Why hasn't classic series (original, Z, and GT) is not available on Blu-ray in Japan?

[PowerPhantom245]

I've asked this question before in other thread, but want to make detailed discussion here.
As of this writing, almost EVERY major anime, has gotten Blu-ray, whether it's SD-on-BD or HD remastered from film negatives.
The movies has been available on Blu-ray, albeit there are few noticeable and jarring edits were made (score to Funimation for UNCUT), but at least they are in HD.

I'm curious why classic TV series (original, Z, and GT) hasn't gotten a Blu-ray in Japan.
Is it due to import from foreign countries, where they are cheaper than it would have been release in Japan (which tends to have higher price for home video)?
Some of the quality for those releases are varied (...especially Funimation), but fans has been importing those release, especially since region free Blu-ray/DVD players are much affordable these days.
I understand remastering 500+ episodes from film are time consuming and very costly, but if Toei did do proper HD remastering, the result would look much better than ANY foreign release (...especially Funimation) along with Kai, and fans would go insane for this type of release.
I can guarantee that pre-order would be insane, where it would probably sold out within minutes.

I would really want to see classic series on HD remaster, with stunning and beautiful details.
Given how important the franchise is to the pop culture, it really deserve a boutique release.

Get with the game Toei!

[TechExpert2021]

I'm not sure why. Maybe Toei doesn't care about remastering the classic DB trilogy series for Blu-ray releases, I think...?

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

For original Dragon Ball and GT it's probably a case of them being overshadowed by Dragon Ball Z. Think about it, all the content we've gotten in this revival has pondered to the Z era. There's been rare cases of original Dragon Ball fan service like the mafuba being used in the Future Trunks arc, but it's been nowhere near as ubiquitous as the Raditz-28th Tenkaichi Budokai fan service.

As for Dragon Ball Z itself, Kai was meant to be TOEI's HD version, it was probably "good enough" for them. It may have not done as well in Japan as TOEI hoped, but it did well enough in international territories, allowing The Final Chapters to be a thing. Conversely international territories don't seem to see Kai as a replacement for Z but rather a supplement, as it should be.

[GhostEmperorX]

Get with the game Toei!

Don't hold your breath, it's never going to happen. Apparently they have an aversion to remastering 16mm film for whatever reason.
Even if they're the odd ones out as pre-Y2K companies/distributors go, they'll never see reason and this will always be a massive blind spot for them.

[PowerPhantom245]

Get with the game Toei!

Don't hold your breath, it's never going to happen. Apparently they have an aversion to remastering 16mm film for whatever reason.
Even if they're the odd ones out as pre-Y2K companies/distributors go, they'll never see reason and this will always be a massive blind spot for them.

I don't understand Toei's mentality behind that; especially for high profile shows like Dragon Ball, which has importance to pop culture INTERNATIONALLY.
Is it because of amount of episodes (500+) that needs to get restoration?
I understand that it's very expensive and time consuming, but there are more than demands for it.
I'm sure if Toei did crowdfunding, they would reach it's goal withing few minutes or hours... unlike what Funimation did for their hackjohack job Z's 30th anniversary Blu-ray.
Not to mention, people who's going to purchase this type of release, are adults who's on their mid-30 to early 40, where some of them have kids who would be interested.
Even if it's not HD remastering, SD-BD would be an alternative update, even if doesn't have much to video quality.
I can see something like Dragon Ball SDBD Vol. 1 Pilaf Saga (1~13), Vol. 2 Tournament Saga (14~28), etc.
It's utterly frustrating that Toei has so many films of their older shows in vault that has yet to get remastered.


Dragon Ball GT films at Toei film archive

[MasenkoHA]

I'm curious, how often does Toei give blu-ray release of their older content?

I don't buy the argument "Kai got a blu-ray release so Toei didn’t see a point in doing it for Z". If Kai wasn't a thing would Toei have gone through the trouble of remastering 291 episodes for a home video release?

