Dragon Ball Z Abridged

You could generalize anything that way.

I'm not saying anyone in DB is super deep, but Vegeta has much more to him that that. I would say he's deeper than Gohan or Piccolo (who fits that description better).

Vegeta had the distinction of being the breakout rival of the series, so rather than write him out, Toriyama just have him a character arc that spanned the series.

It's not really Tien's fault he's kind of dull. The character had already went through his arc and he wasn't as involved in the plot as say Gohan(The protagonists kid), Piccolo(One half of god for a long time), or Vegeta(Shares the hero's race) to justify his continued use. So he's just kind of there.

What irks me about most fans in DB is that it's always a dick measuring contest in terms of power levels and it gets tiresome. Some characters aren't as popular as others, that's life.

edited 30th May '17 7:03:42 AM by BlackYakuzu94

It doesn't help when Toriyama himself apparently has an agenda against Yamcha or the entire fanbase is dedicated to memifying how shitty a character you like is.

People get defensive when things they like are attacked. That's also life

edited 30th May '17 9:16:58 AM by Nikkolas

I don't think Toriyama has an agenda against Yamcha. I did at first, but I don't believe he does it deliberately.

I've been ruminating on the direction he went with him, and it dawned on me why Yamcha was the initial Worf of the group. Simply put, his desire to subvert expectations means that, since Yamcha was the oldest and people who would just be coming into the series would expect him to be the strongest, having him lose first, and then having the younger and (at least at first) smaller Goku then stomp said foe was a great way to throw people who didn't know the series off guard. And it likely worked in the early going. Now, I'm pretty much wearing the Captain Obvious hat on this one, and I admit it.

However, he kept doing it long after it lost meaning, likely due to either his laziness, or not being able to see what he's doing. I imagine this is a thing for a lot of Mangaka (look at poor Chad and Renji for another example.

Yamcha was, in the early going, the kind of character that people would expect to be an uber badass (yeah, I know, but lets not look at it from a modern perspective) due to his long haired pretty boy look, so Toriyama, being the Gag writer he is, likely saw him as the perfect Butt-Monkey because he would look like the kind of character who wouldn't be a Butt-Monkey.

That's my thought on it.

Renji at least has a few good memorable victories under his belt and tends to look less like a chump in his losses. Chad yeah the comparison works since any moment he has is usually the prelude to him getting stomped by the very next guy.

Also, Toriyama has said that Vegeta is very convenient for the story, likely referring to the conflict and complications his personality creates for everyone.

there are plenty of reasons to have a character continously fail than lazyness or not knowing what to do with the character.

From those examples, Renji's losses in the SS arc were for his character development (well except for Aizen, everyone jobs to Aizen). In HM, he was in over his head like all of Ichigo's friends - and he had more focus than Chad/Uryu in SS so he gets less focus here. Then he powers up and handily wins his next fight, loses to someone he later beats with another major power up and only loses to the final boss.

Chad, on the other hand, is all about his Can't Catch Up complex with Ichigo. It's awkward in the Arrancar arc where he loses right after a big win, but the plot was about Ichigo being in over his head so of course his friends went through the same. While he doesn't get another big moment, this leads to the final arc having Ichigo not question his involvement (as he did when Chad was too weak to get involved).

edited 30th May '17 7:29:50 PM by Saiga

Oh I agree. There's also convenience to the plot. You need someone to lose, and this character is just good for that role.

That being said, I'm likely over thinking it. It's possible that when Toriyama thought of what jokes to use, he just liked the ones that came with Yamcha losing another fight.

Yamcha's losses in the manga are usually played dramatically (even against God, that ended on a dramatic note) all the way until his last death.

In current DB, yes he's used more often for jokes, but we don't know who is writing those particular jokes and modern DB is heavily influenced by memes and fandom perceptions.

Ah Bleach, I'm still trying to figure out how the weakest Captain grew to be stronger than almost every Captain as well as all the Espada. Maybe if I hate myself I'll actually read the ending of Bleach someday.

