Dragon Ball Daima

After saving the world from the destructive might of Majin Buu, Gokuu Son and his allies look forward to a well-earned rest. However, unbeknownst to them, their battle was recorded and observed by Gomah, an evil being who assumes the title of King in the Demon Realm, filling the void left behind with the death of former ruler Dabura.

At Gomah's side is Degesu, the younger brother of Higashi no Kaioshin, a being who lords over the universe. Jealous of his brother's power, Degesu works alongside Gomah to steal Earth's Dragon Balls and preemptively subdue any potential future enemies. Calling upon the power of the legendary dragon Shenron, Gomah wishes for Gokuu and his friends to be reverted into children, intending to rob them of the limitless power that defeated Buu. With Earth's greatest warriors shrunken down, Gomah abducts Dende, the planet's acting god.

But Gokuu refuses to be set back by his new body, working to master his younger form to fight as proficiently as he could as an adult. Joined by Kaioshin and Glorio—a mysterious but seemingly rebellious demon—Gokuu pursues Gomah to the Demon Realm in order to rescue Dende and restore his friends to their natural ages.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Son, Gokuu Main

Nozawa, Masako Japanese

Higashi no Kaioshin Main

Kobayashi, Yumiko Japanese

Glorio Main

Uchiyama, Kouki Japanese

Panzy Main

Fairouz Ai Japanese

Vegeta Supporting

Mino, Yudai Japanese

Son, Gohan Supporting

Nozawa, Masako Japanese

Piccolo Supporting

Yamaguchi, Tomohiro Japanese

Trunks Supporting

Yonaga, Tsubasa Japanese

Bulma Supporting

Nakahara, Mai Japanese

Muten-Roushi Supporting

Kanemitsu, Nobuaki Japanese

Cook, Justin Producer

Kunihiro, Mamoru Producer

Hirokawa, Taku Producer

Yashima, Yoshitaka Director

Reviews

Feb 28, 2025

Marinate1016

Recommended

In what would end up being his final gift to the world, Toriyama sensei left us with some of his best ever work, Dragon Ball Daima, returning to the magical sense of adventure that the original Dragon Ball series had, while delivering some of the franchise’s best action and transformations. What it may lacked in story, it made up for in epic moments. This simply put felt like a love letter to the dragon ball community and fans who have supported this series over the decades. It’s fanservice in the purest and most wholesome form. Canonising previous transformations and concepts that would’ve seemed unbelievable just ... a couple months of ago. Many will sit and debate how this fits into the canon of the franchise and to those I simply say, “just enjoy it man”.

As someone who grew up watching the original dragon ball with my dad back in the early 2000s, there was a strong sense of nostalgia watching Goku in kid form going on a classic shonen style adventure to gather the dragon balls and making friends along the way. For newer fans this may have felt like a departure from what they know in the Z and Super era, but for me this was Toriyama going back to his roots and frankly his prime when writing. Dragon Ball at its best was when Goku didn’t have all these transformations and had to actually rely on his friends to help him. While Daima does have those big action set pieces and newly canonized forms as I mentioned before, it strikes a healthy balance between the magic of the original series and the epic fights of the more recent DB franchise. It almost felt like Toriyama knew he was going to die and wrote this with that in mind, satisfying both types of fans while opening up possibilities for future instalments.

The story wasn’t the strongest in Daima, I felt like there was much more emphasis on the journey itself. The companions, the banter, the sticky situations Goku, Glorio and Panzy got into, etc. I found the antagonist to be pretty disappointing as a big bad on his own. He felt more like a device for Toriyama to be able to bring out all these cool new abilities and transformations which I’m ok with. It’s dragon ball, it’s no stranger to mediocre antagonists who do just that. For me, the big highlight was just seeing Goku and the others go on this adventure together in a new realm we’ve never explored and expanding upon the existing Dragon Ball lore and mythos.

Production values are where Daima really shines to me. It’s easily the best looking DB show ever. It has movie quality art and animation for most of the series and episodes 19 and 20 are probably the best we’ve seen outside of DB Super Broly and a handful of ToP episodes. This show looked great. Also really enjoyed the musical selections! Credit to the staff who brought this to life.

