The Dragon Ball franchise has a history of wasted characters.
Dragon Ball
- Yamcha was a hero with a unique fighting style and endearing personality of a cocky yet clumsy and kindhearted character, yet is reduced to a Living Prop after a certain point (namely his infamously humiliating death during the Saiyan Saga), whose lines by the point of Dragon Ball GT and Dragon Ball Super can be counted on one hand, never even getting any conclusions to his storyline. Eiichiro Oda, a friend of the author of Dragon Ball, lamented how the character was left behind in an art piece for the 30th anniversary of the series.
- Chi-Chi was introduced as the Ox King's timid and easily flustered but surprisingly strong daughter whom Goku agrees to marry, not knowing what marriage actually entails. She returns years later as a confident young woman and a fighter good enough to make it to the quarter-finals of the 23rd World Martial Arts Tournament... where she gets effortlessly defeated by her fiancé and does very little of note for the rest of the franchise. Many fans were disappointed that she more or less gave up fighting after marrying Goku, thinking Toriyama should've made her a more impressive fighter with a larger role.
- An entire species gets hit by this. The Giras, save Giran, never play an important role and are rarely mentioned. Giran only plays a major role in Goku's first tournament, and is subsequently seen only in minor roles, such as helping Goku's Genki-Dama. The species itself is only seen as bosses or mooks in certain video games, with only a single episode in the original Dragon Ball focusing on them.
- There was a few covers on the manga volumes that had Bulma in them. Which involved her holding some firearms, like volume 2
◊, volume 10◊ and of course volume 70 which implied that she'll Take a Level in Badass and become an Action Girl somewhere in the story. But in the actual story, there wasn't one moment where she does pick up a gun and fight against Pilaf, or the Red Ribbon Army. (Not counting the moment where she shoots an uzi at Goku, for taking off her panties. Which is Played for Laughs) Which to say the least, is bound to annoy any fan of Bulma who expected her to grow into being such throughout the whole story.
Dragon Ball Z
- Raditz is Goku's older brother. Not only could this idea alone easily lend itself to an interesting character dynamic with Goku, but there is also the fact that Raditz essentially represents how Goku could have turned out if a stray accident hadn't caused him to forget his original mission and turned him into the lovable super-strong Manchild he ended up as, setting him up as a potential foil and rival to Goku. But the bottom line is that he is ultimately defeated and killed a mere few chapters after his introduction, and after this he's rarely if ever brought up ever again. Dragon Ball Z Abridged lampoons this, with Krillin asking Raditz "You'll be involved in many future events, right?", to which Raditz responds by an annoyed silence before attacking Krillin. The games make this worse, as it is revealed in Dragon Ball Heroes that he shares his brother's very rare ability to learn any attack after seeing it performed, retroactively making him the poster boy of the series for Brilliant, but Lazy. Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2 attempts to rectify this via making Raditz one of the many villains the Player Character can recruit to be their Evil Mentor and giving him depth via dialogues with the player and occasionally other characters.
- Nappa plays a huge role in the Saiyan Saga, being the one who kills off most of the heroes. However, after being killed by Vegeta, he stays dead in a series where death is famously cheap. Any time Nappa appears again, it's just a quick cameo in Hell. Granted, he does finally get to confront Vegeta again in GT... only to be curb stomped. It could have been interesting to have seen a fight between the two with Nappa actually having a fair chance at winning, or even to have Nappa pull a Heel–Face Turn like Vegeta.
- King Cold, like Raditz above, has a very impressive pedigree as the father of Frieza who is arguably the single most prominent villain of the entire series, yet all he does is get beaten to build up Future Trunks. While he does appear again, unlike Raditz who completely vanishes, all he does after that is show up for bit villain roles in filler arcs. A villain with a distinctive aristocratic personality in spite of his limited screen time, he could have and arguably should have been used for bigger things. Note that unlike other examples detailed here, this has remained a constant: Frieza passes on a chance to resurrect him in Dragon Ball Z: Resurrection 'F' and even Xenoverse 2, which gave depth and complexity to many other neglected villains such as Raditz, Turles and even Bojack, ignored him completely.
