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SUPERHERO DEBATES AND DRAGON BALL SUPER

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How the constant barrage of insults from the comic fandom against Dragon Ball’s fanbase led to Dragon Ball Super.

Note: What I am about to talk about is mostly a theory. A theory that cooked up in my head when I was talking to my friend about the contrast between Superman and western superhero comics, and anime such as Dragon Ball Super.

There is nothing like a good, old-fashioned debate between two nerds as to which franchise and character is stronger. It’s as old as nerd culture itself. When the first comic books popped up, and the first nerd mythologies came about, people started debating. Is the Empire from Star Wars stronger than the Federation from Star Trek? Is Captain America better than Superman? Who is stronger, Darkseid, or Thanos? I suppose the nerds who first started these debates are probably old enough to be in retirement homes, wearing diapers and being taken care of by family members or maids and nurses.

Still, such debates have been a hallmark of nerd culture as long as there was a nerd culture. And such debates continue up to today. Is Disney Star Wars better than the old Expanded Universe? Who would win in a fight, the Gundam, or Optimus Prime? Is Alduin from Elder Scrolls Skyrim far more powerful than Smaug from the Hobbit or Balerion the Dread from Game of Thrones? If Unicron fought Beerus, which destroyer god would come out on top? Is Sauron stronger than Ganondorf?

One of the biggest debates in nerd culture during the recent years was the Dragon Ball Z vs. Superman debate. The long-standing feud between Goku fans and Superman fans has been going on ever since Dragon Ball Z hit American shores and garnered a following that rivaled the decades-long following Superman has enjoyed in the States. These two fanbases debate on which hero is the strongest: Goku, or Superman. Sure, there are other categories such as character and story, but they are mere side-factors compared to the debate of which one is the strongest.

And for the longest time, Superman fans and other comic book fanbases have taken the piss out of DBZ. Trying to prove that their character is stronger than Goku and the Z Warriors almost seems to be the initiation rite for any comic fandom. Whether it be Marvel or DC, comic book fans seem to hate Dragon Ball Z with a passion, mostly because of the fact that DBZ was very popular in the early 2000’s, and many of its fans attested that the feats shown in DBZ were stronger and better than most comic book heroes, Superman included. This, of course, caused the comic fandom to strike back with fury against the popular show, talking about how their heroes can easily defeat the DBZ cast.

Now, for me, I’m more of a sci-fi fan, and to me, there’s more than one way to skin a Wookiee. I can think of ways for my favorite sci-fi characters to defeat Z Warriors, but it could go both ways. Let’s say Super Vegeta and Darth Vader meet. Vegeta can go up in the sky, destroying the planet Vader is on and killing the Sith Lord. Maybe after that, Vader’s ghost would use his strong mental powers and possess Vegeta, and combine Dark Side power with Super Saiyan might. Or maybe Veggie doesn’t get to fly at all, because Vader snaps his neck or pops his heart like a balloon using the Dark Side, similar as to how Hit nearly killed Goku by crushing the latter’s organs with his killing move. Similarly, Beerus and Unicron going toe-to-toe can end in many ways, especially when a God of Destruction meets a God of Chaos. Maybe Beerus can annihilate Unicron through sheer power. Maybe not, since other iterations of Unicron require more than raw power to be beat. His Transformers Armada incarnation can even regenerate from any damage so long as there is evil in people’s hearts for him to feed off from. The evil in Beerus’ heart would be a delectable source of evil for Unicron to feed off of, sustaining him and keeping him alive no matter what Beerus throws at him. Other incarnations require the Matrix of Leadership to beat him. Maybe Unicron would fire a Dark Energon blast at Beerus and Beerus’ body gets poisoned by the dark substance, with no cure in sight, which will lead to Beerus’ demise, unless they ask an Autobot for some Energon to help expunge the dark matter, or gather the Dragon Balls to wish for a cure.

