Dragon Ball (ドラゴンボール Doragon Bōru?) is a Japanese manga
series written and illustrated by Akira
Toriyama. It was originally serialized in Weekly Shōnen Jump from 1984 to 1995; later
the 519 individual chapters were published into 42 tankōbon
volumes by Shueisha.
Dragon Ball was inspired by the classical Chinese novel Journey to the West. The series follows the
adventures of the protagonist Goku from his childhood through adulthood as he trains in
martial arts and explores the world in search of the seven mystical orbs known
as the Dragon Balls, which can summon a wish-granting dragon
when gathered. Along his journey, Goku makes several friends and battles a wide
variety of villains, many of whom also seek the Dragon Balls for their own
desires.
The 42 tankōbon have been adapted into two anime series produced
by Toei
Animation: Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z, which together were
broadcast in Japan from 1986 to 1996. Additionally, Toei has developed
seventeen animated feature films and three television specials, as well as an
anime sequel titled Dragon Ball GT, which takes place after the events
of the manga. From 2009 to 2011, Toei broadcast a revised, faster-paced version
of Dragon Ball Z under the name of Dragon Ball Kai, in which most
of the original version's footage not featured in the manga was removed.
Several companies have developed various types of merchandising such as a collectible trading card game,
and a large number of video games.
The manga series was licensed for an English-language release in North
America by Viz
Media, in the United Kingdom by Gollancz
Manga, Australia and New Zealand by Chuang Yi
and Malay-language release in Malaysia by Comics
House. The entire anime series was licensed by Funimation Entertainment for an
English-language release in the United States, although the series has not always
been dubbed by the same studio. In China, a live-action film adaptation was
produced in 1989. In 2002, 20th
Century Fox acquired the rights to produce an American-made live-action film that received a negative
reception from critics and fans; the movie was released on April 10, 2009 in
the United States.
Since its release, Dragon Ball has become one of the most successful
manga and anime series of all time. The manga's 42 volumes have sold over 152
million copies in Japan and more than 200 million copies worldwide. Reviewers
have praised the art, characterization, and humor of the story. It is widely
regarded as one of the greatest manga series ever made, with many manga artists
such as Masashi Kishimoto (Naruto), Eiichiro
Oda (One
Piece), Tite Kubo (Bleach),
Makoto
Raiku (Zatch Bell), Yoshio
Sawai (Bobobo-bo Bo-bobo), and Hiro
Mashima (Rave Master, Fairy Tail)
citing Dragon Ball as a source of inspiration for their own now popular
works. The anime, particularly Dragon Ball Z, is also highly popular in
various countries and was arguably one of the most influential in greatly
boosting the popularity of Japanese animation in Western culture.
Plot summary
The series begins with a young monkey-tailed boy named Goku befriending a
teenage girl named Bulma. Together, they go on a quest
to find the seven Dragon Balls. Goku later undergoes rigorous training regimes
and educational programs under the martial artist Master Roshi in order to fight in
the World Martial Arts Tournament, a competition involving the most powerful
fighters in the world. During his training time with Roshi, he meets a bald
Shaolin monk named Krillin, who starts out as Goku's rival classmate; however,
they soon become best friends. Outside the tournaments, Goku faces diverse
villains such as Emperor Pilaf, the Red Ribbon Army, and the Namekian King Piccolo. Several of the enemies
and rivals Goku encounters eventually become his allies and close friends,
including the desert bandit Yamcha, the assassin Tien Shinhan, the samurai Yajirobe, and King Piccolo's
offspring/reincarnation Piccolo Jr.
As a young adult, Goku meets his older brother Raditz, who reveals to him that they
are members of a nearly extinct extraterrestrial race called the Saiyans. The
Saiyans had sent Goku to Earth as an infant to conquer the planet for them, but
he suffered a severe head injury soon after his arrival
and lost all memory of his mission, as well as his blood-thirsty Saiyan nature.
