Dragon Ball will forever be one of best known piece of classic anime out there. For many, it was one of the first of the genre they’d ever seen, leaving a heavy impact on what would catch their eye in the future. Because so many of us first saw the series when we were children, we were much more forgiving of its mistakes. In fact, there were times when Dragon Ball stopped making sense altogether. This is a problem that hits a number of anime but with a series that was originally meant to be a comedy, it shows that much more easily when the pieces don’t quite come together properly.
Yes, despite its status, there have been plenty of times where Dragon Ball hasn’t made sense. I’m not talking about things that were lost in translation either. I’m talking about flaws in its storytelling or even its universe that we either let slide or went over our heads completely. Looking back on it, some of them are pretty silly in retrospect but these problems are still coming up to this very day.
Dragon Ball Super has introduced us to all-new sides of the Dragon Ball universe that we never though we’d see and yet even some of those are bit crazy. It’s time to take off those nostalgia glasses and drink down a hard glass of reality folks. Here’s a list of twenty-five times Dragon Ball took us on a no sense ride and we didn’t even pick up on it.
24 The Most Pointless Tournament Ever
Like most people, I think the Cell Saga was pretty awesome. As awesome as it was though, there were some plot points that barely made sense. After absorbing Android 17 and 18, Cell had reached his ultimate form. He was virtually invincible. Instead of simply fighting and defeating each of the Z warriors on the spot, he decides to set up this completely arbitrary tournament known as the Cell Games.
It’s called a tournament, but that word really doesn’t describe it.
Everyone is fighting against Cell…just as they were going to do before. The announcement of the Cell Games was really nothing more than a way to build fake tension for the series. Oh, it also gave the main characters just enough time to get strong enough to win against Cell. Smart plan.
23 The Road To Ultra Instinct
If you’ve been watching the latest Dragon Ball series, you’ve likely already seen Goku’s latest transformation, Ultra Instinct. It’s a cool form that’s gotten fans to shower it with praise, with some even comparing it to Goku’s original Super Saiyan transformation process. The only problem with that is that the way he gets it is kind of dumb. Actually, it’s really dumb.
Fighting against the series latest villain, Jiren, Goku gives it everything he has. He goes through every form up to Super Saiyan Blue and is still unable to land a scratch on this alien foe. Getting beaten to a pulp would have been enough of a reason to unleash Ultra Instinct but instead, he ends up getting hit by his own spirit bomb and straight up passing away. How did he come back? Nobody knows.
22 Friend Or Foe?
Goku’s love of fighting has pushed a lot of Dragon Ball’s plot, but some of it can lead to some wonky storytelling. During Cell’s mostly pointless tournament, Goku goes up against the big man himself and is evenly matched. He decides to forfeit the match and put the spotlight on his timid son, Gohan.
That would’ve been a fine choice if he didn’t then go on to give a senzu bean to Cell!
I can understand wanting to give your child a confidence boost when he’s feeling low, but a tournament where the world is at stake is NOT the time to do it. I guess I can forgive Goku for this one though, seeing as he sacrificed himself against Cell shortly after.
21 The Dimension Travelling Tantrum
The Buu Saga is probably the weirdest of the original Dragon Ball Z arcs. Majin Buu went through so many phases that messed with his already unpredictable character. This also applies to a lot of Buu’s actions as well.
In an attempt to stop Buu, Piccolo guides him into the hyperbolic time chamber for him to fight the newly fused Gotenks. When things start to go south, Piccolo destroys the only door that can let someone in or out of the chamber. After Buu realizes there’s no escape, he does what any super villain would do: he cries. A lot. He cries so much with such force, that he rips open a hole in the hyperbolic time chamber’s dimension, back to earth. What a baby.
20 Super Saiyan Bluer
While Goku was working out all of the kinks in his new Ultra Instinct form, Vegeta was going through his own trials. It felt a lot like Vegeta was primed to follow after Goku, joining him in the world of Ultra Instinct power. He was watching and taking notes on exactly what Goku did. Even Whis made it sound as though Vegeta had figured out a part of it.
Instead of going the route that makes sense however, Vegeta gets shafted with what might be the dumbest powerup ever.
His Super Saiyan Blue form gets…bluer. This form looks as dumb as it sounds, and he still loses even after getting it. I just hope that Super Saiyan Royal Blue isn’t the last form we’ll see Vegeta unlock. It makes sense that Goku would skip this one.
19 Super Saiyan Tailors
There aren’t many good things to talk about when it comes to Dragon Ball GT, but one of the ones I hear about most is Super Saiyan 4.