My general feelings after 20 weeks of watching this are this is the second best Dragon Ball instalment ever. I know I know “GT BAD!” Is the general narrative online, but I personally loved the villains and story in that the most out of any Dragon Ball so that’s my top 1. BUT Daima canonized some concepts from that series and goes back to that Dragon Ball gathering sense of adventure so it’s a close second and a fitting final gift from Toriyama-sensei to us longtime fans.

Dragon Ball Daima gets 9 out of 10.

Reviewer’s Rating: 9

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Mar 2, 2025

ReAwakenZ

Mixed Feelings

Before watching this series, ask yourself what do you think about "Dragon Ball". Does it really deserve to be an inspiration to so many creators? Does the original story have anything beyond surface level, which wouldn't just make it some comic/cartoon for kids? Or is it just mindless fun, and you want to see the last "game" of your favorite "football team"? Depending on your answer, you'll either have a lot of fun or will be constantly disappointed.

CHARACTERS:
Firstly, let's start with the characters. There are quite a lot of cameos and the main cast includes a lot of heroes, which you might remember from ... the previous series, but there are also some notable omissions, which (in certain cases) are quite odd. This in and of itself isn't a big deal - the main problem lies in the (lack of) use of the already established characters, who became a part of the main roster. Besides Goku and Vegeta, they just didn't do all that much. At best, they might have had one or a few gags, but usually they were a background character #47, whose presence simply coincided with Goku and Vegeta's screen time. The story would really benefit from having a smaller roster and giving it more shine.

This inadequacy is however somewhat balanced with a colorful cast of new heroes, which I really have to praise. I don't think I particularly disliked any of them, so kudos for that. They provided a lot of laughs, some insight, and I'd gladly see them back in the future productions. One of them, even though they have left a bad first impression, has even managed to become my favorite character. But if I really have to critique the new heroes, I'd say that they also felt more like an aid to the big guns, rather than being the ones who drive the conflict in the place which is supposed to be their home.

When it comes to villains, you have neutral forces such as the Tamagami, who can be quite enjoyable, but it's better to think about them as challenges, rather than normal people.
And at last you have our antagonists in the form of Gomah and Degesu. The only thing they contribute to the story is that they try to make it harder for our heroes at every turn possible, but besides that, they are too comedic to be taken seriously, which is a problem, because the story wants you to treat them like real, evil villains, similar to the ones we've seen in Z.

THE MAIN PROBLEM:
Using this example, you can guess, what's the biggest problem with "Daima". It's the sudden shifts in tone. It almost feels like 2/3 writers were taking turns writing episodes, and all of them had a different vision of the series, as one episode is packed with action, the other is toilet humor incarnate, and the rest adds lore which contributes nothing to the story. All three of these aspects could be integrated much better, and flow into each other more naturally, but the plot doesn't commit to any one of these fully, and instead of, for example, making the first portion more humorous, the second one more information-heavy and the last one full of action, it's all mixed without any thought, whether it sticks well or not.

LORE AND "CANON":
Now that I mentioned lore, it's worth pointing out that, unfortunately, rarely does it make any sense. At this point it's unclear whether certain events were supposed to be taking place hundreds, thousands or millions of years ago. Some characters possess knowledge, which they have never shown before, while forgetting things, which we've seen they knew earlier. If anything's certain it's the fact that nothing makes sense anymore and in the rare instances, when you could theoretically try to make sense of new info, it's as unimportant to the story, as it could possibly be, and it most likely won't be resolved, as "Dragon Ball" in recent years doesn't like to do that.

While I'm at it, it's also worth noting, that it's best to forget "Dragon Ball Super" when watching "Daima", as both of these contradict each other a lot. Trying to make sense of it is either impossible or requires big, unnecessary logic hoops. This is not to the detriment of "Daima", as these can just very well be two separate continuities, but it's good to keep that in mind and set your expectations well.

