Here’s the thing about both though. Zenkai by itself is such an immense copout it’s insane. But it works for the Frieza Saga for two reasons. The generic reason is, unlike literally the entire rest of the series outside of the King Piccolo Saga in the OG and the Tournament of Power in Super (both of which had their own bullshit powerups but both share the same reason as the Frieza Saga) the entire cast had zero time to actively train. Once Goku arrived on Namek (and Piccolo to a lesser extent) that was it. No more training could be had and anything they had was all they got. The problem is that the series even as far back as the OG had thrived itself on escalating threats that were far beyond what the characters could initially do. But since they can’t train to make up the difference, what can be done? The answer is, throw a random powerup so they aren’t fucked.
The second reason goes back to the thing about Vegeta. Vegeta intentionally abusing the Zenkai to catch up to Frieza is a low point…but that works. He’s desperate, so much so he has to ally with allies he hates a smidge less than the Frieza Force and willingly throw away his pride and let the guy who had him dead to rights at the end of the Saiyan Saga basically “kill him” so he could go fight Frieza. So often in the arc he isn’t the haughty Prince of all Saiyans but a man who simply just wants to avenge his people by any means necessary.
As for Goku, he did earn it…emotionally which was my earlier point. Becoming Super Saiyan was far more about Goku embracing his heritage and lineage than a strict powerup. It’s him saying “I am a Saiyan above all else” at that very moment in time and the transformation was a fantastic way of visually representing that. He can be afforded the freebie because of when it happened and how it was presented.
Goku Black Saga
Half the arc was fantastic. The beginnings were legitimately compelling and greatly written. The actual mystery as to what was going on, the sheer dread of Goku Black, the tragedy of Trunks and his timeline becoming even more desolated and the reveals. Everything was superb. There was just one problem. After the final reveals that lead to the final confrontations (Goku Black and Future Zamasu vs Goku, Vegeta and Trunks) they ruined nearly everything else. From the whole “Potara now is only temporary on mortal beings” (though…I guess kudos for actively taking advantage of a potential loophole the Buu Saga had put in) but mainly the ending. All they had to do was simply end it on Trunks being victorious with the Spirit Sword. It was the perfect ending. Vegito weakening Fused Zamasu and revealing that his indestructible nature is now fucked up by the Fusion and Trunks’ final hope with the people of his timeline backing him up to Save the Future once more. The Diabolous Ex Machina that happened afterwards made no sense and is so actively against what the entirety of Dragon Ball is about it’s absurd.
It’s honestly absurd and it shows how much sticking an ending matters. If we end on Trunks winning with the Spirit Sword, I would say the Goku Black Saga is actually the pinnacle of Dragon Ball Sagas even beyond the Frieza Saga. Even with shit like Super Saiyan Rose (though to be honest there was a ton of potential ground to cover on Body Swapping that Ginyu really never took to the fullest potential so I can live with it).
Well since you all talking DB anime you open the door to a think I was thinking of yesterday after for some reason being shown by YT clips of the 2nd and 3rd WMAT arcs.
I have always preferred vanilla DB over DBZ and those clips made me realize why. DBZ turned using KI into a joke.
Using a KI move in DB was a big fucking deal. In DBZ onward they throw and deflect KI like it’s nothing, they cheapened it.
I mean, this was a big moment.
I never considered Yamcha learning the Kamehameha a big thing because he learned the Spirit Ball first. So we already knew he had an affinity for that type of thing.
Then they deadass went with the diabolus ex machina, which was pretty damn bad, mind you, but honestly the worst part was Trunks just hopping to another timeline.
When I watched I was like: “Oh, ok, so Trunks got nowhere to go now, so he’ll be a regular cast member, that’s pretty cool.”
But nope.
You really gotta question the whole logic of it at that point.
I also think Black should’ve gotten Rosé at the point Vegeta beats the shit out of him. Y’know, make it like the original SSJ where it gets triggered by rage.
Super does have the stupidest problems with its pacing because the power creep just rushes everything.
Spirit ball is at the 3rd martial arts tournament, he does Kamehameha in the 2nd. Also what’s special about that moment is Tie. Being able to reflect it, it’s the 1st time, no one has ever done it before, it’s a big deal.
Okay, I’m gonna go in a little bit because this continues to annoy me. In what way has Gohan become a waste? I feel the fandom’s treatment of Gohan is so horrid it drives me to the point of insanity. I feel that he ends up revealing how hypocritical a ton of DB fans are in the end.
