Wow, of all the threads I never thought would appear...yes, I do indeed have Asperger's Syndrome. I could talk about it for a while, but I'll try to keep my post as Dragon Ball-related as possible in the interest of not weirding anybody out with my life story.
It is a very common occurrence among people with AS to be in a situation like this:
A) They struggle greatly with relatively basic social skills. How much they struggle varies, but they can be so socially inept that they will be mistaken for weirdos and/or jerks.
B) They have incredible aptitude and/or talent in other areas that many "normal" people don't have. How much talent they have varies, but they can be so talented that people will often be in awe of what they're able to do.
Anybody who has it is a living example of irony. Here's an example in my case. I hate socializing for others and don't have much skill for it, but I love performing for others and (without stroking my ego too much) am pretty good at it. I would much rather perform my stand-up act or a comedy sketch in front of Madison Square Garden then strike up a conversation with somebody I don't know (especially girls). And that's even after the many years of therapy that my awesome parents were perceptive enough to put me through. How's that for ironic?
Narrowing the focus a bit on to anime, it might interest you to know that the guy who created Pokemon in Japan has AS as well. He's described as something of a recluse, but that just goes to show you. People with AS, like I said, struggle with "normal" stuff, but excel with extraordinary stuff. A recluse who loved catching a ton of different bugs as a kid ended up creating one of the most financially successful animes of all time.
Now, let's narrow this even further down to Dragon Ball specifically. As far as this relates to Dragon Ball, I can tell you that one of the biggest sources of interest for me in Dragon Ball is its many English incarnations. I love acting and actually became a professional voice actor partially out of my love for--and fascination with--English dubs. Don't worry, I'm not one of those over-zealous anime fans who wants to voice act for the sake of voice acting, I am a professional actor and I was a professional actor before I even thought of voice acting. It wasn't until around 2006 that I began to remember watching DBZ on Toonami and then got to thinking, "Hey...wait a minute...people get paid to do that, don't they?"
Then I found out how much, and I STILL wanted to do it.
As such, I have difficulty starting up a conversation about "normal" stuff, but ask me a question about the production history of any of the English Dragon Ball dubs and I will know the answer. I'm a walking encyclopedia on the subject. You can name any role in any of the series, ask me who plays it, and my immediate response will be, "which dub?" Upon getting an answer to that, I can then name the actor or actress in no time flat (assuming I don't have to go through my long explanation of how there are a multitude of different English dubs). For all my social difficulties, I am lucky enough to have a few very good friends, one of whom is in to Dragon Ball almost as much as I am. When somebody asks me a Dragon Ball-related question, if my friend is near he will jokingly say, "Do you realize what you've done? We're gonna be here for nine hours. Remember, you asked for it."
So it doesn't surprise me that Dragon Ball breaks down barriers like that. This show really is incredible, it has a certain magic about it that a ton of modern anime are sorely lacking in. I don't keep up with the Japanese voice actors very much, but one of my favorite quotes of all time about Dragon Ball comes from Masako Nozawa. She once said, "You've got to believe in the magic of anime." I know that sounds corny, but it's totally true.
