It can’t be argued that Dragonball is one of the best anime and manga series ever developed for over a decade. It was one thing we’ve learned to love and grow up with complete fascination, all thanks to Akira Toriyama, the person responsible for Goku, ChiChi, Bulma, Master Roshi and the rest of the DB character’s existence. He is a pure genius and a brilliant manga artist. Nevertheless, despite its phenomenal success worldwide as a manga and an anime series, its live-action adaptations could never live up to the fans expectations. The live – action adaptations were complete failures, especially the recent release Dragonball Evolution. It’s absolutely insulting and full of crap.

Dragon Ball: The Magic Begins (1989)

Now, this was the first ever Dragon Ball live action adaptation I’ve ever seen. I was really young then when it was aired on Philippine television via ABS-CBN, if I’m not mistaken it was one of their Sunday night special featured film. I had fun watching it as far as I could remember, ‘twas because the frivolous special effect was able to fascinate a kid like me.

Dragon Ball: The Magic Begins is believed to be an unofficial Chinese live-action remake of the Legend of Shenlong, the first Dragon Ball feature film. It was unendorsed because Akira Toriyama didn’t approve of this one. Instead, the characters were renamed, different from the names of the characters created by Akira Toriyama. Goku here was named “Monkey Boy”, Bulma was named ”Seetoe”, Grandpa Gohan was named ”Sparkle”, Oolong was named ”Piggy”, Yamcha was named ”Westwood” and Master Roshi was named ”Turtle Man”.

The story initialized when King Horn tried to get his hands on the seven dragon pearls. He was able to conquer a village that possessed one of the dragon pearls, his men killed all the villagers and he killed the village chief with his vicious power. Monkey Boy and his Grandpa owned the four star Dragon Pearl while Seetoe have the other one. Seetoe met Monkey Boy on her way to find the other Dragon Pearl. Monkey Boy thought of her as an enemy since he couldn’t recognize her. He has never seen a girl before and meeting Seetoe is like meeting an alien for most normal people.

Sparkle was held captive by King Horn and their Dragon Ball were taken from them, Monkey Boy together with Seetoe went to search for Turtle Man with the help of Piggy, an unusual person who has strange funny imitating power. Westwood overheard their conversation, he was defeated earlier by Monkey Boy because of Seetoe, and he has a strange phobia with women. Westwood have the other Dragon Pearl and after learning the power of the seven Dragon Pearls, he wishes to get his hands on them and fulfill his ultimate wish that is to have the courage to face women like a real man should.

The group went to seek for Turtle man’s aid upon obtaining the power of the dragon pearls. Together they tried to defeat King Horn and his armies and at last gathered all the seven Dragon Pearls. A girl by the name of Jade, daughter of the village chief were the one who made a wish on the Dragon God. She had wished for the restoration and peace of her village and it was granted right away. Monkey Boy was able to reunite with his Grandpa and the world is now safe from King Horn’s invasion.

Dragon Ball: The Magic Begins was written for screenplay by Jackie Lam, based on the original story by Akira Toriyama and directed by Joe Chan.

DragonBall Evolution (2009)

Dragon Ball Evolution was bombarded with negative criticisms from fans all over the world, which counts me in. It was pure crap, nothing more and nothing less. It was believed to have a sum of $100,000,000 budget, that huge amount should’ve been donated to a charity instead of producing wasteful project such as Dragonball Evolution. I was really disappointed, first two minutes or even less gives me an impression that I’m watching another s*@t anime-movie Hollywood adaptation. My excitements were all gone, just untainted aggravations. I can’t even find something within the entire film that justifies the said $100,000,000 budget. The story and characters weren’t even close to the anime and manga series.

Probably there are at least 2.5% people or less who have watched it which are not a DB anime and manga fans will somehow find it amusing. One of them is my former office colleague; she was the one who told me about this new Dragon Ball movie. In all honesty, Dragonball Evolution is a total joke. One thing is for sure, Goku didn’t went to high school and to top it all, he wasn’t even interested in girls not even when he met ChiChi for the very first time.

The movie somehow circles around the Piccolo Saga wherein Piccolo tries to gather all the seven dragon balls to rule over the universe. Goku, Bulma, Yamcha and Master Roshi endeavor to defeat him at all cost. Of course Piccolo was defeated and Shenron appear in the end to grant another wish. I have nothing much to narrate about this petty movie, except that Goku and ChiChi’s love story were emphasized with too much exaggeration.

Dragon Ball: The Magic Begins vs DragonBall Evolution

If I were going to compare Dragon Ball: The Magic Begins with DragonBall Evolution, I would go for the Chinese version, minus the special effects, I think Dragon Ball: The Magic Begins is a lot better than that of the DragonBall Evolution. The Chinese version got better style and fighting stunts, which the Hollywood version could never compete with.

In Dragonball Evolution, Goku were able to turn into a gorilla or something, they could’ve at least starred King Kong for that part, to be able to emphasize the great monster from Planet Vegeta. Damn, another disappointment! Are they serious about its budget? At least on the Chinese version Master Roshi as Turtle Man is acting like the character we love on the anime and manga series, the perverted turtle-like martial arts master. In Dragonball Evolution I couldn’t recognized which one is which on the anime and manga series. If they were renamed like the characters on the Chinese version, I’d probably get lost somewhere and mistaken it as another stupid piece. Good thing, they were using the names of the original characters. Tsk! Tsk! Tsk!

What can I say about the plans for a trilogy on Dragonball Evolution? Oh, no, enough! Forget about it! I had enough! For the love of God, please, it’s no fun anymore!

Photos courtesy of IGN.com and Google

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