What makes the Buu saga so poorly written?...

[Akumaito Beam]

Huh, the Buu saga was always my favorite, it wasn't until I joined this website did I see people complain about it. Now reading why people hate it is making me rethink my decision of the Buu arc being my favorite.

That's a shame... I always hate when I go onto a discussion site and become unwillingly jaded. It's not rare.

It depends on the person but I'm not sure rethinking your position on matters would make many people "jaded" per se. If nothing else it merely gives you alternative view points to ponder over. At best it can bring to light flaws you've never been able to put your finger on before.

[Vegeta1056]

I use to love the saga until it DID seem a bit too childish for my tastes. Sure it's an okay saga, but it just seems like Toriyama put so much more of his effort into the Saiyan and Freeza saga, giving more back-story and what not. Here he just made it too childish. This pink blob came and killed everyone. Yay for weirdness?

[Cipher]

Sure it's an okay saga, but it just seems like Toriyama put so much more of his effort into the Saiyan and Freeza saga, giving more back-story and what not. Here he just made it too childish. This pink blob came and killed everyone. Yay for weirdness?

But the whole series is childish. How much backstory is there, really, to the Saiyans and Freeza? It's not tightly-written space opera. It's a bunch of dudes selling planets who work together we have no idea how, and because this is a fighting series, the mightiest alien in the universe is also a super-strong kung-fu master. Somehow we wiped out an entire planet with no one knowing, and even though they regularly sent babies to other worlds, only a specific four survived. Then there's the whole Android arc which, as seriously as it plays itself, is an unabashed Terminator pastiche with ridiculous time travel mechanics that fall apart under any scrutiny.

Not that any of that is bad. I love the Saiyan and Freeza arcs. But isn't it just ... more honest when the villain is a Silly Putty demon and the whole thing's played out tongue-in-cheek?

No they don't. Even after the Potara is broken, there's still the fusion dance. And the fact that Goku could teleport to the check-in station at any time and grab Gohan and/or Gotenks.

Well, yeah. You got me. That really is poorly written. There really should have been some element preventing them from doing so. Oh well. It doesn't hinder my enjoyment much.

I should specify also that I've only seen the anime version of the Boo arc. I suppose it's totally possible it's terrible in the manga; I've seen several people say it's one of the areas where Toei actually improved the story. I suppose my enjoyment might also be tied into the soundtrack and some other elements. It's hard to separate.

[jjgp1112]

The Buu saga had a really slapped together feel to it. Take away Vegeta's character development and a few other small things and it really doesn't have any importance towards the overall Dragon Ball story. Every other saga saw some huge loose end finally tied up, and hell, Vegeta already got a good amount of character development at the end of the Cell saga. Even though he was still cold, he admitted Goku was better than him when Trunks tried to give him a Senzu bean when everyone realized he was exhausted, and finally "accepted" Trunks. The Buu saga just felt tacked on. Even though the Android saga had the villain flip-flop, several characters had their own little arcs that they went through.

[Akumaito Beam]

On topic I personally don't like the slapdash feel either for many reasons that were already said. It seems a lot to me like Toriyama just did his thing and this time it didn't work out so hot. In my book if you could write 90% of a series off the top of your head, chapter by chapter that's impressive. I just feel like the Boo arc was the exact same thing he was doing but he slipped up a few too many times. That being said I like this saga for a lot of reasons and I think it shows some examples of good writing too. Gotenks and Vegetto are hilarious, I love fat Boo especially his relationship with Mr.Satan and Babidi. The Great Saiyaman stuff is my favorite "arc" to date. I can't tell you how much I laughed (embarrassing my friend in the mall) after buying my copy of that particular volume. I could go on and on about things I do like as long as I could about things I don't like. I really don't subscribe to the idea of it being a "parody" personally. I can see how people could view it that way but I think it being like the other sagas but more ludicrous is just the result of Toriyama not knowing when to say when like always.

I should specify also that I've only seen the anime version of the Boo arc. I suppose it's totally possible it's terrible in the manga; I've seen several people say it's one of the areas where Toei actually improved the story. I suppose my enjoyment might also be tied into the soundtrack and some other elements. It's hard to separate.

