I think the fact that a character starts performing a little better than we expect is a cause for worry is in turn a sign that something has gotten deeply wrong with the core of the series. The formula has become so ingrained that it actively feels off when they deviate even in the slightest regard.
"And when the last law was down and the Devil turned round on you, where would you hide, the laws all being flat?"I'd say that 17 is the only real surprise in the back half of the To P. The only other guy who really punched above his wieght was Roshi who was taken out in the front half. Everything else has more or less been moving like clockwork.
"And when the last law was down and the Devil turned round on you, where would you hide, the laws all being flat?"I would also add that the characters do some form training in the Room of Space and Time/Hyperbolic Time Chamber as opposed to just getting handed power ups in the TOP. Granted, I know that has been a thing in the series but at least the characters are shown training to be stronger at least.
"Mai waifu."5 Changes I'd make to Super?
1) No readapting the Battle of Gods or Resurrection F arc. Cut straight to the Champa arc.
2) Actually have Majin Buu be involved in the tournament against Universe 6. I'd re-arrange the order of Fights to accommodate this.
3) Have Goten and Trunks more involved in the Future Trunks arc. This one may be divisive but I saw it as a mixed opportunity how Trunks barely interacted with his future self, or how Goten never learned how there was an alternate timeline where Zamasu murdered him and his family, all just to steal his fathers body. I'd also "age" up Goten and Trunks to look closer to how Trunks did in the History of Trunks Special. Also do away with that "similar duplicate future.)
4) Similar to what Saiga said, I'd ditch the humans and have Goten, Trunks, and Buu take part in the Tournament of Power. I'd probably keep the power hierarchy being Goku > Vegeta > Freeza > Gohan > Gotenks > Buu > 17 & 18 (who are closer in strength here) > Piccolo.
5) Jiren too strong pls nerf
I don't mind Jiren being absurdly strong. Frieza was absurdly strong on Namek to the point where anything prior to Super Saiyan amounted to little more than minor injuries (aside from the Spirit Bomb, which I think nearly killed him), and he's a popular villain.
Just make Jiren more interesting.
edited 1st Feb '18 7:55:06 AM by Hobgoblin
Why do so many wish the adaptations of Battle of Gods and Resurrection F didn't exist? Do they have something against people who want to know the story but don't want to spend money on DV Ds?
De Romanīs, lingua Latina gloriosa non fuī.I'd actually rather take some stuff from the Super retellings and add it to the movies, like establishing that Beerus has the power to destroy matter and energy. It would also build him up as more of a threat if Kaio mentioned that if he destroys you, neither Shenron nor Porunga could bring you back.
Or, a character who was mostly in a secondary role suddenly returns and starts performing far better than his weight class should imply. The same shit happened with Roshi, but at least he specifically focused on the weaker character, 17 is holding his own against characters who should logically be way stronger than him. And like I said, he was literally way less prominent than 18 for years and now comes back to this massive push.
Its not people having a problem with the formula "being changed", it's the jarring fact that this secondary character is being pushed so hard so suddenly.
Anyway...five changes to Super? So I'm assuming that doesn't count the movies then huh. Ok. I'm not even going to say nix the movie adaptations, removing them kind of goes without saying, so I'll focus on Super specific content.
1. Actually show Vegeta doing the SSG ritual. I know him getting his power ups offscreen is the norm, but I really don't like the implication that he simply trained really hard and got it. Because what does that say about Goku?
2. The Monika subplot of Universe 6 is axed and Buu actually gets to participate. He can get one match and then fall asleep forcing the others to pick up the slack. Frost actually is a nice guy, or at least more benign than Freeza instead of literally being Freeza lite. Vegeta would still train Cabba to learn Super Saiyan, but he's still explicitly weaker rather than being as strong as Vegeta's base. No Kaioken, as much as I liked it, I would rather put more focus on Blue itself.
3. Black Arc: More streamlined like the Manga. There's only 1-2 trips at most. Black doesn't come back to the past. No Super Saiyan Rage, and Rose only makes Black just slightly stronger than Blue (Because of his official god status). Have Trunks and Mai stay in the present, but go off to live their own lives.
4. TOP: Yea, nix the humans. Even if Roshi had the best showing, I'd rather focus go towards characters who need it. So the line up would be: Goku, Vegeta, Gohan, Freeza, Piccolo, 17, 18, Boo, Goten and Trunks. Goku and Vegeta would not be spamming Blue all over the place and actually save it for opponents who need it, and they should be stronger than basically every other combatant in that case. And much more evenly divided screentime for all non-Goku and Vegeta characters like Saiga said. Jiren actually participates before fighting Goku, and shows something resembling a personality.
.....I can't think of another change I'd want. I already covered the main arcs....
edited 1st Feb '18 8:41:58 AM by BlackYakuzu94
A lazy millennial who's good at what he does.Apparently the latest chapter of the Heroes manga spoils a couple things for Universe Mission 1.
- Time Patrol Gohan and Goten go Super Saiyan
- Fu seems to be behind Future Trunks' enprisonment and the Hero in-fighting.
Five changes?
1. Ditch Ro F and Bo G rertellings. We already have movies. Just start at the Champa arc.
2. Future Trunks needs a better ending to the Zamasu fight. Either have Vegetto or Trunks finish it.
3. Destroying Future Trunks timeline made no sense. Making him move to another timeline is so weird. Either have him stay in the current one or have him join the Time patrol.
