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_Dragon Ball Super: Broli_ is an amazing movie and the best the franchise has to offer. For those curious, it does not spoil the ending of the Tournament of Power arc of Dragon Ball Super. The movie goes back to the beginning of everything when King Cold retires and gives Freeza the crown, thus making him the leader of all of the Saiyans and the Freeza Force. The movie explores the past, building backstory and adding insight to the Saiyan race before its destruction at the hands of Freeza. Gine, Goku and Raditz’s mother, is finally seen, and a more kind Bardock is seen as ... well, especially compared to his appearance in the now retconned OVA _Bardock: The Father of Goku_. The time Broly spends showing off interactions between the characters and building up the backstory of the new characters pays off later in the movie. Toriyama has re-written the story of Broly and his father Paragus, giving them a tragic backstory that serves as a motive for vengeance later on. This is a wonderful addition to the characters that is rarely seen in the series (especially Jiren in Super) and makes the two characters ones you can care about. For once, I did not want to see Goku take a beating before one-shotting his enemy like in the first thirteen movies, but I hoped for a different resolution instead such as the common trope in this series where a foe turns into an ally like this happened with Yamcha, Vegeta, Krillin, Majin Boo, etc.

Also per the common traits of this series are the laughs, which are not forgotten. However, they are not as commonplace as they were in 2015’s _Revival of ‘F’_. The jokes are quality and garnered plenty of laughs from the audience I was with, even if there were not many in the film. Broli combines all of the best parts of Dragon Ball into one amazing movie: superb animation, characters with depth and reason for their actions, a beautiful art style, a great score, good laughs, and awesome battle scenes. Norihito Sumitomo scored this movie and did his best work since 2013’s _God and God_. The music for this movie is miles ahead of the previous movie where I found the music to be lackluster, complimentary instead of additive, and generally minimalist. Instead of chanting, humming, or a similar sound that is short and repeating in different ways throughout the movie, Sumitomo uses many different instruments to create different melodies that convey the emotions a scene requires.

However, there is a chorus that chants throughout the battle scenes that, as small as it may be, I find to be one of the worst and most offending pieces of music ever used in the franchise. During the battle scenes, certain parts have a group chanting the name of whomever currently has the upper hand in the battle. It is obnoxious, repugnant, and out of place. It changes the tone and generally sounds awful. If you take your least favorite/most disliked composer of the franchise whether it’s Shunsuke Kikuchi, Bruce Faulconer, Kenji Yamamoto, Norihito Sumitomo, or anyone else not mentioned and then multiply your disgust one thousand fold, that is how off-putting the chanting in these scenes is. It’s bad enough that I’m spending a paragraph writing about how terrible it is, and unfortunately, these vocals are part of the score itself by Sumitomo so it is unlikely they will be removed for the home video release.

While it most likely is my opinion and not one most other viewers will share, I found the ending of the movie to be weak. It has closure, but not in the way I expected. I cannot give more of an explanation without spoiling the ending so I will just leave it at this. I will admit that I am somewhat pessimistic, so it may be my gripe alone to bear. However, don’t let either of these two detractors stop you from seeing the movie. The people who worked on this movie whether it be Toriyama, the animators, the artists, the musicians, or anyone else put their passion into this movie. It deserves to be seen if you call yourself a fan of Dragon Ball.

Not nearly as good as last year's _I Choose You!_.

As someone who is not really into the series enough to call himself a fan, I did see the rebooted movie from last year and went to see this with some good excitement. Last year's movie had absolutely gorgeous artwork and great animation. There was an antagonist who was befriended in the end, Ash had a goal of meeting and battling Ho-Oh, and the battles throughout the film were fun and interesting spectacles to see.

This movie has none of that. Yes, the artwork is good and so is the animation, but there aren't any breathtaking scenes ... like in the first movie. No gorgeous artwork or background shots. Just standard shots without anything specifically noticeable unlike _I Choose You!_ where we saw a butterfree fly off with a flock of others or the beautiful vistas of the forest and nature. But what sets this film apart and makes it so boring is that there is no central antagonist to it. The main conflict of the movie is two disasters concerning the environment and the town itself. The second half of the movie is Ash and a group of relative strangers the movie gave focus to trying to stop the disasters (non-natural, of course) from destroying the town and hurting people and Pokemon.

Because there is no central antagonist, we don't have the interest of seeing his or her evil ways put to an end. There is no motivation to see justice served. There also aren't really any Pokemon battles. Yes, there are a few tiny skirmishes that involve capturing Pokemon, but nothing like last year's reboot. The battles in this film are very short, basic, and nothing spectacular. They are not a focus in this movie like they were in last year's because the point is the story. But there again is the problem. The story is just characters reacting to some disasters that hurt people and Pokemon. There isn't a fight or big climactic battle like Ash & Pikachu vs Ho-Oh or the mean guy who only wanted powerful Pokemon.

