If you admit that its perfectly acceptable to admit that their reactors would decay eventually, then you don't really have an argument for criticizing DBM's choice.TheBritWriter wrote:
Not really I can acknowledge they will wear down via ageing or be gone by other stronger fighters (eg Beerus) but that they haven't worn down during the events of their terror and during Trunks' lifetime, or till Cell absorbs them at least.
We simply don't know how long they can live for, but Rhoshi is doing well for someone who is over 300 years old, so why should it seem far fetched for other characters to be long lived and still be constantly strong? Even the saiyans themselves are anti-aging by nature. How long was Cell intended to live for?
Characters who don't decay to time are surprisingly common in the dbz universe. I'm not saying the androids will be around for billions of years, it's simply impossible given you have beings like imperfect cell, dabura or Beerus, so they would had died at some point if Trunks hadn't killed them. 18 isn't around at the time of goku jr in GT or DBO so natural death is likely.
What I take issue with is DBM's interpretation of how quick they will decay. There is no hard evidence to verify it was already happening in Trunks' future timeline, and why should it? They were destined to be absorbed by Cell, if they were to become weaker over time before Cell could absorb them then what was their point in their creation? I can buy the idea they would slowly age over time and die but not the argument they became weaker over time because of mechanical faults, not within trunks' lifetime at least. The theory treats Android 17 and 18 as if they had cogs and gears inside of them.
Roshi and others like him are not a good argument because: a) the decay of a full human is incomparable to the decay of a reactor, and b) Roshi and the others actually show signs of decay, since they got old.
You just have an arbitrary and personal preference, not based on anything concrete in the manga, for their reactors lasting longer without any decay than what DBM suggests.
In conclusion, the manga is not clear on why there seems to be such a difference between the android's power and the the eventual degradation of their parts doesn't contradict anything in the manga. So, interpreting it like DBM did doesn't rewrite anything, it just adds an interpretation/explanation for something that is not clear in the manga.