Maybe if Beerus and the Didact from Halo 4 meet, Beerus could disintegrate the Didact and his whole ship with a simple hand gesture and yelling out “HAKAI!” (Which means “destroy!” in Japanese) Or maybe, the Didact fires the Composer at the God of Destruction, turning his body into atoms and transforming him into an automaton that takes orders from the Didact. Perhaps if Freeza entered into the Universal Century Gundam universe and started blowing up mobile suits and space colonies, the Newtypes of Earth would band together and use their Newtype powers to destroy his mind and make him a crippled vegetable, or maybe they wouldn’t be able to do that and Freeza would keep firing until he kills them all. Perhaps if Darth Nihilus threatened to absorb the two Omni-Kings, he’d either get laughed off or destroyed, or he might absorb the life-essences of the two Omni-Kings and they will realize what death feels like when they feel the pain, and the cold, soulless death at the hands of the Lord of Hunger, while he uses their power to tear apart the Grand Priest and the other Angels, Kais, and Gods of Destruction.

Notice how I didn’t try to one-up the Dragon Ball characters on strength. Notice how I actually gave them a chance to win, and a speculation of how they might either win or die. Also notice how I tried to use different avenues of attack, instead of just saying that the DBZ characters were weaklings, which is what most of these comic book fans keep trying to beat people in the head over with. I used technology, sorcery, telekinesis, psychic powers, and Dark Energy to explain ways of killing Dragon Ball characters without resorting to power level dick contests, which is what most comic book fans, and Superman fans in particular, rely upon. They rely upon feats of destruction and, quite ironically enough, they took upon the worst aspect of the DBZ fandom, the power level obsession. An obsession, I might add, that the author, Akira Toriyama, never had to begin with. He used power levels to gauge characters, yes, but in the end, it seemed that even he forgot about them when a human like Tien Shinhan can damage Semi-Perfect Cell, a feat that not even the Androids that defeated the Super Saiyans can manage.

And here we come to the meat of this thesis:

Was Dragon Ball Super an answer to these comic book fans?

When comic book fans launch into a tirade about how much DBZ sucks and how weak Goku is, they bring up things like Superman sneezing away a solar system, Superman surviving hits that would destroy galaxies, and even entities capable of galaxy or universe-busting. They’d put Superman on such a high level that Goku would seem like a bug, even though Superman has been killed by threats like Doomsday, a threat that was was weaker than Nappa, who was a threat only in the first season of Dragon Ball Z. They explain that pre-crisis Superman was far stronger, but Vegeta in the Saiyan Saga anime was able to blow up a planet with two fingers, barely extending an effort, hence why I gave him a chance to destroy Vader in the above confrontation that I imagined. And this was before the guy found out he can turn blonde without dyeing his hair.

Both sides had feats of incredible power long before they became more powerful, and yet, the Superman fans insist that the Saiyans are barely planet-busting, even though the Saiyans were already able to do that before becoming more powerful as the Saiyan Saga gave way to the Freeza Saga, Cell Saga, and the Buu Saga. No matter what happens, the Saiyans are still stuck on planet-busting levels in the eyes of these comic book fans, even though they’ve become more than a thousand times more powerful than when they first faced the likes of Freeza. The Supreme Kai, Shin, was originally sold as a being who is a thousand times stronger than Freeza’s first form, yet even he was a mere side character unable to do much in the Buu Saga where he was introduced. Just as a reminder, Freeza in his first form was able to blow up Goku and Vegeta’s home planet with one finger.

I think it finally climaxed with that Screwattack Death Battle video where Goku and Superman were put up against each other. They got some well-known voice actors to play the parts, and they hyped the living shit out of the event. The DBZ and comic fanbases continued to confront each other on murky grounds, but it was only up to a certain level where both fandoms would agree to disagree. Of course, after that Death Battle video, it was never the same ever again.

