Massive influx of hate towards GT - Where did it begin?

[Luke Groundwalker]

Now I'd like to establish first that I'm in no way a Dragonball GT apologist. There is so many reasons why, as a series, it's flawed to the point where people have beaten the horse on why Dragonball GT is so "shit" for close to an entire decade now.

What I am puzzled by is how extreme it is. To me, I don't really hate GT, I just find it uninspired in various ways. Then again, a lot of stuff from Z and the movies can be said to be uninspired, easily.

Where exactly did the extreme hatred for Dragonball GT start? While it's no doubt this was influenced by the internet, and Dragonball GT already got very low ratings in Japan. However before people really knew much about the series (aka when we got the Funimation dub) since when was there such a great amount of hatred?

Though back then the DB fanbase was completely alien to me, and I relied on the shittiness of early internet and magazines fuel my answers to what Dragonball GT was all about. To me, back then it was well known that there is Dragonball, Dragonball Z, and Dragonball GT as a complete trilogy of anime series detailing the entirety of Goku's life. Never did I encounter in those days that Dragonball GT was "non-canon" or it was "shit." For a good while, Dragonball GT was almost a thing of legend for American Z fans, which is where I primarily come from in my childhood and teenage years.

So these questions really shout out to people like VegettoEX and others who got into the series before the dub. Was Dragonball GT ever hated on this greatly by the fanbase as it is today in the late 90's? Did people view it was "non-canon"? Do you think the hatred for Dragonball GT stems from high expectations not being met with American fans, or by word-of-mouth that Dragonball GT "sucks"?

[NeoKING]

I agree in that DBGT was somewhat of a legend back in the day. I remember my classmates and neighbor always telling me about DBGT, a Super Saiyan 4, and the Shenlong saga, back in the late 90's to early 2000s.

[jjgp1112]

Yeah, like both of you guys said, GT was basically a legend to me back in the early '00s. I would always try to find things out about it with stuff like SSJ4, The Shadow Dragons, etc. Hell, at one point, me, being a naive 10 year old, actually wrote a letter to FUNimation asking when they would start dubbing it

[Krycek7o2]

Playing Final Bout with a Mod-chip on the old PSX (NOT PS1)!
Wondering how awesome it would be to see SSJ4 Goku in action! Good times! And then the real truth after downloading a crappy Real Media file and watching several episodes wondering; what is this crap! I spent eight hours downloading this! I guess, we all went along with the hype train, lol! I was barely up to the Freeza Saga. And then all of the sudden we got a glimpse of the future, that my friends and I all thought would be awesome!

[Tanooki Kuribo]

So these questions really shout out to people like VegettoEX and others who got into the series before the dub. Was Dragonball GT ever hated on this greatly by the fanbase as it is today in the late 90's? Did people view it was "non-canon"? Do you think the hatred for Dragonball GT stems from high expectations not being met with American fans, or by word-of-mouth that Dragonball GT "sucks"?

I think it was more popular as a story told to other fans than the actual series was. It all sounded awesome when someone was telling you Goku and his friends go to other planets to find Dragon Balls, there is a Super Saiyan 4 or Goku fights the Dragons. But then you sit down and actually watch it, and well you've seen it!

From my experience, no one talked about canon or non-canon. We were kids and I guess we just assumed everything wsas true. I mean, sure you could question it but, before the Internet was big where would you get the right information?

I gotta admit. When I got my first fan-sub of the first 3 episodes (sometime in early 1998) I enjoyed it. I don't know if it was because I felt it was like a secret series only me and my friends knew about or did I really enjoy it? I don't know but to this day the first few episodes are my favorite.

[Zeroplus]

Simple Answer.

February 7, 1996

[kei17]

Simple Answer.

February 7, 1996

Definitely. I already started hating GT just after they started the original run when I was in elementary school. I gave up watching the show around the first appearance of SSJ4. I always bitched about the design of SSJ4 while talking about GT with my friends at school (like "What the hell is that kabuki shit?! That's not Goku at all!").

[Chuquita]

This makes me wonder what actual kabuki Goku would look like....
SSJ4 always looked kind of 80's hair band to me.

I can't say I've ever noticed any increase in hate towards GT. I don't hate it, but I've grown apathetic towards it over time. There are bits and pieces I like in the series, but the series as a whole has too many plot-holes (plus they never brought base form or ssj 1-3 adult Goku back after that first episode and that soured part of the whole experience for me. I wouldn't mind if it was just for one arc, but if I want to watch child Goku, I'll watch the original DB.) and too many unpleasant character designs in my opinion. (Goten, Bulma, and "moostache" Vegeta are the top offenders for me.)

