Dragon Ball Refuses To Move Forward

[Zephyr]

I think DBO works as kind of epilogue and similar to GT's ending. After taking care of all the major threats in the universe, the main cast lives out the rest of their lives in peace. I feel that's how almost every shonen series ends that allows the characters to age. The universe isn't going to keep conjuring up stronger and stronger villains forever. Eventually they'll face off against the strongest villain of their story and not much left after that. In DBO, it showed the only threat they faced in their lifetime was some remnants of Freeza's army then it took a few hundred years for a real threat to emerge.

It definitely does work as an epilogue of sorts, in that it reveals character fates, but part of my point is that it's still not a story in itself. It's just lore we learn about in the abstract. The other part of my point is that much of this lore exists to explain where the game's playable races and classes come from. It's there to contextualize gameplay, as is the norm for video games.

Does that make the lore bad or unfitting? Does that mean it isn't still what Toriyama had in mind for character fates? No, not necessarily. They are still character fates cooked up by the man himself. But I personally don't think it was ever meant to be much more than context for a video game, and were Toriyama around long enough to actually write stories taking place around Age 800, I wouldn't have been remotely surprised if it contradicted a ton of what DBO said. Just like how Daima's new lore contradicted a ton of lore that Toriyama had previously said in interviews about Kaioshin and the Demon Realm.

I guess, for me, it’s like…the epilogue is just that…an epilogue. The meat and potatoes of the story ends when Goku obliterates Majin Boo. We get the further adventures of Goku and friends with Super and Daima so…so what if it’s before the 10 years later epilogue? It’s still after the last main event of the original manga. I know interquel stories can be frustrating because there’s a status quo to maintain. This is what made those Disney “sequels” that usually took place in the middle of the original movie so annoying when I was a kid. By their nature they can’t have actual stakes because the story has to work without them. The Fox and the Hound still got to be friends because they didn’t have a falling out until they were adults. But Dragon Ball Super in particular doesn’t seem all that concerned with if it contradicts the manga’s ending or not. They’ll pay lip service by referring to Oob’s God ki (however that works?) or Gohan still being a nerd and studying in Super Dee Duper Hero but that’s about it. 10 years of peace and not seeing much of each other since Boo was defeated is all thrown out the window. Super is already a sequel to Z that just happens to take place “before the epilogue” that might as well not exist in Super’s canon at this point.

Definitely disagree there. It does feel much more like strictly an epilogue now, with Super and Daima in the mix, but it is still the conclusion of the Boo arc. Goku leaves to train and fight with the reincarnation of the foe he vanquished and asked for a rematch with just two chapters prior. Anyone doing a read/watch through who doesn't read/watch it before moving onto Daima, Super, or whatever, is just as much my enemy as someone who skips the first six story arcs lol.

And you can call the Oob stuff "lipservice", but they didn't have to do that. The 28th Tenkaichi Budokai still happens after Super, and contradictions truly extremely do not matter, especially in a story like Dragon Ball.

[Artorias]

Having all these stories take place in a time period that was established to have been peaceful directly goes against the ending you're defending.

No, it doesn't. It is peaceful to the Earth.

The Tournament of Destroyers saga, the Future Trunks saga, the Tournament of Power saga, and the Granolah the Survivor saga happened entirely outside of the Earth.

As for the arcs that happened within the Earth - Beerus, Broly, and the Cell Max did not actually kill or destroy any civilian on Earth.

The only antagonists in Super who actively endangered the lives of the humans were Freeza with his destruction of the planet and Moro with his stealing of the energy. Freeza's actions, however, were undone by Whis, leaving Moro as the only antagonist who actively caused harm to the humans and the Earth as a whole. One day in 10 years. That's still peaceful.

Nothing's being contradicted.

You are bending over backwards to try and retroactively justify something that clearly was not the original intent. Everyone knows that Toriyama did not intend for there to be this many insane, multiverse level battles during the "10 years of peace".