[PowerPhantom245]

I'm curious, how often does Toei give blu-ray release of their older content?

I don't buy the argument "Kai got a blu-ray release so Toei didn’t see a point in doing it for Z". If Kai wasn't a thing would Toei have gone through the trouble of remastering 291 episodes for a home video release?

I would say, most of their classic anime (like 85~90%) from 70's~90's has gotten Blu-ray in one way of other; regardless if it's released only in Japan.
Regards to Kai, while it was nice to see older anime in HD remastered, which wasn't common back in 2009, it seems to be more of novelty. Toei remastered most of Z (like 170+ episodes?), so they could have remastered the rest, and eventually released it as Z HD Remastered Set.

[JulieYBM]

There's hardly a market for one or two cour anime now, why would Toei Animation spend all that money on remastering and releasing a long-running anime?

[TechExpert2021]

There's hardly a market for one or two cour anime now, why would Toei Animation spend all that money on remastering and releasing a long-running anime?

Exactly! If Toei is going to release the classic DB trilogy series on Blu-ray, they could just lazily use the same video and audio masters as the Japanese Dragon Box DVD sets and release them pillar-boxed with no alterations to save time and money.

For original Dragon Ball and GT it's probably a case of them being overshadowed by Dragon Ball Z. Think about it, all the content we've gotten in this revival has pondered to the Z era. There's been rare cases of original Dragon Ball fan service like the mafuba being used in the Future Trunks arc, but it's been nowhere near as ubiquitous as the Raditz-28th Tenkaichi Budokai fan service.

I think the "skip to Z" trope is mostly a FUNimation thing, right?

[GhostEmperorX]

I would say, most of their classic anime (like 85~90%) from 70's~90's has gotten Blu-ray in one way of other; regardless if it's released only in Japan.

And it's only really the movies that seem to get actual (if faulty on a few areas, see colour) remasters with their audio intact.
The shows probably get SD at best, and only 35mm shows like Mazinger Z and the like do get remastered. Definitely not the likes of Saint Seiya, FoTNS, etc.

To anyone asking why they'd do that though, may as well ask why all the other older anime studios are putting out remasters of their own pre-Y2k content (and even stuff like City Hunter which has quite the number of episodes itself and aired right alongside DB in its heyday).

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

I think the "skip to Z" trope is mostly a FUNimation thing, right?

Funimation is probably the most notorious for popularising it, but the Filipino company Creative Corp Products who created the very first English dub of Dragon Ball Z began working on it and later went back to original Dragon Ball, which they dubbed 122 or 132 episodes and then continued Z from episode 27 or so?

Not sure which was the lesser of two evils, you can say Creative Corp skipped 153 episodes whereas Funimation skipped 140, but the former at least did revisit most of those early arcs before viewers were introduced to the more action heavy end of the Saiyan arc.

As regards Kai not being TOEI's replacement for Z, while it has never been confirmed to be their intention they clearly don't care too much to do anything with Z anymore. I think the fact TOEI wanted a show on Fuji TV to masquerade as a new series and sell more merchandise and toys shows that they didn't have enough faith in the older audiences buying home releases.

The 20th and 30th anniversaries were opportunities for TOEI to capitalize on remastering the entirety of Dragon Ball Z but they didn't take advantage of either. They promoted the 30th anniversary on Twitter, sure, but it was Funimation doing the work (however lackluster) on creating a new remaster. TOEI seemingly thought the movies and specials was enough.

[PowerPhantom245]

I would say, most of their classic anime (like 85~90%) from 70's~90's has gotten Blu-ray in one way of other; regardless if it's released only in Japan.

And it's only really the movies that seem to get actual (if faulty on a few areas, see colour) remasters with their audio intact.
The shows probably get SD at best, and only 35mm shows like Mazinger Z and the like do get remastered. Definitely not the likes of Saint Seiya, FoTNS, etc.

