infamous_emijayne said:

Watched it online yesterday. It's 88 minutes total including the credits. I'd post a link to it but mods get testy about that.

Unlike my negativity of TDK before it was released, this film kept it's promise of being a horrid and completely blasphemic version of Akira Toriyama's manga creation. It was flat out garbage. The overall plot could have been a great film, but instead it was worse than watching the first Fantastic Four. This film was made for kids. Period. The fights scenes were over-edited with several elements from the trailers and tv spots being cut out, Piccolo pretty much got the Venom treatment and was hardly seen, Chatwin SUCKED and was not once believable as a martial artist, almost all of the hundred or so alterations to the source material were unnecessary, Roshi just wasn't Roshi, NO KRILLIN...

I could go on and on, but to sum it up...

I actually enjoyed Street Fighter over this and I'm a HUGE fan of DragonBall that can't stand Lil' Miss Kreuk.

matacron said:

I'll be honest with you, I'm probably going to see this thing.

No, it's not because I disagree with either of you. The movie probably IS a horrible translation of the cartoon.

The thing is, I've never WATCHED the cartoon. Not ONE episode.

So even though I'm SURE that YOU ARE BOTH RIGHT and this movie is a vomitous production which would make any Dragonball fan would want to grab their torches and pitchforks, I am in a UNIQUE position to say whether or not this thing is a good or bad movie BY ITSELF.

It's kind of like my old book dealer. He's probably about 70 years old or older. He absolutely WORSHIPS LOTR, and when the movies came out, he thought they were COMPLETE GARBAGE because he had spent his entire life reading and REreading the books.

He agreed that the films might be good BY themselves, but they didn't stay true to the source material. (Personally, I've read them all, and I thought they did a pretty good job).

optimus_x said:

Dragonball Z pissed me off. I really wanted to like the cartoon, I wanted to see see people getting the crap kicked out of each other, but after watching them grunt and flex their muscles at each other for 4 1/2 out of the 5 episodes..... I wanted to kill myself.

Overrated.

vegetasgirl said:

I have read it and I own almost the complete anime series on tape and have watched it many times. I want to see the movies "Mystical Adventure" and "Path to Power" as well, were Toriyama retold the Dragonball story in two completely different ways from the original one by rearranging the storyline in slightly different ways and leaving out main characters (Krillen for instance in the second retelling) and seeing how he rewrote and re-imagined the story himself. If he did it to his own material twice, who are we to bitch about it being done a third time with his approval?

matacron said:

I'll be honest with you, I'm probably going to see this thing.

No, it's not because I disagree with either of you. The movie probably IS a horrible translation of the cartoon.

The thing is, I've never WATCHED the cartoon. Not ONE episode.

So even though I'm SURE that YOU ARE BOTH RIGHT and this movie is a vomitous production which would make any Dragonball fan would want to grab their torches and pitchforks, I am in a UNIQUE position to say whether or not this thing is a good or bad movie BY ITSELF.

It's kind of like my old book dealer. He's probably about 70 years old or older. He absolutely WORSHIPS LOTR, and when the movies came out, he thought they were COMPLETE GARBAGE because he had spent his entire life reading and REreading the books.

He agreed that the films might be good BY themselves, but they didn't stay true to the source material. (Personally, I've read them all, and I thought they did a pretty good job).

Maverick Hunter said:

matacron said:

I'll be honest with you, I'm probably going to see this thing.

No, it's not because I disagree with either of you. The movie probably IS a horrible translation of the cartoon.

The thing is, I've never WATCHED the cartoon. Not ONE episode.

So even though I'm SURE that YOU ARE BOTH RIGHT and this movie is a vomitous production which would make any Dragonball fan would want to grab their torches and pitchforks, I am in a UNIQUE position to say whether or not this thing is a good or bad movie BY ITSELF.

It's kind of like my old book dealer. He's probably about 70 years old or older. He absolutely WORSHIPS LOTR, and when the movies came out, he thought they were COMPLETE GARBAGE because he had spent his entire life reading and REreading the books.

He agreed that the films might be good BY themselves, but they didn't stay true to the source material. (Personally, I've read them all, and I thought they did a pretty good job).

