keep her in the story.

That would certainly suit her name being an anagram for Devil.

Yeah, it's a two-birds-one-stone situation: you get the gag of "Mr. Satan unwittingly marries a devil" and "Videl gets to have a journey of self-discovery" and "We get a new part of the world to discover." Okay, that's three birds, but whatever!

This way, you have an excuse to make Gohan into 'half-Earthling' rivals that can reasonably compete and clash. It strengthens Gohan's role as a protagonist by giving him a character—a peer!—to bounce off of and grow from interacting with. Gokuu and Vegeta can fail to stop Majin Buu, but Gohan and Videl succeed where they fail.

God forbid a woman have interior and arcs, though.

[super michael]

Spopovich even though he sent Videl flying, almost winning by ring out, Spopovich stopped Videl and continued the beating. Spopovich could have won by ring out, but he wanted to beat her up.

Just want to add here: The "Spopovich stopped Videl from getting a ring-out" scene was added by the anime, it wasn't there in the manga.

Yes you are right, Spopovich preventing Videl from getting ring out didn't happen in the manga. However he didn't try to ring out until Yamu told him to stop wasting time.

Yeah, it's a two-birds-one-stone situation: you get the gag of "Mr. Satan unwittingly marries a devil" and "Videl gets to have a journey of self-discovery" and "We get a new part of the world to discover." Okay, that's three birds, but whatever!

This way, you have an excuse to make Gohan into 'half-Earthling' rivals that can reasonably compete and clash. It strengthens Gohan's role as a protagonist by giving him a character—a peer!—to bounce off of and grow from interacting with. Gokuu and Vegeta can fail to stop Majin Buu, but Gohan and Videl succeed where they fail.

God forbid a woman have interior and arcs, though.

We know Mr Satan is 100% human, however we know nothing about Pan mum. So there is nothing wrong with making her a devil, which would make Videl a hybrid human-devil. Then that would make Pan a hybrid Human, Devil and Saiyan.
There is the ROSAT and fusion for Videl to gain huge power.


Gohan knew Piccolo as the Demon King, so I don't think Gohan would have any trouble accepting Videl as the demon hybrid.

[Kenji]

Personally, I find "character turns out to be X race, thus explaining their hyper-strength" to be a lazy cop-out.
In a series that preaches that you get stronger through hard work, there was nothing stopping Toriyama from just making the other characters as strong as the Saiyans. In fact, the Earthlings do technically get stronger than Freeza long after he passes. Just say Videl decided to train a lot and now she's stronger than Gohan, Goku & Vegeta combined lol

[JulieYBM]

Personally, I find "character turns out to be X race, thus explaining their hyper-strength" to be a lazy cop-out.
In a series that preaches that you get stronger through hard work, there was nothing stopping Toriyama from just making the other characters as strong as the Saiyans. In fact, the Earthlings do technically get stronger than Freeza long after he passes. Just say Videl decided to train a lot and now she's stronger than Gohan, Goku & Vegeta combined lol

I'm not interested in using Videl being a devil as an excuse to make her strong, so much as using it for character purposes. Random Earth Human A else could suddenly become the strongest character in the series without making them an alien or non-human or whatever and that wouldn't bother me at all. "You can get stronger through hard work" is entirely unrealistic and frankly not a positive message to be putting out into the world and we shouldn't be trying to validify the idea that it's a valid way of living, because human life is in and of itself valid and needs no excuses.

[super michael]

Personally, I find "character turns out to be X race, thus explaining their hyper-strength" to be a lazy cop-out.
In a series that preaches that you get stronger through hard work, there was nothing stopping Toriyama from just making the other characters as strong as the Saiyans. In fact, the Earthlings do technically get stronger than Freeza long after he passes. Just say Videl decided to train a lot and now she's stronger than Gohan, Goku & Vegeta combined lol

I don't believe the humans surpassed Freeza, mostly because they did weak training after the Namek Saga. Only the Saiyans and Namekian trains hard. However Saiyans has transformation and zenkai, which is something the human lacks.

