Goku and Vegeta should have been retired as leads

[Soppa Saia People]

It's not Dragon Ball without Goku and Vegeta as leaders. I don't give a fuck about "new generation", they all suck and are not likeable like these two...

what about Dragon Ball (T.V show) ?

[Rockman X]

We see Goku's struggles and motivations and they do resonate.

it doesn't with me... Goku is just a selfish guy who wants get stronger for himself..in fact going super saiyan was probably the only time he wanted to become stronger for an another reason.

It bothers Goku that he couldn't get to the level of Super Saiyan God except by relying on others, but he won't let that prevent him from using that power to protect his world.

too bad DBS doesn't have bit of dialogue.

Gohan is more the reluctant hero and that doesn't feel like DB.

What do you mean by it doesn't "feel" DB? Goku doesn't represent DB universe alone he's just ONE of the many main characters and IIRC Goku is not a hero at all! he's just a selfish dude who's on the side of good guys.

Goku's "I am the Lightbulb in the darkness bacon in the fridge!" Speech from Z dub was just made up crap.. Goku ain't a hero not now not ever.

That's better than Gohan getting yet another power up because he's finally tapping his full potential.

Like that other guy pointed out that's the same with Goku.. Goku literally did nothing to achieve SSJ God heck he wasn't even stronger than Gohan at the time he got SSJ God besides the old kai power up was more of a way to make up for his SSj2 nerfing in the buu saga.

Goku is the only character whose entire motivation is to get stronger.

What's the point? Vegeta wanted to become stronger to prove himself to his race,to himself and surpass his rival,Gohan wants to become stronger to protect his friends now that's 10,000 times more interesting than a guy who just want to get stronger.. cus.. just cus.

There's a joke in Pokemon community that someday ash will become the "Pokemon master" Goku/Ash strives to be the best but meanwhile he'll just be a bland one note character with the depth of a sandpaper Goku being so bland&boring won't bother me if actual 3-dimensional characters like Gohan,Piccolo,Vegeta&Future Trunks didn't exist in the same show.

[Kuririn Fan]

It's not Dragon Ball without Goku and Vegeta as leaders. I don't give a fuck about "new generation", they all suck and are not likeable like these two...

what about Dragon Ball (T.V show) ?

We have Goku?

[ABED]

it doesn't with me... Goku is just a selfish guy who wants get stronger for himself..in fact going super saiyan was probably the only time he wanted to become stronger for an another reason.

First off, he doesn't just get stronger for himself. We see that numerous times. We see that he agrees to become a Super Saiyan God to not only fight but to protect, and your moral argument is weak. Doing something for others isn't the criterion for morality. Heaven forbid someone sees themselves as their highest value and wants to do things for primarily themselves.

What do you mean by it doesn't "feel" DB? Goku doesn't represent DB universe alone he's just ONE of the many main characters and IIRC Goku is not a hero at all! he's just a selfish dude who's on the side of good guys.

Shows are reflections of their main character. Goku is the show. The tone fits him to a T. Put someone else in that role, the show has to take on a different tone. We get it, selfish = bad! Doing things for yourself is bad, doing things for others is good. All selfishness means is to act in one's own self-interest. It's not immediately apparent what that means. What most people think it means is acting like Attila the Hun to get whatever you want regardless of whom you hurt, but is that really in someone's long range interest?

Goku's "I am the Lightbulb in the darkness bacon in the fridge!" Speech from Z dub was just made up crap.. Goku ain't a hero not now not ever.

You don't need to fight for the sake of others or make big speeches to be a hero. Goku has taken down numerous bad guys and he did so for good reasons, he's most definitely a hero.

[garfield15]

Didn't Toriyama say something once about how he doesn't really see Goku as a hero or something like that? Like he just wrote him as a selfish dude

[ABED]

Didn't Toriyama say something once about how he doesn't really see Goku as a hero or something like that? Like he just wrote him as a selfish dude

His stories undercut that. Goku is definitely a hero.

[Doctor.]

