Where did DBE fail, where the Autobots and Joes succeeded?

[Rocketman]

The biggest f**k up of this year was the new Star Trek for me....

What the hell is wrong with you.

[Kaboom]

The biggest f**k up of this year was the new Star Trek for me...

I am going to beat you over the head with the Narada.

[Hellspawn28]

Star Trek 09 was awesome, I hear most older fans of the original series where not too crazy about it.

[MCDaveG]

In case of movies, I'm hard to please......

[Kaboom]

Star Trek 09 was awesome, I hear most older fans of the original series where not too crazy about it.

Obsession and common sense are not often found together within a fandom.

[Rocketman]

Star Trek 09 was awesome, I hear most older fans of the original series where not too crazy about it.

As a fan of the 'original' (read: ONLY) series, they're dumb. Star Trek '09 was awesome.

[laserkid]

Eh, I liked Trek 09' as a movie, but not a fan of it being in Star Trek, call me weird.

And for the record, I loved both Transformers and the GI Joe movies, and am a longstanding fan of both franchises.

[Hellspawn28]

GI joe was tons of fun, and the movie brings back memories on how awesome the show was. And I thought they stay rather close to the original TV series too unlike Transformers. Only if DBE was done by a big name director, and had a better rep then we maybe we would have gone a good DB live action movie.

Sadly I don't think we will see another Dragon Ball live action movie, and if DBE does get a sequel then it will likely be direct to video.

[Super Sonic]

GI joe was tons of fun, and the movie brings back memories on how awesome the show was. And I thought they stay rather close to the original TV series too unlike Transformers. Only if DBE was done by a big name director, and had a better rep then we maybe we would have gone a good DB live action movie.

Sadly I don't think we will see another Dragon Ball live action movie, and if DBE does get a sequel then it will likely be direct to video.

That's what happened with the first G.I. Joe movie. When the Transformers and My Little Pony movies bombed in theaters back in 86, they decided to have the G.I. Joe movie released to video. Though does make you wonder if like the Transformers movie, will that mean DBE will make more on dvd and become a cult classic, even among non DB-fans?

[Hellspawn28]

I don't think DBE did well on DVD neither, and I did not see any TV adds for DBE on DVD neither. So I doubt it will be come a cult classic anytime soon.

[jaywonder]

Poor advertising
Bad script
Terrible special effects
Characters' personalities re-written
Didn't stay true to the original story
just didn't appeal to the fan base

Dragonball is a series that would've fared better with a big budget animated or CGI based film. It just won't work with the live action format

[Kaboom]

If you ask me, Goku being so out-of-character is THE one big flaw that, if fixed, would have at least rendered the film "acceptable."

[JulieYBM]

If you ask me, Goku being so out-of-character is THE one big flaw that, if fixed, would have at least rendered the film "acceptable."

That's relatively true. A low-budget film can still be great if it has character and acting down. Heck, acting and script don't even need to be spectacular, but it can still be relatively good.


Ah well, at least Gokû didn't try out for a sports team to impress Chichi...

[Kendamu]

The biggest f**k up of this year was the new Star Trek for me....

What the hell is wrong with you.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=02LgdXVkXgM

Anywho, lack-of in-depth knowledge of GI Joe and Transformers helped me enjoy those movies. I wasn't a hardcore fan so, except for super obvious stuff (like the way the Autobots looked or the Joes' Accelleration Suits) I didn't know what to look for in terms of being true to the source. My situation probably applies to a lot of the people who paid to see the movies and ended up liking them. It was close enough to the vague things people remember fondly about the properties that only the hardcore fans complained. Heavy advertisement, merchandising, and an actual budget probably helped, too.

Dragonball, on the other hand, had none of the heavy advertising and merchandising and it certainly didn't have a budget. Also, even with a split fanbase that gives Dragonball two distinct and different images in the West, DBE didn't seem to pin either crowd with something vaguely resembling what kids started watching on TV over ten years ago. The atmosphere didn't match up at all in either direction, the character drama they tried to insert didn't fit, and they didn't use a storyline that would be more recognizable to people who haven't watched it since they were children (read: it wasn't DBZ).

[Chuquita]

If you ask me, Goku being so out-of-character is THE one big flaw that, if fixed, would have at least rendered the film "acceptable."

That's relatively true. A low-budget film can still be great if it has character and acting down. Heck, acting and script don't even need to be spectacular, but it can still be relatively good.


Ah well, at least Gokû didn't try out for a sports team to impress Chichi...

This was my biggest beef with it too. Wildly-out-of-character Goku makes me cringe. It's like ordering a cheeseburger and being served a bowl of olives and eggplant instead. >_O


I think they should've gone with a Z arc if only because it'd have Vegeta; and Vegeta was hugely popular in the U.S. back in Dragon Ball's heyday there. You would get people who'd go out to the theater to see him.

