Audience reviews
20 · Sample from the first available page, separate from the total number of ratings.
_Bubassotto_
Many expectations and few of them met...
That was my first thought when I watched this part of Dragon Ball because I expected to see at least one fight that would be memorable in this part, but I ended up disappointed. I didn't see anything worth remembering. I was a little frustrated but I kept watching, thinking that would change that. Unfortunately, there was no change in that regard. For me, who always had a problem with Dragon Ball, watching the anime was a real war against the desire to abandon the work. The only thing that made me want to watch it was the fact that by watching this part of Dragon Ball I would have a better understanding of Dragon Ball Z and its other sequels, which are the parts I really want to see. I tried to watch this anime a long time ago but I didn't get past…
Read at the sourceHaxkarl
Thought that i should update this review at the end of 2022. I wrote this review like 2 years ago, and it was kinda cringe lol. Anyways, DB is the first Anime that i ever really completed. Yes i have seen some that aired on TV in early 2000s but i dont count them. Dragon Ball is basically a parody of Journey to the West, and has literally NOTHING to do with what DBZ became. Some weird space alien planet buster type....... There is so MUCH to say about the OG Dragon Ball, all i can say is WATCH IT NOW. This is by far the best Anime i have ever watched in my entire life. I started around 2014 after i got a recommendation from a friend, then i tried to watch and i got hooked instantly. The storyline, the characters, the voice actors ( Japanese ) it just blew my MIND because at that point in m…
Read at the sourcedhimandeydip
Well, this review might seem overrated and that might be true as I am a little biased to this anime.
I came to know about Dragonball through Dragonball Z. To be honest, I thought this would be another action-packed masterpiece like Dragonball Z when I started to watch it.
Don't get me wrong. This one is a masterpiece. But unlike Dragonball Z, this anime focuses heavily on comedy. You will see a lot of slapstick-style comedy everywhere throughout this series. (Even from the first episode)
The art style also focuses on comedy. Sometimes it does get serious. But most of the time, it will make you smile, even in the midst of a serious fight.
This story is mainly about Goku. But others are not totally neglected. They all have their signature style, unique stories, unique contributions t…
Read at the sourceThatAnimeSnobRE
#1: Emperor Pilaf Saga
Just like it happened with so many other people of my generation, I instantly fell in love with Dragonball. And I am talking about the original series, not Z which was what most watched in America and didn’t know there was more before it. By then, the plot had become the stereotype everybody was copying, instead of something completely different from everything else that was airing at that moment. Unless for some reason you were lucky enough to get another action adventure comedy series, with plot continuity, where everybody was a selfish idiot, instead of picture perfect boyscouts and one-dimensional bad guys. It’s funny to think how Dragonball, which came to be the monolith of fighting shonen formulas, began as a deconstruction of the typical hero’s journey and a…
Read at the sourceRyu-Lee
The original Dragon Ball is the beginning of what became the most famous anime series of all time, everybody knows what Dragon Ball is. The original and the Z saga are the best 2 versions of Dragon Ball. I take the Z saga over the original but this one gets better with his progress and ends up in a high note. The Z saga the best parts are the sagas in the first half of the anime...
The second and the third martial arts tournament are fun to watch, the Red Ribbon vs Goku feud is also entertaining especially the sacred tower and the Tao Pai Pai parts. But the highlight of the anime is the Piccolo Daimao saga, it's in my top 3 overall Dragon Ball sagas with the Saiyans and the Frieza sagas...
Read at the sourcePageplant
I am giving "Dragon Ball" 10/10, and not just because this is a classic anime. A lot of people prefer "Dragon Ball Z" over the original, and I don't doubt I will like it. But... I don't think the sense of friendship and adventure seen here can be recreated anymore. As the series went on, it just became a way to show great animation and impressive battles, but little by little, the soul of simplicity and adventure was lost. Here is where it will always remain. A story that began with a weird boy with a tail and a girl on a mission to find all the dragon balls. And nothing can ruin the experience, even the fillers and perversion of Master Roshi and Oolong can be excused. These 153 episodes gave me so much hope, joy and entertainment over the years it took me to watch them all that I cannot p…
Read at the sourceSleepyWicked
Ok so I didn't grow up with this show so I never really had a childhood attachment to it. And here is my long sordid history and review of this show after watching it twice.