Goku refuses to help Raditz continue the mission, and is soon killed along with
Raditz in battle; however, he is revived a year later by the Dragon Balls. He
then begins to encounter other enemies from space, most notably the Saiyan
prince Vegeta,
who becomes his rival and eventually ally. Goku also encounters Frieza, the
galactic emperor responsible for the destruction of almost the entire Saiyan
race, whose actions cause Goku to transform into a legendary Super
Saiyan. After an epic battle on the planet Namek, Goku defeats Frieza,
avenging the lives of billions across the galaxy.
Some time later, a group of androids from the former Red Ribbon Army
appear, seeking revenge against Goku. During this time, an evil life form
called Cell emerges and, after absorbing two of the
androids to achieve his final form, holds his own fighting tournament to decide
the fate of the Earth entitled the Cell Games. However, Cell is eventually
defeated by Goku's son Gohan in a desperate Kamehameha
wave struggle. Seven years later, Goku and his allies are drawn into yet
another battle for the universe against a magical demon named Majin Buu. After numerous battles,
Goku destroys Buu with his ultimate attack; the Spirit Bomb. Ten years
later, at another World Martial Arts Tournament, Goku meets Buu's human
reincarnation, Uub. Leaving the match between the
two of them unfinished, Goku takes Uub away on a journey to train him.
Themes
At its core, Dragon Ball maintains the central tenets of the Weekly
Shōnen Jump philosophy of "friendship, struggle, and victory". As
the series shifts from a "heart warming" story into a more
action-oriented piece, the protagonists go through an unending cycle of
fighting, winning, losing and improving. They continue this cycle by using
miraculous devices to achieve life after death and continue to learn lessons as
they defeat their challengers. The series also follows the idea that people can
better themselves and achieve their goals by constantly challenging themselves.
Production
Wanting to break from the Western influences common in his other series,
Akira Toriyama loosely modeled Dragon Ball on the classic Chinese novel Journey to the West. He also redeveloped
one of his earlier one shot manga series, Dragon
Boy, which was initially serialized in Fresh Hump and released in a
single tankōbon
volume in 1983. This short work combined the comedic style of Toriyama's
successful six-year series Dr. Slump with a more action-oriented plot and paid
homage to famous martial art actor Jackie Chan.
Toriyama notes that his goal for the series was to tell an "unconventional
and contradictory" story. In the early concept of the series, Goku and
Piccolo were from Earth. With the introduction of Kami, the idea of having fights from
other planets was established and Goku and Piccolo were changed to alien
species. For the female characters, Toriyama felt it was not fun to draw
"weak females" so he created women that he felt were not only
"beautiful and sexy", but also "strong".Going against the
normal convention that the strongest characters should be the largest in terms
of physical size, he designed many of Dragon Ball's most powerful
characters with small statures, including the protagonist, Goku. 
The fighting techniques were initially unnamed, but the series editor felt
it would be better to name them all. Toriyama proceeded to create names for all
of the techniques, except for the Kamehameha which his wife named when
Toriyama was indecisive about what it should be called. When creating the
fictional world of the series, Toriyama decided to create it from his own
imagination to avoid referencing popular culture. However the island where the
World Martial Arts Tournament is held is modeled after Bali. When including
fights in the manga, Toriyama had the characters go to uninhabited locations to
avoid difficulties in drawing destroyed buildings. In order to advance the
story quickly, he also gave most fighters the ability to fly so they could
travel to other parts of the world without inconvenience. This was also the
reasoning behind Goku learning to use Instant Transmission (thus
allowing characters to teleport to any planet in a second).
After the first chapters were
released, readers commented that Goku seemed rather plain, so his appearance
was changed. New characters (such as Master Roshi and Krillin) were added and
martial arts tournaments were included to give the manga a greater emphasis on
fighting.
Anticipating that readers would expect Goku to win the tournaments,
Toriyama had him lose the first two while continuing his initial goal of having
Goku be the champion and hero. After Cell's death, he intended for Gohan to
replace Goku as the series' protagonist, but then felt the character was not suited
for the role and changed his mind. Toriyama based the Red Ribbon Army on a
video game he had played named Spartan
X in which enemies tended to appear very fast.
