Back in October, I wrote a little piece on the leaked trailer for Dragonball (now re-named Dragonball Evolution) and in it I basically talked about how terrible the teaser looked. I was clearly not the only one who thought this and after 91 comments and some feuding, Screen Rant Master Vic had to shut down the thread to simmer things down.
|
|
In defense of the movie (at that time), that trailer was very early and not complete in terms of post-production. Today however, we have the first official trailer for the upcoming live-action adaptation of the hit Manga series and it still sucks… maybe even more than the first teaser.
From this trailer, the characters and costumes look ridiculous (especially the secondary characters), the fight choreography looks awful and the dialogue and cinematography has B-movie or worse written all over it. Not to mention the terrible use of slow motion in some of the action sequences.
Don’t believe me? Watch and see:
Now, re-watch it while trying to put aside the special effects (which are 95% of it) and focus on what’s actually happening, especially the dialogue and acting. They are burying this in heavy visual and sound effects.
It looks like they’re trying so hard to take and use cool styles from other films but this movie doesn’t have that kind of ‘cool’ and using those techniques in the wrong places with poor execution really makes this feel over-the-top but in a bad way.
What I’m seeing from the trailer and images of this film give me the exact same feeling as Catwoman and Elektra did – both of which are both on my list of worst movies ever.
Some stories simply cannot be translated to the big screen. Have you seen the characters from Dragonball Z or its action sequences? It’s not even remotely human. The show was super popular and many people I know really dug it but I don’t think it makes for a live-action version, especially if it’s supposed to be faithful to the cartoon. Even if it’s not, the extreme nature, extreme style and crazyness that was Dragonball Z (for example) can’t be done in reality because it’s so far from reality that it looks stupid when they try to imitate with real people. The styles are simply too different.
Even the characters saying the word “dragonball” while holding a literal glowing ball sounds and looks like cheese in live-action. And that scene with that vehicle transforming while Justin Chatwin (playing Goku) says “cool” is really awesome too… Not.
I can’t tell if this is made solely for the fans of old (not me) and the young audiences or if the fans of the series’ will hate this and Fox is actually targeting more of a mainstream audience.
I don’t know if the movie will actually be as bad as I think this trailer is because I know Dragonball isn’t my thing regardless -- but I expect pretty weak box-office earnings and I know I will not see it at the theater. Like I said in my first article, it might be a fun rental. I would love to know what fans of the cartoons think of this. Do you think it can be done well in live-action? Does this meet your expectations? And for those who don’t know much about Dragonball or simply may not have fancied the cartoons, will you see this flick?
Dragonball Evolution stars Justin Chatwin, James Marsters and Chow Yun-Fat and comes out April 8, 2009.
Loading ...
178 Comments
I really don’t think they should be making the movie like this. it can definitely work as a live action piece, but it HAS TO be done by the right people
I have to agree with Kaypain about Marsters. He’s going to kick butt in this role.
did anybody catch James Marsters voice over on smallville a few weeks ago? That was just awesome
The movie is completely different from Dragonball from what I’ve seen. Sure it has the same characters but thats where it ends…and even they aren’t true to the source material for the most part. I’m not a Dragonball fan but I was eager to see this movie as Dragonball was one of my joys growing up so I am familar with the series and this just isn’t it. I’d be fine with the movie if it evolved into something more plausable and entertaining but really, it doesn’t seem to do so…so why switch one absurd story for another? I just don’t get it. I’m disappointed but will probably end up seeing it regardless as well… I like to experience nostalgia from time to time.
I’m a fan of DB/DBZ and I enjoyed the trailer. Getting a X-Men 1 type vibe. All the changes I see are no different are no different than a 6′3 Wolverine or organic web shooters. Those complaining about the weird Dragonball Origin story should look up Episode 33 part 2 of the original Dragonball series on youtube. In it Roshi tells a tale similar to Roshi’s voice over of the trailer that does not mention the Namekiam origins. So either he made it up or it was just a legend he heard. I have no doubt that the Namekiam origins will be revealed in the sequel (if we get one..) much like how DBZ expanded on the Dragonball origns of Dragonball. Anyways this movie is right up there in my hype meter along Wolverine: Origins and Watchmen. Obviously it won’t be Dark Knight good, but should be at least good popcorn fun!
