Dragon Ball Movie 1: Shen Long no Densetsu

Toriyama Akira's Dragonball franchise is one I've looked at before. I've also looked at two films associated with it: Fusion Reborn & Battle of Gods. This time, we're going to kick off film festival week with a look at one of the Dragonball era films, Legend of Shenron. It originally aired in late 1986. Yes, the same year that Dragonball itself started airing. So, let's see how it compares to the others we've looked at.

Story:

We open with soldiers destroying buildings and fields while terrorising the citizens in order to mine rich stones. Clearly, the most creative name for valuable stones ever. We then cut ... to a pair of the soldiers meeting with the king. He stays in the shadows, but still manages to look grotesque. He orders them to find the rest of the dragon balls. We then cut to the beginning of Dragonball. Yeah, the whole scene where Goku goes out to catch a fish and then bumps into Bulma, mistaking her vehicle for a monster. There is, however, a difference. In this one, his dragon ball is stolen by the king's stooges, forcing him to go with Bulma and give chase.

Therein lies the biggest issue with this film. About half the running time is devoted to reiterating different scenes from the series proper with only minor differences. Except that the series proper took its time with them and gave you time to acclimate to the major characters they had before introducing you to more whereas this film throws one encounter after another at you. Let's say, for the sake of argument, that the idea was to bring in new viewers to the anime. The problem is they don't give you enough about these characters to make them worth your time. If, on the other hand, this is for fans of the series then it shouldn't be repeating all this information. Sure, there are differences but it's also a lot of wasted time that could be better devoted to fleshing out the film's narrative. Which gets pretty rushed when you factor out the repetitive scenes. The humour in this is also pretty mediocre. You get some funny scenes, but you also get comedic moments that represent the worst of Dragonball's jokes. IE: Muten Roshi and Oolong are perverts and a urine joke.

Characters:

Honestly, the characters are recognisable. You aren't going to look at Goku, Roshi, Yamch, Bulma or Oolong and think that they're out of character. That being said, the film doesn't do a good job of conveying the charm that the cast had, overall, in the series proper. Most of these characters get a quick introduction and hen don't do all that much. There's almost no reason for Yamcha & Pu'ar to be in this at all. It's very much focused on Goku & Bulma. The main antagonists are pretty dull. They're basically equivalent, in terms of characterisation, to the villains who show up for one episode of the show and get beaten with ease.

Art:

The artwork is pretty much on par with the artwork in the series proper. The backgrounds can be sparse but the character designs are nicely done and distinctive. The action scenes are well done. Actually, the best action sequence in the film might be an aerial dogfight with actual planes. Which is odd for something Dragonball related. The climactic sequence, in contrast, is kind of weak.

Sound:

The vocal cast is just as strong as they were in the series proper. Tsuru Hiromi, Nozawa Masako and Furuya Toru all deliver fine performances. Koyama Mami is also in this, although she's playing the villainous pasta rather than Lunch. Suzuki Tomoko takes a break from voicing random young girls in supporting roles to voice Pansy, a young girl who needs help. The music is also the same type you get in the main series. It's pretty good.

Ho-yay:

There really isn't any.

Final Thoughts:

So, that's Legend of Shenron, the first film in the Dragonball franchise. It's not very good. It suffers a lot from its need to reintroduce characters, presumably for new audiences, at the expense of the film's narrative. If you're a big Dragonball fan, you might enjoy it regardless but, for myself, I give it a 4/10. It's weak, but not bad. Tomorrow I'll continue film festival week with a look at Futari wa PreCure: Max Heart film 1.

Eu acho que esse filme possui uma história bem preguiçosa já que copia a história do mangá original do começo ao fim. Isso também pode ser interpretado como uma maneira de atrair o público para consumir a obra original, e acaba sendo um filme bem prático nesse quesito.

Fora o filme ter um roteiro copiado, o vilão final é bem decepcionante para um primeiro filme de Dragon Ball, todas as outras lutas são interessantes e talvez sejam tão boas por serem copiadas, porque, quase tudo de original nesse filme não é tão bom quanto os conceitos originais da obra já aplicados no filme.

As consequências ... são praticamente inexistentes para os vilões do filme, eu consigo até pensar que a trama principal possua uma mensagem bonita, mas sinto que é uma mensagem efetuada de maneira rasa por não ser mais aprofundada.

Dragon Ball é uma das coisas mais nostálgicas que eu conheço e reviver esses personagens é algo bem aconchegante de certa forma. A comédia é realmente boa e disso eu não tenho do que reclamar.

The animation while more fluid than the TV anime isn't anything to write home about, none of the movie original characters really matter nor do they do much except for the start and the end. It is the first movie of the franchise so I suppose the overall sort of "clumsy" feeling that it gives you makes sense, as it is very clearly not a movie meant to be watched in the current year or ever again.

The story is a loose "what if?" recap of the very first arc. Instead of the Pilaf gang we are introduced to this weird demon guy and his very ... boring goons, which are more competent that Shu and Mai, this is a negative.

The Pilaf gang was never meant to be seen as actual obstacles and instead existed for what the series was at the start, gags. Their failures and overall pathetic nature was funny and charming, if you take away their fuck ups the goons just become boring tough guys with equally boring scenes. It doesn't help that we don't learn anything about these characters, making it difficult to get invested in the antagonists of the film. It tries to make up for it by giving the audience more action, but just like the animation it looks nice but isn't all that impressive or different from what you would see in the TV anime.

Same goes for the new movie original character who was (sorta) part of the main crew, none of the scenes with her were funny and instead she just existed to drive the plot along, something which Bulma does in the original series but in a more entertaining way. I couldn't even remember her name because she was so forgettable and I can't be bothered to google it right now.

Goku has little to no focus. We get good moments with Bulma and Yamcha, but Goku gets little to no time to shine. The same goes for Puar, Roshi and Oolong, but at the time of the story they were minor characters anyhow.

Goku is the MAIN character, why the fuck does Yamcha get better scenes and more focus in the first movie than the actual main lead? No hate to Yamcha fans, but this decision just does not make sense to me. With Bulma it's fine as she's the main heroine and the second lead, but even in the OG series Yamcha's role becomes incredibly minor. Having him get a bigger role than Goku just...baffles me.

Finally my biggest issue with this movie, the pacing. Everything feels way too fast as they rush from story beat to story beat with little to no time to relax and they redo scenes from the original but in a way more loose and less impactful way. It makes sense as this movie isn't even an hour long so they have to rush it but oh my goodness SLOW DOWN.

Yeah it's just not very good.