To anyone asking why they'd do that though, may as well ask why all the other older anime studios are putting out remasters of their own pre-Y2k content (and even stuff like City Hunter which has quite the number of episodes itself and aired right alongside DB in its heyday).

Saint Seiya is available on Blu-ray, even though it's Japan only.
https://www.amazon.com/Animation-Saint- ... 146&sr=1-7

Since 2026 is going to be 40th anniversary of anime (1986), maybe that might be a chance for release.

I think the "skip to Z" trope is mostly a FUNimation thing, right?

The 20th and 30th anniversaries were opportunities for TOEI to capitalize on remastering the entirety of Dragon Ball Z but they didn't take advantage of either. They promoted the 30th anniversary on Twitter, sure, but it was Funimation doing the work (however lackluster) on creating a new remaster. TOEI seemingly thought the movies and specials was enough.

That was probably the most frustrating moment, where many of us were excited for proper higher quality home video release, until it was revealed that it was Funimation (...woohoo ).

Regards to movies, I still cannot forgive the censorship they done with one of the movies for Blu-ray release; regardless of the quality of movie, that type of revisionist is unforgivable.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vHx4b1n3Rys

I'm curious if Toei is going to do that censorship for potential HD remaster Blu-ray for classic series, particularly original.

[MasenkoHA]

I think the "skip to Z" trope is mostly a FUNimation thing, right?

Funimation is probably the most notorious for popularising it, but the Filipino company Creative Corp Products who created the very first English dub of Dragon Ball Z began working on it and later went back to original Dragon Ball, which they dubbed 122 or 132 episodes and then continued Z from episode 27 or so?

Not sure which was the lesser of two evils, you can say Creative Corp skipped 153 episodes whereas Funimation skipped 140, but the former at least did revisit most of those early arcs before viewers were introduced to the more action heavy end of the Saiyan arc.

As regards Kai not being TOEI's replacement for Z, while it has never been confirmed to be their intention they clearly don't care too much to do anything with Z anymore. I think the fact TOEI wanted a show on Fuji TV to masquerade as a new series and sell more merchandise and toys shows that they didn't have enough faith in the older audiences buying home releases.

The 20th and 30th anniversaries were opportunities for TOEI to capitalize on remastering the entirety of Dragon Ball Z but they didn't take advantage of either. They promoted the 30th anniversary on Twitter, sure, but it was Funimation doing the work (however lackluster) on creating a new remaster. TOEI seemingly thought the movies and specials was enough.

With Toei apparently censoring stuff from the movies, I wonder if pushing Kai is because it's more "kid friendly" for modern Japanese sensibilities. Less gore, no middle fingers, no child nudity.


Og Dragon Ball might be a harder sell because it's got so much content even its home country no longer considers kid appropriate, despite the series being made with kids in mind.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

With Toei apparently censoring stuff from the movies, I wonder if pushing Kai is because it's more "kid friendly" for modern Japanese sensibilities. Less gore, no middle fingers, no child nudity.

Og Dragon Ball might be a harder sell because it's got so much content even its home country no longer considers kid appropriate, despite the series being made with kids in mind.

Yeah, Japanese standards and practices were a lot more strict in the 2010s than they were in the 80s and 90s, and Kai aired on early morning weekend timeslots whereas the original three anime received primetime slots so they could get away with more.

I suppose shortly after GT's ending we had Pokemon taking the world by storm followed by shows like Yu-Gi-Oh, Digimon, Beyblade, Battle B-Daman, and all of a sudden super toy centric shows caused a shift in the industry towards battle shounen aiming even more aggressively towards kids.

I can understand Kai because it was created as a TV-anime in the post-Pokemon era, but it was really disappointing TOEI censored the old Dragon Ball Z movies, and claimed on the boxes there was no change to the footage. Complete disregard for this series history.

Original Dragon Ball's humour is certainly a product of its time, I couldn't imagine a kids anime with as much dirty jokes being made again. We can all be quite sure any remake we get will be considerably toned down.

