Hey, wasn't there a bald guy in there? Or something? Guess not.

[secondlina]

(photo by Noobsausess)

In the opening for Watchmen, we saw the trailers for the final Terminator movie, Wolverine and Dragonball Evolution. As much has i'd love to share my suffering about the previous two, i'm really going to have to focus on Dragonball. I love Dragonball. It's awesome. It's silly and funny. But i'm not sure i'm gonna like this movie.

Points that bother me -

• The main hero (Goku) is white. Yes, I know. American cinema means white male american hegemonia. But still, like the film 21, where all the protagonist of the original tale were asian, I was expecting more asians then just the sexy broad and the aging kung-fu master. But I guess that that's like expecting a black superman.
• Krillin? Where are you? Did you die? They removed Krillin. I guess being bald is unamerican. He's one of the main characters and he totally didn't make the cut. Sucks.
• Chichi. You're RELEVANT? Okay, as much as I am all for more badass female superheroes and that I was sad to see her be some lame in the original manga, i'm suprised to see her here as a main protagonist. I mean, in the manga, the only person she seemed to fight was Goku (twice) and then she bore children (she was a kick-ass mom though, like Mrs Weasley.)
• Teen!Drama. Okay...what? Oh Spiderman, when did you learn to Kamehameha? The teen drama is so unecessary. But they added it to transformers, which proves that they can add it to EVERYTHING. Goku is apparently pinning for Chichi. Wasn't that the other way around (In the - he barely remembers her type of sense?)
• The thrill is gone. Roshi, not a pervert. Because Perverts and kung-fu masters don't mix. It's not zen. And unamerican.
• Learning the power of hollywood makeup. MWAHAHAHAHAHA
• Oh, Shucks, Kami's dead too. No god here. Dragonballs were created by mystics. Mystics. Because non-christian beliefs aren't american. Just like baldness.
• Red Army. I'm half-expecting them to be arabic.

Points that give me hope.

• Capsule Corps. Still rocks.
• Bulma. Still hot. But not Asian. The hot token asian role is filled by Chichi.
• James Marster. His make-up looks crappy but he's by far the geekiest member of the cast and loves piccolo because he knows the original story. Plus he's got villain experience.
• CGI Shenron. BADASS.
• Shape-shifting underling. Because even X-men was made cooler by it. And X-men was bad.

Akira Tokiyama said that even though he was initially taken by surprise (in the *huh?* sense people) by the screenplay and actors, he still though it was a cool adaptation. Basically. This is Dragonball for People Who Know Not of Dragonball tm

I guess all we can do is accept that this movie is an independant story to the original, just like the creator is doing. I can manage that. I'm still going to go see it. I might weep and cling to my managa when I get out of the theatre. This is going to most likely be a cool American style kung-fu movie. But it sure as hell won't be Dragonball. Just like V for Vendetta, Howl's moving castle or Stardust are interesting revamps of the originals, this might be too.

Or it might be Spiderman four.

Oh hell, at least we can still produce Nuclear explosions from our hands.

Isa

EDIT: OH well, at least the theme song will be japanese. On December 9, 2008, it was confirmed that the theme song will be "Rule" by Japanese singer Ayumi Hamasaki.  "Rule" will be used as the theme song for every country's release.^[28] Neat. I actually like Ayumi. Well, some of her songs anyways.

Comments

[dqbunny.livejournal.com]

Huh. We didn't get the Dragonball preview in our showing of Watchmen. Because if we had done so, I'm sure both me or Stef would have posted our shock and horror by now.

[secondlina.livejournal.com]

You can still view it online, if you dare. dragonballevolution.com

(View overhead points for badstuff)

Also, hot sexy asian Chichi fighting other asian hot sexy Chichi (who is obviously the shapeshifter) in tiny light blouses = oh, fanservice, you do tease.

[amelia-seyroon.livejournal.com]

We didn't get the Dragonball trailer, either. This sounds just as bad as the upcoming Avatar movie.

[yukinoomoni.livejournal.com]

....<.<;;

I kinda liked X-men x.x.

[yukinoomoni.livejournal.com]

Also: White!Goku pissed me off to no end. This is one I'm going to skip. I also hated Transformers because of how much angst they put into it.

[secondlina.livejournal.com]

...Transformers angst = Dawson's creek with robots.

White!Goku is really weird. But I guess he's an alien, so he could be anything, but it was obvious he was gonna be an american brat.

[yukinoomoni.livejournal.com]

But...a white kid named Goku?!

[secondlina.livejournal.com]

GAH, I know. :(

[secondlina.livejournal.com]

It's not that the movie was bad in itself. Is that it doesn't live up to it's original.

[yukinoomoni.livejournal.com]

This is true.

[earthstar-moon.livejournal.com]

I feel so bad for the Dragonball fans. (Goku white? And highschool, why?) They should just leave anime/manga alone. I just can't see a good North American movie version being made from it, unless the original creator is in on the project.