You're genuinely arguing that the following statement makes sense: "In between Buu and Goku training Uub, there were 10 years of peace. Oh except the time a God of Destruction came and nearly wiped out Earth. Oh and also when Freeza was revived and tried to wipe out Earth. Also that one time there where our heroes went to Future Trunks's timeline and defended his Earth and were nearly killed several times. Oh and ALSO that one time there was a multiversal tournament where the punishment for losing was the universe being deleted. Oh AND ALSO BTW that one time a magical goat man showed up and nearly wiped out Earth."

Come on, at some point it just becomes comical. This clearly was not how this was originally envisioned to go. It is about as blatant of a contradiction as I can feasibly imagine in a story.

I don't know how you can somehow find it MORE sacrilegious to just go past EoZ than to shove in this many ludicrous, potentially universe-ending threats into what was labeled as a "time of peace". One of these things seems far more disrespectful to the original story than the other.

[JulieYBM]

Toriyama outright said he was writing Super as if he had never ended the series after the Majin Buu arc, so clearly he was tossing a lot of those little details about the ten year period out. And that's a good thing! Toss a curveball at our balls, surprise and shock us!

Fans bending over backwards as A Bit to explain inconsistencies away is a waste of time. There is no substance to it. It's the same annoying pretzel shit that Geoff Johns does to try to explain old DC Comics storylines he doesn't like. Girl, just fucking ignore it and focus on making the new stories interesting!

This is going to be bitchy, but 98% of the continuity wonks who opine about this stuff have never written a story in their lives. They do not have their priorities in line and it ultimately makes the entire storytelling analysis more of a headache than it needs to be.

[The Dark Knight]

You're genuinely arguing that the following statement makes sense: "In between Buu and Goku training Uub, there were 10 years of peace. Oh except the time a God of Destruction came and nearly wiped out Earth.

This statement would be acceptable if it stopped at one event, as in Battle of Gods alone took place during that time period, then everything moved beyond the End of Z starting with Resurrection F.

[kprison]

I agreed with the initial thesis about everything since Battle of Gods being a thinly veiled copy of the old; a cynical attempt to repackage the old rather than genuinely pushing anything forward, and in the few instances it does push forward, it's not good, because its missing the production environment that made the original work.

However he loses me in the 2nd half. IF Super has to be a thing. it needs a remake because it's bad, and ugly, even the movies are bad and ugly. You can't seriously expect anyone to watch it in the current state because it's so bad and ugly. He understates the production woes, you have episodes falling apart as late as the Goku Black arc.

I'm laying it out in a tongue in cheek way but that is the reality of the situation.

He acts as if it's lazy to reuse assets from Super which is just silly. That's the absolute best thing to do without wasting resources. Kai is a bad comparison because, while similar production wise, its goal is very different. Z was already a fine show, it didn't *need* a re-edit. Super desperately needs fixing just to meet basic standards you'd expect from any piece of entertainment.

His assertion that FMS Brotherhood didn't reuse *anything* from 03 is... dubious, let's say. The brothers' teacher is in the background of a scene where she canonically shouldn't be, but she was in that scene in 03, an error that suggests to me that even they were referencing the older anime. Of course they were, you'd be silly to ignore a previous template for a project you're also undertaking. If FMA Brotherhood was adapting the same story, just improving it, they'd probably have reused assets too.

I also don't want a remake of the original show because I know with like 80% certainty it won't be as good. They wouldn't bring back Kikuchi, the actors are increasingly struggling to give good performances (the video games of the past 5 years are sounding *very* rough) at this point the cast would most likely die before it finished. You'll also lose a lot of the cool worldbuilding that's anime only. I don't want it revised in the public consciousness, I like the old adaptation, imperfections and all. If someone wants a tight version, the manga exists. It's one of the most cinematic manga you'll ever read, too.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

the actors are increasingly struggling to give good performances (the video games of the past 5 years are sounding *very* rough) at this point the cast would most likely die before it finished.

I suspect the reason a remake of the original series hasn't happened yet because of Nozawa's advanced age. Super Kai may be her swan song but TOEI (hopefully) wouldn't put her through doing hundreds of episodes again.

I agree Kikuchi will be hard, if not impossible to top (though Tokunaga came close) but I'm willing to give new composers a chance.

It is inevitable though.

[JulieYBM]

The point of a second animated adaption would be working with new actors and musicians and production staff. The 1986 series is over and its leadership is long gone as it is.