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

[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