New-found love for the Freeza saga

[mAcChaos]

Well, before, he was never given the pivotal role in deciding it; and he wasn't fighting so much to explicitly kill someone but just to survive. And it wasn't that he was a coward or a pacifist, but he didn't have that lust for combat the Vegeta, Piccolo, Goku, Cell and true warriors did. Goku thought the prospect of fighting someone like Cell would excite Gohan as a fighter and he'd embrace it, but Gohan was never really a fighter.

[Thanos6]

But he was so eager to, for example, go off and blow Cell to smithereens when he was killing Piccolo. It seemed like someone flicked the pacifist switch in just a few days.

EDIT: Also, didn't he kill pretty damn eagerly on Namek? I'm thinking about those two low-ranking Freeza soldiers...they didn't bother trying to KO them, did they...

[Kendamu]

But he was so eager to, for example, go off and blow Cell to smithereens when he was killing Piccolo. It seemed like someone flicked the pacifist switch in just a few days.

And that's pretty consistent with what it took to actually make Gohan attack somebody throughout most of the series up to that point.

[DBZGokuSaiyan]

The Frieza saga was EPIC, hands down. When I was 5, I used to watch DBZ a lot... and then one day after KG... I saw Goku transform into a Super Saiyan. That was such an amazing sight to see, I can't even tell you. I literally got goosebumps! I'd say the Frieza saga was prolly one of my Top 3 sagas... maybe even my most favorite. It was a HUGE turning point in DBZ.

[Thanos6]

Then why didn't he go ahead and try and kill Cell right from the beginning of the games? I'm not sure I buy the excuse that the "heat of the moment" had passed...

[Storm]

Because Cell hadn't hurt any of his friends yet. That's why the Cell Juniors were created (and why Android 16 was killed), to push him to the breaking point like he had done before...and he did.

[Kendamu]

Then why didn't he go ahead and try and kill Cell right from the beginning of the games? I'm not sure I buy the excuse that the "heat of the moment" had passed...

But it did. For Gohan, it felt like Cell attacked Piccolo a little over a year ago. That gives you a long time to calm down about something.

Maybe I'm bringing a little too much realism into it, but there are plenty of skilled martial artists out there who freeze up due to pacifism or fear when the time comes to defend yourself or someone else. I think a little of both are what initially made him reluctant to fight.

Also, just from a writing standpoint, making Gohan so reluctant to fight before his transformation may have just been a way to show how extreme the transformation was. I mean, after his SSj2 power-up, he was all about wanting to make Cell suffer for his crimes rather than just killing it right away.

[Mike D]

Aren't all of these things (or very close equivalents) recycled in Cell's story?

I'd say no.

Villian with endless supply of trump cards:

Freeza's transformations was an original concept that was used by Cell through absorbing the androids. Think about it. Why couldn't his character be created without being able to transformation? And Cell depended on his transformations, Freeza only did it to prove how much stronger he was than everybody, that is until he was pushed to the edge and had no choice but to put that strain on his body by going 100%.

Villian with lack of real backstory:

I do agree with this paragraph though. In my opinion, this is what set the two sagas apart from each other the most.

But Freeza lacked a backstory in order to establish a sense of fear of the unknown. He tamed the most feared warrior race in the galaxy and after watching the Saiyan saga, you could only imagine how strong he was. He even struck fear into the Lord of the Worlds. I feel as though Cell didn't give off that same frightful aura that Freeza did simply because we all knew what he was about.

Uniform scenery:

There was "uniform scenery" because it took place on a banal planet that was utterly ravaged by a storm.

Cheap and boring power-up:[.quote]
How did you find the Super Saiyan to be cheap and boring?

Character designs that are my least favorite:

Yea, final form Freeza was rather plain and boring (hell, even Kuririn put it that way) but I see his 100% state as something unique in the sense that he goes from his plain and ordinary final form into a beast. My reasoning for saying that this is unique is because that despite the fact that he looked slim and weak, he appeared to be invincible. When he was forced into going 100%, the physical change on his body's muscles showed that he was indeed at his limit and obviously set him at a much higher level. It just further emphasized the strain that is put on his body when he puts everything on the table and despite that, the "strongest in the universe" was still inferior to the legendary super saiyan.