Maybe they were planning on saving him for the sequel back before they realized their ambitions clashed with what the general audiences would expect from a live action DB?

Me personally, I'd go to see an in-character Goku, but I didn't get that from DBE and found the movie hugely disappointing because of it.

[Super Sayian Prime]

I do feel sorry for the cast, Marsters said he was told the movie was going to have a budget of atleast $100 million, and that it would be filmed all around the world. They end up in Mexico, and a $30 million budget.

[Rocketman]

If you ask me, Goku being so out-of-character is THE one big flaw that, if fixed, would have at least rendered the film "acceptable."

Non-dickhead Goku was the best part of DBE.

[Chuquita]

I do feel sorry for the cast, Marsters said he was told the movie was going to have a budget of atleast $100 million, and that it would be filmed all around the world. They end up in Mexico, and a $30 million budget.

I forgot about that; talk about an awful type of bait-and-switch. I feel bad for Marsters especially because he was so gung-ho on getting to do a live action Dragon Ball and his son is a fan of the series and...it's just really depressing how things turned out.

Why would they lie to him like that? Or if they didn't lie and things changed suddenly without his knowledge, where did the other $70 million go?

[Kaboom]

Yeah, if a better-handled, more well-done next attempt at a DragonBall movie happens, I'd totally want to see Marsters get to play Piccolo again. At least DBE-Piccolo was probably the best character out of the whole bunch. Just severely underutilized.

[Onikage725]

Oh no, more "true fan" debates?

Well, I consider myself a true fan of Transformers. I have love for the original series, though I haven't followed any of the comics. I also loved Beast Wars, but not Machines. I didn't care for the stuff that aired on CN (Armada and such), but I think most of that was a lack of appreciation for the art style and certain modern "kids shows" styles of story presentation. As a guy in his 20's, they weren't really made for me and that's OK. Nostalgia locks in the 80's series and movie for me, and I'm fine with that.

I liked the first TF live action film, mainly because I had below 0% expectations of it. I think it came out pretty decent. It isn't a cinematic masterpiece, but I was the kind of kid who would go to Blockbuster every Friday and rent B action and horror flicks for the weekend. I love a deep story, but sometimes I like to put down some chips and soda, gather with good friends or family, and shut the brain off for a bit. Most shitty Van Damme movies had some entertaining fights, many crappy horror flicks had decent kill scenes, and the camp factor often provided unexpected humor. TF was a big budget B action flick. It also had Peter Cullen. As a kid born in the early 80's, Optimus Prime was my hero and fricken role model for the first decade of my life. I'd have paid my ticket to both movies just to contribute to Mr. Cullen's salary.

That's part of the answer to this question, most likely. Actor respect, and movies that played to their strengths. Bay didn't TRY to make a cinematic masterpiece. He wanted to make a fun action flick about giant robots, and that's what he did. He brought in the cartoon actor for the lead robot, which drew in old fans. They had other actors with their own following. Shia draws in his own crowd (I don't know how substantial that crowd is, but it's there). Ditto Fox. Weaving too gets a nod. My father saw the movie basically on the grounds of his being a Hugo Weaving fan and his vague recollection of the franchise through my childhood fandom. So that's one ticket sale that is owed in part to the strength of one casting choice.

DBE really had none of that. The budget was horrible and fights were poorly choreographed. Whereas Bay gave us gratuitous scenes of Optimus "busting Decti-chops" in the TF films (especially the second), Goku's shining moment in DBE was when he tricked a bully into wrecking his own car. THAT was the best fight in the film, which is really sad. Emmy Rossum and Justin Chatwin fans probably don't give two shits about Dragon Ball, so you can't expect much loyalty there. James Marsters is a good actor and a decent genre choice... but they abused and underused him to the point that one wonders why they bothered. Chow Yun Fat is the closest they had to star drawing power, and he isn't going to single handedly unite a fractured core fanbase while intriguing the mainstream.

There's also the feeling. This is just my opinion, but despite radical design departures, TF still feels like Transformers to me. There's more human interaction, but one would expect that for a live-action film. When Megatron chides Starscream, it might as well be Frank Welker and Chris Latta bickering. DBE fails to evoke this sort of feeling, since most of the characters simply don't feel like their source material.

G.I Joe... I'm not a huge fan of the original series, but I did watch it as a kid. And I like the old movie, aside from the rookie-training portions. The live action movie followed a similar concept as TF, though I don't think it came out quite as well. It's a little telling when the best performance in the film comes from Marlon Wayans. That said, it was still kind of fun on a mindless B-action level. Plus, Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow are always a treat.

Non-dickhead Goku was the best part of DBE.

I kinda thought he was an ass. He trespasses in Roshi's home, and tries to beat him down. Yea, some of it was self-defense, but still. He also seemed big on beating on women-folk. The dickhead things manga Goku does (the gratuitous leaving of his family, for example) are generally Z era. You can't really compare the era Chatwin was supposed to be portraying Goku from to that.