What is a hero, first of all?

[garfield15]

Didn't Toriyama say something once about how he doesn't really see Goku as a hero or something like that? Like he just wrote him as a selfish dude

His stories undercut that. Goku is definitely a hero.

I think a better description of Goku is that he fights for the side of the good guys, but I wouldn't call him a hero. Unless we mean hero in the pragmatic tense like "the protagonist"

[ABED]

Didn't Toriyama say something once about how he doesn't really see Goku as a hero or something like that? Like he just wrote him as a selfish dude

His stories undercut that. Goku is definitely a hero.

I think a better description of Goku is that he fights for the side of the good guys, but I wouldn't call him a hero. Unless we mean hero in the pragmatic tense like "the protagonist"

Goku has fought and defeated evil beings (Freeza, Piccolo, the Saiyans) because they were a danger to him and his friends and family. That's definitely a hero. He didn't just fight on the side of the good guys out of default, that's Vegeta. Goku loves life and he will fight to protect it. No, he doesn't go out to fight crime like Batman or Superman, but he doesn't turn a blind eye to it either.

[fadeddreams5]

What is a hero, first of all?

Goku cause, you see, he's the hope of the universe...

...an ally to good.

What he represents cannot be destroyed...

...even if his foes are a million times stronger than him.

[ABED]

What is a hero, first of all?

Goku cause, you see, he's the hope of the universe...

...an ally to good.

What he represents cannot be destroyed...

...even if his foes are a million times stronger than him.

Damn you season 3!

[Baggie_Saiyan]

Didn't Toriyama say something once about how he doesn't really see Goku as a hero or something like that? Like he just wrote him as a selfish dude

His stories undercut that. Goku is definitely a hero.

I think a better description of Goku is that he fights for the side of the good guys, but I wouldn't call him a hero. Unless we mean hero in the pragmatic tense like "the protagonist"

Well having a look on the definition of hero on the Oxford dictionaries, they pretty much described Goku- "A person who is admired for their courage, outstanding achievements, or noble qualities", "The chief male character in a book, play, or film, who is typically identified with good qualities, and with whom the reader is expected to sympathize", "(In mythology and folklore) a person of superhuman qualities and often semi-divine origin, in particular one whose exploits were the subject of ancient Greek myths." Goku pretty much hits the bill on these definitions, I think a lot of people associate hero as Superman-like which is wrong, I mean people who fight for their countries etc are considered heroes right? Yet the don't go around rescuing cats up a tree or stopping crime etc.

Also, I believe Goku in Super also said to Beerus "Don't you value human life" or something to that effect anyway.

[Kakacarrottop]

Vegeta was retired as a lead in GT. As was (adult) Goku.

[Hellspawn28]

The two characters are the main marketing keys to the series. Without Vegeta or Goku, most people won't bother to watch it. That's why Super is set after Buu since they can do the series when the characters are still young and in their prime. And why we never got a series set after GT since Goku is gone a 100 years after GT and most people won't watch a series without Goku. A series set after GT would just have Goku as the only returning character back and everyone else would be dead.

[dbzfan7]

I think we could use some specials without these two, or at least it definitely can work. Two of the best Dragon Ball products I'd say are the Father of Goku and History of Trunks. Neither needed Goku or Vegeta to lead it. Both were some of the best stories of the series. I don't think retiring these 2 is a good idea, but I think if people want other leads, it can only be done via special or one off.

[JulieYBM]

Didn't Toriyama say something once about how he doesn't really see Goku as a hero or something like that? Like he just wrote him as a selfish dude

Yes. In a 1997 interview with Wired Toriyama outright stated he dislikes how Toei Animation gives Gokuu the 'righteous hero' personality.

[Kunzait_83]

Some of the posts in this thread make me feel like the entire Wuxia thing I did recently was a complete and utter waste of my time and energies.

Doesn't help also that "hero" is such a malleable term.