It’s not really a design I personally find great, but that’s because of one specific flaw. The form grows clothing! When Goku first achieves this form, he was a Oozaru, a giant monkey which always leaves him unclothed by the time he reverts back to normal. When he turns Super Saiyan 4, however, he comes out of it with a brand-new outfit, including new shoes. Vegeta’s transformation is even more strange, granting him skinny jeans with a belt and new gloves. It begs to question, just how are they picking these outfits while doing all that yelling?
18 Vegeta’s Forgiveness
At the start of Dragon Ball Z, Vegeta was one of the most serious villains on the series. He made a lot of people suffer, especially for the main heroes. He was so evil in fact, that the only way we could overlook him was when an even bigger threat was introduced with Frieza. That doesn’t mean he should’ve been forgiven, though.
When Vegeta comes to Earth, he’s almost immediately forgiven by everyone who knew and feared him not long ago.
Everyone starts talking about him as though he’s just grouchy ol’ uncle Vegeta. It’s bizarre. It’s even more bizarre that that people were shocked when Vegeta went on a rampage during the Buu Saga. What did you expect from a guy proudly announcing himself as the prince of such a destructive race?
17 Frieza’s Rise To Power
Frieza will likely always be considered the best villain in all of Dragon Ball. He was ruthless, arrogant, and so easy to hate. It’s no shock that he made a huge impact on the series. While it was a really cool idea to bring Frieza back as a returning threat in Dragon Ball Super, it doesn’t make any real sense. Frieza first appeared during the time when Super Saiyan was nothing but an unseen legend. However, Frieza was practically a joke by the time of the Cell Saga when Trunks wrecked him in minutes. For Frieza to return after Goku achieved godhood seems completely pointless. They tried getting around this by powering up Frieza, but for him to reach the strength of Super Saiyan Blue in a few months? I call shenanigans!
16 Hungry For Candy
Like I mentioned earlier, the Buu Saga was full of weird stuff and even weirder abilities. One of them was Majin Buu’s ability to turn anyone into candy. Honestly though, this could’ve been his only ability. While there’s plenty of strong and cool techniques in Dragon Ball, the ability to turn ANYONE into candy with a laser beam has to be the most powerful ever.
Buu managed to take down just about every opponent he went up against.
But just think about how much faster it would’ve been if he immediately turned them into candy and ate them. Instead of watching Goku turn Super Saiyan 3 and doing nothing afterwards, he could’ve eaten him and become a Super Saiyan 3 himself! Sorry for that weird image.
15 The Dragon Ball Time Paradox
Dragon Ball plays things fast and loose when it comes to time travel. At times, though, it can play things a little too loose.
If you weren’t at all confused during the Cell Saga with Trunks travelling through time along with Cell between at least two separate timelines, The Goku Black Saga will most likely make your head spin. Between each of the jumps through time, along with the alternate universes, it all barely holds itself together. The gods who constantly try to lecture everyone on the dangers of time travel and how forbidden it is don’t help much either. In fact, they’re the ones helping half the time. The surprising part of it all is that Goku is the first character to figure all of these confusing timelines out.
14 The Skipped Transformation
Goku making the jump to Super Saiyan God was large but warranted. We’d watched him train from nothing to being as powerful as gods. It makes sense for a number other Saiyans to pull this off as well but many of them skip a step along the way.
Aside from Goku, just about every Saiyan character completely skips over Super Saiyan 3.
Vegeta leaps straight to Blue just to color coordinate with Goku, and Gohan abandons Super Saiyan altogether. Even Goku pretty much drops the form entirely. In the end, the only character who really gets to make use of the form is Gotenks and for the few times he appeared, he has yet to actually win a proper fight. I suppose nobody likes shaving their eyebrows off each time they transform.
13 Indestructible Trunks
If you thought Frieza’s power creep was too much, you won’t believe how high Trunks climbs in the span of an hour or so. During the Goku Black Saga, Trunks manages to fight on the level of a Super Saiyan God Blue despite not even learning to go Super Saiyan 2.
Trunks does eventually gain this weird blue glowing Super Saiyan form, but that’s never explained or even questioned by any of the other characters. Come to think of it, neither is that spirit bomb sword he randomly creates. With all the power-ups he managed to get while fighting Goku Black, there’s almost a question as to why he even needed Goku’s help in the first place. The fight started and ended with Trunks.
All Goku and Vegeta really did was bring the senzu beans.
12 The Underused Dance
When Goku first brought up the idea of the fusion dance, it was exciting. A totally unique concept that brings two characters together to make a brand-new character with even more techniques. We got our first taste of this with Gotenks and it worked great, but we never saw it again which is a huge letdown.
The fusion dance was almost immediately pushed to the backseat for an even stronger form of fusion using the potara.
