Tension in Ressurection "F"

[RedRibbonSoldier#42]

the dramatic tension in Dragonball Z has always been "how can our heroes ever hope to beat this mighty villain?!" but in Ressurection "F" it's more like: "how can our villain ever hope to beat our mighty heroes"? The Z warrior's greatest moments always come when they rise to face impossible odds. ( Freeza rising after surviving Goku's final and best attack, the spirit bomb. Gohan at half power staring down a stronger than ever Cell's solar Kamehameha. Vegeta giving his life in a desperate move to take out the invulnerable Boo.) But Freeza has been a joke for a while now before the film, and now we are expected to fear him again? Instead of our heroes despairing at the immense power of their foe, the movie has to make up BS ad hoc power ups to even give Freeza a fighting chance. Sure, everyone says that Freeza is terrifying and strong but do you, the audience, really buy that? Do you ever really feel what the movie wants you to feel?

[fadeddreams5]

I don't even know what this movie wants me to feel. Maybe indigestion.

[RedRibbonSoldier#42]

I don't even know what this movie wants me to feel. Maybe indigestion.

somehow.....i don't think that's what they were going for.

[SpiritBombTriumphant]

That's what is different about this film. For Battle of Gods, Toriyama stated that he didn't want it to be the usual "Goku gets a power up and beats the bad guy" but rather loses and makes a new friend. With the God of Destruction! Resurrection 'F' isn't completely about who can beat who, but for a first for Goku (and possibly the Z portion of the series), it's about his development as a character/fighter. He changes from the beginning of the film to the end. In the beginning of the film (well, when Goku/Vegeta first appear), Whis states that

Spoiler:

Goku is too laid back and relaxed and lets his guard down because he's over confident. Vegeta is too tense and angry--he needs to be more relaxed. This film is about their dealing with their mental attitudes towards fighting and overcoming their challenge to be better fighters.

The big moment of the film isn't truly the new forms Goku, Vegeta and Frieza sport, but rather the moment where Goku gets hit by a "standard ray gun" and nearly killed by it. He was over confident, relaxed, and after 3 attempts at his life too damn forgiving to Frieza. This time his nonchalant attitude cost him Earth and almost everyone he knows. The point of this was to show that he needs to be more aggressive and finish some people (like Frieza) off rather than give the yet another opportunity to kill everyone.

There was also an interview where Toriyama stated that the reason the new SSJG form is blue--he wanted it to reflect Goku's calm and laid back nature. It's been shown that the color blue gives off a more relaxed feel while red makes people feel more aggressive. A reason the SSJG form in Battle of Gods was red was due to Toriyama not liking blue for it not seeming "aggressive" enough (I forget the word he used).

TL;DR The film isn't about the fighting but rather Goku and Vegeta overcoming their character flaws. It was about character development for the first time ever in this series (and of course, good old ass kicking).

[Doctor.]

It wasn't about character development. It was about character regression. The movie made it its job to introduce a character flaw that wasn't there in the first place only to give the illusion that it's developing its characters. Even then, no development occurred at all, at the end of the movie both Goku and Vegeta agree they still won't fight together, they learned nothing from the experience, it's a pointless and useless movie.

Goku had already learned how to kill prior to F. He learned it back in the Freeza arc when Freeza back-stabbed him. That's why he kills Yakon and Boo and that's why he has no problem saying he'll kill Cell and Dabra. His portrayal in F, someone who puts his desire to fight above everything under any circumstance, is outdated and is no longer Goku. And he also had learned how to stop being overconfident, he learned it the hard way with Mr. Popo's training and later on preaches to his enemies, like the Ginyu Force, that they shouldn't underestimate their opponents and let their guard down, he's just being awfully cocky in the film to such a degree where he's out of character.

[dbgtFO]

I think any tension the movie tries to force onto us goes out the window, when Freeza is cowering in front of Beerus. Even in his own movie Freeza is a punchline for a joke, rather than a serious enemy. I also didn't like Vegeta interrupting their fight, as it just seemed like they weren't taking Freeza seriously and it was more like a training session like against Whis, than actually a life and death battle against a terrifying enemy.

[BlazingFiddlesticks]

Having now seen the movie, I now have to read Toriyama's comment as "I wrote Battle of Gods again, then realized there was no fighting, so I added fighting on top of an already finished idea." Which leaves us with an action movie that is too self-aware to take itself seriously (action movies taking themselves seriously often being one of the funniest things about them), and a character comedy that is too often interrupted by that dastardly plot to keep its momentum. It really does look like Toriyama just wrote up an idea and script for a movie one day and Toei just adapted it straight with no editorial suggestions at all. I knew Resurrection F was going to be a big drop off from Battle of Gods, but I just wasn't prepared for this.

