Dragon Ball was THE anime of my childhood. Back then when I saw it in the early 2000s I was used to watch the localized dubbed version, but through certain censorship I got interested in watching the removed scenes and that's how got to see the Japanese original version. Same for Dragon Ball GT.
Also with the release of the movies I often liked to switch to the original dub, even if it was only for listening to other voices. I barely understood any word, but there were subs, so no problem.
Fast forward to 2015: Dragon Ball Super was announced and started in July. It was the first time I started watching an anime from the very beginning in Japanese and as I was already studying Japanese myself for around a year back then it was a great way to increase my knowledge.
Even though the Dragon Ball 'vocabulary' is not the most usual, but on the other hand often kinda easy I felt understanding more and more and even got to a point where I noticed that these inofficial 'speedsubs' were partially wrong. Things like that strengthen your self-confidence and as I found new vocabulary looked it up and added in my Anki deck.
Later on with new spoilers of the show coming up and the monthly manga chapters I found myself in the situation where I wanted to check first what I can understand before I went for a translation of some well-known Twitter users.
And sometimes I even feel frustrated if some leaks of the new manga chapters are in Korean and not in Japanese. For the anime I even go that way that I watch the live broadcast on Fuji TV sometimes when I have the time and try to understand as much as possible without subtitles.
In some battle-focused episodes it's not even too difficult with things like: これは終わりだ (This is the end). Often I end up only rewatching certain scenes to get the exact meaning using subs.
From the first theme song (Chouzetsu Dynamic) I even know the lyrics by heart and can understand the song. For the new one I know most of it, but not everything (yet).
During my recent travels through Japan I acquired the new Dragon Ball Super manga volumes 1, 2 and 3 which I find really enjoyable to read. Thanks to Furigana I can collect more Kanji and vocabulary (even though sometimes not really helpful in daily conversations :D).
The upcoming end
Examples like these show clearly the influence of Dragon Ball Super in my Japanese studies. This era is going to end in March for now.
But as the shows seems to be quite popular right now - also in terms of sales with the new PS4 fighting games Dragon Ball FighterZ available since the end of last month - it seems weird to end the show on the high which it definitely has right now.
On the other hand we get a new movie in December - so let's see how that will turn out. Many expect Dragon Ball to return after the movie release. But in which form? Many ways are possible:
- Continuation as Dragon Ball Super with episode 132
- A new show taking place after end of DBZ (continuing the event of Super)
- Dragon Ball Heroes anime
As Toyotarou continues drawing the Universal Survival arc of the manga throughout this year he could either finish Super or could extent the story beyond the anime.
So we definitely need to keep an eye on the manga. And for me even more at the Japanese version.
Dragon Ball is not going to end. We just need to be patient...
