Dragon Ball Z Kai 2014 - The Great Saiyaman and World Tournament Sagas

I've been a fan of Dragon Ball Z since I can remember. Alongside Pokémon and Cardcaptor Sakura, it was one of the first animé shows I watched as a child, long before I knew what animé was. As soon as I was old enough to stay up as long as I wanted to on weekends as a child, I would stay up long past my parents so that I could watch Dragon Ball Z on Toonami at 1:10AM for years. In that case, I probably should have been more attentive about the remastered series DBZ Kai, but in reality I only watched the remastered episodes whenever I visited my mother and managed to stick it onto the magic Sky+ record thing.

So after taking a hiatus in August 2011, DBZ Kai resumed at The Great Saiyaman Saga this April just past. For exposition, Dragon Ball Z Kai is a recut HD remaster of the original show, slimming down on filler content and providing a story closer to Akira Toriyama's manga. Because of this, new scenes have been animated to bridge the gaps left by removing some content, and due to being created with the classic style in mind, they fit in rather perfectly.

The following contains a rundown of the events of the first two mini-sagas of the Majin Buu era, so there are spoilers, but these episodes originally aired 20 years ago now.

Even though it's nowhere near being the most popular part of Dragon Ball, the Great Saiyaman episodes are amongst my favourite. They're a huge change of pace from everything else and for a few episodes, Gohan goes from Cell beating wunderkind to a super hero trying to avoid having his cover blown by Videl, and whilst I wouldn't want the whole show to become this way forever, it was a great way to show how Gohan has grown in the absence of his dad and gives him more of a personality.

Although Sharpner and Erasa are pretty much forgotten about entirely after the World Tournament, Videl has some of the biggest character development in the entire series, and it all happens in these 6 episodes. Starting off as the somewhat overconfident daughter of Mr. Satan, her friendship with Gohan opens her up to the idea that her dad may not be the strongest fighter in the world as the public believes.

It's just as Gohan starts his life commuting to civilization for school that Goku speaks to him through King Kai to announce that through Fortuneteller Baba, he will be able to come back to the land of the living for one day, and that he has chosen the 25th Tenkaichi Budokai to be this day to bring his family and friends to one place. Convenient, as Gohan must compete in order for Videl to keep his identity secret.

Teaching Goten and Videl how to fly, Gohan mentions Videl's long hair may get in the way when flying, which Videl takes to mean Gohan likes girls with short hair and visits the following day with the haircut we see her with for the rest of the series.

As a slight gripe with these two sagas, at ages 7 and 8, both Goten and Trunks are able to become Super Saiyans, a transformation that until now, every character had to have a near death experience to achieve. What's more than this, neither Gohan or Vegeta are aware of this. I get that the two kids need to have the SS ability to stand a chance later on in the Fusion saga, but I would have thought Vegeta, who is obsessed with strength and fighting, would have noticed his son being stronger at age 8 than he was around 7 years ago. Vegeta puts it well by saying "It's like they're handing out being able to become super saiyan nowadays". Granted, I'm starting to think Saiyan-Human hybrids are naturally super competent.

Anyway, as the day of the 25th Tenkaichi Budokai arrives, Goku arrives from the other world and greets the cast. Goku's reunion with his wife after dying during his battle with Cell and meeting his second son Goten for the first time is a real tug on the heart strings. The show takes a jump back to the old fashioned Dragon Ball feel around here and the exciting mystery common in the show starts to ramp up again.

The fights between in the World Tournament Saga are pretty cool but are ultimately cut short as Spopovitch and Yamu manage to steal enough energy from Gohan to revive Majin Buu, and in my opinion, we don't get another spectacular fight again until Vegeta and Goku a little later on.

Though I watched the Japanese version of Kai here, I think it was the Funimation English dub that originally got me interested in voice acting. Sean Schemmel, whilst amazing and iconic as Goku, makes me crack up as King Kai without fail. Seeing Christopher Sabat's work as both Vegeta/Piccolo/Yamcha/Shenron/basically every character in the show and as ADR Director was incredible. That man knows how to work in dubbing. Later on in my teens I also discovered my all-time favourite voice actor Laura Bailey also played Young Trunks and Dende, but that was some time after I had played/watched other things she has worked on. I could probably write a whole blog entry on voice actors, but I'll save that for another day.

I'm very thankful for Kai resuming for reminding me how much this show has meant to me throughout my life. It's the reason I got into martial arts as a kid and gave me and my friends an endless supply of things to debate, such as whether Gogeta was stronger than Vegito, or if Pan would ever be able to go Super Saiyan. I have fond memories of playing hours and hours of Budokai 3 with my friends. This series is older than I am, and I hope it's continued to be supported for a long time to come.

I think Dragon Ball has been the most fun I've had rewatching a shounen animé in some time. Apart from Sword Art Online and maybe Shingeki no Kyojin, I've not been able to enjoy a shounen show in quite a few years. After growing fed up with the Naruto and Bleach mangas years ago and never being able to get into One Piece, it's good to know that Dragon Ball still has that magic that kept me tuning into Toonami as a kid.

However, would I recommend it to somebody who has never seen the show? Actually, probably not. It's still a massively long show and I think without the overwhelming power of nostalgia, newcomers may not have the patience to sit down and tackle it. But if you already love the Dragon Ball universe, it's an amazing watch and well worth revisiting.