Whis's charges to Goku and Vegeta were pretty spot-on, I thought, just amounting to nothing in the movie itself. Does anyone know how to write a slightly-mellow Vegeta? Between this and what little we have of Super it looks like Toei and Toriyama just want their angry rival back.

[Akyon]

Forget if I think Freeza's a genuine threat; do the characters in-universe even?

On the one hand Krillin looks somewhat scared when he hears Freeza's brought back to life...but his immediate thought is to bring Master Roshi of all people to take him on. Master Roshi who last we checked wasn't even a match for Raditz.

Hell; they had to get rid of Majin Buu and Gotenks and make Goku, Vegeta, Beerus and Whis be in another place entirely to make Freeza even in his new threat seem like he could possibly handle the Z fighters. Gohan getting taken out was probably the only part that made Freeza seem powerful, but even then it was a sucker punch attack directly to the heart.

[Lord Beerus]

I understand you gripe about the lack of tension in the movie. The time placement of the movie really worked against it because you knew for a fact that Freeza would bite the dust and that earth and the Z-Fighters would make it out okay.

[h0kuten]

The movie was an absolute mess and did next to nothing for the characters, the story, or the fans. It really seemed like Toei & Toriyama simply made it for the sake of pulling in some extra money, before starting back towards the Majin Buu saga and re-writing over it.

[Lord Beerus]

The movie was an absolute mess and did next to nothing for the characters, the story, or the fans. It really seemed like Toei & Toriyama simply made it for the sake of pulling in some extra money, before starting back towards the Majin Buu saga and re-writing over it.

This thread disagrees with you in that regard.

[h0kuten]

The movie was an absolute mess and did next to nothing for the characters, the story, or the fans. It really seemed like Toei & Toriyama simply made it for the sake of pulling in some extra money, before starting back towards the Majin Buu saga and re-writing over it.

This thread disagrees with you in that regard.

I know MANY DBZ fans from other forums who would completely agree with me.

[Ajay]

I know MANY DBZ fans from other forums who would completely agree with me.

While I don't love Revival of 'F' by any means, you're not exactly saying very much with that statement. The Dragon Ball fandom is notoriously terrible outside of this forum.

[Baggie_Saiyan]

The movie was an absolute mess and did next to nothing for the characters, the story, or the fans. It really seemed like Toei & Toriyama simply made it for the sake of pulling in some extra money, before starting back towards the Majin Buu saga and re-writing over it.

This thread disagrees with you in that regard.

Following on from that going on Twitter and searching #DBZRF the response the movie has been way too overwhelming, you have people saying "this is the greatest movie ever" or "I would rate it 20/10" etc etc I don't think you should be speaking on behalf of everyone else just because you had a bad experience with the movie.

[Gyt Kaliba]

I know MANY DBZ fans from other forums who would completely agree with me.

While I don't love Revival of 'F' by any means, you're not exactly saying very much with that statement. The Dragon Ball fandom is notoriously terrible outside of this forum.

Hell, in all fairness and at the same time meaning no offense to anyone in particular, it's pretty terrible plenty of times here too.

I haven't actually seen the film yet (seems like I won't get to theaters for this one either, gah!), but having read just about everything there is available about it...really the only major thing that to me makes it lack tension is establishing so early on that Whis can take us back in time to correct things. I mean, I can see why they did it - if they just brought it up towards the end of the film without establishing it at all, it would have felt completely out of the blue. But maybe that would have actually been a lesser evil in comparison to us being able to see the ending coming a mile away?

Freeza popping up stronger than ever, but not actually strong enough to be a 'true' threat due to rushing back without really getting used to his new form? All of that I'm fine with. Outside of the old movies and filler stuff, we've never had a "pseudo-canon" story that had a villain come back from the dead. We've never had one come back stronger to the point of being a challenge despite having been outclassed for so long. And we've never gotten to see it all be for naught either.

Again, I haven't actually seen the movie, but based on impressions I've gotten from other people, the film tries to walk a tightrope in regards to Freeza's new level of power. He's stronger than we'd ever have imagined him being able to get, but at the same time, he's still not as big of a deal as one might have expected given what we had with Beerus in the previous film. Having the main threat following a previous one actually be weaker than the previous one is something else we'd never had before, so it's interesting in that regard, at least to me. Whether the film actually succeeds with this new attempt on telling a story, is up for debate of course.