Just to be frank, I never trusted the Death Battle results. Either they were grossly wrong, or they were right for the wrong reasons. The only time I saw them be almost decent was the Luke vs Harry Potter video, and even then, to me, that fight lasted longer than it should have. Their reasoning as to why Cloud loses to Link doesn’t sit well with me, even though I wanted Link to win, and their Boba Fett vs. Samus Aran video proved to me that they were too much in Samus’ favor, especially when Samus tends to lose the powerups of her suit due to electrical discharges like in Metroid Prime. That battle should have been a draw, but they made it a decisive win for Aran, even though Fett should have the equipment to disable most of Aran’s suit and the experience not to fall for her toys and tricks. The guy fights Jedi, for God’s sake. A Jedi who is pissed off enough can use the Force to pop the heart of even a Super Saiyan, and this dude killed enough Jedi to gain Vader’s respect. The most I’d have given Samus is a tie. Or a win that would be so desperate, her armor would have been destroyed, and she and Boba would be at their last legs when she pulls the trigger.

So when I saw the video, I sat down, preparing myself for a fun show. I liked the fight choreography, but it was obvious as it went on that Superman was getting way more love than a fair fight ought to give him. Goku acts like someone who would want a fair fight, in character, but Superman doesn’t. In the end, there was a beam struggle, and Superman winds up destroying the Earth just to kill Goku, even though he wasn’t fighting a threat to the universe; it was just a bum fight between two heroes.

WHAT. THE. HELL.

Goku acted in-character, saving Superman from a block of Kryptonite so he can fight fairly. Superman, however, did not act in character. Even if he was stronger than Goku, he would not go all-out to kill an innocent man, let alone BLOW UP THE PLANET THAT HE HAS CALLED HOME FOR YEARS. If Goku should act in character, so too should Clark Kent, and the last thing Kent would do is blow up his home. The home of his adoptive family, whom he loves. The home of his beloved Lois Lane. They could have had it so that Goku won that beam struggle, or it was a tie, but then later have Supes say that he didn’t go all out because he didn’t want to kill Goku or harm Earth. That way, it would remain ambiguous, or at least give Superman a small lead. Instead, the makers of the video opted not only to insult the DBZ fanbase, but to make Superman act out of character and destroy Earth just to win a bum fight. They broke their own rules, ie., making the characters act in-character and not just fight for the sake of fighting. They went that far to make Superman win, eh? Really?

And their reasoning for it made things sound even worse. They reasoned that Superman was always made to win anything, that nothing Goku can do can stop him. I wasn’t even back in my DBZ phase yet, and even I knew it was a cheap way to explain why they would let Supes win a fight that, for all intents and purposes, he should have either had a draw or lost at. Or at the very least, a very close victory where Superman collapses five seconds after Goku keels over. If I were to write a battle where Superman wins over Goku, it would have the two of them, near the end of the fight, having run out of energy for laser eyes and ki blasts, just slogging it, punch after punch, as they exhaust themselves near death. Superman collapses and dies, five seconds after Goku collapses and dies. At the very least, it would be in character and respectful to the other side.

This video’s result ignited the fan wars once again, and even though I wasn’t that much into DBZ at the time, I was firmly on the Goku camp. The Superman fanbase was at it again, on full swing, attacking the DBZ fanbase, agreeing with Screwattack, painting the video as objective proof, once and for all, that Superman was the stronger hero, and they constantly put down the DBZ Saiyans, saying that they were planet-busters, at best, even though they’ve surpassed a guy who was a thousand times stronger than the guy who blew up the Saiyan homeworld with a finger. The fan wars began anew, and the DBZ fanbase, once again, found itself in heated arguments with comic book fans.

All of a sudden, we heard of a new Dragon Ball Z movie coming out. The timing of it could not be more foreboding. Sure, there was a recent spike concerning interest in the franchise, what with Dragon Ball Z Abridged and Dragon Ball Z Kai bringing the series to a new audience, but a new movie, the Battle of the Gods? That involves a new character, the God of Destruction, Beerus? Along with a new Super Saiyan Form? And all of this was done with the blessing and involvement of Akira Toriyama, the creator of Dragon Ball? The timing of it could not be more……...convenient.