Goku is, pretty much without the slightest room for argument, a Youxia protagonist through and through. The entire point of this type of character, indeed the entire point of this genre that he occupies, is getting stronger as a martial artist purely for himself and purely for the sake of it. All, and I do mean ALL other motives are 100% secondary to this. Sometimes Goku fights out of self-defense. Other times for straight up revenge. Other times he'll fight to protect close friends and family sure... but almost NEVER "the world" in a broader, more abstract sense.

Numerous characters throughout the series outright state repeatedly that Goku doesn't particularly give two shits about being some sort of "defender/savior of humanity" and his actions throughout the series largely bear that out loud and clear. Altruism in the traditional Western sense of it takes a HUGE backseat to him in favor of his progression as a martial artist and testing his skills against worthy opponents. And that's because progressing as a martial artist and testing one's limits against worthy foes is the entire root crux of this very genre. There's a damn good reason why Toriyama would get annoyed at Goku being portrayed as some classical do-gooder: he isn't because Dragon Ball ain't that kind of series to its utmost core.

Part of the whole reason I went to the trouble of making that whole Wuxia thread was due to how tiresome, wrongheaded, and ultimately straight up futile it is for so many Western fans to continually examine the series under the lens of being some sort of Superhero epic. Little to nothing in the actual meat of the narrative and characters can support that angle because Dragon Ball is, foundationally, predicated on the tropes of Martial Arts fiction. Martial Arts fiction places Competitiveness and Self-Improvement as the central-most themes, and whenever moral ideals DO come into play, they're generally archaic, Eastern medieval notions of "warrior's honor" that have exactly jack shit in common with the kinds of morals espoused in most Western Superhero/action-adventure stuff.

The only reason that this all flies past so many fans is purely due to total ignorance and unfamiliarity with Martial Arts fiction as a genre and a stronger familiarity instead with Western Superhero material (that and the FUNimation dub sure as shit doesn't help either). Continually and stubbornly insisting on examining this story and these characters under the same lens as Batman or Spider-Man or whatever else is only going to lead you ultimately to continual frustration and being let down time and again as these characters fail to live up to ideals that they were never originally built for in the first place, not to mention constantly hurling "criticisms" at the material that are entirely unfair and misguided in the extreme.

As for this making Goku "boring and one note".... everyone's entitled to their subjective opinion naturally, but before one hastily comes to that conclusion, its worth noting that the Youxia archetype is among one of the single oldest in fiction, with a history spanning more than 2000 years worth of poetry, literature, stage performance, oral storytelling, film, art, you name the medium. This archetype clearly has the ability to resonate powerfully and has a kind of timeless longevity that I would say makes someone writing it off hastily and out of ignorance to its broader fundamentals to be an incredibly unwise (and frankly kind of douchey) move on their part.

The only times that the series ever really flirts with modern Western Action Hero morality and/or Superhero tropes is The Great Saiyaman and Mirai Trunks' characterization. The Great Saiyaman is a super quick, largely inconsequential piffle of a mini-arc showing Gohan humorously trying to figure out what the hell to do with his martial arts skills during a period of downtime (seeing as how he's NOT a Youxia like his father, which makes his "reluctant heroism" the farthest thing in the world from "un-Dragon Ball-like"), and Mirai Trunks really is about one of the only characters in the entire series who truly fits the sort of "Save the World Hero" mold that so many Western fans awkwardly try to shoehorn Goku into. And even then, Trunks still has his share of Martial Arts fiction tropes mixed in along with all his more Western Action Hero conceits, so its not like even with him the series' Kung Fu Myth roots are 100% lost.

TL;DR - DB ain't the equivalent of a fucking DC Comic. Its the equivalent of a Jademan Manhua. You absolutely have to adjust your expectations and preconceived notions accordingly, and if you're unable to do that because you have no clue whatsoever how the fuck Martial Arts Fantasy Fiction works, that's ENTIRELY on you and not Dragon Ball itself.