[SpiritBombTriumphant]

It wasn't about character development. It was about character regression. The movie made it its job to introduce a character flaw that wasn't there in the first place only to give the illusion that it's developing its characters. Even then, no development occurred at all, at the end of the movie both Goku and Vegeta agree they still won't fight together, they learned nothing from the experience, it's a pointless and useless movie.

Not quite. Goku is known for being too naive and forgiving. He tried sparing Freeza on Namek despite the fact that he was responsible for hte death of the Saiyan race, the Namekian race, his best friend, Piccolo and almost his son as well. Then after Freeza was dying he spared him again only to be attacked. It took a teenager to finish off Freeza until this movie, where even now Goku still has compassion and thinks something like Freeza could change and become good. This isn't a new problem either, as we saw when Goku fought Raditz and right before fighting Kid Buu on Elder Kai's homeworld. Goku kills when he has to, as he is the one who killed Freeza in Trunks's timeline as well as Kid Buu and almost Cell.

The movie was an absolute mess and did next to nothing for the characters, the story, or the fans.

Dragon Ball Z is and always has been about fighting. It is not a series known for its plot or anything, so don't use "story" as a casualty of the film. What this show is about is fighting and watching good overpower evil. Goku becoming stronger and achieving his goals and then creating new ones to work up to. We want fighting with the latest animation and ass kicking and this film delivered. So you can take "the fans" out of the casualty list too. And finally, there is character development regarding the flaws of Goku and Vegeta, especially their rivalry (although mainly the relaxed/aggressive traits they have). So arguably "the characters" has to be removed too.

It really seemed like Toei & Toriyama simply made it for the sake of pulling in some extra money

That is the reason they made it. Toei understands that people still want more Dragon Ball and a simple glorified edit of crap from the 80s/90s won't cut it, so we get a new movie and now Super. But rest assured it's for the money and that if this movie had done poorly we would not be getting anything more.

[Doctor.]

Not quite. Goku is known for being too naive and forgiving. He tried sparing Freeza on Namek despite the fact that he was responsible for hte death of the Saiyan race, the Namekian race, his best friend, Piccolo and almost his son as well. Then after Freeza was dying he spared him again only to be attacked. It took a teenager to finish off Freeza until this movie, where even now Goku still has compassion and thinks something like Freeza could change and become good. This isn't a new problem either, as we saw when Goku fought Raditz and right before fighting Kid Buu on Elder Kai's homeworld. Goku kills when he has to, as he is the one who killed Freeza in Trunks's timeline as well as Kid Buu and almost Cell.

Yes, Goku didn't want to finish off Freeza.

This isn't the same Goku.

This 'development' of his in the film is the same thing he did on Namek: give him a bunch of chances to go away, then finish him off when he has no options left. He didn't learn anything at all, he should have learned from the first time, back on Namek, that he needs to finish off his enemies for the better of his friends and family. And one may argue that he DID, hence why he kills Yakon and Boo, and why he kept saying he'd kill Dabra and Cell. RF suddenly bringing that aspect of Goku's personality back, when it was long gone, made him regress.

[Baggie_Saiyan]

This 'development' of his in the film is the same thing he did on Namek: give him a bunch of chances to go away, then finish him off when he has no options left. He didn't learn anything at all, he should have learned from the first time, back on Namek, that he needs to finish off his enemies for the better of his friends and family. And one may argue that he DID, hence why he kills Yakon and Boo, and why he kept saying he'd kill Dabra and Cell. RF suddenly bringing that aspect of Goku's personality back, when it was long gone, made him regress.

Not really, Goku only killed Buu because he had too,(just like he ended up killing Freeza because he had too with Earth blowing up etc) that whole speech before he killed Buu you can tell Goku didn't really want to kill him, for that reason he was re-incarnated as Uub and that is why he kept Fat Buu around too, if Goku truly had changed then he would have let Vegeta kill Fat Buu too, besides Goku has a soft spot for Freeza anywa, before they started frighting he said Freeza would make a good ally if he wasn't so evil.

[Doctor.]

It doesn't really matter if Goku didn't want to kill Boo, he still ended up doing it with no hesitation, he didn't give him a chance to survive, not to Kid Boo or any of his other forms.

[Baggie_Saiyan]

But it never got the point where Buu had a chance to survive with Goku being in control though infact Goku said himself he could have killed Fat Buu when he went SS3 and he didn't.