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All Purpose Dragon Ball Thread

Hasty12345 said:
This might be controversial, but I think what is "good" isn't the same as "what I like/enjoy".

I can say DB is good but also say "I don't like it."
Click to expand...
Thinking that something is good is inherently your opinion.

Sometimes bad things ARE bad and sometimes good things ARE good. When it comes to fictional stories tho, nah not really. I mean, for certain PARTS of a story you can say that, but just in terms of an overall rating, it will vary no matter what and it will be subjective cause some people have a strong preference for certain types of stories.
 
RinneItachi said:
Thinking that something is good is inherently your opinion.
Click to expand...
I don’t think that’s entirely true, but for the sake of discussion I’ll assume it is.

people can enjoy critically bad media, and people can dislike critically good media.

my initial statement was obviously hyperbolic, however, my point was that from a literary standpoint, Dragon Ball is well constructed. It wasn’t a statement meant to be read as or interpreted in such a way “everyone should enjoy dragon ball”.
 
XXBenShapiroXx said:
Stating something is dumb fun is not spectacular grounds for establishing an opinion on a series. A simple story isn't a bad story.

With character development being predictable thing, just, no. At best its Vegeta, who is still a great character, but everyone else, yeah no, neither predictable nor 'generic'.

Calling Dragon Ball generic is my litmus test for reading comprehension. It popularized nearly all of the biggest anime tropes, so calling it generic when it was one of the first ones to do it is wrong on all kinds of levels.

Buu Saga is the second litmus test, because beyond pacing, the strongest marks against the arc are just 'it didn't happen how I want it to happen therefore bad'. Buu Saga I think is a phenomenal capstone to the series.

For why I think Dragon Ball holds up? Well I could write an essay on that lol. It's got some phenomenal character work, the 23rd Budokai arc is about the most foundationally sound story I've seen in anime/manga, god tier fights obviously, fantastic villains, and while the plot is comparatively simple to other animes, beyond the first half of the cell Saga, the plot is pretty solid.
Click to expand...
I didn't say anything like that. I just explained that I prefer more complex stories.

Uh, not a whole lot of characters have much development if at all as far as I can remember. The only character who I'd say has really good development is Piccolo tbh. And yeah very generic, but not generic for its time I guess? Examples please.

That much is true. It is basic but it was the first to do what it was best at.

Buu Saga? Let's see. SSJ3 was forced af and served no purpose. Gohan was shafted entirely two times in the arc effectively rendering the point of the Cell Saga moot. The arc felt very drawn out with a lot of unnecessary additions and conflicts to the plot. Well over half of the cast were irrelevant in the arc up until like, literally the ending of the series. I could go on. There isn't a lot of good things about the Buu arc in my opinion but I'd love it if you mentioned some that I might not have seen?

"phenomenal character work"

Vast majority of the characters we are introduced to early in the franchise become non-factors in Z pretty early on and are only really brought up for the sake of nostalgia or to show how Goku has grown or something. Actually this is pretty much a trend. 90% of the characters we are introduced to in the franchise lose their importance depending on how the writers feel, the Saiyan's are the only exceptions. Toriyama introduced Goten and Trunks decades ago and hyped them up massively and they've done virtually nothing besides a decent battle involving Gotenks. Tien was literally the main antagonist of an arc and one of the main characters in OG Dragon Ball. Now he is about as relevant as a microbe. I'll give you a lot of these points but on no planet does Dragon Ball have phenomenal character work. I'm not saying there AREN'T good characters, but there are only a very small few imo.

The 23rd Budokai is one of the best parts of the series, what about it?

"god tier fights" Mm, they're not as good as they used to be by new standards, but they hold up pretty well and WERE god tier for their time, only a good handful of the fights I would really put on that pedestal, like Goku Vs. Cell.

