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 but it sure felt like whoever made it had only one thing on their mind. So much so that they would break the pacing of the story and take me out of it. One minute I watching a kid going on adventure and the next it might turn into hentai. Oh wait no it's back to being an adventure. And I didn't find the story all that interesting in the first place so that kind of jarring disruption to what was supposed to be an adventure story really took all hypothetical enjoyment out of it. Everytime the story flow was broken I would sigh, roll my eyes and endure the rest of the episode so that next time my friends pastered me about it I could say I moved along in the storyline. I didn't really want to be left out of discussions and stuff back then so I grit my teeth and watched all of it but as I got further in the series it got more and more boring to me, and at some point I would put it on as background noise to do homework to, or watch it at 1.25 speed to help the story get along faster. I just wanted to finish it so I can say "Hey I watched it. You must be high on mushrooms or nostalgia because this sucks." And it never got better. That however was not a good way to watch an anime and decide I hated it, afterall maybe I missed some brilliant writing while paying more attention to my homework. But back then I could not get myself to get into it. My attention would drift to other things every few minutes and I often found myself falling asleep to those episodes. Which btw was great considering I had insomnia and this was one of the things helped which made me be a little less reluctant to put on more episodes. I progressed through all 153 episodes in about 8 months (unlike say something like one piece which once I started watching I finished arout 400 episodes in about a month until I caught up, lost so much sleep back then). It took me this long since in-between I would continue to watch shows I enjoyed a lot more and I couldn't really stand to do too many episodes at once anyway. I finished it and hated it, not really able to articulate why. And when my friends asked if I will see a sequel I replied with a horrified no. By then I learned to be more assured in having friendships and being more confident so I didn't do things just to please my friends.
Fast forward years later and me as an adult who is an otaku and a cosplayer. And from every direction many years later I would hear praise to the glorious Dragon Ball and being asked by people to cosplay a character from it. I wasn't particularly against it (it's miraculous ability to help my insomnia left at least some fond memories). My first watchthrough was painful and I could not remember much of what happened in the series at all so I decided to give it another go. As a much older person I might get into it I thought. It's still being talked about so there must be something there. So I sat down and began seriously watching it while also searching for a character I could cosplay. And you know what, my first impression wasn't wrong. It was not my cup of tea. On a more careful watchthrough and after seeing a lot more anime over the years I began to see how much it must have influenced so many of the anime I loved which rose my appreciation of it. But at the same time Dragon Ball itself was a horrible watch for me.
The story was horrible. Not because the concept was not interesting but the pacing really was interrupted too often. As soon as you would feel yourself being pulled into the story something would happen to pull you out of it and make you roll your eyes. The show really was pulling itself apart without deciding what it wanted to be: a fanservice softcore porn or a story of an OP character being and OP character while on adventure with sidekicks. Both are kind of things I enjoyed in a lot of different anime and I even have seen a mesh of those 2 genre before in other things that worked wonderfully together. This show must have been the first to do it as well so I can thank it for starting it all. Yet the tone each of those parts took didn't mesh well together as one cohesive story. It's like a show for 5 years olds everywhere was trying to mix itself with a show for horny single middle aged adults. And I guess not all kinks were worked out yet of that paring.
The art must have been good for it's time, but frankly it did not age well at all. It's not one of those timeless masterpieces. At least not the art.
The soundtrack was ok. It wasn't mismatched at all but there was also nothing that stands out. If you asked me again for any melodies from the show I would be hard pressed to produce any. They were easily forgettable honestly to the point where if you put them on without telling me what anime they were from I would probably not recognize it.