HUMOR:
But if you don't particularly care about all of that and simply enjoy Toriyama's gags, then you'll certainly find yourself having a lot of fun, as there are quite a lot of them and, if it weren't for the problems with the tone I mentioned before, I really wouldn't write anything bad about them. Obviously, humor is subjective, but besides making us laugh, they can also make you feel like you're experiencing early "Dragon Ball" without recreating it 1:1 like the franchise likes to do nowadays.

STORY, ANIMATION AND POTENTIAL:
And lastly, the story. This should be, by far, the longest portion of this review, but as you might guess, there's not a lot to talk about the plot itself, because the story is as simple and as surface level as it gets. There is no nuance to be found, no deeper themes, no substance, unless we add to it a lot of "headcanons". Some plot points, which could very easily drive the plot, are quite literally dropped and forgotten mid-series, and the conclusion to one plot thread, which was established early on, doesn't get a satisfactory conclusion - it kind of resolves itself, without showing the reasons behind the actions of certain characters. Other plot points lead to nothing, even though the show unsubtly leads you to believe they really want to explore them. And what's worse, most likely this was all because of forced fan-service and nostalgia-baiting, which were the main driving forces behind the creation of this series. For anyone who's looking for something fresh in "Dragon Ball" - you won't find it here. There was a lot of potential, you might enjoy some early portions, but later on it was just wasted. Unless you're here just to see some nice fights and transformations.

If the story really decided to go one way or another, it could've been saved. Instead, it chose the constant balancing between the lighter tone and the more serious tone, which created a big mess, the only saving grace being the animation, most likely the best the franchise has ever offered. That's all I can say about it, as I'm not a professional in this field. I like seeing nice colors, and cool poses, but this can't substitute a good plot, narrative coherence, and themes which were heavily lacking. What hurt the most, however, is that at some point, you start to accept that it's not even worth theorizing about what will come next, as usually it's the most boring and predictable choice. And I say that, while comparing it to other series in its class, and especially when comparing it to the original manga, where Akira Toriyama proved to the world his capabilities.

Reviewer’s Rating: 4

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Mar 6, 2025

Ultima14

Not Recommended

Let’s make this clear right from the start. Daima was a cashgrab that nobody wanted and few watched. It was made just to canonize Super Saiyan 4, the same way the Brolly movie was made to canonize the filler villain. Toriyama in general spent his last years in rehashing old ideas, making the line from the opening song “here comes a brand new story” to be deceptive.

Daima is part of Toriyama’s attempt to incorporate a lot of non-canon ideas into canon, but since he is not a good writer he did a crappy job. Not only Daima contradicts pretty much everything that has been canon ... for decades, it doesn’t even fit with the Super continuity. The way the Potara earrings work changed, the origin of the Dragonballs and Majin Buu changed, and Piccolo doesn’t even know how to speak Namekian anymore! It also has no explanation for why Goku never uses Super Saiyan 4 in Super, or why Kaioshin is not fused again. It will piss off anyone who still thinks Dragonball is consistent with its rules. Not that it ever was or it matters at this point.

Although Daima expands the lore by delving into the demon realm and the origin of the Namekians, that doesn’t mean a thing because no one gives a shit about the setting. A dozen universes were introduced in Super, they were left completely unexplored, and nobody complained when the Tournament of Power began. Because Dragonball is all about the fighting, not exploration. It is not One Piece or Tower of God; it’s Goku changing hair colors and exchanging energy beams with a villain. Plus, there have been so many fanfic stories over the decades, to the point the canon lore doesn’t matter anymore. Heck, Xenoverse and Sparkling Zero are nothing but ‘what if’ scenarios, yet nobody complains about the breaching of canon. Heck, not even Daima cares.

