rereboy wrote:The author being required to take responsibility for every opinion that a reader/fan can have after reading his work...? Er, no.
I believe that any author who's worth his ink cares enough about his fans and the integrity of his own work more than to just shovel out any old crap without a giving a single consideration for how it might effect that which came before it. That's not to say that I think the guy has to be responsible for the '
opinion of every reader' (I have no idea where the hell you've got that warped, exaggerated version of the argument from), but that the guy's involvement with his work
doesn't just end at the moment it leaves his desk. He's an artist - the stuff he puts his name to will forever carry an association straight back to him, and as such, he'll forever be open to be judged on it. Whilst some artists may choose to distance themselves from earlier work they're not proud of, the concept of total artistic abandonment is, to me, not possible. Moreover, Toriyama has made no such claims with Dragonball, so in regard to in-unverse lore, surely we are simply to assume that everything that has gone before still stands - which is all the more solidified with the recent release of the Chozenshuu guidebooks.
We all
know that Toriyama's memory isn't particularly good, as we all know that it's
incredibly unlikely that his intentions are anything but good - but I think that if the guy is so out of touch with his own work and so unversed with the very in-universe lore he constructed in the past, then perhaps he ought to recognise that his fans aren't going to appreciate him releasing new stuff that could very easily, and unintentionally, revise things that they enjoy without
any good reason other than it didn't occur to him at the time.
Let me make this clear: there is no
artistic merit whatsoever in saying stuff in Q&A interviews that contradicts wholesale narrative events. If there was something he wasn't happy with that he wanted to change so badly that he went back and released a fully revised version, then the situation would be totally different -
but that just isn't the case here. He's unintentionally picking apart his own creation with aimless soapbox pot shots in the small print of a magazine, like a Mr Magoo type character, obliviously strolling along leaving chaos in his wake.
rereboy wrote:To stress my previous point, I will give an example: If I buy a series of paintings from a artist and I like that series very much, but later on the same artist does another series of paintings reinterpreting the same concept that was present in the previous paintings, and I happen to not like what he has done with it, I won't argue that he "owes" me something better as a fan and that he should take responsibility because that doesn't even make sense. So, why should I do it with a shonen manga writer...?
That's
completely different. It's not like Toriyama has decided to remake or remodel Dragonball, he's done nothing of the sort by releasing these little tidbits, which are clearly intended to be
supplemental information to his work to add to the pantheon of what already exists.
These are intended as additions, not revisions - but due to inconsistencies with the original work, to the fandom they can feel more like the latter.
Would Toriyama be saying these things if he knew, or it occurred to him, that they contradicted his prior work? Hell no - or at least, he'd most likely tweak them so that they didn't clash so badly - and that's exactly what I keeping having to harp back to, this sort of nonchalant attitude to throwing new stuff out there without proper thought is just crass, as it either undermines his original work or speaks negative volumes about his quality control. And, I don't know about you, but I find it slightly belittling as a fan of the guy's work to think that he's happy with just putting any old crap out. It's demonstrative of either the low esteem in which he holds his fans, or the lack of thought he puts into his work these days - and, call me unreasonable,
but I don't like either.
I honestly couldn't care less how my opinion on this makes you feel about me, because I think that such a practice on his Toriyama's part is
downright odious, and an insult to the people who love and follow his work. And in response to
DBZGTKOSDH, I personally find that to be quite disrespectful towards the fans of his work.
DBZGTKOSDH wrote:Wait, when did Toriyama show disrespect towards the fans?
rereboy wrote:I don't think you realize how incoherent you are being in this point.
I apologise if the way in which I've constructed my posts have been difficult to follow, as I hope you can understand, attempting to debate in an online forum during work hours leads to a fragmented approach to responses - but if you're trying to say that my arguments are inconsistent, then I suggest you re-read them. Otherwise, feel free to highlight the areas you're struggling with, and I'd be glad to clear them up for you.
rereboy wrote:Toriyama has ALWAYS been this kind of author. He has NEVER been an author with that much care for consistency and details at all. That has never stopped you from loving his work. But now it does?
. Just because you don't like the direction of Toriyama is taking with some of this info, don't mistake it for him suddenly being different. He has always been like this. This is not about his care at all because he has always been like this.
The difference is that despite the fact that Toriyama was always writing off the seat of his pants, previous narrative events were still fresh in his mind - so the inconsistencies were fewer and less glaring than when he is dipping into places in his work he hasn't touched for 20 years. Furthermore, during the serialisation he also had editors who kept him in check, pointing out glaring discrepancies and inconsistencies, meaning that he at least addressed them in
some way more often than not. but when going back to do something like Dragonball Minus, I feel that the
least he could have done was run his plot by someone familiar enough with his work as to be able to spot any inconsistency. I mean, the guy has said so on numerous occasions himself that his memory isn't great, and he doesn't like saying things in case he
'gets into trouble', so as such, having a clear awareness of the issue - why doesn't he bother to do anything about it? Unless, of course,
he simply doesn't care.
As
hleV said, there's no saying how Toriyama's recent forays into the Dragon Universe would have turned out with a decent editor keeping him away from getting tangled up in the complex mesh of Dragon Universe lore he's long since forgotten about.
hleV wrote:It was Toriyama and his editors who made Dragon Ball awesome. Hell, even if his editor suddenly gotten back, there's no telling if the current, senile version of Toriyama would live up to the task of making awesome new DB material.
rereboy wrote:Also, have you even seen or read "Misery"? How someone can be "glad" to be labeled as that is beyond me.
I have no idea what that is, and frankly I don't care - I merely assumed you were calling me a miserable fan or making some other sort of adhominum jibe. Either way, it's of no interest to me. I'm debating your arguments, I'm not interested in your insults, which is what I'm pretty sure
Gaffer Tape was referring to.
Gaffer Tape wrote:Yeesh. I am not at all getting the derisiveness towards Blade's opinions here.
Herms wrote:You know, lately I've been re-reading the manga and watching the anime alongside it. Near as I can tell, everything's the same as it was before. I don't think anybody's ruined anything.
Totally agree with this, just to go back to my original post.
Blade wrote:I don't think that Toriyama can ruin Dragonball - it's already out there in completed form as a finished, published work.
'Multiculturalism means nothing in Japan, for every outside culture must pass first through the Japanese filter, rendering it entirely Japanese in the process.' - Julian Cope.