After the second tournament concluded, Toriyama wanted to have a villain
who would be a true "bad guy". After creating Piccolo as the new
villain, he noted that it was one of the most interesting parts of the stories
and that he and his son became the favorite characters of the series. With Goku
established as the strongest fighter on Earth, Toriyama decided to increase the
number of villains that came from outer space. Finding the escalating enemies
to be a pain to work with, he created the Ginyu Force
to add more balance to the series. During this period of the series, Toriyama
placed less emphasis on the series' art work, simplifying the lines and sometimes
making things "too square." He found himself having problems
determining the colors for characters and sometimes ended up changing them
unintentionally mid-story. In later accounts, Toriyama noted that he didn't
plan out the details of the story, resulting in strange occurrences and
discrepancies later in the series.
Media
Manga
Dragon Ball
See also: List of Dragon Ball manga volumes
Written and illustrated by Akira
Toriyama, Dragon Ball was initially serialized in the manga
anthology Weekly Shōnen Jump starting on December 3,
1984. The series ended on June 5, 1995
when Toriyama grew exhausted and felt he needed a break from drawing. The 519
individual chapters were published into 42 tankōbon
volumes by Shueisha
from November 10, 1985 through August 4, 1995.[12][13][14]
In 2002, the chapters were re-released in a collection of 34 kanzenban volumes, which included a slightly rewritten
ending, new covers, and color artwork from its Weekly Shōnen Jump run.
Toriyama also created a short series, Neko Majin,
that became a self-parody of Dragon Ball. First appearing in Weekly
Shōnen Jump in August 1999, the eight chapter series was released
sporadically until it was completed in 2005. These chapters were compiled into
a "kanzenban"-style package for release in Japan on April 4, 2005.[15]
The Dragon Ball manga was licensed for release in English in North
America by Viz
Media which has released all 42 volumes. Viz released volumes 17 through 42
under the title Dragon Ball Z to mimic the name of the anime series
adaptated from those volumes, feeling it would reduce the potential for
confusion by its readers. They initially released both series in a monthly
comic book format starting in 1998, and later began collecting them in graphic
novels.
The first 10 volumes of both series
were re-released from March to May 2003 under the "Shonen Jump"
format, with Dragon Ball being completed on August 3, 2004 and Dragon
Ball Z finishing on June 6, 2006. In June 2008, Viz began re-releasing the
two series in a wideban
format called "VIZBIG Edition," which collects three individual
volumes into a single large volume.
In 2006, Toriyama and One Piece
author Eiichiro
Oda teamed up to create a single chapter crossover of their individual hit series.
Entitled Cross Epoch, the chapter was published in the December 25, 2006
issue of Weekly Shōnen Jump.
Spin-offs
A manga adaptation of Dragon Ball: Yo! Son
Goku and His Friends Return!! illustrated by Naho Ōishi, was published
in the March 21, 2009 and April 21, 2009 issues of V Jump.
A spinoff manga titled Dragon
Ball SD, also written by Naho Ōishi, has been published in Shueisha's Super
Strong Jump magazine beginning in December 2010. A second issue was
released in April 2011.
This manga is a condensed retelling
of Goku's adventures as a child, with many details changed. Dragon Ball:
Episode of Bardock is a three-chapter manga, once again penned by Naho
Ōishi, that was published in the monthly magazine V-Jump between
August and October 2011. This manga is a sequel to the 1990 TV special Bardock - The Father of
Goku with some key details changed. As the title indicates the manga's
story revolves around Bardock, Goku's father, who in this special is featured
in a "what-if" scenario in which he did not die at the hands of
Frieza and gets to fight his enemy as a Super Saiyan. The fact that Bardock
appears as a Super Saiyan is based on the Dragon Ball Heroes card
featuring him as one.
Anime series
Dragon Ball
Toei
Animation produced an anime series based on the manga chapters, also titled
Dragon Ball. The series premiered in Japan on Fuji
Television on February 26, 1986 and ran until April 12, 1989, lasting 153
episodes.
