Gine Appreciation Thread.

[JulieYBM]

I like the new Bardock because I feel like it sets him apart from other Saiyans. I understand growing weary of a life thrust upon you by family and societal norms and I think Bardock simply coming to a decision to try new things after a lifetime of killing and come to new conclusions about what he can and should do is super relatable.

Also, it makes him more husband material.

[ABED]

I wish that Bardock remained as a more typical Saiyan like he was presented as in the original TV special. This retcon also changes the story of when Goku was sent to Earth, why he was sent to Earth, and pretty much changes the entire idea that Goku was meant to be evil until he hit his head because we definitely didn't see the out of him in Minus/Broly.

I really am indifferent to Gine herself because we didn't spend any time with her. All we saw was basically Lara-El for a very brief amount of time. I get the feeling that she was just stuck into the story because people have been asking about Goku's mom for decades now. At least it didn't end up being Seripa.

I think there's so much potential with Dragon Ball spin-offs, and I always thought that a Saiyan spin-off would be cool. So, maybe have a little side story that focuses more on Bardock and Gine to flesh out the characters and have the audience get to know them more. We thought we knew Bardock, but he was changed. I think that it would do the characters justice to give them something to get fans behind them. Their own TV special or a manga dedicated to them--doesn't have to be anything long-term, but just enough for fans to get to know them a bit more. At this point, we know Tarble better than we know Gine and the new Bardock.

I don't think it makes sense to include Gine in stories that take place aftet she dies. I would rather see the development that led into her appearance in Minus/Broly. Especially because it would be a really tall ask for Goku and Gine to share some sort of connection. Goku wouldn't care and Gine wouldn't even know him. I think the real interest for me would be to know Gine before she died. Or if not, I'm cool with it too.

I don't like the idea of spin offs at this point. I like the idea of one centered on the Saiyans even less. Prequel spin offs are usually awful. Better Call Saul is about the only one I can think of that's good. It's a miracle that it's as great as it is. It boils down to not existing just to explain things, which is what most of them do.

As for Masennko's point about the scientist missing the memo, that tracks for me.

[Zephyr]

I like the new Bardock because I feel like it sets him apart from other Saiyans. I understand growing weary of a life thrust upon you by family and societal norms and I think Bardock simply coming to a decision to try new things after a lifetime of killing and come to new conclusions about what he can and should do is super relatable.

I think it's cool, in theory, for a story to depict a Saiyan who goes through this, but it's a shame that it had to be Bardock specifically. Goku himself stands apart from the Saiyans with his gentle nature and all that, so having his father also be unique and special among the Saiyans feels really uninspired.

[JulieYBM]

I like the new Bardock because I feel like it sets him apart from other Saiyans. I understand growing weary of a life thrust upon you by family and societal norms and I think Bardock simply coming to a decision to try new things after a lifetime of killing and come to new conclusions about what he can and should do is super relatable.

I think it's cool, in theory, for a story to depict a Saiyan who goes through this, but it's a shame that it had to be Bardock specifically. Goku himself stands apart from the Saiyans with his gentle nature and all that, so having his father also be unique and special among the Saiyans feels really uninspired.

I mean...eh. Shrug. I think that's applying more thought than one needs to apply to the situation. I don't think there's a right answer on the subject. Gokuu ultimately does what he does because he wants to, so I don't really see the tie back to Bardock being all that important toward influencing Gokuu's decisions. There's a story to tell of Bardock being just being a hapless, harmless salaryman and a story of Bardock developing out of the generic Saiyan shit. I don't think Bardock being the Saiyan to develop beyond some arbitrary aspect is going to make Gokuu look any less unique.

[8000 Saiyan]

She's adorable, I gotta say.

But I despise Minus. There was no need to soften Bardock's character when he was fine as it is. Funnily enough, the Funimation dub of the Bardock special did the same thing, making him say things like: "I only wish I could have held you in my arms" or "And I thought you were special".