4. Even out the eliminations in the To P. Or it at least make them less stupid that the majority of them are by u7. Why Vegeta and Freeza still here is baffling? There's no point in watching them lose if they're still in.
5. Give Goten and Trunks something do. All they got going for them is Gotenks and for some reason they writers hate him.
35 year old white man.So, how about this Super change:
Zamasu is defeated, but he manages to badly damage the time machine and Goku and Vegeta are stuck int he future until Bulma repairs it (which, given how Dragon Ball time travel seems to work, means they will be gone for, say, couple months from the present timeline). Meanwhile, Zeno remembers he wanted to hold a tournament. He wants to see Goku fight of course, but because time travel is such a taboo Beerus won't admit he's gone and persuades Zeno that Gohan is in fact Goku who has cut his hair short (this is played for laughs) and the tournament proceeds to happen. There is no universal destruction, but the Super Dragon Balls are still a reward for the winner.
Now, there's no Goku and Vegeta in this version of the tournament (Goten and Trunks take their place), and only God tier opponents are Hit, Toppo and a significantly weaker (compared to canon) Jiren. Meanwhile, the strongest Team U7 members are Buu and Gohan, so they mostly try to survive until the heavy hitters wear each other out. Also, there is more fighting between other universes instead of them attacking U7 one by one.
In this situation, there is no need for the protagonists to sandbag, the comedy wouldn't feel out of place since the stakes are lower, and U7 team composition makes sense power-wise.
Additional thought: This change would also remove the episode with Zeno Button, since it is never used and this proposed story would work better without the "friend for Zeno" subplot. Also, it eliminates the possibility of Grand Priest seeing right through Beerus' "Gohan is actually Goku" ploy.
Except that Goku and Vegeta wouldn't actually be gone for months, they'd show up immediately after they left.
My various fanfics.
IIRC time travel in Super operates on San Dimas Time, which is why they didn't spend months level grinding once they couldn't beat Black and escaped to the present.
EDIT: I also vaguely remember Trunks saying he never changed time machine settings because he wasn't sure he'd end up in the right universe if he did so; not sure where though.
edited 1st Feb '18 11:08:08 AM by ulka96
Isn't Toriyama still the guy who writes the actual plot for Super?
(which was always hilarious, since it's always been his weakest skill).
edited 1st Feb '18 11:10:36 AM by Sigilbreaker26
"And when the last law was down and the Devil turned round on you, where would you hide, the laws all being flat?"Toriyama "supervises", which sometimes takes the form of post-it notes with barely anything written on them.
Toyotaro and Toei are doing most of the actual writing while Toriyama gives them overarching plot points.
Toriyama definitely has a big influence on the series and potentially (probably) has a hand in what happened to Goku and Gohan.
So I guess i should've said "writers" in general since it isn't always clear who came up with what ideas. Toyotaro was the one who brought Vegito back, for example.
edited 1st Feb '18 11:14:49 AM by EpicBleye
"There's not a girl alive who wouldn't be happy being called cute." ~Tamamo-no-MaeSpeaking of fusion. Just realized realized that the To P has a good excuse for having fusion characters stick around for multiple episodes. We probably could've got up to 5 episodes of Gotenks, Vegetto, or Gogeta. :p
35 year old white man.I wonder how Zeno would view that. Yes, Zamasu is from Universe 8, but the body he is in calls Universe 7 home. Would Zeno even be aware that there was a switch? He didn't seem to be aware of, or care about Trunks changing the timeline, so does he care about people switching bodies through magical means?
Exactly that. The separation was explained by the earring breaking, but to me "Kefla" is the apex of their character development. Seeing her separate back into the other two was kind of disappointing and unnecessary.
Blasphemy! Goku looks savage without the armbands and undershirt. It sells the whole "Goku and the others are going all-in, this sh't is for real Daniel-san" vibe of the tournament.
It might have been smarter to not put the entire multiverse at stake. Have to wonder how the earthlings deal with knowing that their existence was nearly snuffed out by a toddler... though I guess that's nothing new in Dragonball really. Piccolo, Cell, and Buu all count towards "evil toddler who nearly wiped out mankind" to some extent.
Mah man.
It is pretty disappointing how at first the other universes seemed like a big deal, what with "mortal level" putting the heroes second-from-the-bottom, and Goku not being able to sense the energies of the Trio de Dangers. Much as I dislike them, seeing them get handled by Super Saiyan tiers and below was really sad.
-nods twice-
I'm conflicted. On one hand, it was an effective way of keeping the suspense and changing up the usual formula (lose a bit, gain a new power because rage, kick the villain's ass). On the other hand, it really craps over everything Trunks tried to accomplish. It wasn't fair in the slightest and Dragonball isn't a work where things are just plain "unfair" because "life isn't fair." Happy endings typically exist in this work. The least successful protagonist you could probably find is Yamcha and his life, ultimately, isn't all that bad considering where he was when we first met him.
edited 1st Feb '18 1:12:05 PM by Soble
I'M MR. MEESEEKS, LOOK AT ME!Yeah, in addition Trunks hasn't even slacked off or anything. He spent 10 years solidly training, dealt with the Buu situation fairly pragmatically, but still it wasn't enough, and that really grinds my gears that some asshole can just show up and make all of that moot.
"And when the last law was down and the Devil turned round on you, where would you hide, the laws all being flat?"

Yeah, 17 shilling is pretty weird. I'm not even much of a Gohan fan, but the fact that 17 stayed longer and accomplished more than him feels wrong somehow. I would probably swap their roles in TOP.