"fantastic villains"

Sure. Though a lot of them are very one-dimensional and there are extremely few villains who have a desire other than "destroy everything" "rule everything" etc. and it gets tiring. I am not saying that makes a villain bad, a villain doesn't have to be relatable or have some kind of particular goal or anything else. Aizen is one of my favorite anime villains ever and he's not exactly complex or deep. Frieza is an amazing villain and there's a REASON why he's iconic. Just saying that it'd be nice if Dragon Ball had more VARIETY instead of like, 99% of the villains just being "I'm gonna kill everyone!!!" over and over again. And if we get into the Super manga...Jesus Christ.

"
and while the plot is comparatively simple to other animes, beyond the first half of the cell Saga, the plot is pretty solid.
Click to expand...
"

You see though, the thing I'm saying isn't just about the plot, but that it has very little complexity or emotionally compelling narrative story telling, and that I PREFER series' like that, like Arcane, or Attack on Titan, or the Chimera Ant Arc in HXH, and so on. Dragon Ball has almost none of that to speak of.

What I would say is, for what DRAGON BALL IS, I'd give it a 6-10/10 depending on the arc, but for my OVERALL preferences, Dragon Ball peaks at an 8/10 even at its best, because while it is entertaining, nostalgic, iconic, genre-defining, and has some emotionally compelling moments and characters, it just lacks a certain depth to it that I find more appealing in a story, which is what stops it from ever getting higher than an 8/10 in my book.

Also, might be a hot take, I've always thought Dragon Ball's humor was extremely lacking even though it tries to be funny very often. There are some good jokes here and there but a lot of it is toilet humor, a character falling over because someone did or said something "wacky", or "SEXUAL HARASSMENT XD" which is a trope I despise in anime overall.
 
In my opinion dragon balls simple writting is what makes me enjoy it no complex bull shit or anything followed by some simple foreshadowing people say that they pull ui out of ass but it was foreshadowed from resurrection f which makes t.o.p even more solid in my eyes
 
You know that scene where Beerus and Champa are fighting and then Whis and Vados say that if two gods of destruction fight they could destroy both universes? When they were fighting, the area of effect was the power of destruction, wasn't it? Couldn't this mean that the power of destruction could erase universes? Which would probably result in non-existent erasure due to subspace. It was something I suddenly thought of to see what anyone thinks.
 
RinneItachi said:
I didn't say anything like that. I just explained that I prefer more complex stories.

Uh, not a whole lot of characters have much development if at all as far as I can remember. The only character who I'd say has really good development is Piccolo tbh. And yeah very generic, but not generic for its time I guess? Examples please.

That much is true. It is basic but it was the first to do what it was best at.

Buu Saga? Let's see. SSJ3 was forced af and served no purpose. Gohan was shafted entirely two times in the arc effectively rendering the point of the Cell Saga moot. The arc felt very drawn out with a lot of unnecessary additions and conflicts to the plot. Well over half of the cast were irrelevant in the arc up until like, literally the ending of the series. I could go on. There isn't a lot of good things about the Buu arc in my opinion but I'd love it if you mentioned some that I might not have seen?

"phenomenal character work"

Vast majority of the characters we are introduced to early in the franchise become non-factors in Z pretty early on and are only really brought up for the sake of nostalgia or to show how Goku has grown or something. Actually this is pretty much a trend. 90% of the characters we are introduced to in the franchise lose their importance depending on how the writers feel, the Saiyan's are the only exceptions. Toriyama introduced Goten and Trunks decades ago and hyped them up massively and they've done virtually nothing besides a decent battle involving Gotenks. Tien was literally the main antagonist of an arc and one of the main characters in OG Dragon Ball. Now he is about as relevant as a microbe. I'll give you a lot of these points but on no planet does Dragon Ball have phenomenal character work. I'm not saying there AREN'T good characters, but there are only a very small few imo.

The 23rd Budokai is one of the best parts of the series, what about it?

"god tier fights" Mm, they're not as good as they used to be by new standards, but they hold up pretty well and WERE god tier for their time, only a good handful of the fights I would really put on that pedestal, like Goku Vs. Cell.