[JulieYBM]

With Toei apparently censoring stuff from the movies, I wonder if pushing Kai is because it's more "kid friendly" for modern Japanese sensibilities. Less gore, no middle fingers, no child nudity.

Og Dragon Ball might be a harder sell because it's got so much content even its home country no longer considers kid appropriate, despite the series being made with kids in mind.

Yeah, Japanese standards and practices were a lot more strict in the 2010s than they were in the 80s and 90s, and Kai aired on early morning weekend timeslots whereas the original three anime received primetime slots so they could get away with more.

I suppose shortly after GT's ending we had Pokemon taking the world by storm followed by shows like Yu-Gi-Oh, Digimon, Beyblade, Battle B-Daman, and all of a sudden super toy centric shows caused a shift in the industry towards battle shounen aiming even more aggressively towards kids.

I can understand Kai because it was created as a TV-anime in the post-Pokemon era, but it was really disappointing TOEI censored the old Dragon Ball Z movies, and claimed on the boxes there was no change to the footage. Complete disregard for this series history.

Original Dragon Ball's humour is of its time, I couldn't imagine a kids anime with as much dirty jokes being made again.

4Kids Entertainment specifically requisted OLM to make the AniPoke franchise less queer, less violent and less Japanese so that they could sell it worldwide as a homogenized product, so yeah, there was still nonsense going in the late-1990s.

[PowerPhantom245]

With Toei apparently censoring stuff from the movies, I wonder if pushing Kai is because it's more "kid friendly" for modern Japanese sensibilities. Less gore, no middle fingers, no child nudity.

Og Dragon Ball might be a harder sell because it's got so much content even its home country no longer considers kid appropriate, despite the series being made with kids in mind.

Yeah, Japanese standards and practices were a lot more strict in the 2010s than they were in the 80s and 90s, and Kai aired on early morning weekend timeslots whereas the original three anime received primetime slots so they could get away with more.

I suppose shortly after GT's ending we had Pokemon taking the world by storm followed by shows like Yu-Gi-Oh, Digimon, Beyblade, Battle B-Daman, and all of a sudden super toy centric shows caused a shift in the industry towards battle shounen aiming even more aggressively towards kids.

I can understand Kai because it was created as a TV-anime in the post-Pokemon era, but it was really disappointing TOEI censored the old Dragon Ball Z movies, and claimed on the boxes there was no change to the footage. Complete disregard for this series history.

Original Dragon Ball's humour is certainly a product of its time, I couldn't imagine a kids anime with as much dirty jokes being made again. We can all be quite sure any remake we get will be considerably toned down.

The thing that I don't understand about censorship is that anime that came out that era, along with older series from 50s~70s, had plenty of humor and violence, more so than Dragon Ball, yet their home video releases were uncut; Fist of the North Star/Hokuto no Ken Blu-ray (Japan AND USA) were uncut, where there was no censorship.
I'm curious why Dragon Ball had to suffer with that.

[MasenkoHA]

With Toei apparently censoring stuff from the movies, I wonder if pushing Kai is because it's more "kid friendly" for modern Japanese sensibilities. Less gore, no middle fingers, no child nudity.

Og Dragon Ball might be a harder sell because it's got so much content even its home country no longer considers kid appropriate, despite the series being made with kids in mind.

Yeah, Japanese standards and practices were a lot more strict in the 2010s than they were in the 80s and 90s, and Kai aired on early morning weekend timeslots whereas the original three anime received primetime slots so they could get away with more.

I suppose shortly after GT's ending we had Pokemon taking the world by storm followed by shows like Yu-Gi-Oh, Digimon, Beyblade, Battle B-Daman, and all of a sudden super toy centric shows caused a shift in the industry towards battle shounen aiming even more aggressively towards kids.

I can understand Kai because it was created as a TV-anime in the post-Pokemon era, but it was really disappointing TOEI censored the old Dragon Ball Z movies, and claimed on the boxes there was no change to the footage. Complete disregard for this series history.

