Top 10 Biggest Dragon Ball Controversies

WatchMojo

Oh Kami, here we go again. Join Ashley as we look over the times where the Dragon Ball franchise came into the public eye for all the wrong reasons

Transcript

00:00Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're counting down our picks for the Top 10 Biggest Scandals

00:10Surrounding The Dragon Ball Franchise.

00:1510.

00:16Not-So-Super Animation

00:21On paper, the idea of a new weekly Dragon Ball series had fans rejoicing around the

00:27world.

00:28But then, Super started to air, and the monkey's paw curled.

00:32Instead of the hype action people expected, the animation was practically melting before

00:37their eyes.

00:38As it turns out, Dragon Ball Super had been rushed onto screens without the pre-production

00:43necessary for such an action-heavy battle shounen.

00:47The result?

00:48Fight scenes that looked really, really bad.

00:57They were so stiff, Super became the laughingstock of the entire anime community.

01:03To be fair, the show eventually clawed its way back to glory and delivered some genuinely

01:08awesome moments.

01:09But there's just no forgiving that rough start.

01:159.

01:16Roshi's Proclivities

01:29The franchise may still be relevant today, but don't forget, Dragon Ball started all

01:34the way back in the 80s.

01:36Things were different.

01:37For example, back then, Master Roshi trying to get in every girl's pants came across

01:42as a joke.

01:44But you can't really get away with that sort of thing in the modern climate.

01:47Unfortunately, Dragon Ball Super didn't do much to rein in Roshi's naughty behavior.

02:02If anything, it doubled down on it.

02:04Since that kind of stuff isn't a laughing matter to some anymore, it led to a formal

02:09complaint from the Ethics Committee of Japanese Broadcasting.

02:20Could you imagine what would happen if they saw what he did in the original series?

02:248.

02:25Toyotaro's Tracing

02:30Ever since the Dragon Ball Super manga began serialization, series creator Akira Toriyama

02:36has left some of the heavy lifting as well as drawing to a new artist, Toyotaro.

02:42Inevitably, there's a lot of parallels between his and Toriyama's work, but that's not

02:47the only place Toyotaro's found inspiration.

02:50In 2018, comic book artist Dexter Soi found that one of Toyotaro's drawings looked an

02:57awful lot like his rendition of Captain America.

03:01In parts side-by-side, it's pretty obvious that Toyotaro borrowed Soi's work to trace

03:06Goku's pose.

03:10Despite the massive blowback, no official channels ever released a statement on the

03:15controversy.

03:16Either way, Toyotaro continues to draw the super manga to this day, and for the most

03:21part he does a bloody good job.

03:277.

03:29The Big Green Dub

03:33Between 2000 and 2003, French broadcaster AB Group commissioned English versions for

03:40a handful of Dragon Ball films and specials, although calling them English dubs is pretty

03:47generous.

03:48The voices were recorded in France using local British and American actors, and you can tell.

03:55The translation also came with a whole lot of baffling name changes, like Piccolo, who

04:01was randomly renamed to Big Green, giving this infamous dub its name.

04:13With all due respect to those involved, it's kind of embarrassing that this is how some

04:18people had to experience Dragon Ball.

04:21Say what you will about the series' other English iterations, but they're leagues

04:25better than whatever this is.

04:27Well, except the speedy dub.

04:366.

04:39The Lost Episodes

04:40It's no small secret that Dragon Ball GT doesn't exactly put its best foot forward.

04:50So in order to drum up interest for the new series, the original English broadcast skipped

04:55the entire first arc, fast-forwarding to the much better-received Baby Saga.

05:01Then in a genius bit of marketing, they double-backed and tried to resell the skipped content as

05:07exclusive Lost Episodes.

05:15Both the UK and Canada got the Blue Water dub instead, which meant they didn't have

05:20to skip episodes, and were also spared of the horrid rap featured in the American version.

05:305.

05:32Popo's Design

05:33Remember what we said about Master Roshi?

05:40Well, the same principle applies to Kami's assistant, Mr. Popo.

05:44When he first appeared in the series, he was depicted with black skin, large red lips,

05:50and dressed in a genie outfit, which seemingly did not garner a negative response from Japanese

05:55audiences.

05:56However, when the series began to air overseas, his dark skin and prominent lips came across

06:01to some audiences as an offensive racial caricature.

06:08In response, the English manga has digitally shrunk Popo's lips in a few places.

06:13Also, during Dragon Ball Z Kai's original airing on CW4 Kids, they instead opted to

06:20make Popo blue.

06:22Interestingly enough, in every single official release since, Popo's design has reverted

06:28back to the way it was in his first appearance.

06:354.

06:37Something About Dragon Ball Evolution

06:48As every fan knows, live-action anime do not have a great reputation.

06:53Films like Dragon Ball Evolution are exactly why.

06:57For one, there was no passion behind the scenes, and it shows.

07:04It's honestly kind of impressive for a movie named after Dragon Ball to completely miss

07:09every single thing fans love about the series.

07:12Although, rest assured, the film isn't just a bad adaptation.

07:16It's simply a bad movie, period, to the point that fans are still trying to understand how

07:22it ever saw the light of day.

07:34If there's any silver lining, it's that this poor excuse for an adaptation motivated

07:39Akira Toriyama to give us a true Dragon Ball film with Battle of Gods.

07:493.

07:52Kenji Yamamoto Plagiarism

08:00For decades, fans of Dragon Ball video games were in good hands with composer Kenji Yamamoto.

08:06In fact, the response to his work was so positive, he was brought on to score the flagship Dragon

08:12Ball DK.

08:13But, as it turns out, his work was too good to be true.

08:17Fans quickly realised that Yamamoto's work sounded awfully similar to James Horner's

08:23tracks in Avatar and Danny Elfman's work on Terminator Salvation.

08:33Coincidentally, those two films came out the exact same year Kai did.

09:01The rabbit hole kept going deeper, encompassing Yamamoto's work on the games too.

09:25Soon enough, Dragon Ball had no choice but to remove his work from Kai and future game

09:31releases altogether.

09:322.

09:33The whole Vic Mignogna situation

09:36Vic Mignogna is one of the most featured voices in the English dubbing community, or should

09:40we say he was.

09:42In 2019, Mignogna was met with several accusations of inappropriate behaviour towards fans and

09:48peers.

09:49Following an official company investigation, dubbing studio Funimation officially terminated

09:54Mignogna's contract.

09:56They later recast all of his ongoing roles, including the legendary Super Saiyan Broly,

10:02a part he'd played since 2003.

10:12Mignogna responded by filing a defamation suit against his accusers.

10:16He lost the case and the appeal.

10:462019 was a rough year for the Dragon Ball dub.

10:49Following the very public departure of the previous entry, several incriminating audio

10:54clips were released onto the web.

10:56They featured other members of Dragon Ball's English dub saying all sorts of offensive

11:00slurs and crude jokes, mostly surrounding sexuality.

11:03To put it into perspective, the audio is so graphic at times that we can't really play

11:08most of it.

11:16These weren't background actors either.

11:18Any dub fan can easily clock these as the voices of Goku, Krillin, Chi-Chi and more.

11:24Funimation declined to comment on the story at the time, and to this day, there's never

11:28been any public recourse on the situation.

11:37Did we miss any buzz-worthy Dragon Ball scandals?

11:41Let us know in those comments below.

12:07And as always, thanks for watching.

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