Harmony
Gold USA licensed the series for an English-language release in the United
States in 1989. In their voice dub of the series, Harmony renamed almost all of
the characters, for example, Goku was renamed "Zero." This dub version
was test-marketed in several cities, but was cancelled before it could be
broadcast to the general public.
In 1995, Funimation Entertainment acquired the
license for the distribution of Dragon Ball in the U.S., as well as its
sequel series Dragon Ball Z. Funimation contracted BLT Productions to
create an English voice track for the first anime at their Canadian-based
dubbing studio and the dubbed episodes were edited for content. Thirteen
episodes aired in first-run syndication during the fall of 1995
before Funimation cancelled the project due to low ratings and decided to shift
their focus on the more action-oriented Dragon Ball Z. Vidmark
Entertainment (later known as Trimark
Pictures) purchased the home video distribution rights for these dubbed
episodes sometime after. In March 2001, following the success of Dragon Ball
Z on Cartoon Network, Funimation announced the return of
Dragon Ball to American television, featuring a new English audio track
produced at their own Texas-based
dubbing studio, as well as slightly less editing, and left the original
background music intact unlike their dubs of the two sequel series. The
re-dubbed episodes aired on Cartoon Network from August 20, 2001 to December 1,
2003. Funimation also broadcast the series on Colours TV
and their own Funimation Channel starting in 2006. Funimation began releasing
their in-house dub to Region 1 DVD box sets in March 2003. Each box set, spanning an entire saga
of the series, included the English dub track and the original Japanese audio
track with optional English subtitles. However, they were unable to release the
first thirteen episodes at the time, due to Lionsgate Entertainment holding the
distribution rights to their original dub of the same episodes, having acquired
them from Trimark after the company became defunct. After Lionsgate's license
to the first thirteen episodes expired in 2009, Funimation remastered and
re-released the complete Dragon Ball series to DVD in five individual
season box sets, with the first set released on September 15, 2009 and the
final set released on July 27, 2010.
Dragon Ball Z
With the ending of Dragon Ball, Toei Animation quickly released a
second anime series, Dragon Ball Z (ドラゴンボールZ(ゼット) Doragon Bōru Zetto?, commonly
abbreviated as DBZ). Picking up where the first left off, Dragon Ball
Z is adapted from the final twenty-six volumes of the manga series on Weekly Shounen Jump from 1988–1995, it
premiered in Japan on Fuji Television on April 26, 1989, taking over its
predecessor's time slot, and ran for 291 episodes until its conclusion on
January 31, 1996.[5]
Following their short-lived dub of Dragon Ball in 1995, Funimation
began production on an English-language release of Dragon Ball Z. They
collaborated with Saban Entertainment to finance and distribute
the series to television, sub-licensed home video distribution to Pioneer
Entertainment (later known as Geneon Universal Entertainment),
contracted Ocean Productions to dub the anime into English,
and hired Shuki
Levy to compose an alternate musical score. This dub of Dragon Ball Z
was heavily edited for content,
as well as length; reducing the first 67 episodes into 53. The series premiered
in the U.S. on September 13, 1996 in first-run syndication, but also struggled to
find a substantial audience during its run and was ultimately cancelled after
two seasons. On August 31, 1998, however, these cancelled dubbed episodes began
airing on Cartoon Network's weekday-afternoon programming
block, Toonami,
where the series received much more popularity. With new success, Funimation
continued production on the series by themselves, now with less editing due to
fewer restrictions on cable programing. However, they could no longer afford
the services of either the Ocean voice cast or Shuki Levy's music without
Saban's financial assistance, resulting in the creation of their own in-house
ADR studio and a new musical score composed by Bruce
Faulconer. Dragon Ball Z was now in full production in the U.S. and
the new dub of the series aired on Cartoon Network from September 13, 1999 to
April 7, 2003. In 2004, Geneon's distribution rights to the first 53/67