"fantastic villains"

Sure. Though a lot of them are very one-dimensional and there are extremely few villains who have a desire other than "destroy everything" "rule everything" etc. and it gets tiring. I am not saying that makes a villain bad, a villain doesn't have to be relatable or have some kind of particular goal or anything else. Aizen is one of my favorite anime villains ever and he's not exactly complex or deep. Frieza is an amazing villain and there's a REASON why he's iconic. Just saying that it'd be nice if Dragon Ball had more VARIETY instead of like, 99% of the villains just being "I'm gonna kill everyone!!!" over and over again. And if we get into the Super manga...Jesus Christ.

"

"

You see though, the thing I'm saying isn't just about the plot, but that it has very little complexity or emotionally compelling narrative story telling, and that I PREFER series' like that, like Arcane, or Attack on Titan, or the Chimera Ant Arc in HXH, and so on. Dragon Ball has almost none of that to speak of.

What I would say is, for what DRAGON BALL IS, I'd give it a 6-10/10 depending on the arc, but for my OVERALL preferences, Dragon Ball peaks at an 8/10 even at its best, because while it is entertaining, nostalgic, iconic, genre-defining, and has some emotionally compelling moments and characters, it just lacks a certain depth to it that I find more appealing in a story, which is what stops it from ever getting higher than an 8/10 in my book.

Also, might be a hot take, I've always thought Dragon Ball's humor was extremely lacking even though it tries to be funny very often. There are some good jokes here and there but a lot of it is toilet humor, a character falling over because someone did or said something "wacky", or "SEXUAL HARASSMENT XD" which is a trope I despise in anime overall.
Click to expand...
Alright let's go through all this bit by bit since there is a lot wrong here.

The 'oh i understand that simple isn't bad but villains are bad because they are simple' really wasn't a great start. As for why calling Dragon Ball generic is ridiculous? It fostered a majority of shounen anime's most popular tropes, and even back in the 1980's Dragon Ball still had its own unique and wacky identity.

While side characters not being relevant is a fair knock, the only fair knock you make, the story as a whole was about the pursuit of happiness, and these characters found their happiness in several ways. Krillin got married and had a child and eventually got back into martial arts, Yamcha got a baller baseball career, Tien is now teaching his own school, I mean they moved on with their lives. I would like to see them get relevance again, most fans would.

Goku, Vegeta, Gohan, Trunks, Piccolo, they all have a vast array of development, Vegeta and Piccolo explore redemption and forgiveness, Trunks has his hope storyline, and Gohan and Goku both have nature vs nurture stories. Besides, a character doesn't exactly need to have development to be good, take King Kai or Beerus or Whis.

Now, Buu Saga. SSJ3 was a plot device that wasn't meant to actually do anything because the time of one person saving everyone was long gone, no one person was gonna defeat Buu. Goku wanted a successor and threw Gotenks and Gohan at Buu, only for Buu to throw his sucessors back at him. Gohan didn't get shafted, the entire point of the Cell Saga was that he hates fighting because he's been traumatized as a child and these outbursts of anger are the defensive mechanic-isms of a scared child. Goku told Gohan to beat Cell, then go be a scholar.

So like, there isn't a whole lot of ground for Gohan got shafted in the arc when his failure came down to already established flaws he had as a fighter. The most you got was Toriyama going back to Goku as a protagonist, which I think told a much better story due to him realizing it wasn't about one person but everyone working together, ya know, that why he used the spirit bomb, why he needed energy from earth and from those irrelevant characters.

If you have any critics of the Buu Saga with actual narrative grounds I'd like to hear them, because so far they seem to just stem from misunderstanding the story.

Things like Goten and Trunks are points I agree with, just about everyone wants them do something but beyond that I don't see any meat to the rest of those statements. Dragon Ball is the story of Goku, characters come and go throughout the story. And there is no 'writers', mostly just Toriyama and sometimes an editor.

Villains?