And, going in-universe for a moment, Goku's childish enough as an adult. Being back in that little kid body has got to mess with him psychologically at least a bit. Actually, I think picking a more "serious" character like Piccolo or Vegeta to be turned into a child for an arc would be a better choice because you'd have a bigger mining for humor.

[Bussani]

Massive influx of hate towards GT - Where did it begin?

When people saw it.

Seriously, though, I don't hate GT. Like you, I just find it quite flawed. I don't think there's a single idea in GT that I don't like, but like Tanooki said, it sounded better when people were describing it than it was when you finally watched it. That hasn't stopped me watching it multiple times and being entertained, however.

As for canon and non-canon, I don't think that should have anything to do with whether the series is "shit" or not. "Non-canon" isn't an insult.

[Mountain]

Lol. I totally agree with everyone about GT being a "legend". Just the idea of ssj4 and fusions beyond, the dragons, and whatever else brought excitement to many people. In the end, however, the actual show just didn't live up to everyone's expectations, which is exactly why I feel it is bashed so heavily today.

[Luke Groundwalker]

As for canon and non-canon, I don't think that should have anything to do with whether the series is "shit" or not. "Non-canon" isn't an insult.

I wasn't going for that, but you'd be surprised at the amount of people who say DBGT is shit cause it isn't canon to the manga.

There also seems to be this big misunderstanding that DBGT isn't canon period, even though it's never been said it isn't canon and is on the Daizenshuu timeline I believe. People constantly quote Toriyama saying it's a "side-story" as being a confirmation it's non-canon, but Toriyama has specifically said in the past in relation to non-canon things like the movies that he considers them to be like alternate universes, which he never described DBGT as such. DBGT is most definitely meant to be a canon continuation of the Dragonball Z anime, so I think it's misguided across the fanbase when you hear people saying it practically doesn't exist.

[dbgtFO]

As for canon and non-canon, I don't think that should have anything to do with whether the series is "shit" or not. "Non-canon" isn't an insult.

I wasn't going for that, but you'd be surprised at the amount of people who say DBGT is shit cause it isn't canon to the manga.

There also seems to be this big misunderstanding that DBGT isn't canon period, even though it's never been said it isn't canon and is on the Daizenshuu timeline I believe. People constantly quote Toriyama saying it's a "side-story" as being a confirmation it's non-canon, but Toriyama has specifically said in the past in relation to non-canon things like the movies that he considers them to be like alternate universes, which he never described DBGT as such. DBGT is most definitely meant to be a canon continuation of the Dragonball Z anime, so I think it's misguided across the fanbase when you hear people saying it practically doesn't exist.

Dragon Box GT says this about the series:

Well, after a total of 508 episodes, 3 TV specials, and almost 11 long years, the DragonBall TV series has finally come to an end! But what's this? There was more, you say? And it was filler, too?! Oh but don't worry, this isn't shoddy filler like DragonBall GT, these are the movies, some of the best DragonBall material out there!

So DBGT is not some of the best DB material out there and it's considered shoddy filler?
Apparently that's what they are implying.
Though it sounds like a joke statement more than anything.

As for me, I don't hate GT though my username comes from a time, where I disregarded GT for no good reason:
dbgtFO = dragon ball gt Fuck Off
After seeing some episodes of it, I can't say I agree with that statement anymore.
I think you'd probably be right, if you say that it's because of the show not living up to the expectations.

[Bussani]

There also seems to be this big misunderstanding that DBGT isn't canon period, even though it's never been said it isn't canon and is on the Daizenshuu timeline I believe. People constantly quote Toriyama saying it's a "side-story" as being a confirmation it's non-canon, but Toriyama has specifically said in the past in relation to non-canon things like the movies that he considers them to be like alternate universes, which he never described DBGT as such. DBGT is most definitely meant to be a canon continuation of the Dragonball Z anime, so I think it's misguided across the fanbase when you hear people saying it practically doesn't exist.

Most people who talk about Dragon Ball canon are mainly referring to the "manga canon". If I'm in a discussion about Vegeta's motivations in the manga, I really don't care what GT has to say about it.

is on the Daizenshuu timeline I believe.

I could be wrong, but I don't think this is the case. The GT Perfect Files have their own timeline.

People constantly quote Toriyama saying it's a "side-story" as being a confirmation it's non-canon, but Toriyama has specifically said in the past in relation to non-canon things like the movies that he considers them to be like alternate universes, which he never described DBGT as such.

Personally, I think using that as evidence either way is expecting too much consistency out of the man. I doubt he really thinks that hard about what is/isn't canon.