What matters the most is if people wanted Daima, and the answer is, they didn’t. When it was first announced everyone quickly yelled “We want Moro!” meaning they wanted the next arc of Super to be adapted. Daima, like GT, is a cashgrab, and if it had never been made, nobody would miss a thing. Not even calling it a sendoff or a passion project of Toriyama is enough to excuse its existence. No one cares about anything else the late mangaka made, from Dragon Quest to Blue Dragon, to even the very recent Sand Land. And they certainly don’t care about silly gag comedies that involve Muppet Baby-like versions of characters from the battle manga they love. Let’s be honest, people only care about Dragonball, even if Toriyama isn’t involved. Quick reminder that all he was doing with Super was giving Toyotaro, the succeeding mangaka, vague concepts and plot threads and was then letting him do as he pleased. The result was a complete mess of unbaked ideas and bad writing.

The fans didn’t wait 10 minutes before calling Daima a GT 2.0, which in many ways it is. Once again, Goku is back to being a kid through a wish from the dragon and travels to distant lands in a spaceship to undo it. Despite many others becoming babies along with him, the premise did not change. On the side of lies, the shills of this cashgrab were insisting it’s not a rehash. It’s more like a return to the style of the original series, when Goku was still a kid and there was a lot of adventure instead of constant Super Saiyan transformations and energy beams. This was quickly proven to be a lie, since not only Daima is chockfull of transformations and energy beams, it also doesn’t feel like the original series in the slightest. Back then Goku and the gang were far more violent and sexually deprived compared to the sanitized versions they had post Z. Remember how kid Goku killed and ate his enemies? When he sexually molested every girl he was coming across with his pat-pat move? That’s not here. We got the adventure aspect and the design of Goku, but not the personality he had as a kid or the type of comedy the original show was using. The jokes were in general too sanitized. Even if you liked the vulgar Dr. Slump type of comedy Dragonball used to have at first, this is not a return to that kind of humor. It’s safe and inoffensive, making it dull and unmemorable.

The shills obviously refused to admit that, and insisted you shouldn’t let your hatred of GT to get in the way (in case you didn’t know, nobody liked anything in that show aside from Super Saiyan 4, because it was boring). The shills eventually backpedaled when Super Saiyan 4 got rehashed and sang a different tune. Oh, it actually is a rehash and you should watch it because you love GT!

The rehashed transformation was nothing but memberberries, but it became an instant hook regardless. Too bad it happened in the finale. The rest of the show was a chore to watch and the idea to rehash Goku becoming a kid didn’t sit well with the audience. Narrative-wise it was done to depower him, but aesthetic-wise the Muppet Babies / Tiny Toons type of designs didn’t look nice. It’s the adult forms everyone liked, not the chibi ones. How do you switch from buffed adults who only care about punching each other to baby food without eye rolling? It’s like seeing Rambo become a My Little Pony. Your average Dragonball fan only cares about action and transformations, not a bunch of brats doing goofy things. No wonder the show lost 80% of its audience just from that. It also didn’t matter in the long-run, since the only opponent that posed a challenge was the final villain. Everyone else was a cakewalk, even with Goku being a much weaker kid.

Everyone else becoming kids didn’t matter either, since Toriyama didn’t do anything with it. It was there just as a joke for the first episodes and then didn’t play a role for the rest of the series. It could be argued that it was done to make the show more accessible to children viewers, but it didn’t work since not many were watching the show, and those who did were all 40 year old diehard fans waiting to see epic fights. They eventually got them.

Even then, though, the fights are just a hollow spectacle. They don’t have the epicness of Z, since everyone looks dumb and the threats are barely felt. Nothing is at stake in this show, since the good guys don’t mind being kids. In fact, they love it! On top of that, there is no time limit that would lead to Earth blowing up like in GT. Basically, there is no tension, pressure of time, or stakes in general.

Despite that, the vast majority of viewers/readers were pleased, even if they were aware that they were essentially being given garbage. Because none of them cares about the quality of the story, and they certainly don’t care about who wrote it. They just wanna see adult Goku changing hair colors and exchanging energy beams with a villain. They don’t want to see Rugrats versions of Goten and Trunks rolling on the floor and laughing.

