The GT writers screwed up when they made most of the Shadow Dragons pathetically weak

[Benjamin-Simons-91]

Rage Shenron, Haze Shenron, Naturon Shenron and Oceanous Shenron should have been at least Super Saiyan 3 tier (comparable to Goku of that time, who is stronger than his Buu Saga self) without any tricks or transformations to make them a reasonable threat.
I understand that they did that to allow Pan to do something, but this was lame.

[Vegeta th3 4th]

GT pretty much dropped the ball with everything they attempted, not just the shadow dragons. As much as I complain about reused concepts in modern DB, I think there's an argument to be made to justify remaking GT's concepts. Ssj4 has one of the best designs in the series, yet it didn't get a single memorable fight before Daima. Taking the series back to its roots did not work at all in GT, but Daima pulled it off, although not perfectly. I would not be against a Daima sequel sending the heroes to other planets, giving #17 a new body to get stronger, or fighting against corrupted dragon balls. I never understood why they felt the need to reboot Bardock and Broly, as both ended up worse than their Z counterparts. GT however can benefit from a remake, which was proven by Daima. With that said, do I trust Toei to pull it off without Toriyama ? honestly I'm not sure. On one hand, I like to believe that they learned enough from him to pull off a good Dragon Ball story, but on the other we have Super and GT as proof that they're incapable of learning anything.

[Trouser]

Ssj4 has one of the best designs in the series, yet it didn't get a single memorable fight before Daima.

I'm sorry, what? Fight with Baby Vegeta is THE fight of Super Saiyan 4 where everything started. Daima was just pretty with lots of flashy effects. Baby will always be more popular than Gomah, he was a character with purpose and story to tell. What is memorable about Goku vs Gomah fight aside from the fact that it reused previously established (and better written in GT) transformation of Super Saiyan 4?

[Vegeta th3 4th]

I'm sorry, what? Fight with Baby Vegeta is THE fight of Super Saiyan 4 where everything started. Daima was just pretty with lots of flashy effects. Baby will always be more popular than Gomah, he was a character with purpose and story to tell. What is memorable about Goku vs Gomah fight aside from the fact that it reused previously established (and better written in GT) transformation of Super Saiyan 4?

Baby is by far a better written villain than gomah; it's not even close. Goku's fight against him however was very underwhelming; GT just couldn't choreograph good fights. There's not a single memorable fight in that entire show. Daima's two Ssj4 fights are among the absolute best fights this franchise has ever produced.

[Benjamin-Simons-91]

Daima sucked bad! This thread is not going to be a platform to hype it.
I asked about the majority of the Shadow Dragons being total weaklings. That's the issue here.

[Vegeta th3 4th]

I asked about the majority of the Shadow Dragons being total weaklings. That's the issue here.

You brought up a good point about them being weak and underwhelming, and I agreed with you. I also provided a solution to make things right regarding that concept. It's hard not to mention Daima when it successfully remade two of GT's main plot points. If you like the concept of the shadow dragons, then why wouldn't you want it revisited and corrected ?

[Benjamin-Simons-91]

I asked about the majority of the Shadow Dragons being total weaklings. That's the issue here.

You brought up a good point about them being weak and underwhelming, and I agreed with you. I also provided a solution to make things right regarding that concept. It's hard not to mention Daima when it successfully remade two of GT's main plot points. If you like the concept of the shadow dragons, then why wouldn't you want it revisited and corrected ?

Just as the "exploration" of the Demon Realm wasn't a "successful remake" of the Black Star Dragon Balls Saga, the Tamagamis weren't a "successful remake" of the Shadow Dragons - in fact they added more plot holes like why hadn't Dabura offered Babidi to use their Dragon Balls and wish to secure his control over Majin Buu.

I mentioned that I'm not a Daima fanboy and that this topic was about discussing the Shadow Dragons' rewriting.
I hope that this is the last time I'm going to pull a Hank Voight "we are not doing this!" at you.

[Vegeta th3 4th]

I mentioned that this topic was about discussing the Shadow Dragons' rewriting.

If we were to ever get a Shadow Dragon re-write, it would be in a Daima sequel due to it being the show that rewrote a couple of GT's concepts. Considering the rights issue going on behind the scenes regarding Super, I think the chances of us revisiting more of GT's concepts is very likely. One thing I'd like to see in this hypothetical re-write is the dragons calling out the heroes for their overuse of the dragon balls. I don't want them to just be villain of the week type characters, I want them to actually make us question the decisions made by the heroes. Go a step further, have some of the heroes agree with the dragons that the dragon balls have indeed been taken advantage of.