- Android 17 is introduced alongside his twin sister Android 18 in the Android Saga as a powerful threat to the Z Fighters early on, while he is given the most memorable fight in the series with Piccolo, he is quickly written out when he is absorbed by Cell note , by the time the next saga begins (the Buu Saga) which turned out to be the last Saga of Z, he doesn't make a meaningful return at all, since he was Killed Offscreen by Super Buu's Human Extinction Attack, meaning he doesn't get to live nor help out the Z Fighters in any way, except to provide energy for Goku's Spirit Bomb in a meaningless cameo note . His sister 18 on the other hand got far more screentime to compensate (even though she too was killed alongside her daughter) and was actually responsible for the Universe being saved thanks to throwing the fight with Hercule. Thankfully, this was Averted when he was brought back and made the main focus for Dragon Ball Super in the Tournament of Power Saga where he went on to win the entire Tournament.
- Videl is introduced as a slightly irritating but quickly charming character who dovetails nicely with Gohan and the extended Z Fighter family, and even has early episodes dedicated to the relationship between the two to the point she got one of the most brutal beatdowns in the entire series... only for her to be relegated to the Kami's Lookout crew after said beatdown, then turned into chocolate by Super Buu and effectively written out of the story. Pretty much everything in the early high school portion of the story is unimportant, outside of establishing what's new since the Time Skip.
- Gohan himself is generally viewed as a disappointment in the Buu Saga. He's billed as the new protagonist after his father's death, and the story begins with him playing as an awkward high school student hiding his double life as a gaudy superhero. However, Word of God decided that Gohan wasn't working out as the main character, and soon after Goku returns for what was supposed to be a one-day visit, basically everything Gohan-centric outside of his relationship with Videl is quietly dropped. The story tries to force him back into relevance with a cheap powerup, only for him to be overwhelmed and ultimately fall victim to Buu's absorption ability, leaving his dad to firmly retake the helm for the remainder of the series.
- The World Tournament arc is a glorified Saga-long Breather Episode that does little plot-wise except introduce the otherworldly Piccolo Expy Pikkon, which is a shame as quite a few of the filler fighters are more interesting than him and could have had more promise if properly developed. Olibu in particular seems to be the DBZ equivalent of Hercules, with King Kai stating that most of Earth's heroic legends are based on him, yet he plays a very minor role and has only made a single video game appearance. Torby also shows promise in his limited appearances, being stated to be the strongest fighter in the South Galaxy and having an appearance remarkably like a red, good guy Cell. Like Olibu, he only makes a handful of minor appearances and his potential is never explored at all.
- Dabura, initially The Dragon in the Buu Saga. He has an elaborate character design, is stated to be ruler of an alternate universe where he is the strongest person, and his power is said to be in the same league as Cell, the previous Big Bad. His existence opens up many questions about The 'Verse which are never elaborated on, and his ultimate plot role is to temporarily take out Krillin and Piccolo, have an inconclusive fight with Gohan, and finally get owned to hype up Buu himself. The games, which are known for expanding upon many other characters of this type, disappointingly also squander his potential, introducing a much less interesting sister for him named Towa and then shoving her into the limelight instead. The franchise finally makes an attempt to rectify this by having Dabura become the new Big Bad in Xenoverse 2 DLC after Towa's defeat in the main story (completely independent of Babidi now) and allowing him to Take a Level in Badass via plot contrivance. It's a small thing, but it's a start.
- Turles is a rogue Saiyan who acts as an Evil Counterpart to Goku and has a standout personality compared to most of the other Saiyans, being composed, refined and pragmatic. However, the movie he's from doesn't really explore him all that much. Unlike some other characters on this list, though, he actually gets significant fleshing out in video games.
- From a story perspective, Broly of all people counts as this. He is introduced in the eighth movie alongside his father as a new Saiyan survivor and at first seems to have a very polite, even meek, personality. Midway through the film it is revealed that he is actually an Ax-Crazy madman and the meek Broly we first see is the result of decades of brainwashing at the hands of his own father Paragus. While the crazed madman Broly has since become a popular, if base-breaking, character, it must be said that the meek Broly we first see is arguably more interesting, and had promise for an Hulk-style case of Jekyll & Hyde if he had been explored at all. Instead he got hit with Flanderization in his next appearance, as well as in most of the games and adaptations he has appeared in since. Thanks to his enduring popularity, however, Akira Toriyama himself stepped in to rectify this, first by inventing an Alternate Universe Distaff Counterpart of Broly for Dragon Ball Super and then, after that measure proved controversial, making Broly a Canon Immigrant outright with the 2018 film Dragon Ball Super: Broly which rebooted the character's backstory and expanded upon his meek traits to the point of making him a full-on Tragic Villain.
- Bojack from the ninth movie is infamous as one of the most Generic Doomsday Villain Big Bads across all 13 of the original films, which says something as a good chunk of them have Generic Doomsday Villain traits, yet had he been properly developed he could have been as well-regarded as Turles and Coola. A galactic tyrant who rampaged across the universe thousands of years ago, Bojack is notable for forcing the four Kais to unite and make him a Sealed Evil in a Can, a measure they didn't even take for the much more menacing Frieza. We're never given any specifics on Bojack's rampage, whether he was a conquering type like Frieza or just a rampaging beast like Broly, though his very limited dialogue implies he was something closer to Frieza. We're also never told why he homes in on Earth after being released from his imprisonment, what exactly he wants from the world ("Nice planet you got here, kid" is about the only explanation we get in-universe), or, most frustratingly, why he seems to have a grudge against Goku despite never meeting him (at least that we know of). With more lines, more motivation and some filling in of the gaps, he could have been a very interesting villain indeed. Instead he's down there with Lord Slug on the movie villain scale.
- Outside of one joke, Vegeta's younger brother Tarble from Dragon Ball: Yo! Son Goku and His Friends Return!! is not really fleshed out as a character, remaining rather flat and only working as the one who starts the plot. He doesn't even appear in the last scene with everybody eating together. His relationship with Vegeta could have been expanded, or heck, with the introduction of the Galactic Patrol he could have found more of a purpose franchise-wise, but he remains as an afterthought. Toriyama probably noticed this, but rather than giving Tarble himself more focus or depth he simply tried again by creating a Suspiciously Similar Substitute in Cabba from Dragon Ball Super.
Dragon Ball Super
As a whole, Super is better at using its characters compared to Z, mostly thanks to the in-between Breather Episodes. However, the show still runs afoul with this trope:
- Gohan, especially in the first half of the anime, where he contributed nothing to any of the main story arcs outside of Resurrection 'F' where he was hit with severe Badass Decay and was nearly killed three times. His exclusion was considered the most jarring since Gohan was the Deuteragonist of Dragon Ball Z before taking up the main character role for the lion's share of the Buu Saga, at least until his following Goku's formula of heroism to face Super Buu failed to Toriyama's whims. This was being corrected during the Universal Survival Saga where Gohan got the most screentime after Goku and his Ultimate Form back, only for things to take a slight dip once more. While he was named the leader of Universe 7, he ends up being Authority in Name Only, with the people who actually followed his advice mostly comprising of U7's weaker members and many of the more powerful ones being the ones who barely even bothered with team tactics. Instead of surpassing his father or earning another transformation as many speculated he would, as many people outright took for granted would happen with how far into the Tournament of Power he was getting, he ends up pulling a Taking You with Me on Dyspo, completely abandoning his fight with Toppo to do it, in addition to becoming the only fighter of Team Universe 7's final five to not fight Jiren. To many, it mirrored Tien's very widely panned sendoff in all but a more prominent opponent being taken down, with many wishing that he had completed his fight against Toppo or took on Jiren instead.
- Piccolo, who like Gohan had no major role in any story arc and was killed off in the middle of the Resurrection 'F' Saga. Despite being part of the U7 team during the Champa Saga, he only had one fight that he lost, due to cheating and was forced out by Vegeta so he could fight Frost. Like Gohan, this was being reversed since he played a more major role in the Universal Survival Saga and even helped Gohan get his Ultimate Form back. However, it comes full circle when he gets eliminated by Damon in episode 119 in a lackluster way, especially after he had his shining moment eliminating the Universe 6 Namekians. He gets taken out by Damon because he relied too much on ki sensing instead of his other senses. Many fans pointed out that Piccolo has enhanced hearing, which could have made him more suited to eliminate Damon rather than 17.
- Goten and Trunks. After playing an important role in the Buu Saga, they're sidelined all throughout Super. While Trunks gets a lot of development in the Future Trunks Saga, Goten is all but left out and never receives a focus episode. This sentiment only increased in the Universal Survival Saga, where they aren't chosen to be on the U7 team due to their lack of experience and being too straightforward.
