Salutations! Since I talked about Dragon Ball in the previous post, talking about the infamous Dragon Ball Z was unavoidable. Despite what I said about Dragon Ball, it was at least a fun read. This, my friends, is where all the fun gets sucked out. We have exited the park ride and entered the projectile vomitng. Metaphorically, of course
Ginger, anyone?Now, for those familiar with the series, you're probably asking yourself, "What can this guy say that hasn't already been said?" Well, since I've read the manga and have not watched the anime, I shan't be talking about the constipation-slow fights or how entire episodes can be dedicated to a guy screaming.
ACTION-PACKED!Now, I'm going to spoil a lot of things in the series, so if you have ANY interest at all to read DBZ, I suggest you stop reading. Right. Now.
For those not familiar with the series, I'll give you a briefing; It begins with the protagonist from Dragon Ball, Son Goku, now the world's greatest martial artist and all grown up, along with many of the other characters. Now, Goku is married to a woman named Chi-Chi (who he met in Dragon Ball, knowing her for a grand total of two days) and has a son named Gohan.
BUT THEN, a visitor named Raditz comes, revealing to Goku that he is his brother and that he's part of an ALIEN RACE called the Saiyans, sent to kill every earthling and sell the planet to other aliens! So, he kidnaps Gohan and Goku kills Raditz at the cost of his own life. HOWEVER, a new threat emerges, as the other Saiyans discover the death of Raditz and come to Earth to take matters in to their own hands. The other Saiyans consist of two men named Vegeta and Nappa, who are far superior in combat to Raditz, so it's up to Gohan to save the planet!
Awww, Raditz looks like a nice guy!Or it would be, save for the fact that the author of the series, Akira Toriyama, thought fans would not like him killing Goku and replacing him with Gohan, so Toriyama decided it'd be best to bring him back to life. So, now it's up to Goku to save everyone from this huge threat! However, in order to defeat his fellow Saiyans, he must train harder!
Get the idea? Big threat is said to arrive. Goku and others train, the big threat arrives (who's so powerful, he can blow up the universe by farting) Goku is occupied and the others are forced to fight. Others hold him off pretty well, but then he reveals a 'true form'. True form is ALWAYS, visually, the least threatening and the smallest. Others get defeated by the true form. Gohan shows massive potential and, despite being 7, can easily hold off the true form. Goku arrives and enters fight, eventually defeating big threat.
Now that you understand that, allow me to tell you the first thing I hate about the series; That formula is what occupies the entire story, being used about four times throughout the series. In fact, the only one that's a little different is the first one, the Saiyan Battle! It's different in the fact that Goku falls during the battle and the others end up taking the Saiyan, Vegeta, down. Other than that, the other battles follow the same exact formula. So, the first thing I hate about the series? It's repetitive.
Which is boring.Now, my friend, now that I've got the plot out of the way, allow me to pick apart what parts bothered me, personally!
Gohan: Here I was thinking that Goku was the boring, soulless Marty Stu in the story. Gohan beats him in that regard, no contest. Seriously, Goku at least had the flaw of being ignorant to the rest of the world and Gohan doesn't even have that. He's smarter than his daddy and has the pontential to be stronger than his daddy.
Gohan SMASH!Somehow, he has the potential to be more powerful than his father, being able to learn techniques at seven years old that Goku didn't even learn until he was in his late twenties. But you know what I don't get? Goku is more powerful than his allies because he's a Saiyan, a warrior race of aliens, right? And he married a human, right? Then, how do you explain why Gohan is supposed to be more powerful if he's only half-Saiyan? As in, that makes no sense! If you take booze and water it down, do you get stronger booze? No, you get much weaker booze! Therefore, if you put an inferior race into a race of warriors, you'll get a weak warrior.
Also, despite the fact that Goku's allies have trained alongside him for so long, Gohan is stronger than them, even as a child. Toriyama loves bruising his supporting character's egos, doesn't he? Some guy once explained to me on Youtube that Gohan is more powerful because he is a pacifist and somehow it charges him up and makes him more powerful... Which shows that people trying to defend this are idiots. By his logic, Ghandi could easily defeat Mike Tyson in a fight.
Getting ready to kick some ass.In short, I'm glad Gohan was rejected as the main character by Toriyama. I prefer Goku, the lesser of two evils.
Everyone is interesting but Goku and his family: Despite what I said about Goku and Gohan, Akira Toriyama is actually capable of making some interesting and flawed characters. For example, there is Piccolo Jr.; The final enemy of Dragon Ball, Piccolo Jr. was the son of Demon King Piccolo (later revealed to be an alien from the planet Namek), birthed for the sole purpose of killing Goku, born just as his father met his demise at the hands of Goku.
During the events of DBZ, he stills holds onto his purpose of killing his rival. However, throughout much of the story, he's forced to join Goku to defeat a common foe. As a result of the many fights he endured alongside Goku and helping to train Gohan, he starts to go through many transformations, starting out as vengeful, then chaning to just being cold-hearted and finally, he ends up growing a soft spot for humanity.Or then there's Vegeta! His story is similar to Piccolo's, only he's ten times more evil and a hundred times more insane! After his defeat to Goku, his pride as a Saiyan warrior basically took control of him. He cares for no one but himself and values his own pride above all else. Anyone who tries to get in the way of his ambitions will be crushed by him without even the slightest bit of hesitation.
Plus, he had one of the most badass lines I've ever heard; "My heart is pure... Pure evil!" Haha! Now, that was awesome!
But then, he later started to change. In the end, he started to care about people, such as the family he created on Earth (he married Bulma, FYI) and later even admitted that Goku was a worthy rival.
So, why couldn't these guys have been the main characters? They had flaws, they went through changes over time and, despite being aliens, they felt like real people. Goku and Gohan went through none of that. It saddens me when a writer shows he has abilities, but he doesn't use them.
Continued in part 2...