NO! See that's the trap! They assume that if you don't like it as a fan, maybe it will be good for non-fans. No, it's a horrible piece of cinema that had me staring blankly at the screen the whole time. I haven't watched Dragonball in years, so I thought I'd just check it out to see if the rumors of it's horrid nature were true.

The script is horrible, whether you know the story or not what this writer/writers has concocted is just pure and utter stupidity. It jumps from scene to scene with little explaination, things that needed to be explained never are, and worst of all they try to treat it like it could happen in a real world like ours instead of letting it all be in more of a fantasy world where we can 'believe' it a bit better.

The style of the film was all over the map; it was trying to modernize the fantasy and give it a look that suggests future but never really seems to push it. It's like most of the time they were afraid to take it too far, and yet suddenly they'd throw some impossible piece of technology at you that you're just supposed to accept.

The acting is even horrible, though I'm not sure if it was because they just couldn't act or if they just didn't care, probably the latter. Though Chow Yun Fat, who I generally adore, even sucked hard in this. He was trying to play the Roshi character as he was in the cartoon, which was nice of him, but he was just so over the top and cartoonish that it just felt awkward. He was trying WAY too hard. "Punk, prepare for your clock to be cleaned!" I laughed when i heard that, and not in the good way.

Chatwin.....as much as I wanted to defend his casting by saying that since it's young Goku he wouldn't be that muscular and all that, just really didn't do a good job at all. If they hadn't kept calling him Goku I honestly wouldn't have known, though maybe a lot of that is the script. He had to spew so many 'dramatic' lines of 'dialogue', and all of them sounded as if every syllable was another stick being shoved up his ass.

Goku was just written horribly, none of his charm and general coolness survived the 'translation'. He's a whiny, selfish high school student who just wants to be accepted by his peers and has the hots for the girl of his dreams who happens to be dated the guy who loves threatening him daily. He doesn't have any confidence in himself except when the script demands him to. And if you loved the way he learned the Kamehameha in the cartoon (When Roshi bragged that it took years of training, only to see Goku already using it on Roshi's car), well instead we're treated with a lame sequence involving Chi-Chi's idea of a PG rated 'sex' game (Yeah yeah it was for a kiss but do you REALLY believe they weren't off getting it on between scenes?) to get give him the incentive to actually throw a working energy blast on candles.....wait....so now they're actually fireballs? So now we're watching Street Fighter I guess.....

Marsters, well, as far as acting goes I can't really fault him. He actually did a pretty good job playing evil Piccolo, voice sounded close enough and he didn't really act all too badly. Piccolo's problems were definately not his fault, the real fault lied in the script. He has maybe....five lines of dialogue, you see him in maybe six or seven scenes, and even in the final battle he never really DOES anything. Oh and how about that climax? [SPOILER] Goku pulling off the dumbest looking super move in the history of cinema (aka their dumb ass excuse for a Kamehameha), and Piccolo just falling down. Was he dead? Was he alive? We don't know, and they don't care! [/SPOILER]

The plot, unless you know the story of Dragonball, is so cut up and vague that you'll be just staring at the screen wondering what the hell is going on. But as a DB fan, you'll just be staring at the screen wondering how the hell they managed to mess up every single aspect that they kept. Namek's are a race of alien destroyers who conquer worlds? Wasn't that the Saiyans? Oh but wait, apparently the Saiyans are the Namek's lackies, since it turns out Piccolo brought [SPOILER] Goku (I use spoilers cause apparently some haven't seen the show) [/SPOILER] to Earth and used Oozaru as his minion.

Using this story pretty much destroys any chance for a redeeming sequel made by superior writers, director, and cast, as Dragonball Z heavily depended on the story they just butchered to actually exist.

Now....the effects. The 'special' effects were so bad that I swear they must of just plucked some Freshman out of his 3-D design class to do the work for this. Oozaru looks ridiculous, he makes what we got in Van Helsing look state of the art. And the wire work was absolutely hilarious, it looked like they weren't even expecting to be lifted most of the time. I'm sure you've all seen the clip of Goku and Roshi's fight? Well if you hoped to God that they would tighten up the effects in that scene, you're in for some bad news, it some how looks WORSE! (By the way, with all the craziness going on, did they REALLY have to move Roshi from his nice little island to some haunted looking house in the dead center of whatever the hell city that was supposed to be?)