When I was in highschool I heard a lot of good things about it and decided to watch it. I watched all of it. Mostly because of being pressured and everyone telling me that it will get better as I got towards the ends. As soon as I started watching it the first few episodes seemed like they were animated by a very horny crew, which is not necessarily a bad thing but was kinda jarring for a show that was supposed to be for kids. But well each person finds their own level of what to expose their children to and well I don't really care for stuff like that anyway. The characters themselves (mostly at least) weren't horny b…
Read at the sourceFor_Reign
If you haven't heard about Dragon Ball then you are not a true anime fan. I rate this keeping in mind that the art and sound is what it is because it was created in the 80's. Dragon Ball was NOT a part of my childhood although I truly wish it was. Most people I know were exposed to the series because of it's sequel, Dragon Ball Z (so was I). Several years back I decided to download the entire series already having watched Dragon Ball Z on TV in my teen years. I wanted to know Goku's back story, how he and his friends came to be and the genesis of this anime classic. I was definitely not disappointed. Many a times, watching something backwards from it's sequel, one can get a little disappointed because you already know how powerful the character is and to go back and see him crawl his way t…
Read at the sourceBowlingJD
One of Toei Animations (Galaxy Express 999) best franchises anime ever made, Dragon Ball. Spanning at 153 episodes this is the shounen epic of all shounen anime. Thanks to the work by Akira Toriyama, Dragon Ball was one of the first anime that came to the west and started a revolution.
The first arc in the epic starts with a little boy with a tail called Goku living alone in the forest when a teenage girl named Bulma runs into him looking for dragon balls (mysterious balls when all 7 are gathered together they grant one wish). In the beginning, the banter between the two is absolutely hilarious, and continues when they start adding companions to their quest such as Oolong the shape shifting pig and Yamcha the teenage bandit. During their quest together, they run into various villains and…
Read at the sourceRagewalk
(May contain Spoilers) I give this Anime an 8, here is why. First reason, GOKU. If this anime was crap, had audio that made me want to listen to Nickelback, and visuals that made me want to poke my eyes out with rusty spoons, and a plot so bad, that it made School Days seem like a Quentin Tarantino film, This would still get at least a 5. It is like a Katy Perry song. You can feature Based God in it and it would still number 1 because of Katy Perry. Goku is the superman of Anime. He can do whatever he wants and not get into trouble. He smacks Bulmas coochie a few times, lives alone, and uses the 4 star ball as a butt plug. Bulma's character is kind of annoying, is never happy, tries to kill Goku with Second Degree murder, but Goku is still nice to this dumb gatorade color hair broad. Goku'…
Read at the sourceliteraturenerd
Overview:
Today I pay my respects to one of the all time classics of shonen anime. Some of you might be thinking, "seriously? This filthy casual weak sauce!?" As someone who has always loved reading classical literature, biology, history, and art, the gradual evolution and shaping forces on a medium is of great interest to me. It is impossible to discuss shonen anime without bringing up Dragon Ball. The tremendous influence that Dragonball had on both the fighting Shonen genre and anime in general must be acknowleged, even by those that dislike the series. What the hell made this series so freaking popular and influential? That is what I wish to delve into.
Story: 8/10
The story as most people reading this review are no doubt aware, was based on the Chinese novel Journey to the West. In…
Read at the sourcektulu007
Now, I can pretty much guarantee that everyone reading this already knows this information since Dragonball is one of the best known anime/manga franchises out there. Dragonball was first created by Toriyama Akira in 1984. In 1986 Toei animation picked up the license to adapt it into an anime. They have been swimming in the money bin filled with the profits from the license ever since. Let's take a look at the series and see how well it holds up. Keep in mind, I'm not going to worry bout spoilers in this one since both it and its sequels are so well known that even people who haven't seen it are probably familiar with how it goes. If you're one of the few people who isn't, then you may not want to continue.
Story:
The narrative begins with the wild young Son Goku, named for the Journey…
Read at the sourceHappyHarryHardOn
This won’t be an in depth review because everyone knows about Dragon Ball and its influence and there are already numerous reviews written about it. This will just give you an idea of whether you should watch it or not, for those who haven’t yet.
Dragon Ball undeservedly doesn’t receive the same attention as its more popular sequel. The Dragon Ball series does receive a lot of flack for being really repetitive and for its unnecessarily long fight sequences but it’s really unfair to compare the franchise to what the shonen genre has become today. Because of this people tend to overlook Dragon Ball.
Story
Dragon Ball is divided into multiple story arcs, some longer than others, which are hilariously funny and manage to entertain with fantastic battles. Dragon Ball is gut bustingly hilariou…
Read at the sourceligemeget
Oddly enough not alot of people know of the anime that started it all. Yet most of them have probably watched the sequel. Why is this? I catch myself in this thought all the time, because the prequel is strikingly good when compared it to it's Z counterpart.