Everyone agrees that his pinnacle was claiming SSJ2 and defeating Cell and then everyone “agrees” afterwards that he was ruined as a character. Again, why? Because he doesn’t fight or win enough? You can’t even say he was power creeped out of existence because any gaps in power are primarily due to his own choices. When at full power, even at the end of the Buu Saga he’s the strongest of the Z Fighters. Even stronger than SSJ3 Goku (especially by virtue of not burning himself out). Even in Super when he fully trains once more it’s shown that he’s basically on the same level of a base Super Saiyan Blue form and that’s with a minimum amount of training to get back up to speed.
It feels like everyone resents Gohan for not being Goku. For not training constantly and stepping out into the front lines at the first given opportunity. But absolutely everything he does fits his character. Of course he prioritizes his new family and of course he prioritizes getting a new job in his field of choice. Fighting was never his first love and while he certainly doesn’t hate fighting, he’s never enjoyed it like the rest of the cast. He never was big on doing it for sport and even only entered the WMAT in the Buu Saga thanks to Videl essentially blackmailing him into doing so (and Chi-Chi being told about the prize money). He only fought when absolutely necessary.
His two biggest character flaws are his insistence that having a higher reason for fighting is what drives him forward and gives him the moral high ground to victory. The second, is that he gets absurdly cocky and lackidasical whenever he has a clear upper hand in a fight and both get him into trouble often. Both character flaws are pointed out by Piccolo himself (we’ll get to him after Gohan). He gets over the first by being told off by Piccolo. He won’t always have the Moral High Ground or be the only one fighting for loved ones and even if he is, it doesn’t mean shit in winning a fight in the end. It’s good motivation but without the proper effort it means nothing. He has to dedicate himself to some training time even with his obligations if he truly wants to protect his loved ones.
The second he hasn’t gotten over but that’s instinctual. He cannot possibly get over that deep-seeded of an emotional response that quickly. It’s likely a response to his upbringing and the shit he went through in adolescence from the Raditz Arc all the way through into the Cell Saga which lead to him developing an extreme passive aggressive nature and a sadistic streak whenever he gains the upper hand against a reviled opponent. It’s something even Goku has admonished him for. If anything Gohan outright needs therapy to help correct that. But ultimately everything in the series is in character for him.
As for Piccolo while he doesn’t have a main spot in the cast anymore he still has purpose. He’s nowhere near as strong as his compatriots anymore but he gets by on sheer craftiness, something that is a rarity in the series. So much so that his allies still consider him an asset in battle even if they outstrip him by several miles in power. He’s a great tether to what Dragon Ball was. Still though, his main role is definitely being that extra parental figure in Gohan’s life. Yes we all make the jokes about Piccolo being Gohan’s “real dad” but really Piccolo is the only person in the entire series that knows Gohan intimately enough but is intelligent and empathic enough to call out Gohan on his shit and get him to change. Chi-Chi doesn’t bother as she doesn’t really watch him engaging in fights so she can’t, and Goku doesn’t have the emotional maturity to be able to help Gohan with these issues. Piccolo has the blessing of covering the blind spots both Chi-Chi and Goku missed. He’s watched Gohan grow up from a toddler to a man, and has seen him both constantly in battle and in peaceful life so he knows Gohan in a way that his parents realistically can’t. That’s generally enough to keep him around in the series. The two need each other and both characters make each other better as a result.
I’ll admit I fucked up on my WMAT timing. But I do agree that Tien deflecting the Kamehameha was the actual big deal. But that speaks more to the Kamehameha as a technique rather than Ki as a whole. Even now it’s treated as an exceptionally powerful move and while it doesn’t put a ton of people down for the count it still has great presence and often does a fair bit of damage.
But honestly, the issue with Ki is the issue with anything else of that nature. When you open the box you can’t close it again. The second the Kamehameha is introduced it’s going to get escalated. That isn’t a Dragon Ball problem, that’s a problem in any sort of “battle” anime/manga.
Here’s the thing tho. Gohan gets his sick, most powerful, unique form.
How many wins he got with that?
That’s literally my issue with it. Same as Piccolo after he fused with Kami, but at least he gave Cell’s first form a solid ass whooping.
Gohan showboats against Buu (In a manner strikingly similar to what he did against Cell, which just low key shits on his character development.) then Buu tricks him and he gets absorbed.