[Ashura]

At risk of revealing how much of an old frogurt I am... I remember when GT was airing, and the hate started fairly quickly. The perspective of an American fan at the time was a little different then; I remember waiting every week to read descriptions of the episodes posted on Usenet as they aired, and from that I recall the biggest issue people seemed to have with the show was that it focused on kid Goku and adventures searching for the Dragonballs and not huge Z-style battles.

Goku being a kid and not the big badass hero was the first thing they picked on. At the time, this excited me because I had LOVED the original Dragonball stuff that had aired a little earlier. By the time GT was ending, Funimation had begun to get into the early Freeza stuff and that just didn't interest me even as much as the Saiyan stuff did. (I will say though, that Kai has totally redeemed the Freeza storyline for me.)

One of the other biggest reactions was about Vegeta's newest design. EVERYONE hated on the mustache, despite the fact that Toriyama designed all the main characters. But then, the fact that Toriyama wasn't writing it was one of the other complaints.

It seemed through the descriptions every week that Toei's reaction was to sort of try to posthumously Z-it-back-to-life. The results seemed mixed, and SSJ4 Goku had his lovers and haters. I remember the big rumour at the time of the end of the Super Baby stuff was that it was going to end there, but suddenly they put together the Evil Shenlong stuff because Bandai was putting out the Final Bout game and wanted a TV tie-in for it. I don't know how much of that is fact or fiction, but I know a lot of people seemed to think this idea was accurate. I wish there was some research into its veracity.

Also, I think Super Baby was a point of contention to some people as well... 'Super Baby? That sounds so stupid!!!!' ... and then it's like 'Yeah, because Buu was that much more genius.' A lot of the things people hated on at the time had nothing to do with pacing or storyline, but because things had been changed from the Z formula.

To their credit, the Evil Shenlong stuff actually was a much stronger, more clever storyline in my mind. Turning our heroes' greatest asset against them, showing how this group of characters has abused the system, nay, the entire balance of the universe. It seemed like the logical big bad to culminate after close to 500 episodes to me. Whatever you say about the whole series, the ending to GT seems more meaty than Z's actual ending to me.

I really don't know how much that mattered to most fans at the time; probably not very much.

After the show had aired and gone off to wherever shows go after they end in Japan, I think the schoolyard legends of GT and SSJ4 Goku sort of grew as DBZ picked up again in America and the people who were fans of Dragonball were less and less college kids or whoever had access to bad fansubs and raws and more people who had watched it on Cartoon Network.

I'm pretty sure by that time I had seen most of the first arc, and then had watched the final episodes in raw Japanese.

[MasterVampire]

I think it began at the start when they nerfed Goku and made him into a Kid again.

[CatouttaHell]

I think it began at the start when they nerfed Goku and made him into a Kid again.

What's wrong with Chibi Goku?

And how exactly is he nerfed? The GT Perfect Files stated he didn't get weaker from being turned back into a kid. And GT itself shows us that GT Base Goku > GT SSjin Gohan. Not nerfed at all.

[Kroni_Hunter]

Honestly, I think things started to boil over when the GT dub was released. This was the first version of GT I ever saw and I remember cringing at it's shittiness. And keep in mind this is coming from a fan of the Z dub. I still remember hearing that "Grand Tour" song for the first time...

[Herms]

There also seems to be this big misunderstanding that DBGT isn't canon period, even though it's never been said it isn't canon and is on the Daizenshuu timeline I believe.

No, GT events aren't included in the Daizenshuu 7 timeline, for logistical reasons if nothing else: the book came out after only the first few GT episodes aired. The first GT Perfect Files book though contains a timeline that's basically a reprint of all the Saiyan/Tsufruian-related entries from the daizenshuu timeline but with GT events thrown in.

Dragon Box GT says this about the series:

Well, after a total of 508 episodes, 3 TV specials, and almost 11 long years, the DragonBall TV series has finally come to an end! But what's this? There was more, you say? And it was filler, too?! Oh but don't worry, this isn't shoddy filler like DragonBall GT, these are the movies, some of the best DragonBall material out there!

That quote's not from the actual Dragon Box GT, it's just something Hujio or DBW wrote for the boxset's Kanzentai DVD guide page.

[The Tori-bot]

dbgtFO, you might wanna change your signature...

[dbgtFO]

That quote's not from the actual Dragon Box GT, it's just something Hujio or DBW wrote for the boxset's Kanzentai DVD guide page.

Heh, I always thought it seemed like a weird thing to say about your product. Now that I know the truth it makes more sense.

dbgtFO, you might wanna change your signature...

Yeah.