Dragon Ball Z "Seasons" On Blu-ray: News & Discussion

[MagicBox]

The "Rock The Dragon" edition is a different product entirely, and all of those other releases are long out-of-print and you know it. The only options right now are the cropped DVDs or the cropped blu-rays. People are obviously not happy with this. There's nothing wrong with expressing that unhappiness. Apparently you think people should quit complaining because they can just A.) Get rich and track down overpriced past releases, B.) Get rich, import, and make custom subtitled discs, or C.) Learn a foreign language, get rich, and then import, you lazy bums. I love how practical you make each of those options sound. They're not practical.

You seem to be putting forth a lot of effort to tell people to quit complaining about something worth complaining about. I think it would take much less effort to just let people feel the way they feel. Any complaints are directed at the release itself. They're not directed at you just because you happen to like this release.

[Black_Anime_Fan]

- DBZ Singles
- DBZ Orange Bricks
- DBZ Dragonboxes
- DBZ Rock the Dragon Edition
- DBZ Levels (Cancelled)

Um, I said that the Orange Bricks are the only release to get this kind of flack that the new Blu-Ray release is getting now, I never said that the Orange Bricks were the only past release, read more carefully next time.

But out of all these the only one that's the best and complete is the US Dragonbox so if you're really soo desperate then just fork out $$$ for it or get the two original Japanese Dragonboxes Z and then add subs to it.

All of those releases (excluding the Orange Bricks) are much better than these new Blu-Rays, but long gone, besides the RtD Edition which isn't technically a complete release, so our only options are either the Orange Bricks, and the new Blu-Rays, both shit releases.

[Baggie_Saiyan]

To rank the releases(that I have seen).
1. New Blu Rays
2. Kai
3. Level Sets
4. Dragon Box Z
5. Orange Bricks.

[TheAldella]

To rank the releases(that I have seen).
1. New Blu Rays
2. Kai
3. Level Sets
4. Dragon Box Z
5. Orange Bricks.

WoahwoahwoahwoahWoah. Did you just put these above Kai? Sure, they're WAY more consistent, but those Cell games reanimated scenes were kickass!

[samuraix123]

To rank the releases(that I have seen).
1. New Blu Rays
2. Kai
3. Level Sets
4. Dragon Box Z
5. Orange Bricks.

Not for me. I'd have to go like this
1. Level Sets(That was the US's equivalent to the Dragon-boxes IMO)
2. Dragon-Boxes(Thank God for these)
3. Kai (I do like the quality of this release a-lot!)
4. It's hard for me to judge this one considering I've seen stuff here and there for it but I'm gonna put the New Blu-ray right here.
5. Orange Bricks (LOL)

Edit - I'm referring to the quality of the release with this post. not the dub or anything like that.

[samuraix123]

Hey! C'mon, some of us here grew up with that crummy rock music! xD Anyway, I do see where they're a step-up from the old Seasons, but I also see where they're a step-down from the Dragonboxes and levels. The OBs were a bad release in comparison. The Dragonboxes and levels were Good releases. That makes these the middle-ground, yeah? These are a fine/tolerable/decent release. That, and ever since they started including Jap music, it hasn't been excluded again, unlike with the Dboxes, so we're actually kinda lucky, guys xD

I've thought about this same exact thing just the other day! I'm glad with each release they keep including the Japanese audio and voice.

[dbboxkaifan]

WoahwoahwoahwoahWoah. Did you just put these above Kai? Sure, they're WAY more consistent, but those Cell games reanimated scenes were kickass!

Reanimated scenes in Kai for the Cell Games? I watched Kai on Blu-ray and it was one of the worst PQs I've seen on BD with dirt, badly remastered (for a supposedly "HD") and to make it even worse it had the replacement score.

Kai doesn't have place to be competing with DBZ, sure it's the same bloody story but it's a different version nevertheless.

[Black_Anime_Fan]

1.Tie between Levels and Kai (Blu-Ray)
2. Dragon Box
3. RtD Edition/Pioneer/FUNi Single DVDs.
4. Orange Bricks
5. Filtered 2K/4K "upscales" on YouTube.
6. This release.

[TheAldella]

WoahwoahwoahwoahWoah. Did you just put these above Kai? Sure, they're WAY more consistent, but those Cell games reanimated scenes were kickass!

Reanimated scenes in Kai for the Cell Games? I watched Kai on Blu-ray and it was one of the worst PQs I've seen on BD with dirt, badly remastered (for a supposedly "HD") and to make it even worse it had the replacement score.