Bardock was fine as he was in the original Japanese version, an asshole who learns that a bigger asshole wants to wipe out the Saiyan race, who are also assholes like he is.

[WittyUsername]

I wish that Bardock remained as a more typical Saiyan like he was presented as in the original TV special. This retcon also changes the story of when Goku was sent to Earth, why he was sent to Earth, and pretty much changes the entire idea that Goku was meant to be evil until he hit his head because we definitely didn't see the out of him in Minus/Broly.
L

I dunno, I like aspects of the Super/Minus version. Goku being deliberately sent to earth for his safety makes way more sense than the scientist assigning him to earth apparently missing the memo that Freeza was calling all the Saiyans back to Vegeta. Goku as a toddler being initially vicious and violent on earth works better than him being a vicious baby because apparently Saiyans are violent by nature?

I'd probably split the difference in a re-do if I could. Make Bardock an asshole who doesnt give a shit about his children or the mother of his children and tries to prevent planet Vegeta's demise after receiving visions, but Gine is the only Saiyan to take him seriously and sends Goku to earth by her own volition.

Freeza asking all the Saiyans to return to Vegeta was only in Minus, though. It wasn’t in the Bardock special, and all the original manga stated was that Freeza chose to destroy the planet while Vegeta (the person) was off-world, which Minus actually contradicts.

[MasenkoHA]

I wish that Bardock remained as a more typical Saiyan like he was presented as in the original TV special. This retcon also changes the story of when Goku was sent to Earth, why he was sent to Earth, and pretty much changes the entire idea that Goku was meant to be evil until he hit his head because we definitely didn't see the out of him in Minus/Broly.
L

I dunno, I like aspects of the Super/Minus version. Goku being deliberately sent to earth for his safety makes way more sense than the scientist assigning him to earth apparently missing the memo that Freeza was calling all the Saiyans back to Vegeta. Goku as a toddler being initially vicious and violent on earth works better than him being a vicious baby because apparently Saiyans are violent by nature?

I'd probably split the difference in a re-do if I could. Make Bardock an asshole who doesnt give a shit about his children or the mother of his children and tries to prevent planet Vegeta's demise after receiving visions, but Gine is the only Saiyan to take him seriously and sends Goku to earth by her own volition.

Freeza asking all the Saiyans to return to Vegeta was only in Minus, though. It wasn’t in the Bardock special, and all the original manga stated was that Freeza chose to destroy the planet while Vegeta (the person) was off-world, which Minus actually contradicts.

Then the problem becomes how only 4 Saiyans were still alive. Shouldn't a lot more have been on assignment. Only those 4 were off planet. Really?


Freeza calling the Saiyans back to Vegeta but Prince Vegeta and his group deliberately ignoring it and Bardock and Gine sending Goku to earth for his safety makes the most logical sense for this narrative

[WittyUsername]

I dunno, I like aspects of the Super/Minus version. Goku being deliberately sent to earth for his safety makes way more sense than the scientist assigning him to earth apparently missing the memo that Freeza was calling all the Saiyans back to Vegeta. Goku as a toddler being initially vicious and violent on earth works better than him being a vicious baby because apparently Saiyans are violent by nature?

I'd probably split the difference in a re-do if I could. Make Bardock an asshole who doesnt give a shit about his children or the mother of his children and tries to prevent planet Vegeta's demise after receiving visions, but Gine is the only Saiyan to take him seriously and sends Goku to earth by her own volition.

Freeza asking all the Saiyans to return to Vegeta was only in Minus, though. It wasn’t in the Bardock special, and all the original manga stated was that Freeza chose to destroy the planet while Vegeta (the person) was off-world, which Minus actually contradicts.

Then the problem becomes how only 4 Saiyans were still alive. Shouldn't a lot more have been on assignment. Only those 4 were off planet. Really?


Freeza calling the Saiyans back to Vegeta but Prince Vegeta and his group deliberately ignoring it and Bardock and Gine sending Goku to earth for his safety makes the most logical sense for this narrative

To be fair, the Bardock special does have Freeza sending Bardock’s crew off on a mission so Dodoria and his men can kill them. Maybe they did that with other Saiyans too?

