I promise this isn't a hate thread, but why are so many DB fans so ignorant?

[Forte224]

I'm not referring to here by the way. This place is like a safe haven for me. I don't post much but I do a ton of reading here and most heads seem to be on straight. But it's when I look almost literally anywhere else I see mind numbingly terrible posts from people that act like huge fans but have no idea what they're talking about. People that are like "Bro these days the Funi actors are trying to mimic the Ocean ones" or "Don't worry guys Funi will fix the bad animation" or "The Dragon Balls can only grant 1 wish not 2 lol Super is trash and inconsistent" are actual things I've heard more than once. These aren't even the best examples but are just ones I could think of off the top of my head.

Is it just because the show is so popular that it attracts a very large casual audience as well? It seems to attract people that could care less about anime otherwise, so maybe that's it? I don't see this type of consistent ignorance in other fanbases.

Man, this sounds kinda like a hate thread now. It really isn't intended to be so, I'm just curious what all your observations are. Thank you all for being so consistently level headed here, by the way. It feels like a fan of any version of the show, even the OG Funi stuff can survive just fine here as long as they don't get toxic (Japanese fan here, though I grew up with Ocean and OG Funi but only prefer Kai for English these days, still hoping Ocean Kai gets released)

[KBABZ]

As a fan of Ratchet & Clank, I blame the combination of the original demographic (kids) mixed with the target audience introduced by Funimation in the West (early teens). When Ratchet & Clank got to Up Your Arsenal, the humour got a lot more vulgar and sexual, and it attracted a subsection of fans who are there to "feel" like they're watching adult badass awesome content (I call this the South Park effect, where you're watching a cartoon that is badass and certainly not Hey Arnold! or Dexter's Lab). DBZ I imagine had the same thing, where people punch themselves into mountains and spit out blood, and it attracts a sect of thirteen year old hooligans who think they're the hot s*** and won't let anyone tell them otherwise.

Despite this having long moved on due to Super and the more... (how do I put it?) accurately-cheesy presentation in Kai's openings and whatnot, this part of the fanbase has endured. Again similar to R&C, there are a fair few vocal fans who wish that the devs didn't "dumb down" the later games for kids, and bring up examples of the OG games being rated T for Teen while the later ones were rated E10+. Now time and again I bring up the fact that A) E10+ didn't exist until PS3 and B) When those games were ported to PS3, they were rated E10+, but they don't listen and keep blowing the same vuvuzela-like arguments because they want their own little bubble to be correct. Sound familiar?

This is most likely a generalization, but to me the main point of separation between DBZ Fandumb and someone who's a more wholesome and intelligent fan is honestly how much they respect, acknowledge and have an interest in the japanese side of the franchise. Things like the manga, accurate translations, original character names, japanese voice actors, the worth they see in the Dragon Boxes, etc. If you're so sensitive to knowing the franchise as it exists inside the little bubble of the original Dubs that any suggestion of, say, Korin's name being spelt with an A, feels like an offense to your worldview, you are not a rational fan of the series.

[MaskedRider]

Oh yeah I feel you. I watch any dragon ball video on youtube and I always regret scrolling down onto the comments. There are a lot of people who aren't as invested or are unaware of the plethora of knowledge that the franchise has. It has got to a point for me that when I see what I consider a buzz word / phrase when it comes to reading discussion on dragon ball that I just stop reading and continue scrolling down.

You could explain with facts and bring up good points but they almost always say, "Well I still think its just dumb :/" and you think back to all the time you took to typing up your responses and have the internal rage of one thousand hot white suns. I'm American but I feel like a lot of the discussion that makes us heated comes from a LARGE casual American audience.

[Cipher]

Because 1) it really is a very silly series, but more than that 2) it was marketed consciously to the lowest common-denominator in Western regions (which is presumably what you're talking about).

Sorry/not sorry. We might be looking at a different experience if FUNimation hadn't pushed Z out the door with a functional nu-metal aesthetic. We'll never know now.

Rock the fucking dragon, my friends.

[Forte224]

Oh yeah I feel you. I watch any dragon ball video on youtube and I always regret scrolling down onto the comments. There are a lot of people who aren't as invested or are unaware of the plethora of knowledge that the franchise has. It has got to a point for me that when I see what I consider a buzz word / phrase when it comes to reading discussion on dragon ball that I just stop reading and continue scrolling down.

You could explain with facts and bring up good points but they almost always say, "Well I still think its just dumb :/" and you think back to all the time you took to typing up your responses and have the internal rage of one thousand hot white suns. I'm American but I feel like a lot of the discussion that makes us heated comes from a LARGE casual American audience.

Yeah you are pretty much summing up how I feel. You too KBABZ. But yeah that buzz word phrase stuff is so common. And it doesn't matter what criticisms come their way they just like it as long as Funimation produced it. Magetta being the most recent example. But anyway, yes it's definitely from the casual American audience, of which I used to be a part of. Funnyily enough it's the scene in my avatar gif that made me finally stray away from the OG dub. I heard how awesome Sabat sounded in the Kai version of this scene that I broke away from nostalgia and actually learned about the franchise. This lead to me accepting and finally loving the Japanese version. Hope others can find the same thing someday.