P.S. James Marster’s Piccolo antenna or not looks and sounds awesome!
If they can make a film about talking cars that transforms into robots,they can make dragon ball,the right way.ever seen the movie 300? when the boy was training out in the wilderness and he had to fight the wolf?slap on some untamed hair and a tail,what have you got?kid goku from dragon ball.u know what im sayin it takes vision.
Fanboys and non-fanboy don’t know what the hell their talking about.
i think this movie looks like crap…
But maybe not for the same reason as you all.
All the characters look way to serious.
when for example Goku who is suppose to be cheerful and lighthearted, looks like hes got a broom stuck in his a-hole.
and roshi whos suppose to be a super perverted bald old man(but great none the less) looks way to serious.
(Chow Yun-Fat is a good actor but not that amazing that he could save an entire movie with just his name)
From what i saw none of the actors(characters) have a dragonball feeling to them.
It looks as if the producer took the first guy who could remember the lines and spiked his hair(sort of) dressed him up in a orange dogi(the pyjama thingy) and said he was goku…
so to me this is just a sorry excuse for a lame scifi/martial-arts/fantasy movie with cheap special fx and a dragonball label on it.
What can you expect from a hollywood remake 90% of the time its crap… sigh
But only after i see this movie will know if i was wright or wrong.until then this movie is crap to me (-.-)
oh forgot to add
Since when those goku says he cant do it
thats just killing the very essence of the character who never let the odds that are against him make him give up.
And say he cant do it.
Hmmm looks silly as hell. Like one of those straight to video LOTR ripoffs had a baby with the new Speed Racer flick. Or any number of old Jet Li flicks.
Question:Why the hell did they cast a silly looking white guy in the roll of Goku(sp?) when the fanbase for this stuff is primarily asian. I know that the character looks vague (could be white,asian, latino, arab,desi whatever you want) but they are going to piss off the base.
Not to mention that they cast just about everyone else as Asian too, especially the hot girls–which judging on the crazyasianmale websites, will piss the base off even more.
I also noticed that they didn’t have the balls to cast Mr. Popo either (lol hehe).
Anyway, this looks like garbage just as much as the anti-american GI JOE crapflick that is coming out in 2009 too.
I think the position you take is perfect because you express that you are not a “die-hard” fan. Therefore you can make a completely un-biased opinion. Myself personally as a DBZ fan, am almost literally physically ill with the film. It in no way captures the essence of what Toriyama sought to present; it’s just like the people who did GT, was it Toei? Either way, they cared more about making money and more “fan-base” (which they already had) instead of the absolute beauty of the story, I apologize if I sound like a freak here, but Hollywood continues to do this with not only DBZ, but most movies in production..it’s no longer about story and performance, it’s just money….A movie like this doesn’t deserve the theatre, but the dollar bin at your local car-wash. I don’t care how much money they throw at it. I will see this movie for what it is, a Hollywood, CGI infested sci-fi flick..not Dragonball
I respect everyones opinions, but you can’t judge a movie by a 1 min clip, trust me hancock taught me that. and personally I thought the trailer looked great, I mean its just a japanese teaser, Im sure when the longer trailer is released I believe it will look more exciting. also there was a comment about the mystics creating the dbs, remember goku didn’t know that kami created them untill after he had killed piccolo.
this movie does not hold true to the important aspects of the db series… and i’m not talking about the actors. whoever thinks this movie has a chance at all– is not a db fan. its that simple
just because a lot of us want to give the movie a chance doesn’t mean we are not db fans. also a lot of us believed that the moment it was announced that there will be a db movie, we knew it wasn’t going to be exactly like the anime. if you think really hard can a live action db movie really look like the anime?
to the people who says that fox cares more about making money than db hardcores, of course they do its called the movie biz, there in it to make money.