This movie was so bad, that it had no real redeeming qualities to it. It's bad, but it is never bad in such a way that it becomes good again. It will eat your soul, kick you in the groin and steal your girlfriend. Worse yet, there will be a sequel.

Overall, I give it a big ol' F, and even that seems generous some how.

Favorite(?) Quote: Yamcha: Cheese and rice, my nads got scorched! (Yeah Yamcha sucked too.)

drwcomics said:

Perhaps some of you don't realize that some people are able to separate the ADAPTATION from the SOURCE material, and judge a movie on it's own merit rather than judging it's worth as a film solely on how similar it is to the source material. I've been keeping track of this movie, and I've seen lots of red flags that could result in this movie ending up being awful, but none of those red flags have anything to do with DBE's lack of similarity to it's source material. You can write a book-length post, but it won't change the fact that just because something is DIFFERENT doesn't mean it's BAD.

Again, I'm not saying that this movie is going to be a masterpiece, just that it shouldn't be judged solely on it's similarity, or lack thereof, to the manga.

vegetasgirl said:

I could say the same thing about the old Transformers cartoon. Same lame story every single episode! I did like it as a kid though, you don't really seem to notice that until you get older and and go WTF? I thought that was coll then? Lol!

infamous_emijayne said:

Okay...Let's play a game. Let's see how many films we can name that pretty much sucked or fell well short of their potential, but were still better films overall than DragonBall.

Try to judge it solely on it's merit as a movie....

Street Fighter (both versions)
Batman and Robin
Electra
Catwoman
Daredevil
Ultraviolet
Bloodrayne (1 & 2)
Aeon Flux
Fantastic Four (1 & 2)

Anybody else???

infamous_emijayne said:

Okay...Let's play a game. Let's see how many films we can name that pretty much sucked or fell well short of their potential, but were still better films overall than DragonBall.

Try to judge it solely on it's merit as a movie....

Street Fighter (both versions)
Batman and Robin
Electra
Catwoman
Daredevil
Ultraviolet
Bloodrayne (1 & 2)
Aeon Flux
Fantastic Four (1 & 2)

Anybody else???

infamous_emijayne said:

OMG!!

I completely forgot one of the ultimate suckfests that was STILL a better film than DragonBall...

Mortal Kombat: Annihilation

BatSTUDVII said:

When I first started working in customer service at the ripe age of 19 I made a PERSONAL discovery that I thought was revolutionary in the sense of human discovery.

I came to realize that about 70% of the human race is made out of complete MORONS.

Later on after becoming a waiter I expanded on this idea.

50% of said 70% are OUT OF THEIR FRIGGIN' MINDS.

NOW, I'm at the point where I firmly believe that 90% of the human population is idiotic and/or out of their mind!

Hence Dragonball.

STUPID

It is dumb.

Not opinion.

FACT

DEAL WITH IT...

Radamantis said:

BatSTUDVII said:

When I first started working in customer service at the ripe age of 19 I made a PERSONAL discovery that I thought was revolutionary in the sense of human discovery.

I came to realize that about 70% of the human race is made out of complete MORONS.

Later on after becoming a waiter I expanded on this idea.

50% of said 70% are OUT OF THEIR FRIGGIN' MINDS.

NOW, I'm at the point where I firmly believe that 90% of the human population is idiotic and/or out of their mind!

Hence Dragonball.

STUPID

It is dumb.

Not opinion.

FACT

DEAL WITH IT...

In what part of the human population do you think you are ?

BatSTUDVII said:

Radamantis said:

BatSTUDVII said:

When I first started working in customer service at the ripe age of 19 I made a PERSONAL discovery that I thought was revolutionary in the sense of human discovery.

I came to realize that about 70% of the human race is made out of complete MORONS.

Later on after becoming a waiter I expanded on this idea.

50% of said 70% are OUT OF THEIR FRIGGIN' MINDS.

NOW, I'm at the point where I firmly believe that 90% of the human population is idiotic and/or out of their mind!

Hence Dragonball.

STUPID

It is dumb.

Not opinion.

FACT

DEAL WITH IT...

In what part of the human population do you think you are ?

Well I am eloquent and hate Dragonball.

So, go figure.