episodes of Dragon Ball Z expired, allowing Funimation to re-dub them
with their in-house ADR Studio and restore the removed content. These re-dubbed
episodes aired on Cartoon Network during the summer of 2005.[31][32]
In 2006, Funimation remastered the episodes cropped to 16:9 widescreen format and then began
re-releasing the series to Region 1 DVD in nine individual season box sets,
with the first set released on February 6, 2007 and the final set released on
May 19, 2009. These sets were notable for including the option of hearing
Funimation's in-house dub alongside the original Japanese music, an option that
had previously not been available. Other options included hearing the in-house
dub with the American soundtrack composed by Bruce Faulconer and Nathan
Johnson, and a third option included watching the original Japanese version,
with the original Japanese soundtrack and English subtitles. In July 2009,
Funimation announced that they would be re-releasing Dragon Ball Z in a
new seven-volume DVD set called the "Dragon Boxes." Based on the
original series masters with frame-by-frame restoration, the first set was
released on November 10, 2009 and the final set was released on October 11,
2011. Unlike the season box sets, Funimation's "Dragon Box" release
is presented in the original 4:3 fullscreen format. Funimation and Toei
released a statement in January 2011 confirming that they would stream Dragon
Ball Z within 30 minutes before their simulcast of One Piece.[35] Dragon
Ball Z is now being streamed on Hulu, containing the English dub with the Japanese music and
uncut footage, as well as subtitled Japanese episodes.
In July 2011, Funimation announced plans to release Dragon Ball Z in
Blu-ray
format. Dragon Ball Z Level 1.1, containing the first 17 episodes, was
released on November 8, 2011. However, on January 26, 2012, Funimation
suspended the release of the third Blu-ray volume of Dragon Ball Z, as
well as production of the rest of the Blu-ray releases, citing concerns over
restoring the original film material frame by frame.
Dragon Ball GT
Produced by Toei Animation, Dragon Ball GT (ドラゴンボールGT(ジーティー) Doragon Bōru Jī Tī?, G(rand)
T(our) premiered on Fuji TV on February 2, 1996, and ran until November 19,
1997. Unlike the first two series, it was not based on the original Dragon
Ball manga. The series lasted 64 episodes. In Dragon Ball GT, Goku
is transformed back into a child by the Black Star Dragon Balls and is forced
to travel across the galaxy to retrieve them in order to transform back into an
adult.
Following the success of both Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z
on Cartoon Network, Funimation licensed Dragon Ball
GT for distribution in the U.S. as well. Funimation's dub of the series
aired on Cartoon Network from November 14, 2003 to April 16, 2005. The
television broadcast initially skipped the first sixteen episodes of the
series. Instead, Funimation created a composition episode entitled "A
Grand Problem," which used scenes from the skipped episodes to summarize
the story. The skipped episodes, advertised as "The Lost Episodes,"
were later aired after the remaining episodes of the series had been broadcast.
Funimation later released their dub to bilingual Region 1 DVD in two season
box sets, with the first set released on December 9, 2008 and the final set
released on February 10, 2009, which also featured the Dragon Ball GT TV
special, A Hero's Legacy. In a similar
fashion to their DVD releases for Dragon Ball Z, the DVD box sets have
the option of hearing the English dub alongside the original Japanese music,
and the rap song used for the TV airing of the show (nicknamed by fans
"Step Into the Grand Tour") has been replaced by English-dubbed
versions of the original Japanese opening and ending songs. Funimation later
released a "Complete Series" box set of Dragon Ball GT (using
the same discs as the two season sets, but with different packaging) on
September 21, 2010. Dragon Ball GT has been re-broadcast in the U.S. on Nicktoons, beginning on January 16, 2012.
Dragon Ball Z Kai
In February 2009, Toei Animation announced that it would begin broadcasting
a revised version of Dragon Ball Z as part of the series' 20th
anniversary celebrations. The series premiered on Fuji TV in Japan on April 5,
2009, under the name Dragon Ball Kai (ドラゴンボール改(カイ) Doragon Bōru Kai?, lit.
