Anime

This Week in Anime: Dragon Ball Kai

Posted on April 6, 2009 by Kary Brown   |   Comments

15Ahh, Dragon Ball Z, the quintessential Shonen experience. I have a special place in my heart for this show, as it is what got me into anime. That being said, I have mixed feelings about Dragon Ball Kai.

The opening and closing animations are quite splendid. They are reminiscent of the Jump Special that was released back in December. Dragon Ball in HD is stunning…

…then the actual show started airing…

I admit that the actual quality isn’t that bad for a show that is knocking on 20 years.  It has actually held up pretty well. But some genius decided to redraw certain scenes of the animation. And, quite frankly, they stick out like a sore thumb. Actually, I think it would be more appropriate to say that they stick out like a healthy thumb on a sore hand.

It all seems a bit too jarring and it just makes me a bit upset. They spent who knows how much money making new opening and closing animation, redrawing certain scenes, re-recording all of the voices, and re-framing their Funimation-esque cropping frame-by-frame. Why not go the extra mile (or rather, the extra three feet) and reanimate the whole thing? I will say that the overall video quality of DBZ improves as it goes on, so maybe this will become less of an issue. But, I honestly doubt that the redrawn scenes will stop punching me in the face with their sexiness.

As far as the episode content, it starts with a summary that begins with Freeza killing off Bardock (and the rest of those pesky saiyans) and ends with Chi-chi and Goku getting married. The show then picks up with Gohan/Goku and we soon see our old friend farmer-with-a-shotgun. They didn’t try to pack too  much into the first episode, which ends shortly after Raditz introduces Krillin to his tail.

I certainly don’t have a problem with them cutting filler out, but they also cut some canonical material out as well. I’m also not impresed that they decided not to bring Hironobu Kageyama back for the theme song. IT’S NOT DBZ DBK WITHOUT KAGEYAMA!!! The new one sounds nice, but it just seems like a ripoff of Dan Dan Kokoro Hikareteku (GT’s first opening). Listen closely to the chants and whatnot and you will hear it too.


I will definitely be watching every episode, and I will enjoy it, but I’m just a tad bit dissapointed. They weren’t as lazy as Funimation, but lazy nonetheless. This could have been the second coming!

  • http://www.wudanbal.com Clarence Brown

    intro looks frakkin awesome… imma try to get my hands on some eps

  • earl4321

    The second comming??? Hardly…I like me some DBZ just as much as the next guy, but it IS just a shonen. Way to show your true “fanboy” colors, Kary. No amount of effort could have been put into this to make it any more or less revelent than it already is. If you think pouring millions into animating, the whole thing would somehow transform it into more than a shonen anime you are sorely mistaken.

    …Cartoons = SERIOUS BUISINESS!!!!

  • http://karybrown.com Kary Brown

    Wow, way to be over dramatic…

    If you think that redoing DBZ in high definition is irrelevant then nothing I say will convince you otherwise. Your mind is apparently made up. If it’s one thing I hate more than a fanboy it’s an anime snob…

    Wait…it’s still cool to hate on DBZ? That’s so early 2000′s…

  • http://karybrown.com Kary Brown

    And…for your information… 70% of an anime budget is usually used for the opening and closing credits.

    WRITE AN ARTICLE FOR A CHANGE INSTEAD OF PICKING SOMEONE ELSE’S APART! :P

  • http://www.ceezsa.com Carl Minor

    Oh come on. It cannot cost that much to re-animate Dragon Ball Z. There were only like a total of 53 pictures per episode. Many were just looped or frozen then zoomed in on and the camera would then pan left, right, up, or down or some combination of that. Ha ha. I love DBZ. The quality of those scenes are awesome. Looking forward to more. Atari needs this. Only their DBZ games sells. Everyone knows how bad Alone in the Dark did. He He

  • earl4321

    Umm…sorry to disappoint you, Carl. Anime is NOT cheap to produce. I don’t have actual numbers, but to put it in a bit of perspective, you should know that Cowboy Bebop cost 20 MILLION yen per episode. That’s about 200,000 dollars. Now, take into account that this was made back in 1998! So, with the inflation that same production would be even more today! Cowboy Bebop was ONLY 26 episodes! See where I’m going? Now, granted it was produced by Sunrise (Code Geass SUZAKU KICK!), but still! 26 episodes at 200 G’s a pop? How many episodes did the ORIGINAL DBZ have? 291?!?!? So, if you are gonna reanimate the whole 100 or so episodes, how much do you think that would cost in 2009???

  • http://karybrown.com Kary Brown

    Yeah, aaron, that’s TOTAL production costs, not just the animation. Keep that in mind. I bet you that Toei is already spending at least that much per episode. Toei Singapore is already going through the show frame by frame, reframing the shots. It couldn’t cost THAT much more for them to go all the way.

    Yes animation production is not cheap but it is more than drawing pictures…You have to write/adapt, record voices, compose music, AND animate. Toei is doing ALMOST all of these things again for Dragon Ball Kai because it is only supposed to run about 100 or so eps. And I am sure there is much more to it than that.

    In fact, animators are paid very little. Here’s an article on anime production costs: http://www.animenation.net/blog/2005/06/27/ask-john-how-much-does-anime-cost-to-produce/

    And…please stop with the flaming…this isn’t Kotaku. >.>;;

  • earl4321

    I was flaming? Okay!…you’re the boss. Seriously, there is no such thing as being lazy when it comes to this stuff, Kary! It’s all about being cost effective. If they really felt like it wouldn’t have cost that much to reanimate the whole thing vs. the profits they thought they would make, don’t you think they would have done so? This IS a buisiness after all. KOEI wants your money with having to spend the least amount possible on their end. You cut out the big piece (reanimation) and stick rerecording and reframing on a shiny HD package! They know the fans will buy it reanimated or not…

    But, let me go back to being inactive and missing podcasts…

    …I’m a pro at that…

  • http://www.wudanbal.com Clarence Brown

    People, people…. I can tell DBZ really strikes a chord…

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