[ABED]

Goku fights to defend his values. When Gohan is kidnapped, Gohan's safety doesn't take a backseat to Goku wanting to fight a strong opponent.

seeing as how he's NOT a Youxia like his father, which makes his "reluctant heroism" the farthest thing in the world from "un-Dragon Ball-like"

Wouldn't it be un-DB like because the tone of a show with Gohan as its hero the show's tone shifts? That is, unless you change Gohan, in which case, why not just keep Goku.

but almost NEVER "the world" in a broader, more abstract sense.

I mean in a very concrete sense. When his home is attacked, Goku fights like hell to defend it.

[Kunzait_83]

Goku fights to defend his values. When Gohan is kidnapped, Gohan's safety doesn't take a backseat to Goku wanting to fight a strong opponent.

From fairly early into my above post:

Sometimes Goku fights out of self-defense. Other times for straight up revenge. Other times he'll fight to protect close friends and family sure... but almost NEVER "the world" in a broader, more abstract sense.

I hate to draw so much right now from a bunch of crap I posted about in a completely different thread, but its kind of warranted here for this topic. In the Wuxia mega-thread I went into a ton of detail about not only the Youxia archetype itself, but also the VASTLY different values and morals of the Xia (supernatural martial arts masters of ancient Kung Fu myth and folklore) in general. One of the things about the antiquated/medieval values that Youxia generally draw from that is in some more post-modernist Wuxia stories deconstructed is how they view and prioritize family/blood and close personal friends in relation to their martial arts training.

Apart from being obsessively dedicated warriors, Youxia are also by definition inherently nomadic travelers at their deepest core being (its right there in their name, which translates to "roving force" or "knight errant"), making the prospect of one "settling down" to raise a family a VERY big deal and decision for them that would cut deep into a crucial aspect of their makeup (their freedom from regular day to day obligations and ability to constantly roam the lands in search of new challenges) that is indispensable to them and comes as naturally as fighting or breathing.

This is precisely why so much humor is mined out of Goku being "tied down" to Chi Chi (even more so in the anime): the idea of such a rough and tumble "man of the wilds" Youxia like Goku being "domesticated" with a shrew of a housewife and a son to care for is inherently ridiculous considering the nature and pedigree of what Goku's archetype represents within Martial Arts Fantasy Fiction.

The "looseness" of Goku's morality with regards to his inherent instincts as a Youxia (compounded that much further with being a Saiya-jin) to constantly seek new challenges to his fighting skills stacked against being a "family man" is something that the series plays with a bit, particularly in the Cell arc. Throughout the ENTIRE series though, Goku is not at all above endangering much of the world (be it against Piccolo Ma Junior, Vegeta, Freeza, or Cell) for the sake of The Fight, and this is something that he is CONSTANTLY called out on by the other characters so often and so routinely, you'd have to be willfully obtuse to ignore it. Goku himself even acknowledges it via his constant and oft-repeated refrain of "sorry for being so selfish" each of the many times he places his satisfaction as a martial arts master above the "greater good" of protecting innocents caught in the crossfire.

As far as the Gohan situation with Raditz, at no point in that entire situation does Gohan's safety interfere with Goku's fight against Raditz. Gohan spends the majority of the fight safely out of the way locked inside Raditz's space pod, and doesn't get mixed up in the fray until his sudden burst of rage-fueled power has him do even MORE damage to Raditz than even Goku was capable of (thus making him hardly helpless or at risk for that brief moment). At no point is Goku really forced to choose between saving Gohan or having it out with Raditz: he basically has to go directly through Raditz in order to rescue Gohan. As either a father OR as a Youxia martial arts master confronted with his strongest foe yet, this is hardly much of a conflict or difficult decision for Goku. He sort of gets to have his cake and eat it too here.

This example is also even further nullified by the fact that later on, Goku places Gohan's safety DIRECTLY in danger and harm's way in the Cell Games, and his doing so is ENTIRELY due to his narrowly thinking like a Youxia and not like a father.