Freeza was the original "strongest in the universe" IIRC.

[DBZGokuSaiyan]

Then why didn't he go ahead and try and kill Cell right from the beginning of the games? I'm not sure I buy the excuse that the "heat of the moment" had passed...

But it did. For Gohan, it felt like Cell attacked Piccolo a little over a year ago. That gives you a long time to calm down about something.

Maybe I'm bringing a little too much realism into it, but there are plenty of skilled martial artists out there who freeze up due to pacifism or fear when the time comes to defend yourself or someone else. I think a little of both are what initially made him reluctant to fight.

Also, just from a writing standpoint, making Gohan so reluctant to fight before his transformation may have just been a way to show how extreme the transformation was. I mean, after his SSj2 power-up, he was all about wanting to make Cell suffer for his crimes rather than just killing it right away.

You're definitely right... it's almost like numerous times during the Saiyan-Ginyu sagas... Gohan was scared to follow Krillin's/Piccolo's orders to follow up their attack pattern tactics... And he was also afraid to hit "Ginyu-Goku", until Krillin sticked it to him, straight, that it was still Ginyu, not Goku.

[djkalteraphine]

I've always love the Freeza saga best out of Z. Saiyajin and Buu saga both seem to sag in the middle for me, like Toriyama wanted to stretch them both a bit longer than they needed to be, but still finished with a flourish. And the Cell/Android arc has no interesting villains until Cell, but like has already been said, once he becomes Perfect, (heck, after he absorbs 17. . . ) the story falls apart. So almost in spite of Saiyajin and the later Buu, Cell lags in the beginning, has a decent middle (with sneaky Cell), and drops away in the end.

But the Freeza saga only lags, in my opinion, because of how long the last fight takes. But the last few episodes of Goku Vs Freeza make the wait totally worth it. I'll agree, so-called "near death power-ups" for Saiyajins are pretty cheap, and do annoy me a great deal. But the frantic search for the Dragon Balls, Vegeta ripping through Freeza's ranks, the Namekians, the Ginyu Tokusentai, Kuririn still being a main character, the pure awesome that is Nail, Piccolo's path of redemption, Goku and Freeza facing in a battle they were destined to have, with the backdrop of a dying planet, and Cui, are all solid reasons why I love this saga.

[Xyex]

I don't get all the complaints about the length of the Freeza battle. Really, I don't. I love it and I love the fact that there's meat to it. Especially for a fight of such scale. A lot of the other battles went too fast, IMO. Like Goku Vs. Vegeta. With the Kaioken and Kamehameha/Gallick Gun stand off and the Oozaru transformation that battle should have lasted another 1 or 2 episodes than it did.

I love the Namek/Freeza and Android/Cell sagas about the same, I'd say. The three-way struggle for the Dragonballs, Gohan finally getting some level of confidence and showing what he's cappable of, Piccolo becoming even more badass, Goku and Freeza, Super Saiya-jin.... And then with the Androids I loved 17 and 18 soon as I saw them, Cell was awesome, Piccolo became even MORE badass, Trunks is one of my favorites, and Gohan going SSJ2 is one of the coolest moments in the series.

Then why didn't he go ahead and try and kill Cell right from the beginning of the games? I'm not sure I buy the excuse that the "heat of the moment" had passed...

Gohan's only ever cared about fighting when the survival of his friends was on the line. On Namek he had the driving force of reviving Piccolo to push him as much, if not more, than Krillin being in danger. But people, friends especially though anyone really, being hurt was always his trigger. It's why he charged Dodoria to rescue Dende despite being severely outmatched by him.

The same then holds true on Earth when Piccolo, who he sees pretty much as a second father, is in danger. He wants to go down there and save him. But then he spends a year training and becoming even more powerful. And this is a kid who's been afraid of his own power. So when he gets to the Cell Games and it's all on him it's not just his non-fighter nature that holds him back.