Mind you, saying it's independeant from the story and it's for the people who never saw Dragonball is probably the best view to take on this. It's an adaptation of the manga, but there's no way it's going to be the Dragonball we all know and love. I'll probably won't see the movie, maybe on DVD just for a laugh and out of curousity, but I'll be surprised if the sequel is actually produce. And yes, there's already a second Dragonball movie in the works. -_-;

[secondlina.livejournal.com]

The white!Goku part could have still flown. They could have made it work. It's the highschool b.s. that falls flat. Also, doesn't he change into a freaking giant monkey? How does that correlate with prom night?

I think they did include Mr. Toriyama in the project, but he apparently approved. As much as I respect him as a creator, I dunno if he's above selling out. Either that, or he's actually really open to having his characters in a really different world. So he's either very open minded or has really low standards.

This kinda makes me think of Alan Moore who is the contrary. He was violently pissed about each and every one of his projects being adapted. To a point where he demands to be excluded from the project entirely. Even the good adaptations piss him off. He's a demanding fellow.

I really want to see this movie, even if it's just to point and laughs. It's kinda like Twilligh. It's such an event you can't just walk past it. I might just rent it too though, just so I don' contribute to the damn box-office and encourage them to carry on.

OH wow, already? Talk about putting the cart before the horse heh?

[earthstar-moon.livejournal.com]

*nods* Point, and I was just talking about it with Stu and he did make a good point that since Goku is an alien, you can get away with him being white.

It's really hard to say how much input the creator should say. On the one hand, they did create the original story and therefore it makes sense to have them on the project. On the other hand, if they're real picky about everything, than that's not good either. A movie adaptation of any type of written media is never going to be perfect. It can be good, but not perfect.

As for the sequeal, yup: http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2009-02-18/justin-chatwin/dragonball-film-sequel-already-written

[ichiban-victory.livejournal.com]

Hollywood whitewashing strikes again!

I'm no fan of Dragonball, but I know how a decent adaptation works. Nice to know the makers don't have enough (dragon) balls to make it a faithful adaptation for fear of causing controversy for depicting things that AREN'T AMERICAN! Because apparently Christians don't know how to decipher reality from fiction?

Boo. Definitely skipping this one. (Although I did like Transformers for the most part.)

[secondlina.livejournal.com]

When I wrote all these down and said *it's unamerican* I was joking, but now I read it over and realise it's not even a joke. American cinema white washes so bad. I hope the movie will still be good, even if it is *not* Dragonball, if you're gonna make the characters evolve in an alternate universe, it better be a damn fine universe.

I don't know why cinema simplifies everything so much still. It's like they consider the average viewer to be a complete moron. I'm scared they might still be right.

Also, i'm still angry about the token hot asian chick thing.

[ichiban-victory.livejournal.com]

It's something I've encountered again and again in my "research" of films. Some directors/writers know that the viewer is not stupid, but so many others think that we are, hence the dumbing down of everything you see on the screen. Granted, sometimes I do like having things fully explained to me, but there are times where it's easy to figure out what's going on and we really do not need to have every little thing spelled out. A lot of movie time can be lost on helping 'stupid viewers' figure out what's going on when it could have been used to add to the plot.

You should be angry about the hot Asian chick thing! Asian actors have a tough time getting into serious acting down in the U.S. since there's a stigma around them (and Hispanics, actually), but they (the talented actors/actresses) do still exist. Movie makers just aren't always willing to take the chance and hire an excellent actor/actress, purely based on their race. It's so messed up!

[earthstar-moon.livejournal.com]

With that said, I strongly suggest you listen to this song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNmzegQUtFA

A fan posted this in the Avatar community and I think it really states this problem very well.

Off topic, there was a good article recently on the Avatar Movie controversy: http://www.emorywheel.com/detail.php?n=26670

[ichiban-victory.livejournal.com]

Sometimes it's just best to leave animated things animated, that way we're not having these problems with people being passed over due to their race. Voices tend to be (somewhat) raceless. Although now I really want to go and watch Mulan...

[secondlina.livejournal.com]

the song is hilarious.

[rowenathewitch.livejournal.com]

I've been following the news regarding Dragon Ball the movie so I know those info.
Strange enough...I don't think this movie will be entirely bad.
Goku and Bulma are white, but the rest of the cast is asian (Chichi, Yamcha, the shapeshifter,Roshi). Piccolo is a green alien so he really doesn't count XD. We can't expect more from a multimillion dollar american movie, it's still better than street fighter where the american Guile is the main char and Chun Li is a journalist D:
They are using a wonderful japanese theme song and the movie is premiering in Japan (where it will be released dubbed) so I think they are having a bit of attention for the japan audience...

What I'm worried about is the high school part(american school drama gets me sick) . I hope it will last just for the first 15 minutes of the movie, just to prove that Goku fails at every class XD

[secondlina.livejournal.com]

I agree that the movie doesn't seem bad. But it's just not Dragonball. Like I said, it's probably going to be a good kung-fu movie, but not great as an adaptation. The high school part scares me. And oh god, I hope it's better then street fighter. THAT MOVIE WAS AN EPIC FAIL.

[snapdragon76.livejournal.com]

EPIC FAIL!! I'm not even a fan of Dragonball and I shake my head at this.


What really kills me is there's a live-action Cowboy Bebop in the works with Keanu Reeves as Spike. No, just... NO!

*shudders*