Sure enough, we watched the movie, and the movie put the once mighty Super Saiyan 3 Goku at the backseat as this new character, Lord Beerus, crushed him like a bug in two blows. The Super Saiyan 3 form was the one that comic fans accepted as Goku’s limit, since they talked about the fact that GT was not canon, and neither was Super Saiyan 4. But now, Super Saiyan 3 was brushed aside in favor of a new form, Super Saiyan God, which was able to fight with this new Lord Beerus on equal terms for quite some time. Then, the power of Super Saiyan God rubbed off on Goku, to the point where he was able to keep fighting Beerus in regular Super Saiyan form, even though he previously lost quickly even at Super Saiyan 3. Instead of the regular hero defeats the villain, Beerus wins against Goku, but due to him having fun, he relents from his promise to destroy the Earth and instead destroys some rocks as a joke, before going home. Then we see how powerful Beerus’ assistant Whis was, when Beerus goes nuts after eating wasabi and bouncing around-Whis knocks him unconscious with one blow. Suddenly, the previous limit of Super Saiyan 3 was broken, with no less than three people breaking through the former limit and introducing a new hierarchy of power.

This wasn’t just a one-time deal. There was another movie, Resurrection F, bringing back everyone’s favorite galactic land shark, Freeza. Freeza too gains a new form, while Goku and Vegeta gain a newer version of the Super Saiyan God that had a different color. In Battle of the Gods, Goku needed the power of five other Saiyans to attain that form. Now, both Goku and Vegeta can achieve the form, although it’s a blue color compared to the original SSG’s red. It later becomes known as Super Saiyan Blue. The other Z warriors get a shot against Freeza’s army, and Freeza fights both Goku and Vegeta in his new golden form. They make sure to keep the power realistic, with Goku getting disabled by a Freeza army general shooting him from the back with a ray gun. Vegeta pounds Freeza to the point where Freeza’s pride is injured, and another power is introduced when Freeza destroys the planet. Whis, Beerus’ assistant, reverses time back before Freeza destroys the Earth, which then prompts Goku to attack Freeza before he can destroy the planet again.

These two movies were the building blocks to a new series named Dragon Ball Super. Dragon Ball Super takes place right after the defeat of Majin Buu, and the show elaborates on events from the two movies, putting in more content and changing up a few things, like making Beerus exhausted after his fight with SSG Goku, or bringing back Ginyu for a limited time. Then, after recapping the events of the two movies, the show moves through with two new arcs: a tournament arc against Beerus’ twin brother, and an arc involving the struggle of Future Trunks against an evil version of Goku named Goku Black.

Throughout these arcs, we see more power tossed around. Beerus destroys half a planet by tapping a nail on a table. The fight between SSG Goku and Beerus nearly destroys the universe, with the pressure from the blows between the two deities causing chaos all across the universe. Beerus’ brother, Champa, also has an assistant in the form of Whis’ sister, Vados, and Vados destroys a whole planet with a tap of her staff. Beerus and Champa exchange gifts of food, which leads to Champa coveting Beerus’ Earth and betting a new set of wish orbs known as the Super Dragon Balls on a tournament between himself and Beerus. In that tournament, Beerus’ Universe 7 fights against Champa’s Universe 6, and Champa’s top fighter, the assassin named Hit, is shown to be able to stop, or in this case, “skip” time. Goku, however, manages to increase his speed by combining Super Saiyan Blue with an old speed/power increase technique, Kaio Ken. He became so fast that stopping time can no longer slow him down. At the end of the tournament, Goku makes friends with the one being that sits above the gods of destruction: the Omni-King, Zeno-Sama, who is rumored to be able to blast an entire universe into space dust. He supposedly destroyed six universes in a single blow when he got mad one time, if Beerus is to be believed.

