u/BulletCola

Like, I enjoyed the fights a lot (Despite them kind of getting boring as the manga went on as I read), I thought the characters were quite cool, and I thought the style was so great.

But I loved that specific part of Dragon Ball Z, because it had everything that I wanted and asked for.

You need to know, before I read this, this was me during Middle School, often reading these via renting them at the library. I was very used to Naruto, specifically Part 1, a shonen that had more focused of its characters and lore in my eyes, and before that even, I am someone who loves emotionally invested stories. This was also before I understood what exactly shonen is structure wise.

You might see where this is going.

Saiyan Saga kind of floored me, it was kind of not much going on tbh, and I felt quite uncomfortable with Gohans forced training onto him, but I was SO shocked of Gokus death right away after the first fight, on top of how much the cast basically dies outside of three people until Goku showed up, it was sort of a shock value of how much hard work didnt mean anything at all (And I felt like it kind of made the story kind of worse in a few ways but I digress).

It was very tense, it was kind of fun for the simplistic fights and how grounded it is (Which is why it was the most reread saga I did of DBZ), but then the Namek saga happened and I was like:

"Wait, what exactly is the world exactly like again?"

Remember, I didn't know OG Dragon Ball existed, and I also felt off by how, despite being such a wide cast of characters, we barely if ever get to see any focus on any of them outside of just filler for the fights. I was kind of weirded out of how much the world felt empty and devoid of detail and concepts outside of the heaven stuff.

So, I was like "Okay, so they're just doing a fetch quest, nothing more. Just quickly go through this and I can get to the juicy plot stuff"

And then I realize of how LONG this fetch quest became.

The fights were still cool but a weird feeling got to me, where I felt like something about the plot is off, and that its nothing more but fights and training, and healing, and fetch quests, nothing really about lore, details (Outside of Saiyan stuff), and not really much going on.

Love the final fights though, and when that arc was done. I was seriously like:

"Okay. Now that is finally over, we can look over the cast and how much the plot opens up, THIS has to be the start."

And then.....

Time skip

You probably dont understand, how much THIS FLOORED ME.

I legit thought that the story was going to open itself up and more in-depth ideas and concepts were about to happen, only to see THAT SKIPPED OVER.

This legit made me very upset, and kind of affected my enjoyment of the whole Android saga, and how repetitive it all felt (Especially with the environments looking so off to me).

And then Gohan vs Cell happened and I thought it was one of the best things in the whole franchise. It did everything that I kind of wanted for it to be within a fight especially with Gohans focus.

The scream he did, how much he wiped the floor of the Cell Jrs despite the rough time they gave everyone, the PURE EMOTIONAL stakes and atmosphere of Gohan not wanting to fight , it felt soo real and genuinely engaging.

And when it ended, I was SO HAPPY, cause with the way the start of the Majin Buu Saga happened, it made me so excited

Gohan going to college, having his own casual life trying to go through the hoops of finally trying to be himself as he becomes a super hero, this imo, was peak Dragon Ball Z, because it felt like it was a great opportunity to breathe new life to create plot elements that perhaps would make it alot more nuanced and thought provoking.

You have Gohan and his classmates, his saiyanman hero form, Vindel acting as the law peace keeper investigating his actions despite living near him, its so cool and neat, and interesting compared to the constant fights with little to no breathing room of anything that isnt "Just get physically better and punch harder but in a better technique, and get angry into super power"

And then............

Goku was revived, and then the tournament happened.

I stopped reading shortly after that, realizing that it went back to that all over again.

I saw the rest of the plot years after, but I genuinely didnt care anymore.

I love the stuff that I did love, but man, finding that out, genuinely damaged not only my enjoyment of the series, making it complicated.

But it also affected of how I see the Shonen Genre, and thus didnt like any of it outside of Part 1 Naruto, first half of Part 2 Naruto and Jojo.

I just.....

Does anyone else felt that way?