WebVideo Better than the official version.
I tried watching Dragon Ball. It was cool. I tried watching Dragon Ball Z. Didn't appeal to me. Then I saw the first episode of this. I was hooked from the get-go. There is humor, action is intense, may Vegeta forever be awesome, may these guys forever spite Can't Catch Up Synrome, and praise be to General Ivan for voicing in the offcial dub of One Piece. And you know what? They implemented Grey and Grey Morality. The Ginyu Squad? True Companions. Gohan fighting Goku as Ginyu? The thought of it being Goku is what motivates him, not demotivate. And you know what? Piccolo goes from being a standard villain to being the most morally sound member of the team. And Team Four Star refrences the original Dragon Ball. Lastly, there's Cell. He. Is. Creepy...
So go check out Dragon Ball Z Abridged out now.
WebVideo Plan to Eradicate Christmas: ...I feel like a jerk saying this, but meh.
Look, from a technical perspective, Team Four Star's 2017 Christmas episode is clearly one of the most ambitious things they've ever done. It features hefty editing, brings together a bunch of the old voice talent from previous stories and movies, includes a bunch of brand new animation made just for this episode, and even has pretty good music and sound mixing. I'm not here to call them lazy or anything like that. And while I'm a bit sad that it's not the fleshing-out of a good idea badly served by the narrative I really wanted out of it, I'm man enough to admit that the plot they came up with to replace it has loads of promise.
But... well, bluntly, the storytelling and writing just aren't up to snuff. A few bits, like Bulma showing up to disperse the miasma partway through the battle, are just part of the source material, but even most of the jokes are misses rather than hits. The vast majority of them are just lame Christmas puns, mis-fired off like machine-gun cartridges in a jammed weapon, and the viewer fatigue they cause ends up dragging down the few really good ones. It just doesn't come across as ultimately satisfying.
I won't say it's all bad. The writing for the Warriors of Christmas Past segment was inspired, even if the way Bulma cuts into it is kind of lame. Again, I do like many of the core ideas, even if certain elements of them are ultimately handled badly. And, as per usual, Team Four Star and their guests all turn in strong performances that manage to elevate the very weak material a bit. But, at the end of the day, I guess the gag dub can only go so far from the source material: it too ends up being a strong central premise poorly executed, sans a few bright spots.
WebVideo A whole new version of DBZ... and it's awesome!
When this show started, it looked just like a parody with funny jokes from time to time, but Team Four Star evolved, and created their own style.
The characters are great, because their personalities manage to combine three things at the same time: parody, novelty, and nostalgia. Goku, for example, is still the Idiot Hero who loves to fight and eat, yet some aspects of his character are much more developed: he is a neglectful dad and REALLY dumb, but still fairly likable because he is an adult with the mind of a child who doesn’t know better, and despite his antics, he can still be a hero when needed to be.
The same is done with most of the characters. Vegeta is an arrogant, angry and massive Jerk Ass, but still badass. Krillin is an eternal Butt Monkey doing his best to catch up. Piccolo is a violent Large Ham with Hidden Depths. Gohan is a nerdy adorkable kid with daddy issues. All these traits are played for laughs, and turn the original awesome yet flat characters of the manga into a mix of comedy and awesome. Other characters are completely reinvented, such as Nappa (a Psychotic Man Child) Dende (a Creepy Child) and the Guru (a Large Ham Jerk Ass).
The voices? Excellent. If the English dubbing cast from the original series praised their work, this HAS to mean Team Four Stars are doing great. Special mention goes to Lanipator (Vegeta, Piccolo and Krillin) and LittleKuriboh, who does an awesome job as the hilariously cruel Frieza.
With all its Running Gags, Brick Jokes, cultural references and overall crazy humor, DBZA is by far one of the funniest web series of the moment. What I love the most about it is that, while most abridged series are simply parodies that make fun of the original, Team Four Stars seldom do so. They do point out lots of plot holes, but they do so cleverly and still make us appreciate how awesome this show is. In fact, they completely rewrite the show! They change the dialogues not only to make fun of it, but to give the characters the colors they lacked in the original. Even the fights are improved by the dialogues, which is something since this is Dragon Ball.
To sum up, this isn’t a mere parody. This is a whole new version of one of our favorite shows, different and similar to the original in good ways. I love it, and I deeply hope they’ll go at least till the end of the Cell Saga. Go Team Four Stars! You’re awesome!
WebVideo The Buu Bits: All Killer, No Filler
Speaking as someone with comparatively little nostalgia for the Buu story (I bowed out about when the big pink dumb-dumb got loose back in the day), I really sympathized when Team Four Star, already clearly struggling under the weight of their growing ambitions, the limitations of the original footage, and the troubles with monetizing something they could never truly own, bowed out after Cell.
But, you know, I was also someone who loved the fanmade gag-dub craze, and I know multiple people only familiar with Dragonball Z through the internet phenomenon that was its abridged series. So from that perspective, and just because, hit or miss, Team Four Star could often be relied upon for some good belly laughs, I was also kind of sad that it meant we'd never get more.
The machinima shorts in the years since were a pretty good consolation prize though, made not just with comedy but with a mature tenderness. And then, years later, I heard about something called "The Buu Bits." I was worried that I would just be getting enough of a taste to wish there were more... but in the end, I couldn't resist giving them a look.
I'm so glad I did.
While I do have enough familiarity with the source material that they were coherent, and while I'm sure that several great and/or heartfelt jokes or moments would have come up in the creation process that would've improved them further, "The Buu Bits" are, by and large, all A-grade material, put together by people with over a decade of experience and polished to a mirror sheen. Awkward exposition or any mediocre stuff is largely absent, and what's left is amazing. Comedy often intertwines with genuine affection for the characters; Videl is so charming that more of her would've been great, and most of the returning cast gets to show off their development.
I do think that Goku's general stupidity, obsession with fighting stronger opponents, and carelessness are a bit much... but then, that's basically how I feel about the source material. And I do think that Vegeta is a bit too much of an asshole to care about... but then, that's also how I feel about the source material, and they put a lot more effort into justifying it than the source material ever did. Some more dramatic Buu Bits wouldn't've hurt, but hey, they do have a couple of those, albeit with a bit more comedy than they might've had otherwise. And honestly? It's probably the closest I've ever come to liking the ending to any version of Dragonball outside of the first series.
As a "highlights reel" of what probably would've been the best parts anyway, it's a fantastic send-off. Highly recommended, though, again, with the asterisk that it probably requires some familiarity with the source material, more than the series usually does.