"Dragon Ball Revised"), with the episodes remastered for HDTV, featuring updated opening and
ending sequences, and a rerecording of the vocal tracks by most of the original
cast. The footage was also re-edited to more closely follow the manga,
resulting in a faster-moving story, and damaged frames removed. As such, it is
a new version of Dragon Ball Z created from the original footage.
On March 9, 2011, Toei announced that due to Kenji Yamamoto's score for Dragon
Ball Kai infringing on the rights of an unknown third party, the score for
remaining episodes and replays of previous episodes would be replaced.[46]
Later reports from Toei claimed that with the exception of the series' opening
and closing songs, as well as eyecatch music, Yamamoto's score was replaced with Shunsuke
Kikuchi's original score from Dragon Ball Z. The series concluded
with the finale of the Cell arc as opposed to including the Majin Buu arc. It was
originally planned to run 98 episodes, however due to the Tōhoku offshore earthquake and
tsunami, the final episode of Dragon Ball Kai was not aired and the
series ended on its 97th episode in Japan on March 27, 2011.
Like all other Dragon Ball-based anime, Funimation licensed Dragon
Ball Kai for an English-language release in the U.S., under the title Dragon
Ball Z Kai. The series was broadcast on Nicktoons from May 24, 2010 to January 1,
2012. In addition to Nicktoons, the series also began airing on The CW's Saturday-morning programming
block, Toonzai,
on August 14, 2010. Both the Nicktoons and Toonzai airings are edited for
content, though the Toonzai version is censored even more so than Nicktoons',
most likely due to The CW being a broadcast network. Both these versions are
rated TV-Y7-FV. However, in addition to the TV airings, Funimation is also
releasing bilingual Region 1 DVD and Blu-ray volumes of the show. These box
sets contain the original Japanese audio track with English subtitles, as well
as the uncut version of the English dub, which does not contain any of the
edits made for the TV airings. The uncut version is rated TV-PG. Following the
plagiarizing accusations of the series' original musical score, both the
Nicktoons and Toonzai airings have also been featuring the original Dragon
Ball Z background music, as well as the uncut DVD/Blu-ray version beginning
with its fifth volume release.
Anime films
Seventeen anime films based on the Dragon Ball series have been
released in Japan. The first three films were based on the original Dragon
Ball anime series. The remaining films included thirteen Dragon Ball Z
films and one tenth anniversary special (also based on the first anime series).
However, the films are generally either alternate re-tellings of certain story
arcs or extra side-stories that don't correlate with the same timeline as the
series. Funimation has licensed and released all of the films to home video in
North America.
Specials
Three television specials based on the metaseries were released in Japan.
The first, Bardock – The Father of
Goku, was released on October 17, 1990. It is a prequel to the
series, set years before the start of the manga and details how Goku's father,
Bardock, discovers that Frieza is planning to kill all the other Saiyans, and
his efforts to stop him. The second special, The History of Trunks was
released on March 24, 1993. Based on an extra chapter of the original manga, it
is set in a parallel universe where most of the series characters are killed by
the evil androids and focuses on Bulma and Vegeta's son Trunks. A Hero's Legacy, released on
March 26, 1997, is set 100 years after the end of Dragon Ball GT. It
features one of Goku's descendants who begins looking for the Dragon Balls in
order to help his sick grandmother, Pan.
Two other specials were also released in Japan. A two-episode original video animation (OVA) series
titled Dragon Ball Z
Side Story: Plan to Eradicate the Saiyans, based on the Famicom video game of the same name, was released in 1993 and
was set during Dragon Ball Z.[52]
Another special, Dragon Ball: Yo! Son
Goku and His Friends Return!!, premiered at the Jump Super Anime Tour
on November 24, 2008. The special is set two years after the defeat of the evil
Buu and has Goku and his friends facing against new enemies, Abo and Kado, and
meeting Vegeta's younger brother, Tarble and his wife, Gure.
In November 2011, V-Jump announced an animated adaptation from Bardock's
spinoff manga by Naho Ōishi, which aired in Japan on December 18, 2011.