[Benjamin-Simons-91]

I'd simply do it as follows (here's just one example, it can be split into 2-3 episodes):
Rage Shenron takes over Satan City; Most of the citizens flee the city, and Mr. Satan tries to put an heroic act and take Rage Shenron down, but fails with nobody besides Bee to witness it. Pan and Goku land and test the Evil Dragon.
He demonstrates that despite his small stature, the negative energy that created him placed his base form equally with Super Saiyan 2 Goku.
As Pan rescues Mr. Satan who tried to fight once more, SSJ 2 Goku and Rage Shenron battle seriously.
Upon crashing near the power plant, Rage Shenron decides to go all out and channels the electricity from the station into him which makes him over 3 meters tall and equal to SSJ3 Goku, but he has other intentions than to pick a fight now.
He flies above the shocked Goku and melts into MANY pieces of goo that covers every device and tech around the city and eats their every drop of electricity which is converted into ki. As Pan wishes to blast the goo pieces, Goku asks her to step down as he wants to see Rage Shenron's true power.
The goo pieces rush to the sky, merge with eachother, and Rage Shenron reappears as over 6 meters tall now and transforms into his huge self (over 30 meters) and is as strong as a Super Saiyan 4 (if SSJ 3 is 4 times the power of SSJ 2 [base x400], SSJ 4 should be 12 times the power of SSJ3/48 times SSJ2 [base x4,800]).
Bee barks at Rage Shenron who decides to stomp him, but as he lift his foot, Pan flies quickly and blast the Dragon's eyeball, which breaks his movement. Satan takes Bee and run away as he can.
The angry Rage Shenron slaps Pan into a building before SSJ4 Goku takes over the lead. Rage's huge stature is too slow to catch Goku. It's like a man vs. a fly.
Satan and Bee rush to check on Pan. Majuub senses the battle from across the planet and rushes there.
The strong thunderstorms that Rage is throwing at SSJ4 Goku in the sky, cause an altercation in the weather which leads to a massive rain that weakens his electric-based composure and power level - leaving him open for Goku and Pan to destroy with a 2 different Kamehamehas at both his back (Pan) and chest (Goku).
As they collect the Dragon Ball, Majuub lands and joins their journey.

[PhantomSaiyan]

Daima sucked bad! This thread is not going to be a platform to hype it.

Bro, if people want to hype it up just let them, we have free will you know lol

[Hugo Boss]

I agree that most of the Shadow Dragons ended up feeling like filler bosses rather than meaningful threats. But if they started at SS3 tier, GT would’ve needed to establish a solid reason for why Goku couldn’t just immediately go SS4 and wipe the floor with them.

That’s actually one thing Daima handles better. Goku being turned into a kid limits his access to full power, which creates a real sense of tension and progression in his battles. GT didn’t really provide that kind of in-story restriction in that arc. SS4 Goku was available, but he just didn’t use it consistently, which made things feel dragged out.

One fix could’ve been something like a magical seal or curse cast by the dragons themselves, locking Goku out of his higher forms and forcing him to overcome each one to slowly break the seal. Or just make the dragons start out at SS4 level and require Goku to rely on help, strategy, and growth throughout.

[coola]

It could still work, have others join. You have limited time before Minus energy spread so much it's gonna destroy whole universe, i know we had that in Black Star Saga, but anything to not make it another Goku and Pan show Some Dragons could be weak, but they are very good at stealth 1st form Cell style.

[Koitsukai]

When I first heard about them, I thought wow, this is going to be great, 7 dragons, the ultimate threat! We have such a large cast, this is going to be amazing!

And then, it was 3 or 4 lame ass dragons that did not look like dragons, not like I expected them to be, at least. They were cartoonish, hardly threatening, and had the MCs not underestimated them, (like if instead of Pan acting tough/careless, it was Vegeta or Uub), none of them would've been a problem.
I can accept them having different ways of being a threat, but the show kickstarted with Buu level threats and ended up with 4/7 shitty dragons that weren't actually powerful on their own.
One just required to move away; the second one can't handle taking a shower; the third one was defeated by an eagle; and the last one was the one that had something going on: since it was so weak, it hijacked bodies.
They seemed custom-made for just Goku and Pan withholding their full power. Goku turned SS4 sure, but why didn't he just defeat the Mole Dragon after he started destroying the nearest city? he and Pan started toying with him, who presented as dumb and weak.

