Your Opinion on Mr. Toriyama as an Author?

[Mewzard]

I definitely think Toriyama's a fantastic manga creator. In fact, he's in my top five:

Akira Toriyama (Dragon Ball, Sandland, Dr. Slump), Masami Kurumada (Saint Seiya, B't X...and sadly, that's all we get in America. Shame too, he's tied with Toriyama as my favorite), Yoshio Sawai (Bobobo-bo Bo-bobo, gotta love some good parody), Buronson and Tetsuo Hara (Fist of the North Star, and I'm counting them as one), and Yoshihiro Togashi (Yu Yu Hakusho, one of the best shonens of the 90s, in my opinion).

But yeah, Dragon Ball is near and dear to my heart, as one of the first anime/manga I've followed for the longest time. Started with the Ocean Dub on Early Toonami, continued with the Funi Dub, started collecting the manga when Viz first started putting out their version of Shonen Jump, got the Orange Bricks and the Dragon Boxes, I'm still getting those even as I buy Kai.

I love this series, I can keep watching it repeatedly without any waning desire. Even if he's not a perfect writer/artist (and he isn't), he's created series that capture my emotions, and make me want more. That's all one needs to ask for: To have a series they can truly care about.

[Eire]

What should I think about Toriyama? I should rate if his way and ideas of DB development fit mine? No, but DB is his and even if he had decided to turn everyone into rainbow little pony that's his right. and mine is to criticize that

I admire the fact that he decided to finish manga after he felt so and didn't turned DB into living dead. The only think that made me to bear a grudge against him are scorned films. I don't remember how it was exactly, but he didn't have a control on scenarios that gave us the LSSJ version like from bad fanfic.

[Dr. Casey]

It doesn't take itself seriously even at the most dire of times which I love.

It doesn't? I think Dragon Ball plays many of its serious scenes about as straight as any other story does.

[Piccolo Daimaoh]

It doesn't take itself seriously even at the most dire of times which I love.

It doesn't? I think Dragon Ball plays many of its serious scenes about as straight as any other story does.

I think what he meant is that there's comedy even in some of the major battles of the series. It's not all serious and dramatic, like Naruto.

[Perfect]

Not only that, but it progresses in a natural way. The only time people really ever have an argument is during the Buu arc, which is entirely subjective and a pain in the ass to argue about (So we'll do that another time). I just watched the part in the anime where Krillin is murdered and Roshi tells of Piccolo Daimao. The way he's introduced in both the anime and the manga is chilling, but with a sense of relief. When Goku runs out on them, you can see mild tears. You don't however see, overly dramatic flashbacks (In the anime we see a few fade backs of pictures with Goku and Krillin). Not like in Naruto where the characters go on forever talking, remembering and crying over something that should have taken less than a minute.

I find Toriyama to be a fantastic and modest writer. He admits his shortcomings and knows what he's good at. He prefers to come up with unique vehicles and designs because modeling something after something from the "real world" can be challenging and often takes too much time. Plus then people would nitpick everything wrong with it. In terms of inconsistencies, plot wise we don't see "too many", given that most of the plot holes are generated by the anime. There's a lot I could say, but I figure writing an article with information based off analyzing interviews and whatnot would be worth the effort more so there than here (We'll see if I ever get to that, I do have a long line of things to write about still... ^.-;;).

[TrunksTrevelyan0064]

For someone who made up everything as he went along, Toriyama was brilliant. I've been trying to write my own story for a while now - planning everything out, unlike Toriyama - and even then it's difficult as heck.

[Turtle Marked Stone]

It doesn't take itself seriously even at the most dire of times which I love.

It doesn't? I think Dragon Ball plays many of its serious scenes about as straight as any other story does.

Yeah I was debating going back and clarifying myself after I posted that. I guess what I mean to say is it doesn't over indulge in its seriousness. Most often than not things are always moving quickly and being snappy.Toriyama doesn't feel the need to bang into your skull how awful things have become and he just assumes you care and moves on with the story. I don't often see him trying to ring out every last ounce of emotion from his fans during tense moments. Of course this holds slightly less true with the anime adaption but it's still mostly relevant.

Toriyama's the kind of author who simply sits back and thinks, "Wouldn't it be cool/funny if..." and then just fucking does it. And somehow it works. And somewhere within all of that, his characters grow old and develop in a natural way. That's about as good as a children's action comic gets.

Totally, it's like the drunken fist technique of manga writing.

[caejones]

Totally, it's like the drunken fist technique of manga writing.

I think this is an excellent description. And seeing as Toriyama at least was a fan of the Drunken Fist movies, I suspect he'd totally appreciate this statement. ^_^