Alright.
Come Super, Gohan goes through some development, cool stuff, nice episodes and gets his ultimate form again.
They make sure to show that this is the real deal and he can hang around with Goku and Vegeta now.
Who does he beat in the ToP? Anyone relevant? I honestly can’t remember. All that development and when you think you’re going to see results… he jobs.
It’s a waste in my book.
Edit:
Piccolo
Same deal as Gohan really. The lack of actual results when it comes to a fight.
Don’t get me wrong, he’s great, but when you need someone to break the “Goku and Vegeta show” and you know there’s a green alien perfectly suited for the job, you start expecting to see him actually give the beats to someone, even if they aren’t the main threats.
For example, the U6 Tournament Arc. Piccolo put up a good fight and got cheated out of his win. Does he get to fight again like Goku? Does he win against somebody?
It’s the underusage of good, iconic characters that bothers me. Everyone besides Goku is really a jobber for most of the series.
Hell, if you start looking at it, who the fuck did Vegeta beat? His performance is looking hella sus for a deuteragonist.
You make a fair point, the problem is that BDZ cheapens KI attacks way too early in the series.
And Admittedly many Shonen anime do the same.
But there are examples on how to do the trope right:
First of all Saint Seya, where special techniques are never cheapened.
But more similar to the DB lZ style we have Urameshi’s raigun, it stays pretty much his trump card from beginning to end and it always drains him, until his very last fight in the Makai where he uses it repeatedly, and even there he’s not able to fight afterwards because of how much of his power he spent
But that’s my point. Yes, he gains the Ultimate/Mystic Form and loses with it. But he didn’t lose because of an immediate power creep moreso than he gave his opponent the opportunity to gain said power creep. He lost because of his character flaw. In fact, he lost the same way he should’ve lost to Cell but only got saved thanks to Vegeta of all people. It’s like Kirk in Star Trek Into Darkness. People bitched that Kirk had to learn the lesson of not being a reckless moron all over again. No, he had to learn it for the first time because all hsi reckless bullshit actually worked in his initial movie. You can’t learn the lesson if your flaws ultimately worked out in the end.
Gohan was the same. He didn’t learn his lesson about being a sadistic clown against Cell because he ultimately won the fight (albeit with help). Gohan had to lose once he began displaying the same traits otherwise he learns nothing.
As for Super, he doesn’t have a “major win” sure, I’ll give you that. But first off I personally think the concept of a “major win” is childish. You can be a benefit without having some grand, keynote moment. Secondly, trusting Frieza with his plan ultimately was the major factor in the Tournament of Power as it allowed Frieza to be FAR more comfortable with teaming up with Goku later. It’s understated for sure but Frieza’s demeanor in how he interacts with Universe 7 changes drastically after that point in time. It’s not a big character moment, but it was important to what was going on at large.
All of the internet talking about how vas is the worse in the game… only for him to win the whole thing.
I expect the dlc chick to fall along the same lines as vas, I can understand why people write off characters quick in this game because gran, and kat are really good and straight forward… so people reason “why do all this work when I can gran or kat it up”
I was completely wrong about lancelot, he’s top tier material for sure. I didn’t realize 2 things about him at the time that takes moves him up all the way to the high tiers.
It takes a certain kind of player to play vas though, back in the day it wouldn’t have been that big a deal to deal but now, a lot of players just don’t want to deal with the struggles of the big body, slow buttons and no reversals.
Other than the general stagnation of the series post Cell, one other thing I dislike about DBZ is the fights stop progressing in terms of power shown/feats. The insane power creep makes it hard/impossible to show progress.
For example Freiza is shown on multiple occasions to be a planet buster…and that’s basically it as far as verifiable feats of strength go. Everything after that is just vague statements of power that we have to take at face value or we extrapolate the level of power being shown based on scaling (to Freiza or other shown planet busters).
DBZ top tiers are probably faster than light universe busters by the end of Super. But there is little visual indication of that progression since you can’t really show anything more impressive than a planet being destroyed.
The problem with Gohan in DBZ is that he’s clearly the coolest character in his 2 best moments but they don’t keep him that way so people get mad.
Outside of future Trunks, adult Gohan unleashed is my favorite character, expecially because he doesn’t do much in the way of ki and instead focuses on single powerful blows.
I see.
You don’t know what an anime game is in the first place.
You’re excused, but for the future, incompetence is not a good reason to spout nonsense.