Besides, having Goku be sent to Earth for his own safety kind of just raises the question of why Bardock and Gine apparently lied to Raditz about why they sent his brother to Earth.

[Zephyr]

I mean...eh. Shrug. I think that's applying more thought than one needs to apply to the situation. I don't think there's a right answer on the subject. Gokuu ultimately does what he does because he wants to, so I don't really see the tie back to Bardock being all that important toward influencing Gokuu's decisions. There's a story to tell of Bardock being just being a hapless, harmless salaryman and a story of Bardock developing out of the generic Saiyan shit. I don't think Bardock being the Saiyan to develop beyond some arbitrary aspect is going to make Gokuu look any less unique.

There's a story to tell about anyone being just a hapless, harmless salaryman and developing out of the generic Saiyan shit. Making it Bardock specifically changes "Goku is unique" to "Goku is unique, just like his dad". If Bardock's uniqueness influenced Goku's, it would feel less egregious to me. But as it is, it's purely coincidental that Goku, like his father before him, is unique among the Saiyans. That feels really uninspired to me, and I don't think I'm applying any excess thought to the matter by explaining why I find it so. It's hardly the end of the world, but it's just not my preferred writing choice.

[ABED]

I like to keep it simple - The only Saiyans who survived just happened to be offworld at the time. It's coincidence, and that's fine. Freeza blew up Planet Vegeta on a whim and didn't care enough to kill the remaining Saiyans as long as they stayed in line. He probably liked Vegeta and created the lie of the asteroid to keep him from revolting. There's no reason Freeza has to be consistent.

[LoganForkHands73]

I like to keep it simple - The only Saiyans who survived just happened to be offworld at the time. It's coincidence, and that's fine. Freeza blew up Planet Vegeta on a whim and didn't care enough to kill the remaining Saiyans as long as they stayed in line. He probably liked Vegeta and created the lie of the asteroid to keep him from revolting. There's no reason Freeza has to be consistent.

Yeah, that works just fine for me too. Kakarrot was a nameless, low-class reject who slipped through the cracks through a sheer quirk of fate. Freeza isn't concerned about Vegeta so long as he remains obedient, since he knows that a single elite Saiyan can never be a threat to him; it would take the entire population revolting, or a Super Saiyan showing up. He prevented the possibility of the former but failed with the latter.

We also see in Super: Broly that a handful of other Saiyans were operating in Vegeta's team that we can only assume died out over the course of many other dangerous missions until only Vegeta, Nappa and Raditz remained. There's always the possibility of other survivors out there that Vegeta couldn't have known about, as proven by Broly and Paragus. According to Toriyama, the Saiyan population was absurdly low because they were always out fighting either other races or among themselves, which also makes sense to me.

[Saiya6Cit]

I dont like the character because


bardock was presented to me in the 90s with his tv special and it was awesome just the way he was

Gine's armor looks like an apron

She is too soft for a female saiyan

Her character was created with the mere purpose to appeal female audience

You asked.

[MasenkoHA]

Her character was created with the mere purpose to appeal female audience

I dunno if "And Goku's mom was a June Cleaver housewife" was meant to appeal to a female audience but uh sure

[JulieYBM]

Her character was created with the mere purpose to appeal female audience

I dunno if "And Goku's mom was a June Cleaver housewife" was meant to appeal to a female audience but uh sure

I mean, kinks aside, she really wasn't made to appeal to us gals. Girls and women like many things and sadly Gine is—insofar—only one thing.

[jjgp1112]

I like to keep it simple - The only Saiyans who survived just happened to be offworld at the time. It's coincidence, and that's fine. Freeza blew up Planet Vegeta on a whim and didn't care enough to kill the remaining Saiyans as long as they stayed in line. He probably liked Vegeta and created the lie of the asteroid to keep him from revolting. There's no reason Freeza has to be consistent.