- Majin Buu since, despite being advertised as one of the members of the five man team against Universe 6 he ultimately falls asleep (anime) or fails the entrance test (manga) and therefore never gets a chance to show his stuff in the tournament. Things started to look up for him in the Universal Survival Arc as he not only got to be the first member of Universe 7 to fight in the Zen'o Exhibition Match, but also was shown in a slimmer form whilst training for the main tournament and showing a variety of interesting moves that could help his team. Then he falls asleep, again, so that he can be replaced in the tournament with Frieza. In the manga, Majin Buu is asleep when Goku and Co consider him for the Tournament of Power, making his role in the Universal Survival Arc very minimal.
- Tagoma. In one episode, he gets built-up as the strongest warrior in Frieza's army after he one-shots Shizami and Gohan while they were distracted, and proves to have been turned into a demented lunatic who can pose a threat to the Z Fighters, which even impresses Frieza himself, especially considering he was much more sane before enduring Training from Hell with Frieza. He then gets body jacked by Ginyu the episode after and hasn't appeared ever since.
- Botamo for having the least amount of development of the U6 team and having the shortest match in the Champa Saga. His fight only lasted half an episode despite his unique ability and it was anti-climatic since Goku just threw him out of the ring. He lasted longer in the Universe Survival Saga (even giving Vegeta some trouble alongside Magetta) but he was still the first team member taken out. It's quite ironic that, outside of his manga fight, his only fighting scenes are through an illusion of him done by U4 Shantza. At least he performed better than Dr. Rota.
- Despite having a small, but still heartbreaking screentime in Dragon Ball Z: The History of Trunks, Future Chichi doesn't appear in the Trunks special. The Chichi of the future timeline could have seen Goku one last time, or being saddened by Goku Black's existence.
- Vegito. After decades since his last appearance in the Buu Saga, Vegito returned stronger than ever as a Super Saiyan Blue and gave one of best animated fights in the franchise before defusing in the middle of the battle. Fans were not happy, especially those who wanted Breather Episodes with Vegito. The sentiment increased during the Universal Survival Saga, where Potara Fusion was allowed after Universe 6 had Kale and Caulifla fuse into Kefla, but because of concerns of losing two members, Universe 7 decided against using fusion, meaning the chances of seeing Vegito fight Kefla, Jiren, or Toppo were shot down hard.
- Yamcha, despite having his own Breather Episode. He's left out of the Resurrection 'F' and Universal Survival Sagas despite his unique moveset and personality. Not helping is that there's an ongoing gag about him coming out of his retirement from fighting to wait for an invite to be on the U7 team for the Tournament of Power, solidifying his Butt-Monkey status. Given the active contempt the writers seemed to have for Tien, imagine if he'd taken up his spot on team U7, or at the very least had joined to replace Buu. Not only would it have meant all the heroes from the pre-Buu arc would have been given a chance to fight together after many of them stopped doing so, it would have allowed him the chance to show he can still fight, and even if he did get taken out early, the fact he would have gone and maybe gotten a few knock outs would have at least been a decent usage of his character.
- It was pretty much taken for granted that not all of Universe 7 would make it far in the Tournament of Power, but after far from insignificant amounts of buildup, who is the first one eliminated? Krillin, blindsided by Frost no more than three episodes into the competition. This despite all his hyping up and rekindling his fighting spirit stronger than ever, as well as the point that he'd been developing powerful and clever new techniques to put to use in the competition. To an extent, this is the reaction in-universe as well. The manga is an even worse offender, since Krillin gets taken out in an even more humiliating manner, without even throwing a single punch much less get an elimination (even moreso his wife was treated just as bad where she only got two eliminations and was taken out just as fast as Krillin), unlike his anime counterpart who managed one elimination with the help of his wife and was the inspiration for her to eliminate the hated Ribrianne.
- Some people argue that a lot of focus in the Tournament of Power is either on Universe 7 or a select amount of characters.note In fact, we don't really see any real fights from anyone outside of Universe 7 and until Episode 102,note only Universes 6, 7, and Basil knocked anyone out. Universes 3 and 10 have it really bad, as a lot of their warriors are seen as cannon fodder. To add further insult to the injury, some of the fightersnote got knocked out without showing any reaction from the gods of their respective universe nor a shot of them getting benched which gives the impression that they were just glorified mooks at best and leaves a rather minimal impact to the audience as they were knocked out. It ends up making the tournament look like a group of poor saps taking a shot against the powerful twin Universes 7/6 and failing time after time. This becomes especially jarring after a lot of those characters mentioned are erased, turning it to "Universes 4, 3, and 11 taking turns fighting Universe 7 while the others stall".
