Dragonball Z: History of Trunks

[ran76]

Here's a question. A Saiyan with a GL ring, before they lost the infamous weakness to yellow. Would the two cancel one another out, due to the SSJ form? How do you think GL rings would have affected the future war against the androids? Since it is similar to Whis' reality warping, I'd speculate it would have a huge effect. Just lock 17 and 18 into hard-light cages, and throw them at the sun.

Well Arisia Rabb is a blond and her ring, as far as I know, never had any issues in that regard. And apparently there's more than one color of aura now where it comes to SSJs. Maybe if a Saiyan decided to give him/herself a hair cut with the ring?

[RobbyB1982]

Super Saiyan is a rage power up. Despite the yellow color, it'd be in the red spectrum of powers in the DCU universe.

The yellow weakness was entirely because there was a fear demon living inside the giant GL battery, it wasn't an inherant weakness of the powers.

[Dae tone]

I dunno, guys; I found Chuck's complete bafflement to be rather charming, myself!

I 100% agree. This was an absolute joy for me.

I know I'm a bit late, but reading the first few pages, I'd like to thank whoever requested this because as soon as I saw it I knew it was going to be a joy. The odd older dub with bumpers were an extra delight. Chuck's usual deep dive approach, discussing nuances and themes, motivations behind the creator; you can see his life experience on display. It's a thoughtful, encompassing look at a piece of art. Not always true of course but even in his most comedic, self-admitting totally lost times, some depth shines through. One of the quotes that always summed up SFdebris for me, was that line he said, paraphrased, as long as you're thinking, whether or not you agree with his opinion, his reviews have value.

Yet, since things like Evangelion and the Gundam "films", I've been dying for more of these where his approach is almost used against him. Even FMA:B and Trigun, two franchises I have enjoyed for years, are interesting to see put through the SFdebris treatment.

With all that said, Chuck did unfathomably well. The reads through the wiki's and other external info are not easy. I expected a bit more random jokes about things he witnesses, but instead it was this uneasiness with the review, he's clearly trying, and wants you to know that, but just can't speak on a material he does not have context for.

Death Knell (SG1) is a great example as in it Chuck mentions it was the first for the show added to the queue, but it's this junction of years of plots both in universe and out colliding and changing the status quo, so he waited til he got through most of the show, and had done other reviews to introduce his audience to the material. I'm not saying Chuck should have done that here, any older fans of his are well aware of the queue. It is what made this such a unique and interesting review. Not to the random person unfamiliar with SFdebris or Chuck's review style and humor looking for info on 'DBZ: Trunks Time Travel Backstory', but to fans of this website and the guy behind it who has created over a thousand videos discussing media. At least, that's just my opinion.

So, from one random fan on the internet to both Chuck and the donor who threw this specific film into the queue, thank you!

[SandroTheMaster]

Don't know why he was so pent up about it. In my opinion this was his best anime review yet in terms of entertainment. Imagine how frustrated he'll get when he finds out the only reason these people get blonde with power was because Akira Torayama was trying to sneak a way into the manga for him to not have to color all that black hair every single frame. Making them blond he could just line the hair and he was done.

He should do Kill La Kill next. But only the last episode.

[SandroTheMaster]

Never heard of this show but looks interesting.

This special actually is a huge departure of normal Dragon Ball fare.

For one, this time-travel plot only happens once (well... twice, but the second time it is not really time travel but going back to the alternate future because the rule of time travel here is time travel only creates alternate timelines, it doesn't save yours).

Also, this special shows more tactical acumen and drama than the entirety of Dragon Ball combined. And I'm including the dozens of movies, the Dragon Ball GT non-canon sequel series, and the Dragon Ball Super canonical sequel series. Mostly, early dragon ball is about comedy action fantasy and evolves into an action comedy sci-fi... ish. It makes sense once you realize the creator, Akira Torayama, doesn't really plan his storylines in advance, he just goes whatever direction and see what sticks and what doesn't, or according to his interests at any single point, or according to his many editors demands.