Uh, Vegeta was a saiyan elite looking to establish himself as the strongest while secretly vying for the dragon balls to wish for immortality to overthrow Frieza, Frieza is a galatic ruler who acts one part tryant one part buisnessman, Cell wants the perfect fight because of the saiyan cells within him as well as the fact his creator and everything related to that have been destroyed leaving him with literally no other purpose than the want a perfect fight. Buu is really the only 'ounga bounga blow up shit' villian, and even then he constantly switches from naive to sadistic to cunning to black air force. There aren't a ton of villains in Super, just opponents like Beerus, Hit, and Jiren. Zamasu loved the universe and wanted to cull the mortals from it so they'd stop ruining it. Moro literally feeds off planets to sustain himself, he's evil yeah, he is also the encapsulation of nearly every past villain, so he was written like that on purpose. Granolah wasn't a villain but he wanted to take revenge upon the saiyans and whatnot, and the heaters wanted to do the same, plus get rid of Frieza too, which is why that arc was about the cycle of violence and pride and how it manifests.

So uhh, if you have a point here beyond reductive framing, that'd be nice.

So far, your reason for thinking Dragon Ball lacks depth comes from not understanding the story it was trying to tell. From the line of examples you've given, you seem to prefer shows that are upfront about their complexity and depth, which is all well and good, but to say Dragon Ball has none of that after misunderstanding several core narrative threads from the shows later arcs like Cell and Buu just isn't a strong argument for Dragon Ball to not have any of the 'depth' you look for. Dragon Ball's depth isn't in your face, which if anything is more subtly than just about any of the shows you mentioned, not to saw they aren't all fantastic pieces of ficton.

The other stuff about the humor and the fights and the rating you'd give it are personal opinions, you are entitled to them, but everything else just isn't an accurate representation of Dragon Ball's story.
 
Just because Dragon Ball doesn't go 'ooh look at how complex and multi-layered I am, look at my mature thematic story telling' doesn't mean it doesn't have complexity or depth. Different interpretations of a story is all well and good until that interpretation is as reductive as possible.
 
Tyranno223 said:
Ben sent a tweet with DB Heroes and DC Infinite Frontier, implying both are gonna be used.
Click to expand...
Yeah by the looks of it, they using composite manga/anime-games Goku (DB, DBZ/Kai, DBGT, DBS, Toei/Movies, DBO, DBVX and DBH) Vs canon composite Superman (Pre-crisis upto Rebirth).

Doing research for such a controversial MU is an unenviable job tbh.
 
You should really add mind erasing to the hakai, as it covers all of this and has already been accepted here, because of this Zamasu has his regeneration.
 
Phsccarvalho said:
You know that scene where Beerus and Champa are fighting and then Whis and Vados say that if two gods of destruction fight they could destroy both universes? When they were fighting, the area of effect was the power of destruction, wasn't it? Couldn't this mean that the power of destruction could erase universes? Which would probably result in non-existent erasure due to subspace. It was something I suddenly thought of to see what anyone thinks.
Click to expand...
Yes, I think it can be done and give that hax to the Gods of destruction
 
@XXBenShapiroXx Apparently Ultra's the same guy who, by testimony, consumed EIGHTY FOUR years of Superman comics, TV shows, cartoons, video games, crossovers, radio shows, books, spin offs, and etc.

That and on top of the fact that they're already using stuff from the movies based off Goku's preview, not even getting into Heroes, then Ultraguy's brain has scrambled like an egg after he was done with everything.
 
The_Unknown_Warrior1 said:
@XXBenShapiroXx Apparently Ultra's the same guy who, by testimony, consumed EIGHTY FOUR years of Superman comics, TV shows, cartoons, video games, crossovers, radio shows, books, spin offs, and etc.

That and on top of the fact that they're already using stuff from the movies based off Goku's preview, not even getting into Heroes, then Ultraguy's brain has scrambled like an egg after he was done with everything.
Click to expand...
So much ******* mid
 
Now I understand the old Kaioshin's quote about leaving just a void and that quote doesn't make BOG level 3-B or anything like that, it just adds even more context to the anime, where all the destruction of the Universe generates a colorful void, where space -time and everything in the Universe was completely destroyed as shown in anime and manga

 
XXBenShapiroXx said:
Alright let's go through all this bit by bit since there is a lot wrong here.