Saiga, I remember a disagreement we had in the Bleach thread a billion years ago. I and many others think Renji,Uryu, Chad and their rough counterparts in other shounen series deserve to be respected by the story and treated as powerful. Looking at the HM Arc for instance, Ichigo was hilariously stronger than every single one of his teammates. I could be totally misremembering so apologies if I am, your counter was "They can be weak as shit and aren't owed anything by the narrative or Kubo and there's no problem Ichigo is so much stronger than them that it renders them irrelevant"

edited 30th May '17 8:14:09 PM by Nikkolas

I really hate when shows that focus heavily on action decide to focus on the supporting characters less just because they're not as powerful as the protagonist. Luckily, it was a phenomenon almost entirely contained within shounen and shoujo anime and manga, and the trend seems to be dying. You don't see Sokka from Avatar being focused on less just because he's not a bender, or almost anyone in any live-action show that involves superpowers being ignored because they don't have superpowers.

Which shoujo neglected characters due to power levels?

I didn't watch it but I heard Sailor Moon had kind of a problem with that.

Maybe, but you can have a Running Gag even if it's not played for humour. Where a certain thing keeps happening to a character no matter what they do. That being said, once again, I might be looking at it too deeply. It's entirely possible he just never gave much thought to how much he had Yamcha lose.

Or hell, maybe Yamcha was just never meant to be strong at all, despite his constant improvement during the story. Only Toriyama knows really, and it's not really relevant anymore. At best we know that he only lost to that Saibaman because he dropped his guard and if not for that, he'd have won.

edited 30th May '17 9:21:48 PM by HandsomeRob

Its more the other way around, its neglected characters don't get power ups. Writers can write anyone into any power level they want however those that they don't will usually lag behind and disappear the lack of power is just an excuse for that loss of focus.

Kenpachi wasn't the weakest Captain, but they make the explanation behind his growth clear early into the last arc.

That's being extreme but yes, those characters aren't owed anything. No character is, not even the protagonist.

We have powerful/competent characters because it serves some purpose for the characters to be powerful. The Captains represent a specific level of power, and are used as a measuring stick for various things. Logically they should measure up to their own standard for consistency.

The humans don't have that kind of standard. They're special... in comparison to humans. Even if they get trounced by every Shinigami, Arrancar and Visored out that is still consistent with their position as being way above regular humans.

Same thing with Saiyans (warrior race), Namekians (well known for their few warriors), mutants (hand picked for Freeza's army) and humans (huwhat?). Exceptional humans exist, but so do exceptional Saiyans and Namekians.

Now, there can still be issues with this - the idea that Ichigo is being an asshole for leaving his friends behind IS mitigated by him being objectively right about how useless they are. But that is something that was not resolved in the final arc, so the issue is more about focusing on this at the wrong time in the Arrancar arc - which was conceptually "the SS arc, except everything goes wrong and Ichigo's ideals get trashed". Such a continously bleak arc for the main character is an inopportune time to attempt to resolve that subplot. Especially when it has to be followed up by an arc about trust issues and an arc about maturing.

@Rob But it's not even a 'serious' running gag in the manga. Over time, Yamcha jobs less and less. He's killed against the Saibaimen, but that scene is there to display the growth of Tenshinhan, Yamcha, Kuririn and Piccolo and move from that into the hopelessness of the battle with Nappa (the very first thing to happen is Ten getting his arm pumched off). Next? He worfs against Android 20, which isn't used as a "he beat Yamcha? This must be serious!" but establishes the energy draining abilities of the pair and giving him a reason to withdraw when the sick Goku needs a ride out. Then he just gets beat up by the Cell Juniors (as part of a group) and eaten by Boo (as part of a group). Not singled out in those cases for any reason.

edited 30th May '17 10:00:13 PM by Saiga

I was referring to Mayuri who was easily the weakest Captain by a considerable margin. Yet I looked at some EOS Bleach power charts and he was in the Top 20 or so, above people like Shinji and I was very sad that it looked like the Visords just kind of fell by the wayside.

I mean, from the start of Bleach to the end of Deicide is a long damned time and throughout it all Mayuri was pretty trash compared to every other Captain-class fighter. It's very noteworthy to me he apparently got such a powerup.

edited 30th May '17 9:58:14 PM by Nikkolas

Okay, there are two major problems with that - fan power charts for Bleach are incredibly varied due to many different interpretations of the series, as well as fanon and memes (plus the online Bleach communities can be very toxic).

Mayuri also wasn't weak. That was a long running assumption, partly on the idea that using weird abilities and tricks meant he had to be on the weaker side. But he isn't shown being weaker than his fellows, and has no issue cutting the Hierro of his Espada opponent.