I'm not interested in using Videl being a devil as an excuse to make her strong, so much as using it for character purposes. Random Earth Human A else could suddenly become the strongest character in the series without making them an alien or non-human or whatever and that wouldn't bother me at all. "You can get stronger through hard work" is entirely unrealistic and frankly not a positive message to be putting out into the world and we shouldn't be trying to validify the idea that it's a valid way of living, because human life is in and of itself valid and needs no excuses.

How is "You can get stronger through hard work" not be a positive message? Going to the gym, doing martial arts, swimming, etc, improves the body health and feels like they have a lot of energy. Being unfit while eating too much unhealthy food can cause many health problems.

[Kenji]

I don't believe the humans surpassed Freeza, mostly because they did weak training after the Namek Saga. Only the Saiyans and Namekian trains hard. However Saiyans has transformation and zenkai, which is something the human lacks.

Yamcha, Tenshinhan and Kuririn trained for a 3-year gap to get on the Cyborgs' level, who were infinitely stronger than Freeza, and even stronger than their future counterparts, then they trained multiple years/days in the ROSAT to prepare for Perfect Cell. You can safely assume they far surpassed Namek!Freeza from there.

As for the Zenkai and transformations, the answer to those were literally in the Namek saga itself: Vegeta at one point stops getting stronger through the Zenkai and beings to wonder if that is its limit. That's it, that's literally it. Just say the Zenkai and Super Saiyan both have a limit on how strong they can make you and stop using them from there.

I have already mentioned these are unfair advantages that undermine the message that hard work pays off, to which someone replied some people in real life have an easier time building muscles, but even then, there are limits to how much that is true. Not to mention: Dragon Ball isn't real life, and human-looking aliens don't exist.

[super michael]

I don't believe the humans surpassed Freeza, mostly because they did weak training after the Namek Saga. Only the Saiyans and Namekian trains hard. However Saiyans has transformation and zenkai, which is something the human lacks.

Yamcha, Tenshinhan and Kuririn trained for a 3-year gap to get on the Cyborgs' level, who were infinitely stronger than Freeza, and even stronger than their future counterparts, then they trained multiple years/days in the ROSAT to prepare for Perfect Cell. You can safely assume they far surpassed Namek!Freeza from there.

As for the Zenkai and transformations, the answer to those were literally in the Namek saga itself: Vegeta at one point stops getting stronger through the Zenkai and beings to wonder if that is its limit. That's it, that's literally it. Just say the Zenkai and Super Saiyan both have a limit on how strong they can make you and stop using them from there.

I have already mentioned these are unfair advantages that undermine the message that hard work pays off, to which someone replied some people in real life have an easier time building muscles, but even then, there are limits to how much that is true. Not to mention: Dragon Ball isn't real life, and human-looking aliens don't exist.

Before training for the cyborgs, the strongest people on earth were Goku, Piccolo, Gohan and Vegeta. Piccolo, Goku and Gohan trained together, while Vegeta trained in 300x gravity.

Tenshinhan trains with Chiaotzu, who is stated to be too weak to be useful in the Android Saga. Kuririn trains with Master Roshi, even though outgrew his training. There is a reason why Master Roshi told his student if they want to progress they should explore the world and why they got new masters. Yamcha he didn't have anyone to train with.
There is no way their training method would allow them to surpass Freeza.

Goku asked Yamcha and Kuririn if they want to train with himself and Piccolo, but they refused.

Afterward the Saiyans and Namekian trained in the ROSAT, which the humans didn't bother using.

[Kenji]

You know what's the beauty of writing? If the writer wants, they can write that a random flying pig from another dimension just popped up with the push of a button and killed the main villain. How well that encapsulates the message they wanted to send to their audience, that's up to their audience to judge. Case in point: the ending of Goku Black's arc.