If I haven’t said a single word about other characters beyond Goku so far, it’s because they were largely left underused. Daima is still the Goku show, with Vegeta being the jealous boyfriend. Despite featuring around a hundred named characters, everyone beyond those two is just there to offer exposition or gasp at how strong Goku and Vegeta are. Most of the older cast is left on Earth where you never see them again after the first episodes. Gohan in specific doesn’t even exist, further proving how much Toriyama regretted making him the new protagonist for a while. Others like Piccolo, Bulma and Shin come along for the heck of it, without offering a thing to the plot. New characters like Glorio and Panzy were initially important for taking the main characters to other places with their airship, and explaining the situation of the demon world, but once Goku began flying again he didn’t need them anymore, and he sure didn’t care about the world he was in. On the villain side, we get Gomah, who is basically Pilaf with a clown head, a completely unthreatening gag character. His two lieutenants, Arinsu and Degesu, seemed to have a hidden agenda that would complicate things, but it never went anywhere and the plot remained fairly silly and straightforward.

In fact, the plot was so silly and straightforward it became completely forgettable. There was nothing interesting going on while the gang was traveling in the demon world. The challenges were so easy to overcome, Toriyama had to artificially make some situations to seem more dangerous than they actually were. There were instances where the audience was supposed to believe Super Saiyans who can blow up planets with a finger couldn’t deal with a big child, or normal solders with laser guns. Such moments were not only insulting the audience, they were also clearly done to stretch a fairly simple mission to five times its natural duration. Just how many episodes were wasted on their airship breaking down and them having to walk? How many minutes of every episode were wasted on characters that don’t shut up and explain everything, even when something is obvious? 80% the show was a complete chore to watch. On top of that, there were plot points that were dropped entirely, such as the fusion bugs that were constantly mentioned, made everyone to expect fusion, and it never happened.

The highlights ended up being the major battles with the guardian robots and the big bad, but even those had to be artificially made to seem harder than they actually were. One of the robots was given a power up out of nowhere, just so we can have a fan service moment with Vegeta turning Super Saiyan 3. And Gomah finds this completely broken eye that instantly turns him from a nobody to someone more powerful than a Super Saiyan 3. The tradition of people gaining power ups with no effort, and devaluing the earlier arcs when training and never giving up were pivotal, continues. Basically, there is no build up to the highlights, the power ups feel unearned, and the battles end up being superficial because of it. I kept thinking all they have to do is shoot the big bad with a laser gun and be done with it.

In case it wasn’t obvious yet, I do not recommend Daima. It was a complete waste of time and an insult to old fans that care about anything other than transformations. I place it even lower than GT, which was also a cashgrab but came out when people were starving for more Dragonball. GT also came out during the 90s when options were limited to what was airing on TV. That is not the case today; you can watch anything you want, from any year, and at any time of the day you fancy. And who would turn his head towards Daima when Sparkling Zero came out at the same time, with every character of every arc and a hundred what-if stories? There is also Multiverse, the best fanfic, that has many times surpassed the official material. Do those two have the best writing? Hell, no! But that is not what fans of the series want. They are pleased with seeing Goku changing hair colors and exchanging energy beams with a villain. Therefore, who gives a dime about Daima when you have so many better alternatives? As the ratings have proved, not many.

Reviewer’s Rating: 3

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	Poll: Dragon Ball Daima Episode 8 Discussion ( 1 2 3 ) Stark700 - Nov 29, 2024	101 replies	by Eva_PhoenixAnime »» 6 hours ago
	Poll: Dragon Ball Daima Episode 12 Discussion ( 1 2 3 ) Stark700 - Dec 27, 2024	111 replies	by XArceusX »» Yesterday, 2:26 AM
	Poll: How should this continue and why? Camoboi1 - Mar 23	14 replies	by Camoboi1 »» Mar 27, 9:29 PM
	Poll: Dragon Ball Daima Episode 20 Discussion ( 1 2 3 ) Stark700 - Feb 28	121 replies	by DmArcher »» Mar 25, 4:23 PM
	Poll: Would you rather have Daima or Super and why? Camoboi1 - Mar 5	17 replies	by pasananthony »» Mar 25, 6:51 AM