Kai doesn't have place to be competing with DBZ, sure it's the same bloody story but it's a different version nevertheless.

...Kay, I'll concede that the way it handled footage that wasn't redone was awful post-Frieza and maybe before, but I still loved the last beam struggle to death with the new animation.

[dbboxkaifan]

1. Levels
2. Dragon Box
3. RtD Edition/Pioneer/FUNi Single DVDs.
4. Orange Bricks
5. Filtered 2K/4K "upscales" on YouTube.
6. This release.

The 2k/4k upscales are made of the Orange Bricks.

If you're going to try to trash this release then put some effort into it.

[qjz123]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1usxuoygA8 This video shows an unboxing of the release as well as the special features.

[Black_Anime_Fan]

The 2k/4k upscales are made of the Orange Bricks.

If you're going to try to trash this release then put some effort into it.

No effort is needed to do so . And even if those upscales are the Orange Bricks, they look nothing like them and look much worse.

[UltimateHammerBro]

The 2k/4k upscales are made of the Orange Bricks.

Sometimes, they're made of Dragon Boxes.

[KentalSSJ6]

Yep, these can be summed up as Orange Bricks 2.0

Well, at least we got Kai in 4:3 so to be honest this doesent really bother me outside of the fact they are milking Dragonball for every single drop they can.

Um..why not do a Dragonball Kai, go redub that and remove the filler, or redub the movies and give it the Level or Kai treatment?

[sumpter360]

From what I've seen of the screenshots for this release, I have to say I'm surprisingly impressed. My copy comes later today, so I'm crazy excited to see this footage in person and in motion.

I know, I'm impressed, which means I'm obviously crazy, at least that's the idea I get from a surprising amount of people here. Now, I won't say I like this more than the Level sets. Those were my perfect release (outside of, perhaps, a release containing broadcast quality Japanese audio). But for a release that is, no matter how much we disapprove, widescreen and DVNR'd, FUNimation appears to have done a heck of a job. And if you compare it to the Orange Bricks, it looks like a pretty great improvement. Not an improvement compared to the Level sets, but to the Orange Bricks, absolutely.

And personally, I think the way they remastered this time around looks fascinating. It's a new way to look at DBZ. Not how it was originally meant to be seen, but interesting nonetheless.

Maybe somewhere down the line, FUNimation will release a sort of "Vintage Collection" release, with a remastering that maintains the original visual style versus this "modern" visual style (widescreen, DVNR'd, etc).

[supersaiyan3]

supersaiyan3 what is your overall opinion of these blu rays?

It's tough to say. I already have the Dragon Boxes, which are a near-perfect release as far as staying true to the original. I got the the blu-rays because I thought they would be more of a cinematic experience on my home theatre system. I knew it would be a completely bastardized version of the show, but I thought they could at least get the picture quality to look great. Which... it doesn't. To anybody watching these YouTube videos, they don't reflect the actual blu-rays at all. I'm not a video expert, but it seems like they rushed the encoding, compressed the shit out of it, or just had a terrible filtering process. There are some sort of artifacts that you can see fluttering around the edges in some scenes. This is one of the worst:

Spoiler:

It actually looks pretty decent when it's downscaled. But just take a look at it in full resolution. Do you really want THAT on your TV? On a smaller screens it looks pretty great, but it just doesn't cut it when you see it in full 1080.

Here's the 4-panel shot too:

Spoiler:

[TheAldella]

To defend that, someone crop it properly. I dare you. I'll spit in your face if it comes below the amount shown that's important. That being said, was Krillin's knee really that important?

[UltimateHammerBro]

A few of the shots we've previously seen look really good, but this 4-panel shot looks like something an amateur with Avisynth would do.

[qjz123]

supersaiyan3 what is your overall opinion of these blu rays?

It's tough to say. I already have the Dragon Boxes, which are a near-perfect release as far as staying true to the original. I got the the blu-rays because I thought they would be more of a cinematic experience on my home theatre system. I knew it would be a completely bastardized version of the show, but I thought they could at least get the picture quality to look great. Which... it doesn't. To anybody watching these YouTube videos, they don't reflect the actual blu-rays at all. I'm not a video expert, but it seems like they rushed the encoding, compressed the shit out of it, or just had a terrible filtering process. There are some sort of artifacts that you can see fluttering around the edges in some scenes. This is one of the worst:

How often are video artifacts like that present and have you noticed any line disappearing issues? Also how do you feel the picture quality of this release compares to the orange bricks?

[kei17]

I still seriously doubt that it's selectively cropped. Are there any instances of selective cropping other than the last shot of the opening?