As I talked about in the Wuxia thread, Xia don't think of or value familial relationships the same way as regular people. Xia view the passing down of their skills from master to student as TRULY siring an "heir" and thus view the master/student relationship in much the same way as (in fact, even stronger than) a parent/child relationship. This is due pretty much entirely to how much and how deeply a Xia feels towards their mastery of their fighting arts, which they have literally dedicated their ENTIRE LIVES to and have forsaken so very, very much in the name of their dedication to it.

Passing that mastery on to another thus holds TREMENDOUS meaning for them. When it comes down to it, the martial arts student is the Xia's TRUE progeny above and beyond that of blood kin. If a Xia's student happens to actually BE their son or daughter (and that's far from a guarantee to be the case) then fine, so much the better. If not though? Then whoever IS their student can be expected to be treated with FAR more care and attentiveness than the poor sap that happens to be said Xia's actual kid.

You can see this dynamic play out pretty much to the letter in Dragon Ball's ending, with Goku's (in Western fandom circles, rather contentious and controversial) tremendously easily arrived at decision to prioritize the training of Oob well above being present for his own family. Its not at all the least bit uncommon for Xia to place an obligation to a perfect stranger well far above that of blood family, as a big part of the Xia's values is the complete and total shirking of the notion of "you get my undivided devotion and loyalty just cause its expected of me".

Throughout the Cell Saga though, Goku begins to "bond" with Gohan for pretty much the only real significant period of time that he does throughout the ENTIRE series. And its, in his mind as a Youxia, for VERY good reason: in the Cell Saga, Goku takes on and begins to look upon Gohan as something of FAR more importance and significance to him than simply that of a son. In the Cell Saga, Gohan is Goku's martial arts student (throughout their training together for several years worth of time in the Room of Spirit and Time).

A HUGE crucial plot and character point of the Cell arc is the fact that Goku spends much of it grooming Gohan as his successor to his skills. Goku, being Goku however, isn't the most perceptive guy in the room and misses out COMPLETELY on the fact that Gohan is not at all in the least bit a Youxia like him. Gohan at no point demonstrates the passion for competitive combat and self-improvement and challenge-seeking which ALL completely and utterly define the utmost core of Goku's very being. As Piccolo devastatingly points out to him while Gohan's on the receiving end of a savage beating compliments of Cell himself, throughout his ENTIRE life Gohan has viewed and treated martial arts entirely as a necessary evil needed to protect himself and his friends and family throughout a series of fucked up situations that were thrust upon him rather than as something wonderful to take joy in for its own sake as Goku (and pretty much any Youxia by definition) does.

Goku is COMPLETELY oblivious to not only this, but the fact that Gohan is CLEARLY eager to just get all his mystical kung fu nonsense over and done with as quickly and painlessly as possible so that he can get his ass back into his true element where he's actually most at home and most comfortable: nose-first inside of a book rather than a fighting arena (as Gohan's Wuxia archetype is, in spite of his own fighting skills that were unwillingly thrust upon him, that of a Scholar who are defined entirely throughout the genre by their timid, pacifistic nature). Hell, it doesn't even dawn on Goku that Gohan at one point turns down an offer to wear an orange Kame dogi identical to his father's and opts instead for a Namekian one in Piccolo's style (showing very unsubtly that Gohan by this point has a FAR deeper connection with Piccolo than he does his own father, who can scarcely be bothered to notice this, dim bulb that he is to such matters).

Thus one of the central conflicts of the Cell arc/Cell Games is the fact that Goku, poster child for everything Youxia in the DB world, that Goku's own son turned out to be the total exact antithesis of him and that particular chicken (Gohan's pacifistic Scholarhood contrasted directly against his father's single-minded dedication to being a Youxia) is now, after so many years and several story arcs of being ever-present, is finally coming home to roost in a MUCH bigger way in this fucked up, grotesque little martial arts tournament.

That being said though, Goku may not be too bright and is more than a little narrowly-fixated on his own perspective as a martial artist, BUT he DOES still have a line (thin though it may be at times) that he WON'T ever step over. Cell meanwhile represents EVERYTHING fucked up about Goku's Youxia tendencies, and is the result of what you get when that aforementioned thin line is eradicated from the warrior's makeup entirely (no doubt helped by the fact that there's as much Freeza and Vegeta in him as there is Goku). The Cell Game itself is Goku's joyful attitude towards Budokai-esque competition twisted and corrupted and perverted into something altogether more horrific, as Cell directly places countless innocent lives in jeopardy in a way that Goku (obviously) NEVER EVER would all for the sake of The Fight and his next great challenge as a (mad scientist abomination's twisted and skewed approximation of a) Youxia.

This is really the only time that DB really ever takes to get a little deconstruction-ish with its Wuxia tropes - in stark contrast to something like Yu Yu Hakusho, which spends almost its ENTIRE run testing and examining and ripping at the guts of Yusuke's Youxia instincts, constantly comparing it to his relationship with his friends, especially through the lens of his enemies and opponents, and making him constantly choose which is more important to him, making the dichotomy of the archaic obsolescence of the Xia's warriors' values against more "modern" morality and values into a central theme of that whole series (YYH generally being a LOT more smarter and thoughtful about this stuff than DB in general).

The point ultimately being, Gohan's characterization is one of the smarter and more interesting aspects of DB. Having him turn out to be, from the jump, a miniature carbon copy of Goku would've been immeasurably more boring and stale in comparison. And its not at all in the least bit a betrayal of the series' own Martial Arts Myth tropes and archetypes: if anything, it shows a remarkable degree of faithfulness to it, to the point of allowing it to have the series dive down one of its altogether more rare rabbit holes of introspection.

seeing as how he's NOT a Youxia like his father, which makes his "reluctant heroism" the farthest thing in the world from "un-Dragon Ball-like"

Wouldn't it be un-DB like because the tone of a show with Gohan as its hero the show's tone shifts? That is, unless you change Gohan, in which case, why not just keep Goku.

This is something that Toriyama clearly struggled with throughout much of the Boo arc and which, ultimately, turns out to be one of the Boo arcs' biggest failings.

The Boo arc spends a VAST chunk of its earlier half focused on yet another Wuxia cliche: that of "the Next Generation of Fighters taking over for the Old Guard". Gohan is CLEARLY meant to head this up and take up the "lead Youxia" baton from his dead dad... but this gets abandoned partway through (rather awkwardly at that) and numerous Deus Ex Machina hoops are leaped through in order to restore the original Status Quo of Goku as central Youxia.

Part of this can be attributed to fan pressure and Goku's Popularity Power, but it could also be argued (and has been) that Toriyama simply couldn't put together a workable way to transition Gohan from a Scholar (something that Toriyama did perhaps TOO good a job of establishing him as to turn back from) to a Youxia. Its entirely possible that the whole Great Saiyaman business was an abandoned experiment at trying to figure out an organic-feeling angle for Gohan to suddenly develop more of a passion for fighting like his dad ("Fuck it, why not try for Costumed Henshin Superhero and see where that takes us?" can almost be seen as the desperate cry of a mangaka running low on inspiration and patience with all this by this point).

Whatever the reasons, Toriyama shot for the whole "next generation takes over" chestnut, and couldn't really make it work out for Gohan, leading to much of the awkward narrative hoops of the latter chunk of the Boo arc. Don't get me wrong, I still love the Boo arc as much as the next person and find it to be great, great fun all in all, but "airtight plotting" can hardly be counted among its virtues.

but almost NEVER "the world" in a broader, more abstract sense.

I mean in a very concrete sense. When his home is attacked, Goku fights like hell to defend it.

Right, which once again, I never argued against.

Sometimes Goku fights out of self-defense. Other times for straight up revenge. Other times he'll fight to protect close friends and family sure...

[Doctor.]

How can you say Goku never fights for the world? He was fighting for both the deceased Saiyans and the deceased Namekians against Freeza. He said he was sacrificing himself for the Earth (not "for you guys", he specifically said he was sacrificing himself for the Earth, probably the first time Goku says this) in the Cell arc.