Original Dragon Ball's humour is certainly a product of its time, I couldn't imagine a kids anime with as much dirty jokes being made again. We can all be quite sure any remake we get will be considerably toned down.

The thing that I don't understand about censorship is that anime that came out that era, along with older series from 50s~70s, had plenty of humor and violence, more so than Dragon Ball, yet their home video releases were uncut; Fist of the North Star/Hokuto no Ken Blu-ray (Japan AND USA) were uncut, where there was no censorship.
I'm curious why Dragon Ball had to suffer with that.

From my understanding (but someone correct me if I'm wrong) Hokuno no Ken has been retroactively treated and marketed as seinen despite originally being shonen. Dragon Ball is still marketed as a kids anime in Japan...which it is but probably makes content no longer deemed kid appropriate harder to sell.

[PowerPhantom245]

From my understanding (but someone correct me if I'm wrong) Hokuno no Ken has been retroactively treated and marketed as seinen despite originally being shonen. Dragon Ball is still marketed as a kids anime in Japan...which it is but probably makes content no longer deemed kid appropriate harder to sell.

Speaking of censorship, is there any other anime (shounen anime in particular) aside Dragon Ball that has this issue?
Just because there are content that is not appropriate for audience in modern day, does not excuse that content needs to be edited; it's a film revisionist, that can potentially give dangerous precedence to future classic anime releases.
At the very least, there should be a big disclaimer or warning on package (or on commercial) that certain materials are getting censored, so that consumers can be aware what they are getting; it's courtesy 101.

[JulieYBM]

Yeah, Japanese standards and practices were a lot more strict in the 2010s than they were in the 80s and 90s, and Kai aired on early morning weekend timeslots whereas the original three anime received primetime slots so they could get away with more.

I suppose shortly after GT's ending we had Pokemon taking the world by storm followed by shows like Yu-Gi-Oh, Digimon, Beyblade, Battle B-Daman, and all of a sudden super toy centric shows caused a shift in the industry towards battle shounen aiming even more aggressively towards kids.

I can understand Kai because it was created as a TV-anime in the post-Pokemon era, but it was really disappointing TOEI censored the old Dragon Ball Z movies, and claimed on the boxes there was no change to the footage. Complete disregard for this series history.

Original Dragon Ball's humour is certainly a product of its time, I couldn't imagine a kids anime with as much dirty jokes being made again. We can all be quite sure any remake we get will be considerably toned down.

The thing that I don't understand about censorship is that anime that came out that era, along with older series from 50s~70s, had plenty of humor and violence, more so than Dragon Ball, yet their home video releases were uncut; Fist of the North Star/Hokuto no Ken Blu-ray (Japan AND USA) were uncut, where there was no censorship.
I'm curious why Dragon Ball had to suffer with that.

To the best of my knowledge, Hokuto no Ken is only marketed towards adults now.
From my understanding (but someone correct me if I'm wrong) Hokuno no Ken has been retroactively treated and marketed as seinen despite originally being shonen. Dragon Ball is still marketed as a kids anime in Japan...which it is but probably makes content no longer deemed kid appropriate harder to sell.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Speaking of censorship, is there any other anime (shounen anime in particular) aside Dragon Ball that has this issue?
Just because there are content that is not appropriate for audience in modern day, does not excuse that content needs to be edited; it's a film revisionist, that can potentially give dangerous precedence to future classic anime releases.
At the very least, there should be a big disclaimer or warning on package (or on commercial) that certain materials are getting censored, so that consumers can be aware what they are getting; it's courtesy 101.

Shows like Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh have always had censored home releases in English-speaking territories (notwithstanding the short-lived uncut Yu-Gi-Oh dub). I don't know any examples of the Japanese home releases being censored, it would set a very bad precedent though, by informing other territories this is OK for a medium that is intended to be the definitive version.