It gets even more insane with the Goku Black arc. Goku Black, an evil doppelganger of Goku with the spirit of an evil Kai inside, terrorizes the world of Future Trunks. Goku Black, like any Saiyan, has the ability to become stronger the more he fights, and he’s assisted by Future Zamasu, a Kai who successfully got the Super Dragon Balls to give him immortality. To stop Future Zamasu from emerging in the present and creating Goku Black, they have Beerus use his powers as a God of Destruction to disintegrate the present Zamasu, who at that time, was the apprentice to the Universe 10 Supreme Kai. However, in their fights against Goku Black and Future Zamasu, the heroes lose not once, not twice, but three times straight, and in their third loss, where they seemingly kill Goku Black and Future Zamasu after they fused, the Merged Zamasu becomes one with the universe, and they call in the Zeno-Sama (or Zen-Chan, as Goku began to call him) of that universe and have him vaporize the whole universe while they used the time machine to go back home.

Not only did they introduce a new villain that once again, showed how woefully inadequate the heroes are, they showed how effective the Dragon Balls can be when used to make oneself immortal. And they introduced two new powers: Beerus has the power to disintegrate anyone, and the Omni-King is proven to be able to destroy a multiverse of flawed universes, because the multiverse where Goku Black is rampaging had all the gods killed, most of the mortals dead, and Zamasu merging with reality. Not only did they introduce a character who can legitimately kill a universe, but they introduced a villain who necessitated that power, just for the good guys to win.

And throughout it all, Goku’s friendship with the Omni-King grows. Instead of the honorific title of Zeno-Sama, which all the other gods fearfully refer to him as, Goku addresses him with a more familiar name, Zen-Chan, to the dismay and horror of Zeno’s guards, Beerus, and the Universe 7 Supreme Kai. Goku brings the future Zen-Chan with to one that he made friends with in the present, and they kick off a new friendship, with Zen-Chan’s main advisor, the Grand Priest, impressed at Goku and Whis for bringing a friend that Zen-Chan can understand at last.

And of course, in its present state, the Dragon Ball Super cartoon is now in the Universe Survival Arc, a tournament where eight out of twelve universes are involved in a free-for-all melee with ten fighters per universe, and every time a universe has all its fighters knocked out of the ring, they, along with their gods and universe, are destroyed by the two Omni-Kings, who arranged the tournament to entertain themselves. Once again, they introduce new powerful heavyweights, with the return of Freeza, resurrected by Goku temporarily to help fight for Universe 7, and the introduction of two Saiyans, Caulifla and Kale, who have the potential to become truly powerful Super Saiyans, with Caulifla becoming a Super Saiyan 2, and Kale becoming a Legendary berserk Super Saiyan that nearly destroyed the ring. They also introduced new enemies like the Pride Troopers, especially two members of said outfit, named Toppo and Jiren, the former being able to go toe to toe with Goku in his Super Saiyan Blue form, the latter easily knocking out Kale despite the fact that SSB Goku had a hard time with her. Hit is also present in the arena, as well as many others with their own powers and kinks. When Universe 9 loses all its fighters, the Omni-Kings stay true to their promise, and they destroy that universe, along with its fighters, its Supreme Kai, and its God of Destruction.

With the introduction of all these characters, it seems that Dragon Ball Super is intentionally made for crossover battles with comic book fandoms, especially the Superman fandom. Whereareas back then, the Dragon Ball fanbase had to debate hard against Superman, now they have no shortage of characters that can destroy him without any hardship. Hit could make his organs implode. Any of the Gods of Destruction (one of whom fought Goku on equal footing, by the way) can point at him and yell “HAKAI!” and he would be disintegrated, Dr. Manhattan style. The Angels like Whis and Vados can destroy worlds by tapping their staffs, and even reverse time to stop a battle from turning sour. Goku Black can summon multiple copies of himself until Superman gets exhausted fighting them all. Merged Zamasu was practically immortal, necessitating a Spirit Sword attack from Trunks to simply destroy his corporeal form, and even then, he was able to merge with reality itself. And of course, Goku’s new best friend, Zen-Chan, can wipe out a whole universe, or multiple universes, if he so much as feels like it.