This anime succeeds despite it's shortcomings in my book. This is simply because it know's it's a goofy fighting anime and thus dosen't try to be anything else. The focus is therefore put on fighting, cracking jokes and gags, and last but certainly not least: The journey that Goku goes on in itself.
The story in here is very simple; finding the Dragonballs. At least that's what the gang spends a large bulk of the series doing. Due to the length of this series it's obvious that there will be fillers. However the fillers do more than j…
Read at the sourceLegionIscariot
Oh DragonBall, I consider this the greatest anime of all time. Better than DragonBall Z or DB GT (in my opinion).
The story of a boy (with a monkey tale) Goku and a girl Bulma who travel the world looking for the 7 dragon balls that when brought together grants a wish. They eventually make friends who join their team…
I prefer DB over DBZ because DB Kid Goku was a clueless kid which was adorable. DBZ Adult Goku is a clueless adult not really interesting.
DB had more actual fighting hand-to-hand while I found that DBZ had too much standing around charging energy and firing energy.
DB was a nice simple, enjoyable, funny adventure with great characters that were useful, but in DBZ these loved characters were put aside and the show focused on Saiyans (monkey-like warrior aliens from a planet c…
Read at the sourceNasudi_808
This has got to be one of the best anime out there! I was first introduced by this how when I was but 5 or 6 years old, the american version! I hated it! But now that I watched the Japanese version with English sub. I was taken into a more colorful, more expressive world!
Art 9/10: What can I say? It has it's own unique quality and although I something think Goku looks more like a frog taking, his cute personalities, as well as the other characters, just keep me watching it!
Sound 10/10: Epic, classic!
Character9/10: I thought the character could have developed, more maturely, throughout the series, but, I was guessing the humor just made up the more "dramatic" development I was looking for that I normally fancy! Also, I wanted other characters to develop such as Bulma and Master Rosh…
Read at the sourcevalarclan
This was the first one I saw.
It is clear it is written for preschool kids.
My review is from the stand point of a adult who is a anime fan. A reminder that Anime in japan is generally watched by adults and not kids.... Like action seems to be the preference for kid viewing.
Overly simplistic story, hero is rather dim witted, plots are ... well... non-existent it seems.
It seems to be the source of the further mythology later on. Kinda sad to base a series on something so dull witted.
Another problem is EVERYONE is on steroids....
Again this is were it kinda started off on a bad footings.....
Doing this to help save people's sanity and intellect.
If you're like me and a adult and looking for content, not animated WWE/WWF then I suggest moving on....
Read at the sourceMazuraKameo129
This series simply doesn't get the credit that it should, instead DBZ seems to get majority of the praise. I enjoyed both series and have watched them a ridiculous amount of times, but Dragonball has something that DBZ didn't, I don't know what that something is, but it's what makes Dragon ball the better series.
-Comedy (Not much of this carried over to DBZ)
-The series based around the tournaments
-Jackie Chun
Three things that made DB great; don't get me wrong, I would still rate DBZ perfect as well, I just don't think it's as clever as Dragonball.
Read at the sourceL-sama
Ah, Dragonball. The beginning of one of the longest and arguably most popular anime franchise on both sides of the pacific. Unfortunately, this anime seems to be shunned by a few based on its affiliation with its sequels. That's a shame, really.
One huge reason why this anime holds its own is that the entire franchise is in its infancy. There are no Super Saiya-jin stages to worry about, and the fights aren’t stretched out to their barely tolerable limits. The various quests that the young Z-Senshi embark on are just that: quests. There are no interstellar enemies to fight (early on), and the majority of the time spent is on the team simply trying to find the dragonballs. The comedic element in Dragonball shines just as brightly and flows smoothly with the story. The characters have…
Read at the sourceSandgolem
The Dragonball Series, is the first in a line of series. It is about the adventures of a young boy Goku, and his travels as he quests to find the 7 magic dragonballs, which can grant anywish! This series is both a comedy and a fighting anime. I enjoyed it quiet a bit and it even enjoys a home in my personal anime collection.
Story
At times the story can be pretty simple, or obvious, or completely random. But overall the general story and the progression through it are very good. Although it doesnt measure up to other animes as well, its own orginal story and characters keep your interested and coming back for more.
Animation
To say it is simple is an understatement. They do recycle alot of animation, like in chase sequences, but over all well done animation, Sometimes it can be a bit…
Read at the source