It’s a shame, because the fusion dance is convenient enough that it could be used in so many situations. But it’s either disregarded for the potara style or ignored completely. At least we know that the fusion dance hasn’t been completely forgotten though, since it’s all over the Dragon Ball Fusions game.
11 The Useless Gods
When Supreme Kai made his first appearance, he seemed like a powerful new ally. It’s too bad that he’s quickly reduced to a sniveling pile of deity, constantly in fear of just about any villain. This fact is a lot more embarrassing when you realize that the Kais are put in charge of just about everything in the ENTIRE UNIVERSE.
The Kais are supposed to watch over everything and step in when things get out of hand but they never actually do until something seems like a threat to them as well. Where were they when the Saiyans were destroying planets? When Frieza was enslaving races? When androids were destroying the earth? They even let King Kai get blown up without a word.
I guess not all Kai lives matter.
10 New Age Saiyans
There’s a certain image we all then of when imagining a Saiyan. Universe 6 Saiyans are the opposite of this image. They’re scrawny and flat, lacking in any muscle ore even a tail. It’s almost as if someone’s tried drawing Saiyans after their art style changed entirely.
Oh wait, that’s exactly what happened.
Akira Toriyama’s art style has shifted over the years and it’s affected Dragon Ball the most. Characters such as Goku and Vegeta have slimmed down in size with less muscle definition than we’re used to seeing them. Universe 6 Saiyans which are supposed to be parallel to universe 7, look unlike anything we’ve ever seen. They look so different from regular Saiyans, that It actually takes them going Super Saiyan just to get some color back in their mostly pale, single shaded skin.
9 Hercule’s Blind Following
If there’s one thing you can take away from Dragon Ball Z, it’s that everyone on earth is dumb.
After winning a martial arts tournament (through cheating), Hercule is given the title of the strongest man in the world. After being completely clowned by Cell, he tells everyone watching the Cell Games that they’re using special effects to fly and shoot beams from their hands. Nobody, not even the camera crew onsite doubts this for more than a second. In a world with tiger men and dinosaurs, believing that somebody can fly is impossible? No matter how many years go by and how many times the world is almost destroyed, everyone always believes that Hercule is the greatest.
Why, you ask? Because he says so.
8 The King Of Everything?
King Zeno was introduced as the strongest being alive, having created all of the universes and everything in them. That’s literally all we know about him though, aside from the fact that he uses planets like marbles.
King Zeno is a big ball of mysteries that may never be explained.
We don’t know where he came from or why he created so many universes. We don’t even know what he does all day long. The only things we known about King Zeno is that he is bored and when he’s bored, he orders the destruction of a bunch of universes and everyone in them. Oh, we also know that he loves watching people desperately beat each other up in hopes that they’ll get to continue existing.
7 The Worst Side Story Ever
Bardock is an extremely popular character, despite having never appeared in the main canon for more than a few seconds. The movie retelling his past is one of the most epic stories of the series, and really built him up as a cool martyr. How do you follow up on an amazing side story like his? You give him one of the worst ones ever.
In an attempt to make Bardock even cooler, there was an additional story told where instead of perishing in the fight against Frieza, he was sent back in time to an ancient version of planet Vegeta. Adding onto how little sense this already makes, they decide to have him take on an ancestor of Frieza’s, becoming the Super Saiyan of legend in the process. It was just too much, and it cheapened his entire sacrifice. Bad move, Toei.
6 Gohan’s Decline
I know I’m not the only one who was torn up over Gohan’s failure to remain at the top. By the end of the Cell Saga, he was the most powerful character alive. Even after taking a small dip afterwards, he quickly caught up after unlocking his hidden potential. It was all downhill from there but what doesn’t make sense, is just how quickly he fell.
It wasn’t too long after the Buu Saga that Beerus appeared.
So, it makes sense that Gohan might be a little rusty, having not been training at all, but it’s only about a year after that Frieza attacks and suddenly Gohan is so weak that he barely knows how to go Super Saiyan? There was a longer gap between the Cell Saga and Buu Saga, but he managed to get through that. It’s obvious that married life is not treating Gohan’s body well.
5 The Basic Legend
Growing up, there wasn’t a single person I knew who liked Dragon Ball Z that didn’t think Broly was one of the coolest characters ever. As I got older, however, the tower I placed Broly on top of slowly began to crumble.
Broly is basically like a child’s OC Dragon Ball character. He’s a Saiyan with unimaginable power with a form nobody has access to. His backstory is one of the flimsiest things about him. He was born strong so the Saiyans tried to end him but somehow failed, and he hates Goku for crying next to him as a baby. That’s about all there is to it. There’s no good reason for him to be so strong and there’s even less of a reason for him to be so insane. None of that will stop Broly’s creator from claiming that he’s the strongest character ever, do not steal.