Hey Dragonball Z was a great show of course people are going to expect great things from the live action movie. im an up coming actor and this would be a movie that i would love to be in people tell me i would be a great vegeta i have the body and the looks but the truth is that i would never look like the cartoon i would do everything possible to be like him but me being a great DBZ fan i kno it wont be the same. And i think you have to have the actors work out a little more. lol
You should give me a call about that Vegeta Part i will do everything humanly possible to make it come to life i will put heart and soul into the part. give me a call what do you have to lose.
qizaguirre07@yahoo.com
man,anime movies seem to be going through the same thing that super hero movies were going through(anyone remember “nick futy,agent of shield”?)
Maybe one day anime will get it’s sam rami(actually,isn’t steven spielberg susposed to direct a “ghost in the shell”movie?)
@pretty much everyone on this board: agreed. The trailer sucks. As a fan of the shows(from the first Dragon Ball when it hit America to GT) I am appalled at the attempted screen version. I hope they nuke the fridge on this one after the first film(the one good thing from Crystal Skull is that phrase) and get to make movies true to the story in a couple of years, starting with a child named Goku and his grandpa’s quest. Now, I love this site, and have the utmost respect for Vic, but I gotta throw this one out there, as I feel this person sullies my good name by dissing everyone here:
@Oscar: change the gravatar dude-you’re giving me and the captain a bad name.
I think they’ve done a kick aS* job at trying to move this from anime to live action. I respect your views but look at what they had to work from, i’m sure they did try to stay faithfull but thought it looked toooooo crap in a movie, would you have a 10 yr old kid fighting a 7ft green alien, it just wouldn’t look right. as for the dialoge being grade B have u seen the anime cartoon its all shouting and fightin they spk roughly 30 words in the whole episode and thats just before they fight. The trailor looks awesome i know the “evolution” bit is dodgey but they had to go hollywood on us somewhere in the movie i’m glad its the title and not the story. I’m only guessin but james marsters has slipped up a few times givin interviews about the film and it seems they are staying quite close to the king piccolo, piccolo Jr saga.
Overall i think an awesome job has been made with what I’ve seen so far, its only made me want to c it more. as for the guys who h8 the trailor, give it a chance, its 2 mins of a 2 hour film, how many trailors have portrayed a bad film when its been awesome, check out the star wars and matrix ones, and they are sweet films,,,, peace xx
O and @Mikeodude, thats actually not goku, roshi is talkin to when he says’your the only one who can do it’,,, theres sum HD versions floating around and its actually the black guy from ghostbusters character cn’t remember his name now, but its him and not goku.. xx
ok… 1st of all dragonball is suppose to be over the top. have you ever seen the anime Dragonball (not dragonball z) its really freakin crazy. there’s talking animals and a kid with a monkey tail(Goku). dont go to the theatre and expect the movie to be an exact copy of the anime cause its never gonna happen. go see it and look at it as a completly original concept and you might enjoy it. you’ll never like it if you try to compare it to the anime. the story will be diffrent but diffrent isnt always bad. im one of the biggest dragonball and dragonball z fans alive. i am 17 and ive been watching the show since i was 9 so i know the original story and im not going to comare the movies story to the original one and thats why i will enjoy the movie.give it a chance …
I wonder if we’ll glimpse any Red Ribbon Army troops? Very important to the Dragon Ball canon
The trailer wasnt mind blowing but I think it was nice. Its good that some changes were made to try to appeal to the general audiences, because a 100% faithful adaptation would have been imposible. Some things would just look too sily in live action.
I actually give the trailer 7 out of 10. We still have another trailer, which apparently will last 5 minutes or so, to see.
About the mystics creating the Dragon Balls. Early in the DB series, it wasnt really known who created them. For all we know, Roshi in the trailer might just be telling the legend he has heard, but then probably in the second movie it will be revealed the real origin of the Dragon Balls, just like it happened in the anime.
I really hope this movie does well, because the story gets more interesting, deep and epic after Piccolo is defeated.
About the dialogue in DB and DBZ. Some of you are underestimating it, Vegeta´s dialogue in the series was deep and interesting. Thats why Vegeta is actually my favorite character and I hope this movie does well so we can see Vegeta in the sequel.
About the Red Ribbon Army, its really sad that they are not included in this movie. Because they are necessary if they want to make a movie about Cell. Also I liked the Red Ribbon Army saga, was interesting.
just my opinion, don’t want to offend any of the previous comments, i’m a big fan of DB, DBZ and DBGT, watched and collected all the episodes, so wud naturally compare Justin Chatwin with the anime Son Goku, hence i agree with the 1st comment upto some extent as my expectations regarding extreme speed, extreme reflexes and extreme energy is very high. i don’t care about the story too much as DB has always been about beyond imagination and insane action. but i’m still a big fan because of the action. i’m somehow not getting enough encouragement from myself for the movie. i read few comics of DB as well and wud gladly choose the comics instead of the movie provided i need to choose one out of the movie or the comics, of course apart from the evergreen series.
hmm…
I first saw dragon ball when I was….around 8 years old…Here in Mexico, Dragon ball Z is a show it’s been on national tv for around 10 years or more if I’m not mistaken, so the fanbase is pretty large considering even kids right now watch it on a daily basis as it was sponge bob or any nickelodeon/cartoon network cartoon without being aware it’s not age appropiate for them.
Even if I don’t want to I’ll go watch it, and I know fans in a range of 7-30 years old will go watch it too…kids will go..cause they’re kids…..and grownups 20+ like me will go to see what kind of horrible mutilation they’ve done to DB…Even if I hate it I will go, and that’s final.
As a fan I’ll give you my opinion…
Dragon Ball is something you shouldn’t attempt to make a live action…it’s something that can’t be made into a movie everyone will enjoy…
In this case, they’re trying to make it look “cool” for a non-fan audience….
with all those drastic changes I doubt any hardcore fan will accept the script, they changed the main concept making it into something else.
For those who haven’t seen dragon ball, the basics of the series are:
-Goku is a young boy with a pure heart who lives in the paozu mountain with his grandfather Son-Gohan. One night, Goku transforms into a giant monkey by looking at the full moon, and accidentally kills SonGohan. Since then, Goku lives alone with his grandfather’s memento, the 4-star dragon ball. Goku never met another human being besides Gohan, so he is really surprised when Bulma comes to “steal” his grandfather’s memento, claiming she is a….girl???
-Kami-sama(God) is an alien from planet Namek. When he arrived to planet earth, in order to become Kami-sama, he divided himself in pure good and pure evil. His evil side(Piccolo) was sealed away by Roshi’s master Mutaito. Kami-sama created the 7 dragon balls, if gathered, they have the power to summon the great dragon Shen Long, and grant one wish.
-Bulma is the daughter of Mr. Briefs, owner of the Capsule Corp( that practically monopolizes all technology in the world), she is an adventurer who built a radar and started a journey to find the Dragon Balls. She somehow manages to convince Goku to help her in her Quest.
-The red ribbon is a criminal millitarized organization, their ultimate goal is world domination, and for that they are trying the dragon Balls.
-Pilaf is a pathetic dwarvish blue alien who wants the same as the Red Ribbon but on a personal level. His minions are a ninga human-dog and Mai, a ninja-girl…they always use cheap robots to fight.
-Mutenroshi (master Roshi) is the “god” of martial arts. Gohan once told him about the boy he found on a spaceship near home, but he never expected the boy to be so strong.Roshi gives Goku the flying Cloud, as Goku seems able to ride it(only someone with a pure heart can) Eventually he has nothing else to teach him and sends him to train with Master Karin (a cat with a staff….) on Kami-sama’s Tower.
other characters:
Kuririn: Goku’s first rival, and fellow student at Roshi’s. They become best friends.
Yamcha: A very strong young man who joins the quest for the dragon balls. The cool handsome of the series, and Bulma’s love interest.
Chichi: Daughter of gian Oxx-Satan, she falls in love with Goku and asks him to marry her…He accepts thinking marriage is Food…………she returns several years later with a great grudge angainst him and determined to beat him at the Martial arts Tournament.
Ten and Chaos: Master Tsuru’s apprentices (master tsuru is Roshi’s rival, they both were Mutaito’s pupils), they have great powers to the extent of levitating.They too become Goku’s friends.
Majunior (piccolo): Piccolo’s reencarnation-son (strange indeed), he doesn’t want to destroy the world, just to defeat Goku.
See how different??? See how impossible it is to make it a decent live action??
When I saw the trailer I had so many mixed feelings I wanted to cry…
This looks like its going to follow the same path as the first final fantasy movie:
going down as one of the worst films of all time on such a popular hit on folks lives
Nerak, good explanation, but one thing. Pilaf wasnt an alien, he was just a multimillonaire weird little blue guy who wanted to become emperor of the world. But he was dumb and stupid and always failed.
Although the basics of the series are here.
Ill copy and paste what a user from another site named “kaypain” wrote. I agree with that he says regarding the fact that both the movie and the series keep the basic things:
————————-
Kaypain:
The story has basic plot points. And in my opinion those basic plot points are in the movie, some altered, some a little same. These include:
Piccolo’s airship: he’s floating over the Earth, blowing up cities… just like in the anime
Goku meet’s Bulma, they join together to search for Dragonballs and find Master Roshi…just like the anime
Grandpa Gohan dies: It’s been interpret that Goku doesn’t kill him, instead Piccolo kills him, either way he still dies.
Yamcha is a desert bandit with explosives and rocket launchers, just like in the anime
Piccolo has henchmen he creates that does his creative work and in my opinion seem more bad ass than Green Reptiles named after musical istruments
Mai is Piccolo’s assistant, even tho her role is more defined than in the anime, it’s still bad ass, I think we can expect some sick s*** from Ekiro
Goku searches for Dragonballs – the most blatant, easy plot point to adapt
Martial Arts tournament with potential of many cameos from the Anime, though the stadium is very different from what we seen. But remember the Expo trailer where Chi Chi is jumping up kicking the guy in the head, she was wearing her tournament clothing and the guy she was kicking was wearing something similar to Crane’s gi. But also that scene was outside, so maybe the tournament is outdoors after all
Goku and Piccolo probably squares off twice, first time Goku getting the crap beaten out of him…just like in the anime
Roshi performs Mafuba and probably dies
Shenron is in the movie
They kept the shape shifting in the movie also, but instead of a communist parody pig and flying puar they gave it to Mai, pretty neat in my opinion
The movie looks cheesy as hell, and correct me if I’m wrong, but Dragonball is a cheesy ass Anime
The highschool scenes are not a problem to me anymore and yes I know Goku never went, but think about, how funny would it be to see him in highschool, it will be hilarious, I look at it as a “what if”, and we can’t deny the highschool will be comical, with Stephen Chow influence into it.
Oozaru is in the movie, it’s a little different than the anime, but hey at least they didn’t completely leave it out, I don’t blame people for bashing the decision, you either accept it or not.
I’m done labeling people haters, and I think haters should be done labeling the ones who accept the movies as non fans, idiots, or etc…
I had an epiphany, and that’s you don’t get everything you want in life, you either accept it or move on or both, and I’m accepting it…also moving on
What's your opinion? Leave a Reply!
Go to Gravatar.com and upload your own (we'll wait)!