Dragon Ball and Dr. Slump
ドラゴンボール / Dr.スランプ
It’s been one year since Akira Toriyama, the creator of both Dragon Ball and Dr. Slump, passed away. We are huge Dragon Ball (and Dr. Slump) fans as we grew up with Dragon Ball Z on Cartoon Network’s Toonami back in the day, he inspires us to create our own manga and webcomics. In honor of him, we will review both Dragon Ball and Dr. Slump, which I will combine into one whole post since most of the parts are exported from the previous blog on Medium.
First, Dragon Ball:
Dragon Ball was inspired by the Chinese novel Journey to the West and Hong Kong martial arts films. The story follows the adventures of Goku (or “Son Goku”; Masako Nozawa, Japanese; Stephanie Naldony (pre-2010, child), thereafter Colleen Clinkenbeard (post-2010, child); Sean Schemmel, English), from childhood to adulthood, as he trains in martial arts and explores the world in search of the Dragon Balls, seven magical orbs which summon a wish-granting dragon when gathered. Along his journey, Goku makes several friends and battles villains, many of whom also seek the Dragon Balls.
His first friend is Bulma (Hiromi Tsuru (original, deceased), thereafter Aya Hisakawa (current), Japanese; Tiffany Vollmer (original, retired), thereafter Monica Rial (current), English), who first appeared as a teenager using the Dragon Radar, a fictional device she created to detect the energy signal emitted by Dragon Balls. She is led to Goku’s location by the signal emitted by the four-star ball in his possession and recruits him as a bodyguard while hoping to get his four-star ball to grant her wish for a boyfriend. She gives up on the wish after meeting Yamcha, and much later in the series, she marries Vegeta. Then we get Krillin (Mayumi Tanaka, Japanese; Laurie Steele, English (child); Sonny Strait, English), a bald martial artist and one of Goku’s best friends and classmates. He and Goku are under the tutelage of Kame-Sennin/Master Roshi (Kohei Miyauchi (original, deceased), thereafter Joji Yanami (deceased), thereafter Hiroshi Masuoka (deceased), thereafter Masaharu Sato (current), Japanese; Mike McFarland, English), initially his rival but later a friend and a loyal companion in adventures thereafter. I could go on for more characters on this Substack post since the cast is massive, but you can use this Wikipedia link.
I also had DBZ Budokai (including the second and third games), Budokai Tenkaichi (first and second games only) on the PlayStation 2, and Dragon Ball Raging Blast (PlayStation 3). Kenji Yamamoto, the composer and arranger who worked on various Dragon Ball video games, was known for plagiarism in his compositions by Toei Animation, and many of his musical works for the series infringed upon unidentified third-party copyrights, most notably “Hunting High and Low” by Stratovarius. The plagiarism of these works has been known to fans since May 2010. Toei Animation fired him and replaced his compositions with those from the original Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z series written by Shunsuke Kikuchi.
Next, Dr. Slump:
Dr. Slump, which was serialized in Shueisha’s shōnen manga magazine Weekly Shōnen Jump from 1980 to 1984, follows the humorous adventures of the little girl robot Arale Norimaki (Mami Koyama, thereafter Taeko Kawata in the reboot in Japanese; Linda Young, thereafter Brina Palencia in Dragon Ball Super in English, pictured above), her creator Senbei Norimaki (the late Kenji Utsumi, thereafter Yusaku Yara in Dragon Ball Super in Japanese; Brice Armstrong, thereafter Robert Bruce Elliott (though often credited as “R. Bruce Elliott”) in Dragon Ball Super in English), and the other residents of the bizarre Penguin Village (“Penguin Miura”). However, she turns out to be in severe need of eyeglasses. She is also very naïve, and in later issues, she has adventures such as bringing a huge bear home, having mistaken it for a pet. To Senbei’s credit, she does have super-strength. The manga generally focuses on Arale’s misunderstandings of humanity and Senbei’s inventions, rivalries, and romantic misadventures. In the middle of the series, a recurring villain named Dr. Mashirito appears as a rival to Senbei.
Dr. Slump is filled with puns, toilet humor, and parodies of both Japanese and American culture. For example, one of the recurring characters is Suppaman, a short, fat, pompous buffoon who changes into a Superman-like alter-ego by eating a sour-tasting (“suppai” in Japanese) umeboshi. Unlike Superman, Suppaman cannot fly and instead pretends to fly by lying belly down on a skateboard and scooting through the streets. Also, one of the village’s policemen wears a Star Wars-style stormtrooper helmet, just as in the American movies. Toriyama himself has been portrayed as a bird (the “tori” in his last name means “bird”, hence the name of his production studio Bird Studio), although it has been suggested (by himself even) that he actually based the design of Senbei on himself.
Arale also appears in some episodes of the Dragon Ball anime series and Dragon Ball Super. She is also playable in several Dragon Ball video games, including Dragon Ball Z: Budokai Tenkaichi 3 (I only had the first and second Tenkaichi, both of which I didn’t own, but not a third one, which is very rare and sold at higher prices on eBay), Dragon Ball: Revenge of King Piccolo, and Dragon Ball: Origins 2, and makes a non-playable appearance in Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot.
Thanks very much, Toriyama-sensei, for giving us inspiration on how to draw manga and post our artwork on the internet and inspiring us to make our own stories.