The 'oh i understand that simple isn't bad but villains are bad because they are simple' really wasn't a great start. As for why calling Dragon Ball generic is ridiculous? It fostered a majority of shounen anime's most popular tropes, and even back in the 1980's Dragon Ball still had its own unique and wacky identity.

While side characters not being relevant is a fair knock, the only fair knock you make, the story as a whole was about the pursuit of happiness, and these characters found their happiness in several ways. Krillin got married and had a child and eventually got back into martial arts, Yamcha got a baller baseball career, Tien is now teaching his own school, I mean they moved on with their lives. I would like to see them get relevance again, most fans would.

Goku, Vegeta, Gohan, Trunks, Piccolo, they all have a vast array of development, Vegeta and Piccolo explore redemption and forgiveness, Trunks has his hope storyline, and Gohan and Goku both have nature vs nurture stories. Besides, a character doesn't exactly need to have development to be good, take King Kai or Beerus or Whis.

Now, Buu Saga. SSJ3 was a plot device that wasn't meant to actually do anything because the time of one person saving everyone was long gone, no one person was gonna defeat Buu. Goku wanted a successor and threw Gotenks and Gohan at Buu, only for Buu to throw his sucessors back at him. Gohan didn't get shafted, the entire point of the Cell Saga was that he hates fighting because he's been traumatized as a child and these outbursts of anger are the defensive mechanic-isms of a scared child. Goku told Gohan to beat Cell, then go be a scholar.

So like, there isn't a whole lot of ground for Gohan got shafted in the arc when his failure came down to already established flaws he had as a fighter. The most you got was Toriyama going back to Goku as a protagonist, which I think told a much better story due to him realizing it wasn't about one person but everyone working together, ya know, that why he used the spirit bomb, why he needed energy from earth and from those irrelevant characters.

If you have any critics of the Buu Saga with actual narrative grounds I'd like to hear them, because so far they seem to just stem from misunderstanding the story.

Things like Goten and Trunks are points I agree with, just about everyone wants them do something but beyond that I don't see any meat to the rest of those statements. Dragon Ball is the story of Goku, characters come and go throughout the story. And there is no 'writers', mostly just Toriyama and sometimes an editor.

Villains?

Uh, Vegeta was a saiyan elite looking to establish himself as the strongest while secretly vying for the dragon balls to wish for immortality to overthrow Frieza, Frieza is a galatic ruler who acts one part tryant one part buisnessman, Cell wants the perfect fight because of the saiyan cells within him as well as the fact his creator and everything related to that have been destroyed leaving him with literally no other purpose than the want a perfect fight. Buu is really the only 'ounga bounga blow up shit' villian, and even then he constantly switches from naive to sadistic to cunning to black air force. There aren't a ton of villains in Super, just opponents like Beerus, Hit, and Jiren. Zamasu loved the universe and wanted to cull the mortals from it so they'd stop ruining it. Moro literally feeds off planets to sustain himself, he's evil yeah, he is also the encapsulation of nearly every past villain, so he was written like that on purpose. Granolah wasn't a villain but he wanted to take revenge upon the saiyans and whatnot, and the heaters wanted to do the same, plus get rid of Frieza too, which is why that arc was about the cycle of violence and pride and how it manifests.

So uhh, if you have a point here beyond reductive framing, that'd be nice.

So far, your reason for thinking Dragon Ball lacks depth comes from not understanding the story it was trying to tell. From the line of examples you've given, you seem to prefer shows that are upfront about their complexity and depth, which is all well and good, but to say Dragon Ball has none of that after misunderstanding several core narrative threads from the shows later arcs like Cell and Buu just isn't a strong argument for Dragon Ball to not have any of the 'depth' you look for. Dragon Ball's depth isn't in your face, which if anything is more subtly than just about any of the shows you mentioned, not to saw they aren't all fantastic pieces of ficton.