- Many fans were disappointed that Tien Shinhan didn't even get his own episode as a protagonist during the Universal Survival arc unlike the other members of Universe 7 and was quickly eliminated in a Taking You with Me during an episode he showed up halfway through. Before this point, the one thing he'd done was eliminate another minor opponent Roshi had paralyzed. Sadly, some of his fans had seen this coming a mile away after his abysmal performance in his own recruitment episode, right down to Goku having literally forgotten he existed and only having asked him because Roshi happened to be there. It says something that the Super manga, where he gets eliminated by Frost without a chance to do anything even sooner than he was in the anime, can be cited as an improvement because of how completely godawful his elimination episode was.
- Despite being one of the members of Universe 6 (the team with the most screentime other than Universe 7), Dr. Rota does not demonstrate any of his abilities whatsoever despite hyping himself up and gets knocked out by Vegeta along with Prum without much fanfare. We don't even see Champa's reaction towards one of his fighters getting knocked out in contrast to Beerus with Tien. Though this did contribute to him being a Fountain of Memes One-Scene Wonder Memetic Badass.
- A minor example, but Hit was seen to have fallen victim to this trope. While there admittedly was focus on him when he teamed up with Goku and his battle with Jiren, he quickly falls into obscurity once he gets eliminated by Jiren at the end of Episode 111. Fans felt that he could have contributed more, and some believed that he could've joined forces with Universe 7 in the final battle against Jiren. Overall, fans felt that Hit was shafted aside to build up Jiren's threat level and making him Goku's new main rival.
- In the manga, Hit is arguably handled worse. While in the anime, he had some spotlight at certain points (even an episode where he and Goku teamed up against Dyspo and Kunshee), but in the manga, his only real scene was his fight against Jiren, which happened after Universe 9 got erased as opposed to the halfway point of the Tournament of Power. Hit doesn't score any knockouts either, meaning that Frost (who knocked out 7 Universe 9 fighters, Tien, and Krillin) had more of a role than Hit (who only served to show how strong Jiren was) in a way.
- While they may or may not become a recurring character afterward, Brianne de Chateau may qualify as far as the tournament is concerned. Despite seeming pushed more than other characters (prominent in the opening and one ending, as well as early appearances in video games about Dragon Ball), all she amounts to is defeating someone from Universe 10 (and by accidentally attacking said distracted enemy), and ultimately is defeated by Android 18, a character she'd never interacted with before that episode. You could remove her from the whole arc and by and largely nothing would change.
- A minor complaint, but the last warriors from Universe 2 (Rabanra, Zarbuto, and Zirloin) barely even have any visible fighting screentime before their final battle, with them even pointing out that they're not really relevant. The fact that Zarbuto is a Tuffle is only pointed out All There in the Manual and nothing about the race is brought up at all in the Tournament of Power (Jimizu's role as a Yardrat, in contrast, was brought up slightly). Even worse, when they do fight (we do get to see a weakened Goku endure all three of them before they transform), it's literally just them borrowing the powerups from the Maiden Squadron. Sure, they were more formidable even being able to activate a Black Hole that would've knocked Goku and co. out if Goku hadn't surpassed his limits again, but it overshadowed themselves as fighters.
- Universe 4. They have some of the best character designs in the Tournament of Power, interesting powers, and use gimmicks and trickery in order to survive in the tournament despite their weakness. Unfortunately, ultimately 8 of the 10 members don't get a knockout and all of them are defeated in the episode they feature in. This is particularly true for the two hidden fighters Damom and Gamisaras where despite hyping them up as a major threat to Universe 7, with even Beerus being afraid of them, they end up going down rather quickly once they are detected. It ultimately turns Quitela into a Big Bad Wannabe where despite his hatred for Beerus and desire to take him down, he doesn't put a dent in Universe 7's numbers and ultimately gets erased rather pathetically, denying that his outcome is actually true. Additionally, the Last Stand showdown with Damon is very anticlimactic and unemotional compared to other showdowns, even the Butt-Monkey Universe 10 and Universe 2's last remaining warriors. The showdown between Ganos and Master Roshi was arguably more emotional due to how Roshi came very close to dying for good, and for how well handled Roshi was that episode.