Plus his weird abilities are the only reason he was considered competitive in the final arc. He went up against another opponent with weird abilities [[spoilers: and mostly got his ass kicked]] which is why he was still relevant.

Mayuri doesn't have a single impressive feat of strength, power, spiritual pressure, speed or anything like that all throughout the parts I mentioned. That is why he's assumed to be weak. It didn't help he fought his Espada counterpart who similarly had little in the way of displayed raw power but mostly survived via hax. I mean, Szayel was awesome and sealing Renji's Bankai is all well and good, but it's the Shishio situation if you ever saw Rurouni Kenshin. Shishio weakened all his opponents so it made people assume he's just weak because his abilities were never "truly tested." Szayel similarly weakened his opponents so it made people question if he could even defeat Bankai Renji.

Mayuri just didn't dazzle in his two fights where he fought opponents who had far more skill than actual power. Actual power kind of matters in Bleach too since you can just flatten your opponent by flexing it. I always thought someone of Grimmjow level or maybe Ulquiorra could Reiatsu Crush Mayuri.

Oh man, ti's 2012 again and I'm posting about Bleach power levels. What's going on.

edited 30th May '17 10:25:17 PM by Nikkolas

I never watched the later stuff - I think it was some time after Chibi-usa showed up that I fell out of the show - but I remember that at least as far as I saw, it had a weird issue with its central protagonist's Useless Useful Spell. The other Senshi had elemental attacks that they could use to distract or damage the enemy monsters, while the titular Sailor Moon always had just one attack that, when used, would completely annihilate the enemy and end the battle.

So fights typically revolved around the Senshi using their attacks to weaken the monster and/or protect Sailor Moon so that once the conditions were right, Sailor Moon could launch her Instant-Death Ultra-Attack of Doom and win the fight. She's somewhere between an Escort Mission and a Poke Ball.

That's not a fair assumption though. He doesn't get put in situations where he needs to show off, he isn't pit in situations where his physical attributes are pushed to his limits - except when Uryu uses a massive power-up that doesn't have a frame of reference for us to use. It's one thing to say we can't assume he's super strong, but we equally can't assume he's weak because we haven't seen his limits.

Syazel was strong. Renji had a hard time getting through his Hierro, and in his unreleased state he still took Uryu's most powerful attack and survived. Uryu was completely shocked that he could survive that at all. But Mayuri had no problem hurting him at all, even with a sealed Zanpakuto.

The final arc also shows that he can keep up with Hitsugaya, with his tricks giving him the upper hand (though he is no match for Hitsugaya's Bankai if he is not using his own).

Fair enough. Right now then, if you had to guess who'd win in a fight, who would you put odds on between Shinji and Mayuri?

Also is it true we never see Shinji's Bankai? I hope the Bleach Wiki is just outdated or something. I mean, come on Kubo. I got into the series right as the Visords showed up and I loved them so much yet he couldn't even be arsed to come up with a Bankai for Shinji?

I'm just gonna assume Bankai Shinji would own everyone.

Huh. If his shikai was a limited form of perception manipulation that can be compared to Aizen's, I wonder what his bankai would even bew.

Wait, did Aizen have/display one, or did he dive deep into Hogyoku BS before that would've been relevant?

The latter.

Shinji vs Mayuri is hard because while Shinji certainly has raw power, Mayuri is a weird motherfucker. It depends on how much of an advantage Shinji has.

Mayuri might even be smart enough to counter Sakanade, though even Aizen didn't fully counter it. His Bankai is still a mystery, but he doesn't show anything to counter Mayuri's poison so a double KO is quite possible.

Neither Aizen nor Shinji had their Bankai revealed. I feel like all of the unrevealed Bankai, Shinji's had the best chance of being used if it hadn't been for Kubo's illness cutting things shorter than he would have liked.

I used to dislike supporting characters getting less focus because of they Can't Catch Up, but I'm over it (poor Kuwabara...). It's kind of a recurring Shonen thing that the main character is generally the most powerful and competent and his friends are weaker so that he has something to protect. It does kind of suck to see them get bodied and have to be bailed out by the MC tho lol.

One of the most heartbreaking examples is seeing Ichigo tell Chad to bugger off because he's just that weak to be of any help, and Chad was like "Wtf, I thought we were boys".