Yup, pretty much.

Overall, Goku just being another cog in the Frieza industrial complex that would've destroyed the Earth business as usual if he hadn't bumped his head is such a more compelling and poignant story than the Super-Man gunk we got instead.

And then Bardock figuring out Frieza's plan on a laser-sharp hunch rather than tragically losing his crew in a doublecross? I blame all of Minus on Toriyama just treating it as an infodump rather than an actual STORY. You don't even need the psychic powers stuff either, which was just an excuse to shoehorn Goku scenes anyway. Just have him figure it out through actual plot and circumstances rather than "Hmm, that's odd, let me draw the worst possible conclusion!"

The most rope I'm willing to give the Minus side is have Bardock say, decide to insure that Kakarot gets sent off on his mission before Vegeta gets destroyed so he can go out doing some sort of good.

As for Gine, meh. I think it's pretty boring that the only canon U7 female Saiyan that we've been exposed to is just a typical Toriyama housewife.

[WittyUsername]

Gine’s reason for existing more so seems like it’s just so fans could finally know who Goku’s mother is. Oh, and I guess so we could have an explanation for why Bardock became “soft,” because I guess Toriyama thought it would be weird if Bardock was just naturally compassionate towards his son, without the influence of a woman.

Seriously though, I do think the idea of Gine being the one to send Goku to Earth would’ve at least worked better than what we got. It still would’ve been an unnecessary change that takes away from what made Goku’s backstory interesting in the first place, but it at least would’ve given her some agency, rather than simply being a generic housewife, and it would’ve made the Superman parallel slightly less blatant.

[Scientist Fu]

There's nothing special about her... her design is cute and she is a soft and caring mother and... that's it? there is really not much to say about her. I think she would have been more interesting if it was Bardock who changed her. At first, she wasn't caring to her own family but due to Bardock's softness and love she would change with time, now we would have something to say about her. Plus - Bardock's softness could be explained by the "power of love", I guess.

[Kaboom]

Gine is probably the only part of the modern material's treatment of Bardock that I don't mind, or potentially even like. Given that her name-drop and character description in a Toriyama Q&A comfortably pre-dates her actual first appearance in Minus, I see no reason not to assume she shouldn't retroactively be considered the real Bardock's wife/mate too, and simply went unseen and unnamed in the original TV special. Her existence also isn't dependent on the sanitized character of nuBardock either — the TV special already at least implied that truBardock had a soft spot for his own teammates, so him rescuing and getting attached to her is plenty congruent with his own character.

But all that aside, if absolutely nothing else... I'm glad that Gine's formal introduction finally killed off all the dumb old fan-theories about Selypa being Goku's mom.

[MasenkoHA]

To be fair, the Bardock special does have Freeza sending Bardock’s crew off on a mission so Dodoria and his men can kill them. Maybe they did that with other Saiyans too?

That is a good point and something I didn't consider, you're probably right.

Besides, having Goku be sent to Earth for his own safety kind of just raises the question of why Bardock and Gine apparently lied to Raditz about why they sent his brother to Earth.

I just kind of assumed Raditz misunderstood. He was also recalling information from twenty years ago so he may just of had faulty memories.

It is a bit odd he didn't tell Goku that their parents sent him to earth though

[dva_raza]

Besides, having Goku be sent to Earth for his own safety kind of just raises the question of why Bardock and Gine apparently lied to Raditz about why they sent his brother to Earth.

I just kind of assumed Raditz misunderstood. He was also recalling information from twenty years ago so he may just of had faulty memories.

It is a bit odd he didn't tell Goku that their parents sent him to earth though

Vegeta tells Goku that he was exiled to do shit jobs because he was weak.

If that's the narrative Vegeta had then for sure Raditz, who hanged with Vegeta was on the same page with that idea. Meaning, yes his parents simply lied to him. And I don't see why that would be odd if the whole point was to hide Goku lol. Again, Raditz hanged with Vegeta and they don't need risking that information get to that malicious kid and possibly his father