There was nothing stopping Toriyama from making the Earthlings as powerful as the Saiyans. Heck, Oob is born a regular human stronger than everyone else for no reason other than having Majin Boo's soul. I would argue that limiting how strong someone can get in a series about getting stronger to winning the genetic lottery is a disservice to your message. If not, then what is even the point of introducing Oob if we know he's "just an Earthling and will never amount to the Saiyans"?

[WittyUsername]

As much as some might try to argue otherwise, the simple fact is that Dragon Ball is largely a series where having the right genetics is generally key to being a strong fighter. Yes, Goku was born as a low-class Saiyan, but he’s still a Saiyan, which apparently means he has an innate biological advantage over the Earthlings. Even in the case of Oob, who is officially the strongest Earthling by the end of the manga, the only reason he’s apparently like that is because he’s the reincarnation of Kid Boo.

[Koitsukai]

It's false that there was nothing stopping Toriyama from making Earthlings as strong as Saiyans. What actually stopped him was the established narrative. This isn’t a minor detail, it’s the core lore of the series, and breaking it would undermine the internal logic of the world, especially that late in the story. If you were going to do that, it had to be established much earlier, not in the final arc of the series.

A writer can’t just do whatever they want, they have to respect the groundwork they’ve already built. You can’t just have Xander beat up the Master who killed Buffy just because it’s all made up.

[JulieYBM]

It's false that there was nothing stopping Toriyama from making Earthlings as strong as Saiyans. What actually stopped him was the established narrative. This isn’t a minor detail, it’s the core lore of the series, and breaking it would undermine the internal logic of the world, especially that late in the story. If you were going to do that, it had to be established much earlier, not in the final arc of the series.

A writer can’t just do whatever they want, they have to respect the groundwork they’ve already built. You can’t just have Xander beat up the Master who killed Buffy just because it’s all made up.

Toriyama often just did whatever he wanted to as it was, though. He kept pulling shit out of his ass for the Dragon Balls whenever he needed a new rule to fit the story.

Writers can write whatever they want and change their minds and basically do it all the time. How they justify their decisions can vary, but that rarely ever gets in the way of a writer just making shit up because they felt like it and then getting criticism for it later.

[WittyUsername]

It's false that there was nothing stopping Toriyama from making Earthlings as strong as Saiyans. What actually stopped him was the established narrative. This isn’t a minor detail, it’s the core lore of the series, and breaking it would undermine the internal logic of the world, especially that late in the story. If you were going to do that, it had to be established much earlier, not in the final arc of the series.

A writer can’t just do whatever they want, they have to respect the groundwork they’ve already built. You can’t just have Xander beat up the Master who killed Buffy just because it’s all made up.

What about when Piccolo merged with Nail (something that had no foreshadowing whatsoever) and suddenly became strong enough to hold his own against a transformed Freeza? Or the entire existence of Gohan Beast?

[Kenji]

It's false that there was nothing stopping Toriyama from making Earthlings as strong as Saiyans. What actually stopped him was the established narrative. This isn’t a minor detail, it’s the core lore of the series, and breaking it would undermine the internal logic of the world, especially that late in the story. If you were going to do that, it had to be established much earlier, not in the final arc of the series.

In the original series, characters got strong via:
- Magic Water
- Potential Unlocking
- Special Saiyan Coming Back Stronger Genetics™
- Special Saiyan Transformation Genetics™
- Special Namekian Merging Genetics™
- "Goten and Trunks got that strong with no training whatsoever lol"
- "Majin Boo is so strong he can break the rules of reality lol"

Now I ask you: Taking all of these into consideration, what exactly was stopping Toriyama from going "Videl was just born that strong lol"? Or what exactly was stopping him from giving the "Zenkai" or Super Saiyan power limits that prevent them from being abused? What was stopping him from doing this long after the original series ended with Super?

Answer: Nothing.

Seriously, #17 gets on Super Saiyan Blue level in Super with zero explanation, given that he's just a regular human with an energy core or whatever, and yet, asking that other non-Saiyan characters get the same treatment is somehow "asking too much"?