Video games
The Dragon Ball franchise has spawned multiple video games across
various genres and platforms. Earlier games of the series included a system of
card battling and were released for the Nintendo Entertainment System
following the storyline of the series.Starting Super Nintendo Entertainment System,
the Sega
Saturn and the PlayStation most of the games were from the fighting
genre including the series Super Butoden.The
first Dragon Ball game to be released in the United States was Dragon Ball GT: Final Bout for the
PlayStation on July 31, 1997 For
the PlayStation
2 and PlayStation Portable games the characters were
redone in 3D cel-shaded graphics. These games included the Dragon Ball Z: Budokai series
and the Dragon Ball Z: Budokai
Tenkaichi series. Dragon Ball Z: Burst Limit was the
first game of the series developed for the PlayStation
3 and Xbox
360.A massively multiplayer
online role-playing game called Dragon Ball Online is currently playable. It
has been stated that Akira Toriyama has been working on character designs for
this project for several years, and the game is available in Japan and South
Korea.
Soundtracks
Myriad soundtracks were released to the anime, movies and the games. The
music for the first two anime Dragon Ball and Z and its films was
directed by Shunsuke Kikuchi, while the music from GT
was directed by Akihito Tokunaga and the music from Kai was directed by
Kenji Yamamoto. For the first anime, the soundtracks released were Dragon Ball: Music Collection in
1985 and Dragon Ball: Complete Song
Collection in 1991 although they were reissued in 2007 and 2003,
respectively. For
the second anime, the soundtrack series released were Dragon Ball Z Hit Song
Collection Series. It was produced and released by Columbia
Records of Japan from July 21, 1989 to March 20, 1996 the show's entire
lifespan. On September 20, 2006 Columbia re-released the Hit Song Collection on
their Animex 1300 series.
Other CDs released are compilations, video games and films soundtracks as well
as music from the English versions.
Live-action films
A live-action Mandarin Chinese film adaptation of the series, Dragon Ball: The Magic Begins,
was released in Taiwan
in 1989.
Considered a "tacky" version of the story by critics,
the plot revolves around a rag-tag group of heroes, led by "Monkey
Boy" (Goku) trying to stop King Horn from using the wish-granting
"Dragon Pearls" (Dragon Balls) to rule the world.
In December 1990, the unofficial live-action Korean film Dragon Ball: Ssawora
Son Goku, Igyeora Son Goku was released. The movie follows the original
Dragon Ball story, and does so more closely than The Magic Begins. This live
action adaption from Korea is an adaptation of the events of the first Dragon
Ball story arc and a little of the Saiyan arc of Dragon Ball Z, as
Vegeta's partner Nappa makes an appearance in this
film.
In March 2002, 20th Century Fox acquired feature
film rights to the Dragon Ball franchise and
began production on an American live action film entitled Dragonball Evolution.
Ben Ramsey was tapped to create a screenplay based on Dragon Ball Z.
Directed by James Wong and produced by Stephen
Chow,
the film was released in the United States on April 10, 2009. The film was
largely considered a failure by both critics and Dragon Ball fans and
it only grossed $57 million at the box office.
Art books
There are two companion books to the series, one called Dragon Ball -
The Complete Illustrations, first published in Japan in 1995, which was
then translated and printed in 2008 by VIZ Media. It contains all the 264 coloured
illustrations Akira Toriyama done for the Weekly Jump magazines' covers, bonus
giveaways and specials, and all the covers for the 42 tankōbon. It also
includes an interview with Akira Toriyama on his work process. In Japan it was
originally released as Volume 1 of the 7 part Daizenshuu series.
The other was Dragon Ball GT Perfect Files, released in May 1997 and
December 1997 by Shueisha's Jump Comics Selection imprint. It include
series information, illustration galleries, behind-the-scenes information, and
more. They were out of print for many years, but were re-released in April 2006
and this edition is still in print.
Collectible cards
There have been collectible cards, based on the Dragon Ball, Dragon
Ball Z, and Dragon Ball GT series, released under Bandai. They
feature various scenes from the manga and anime stills, plus exclusive artwork
from all three series. They were previously released in other countries, like Taiwan and Singapore,
before making their debut in the United States in July 2008.