Anyway, I'm straying off topic because I'm tired. Main reason this whole thing bugs me is that they act like super hardcore fans. I am friends with someone like this. He thinks he knows all this inside info on Dragon Ball but he's only watched Z and hates how Goku sounds like a woman in Japanese, not to mention all his inside info is wrong.

Sorry/not sorry. We might be looking at a different experience if FUNimation hadn't pushed Z out the door with a functional nu-metal aesthetic. We'll never know now.

I honestly believe if we had gotten an accurate dub (with maybe some light TV edits so moms didn't freak out) and the original score from the start, Dragon Ball would be just as popular today as it is now. I attribute no credit whatsoever to the Faulconer Productions side of things for its success

[Cipher]

I honestly believe if we had gotten an accurate dub (with maybe some light TV edits so moms didn't freak out) and the original score from the start, Dragon Ball would be just as popular today as it is now. I attribute no credit whatsoever to the Faulconer Productions side of things for its success

I tend to agree, but who can really say?

I'll point out that "Dragon Ball Z: The Nu Metal Experience" predates anyone from Faulconer Productions coming on board though, going back to the re-versioning of the series done with Saban. FUNimation would be the correct party to target there (circa the mid-'90s).

Whether it would be exactly as popular or not, I don't think it would have the same kind of sphere of "ignorance" around it, as outlined in your opening post. At least not to the same extent.

(That's because I think that presentation tended and still tends to attract a moronic adult fanbase, and I'm trying to be nice enough not to say it outright.)

[KBABZ]

I honestly believe if we had gotten an accurate dub (with maybe some light TV edits so moms didn't freak out) and the original score from the start, Dragon Ball would be just as popular today as it is now. I attribute no credit whatsoever to the Faulconer Productions side of things for its success

Shaped like itself?

I think the broadcast of Kai on Nick took the right tack; make whatever edits are needed for the network without changing the lore and characters, but present it uncut in fullscreen on the Blu-ray.

[Cure Dragon 255]

Because 1) it really is a very silly series, but more than that 2) it was marketed consciously to the lowest common-denominator inthe usa, because Latin America also exists and isnt under Funimation's thumb (which is presumably what you're talking about).

Sorry/not sorry. We might be looking at a different experience if FUNimation hadn't pushed Z out the door with a functional nu-metal aesthetic. We'll never know now.

Rock the fucking dragon, my friends.

Fix'd. But yeah. You are right Cipher ROCK THE DRAGON!

[DragonBallLove]

Because 1) it really is a very silly series, but more than that 2) it was marketed consciously to the lowest common-denominator inthe usa, because Latin America also exists and isnt under Funimation's thumb (which is presumably what you're talking about).

Sorry/not sorry. We might be looking at a different experience if FUNimation hadn't pushed Z out the door with a functional nu-metal aesthetic. We'll never know now.

Rock the fucking dragon, my friends.

Fix'd. But yeah. You are right Cipher ROCK THE DRAGON!

I was thinking the same think. But nevertheless the latin fandom suffers from the very same dilemma the OP adresses. I guess is the show's accesibility.

[IAmTheMilkMan]

I attribute no credit whatsoever to the Faulconer Productions side of things for its success

Dragon Ball Z with the Shuki Levy score was already wildly popular in the states before Faulconer ever came along, so much so that the demand for more dubbed episodes allowed Funimation to continue with the rest of the series. So, yes, I agree with you 100% that the score had nothing to do with Dragon Ball Z's success stateside.

As an aside, when I was a kid, and all I had to go on was Funimation's dubbed content, the only music from Dragon Ball that actually stood out to me was the score from Dead Zone, and I loved it. I didn't give a rat's fanny about the Shuki Levy or Faulconer scores.

[Cipher]

I was being a little ethno-geographic-centric and using "Western" to refer to the Northern Western hemisphere (not just the U.S., because Canada and the UK suffered our re-versioning as well), as separate from Latin America.

Sorry guys. That was uncool.

[8000 Saiyan]

A lot of fanbases have people who tend to be this way, so it shouldn't be surprising.

[ABED]

A lot of fanbases have people who tend to be this way, so it shouldn't be surprising.

True. Even in the same show, fans have misconceptions and different interpretations of scenes and characters. And that's just taking into account shows where there's just one version. DB's dub makes so many egregious errors and changes that it's not surprising there are so many misconceptions.

[Bryesque]

Sorry/not sorry. We might be looking at a different experience if FUNimation hadn't pushed Z out the door with a functional nu-metal aesthetic. We'll never know now.

"Functional nu-metal aesthetic" That's perfect.