Sure, Cell beat up Piccolo and nearly killed him. But that was a year ago. Gohan put aside his differences with Vegeta in just a month or so, so they could deal with the Ginyu Force and then Freeza. He wants to protect his friends but he doesn't want to fight, partly because he doesn't like to and partly because he's scared of his own strength. Which is why Cell has to push him so far.

[saiyanprincess]

I actually confess; I like the Freeza/Namek saga. It does drift on for a while, and the battle between Goku and Freeza does drag a little... But it's the season with so many groundbreaking important events for example:

- Goku transformining into a Super Saiyan

- Vegeta admitting Goku is a Super Saiyan and has exceeded him. (Showing some emotions).

- Piccolo's past and homeplanet, the death of his people.

- Some quite humorous fillers. I.E Bulma and the frog.

- Freeza finally recieving some pain.. And some more pain.

- Piccolo fusing with Neil and growing much stronger. (I'm sorry if that is spelt wrong)

- Of course to round it up... Some of the most awesome battles we see in Z!

Personally the saga I dislike the most would have to be Garlic Jr. To me it just doesn't feel that special or important. Actually it's quite annoying

[Kunzait_83]

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[Rocketman]

Aren't all of these things (or very close equivalents) recycled in Cell's story?

I'd say no.

Villian with endless supply of trump cards: I really disagree. Cell's composite nature lets him pull all sorts of tricks out of his ass (literally in one case). Absorbing people/17/18, unlimited regeneration (even violating his own words and his genetics when he regenerates from the Warp Kamehameha), constantly being shown to be holding back his full 'Perfect' power, being able to create mini-cells that don't reduce his power, but are still stronger than any of the heroes, the stupidly powerful regeneration, and the return of the near-death powerup...

Villian with lack of real backstory: This is an equivalent one, and it's more that the backstory is completely disjointed. The Red Ribbon Army was a long freakin' time ago, but suddenly, 'oh hai, one guy who you missed magically made things stronger than the super saiyan'. Then we get 19 and 20, who want revenge for the RRA but aren't the ones who destroyed the future, then we get 17 and 18, who are, but are totally different in attitude for...some reason and are barely connected with the RRA, then we get Cell, who has no connection to anything that was going on in the first half of the saga (didn't have any hand in the destroyed future, doesn't care about or even mention the RRA, wasn't even made by Gero!)

Cheap and boring power-up: I would make this line be "Constant use of (Super) Saiyan power-ups". The Legendary Warrior suddenly becomes something that can be exceeded with just a bit of training, even a pansy-ass kid is able to ascend, and DBZ becomes the all-Saiyan, all-the-time show, except for like three episodes where Piccolo gets a cheap powerup.

Legend a cliche and dull plot device: Gohan's hidden powahs. Walks into the Room weaker than Second Form Freeza, walks out as The Strongest Being In Existence. Does jack shit for the whole saga until the very end, when Goku loses his mind and makes Gohan be the hero of Earth. Which he promptly fucks up at, killing Trunks and Goku. But hey guys, don't worry that I'm dead, Gohan will protect y'all!

And another part would be how everybody acts so goddamn retarded. The Saiyan/Freeza sagas are filled with the heroes being sneaky and cunning, the Cell (and later Buu) saga is filled with them being stupid and the enemy gaining from that.

[Terra-jin]

longer than fuck post

Whew. That was a long, but great read. You described very well why the Freeza saga is so good. Especially the point about Freeza-tachi's dependence on powerlevels versus the natural feel of ki of the Z-fighters is very interesting.

I always find it hard to describe how I feel exactly about these kinds of things, but let me try. The aspect that I like the most about the Freeza saga is the whole world behind it. Basically, it's a world of hopelessness that creates more hopelessness. By that I mean that the entirety of the empire consists of beings who have seen their world vanish, given only the option to join the force that destroyed it in the first place.
The victims that joined the empire must have done so either out of sheer coldness or out of fear. The entire empire is therefore filled with coldness on one side, and a plethora of negative emotions on the other side. And the empire perpetuates itself as if it were a downward spiral.
In the middle of this are the Saiyans, who got to keep their world, their way of life and basically their dream of fighting. Because they loved to fight as a race, they fit right into the empire, which enabled them to live their dream on a scale they'd never dared to hope before. To the Saiyans, Freeza's empire was a godsend. Thus we suddenly have a spot of complete ecstacy in the middle of all that grief, fear and coldness. The way in which this ultimately comes to an end per Freeza's paranoia adds so much momentum to the whole thing... it's just beautiful.