Those dragons, with a proper writing staff that included the rest of the cast, would've been oneshot immediately. Maybe not the Electric Dragon, but even the most resilient dragon was defeated underwhelmingly. He got just one episode while being the only one that tanked SS4 Goku's KHHx10 something only Ih Shenron was only capable of.

[Dbzfan94]

I agree that most of the Shadow Dragons ended up feeling like filler bosses rather than meaningful threats. But if they started at SS3 tier, GT would’ve needed to establish a solid reason for why Goku couldn’t just immediately go SS4 and wipe the floor with them.

That’s actually one thing Daima handles better. Goku being turned into a kid limits his access to full power, which creates a real sense of tension and progression in his battles. GT didn’t really provide that kind of in-story restriction in that arc. SS4 Goku was available, but he just didn’t use it consistently, which made things feel dragged out.

One fix could’ve been something like a magical seal or curse cast by the dragons themselves, locking Goku out of his higher forms and forcing him to overcome each one to slowly break the seal. Or just make the dragons start out at SS4 level and require Goku to rely on help, strategy, and growth throughout.

In defense of GT, the first Shadow Dragon (Haze Shenron) does this. If I remember right, his pollution in the air made it harder for Goku to access his power.

[Hugo Boss]

Yeah, Haze Shenron does technically impair Goku and Pan through the polluted atmosphere, which affects their ability to fight. But even with that handicap in place, he never really feels like a serious threat. His strength still seems subpar, and it takes him forever to capitalize on his advantage. Once the poison starts taking effect, you’d expect him to go in for the win, but instead, he’s more of a comedic obstacle than a real enemy.

[WittyUsername]

From a narrative standpoint, the early Evil Dragons being “pathetically weak” makes sense. They’re meant to serve as these gimmicky warm-up bosses before the real threats show up.

To me, the real problem is having Goku (and Pan) be the only ones to confront these dragons. They should’ve had the Dragon Team split up to confront the dragons individually. Maybe have Gohan and Oob deal with the five-star dragon, let Goten and Trunks deal with six-star, and have Vegeta confront seven-star or something.

[Koitsukai]

He’s more of a comedic obstacle than a real enemy.

I wrote a huge, boring paragraph but this sums up my opinion on this much better. They look like they are there to be light-hearted, corky antagonists, like something more akin to Bugs Bunny than to Goku... nothing unheard of in DB but without the Akira Touch that made silly things work. Abo and Cado type of enemies.

While I do get some chuckles out of some of them, it's not enough for this to be a believable threat, certainly not the final threat. I guess that's also why they chose to sideline 97% of the cast for this. Otherwise the arc would've been 5 episodes long.
It's specially odd when you think that they form one of the strongest items in the universe... sans the three main guys, all the others can offer is sad.

[Vegeta th3 4th]

The biggest issue I have with the shadow dragons arc is the complete lack of involvement from the cast. This was the perfect arc to get everyone involved in the story, but no, Goku time. Even if the dragons remained as is, having the cast as a whole take part in fighting them would've made up for their shortcomings.

Haze Shenron: Goten and Trunks.
Rage Shenron: Gohan and Uub.
Naturon Shenron: Krillin, Tien, and Yamcha.
Oceanus Shenron: Android #18, Videl, and Pan.
Eis Shenron: Vegeta.
Nova Shenron: Goku.
Syn Shenron: Gogeta, Gotenks, Gohan, & Uub.

[BernardoCairo]

I personally didn't like any of the villains in GT. Baby starts out as an interesting character, but becomes very one note as the episodes go on. Likewise, the Shadow Dragons are a cool idea, but they ended up being boring in practice. The power creep between every other Dragon and Syn Shenron is ridiculous...

I did like Nova Shenron's dynamic with Goku though.

[ABED]

Disagree. I like that they built. There are 7 dragons. They can't all be these huge challenges. Allow it to grow in intensity. I know I'm in the minority on this, but I love the first dragon. He's the weakest but his threat isn't mere physical power. He saps their strength through odor and pollution.

I also like weasly the dragon who absorbs Pan was.

Execution can be better but having a few weak ones with interesting powers and personalities is more interesting than "this one is strong, and this one is strong, and this one is... also strong" Guldo is one of my favorite of the Ginyu Force bc he's weak but it doesn't matter. His ability to freeze time and people makes him a genuine threat.

Something to think about is no matter how strong the characters are written to be, there are 7 dragons and in all probability the first few are bound to be cannon fodder. I hate to use such an obnoxious term, but "plot armor" prevents them from doing much. Doesn't mean they can't be interesting, but saying they're really strong won't make them interesting.