[SandroTheMaster]

Oddly Chuck showed me why 18 would eventually change sides. She was bored with existing just to destroy everything and being a doomsday device. That was a detail I had missed.

That for me was one of Torayama's most low-key genius writing.

The androids are made as weapons for world domination but they were just some random kids Red Ribbon abducted, tortured and then turned into androids.

He assumes they'll follow him just because he created them.

The only thing he did was make them hate people. The Trunks timeline they just keep venting that hate by murder but have no real plans and so they just keep going through the motions of killing more people in ways that amuse them, but they are quite clearly just bored and living empty lives while being too powerful to die.

In the past timeline hanging out with peaceful #16 mellows them out more and makes them more rebellious towards Dr. Gero. So they are uber powerful and are going with #16 mission of killing Goku just because it is SOMETHING to do with their immense power, but doing it as a field trip shows that they are just going to enjoy the trip and not care about accomplishing it.

Which is why Krillin's actions are so powerful. He shows empathy and compassion for them. Everything they know from other people is fear and hatred.

Heck, it was all mostly accidental that Torayama did this, but it was better than any of the villains he'd ever introduced.

[McAvoy]

Dragon Ball Z is definitely not a show you can just jump in the middle of and just 'get' what is going on. Especially with I guess what you would call legacy characters from the original Dragon Ball.

There is just so much going on by the time of the Android/Cell saga to be introduced to the series but also do a review on it.

Between talking animals, character names that are puns, the powers, the Saiyan race, the science fiction part of it with the human tech, like capsules to Dragon Balls themselves and their own set of rules (there is alot to be said just about that). Or who the Red Ribbon Army is etc.

I jumped in this series when in High School during its very first English run with the Ocean Dub on Cartoon Network. At the time, that was there was where it ended when Goku finally arrives on Namek and then they jump to the beginning. That actually allowed me on the second viuff and figure it out. Obviously eventually they continued with a new dub with mostly the same cast that does it today twenty years later.

I remember at that time, the soundtrack of DBZ series was hit or miss. There were some that were better than the original Japanese like Vegeta, Cell, Gohan going SSJ2, Goku going SSJ3 for the first time. But yeah for some reason they used rock based music for the movies.

[MithrandirOlorin]

Heck my general advice is to just stop DBZ once Freeze is destroyed, the attempts to top Freeza as a villain made the show after that very ridiculous.

[Makeshift Python]

Dragon Ball Z is definitely not a show you can just jump in the middle of and just 'get' what is going on. Especially with I guess what you would call legacy characters from the original Dragon Ball.

Back when it originally aired, it was. I didn't really get into this show until it was already in the middle of the Freiza saga, with the Ginyu force arriving on Namek. It would be a long awhile before I even get to see the original DB and the Saiyan saga. I just had watch what was on TV and learn as I went ahead. Sure, it was weird when the show would break from the main characters and show Puar and Oolong doing what they did, but I just took it that they were minor side characters rather than ones who used to be more integral in an earlier iteration of the show. I wasn't aware there was a part of the show that featured a younger kid Goku until the Cell saga episodes would feature flashback clips showing Goku fight Red Ribbon Army and participate in the Martial Arts Tournaments. I suspect those were included in order to speed up newer audiences that had missed out on those episodes, as well as having every episode begin with a "previously on".

Which would make sense, as in Japan the show was continuous. Once DB kicked off in 1986 there was always a brand new episode every week up to 1996. No break between seasons like in the US. But now that we're in the age of instant access and streaming, it's not at all hard to start from the beginning on any show.

That said, what makes THE HISTORY OF TRUNKS specifically not a good place to start is that it's just a supplement for the main show and entirely centered on a supporting character that was only around for a certain period of the show.

[SwissIrishAmerican]

I'm posting this in the hope that Chuck sees another great take on this episode. It's also a bit thick with inside jokes and references, but it is fantastically done. For anyone who hasn't seen it yet, this is TeamFourStar's humorous but still emotional abridgement of this episode:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69J67L4b0xU