The Cell and Buu sagas don't have this kind of incredible backstory to it. I do love the villains and I think it's good on other points in general, but the Freeza saga stands out for me because of the rich backstory, the world it creates around the villains/events/fights.

The whole of this is coloured, IMO, by the interesting designs of Toriyama. What thrills me even more is the promise it makes - imagine this story being realized full-scale and full-budget. You'd get a show that transcends description and pales even epos like Lord of the Rings in comparison.

[Kunzait_83]

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[Kid Trunks]

Villian with endless supply of trump cards: Not really. Cell told all about his transformations from the start, and by the time he self-destructed it was already established that Gero's robots had bombs inside them. The only real out-of-nowhere trump card he has is his regeneration into his powered-up perfect form. No.17 does do that whole "Actually, I wasn't even at half my true power!" thing with Gohan in the alternate future, but neither he nor Cell can compete with Freeza for sheer number of "I'm not really left-handed!" moments. Of course, instead of a stream of trump cards we get a stream of trump villians, but I think it was handled pretty well, a lot better than Freeza just up and deciding he's really way more powerful or that he can survive in space.

I guess its depends on what you prefer. I don't mind the "out of nowhere trump cards". For one thing, if I'd already known that Freeza had 3 transformations, then I'd know that he's obviously not going to be beaten until he gets to his final form (Like how it was obvious in the Cell saga that Cell would become perfect. They're not going to mention his perfect form and not have him achieve it). I liked the surprise.

[Xyex]

*6 page, 4,121 word post*

tl;dr

*goes back to reading War & Peace*







(And yes, I did an actual word count, that's the actual size of the post, minus the warning and the last paragraph)

Give me a second here, my mind is still trying to finsih processing everything.

Right. I have to say I agree with most of Kunzait's points, and he never even really touched on the whole Super Saiya-jin bit of it.

Though, about the architecture. He didn't really give them their own so much as he replicated Daimous. IIRC, his editors said space was a bad idea and that he should keep it familiar. So he just replicated Daimou's design style for the entire race to give it that 'familiarity'. Who knows what the hell their houses/ships would have looked like otherwise.

(Like how it was obvious in the Cell saga that Cell would become perfect. They're not going to mention his perfect form and not have him achieve it).

Actually, he wasn't going to. Toriyama really liked 2nd form Cell and had plans to end him there. But then his editor called it ugly and wanted him to change it.

[DBZGokuSaiyan]

I actually confess; I like the Freeza/Namek saga. It does drift on for a while, and the battle between Goku and Freeza does drag a little... But it's the season with so many groundbreaking important events for example:

- Goku transformining into a Super Saiyan

- Vegeta admitting Goku is a Super Saiyan and has exceeded him. (Showing some emotions).

- Piccolo's past and homeplanet, the death of his people.

- Some quite humorous fillers. I.E Bulma and the frog.

- Freeza finally recieving some pain.. And some more pain.

- Piccolo fusing with Neil and growing much stronger. (I'm sorry if that is spelt wrong)

- Of course to round it up... Some of the most awesome battles we see in Z!

Personally the saga I dislike the most would have to be Garlic Jr. To me it just doesn't feel that special or important. Actually it's quite annoying

I'd say the same exact thing... it was pretty annoying. I never really liked Garlic Jr., he always seemed like a little dumb alien trying to get his hands on the Dagon Balls, rather than have a good backstory and appearance. But even that's just a minor issue. I liked the Garlic Jr. saga, but it wasn't as special and amazing as the other DBZ sagas/arcs.

[Kunzait_83]

b