Is Dragon Ball a character-driven or plot-driven story?

[TheGreatness25]

The Dragon Ball adventure was there and kind of falls into Goku's lap. He doesn't branch out on his own and go through anything. He doesn't go on a journey to find himself. He's just doing his thing and one day, it's like "Hey, there's this thing, wanna go?"

[ABED]

The Dragon Ball adventure was there and kind of falls into Goku's lap. He doesn't branch out on his own and go through anything. He doesn't go on a journey to find himself. He's just doing his thing and one day, it's like "Hey, there's this thing, wanna go?"

He does go out on his own. The entire Red Ribbon Army arc is him going out on his own. Even though Bulma finds him, he doesn't have to go with her. He chooses of his own free will. Goku doesn't go on a journey to find himself because he knows who he is. He has a firm motivation. He leaves with Bulma because it furthers that goal. He's not nearly as passive as you seem to imply.

[TheGreatness25]

Obviously the characters' personalities drive their actions -- as with any story ever made. But they never cause anything, they're just mostly reacting to what's going on around them. That's the difference. Whatever, I see things differently than you do. Dragon Ball isn't exactly known to have such deep characters. I firmly believe that nothing in Dragon Ball happens because of the characters, but what happens to the characters is plot-convenient.

[ABED]

Obviously the characters' personalities drive their actions -- as with any story ever made. But they never cause anything, they're just mostly reacting to what's going on around them. That's the difference. Whatever, I see things differently than you do. Dragon Ball isn't exactly known to have such deep characters. I firmly believe that nothing in Dragon Ball happens because of the characters, but what happens to the characters is plot-convenient.

Are we limiting the characters to the heroes? Based on your argument, I would argue just about no hero story would be considered character story as they rarely involve the hero driving the story. They are reacting. Batman is reacting to supervillains, Goku is reacting to alien invaders, cops are reacting to criminals.

Plot convenience is a different issue. That's an issue of the quality of the writing, not what's driving the story.