- In the manga, although his role was slightly more identical to the anime (getting taken out by Piccolo), Gamisaras actually did something logical and attacked various members from other universes while they were focused on their battles, putting a dent on their numbers and taking out Android 18, the entire Maiden Squadron, and a few Universe 10 warriors.
- Due to the huge staff working on the episodes, most of the —admittedly very large number of— new characters remain undeveloped with no clear backstory (the number of characters introduced in this arc who have an in-depth backstory can be counted in one hand, with Jiren's being a mystery until only 4 episodes remain) or elements that don't pay off (like Quitela's hidden warriors or Gohan's leadership). While the concept of the battle royale was roughly played out during the first episodes (like Basil's fight with Napapapa or Caulifla's fight with the Pride Troopers), this is quietly dropped out at some point when everyone decided to focus on Universe 7, giving them most of the eliminations.
- In the manga, Katopesla is hit with this. Being the hilarious Ensemble Dark Horse of U3, possibly one of the most popular ToP newcomers not to be from Universe 6, and one of the longest-lasting fighters in the anime's entire tournament, you'd expect him to get to stick around, but instead he becomes his universe's first casualty.
- Several other characters get shafted quite hard in the manga as well. For instance, Monna, who was able to last for half of the Tournament of Power in the anime before facing Cabba (even almost knocking him out as well), gets eliminated off screen in the manga. And Dr. Rota gets no expansion at all, making you wonder if he was just there as a living joke in a team full of relatively competent fighters.
- Android 18 in the manga. After barely appearing at all in the manga save for one or two instances, she goes into the tournament and initially seems to be doing pretty good, much like her anime counterpart. However, she is abruptly knocked out after only getting around two eliminations by Gamisaras, with little moments of actual interaction occurring between her and Android 17. While she at least did better than Krillin (who got no eliminations at all and was taken out as soon as the Tournament began), and Tien, she still went out so poorly (much like her husband), especially compared to the anime version where she lasted all the way until the final battle with Universe 11, including being the fighter to eliminate the highly hated Ribiranne, and was eliminated by sacrificing herself to keep 17 in, which many argue was the best elimination of any of the fighters from Universe 7. No doubt, 18's fans were outright livid over this.
- Kale's rampage in the manga essentially turns everyone, save the remaining Universe 7 members, Caulifla, Cabba, and the Pride Troopers that were rather formidable in the anime, into glorified C-List Fodder. Within the span of a few pages, Universes 2, 3, 4 and 10 are all erased from existence without having the glorious Last Stand they had in the anime. Kale accidentally knocks out Magetta (speaking of which, he only had one notable role, and that was assisting Frost with knocking out Krillin) and the Universe 6 Namekians (unlike the anime, they made small appearances in the manga beforehand). Ganos and Shantza, who had interesting abilities in the anime which could've been expanded on (some people were even hoping for a badass showdown between Roshi and Ganos like in the anime), get wasted by her. How about Anilaza, the Climax Boss before the final showdown between Universe 11? Kale just kicks it out in one page of the manga, while in the anime, an entire episode was dedicated to it. Universe 2's remaining warriors? All of them get taken out by Kale very easily, which could've explored more on Zarbuto, the supposed Tuffle. Ultimately, Kale got significantly more notice, but at the expense of a ton of other characters, to the point where it seems like Toyotaro wants the arc to be over as fast as possible.
- While Kahseral got a slightly better role in the manga than he did in the anime, Dyspo and Top had a lot left to be desired in terms of the manga. Both characters were major foes in the anime, with Dyspo having Gohan willingly let Frieza know him out to make sure Dyspo went with him, and Top got to use his God of Destruction powers to have a big fight with Vegeta. In comparison, the manga version has the two be essentially fodder enemies, neither displaying anything noteworthy in the tournament, and being knocked out without any real difficulty by Frieza after both get beaten knocked away by 17 and Vegeta. Considering the two are among the strongest mortals in the tournament, it left many wondering why the two were wasted in the manga compared to the anime.