I've got no grudge against Funimation for how the show was handled back then; heck, the late '90s and early 2000s were all about that "TO THE EXXXTREME" tone and style, so part of me feels DBZ getting that treatment at that point in time was almost unavoidable. And I'm thankful Funi has made an effort to skew closer to the source material since, at least. But yeah, there's still a pretty pervasive misunderstanding of what the series is among a lot of folks.

[BlazingFiddlesticks]

What ignorance are we referring too here, though? A lot of just sounds like people with very different levels of investment- which is not a problem at all.

Details of the animation process are several orders of magnitude deeper than this show is really expecting viewers to dig, and I can't blame anyone who doesn't discuss the thing on a regular basis for confusing genuine minutia like the number of wishes Shenron can make at any given time; I never remember his being able to make 3 but that's how it is now! As VegettoEX often says, he, (and "we" those who enjoy the content the four site managers provide) know too much about Dragon Ball.

I can certainly see Americans who remember Dragon Ball in the lens they did during Toonami's prime being surprised by how little Super resembles that product and how little FUNimation has tried to hide that fact. We're all having that reaction to some degree. But I don't think that disappoint is anything in need of "correction"; they will take new Dragon Ball media on its terms or they won't.

[TheGreatness25]

While I generally agree with you, I have not seen any -- not-a one -- instance where someone said what you pointed to in your opening post. It makes me wonder who you're talking to or which sites you're frequenting. I can name three (not including this one) forums where yes, sometimes the topics and discussions are frustrating, but they never come close to that. If this is a Reddit or YouTube thing, then hell, you're just asking for it by reading that stuff.

It all depends on what you mean by "ignorant." There's ignorant to the story and then there's ignorant in general. To me, the majority of what I've encountered was ignorance in the form of "fans" who criticize other fans for liking a dub or for liking Goku's Japanese voice, or whatnot. To me that's ignorance because we all have preferences and to me, it's ignorant to say that someone is more of a fan of the series than someone else just because of their preference in how to watch it.

Ignorance to the actual series, though, is quite a confusing thing to me. The series has been around forever through various different incarnations. Even if you haven't watched it or read it, you can find information on it with the snap of the fingers (mostly through Dragon Ball wiki, as it's usually the first result whenever you Google something on Dragon Ball), but the info is still readily available. So I don't understand that.

If you're legitimately encountering those kinds of fans, please understand that you're the adult in the room surrounded by kids because that level of criticism, thought process (regarding editing and stuff), and not even taking the 20 seconds that it would take to Google a question for fact-checking, leads me to believe that they're kids.

[ABED]

FUNi's overly heroic Goku has lead to a number of misconceptions about the nature of the character and even the story.

[TheGreatness25]

At least Funimation's version is the official English version of the series, so following it still makes sense. While Funimation messed up on it a lot, the casual fan shouldn't have to go seeking out the original version and watch over 400 episodes to follow the story. That boo-boo is on the company, not on the fan. So calling the fans out for following that version is also, actually, ignorant.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

At least Funimation's version is the official English version of the series, so following it still makes sense. While Funimation messed up on it a lot, the casual fan shouldn't have to go seeking out the original version and watch over 400 episodes to follow the story. That boo-boo is on the company, not on the fan. So calling the fans out for following that version is also, actually, ignorant.

If they watch the series casually (which everyone is entitled to, its all entertainment at the end of the day) I'd agree that its not necessary, but if someone wants to make a judgement on how these characters were originally written they owe it to themselves to watch Kai, the Japanese version or read the manga. A lot of the ignorance in this fanbase simply comes from making the characters and tone of the story out to be something its not when there is an intended vision out there that is easily accessible.

[floofychan333]

Sorry/not sorry. We might be looking at a different experience if FUNimation hadn't pushed Z out the door with a functional nu-metal aesthetic. We'll never know now.

"Functional nu-metal aesthetic" That's perfect.

I've got no grudge against Funimation for how the show was handled back then; heck, the late '90s and early 2000s were all about that "TO THE EXXXTREME" tone and style, so part of me feels DBZ getting that treatment at that point in time was almost unavoidable. And I'm thankful Funi has made an effort to skew closer to the source material since, at least. But yeah, there's still a pretty pervasive misunderstanding of what the series is among a lot of folks.

Yes, it is unfortunate that Dragon Ball was handled in a hilariously unfaithful way but you're right that that was a sign of the times. I'm surprised there's somebody else that's seeing improvement in the dub and doesn't just trash it for no reason. I mean, the old dub is easily trashable but the dub of Super is surprisingly good and FUNimation's accuracy has improved greatly over the years.

Also, I wouldn't classify the Faulconer score as nu-metal. It's so annoying and terrible that it's a genre of its own. I like to call it "shitthrokk," a play on "synthrock," because all the instruments are either electronic or synthesized versions of real instruments which makes it fairly shitty, and it never shuts the hell up. I refer to the blasting and permanently playing nature of the score as "throkking," if you get what I mean. Combine the two, and you have the colossal combination that resulted in a whole new genre of spitting in Kikuchi-sensei's face.