Dragonball Evolution Review

In my infinite wisdom, I have decided to sit through an hour and a half of Dragonball. That normally wouldn’t sound so bad. Until you add Evolution to the end of the title. There’s going to be heavy spoilers throughout the review, but it’s not like anyone cares anyway. But just so you know.

And I’m going to have to do this review in increments. Through the first ten minutes, through the first plot point, through the second plot point, and then the final section. Otherwise my brain would explode from my childhood being destroyed.

Through the first ten minutes, I have a lot of complains. First off, I’m pretty sure there was CG sweat coming off of Goku’s brow. Ok, George Lucas, throw some CG gophers into Indiana Jones. I’m not going to care. But CG sweat? Even if it wasn’t there, it just looked really dumb.

Second: really? Piccolo controlled the Oozaru to destroy the Earth? No. Fucking no. Frieza and the Saiyans had an agreement that the Saiyans would help annihilate an entire populace off of the planet and in exchange, Frieza wouldn’t kill everyone (and we all know how well that worked out). The purpose of the agreement was to sell the planet to the highest bidder, of course. But no. This incarnation (if we even want to call it that) has Piccolo, a Namekian, controlling the apparently only “Oozaru” (not Saiyan) to destroy the Earth for god knows what reason.

Third: Gohan knew nothing about the Dragonballs. He didn’t know it would grant wishes. He didn’t know there were seven others (though I would assume he guessed there were at least three others). Also he wasn’t GODDAMN ALIVE when Dragonball started.

Speaking of people in general, Goku wasn’t 18 years old at the start of Dragonball. He was 11. Though he thought he was 14 because he had trouble counting. So he certainly couldn’t be in high school. Which he is in the movie.

One last thing. Really? They called him Pee-ccolo in the opening explanation thing. Thank god Gohan called him Piccolo later. Like a normal goddamn person. And now they have Master Roshi calling Gohan Go-haan. A long a sound. It’s horrible.

One thing I have to commend the movie for is Goku’s pacifism. It wasn’t in Dragonball of course (since Saiyans were more destroy everything and revel in the fight type of people), but I like it. That said, it’s the only thing I’ve liked through the first 30 minutes.

And in the first 30 minutes we meet Bulma. The girl who wants to find the Prometheus Orb, which has five stars. But wait! They aren’t Prometheus Orbs, they’re Dragonballs. The girl who knew all about them in the anime doesn’t know a goddamn thing about them in the movie. But who does? Gohan and Roshi through some nursery rhyme and unknown prophecy, neither of which existed in the anime.

But wait, there’s more! Bulma wants to harness the energy of the Dragonballs to do something good for the world: create an infinite supply of energy. Not get a boyfriend. What happened to the cowardly, self-centered woman I knew? I miss her. And her capsules don’t open with a comical, Adam West Batman-esque poof. It transformers open.

If anything, at least they kept Goku’s awkwardness. Even if they changed what kind of awkward he is. And Roshi’s pervy-ness.

Chi-Chi. Her father is the Ox King. The feared man of Fire Mountain. And trained by Master Roshi himself. He is not a man that would frown on fighting. Yet apparently no one in Chi-Chi’s family would understand that she’s a fighter training for the World Martial Arts Tournament.

Then we learn that Aang – er, Goku – has to master all four – er, three – elements in order to defeat Fire Lord Ozai – er, Demon King Piccolo. Really, Hollywood? That’s the best you can think up? Copying off of Avatar is the best you can do? You’re already copying off of a source material that continues to sell like hot cakes for FUNimation, yet you want to change nearly everything about it.

And literally everything else that happens up to the second plot point can by summarized by: Yamcha is a douche and Goku learns to be the next Avatar.

Then, then, get this, Master Roshi uses a Kamehameha Wave to revive Goku. Revive him. Not by the Dragonballs, which was done later in Z, but with an energy wave of great destruction.

And apparently the Dragonballs will revive Shenlong. Not summon him. Revive him. I had no idea Shenlong was dead. Or that Piccolo had to pray to revive him. Piccolo is one half of the man who created the damn things, you think he could summon – er, revive – it pretty easily.

Hollywood. This was your chance. The Oozaru and Shenlong were both huge. Gigantic. They were amazing creatures that you dwarfed in the movie. Both the Oozaru and Shenlong were significantly smaller than they were in the anime. Magnitudes smaller. Exponentially smaller.

I do like how Goku was wearing his signature uniform. But no one knows why he’s wearing that because it’s never explained. It’s also never explained why Goku has to become the Avatar.

Looking past the fact that Dragonball Evolution absolutely destroyed my childhood from the inside out, it’s just a bad movie. I mean, it’s fancy looking and the fighting was ok at best, but there are so many things that I would like to know. Like who created the Dragonballs? Or where did the Dragonballs go? It’s clear to me that their target audience was fans of the manga and anime series. But they changed it so much that no one who likes movies can like this and no one who liked the original series can either.