With all this planet-destroying, instant deaths, and even universe-busting feats getting thrown around willy-nilly in Dragon Ball Super, it’s quite obvious that this was a result of the Superman fanbase bashing on the Dragon Ball Z fanbase right after that Screwattack Death Battle video, and the Dragon Ball authors answered the fans’ desire to have feats that outclass comic book characters rather decisively. It seems to me that Dragon Ball Super was made with the intention of being used in crossover fights. The Dragon Ball Z fanbase was tired of being slapped around by comic fans, and in response, Toei and Toriyama made a new canon series that took up where Z left off and replaced the not-so-popular GT cartoon.

They then stuffed it with people who can disintegrate you, people who can skip time, people who can crush your organs with a single punch, people who can destroy planets with a simple tap, people who threatened universes with punches, and people who can destroy universes on a whim, as well as a villain who was so bad, universal destruction was the only way to destroy him. They got tired of all that "Superman is the best hero" bullshit that the comic book fans kept beating the DBZ fans over the head with. The fact that Battle of the Gods came out a short while after the Superman vs Goku Screwattack video confirms my suspicion that the modern DB Super series is being made to knock back against comic fans who kept shitting on DBZ and its fanbase.

It’s quite ironic, isn’t it? That the comic book fandoms, specifically the Supeman fandom, got such a blowback from Dragon Ball after they kept hammering on the Dragon Ball fanbase. I remember those days after that Screwattack video, I was profusely debating the comic book fans because they got way too much of an ego. As I said, I was a sci-fi fan, not a superhero fan, but still, the way that the comic book fans acted, the way the Superman fans acted, really rubbed me the wrong way, and I felt like I had to respond. My memories of Dragon Ball Z were bordering on ancient, yet even I knew they were lowballing DBZ characters. As I said above, we had a guy destroy the main character’s home planet with a finger, and later on, a new character gets introduced that’s a thousand times stronger than the previous character, and he was still a mere sideshow compared to the heroes. Then Battle of the Gods comes out. Followed by Resurrection F. And then by Dragon Ball Super. And each time, they had more powers introduced, more feats showed, more powerful characters entering the stage, either befriending Goku or fighting him, while he evolved beyond his former limits in DBZ.

I guess this is what one would call a classic reversal of fortune. Or karma. It’s quite obvious that like many anime and cartoon fandoms, the Dragon Ball authors knew what the fanbase wanted and delivered on what they desired. And what they desired was a way to shut up those annoying, pretentious, comic book fans, namely the Superman fans, and expand on the lore of Dragon Ball with canonical movies and series that the comic fans cannot weasel out of by saying that “it’s not canon because Toriyama didn’t work on it!” Feats of Goku like fighting the galaxy-buster Broly and Meta Cooler, who uses Instant Transmission in battle, get thrown out by comic book fans for “not being canon” since Toriyama didn’t make the movies where those things came from as a part of the canon. Now, we have a canonical series where a female Broly is stomping around the ring for the tournament, and both Goku and Goku Black used Instant Transmission in the middle of battle to evade and strike at their foes. Battle of the Gods had Goku and Beerus fight in space for an extended amount of time, even after Goku lost the Super Saiyan God powers. Now, there was no weaseling out of things by saying that Goku can’t use Instant Transmission in a fight or that he can’t fight in space, which are popular arguments of Superman fans. And of course, as I previously mentioned, new characters and powers emerged that could easily kill Superman.