Characters that could have been great were ruined by jarring moments of bad writing. So much of those characters I see in shows and characters that I love, which made it devastating at points how occasionally bad writing could ruin those character for me. The worst was Goku. We all know the trappings of OP character, plot armor and power of feelings. Yet I sometimes enjoy all of those and Goku was ok-ish on that front. But as soon as the fights were over... egh. No words just egh. Does someone out there get a sick enjoyment of putting an innocent kid into these awkwardly adult situations? I would be fine if he was a perv and that was it. Or if the situation weren't as drawn out as they are. Or if he didn't repeat same pervy behaviour over and over and over and over. He gets told it's not ok but apparently at those moments his IQ drops well below retard and he forgets the meaning of all words. No really he goes full retard on us (and you never make your main character go full retard) and does the same thing over and over after being told explicitly that it's not ok to do. And he doesn't get it's pervy but those scenes also go on and on and on to the point they get painfully awkward and it's as if we are getting a wink from those making it and a "get it? get it? get it?" in the middle of the story. Like that one bad storyteller you know who pauses in a middle of the joke to explain the joke to the point you want to scream "YES I GET IT." Yes yes we know it's naughty behaviour oooh. Look at disney.They hide their adult jokes so well that for an innocent viewer it doesn't ruin the experience and for an adult viewer you smirk and move on and the story flow ain't broken. Here every pervy moments gets it's own wink and a moment to process this unbelievably hard concept ooh this should be funny because it's naughty but he is innocent and he does the same dumb invasion of privacy and straight up creep behaviour but it's not his fault he is innocent you know. Yeah we know. The creep is the one who wrote it, not Goku. We get it. You are "ooh so horny".
All the characters were token predictable characters. I could see how they influenced so many of the characters I loved in other anime throughout the years, but being one of the first or few also means getting a lot of things wrong. Other authors saw some good things, took them, improved them. Kudos on being one of the originals but there is a reason phrase new and improved exists. Worst of the character archetypes that really improved and was done better by hundreds of different authors now is the pervert character archetype. We have 3 in this show. The middle aged unattractive perv who we should be grossed out with, the younger attractive perv who we are supposed to root for since he is hot or something, and the old dude perv who is just having fun supposedly (let him have his fun before he dies). As a connoisseur of perverts everywhere those 3 dissapoint me. The ecchi should be fun & consensual. And when it's not we should see the characters get punished for their misbehaviour to uphold social norms or whatever. Anyway ecchi is always better when both sides are perving on each other OR the other side doesn't mind the perving just never reciprocates OR we see the non-consensual perv get his OR it's just in jest so no one takes it seriously. Gotta be one of the 4 and best if all 4 are included for a well rounded pervy character. We get heavily leaning on non-consensual perv who is presented as doing it just in jest and thus no one takes it seriously. There some slaps on the wrist and that's about all we get. The only one we really get to see who gets hurt for perviness is Oolong. And I gotta say the others are on his level but get away with it which makes me kinda sad for Oolong. At least stand your ground on your opinion of perverts. Don't crucify some and protect the others. He deserves equal treatment. And if you think I droned on a lot on proper use and characterization of perviness that's because it's a large part of the show, so I can't without good conscience review it without reviewing how they do on this front.
So due to this and many other issues (among which are inconsistencies in storytelling and the feeling that consequences don't matter ever) I still couldn't enjoy the show. As I said this anime is cross between a fanservice softcore porn for middle aged straight men and adventure tale for all them kiddies of ages around 5. Although honestly due to how it comes off instead of a perfect fusion we get some parts as if they were softcore porn written for 5 year olds or adventures written for those with middle aged crisis. It's a horrifying combo. I have seen it done and I have seen it done well. They must have looked at Dragon Ball, noted everything it has done wrong and fixed it, while making all new problems of their own. And that's ok. Dragon Ball should forever go down in history as work that inspired so many others and for this I appreciate it. But just as you don't go back to a horse-drawn carriage after you gain access to a car, you probably would not be able to enjoy this as I haven't. Leave that to those who have the luck of growing up with it and being given the wonderful ability to look at it through the rose-colored glasses of sentimentality and nostalgia. To a new viewer who already experienced the new and improved models of the many things introduced here it feels like a huge step back. Makes all the ugly things look uglier and all the good things become tarnished by the ugly. Still maybe you are one of those rare people who will enjoy this anyway. Just as there are people who still enjoy black and white silent films.
I didn't enjoy it. I tried, failed, tried again and now can firmly say that not only have I not found who I want to cosplay from this series I am actually not sure I even want to anymore. And I wouldn't recommend this to anyone who has watched a large number of newer anime, because you are likely to run into the same problems as me and 153 episodes is a huge commitment. Just trust me when I say that this is basically the grandpa of the anime you watched. But I am inspired now to see the sequels. I wonder how much they improved on the original and how much the curse of sequels plagues them. I wonder if I might like them better. And I do appreciate it as piece of anime history it is. I disliked it, but respect what it has done and the fact that it inspired a lot of stuff that I absolutely love to bits today. So this review is sort of a thank you letter.
