ABED wrote:They don't bring attention to the series! It's ridiculous to think that those views aren't overwhelmingly from people that are already fans of the show. Did you write millions? God dammit, now I'm sad. They might be popular, but what actual influence do they have on the series?
You're referring to Funimation, right?
One only need look at the TV ratings to see Funimation bring in a big audience. If literally your only metric for something having impact is that it brings in viewers who weren't already watching, then none of the Japanese side, video games, or anything else has had any significant impact since about 1994 in Japan, or about 2002 in the English-speaking world.
ABED wrote:it would be even more foolish than saying "Over 9000" has had no influence whatsoever
It did not. I'm tired of people taking credit for the meme that they shouldn't be. It's over 9000 was popular amongst the fandom well before the aughts. And I like this site, but Kanzenshuu's effect on the overall popularity of the franchise is relatively minor
I'm not saying TFS invented "Over 9000", man. I'm just saying, TFS bring in over 7 million views per episode, so saying they've had absolutely no impact on the franchise whatsoever is rather foolish. Most episodes of series 10 of Doctor Who pulled in less than 6 million viewers in the ratings; are you now going to tell me that most of Doctor Who's 10th series didn't have any influence on the Doctor Who franchise?
And, I've gotta say, "effect on the overall popularity of the franchise" is probably one of the worst metrics to measure influence there is. If you're juding something's influence purely on how it directly affected the popularity of the franchise, then as I say, in Japan, nothing since about 1994, and in the English speaking world, nothing since about 2002, will have had any influence at all.
Just face it, man: Just because you don't like something, doesn't mean it isn't important to other people. And that's okay. No one
has to like anything; look at me, I hate Super with a passion. Yet you don't see me saying it has no importance to the franchise as a whole. That would be supremely naive.
The point of Dragon Ball is to enjoy it. Never lose sight of that.