To me, Superman isn’t really that invincible. Check back up to see the arguments I made about how DBZ characters can be killed by other science fiction characters. I can just as easily apply them to Superman and have him die of poison from Dark Energon, have Vader make his organs implode, have the Didact’s Composer turn him into an automaton, have the Gundam Newtypes, especially Paptimus Scirrocco, turn his brain into mush(Paptimus did it to a person with a powerful mind, Kamille Bidan, so it’s not impossible), or have Darth Nihilus absorb his life essences and leave him a lifeless, empty shell. The reason why I make such arguments is to show that NO FRANCHISE is safe from being defeated by another. Not Dragon Ball, not Superman, not One Punch Man, and certainly not sci-fi franchises. My whole idea is that franchises and fandoms need to learn HUMILITY, hence why even powerful Dragon Ball Super characters are not safe from me calculating a way they might die.

Dragon Ball Super actually knows that lesson, with Goku being hurt by bullets and ray guns, even almost dying to Hit’s attack that assaulted his inner organs. Maybe Boba Fett can assassinate him after a long battle with Merged Zamasu or Freeza. Or, maybe an enemy can use a disease like the heart virus that killed Goku in Future Trunks’ timeline to kill him-that’s already proven as a way of killing him. In one of the joke episodes, Beerus had indigestion after eating a chocolate ball, and in another, the Supreme Kai of Universe 7 suspected that the present Zamasu poisoned the tea that the Universe 10 Supreme Kai was drinking, proving that even the gods in the DB Super universe aren’t invulnerable to underhanded tactics like poison-they aren’t necessarily like Melisandre from Game of Thrones who can down a whole glass of poisoned wine. Perhaps if someone tampered with those delicious bowls of ramen that Beerus goes through with a poison strong enough to kill a dozen Gokus, Beerus might kick the bucket. Perhaps that explains why Whis is so adamant to get Goku or Vegeta to replace Beerus as a God of Destruction.

All the DB Super fans seem to care about, and all the authors seem to want to give them, is a good, solid, martial arts superhero show that’s suspenseful and enjoyable at the same time. Outside of giving them feats that could crush Superman and most comic book heroes rather easily, they didn’t much build on the invincibility of these characters. Only Zeno, the Grand Priest, and the Angels seem to even be somewhat invulnerable. And they’re more like watchers than anything. They rarely get involved outside of the current plotline of the Tournament of Power. And that’s what is refreshing to me. Instead of making the characters invincible gods, they’re powerful, but still relatable and vulnerable, and that what makes them all the more fun. But still, they now have powers that could allow them to crush the heroes of those comic book fandoms that constantly shat on the DB fandom and DBZ in general.

Moral of the story: don’t shit on a fanbase too much, or else they grow a spine, and in this case, the makers of what they love will answer their demand for a new series that would make their characters stronger. Disney sure as hell learned that lesson with the Expanded Universe fans when their shows and movies were getting blasted as the worst in Star Wars history, and now they’re trying to do a 180-degree turn to appeal to those Expanded Universe fanboys.

So, is Dragon Ball Super really a result of Superman fanboys battering the DBZ fandom? Or is it just convenient timing that Dragon Ball Super and two canonical movies came after that Screwattack Death Battle video? You decide in the comments below!
Here, I posit a theory that the newest entry in the Dragon Ball franchise, Dragon Ball Super, as well as its two prequel movies, Battle of the Gods and Resurrection F, are the result of the Superman fanbase mercilessly battering the DBZ fanbase after a certain video from Screwattack's Death Battles went a tad bit too far in trying to pose one side as more correct than the other.
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Darthgun1's avatar

This is a really good read.


Although, I find myself amused at the idea that Nihilus would solo Dragon Ball by the mere fact, that he would just consume both Omni-Kings and use their power to annihilate everything. I have never seen anyone making that argument for Star Wars winning against Dragon Ball.


Although, there's Vegeta's new ability named as Forced Fission Spirit. I'd wonder on how it would interact with someone like Darth Nihilus.