Dragon Ball Z: Kami to Kami a.k.a Battle of the God's is an original story written by Akira Toriyama as apart of the Dragon Ball canon storyline. Right off the bat the fact that this film IS canon makes it more interesting to me, and the movie did such a good job of using the canon appropriately, introducing a new character; Beerus the Destroyer, as well as forwardly expanding the story with some things I won't spoil. Now the movie's undoubtably best aspect is that they combined the hilarious comedy and character interaction style of Dragon Ball, while at the same time adding the over-the-top crazy action of DBZ. As much as I wanted to see Goku kicking ass I simply loved the character interaction. The cast's chemistry was so good and seeing the voice actors reprise their role's with effort and emotion is such nice detail. There were some hilarious moments throughout the film, even during the action sequences which were fantastic. The fights didn't by any means drag, I feel people will penalize the movie for not incorporating a plethora of action but in my opinion the film had a perfect balance. Not only were the fights coordinated well, but they looked phenomenal in the remastered HD animation of DBZ. The animation wasn't the best i've ever seen, but seeing the old animation style of the show being reverberated in beauty all while keeping it's 90's aesthetic is eye candy to me. The effects look as good as any top notch anime you'll see, Super Saiyan God mode looks great as well as the transformations and other CGI and particle effects you see. That animation coped with the original sound effects and soundtrack make for a pleseant bundle of fine details that add to the movie. Moving onto the plot, the incorporation of the new character Beerus, couldn't have been done any better as I mentioned before. He's not just some enemy that Goku will overcome adversity to beat so don't worry about any clichés in that sense. And Beerus himself is brought to life by voice actor Jason Douglas, and having a very interesting and unique character design. The film does a good job and making you believe he's insanely powerful, and I only hope I can see him again. The film was also structured very well, there was a sub plot involving Emporer Pilaf that I thought was a little unnecessary but in the end it did add to the comedy at least a little bit so I didn't mind.
Overall I loved this movie despite not being a watcher of DBZ or Dragon Ball, the movie expects you to follow the story line, and I was able to follow since I know a majority of the story with the exception of the fine details. The story isn't over complicated though, it's very easy to follow and paced very well. If you're a fan of Dragon Ball or Dragon Ball Z I highly recommend this to you, as well as the casual anime watcher if you know a decent amount about the show of course. If you don't like DBZ, this isn't going to change your mind. However I loved it and am now more compelled to watch the show.
If you liked my review give it a thumbs up! Thank you (:
