Wow. This movie was really, really bad. Don’t waste your money on it.
I’ll start off by saying that after the brief battle with Grandpa Gohan, Goku whines about not being popular. Goku does not want to be taught to be able to fight. He just wants to be taught to be like everyone else and he specifically asks to be taught “how to get the girl”. There is a lengthy bunch of school scenes filled with Goku being called Geeko by bullies and a silly daydream about Chi Chi eating strawberries before the ever-so-cliche interruption of the teacher getting Goku to say something that sounds stupid to embarrass him in front of the class.
Remember all the hype from James Marsters talking about how deep Piccolo’s character will be? Well it turns out he’s barely ever in the movie for more than a couple of random one-minute segments that are supposed to build up to the ending…Wong totally fails at this as he could have used this time to explain Piccolo’s motivations. Instead he shows Piccolo taking a Dragon Ball in a lake and he and Mai killing about two people. He also takes the time to tell that he was trapped in a jar by the Mafuba for 2000 years. Roshi ‘helped’ with the story explaining that Piccolo invaded Earth with Oozaru 2000 years ago. Why? Is it because he’s the evil half of a Namek? No. In this movie, that good half (Kami) does not exist. Piccolo is just an alien who randomly appeared on Earth and for no reason wants to destroy and then rule it. But who would there be to rule? Mai, I guess.
Speaking of which. Mai’s character is not developed either aside from her walking into a poor village with a woman and a girl that has the same hair style as Mai. They all speak Japanese (including Mai) in this scene. Nothing else is hinted at in this scene for Mai’s origins. But you don’t really ever end up caring anyway.
Wong then takes the time to show more of how this iteration of Goku is the complete opposite of the one we all know of in the manga/anime. Goku shows off to Chi Chi by blasting open her locker when it gets stuck and suddenly Chi Chi becomes attracted to him? Why? Because he can use ki I guess.
Wong again shows another opposite of what Goku should be by having Goku sneak out of his house to show off to Chi Chi at her party. Let’s not forget to mention that Goku is skipping out on his birthday celebration with his grandfather and a big delicious, meal that includes cake. Hmm…I seem to recall Goku marrying Chi Chi in the manga/anime because he thought marriage was a type of food. I guess Wong decided to throw out that part of Goku’s character as well.
So now Goku makes Chi Chi even more attracted to him by getting into a fight with Fuller and his goons and subsequently making them miss him and hit each other Why did Goku never swing at them once before or even in this fight? Because he is not allowed to fight. No reason is given here either other than it was flagrantly ripped off the Superman movie. Goku reveals to Chi Chi he knows nothing about his past or parents but that his grandfather would tell him. So he’s been waiting all his life to find out who he is and on the day he is supposed to find out, he runs off. Goku skips a delicious meal and the story of his origins to show off to Chi Chi. This guy must be desperate for a girlfriend…yeah ‘this guy’ because that’s not Goku.
So after Piccolo conveniently takes out Gohan while Goku’s at the part, Goku senses something wrong and runs home…at the pace of a normal human I might add. Here’s another extremely stupid part. Goku buries his murdered grandfather in his backyard. I could understand this is if this was the same Goku as the one in the manga who grew up away from civilization and the laws set forth, but this Goku grows up around normal people, goes to school, knows how to read, write, do math, knows the laws, etc. So the fact that he buries Grandpa Gohan in his back yard of all places is just ridiculous.
Queue Bulma’s random appearance and let me tell you, this scene in particular has some of the worst acting I’ve ever seen. The annoying voice Rossum came up with for her character is annoying very distracting. Here comes another opposite. Goku suggests to Bulma that they go on a quest for the Dragon Balls citing to a reluctant Bulma that she may need backup whereas in the original story it was the other way around. So if Bulma suggested this would it make her seem like a weak female character? Who knows!? laugh Oh, and let’s not forget Bulma and Goku coming up with the name for her Dragon Ball Energy Locating device or DBE (get it?!) I’m sure James Wong didn’t think you would get the ‘joke’ if Bulma didn’t literally spell it out for you and say ‘…catchy!’.
We are then put through more bad acting featuring the introduction of Chow Yun Fat as Roshi. Fat tries to be funny, but ends up acting as ridiculous and poorly as Arnold Schwarzenegger when he played Mr. Freeze in Batman & Robin. The fighting which was a flagrant ripoff of The Matrix and Spider-Man in these scenes didn’t help with originality, which this movie completely lacks.
What is very annoying is the fact that Piccolo has this advanced airship yet manages to quickly fall behind in his search for the Dragon Balls.
Anyway, the film then establishes through Roshi that ki is nothing more than airbending. So instead of making the ki light-like energy, Wong goes the way of Avatar - The Last Airbender. Why? Who knows? It doesn’t look like Wong or Fox actually like any of Dragon Ball though.
The next poorly-done scenes we come across feature Piccolo and Mai using Piccolo’s blood to create rock-like monsters, much like Ivan Ooze’s goons from the Power Rangers movie. The group then meets up with Yamcha the bandit, who in this movie for some reason has no idea how to fight even though the character of Yamcha has been established as one of the Earth’s strongest/fastest fighters in the anime. After some drilling, the group somehow ends up in the middle of a giant volcanic area. Here they meet up with Piccolo’s rock-monsters and a Power Rangers fight scene occurs against the monsters who regenerate in poorly-done CGI. I mean this CGI is the kind of trash you’d see on a Sci-Fi channel movie.
The one thing that is quasi-DB inspired is when “Goku” beats up Mai (actually the only people Goku beats up besides Piccolo are women). Mai kicks him in the face and it just moves the skin on his cheek but does nothing to hurt him. Unfortunately, the fact that Goku is played by and represented as a whiny wimp like Chatwin fails to make it look believable. Goku never questions why Mai is at the volcano and doesn’t even bother to mention her appearance to the rest of the group
Another thing that was pointless was Yamcha and Bulma’s ‘relationship’. They liked each other in the manga because their was a comical build up to it. In the movie, they had about a minute of screen-time together before they tried to make out with each other. Why? Because Bulma likes bad-boys. So it’s basically a rushed version of the Han Solo/Princess Lea relationship, but poorly done.
This next part is just sickening because it basically involves James Wong taking a dump on the character of Goku. Goku is supposed to learn how to perform the kamehameha to light the torches. Roshi again stresses that the kamehameha is an air-bending technique, does the movements all wrong, then goes to bed. Goku for some reason cannot pull it off in the slightest, so he actually tries to CHEAT by using a lit candle to light the torch. Okay, when did Goku ever try to cheat during his training? He always wanted to get stronger. Anyway, Chi Chi catches him trying to cheat, and Goku complains in a whiny manner of why it’s so hard to perform a kamehameha, so Chi Chi gives Goku a flirtatious incentive to light the torches. To this, Goku is suddenly able to light all the torches with ease except for the last one where Chi Chi teaches Goku to perform the move his own way. After that, Chi Chi just can’t resist and she and Goku make out.
So then what happens is that poorly-done Chi Chi vs. Mai fight scene that we’ve all seen released awhile ago. The gun Goku is shot with doesn’t just knock him unconscious, it nearly kills him. Queue a foggy ripoff scene of Peter Parker having a chat with Uncle Ben, except it’s Goku and Grandpa Gohan. Oh, and Roshi uses the kamehameha (which translates in English to turtle DESTRUCTION wave) to heal Goku. Obviously, Wong did not do his research in this area.
The plot then rushes to the climax that involves Piccolo getting rattled by Yamcha’s flying truck that is again a ripoff of the flying Delorean from Back to the Future. What follows is a very poorly-done scene and explanation of Piccolo and Goku’s past. Marsters tried to hype up Piccolo, but he was barely in the movie at all. He had no motivation for why he was trying to destroy Earth. He wasn’t the evil part of another Namek like he was in the manga/anime, he was just an alien who randomly tried to conquer Earth for NO reason whatsoever. Even more confusing is his story about Oozaru. He says to Goku that Goku is the Oozaru who he tried to conquer Earth with 2000 years prior before Piccolo was trapped by the Mafuba. He also tells Goku that Goku came to Earth on a meteor and hid amongst the humans until his 18th birthday. He then said and I quote “You WORKED for me!”. So how did an 18 year-old work for someone 1,982 years before he was born? James Wong is an idiot!
The CGI for the Oozaru transformations was really poorly done. The camera kept cutting so they could skip on you seeing the transformation. The Oozaru ended up being about the size of a small bear and even kills Roshi in yet another poorly-done scene. Even though the Oozaru is choking the life out of Roshi, Roshi still manages to form coherent sentences with little trouble breathing, then suddenly dies. Oozaru then transforms back to human form in an even more poorly-done CGI scene than the initial transformation. This time it’s literally four or five images, the last being the exact same camera cut of the first transformation but in reverse. Oh, and one more thing on this subject. Goku’s gi gets stretched out like crazy and his belt is just gone when he’s in Oozaru form, but when he transforms back into human form, his gi is magically folded up neatly and his belt is magically back in place.
And now the battle we’ve all been waiting for. Goku vs. Piccolo. They fight for about less than a minute before it cuts to the ‘real’ main even of two gunslingers, Bulma and Mai, the latter of whom is taken out by Yamcha when he shoots her (because Yamcha can’t actually fight without weapons in this movie, remember?)
The fight cuts back to Goku doing a jumping kamehameha into Piccolo, knocking him out cold and saving the world in about 50 seconds. So added together, the Goku vs. Piccolo fight is about as long as the Goku vs. the high school bullies fight. Combine this with ‘airbending’ techniques that look like they have no power to them whatsoever. It just looks like gas spraying harmlessly through the air. After this ‘intense’ battle, Goku looks as clean as a whistle. No cuts, scratches, or dents to him or his outfit.
So…after wishing just Roshi back (so much for the ‘perfect’ wish Roshi and G. Gohan talked about - why is it perfect? Don’t ask me.) instead of everyone Piccolo killed, Chow Yun Fat again attempts to be funny, but to no avail. And instead of more training, Goku decides to join Bulma and Yamcha on their quest for the Dragon Balls…but not before he goes back to Chi Chi to make out with her once again. They then have a dumb argument about why Goku knocked Chi Chi out and how she let him, so the movie ends off with some lame Matrix rip-off of Chi Chi drop-kicking Goku while Goku jumps and punches at her.
Chatwin made all this hype about Goku’s hair ‘evolving’ through the movie the more he accepts himself. It does change, but at the end, Goku just gels it back to the style he had to start with, so so much for that.
Oh, and did I mention a native is feeding Piccolo soup and hiding him under her bed at the end? Yeah, an evil alien tries to destroy the Earth and you hide and rejuvenate him. That’s brilliant!
All-in-all, the movie is bad. Very bad. It’s not the kind of bad that’s either so bad that you’ll laugh at it or bad, but fun. It’s bad and boring. tired
This movie gets a 1/10. The one point coming from the music of Brian Tyler who seems to be the only one who put any amount of effort into this movie. It’s too bad that his music is drowned out by whiny voices and bad name and special attack pronunciations the entire movie. That was all just as distracting as the eyeliner Chatwin had too much of the entire movie. I mean I know actors wear makeup when on-film, but geez. That was way too much eyeliner. It made him look weird.
Sign the PETITION against this movie to help prevent sequels and let Fox know what you think of how Fox is handling the franchise and to help prevent sequels. Seriously guys, if you don’t want any more of this crap, do yourselves a favor and don’t give Fox your money for this movie.
No es que pensaramos que la pelicula iba a estar muy buena que digamos, pero los reviews son completamente ridiculous. Tal parece que lo mejor que puedes hacer en este caso es no gastar tu dinero y verla por internet o ir a verla al cine para reirte por un rato.
Loading ...