I really do think the anime made this saga a lot better. I’m not really sure what it was but had I a guess it could have something to do with the pacing being slower. It's one time when that may have actually improved things instead of hinder it. Lingering on situations more then the manga did may help ease people into some of the more sillier moment. The manga moved fast and I think that did nothing to help the feeling of the focus changing way too much and too many ideas coming in and out of the story. I also think the filler was unusually good in this saga in general.

[Fionordequester]

I’m not really sure what it was but had I a guess it could have something to do with the pacing being slower.

The artwork was also a lot better in the Anime for that saga, which is odd, because normally Akira draws much better than the animators. But by the time Goku started fighting Kid Buu, the art was so much worse than it usually was throughout the series, that you could almost feel Akira's exasperation and tiredness.

[Akumaito Beam]

I agree, the anime artwork was nice for that saga a lot of the time. I can't say I really see what you're talking about on the manga side of things though. Is there like, a certain chapter that can illustrate what you're seeing particularly well? (I'm not trying to imply you're wrong or anything, this is obviously all subjective.)

[jjgp1112]

The best example of the manga moving too fast and the anime improving upon it was the Goku vs Majin Vegeta. They made such a big deal out of it, yet in the manga it was...a few panels. In the anime it had a whole episode and significant amount of airtime on the following episode.

[Piccolo Daimao]

Sure it's an okay saga, but it just seems like Toriyama put so much more of his effort into the Saiyan and Freeza saga, giving more back-story and what not. Here he just made it too childish. This pink blob came and killed everyone. Yay for weirdness?

But the whole series is childish. How much backstory is there, really, to the Saiyans and Freeza? It's not tightly-written space opera. It's a bunch of dudes selling planets who work together we have no idea how, and because this is a fighting series, the mightiest alien in the universe is also a super-strong kung-fu master. Somehow we wiped out an entire planet with no one knowing, and even though they regularly sent babies to other worlds, only a specific four survived. Then there's the whole Android arc which, as seriously as it plays itself, is an unabashed Terminator pastiche with ridiculous time travel mechanics that fall apart under any scrutiny.

Not that any of that is bad. I love the Saiyan and Freeza arcs. But isn't it just ... more honest when the villain is a Silly Putty demon and the whole thing's played out tongue-in-cheek?

Agreed. While some people may say that it's backward for DB to go back to its roots after the "serious" arcs before it, I think it was nice that the villain was basically an overgrown, childish, chocolate-loving magical blob, yet he was the most powerful and dangerous villain yet and had to bring even the highest gods in existence (in a series where gods do fuck all) to deal with him.

[DBZ Mick]

The best example of the manga moving too fast and the anime improving upon it was the Goku vs Majin Vegeta. They made such a big deal out of it, yet in the manga it was...a few panels. In the anime it had a whole episode and significant amount of airtime on the following episode.

While I agree the anime's fight was better, I don't think it was that crash hot. A lot of it from memory was beam spamming...

[What Up Namek!]

The best example of the manga moving too fast and the anime improving upon it was the Goku vs Majin Vegeta. They made such a big deal out of it, yet in the manga it was...a few panels. In the anime it had a whole episode and significant amount of airtime on the following episode.

While I agree the anime's fight was better, I don't think it was that crash hot. A lot of it from memory was beam spamming...

Most of the series is beam spamming since the namek saga.

But at least this fight had some nice choreography added in between the beam spamming(Not saying all the other fights didn't have this, just it wasn't the first fight to overdue beam spamming.)

[rereboy]

The best example of the manga moving too fast and the anime improving upon it was the Goku vs Majin Vegeta. They made such a big deal out of it, yet in the manga it was...a few panels. In the anime it had a whole episode and significant amount of airtime on the following episode.

While I agree the anime's fight was better, I don't think it was that crash hot. A lot of it from memory was beam spamming...

I will have to agree. I didn't enjoy that filler battle all that much. It lacked something...