Review: DRAGON BALL

 Once again, it's time for another Old School Month, where I review some of the greatest 20th century classics and forgotten curiosities.  Today's review is a bit of both: the foundation for a massive anime and manga franchise, but one that's been overshadowed by its far more successful continuation.

DRAGON BALL (Doragon Boru), by Akira Toriyama.  First published in 1984 and first published in North America in 1998. 

 

PLOT:

Goku is a naive little monkey-tailed boy living by himself deep in the wilderness.  One day he is nearly run over by a teen girl named Bulma.  She is travelling the world searching for the Dragon Balls, seven mystical orbs that when gathered together will grant one person a wish.  Bulma soon discovers that the 'grandpa' that Goku keeps referring to is in fact a Dragon Ball, so she manipulates Goku into joining her quest.  Along the way they encounter a motley crew of characters: the pervy turtle-shelled hermit Kame Sen'nin, Oolong the magical shapeshifting pig, and the hapless bandit Yamcha and his companion kitty Puar.

STORY:

It's hard to believe that the omnipresent multimedia behemoth that is the Dragon Ball franchise all began here, with this silly, pervy little shonen gag manga that's literally as old as I am.  Even now, it's easy to see why this series found an audience in first place.  

Much like Goku himself, there's an innocence to Dragon Ball which makes its goofiness and perviness all the more palatable.  He's oblivious to the world outside of his guardian's home, so he takes everything at face value and approaches it all with an endearing earnestness.  Much of the fanservice is rooted in this as well, as Goku is too young to understand things like personal boundaries or even the physical differences between the sexes.  There's not an ounce of malice in its pages, and that makes those instances of fanservice a lot more tolerable.  That's even true for this volume's most notorious gag: that time Bulma accidentally flashes Kame.  The set-up comes from Goku removing her panties as part of his youthful ignorance (namely, why Bulma doesn't have a "pillow" for him to rest his head on), and it takes a couple of chapters for the payoff of this gag to be delivered.  It's just long enough that the reader can start to forget that moment even happened, which makes the gag all the more ridiculous when it does happen.

Toriyama started this series while he was very much still in gag mangaka mode, and truth be told I kind of prefer it this way.  The search for the Dragon Balls isn't so much the main focus as it is the line upon which he can string all of these silly characters and scenarios.  Some of them are meant to serve as parodies of then-current manga archetypes (like Yamcha, who's clearly meant to parody Kenshiro and the similar sort of manly-man wanderers that were in vogue in shonen manga of the time).  Others like Oolong call back to Journey to the West, the original inspiration for this series.  Bulma's the most original character here, but even then her intelligence is tempered by her age-appropriate vanity and hormones, keeping her on par with the rest of the cast.  There aren't any real antagonists at this point in the story - it's just a lot of puns, fourth-wall breaking, and goofy times.

ART:

Not surprisingly (particularly if you've read Dr. Slump), the designs here are mostly short, simple, and rubbery, a combination that had already become Toriyama's signature style.  At this point he's still got some room to improve.  While his backgrounds and mechanical designs are surprisingly detailed, the fight scenes thus far lean a lot on speedlines and sound effect bursts.  He has some fun with the paneling (like having a character break panel lines as they bounce off of them), but he hadn't quite yet tapped into his full potential as an artist.

PRESENTATION:

Dragon Ball has a long and complex history of censorship across its many releases.  The version I initially read was from the early 2000s, which had some edits to make the material a little more kid-friendly.  Most of these edits were undone for the later omnibus releases, though, which are pretty much the only way to purchase the series these days.   

Notably, this was published unflipped from the start (at Toriyama's insistence), years before Tokyopop's so-called "100% Authentic Manga" initiative started.  If only they would give the series a newer translation.  While the translation was quite well-done for its time, it would be nice to make some names and terms more consistent with the anime and remove the need to credit a convicted pedophile for the adaptation. 

RATING:

Don't be intimidated by Dragon Ball's age, length, and the shadow that DBZ has since cast over it - it's still a timeless, enjoyable romp that's worth reading.

This series is published by Viz.  This manga is complete in Japan with 42 volumes available.  All 42 volumes have been released and are currently in print.