Reception
Manga
Dragon Ball is one of the most popular manga series of all time,
and it continues to enjoy high readership today. By 2000, more than 126 million
copies of its tankōbon volumes had been sold in Japan alone. By 2007,
this number had grown to pass 152 million in Japan and 200 million worldwide.
In Little Boy: The Art of Japan's Exploding Subculture Takashi Murakami
notes that Dragon Ball's "never-ending cyclical narrative moves
forward plausibly, seamlessly, and with great finesse." Goku's journey and
his ever growing strength resulted in the character winning "the
admiration of young boys everywhere".
In a survey conducted by Oricon in 2007 between 1,000 people, Goku, the main character
of the franchise, ranked first place as the "Strongest Manga character of
all time." Manga artists, such as Naruto creator Masashi
Kishimoto and One Piece creator Eiichiro
Oda, have stated that Goku inspired their series' main protagonists as well
as series structure. Dragon Ball was also high inspiration to Yaiba, the manga
written by Gosho Aoyama, best known as the creator of the manga
series Detective
Conan. Both Yaiba and Dragon Ball began as a kind of
light-hearted gag manga, but towards the end of their run the tone became more
serious and action-packed. When TV Asahi conducted an online poll for the top one hundred
anime, the Dragon Ball series came in place twelve.
Animerica felt the series had "worldwide appeal" that uses dramatic pacing
and over the top martial arts action to "maintain tension levels and keep
a crippler crossface hold on the audience's attention spans". Ridwan Khan
from Animefringe.com commented on the manga to have a "chubby" art
style but as the series continued it gets more refined with the characters
leaner and more muscular. He also noted he preferred the manga versions of the
series to their animated counterparts that makes the story slower and
pointless.[ Anime News Network praised the story and humor
of the manga to be very good due conveying of all the characters's
personalities. They also remarked Viz's
translation to be one of the best ones of all the English editions of the
series, praising the lack of censor. Rationalmagic.com remarked the first manga
volume as "a superior humor title". They praised Goku's innocence and
Bulma's insistence as one of the funniest parts of the series. Writer Jason Thompson commented that the series
popularity comes from a formula that Toriyama used in various story arcs from
which he describes as "lots of martial arts, lots of training sequences, a
few jokes." Yet, he noted that such formula became the model for other
manga from the same genre such as Naruto.
Anime
The anime adaptations have also received positive reviews. Dragon Ball Z
was listed as the 78th best animated show in IGN's Top 100 Animated Series, and
was also listed as the 50th greatest cartoon in Wizard magazine's "Top 100 Greatest
Cartoons" list. T.H.E.M. Anime Reviews considered the series characters to
be different from stereotypical stock characters and noted that they undergo
much more development. Despite
praising Dragon Ball Z for its cast of characters, they criticized it
for having long and repetitive fights. Anime News Network considered Trunks's
storyline to be one of the better story arcs of the series, with the characters
having more motivation than in previous stories. Some critics and most fans of
the Japanese version have given Funimation's
English dub of Dragon Ball Z mixed feelings over the years. IGN criticized some of
the voices to be "quite annoying" and also noted that Frieza's
English voice "made him sound like a lady. This combined with Frieza's
appearance left a lot of fans confused about Frieza's gender for a while."
IGN commented Dragon
Ball GT "is downright repellent" mentioning that the material and
characters had lost their novelty and fun. They also criticized the character
designs of Trunks and Vegeta as being goofy. Anime News Network also gave
negative comments about Dragon Ball GT, mentioning that the fights from
the series were "a very simple childish exercise" and that many other
anime were superior. The plot of the series has also been criticized for giving
a formula that was already used in its predecessors. On several occasions the Dragon
Ball anime series has topped Japan's DVD sales. The first episode of Dragon
Ball Kai earned a viewer ratings percentage of 11.3, ahead of One Piece
and behind Crayon Shin-Chan. Although following episodes
had lower ratings, Dragon Ball Kai was among the top 10 anime in viewer
ratings every week in Japan for most of its run. 