The other stuff about the humor and the fights and the rating you'd give it are personal opinions, you are entitled to them, but everything else just isn't an accurate representation of Dragon Ball's story.
Click to expand...
I completely agree with your opinion. DB does not mostly look for depth but when it does it well the reader often does not realize it. I think that one of the situations that DB most resents is usually Goku himself with his questionable attitudes and decisions, and taking as an example the Cell saga (which I feel takes a very paternal approach as an objective as much as between Goku and Gohan as with Vegeta and Trunks). Goku sends Gohan to fight since he did not understand and know Gohan well, he projected his wishes on his son and for that reason he ended up hurt and suffering, when Goku realized the situation he ended up going into shock due to such an event.
 
LuffyRuffy46307 said:
Now I understand the old Kaioshin's quote about leaving just a void and that quote doesn't make BOG level 3-B or anything like that, it just adds even more context to the anime, where all the destruction of the Universe generates a colorful void, where space -time and everything in the Universe was completely destroyed as shown in anime and manga

Click to expand...

I’ve always thought it was tier 3, but it’s can’t be lower than 3-A because the living world is larger than our universe and it was going to destroy 2 other 3-A structures.

Saying it’s lower than 3-A is bad faith.
 
Hasty12345 said:
I’ve always thought it was tier 3, but it’s can’t be lower than 3-A because the living world is larger than our universe and it was going to destroy 2 other 3-A structures.

Saying it’s lower than 3-A is bad faith.
Click to expand...
Some say it would destroy all the matter in the Universe making it something around 3-B, but any Universe that is completely destroyed is a low 2-C feat, since you would have to destroy all of it space-time to affect the Universe
 
LuffyRuffy46307 said:
Some say it would destroy all the matter in the Universe making it something around 3-B, but any Universe that is completely destroyed is a low 2-C feat, since you would have to destroy all of it space-time to affect the Universe
Click to expand...
I was writing a long explanation as to why I don’t think the tier 2 scaling for DBS doesn’t start until IZ but then my phone refreshed the page and I lost it.

Long story short about this feat however is it’s not lower than 3-A when you take in the size of the universe and the area of effect including 2 other universe sized realms.
 
Hasty12345 said:
I was writing a long explanation as to why I don’t think the tier 2 scaling for DBS doesn’t start until IZ but then my phone refreshed the page and I lost it.

Long story short about this feat however is it’s not lower than 3-A when you take in the size of the universe and the area of effect including 2 other universe sized realms.
Click to expand...
Exactly, brother, you have a lot of knowledge about it, it's no wonder you've been here for years too
 
Phsccarvalho said:
You know that scene where Beerus and Champa are fighting and then Whis and Vados say that if two gods of destruction fight they could destroy both universes? When they were fighting, the area of effect was the power of destruction, wasn't it? Couldn't this mean that the power of destruction could erase universes? Which would probably result in non-existent erasure due to subspace. It was something I suddenly thought of to see what anyone thinks.
Click to expand...
Power of Destruction is just another type of Ki isn't it? If so......then if they can destroy universe with their own ki, so can their other types of ki
 
It's right here, although my searcher is faulty
vsbattles.com

God Zamasu Mid Godly regeneration removal

https://vsbattles.fandom.com/wiki/God_Zamasu_(DBS_Manga) https://vsbattles.fandom.com/wiki/Regeneration Mid-Godly: The ability to regenerate from the complete erasure of body, mind, and soul. Wiki standard states characters needs to be completely erased & Regenerate on body soul and mind but...
vsbattles.com vsbattles.com

I found it by looking on your profile where the business of the mind was accepted
 
omegabronic said:
What is the proof of that btw?
Click to expand...
It’s stated that the soul includes memories and shapes them I have the scans somewhere, but iirc it’s stated that memories get removed and evil cleansed from a soul after death during the Buu saga before Vegeta does his sacrifice and asks if he’d see goku and keep his body
 
TheGodOfICE777 said:
It’s stated that the soul includes memories and shapes them I have the scans somewhere, but iirc it’s stated that memories get removed and evil cleansed from a soul after death during the Buu saga before Vegeta does his sacrifice and asks if he’d see goku and keep his body
Click to expand...
souls have memory, but so does a body, it doesn't mean that destroying a soul destroys the mind as well by default
 
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