Thus we get a film about five or so random characters and how they interact with a festival going on in the town the movie takes place in (I forget the name). There is a contest going on, but naturally it's interrupted early on in the film. Team Rocket makes an appearance and causes the disaster to happen, but they don't do much else besides that. They don't get punished in the end or anything. They are more of a plot device to cause a conflict than any real villain. They are a tool in this movie to move the plot forward.

All in all, I was disappointed. I wanted plenty of awesome battles. I wanted an antagonist who had to be beaten and maybe befriended. I wanted Ash to have a real goal besides "help save the town." I wanted the characters to do something besides saving a town via methods that don't really involve fighting other Pokemon. Hopefully next year's movie is better.

I don't know why the other reviews are so low. This is a simple show about Sana Kashimura and her experiences with other people and the world around her. Yes, there is some of the story dedicated to other characters and the powers they have, but it all revolves around Sana. It's cute, it's beautiful, it's entertaining, and I find it highly enjoyable. JC Staff tried making a good anime this time and you can tell from the animation and beautiful detailed artwork. It's much better than their previous works such as Little Busters!

Just watch the show if you want to get a feel for ... it. I love it, others hate it. It's a nice show and it's easy to follow. Zouroko is funny and Sana is extremely adorable--their relationship is funny and interesting, if a bit predictable.

While it's better than the Z version for the filler that was removed, Dragon Ball Z Kai: The Final Chapters is a poor sequel to the original Dragon Ball Z Kai that we received a few years ago.

After the end of DBZ Kai with its lower than expected ratings, Toei did not plan to make a Kai for the Majin Boo arc of the series. Investors wanted it for the overseas audience, thus they went ahead with it after all. But since this was never planned to air in Japan and the first Kai got low ratings, Toei half-assed this as much as they possibly ... could. The filler removal is less than I would have hoped for. If I remember correctly, Kanzenshuu said that the international cut only removed 25% of the filler from the series while the cut that actually did air in Japan removed only 33% (it got 9 less episodes than the rest of the world did). Right off that bat, the biggest point of a Kai version for the Boo arc is mostly gone. For reference, the Majin Boo arc for DBZ began at episode 200 and lasted to 291--91 episodes total. Here, the arc begins at episode 99 and goes to 167--69 episodes total (international version, not Japan version that aired on Fuji TV). The first Kai took episodes 001 to 194 of Z and turned it into 98 episodes. This arc could've had much much much more filler removed than it did.

The remastering process was gimped as well. Whereas Toei paid QTEC to remaster the footage for the first 98 episodes of DBZ Kai, this version's remastering was done internally at Toei. The quality has a HUGE drop with a crop to 16:9, haloing, poor framing in certain scenes, bad DNR that removes detail, and for reasons unknown to this day a green tint over the video excluding the OP, ED, and eyecatches. So now the two biggest points of a Kai version for the Boo arc are gone: less filler removal and a remaster that hurts the eyes and dishonors the vision originally intended by the people who worked on the original version of the show.

While the audio for the characters was re-recorded and a new score composed by Norihito Sumitomo (who scored Battle of Gods, Resurrection 'F', and now Super) was done, this version of the show isn't something you truly need to watch. The Funimation dub is VERY similar to the original dub they did for Z, as by the time they reached the Majin Boo arc originally they had gotten more accurate in their translations. If you liked Kikuchi or Faulconer's scores, you could simply save money by buying the Blu-ray remasters and skipping filler content to save some money.

In the end, this is a negligible version of the series and you are better off watching the original Z version and simply skipping the filler scenes. Most of them were not removed for this release anyway. All in all, I think everyone would've been better off had this not been made the way it was. It's simply not worth it in any form.

-A love letter from Akira Toriyama-

_Revival of ‘F’_ is the film the _Dragon Ball_ fandom has been waiting for. Taking place after 2013’s _God and God_, this film has all of the action and mayhem that the franchise is known for. In a first for the series, the film has an underlying focus on Goku and Vegeta's character flaws rather than simply becoming stronger and beating the bad guy.

Toriyama stated that the film would be “utterly hilarious” and he wasn’t lying. This is the most fun I’ve had watching something in the series for a very long time. Combined with an amazing fight that spans ... over half the film and actual character development for Goku, this is the film everyone wanted the rather disappointing _God and God_ to be. Whereas that film spent most of its time with slice of life pieces and Vegeta trying to keep Beerus from getting angry only to have a ten minute fight between Goku and Beerus in the end, _Revival of ‘F’_ wastes no time getting to business. It must be noted though that this film borders on being a parody of itself due to the type of humor in it and a scene where Freeza himself is terrified instead of terrifying due to seeing Beerus a few feet away from him. It isn't bad, this film lacks the threatening tone or mood that the series had back when everyone was on Namek, and Freeza himself is more comical than threatening.

While this film has everything a fan has wanted in a new film, there *are* a few drawbacks. In a number of scenes the animation is noticeably less than stellar instead of buttery smooth, and there are two or three CGI scenes that are cringe worthy due to their simplicity. The ending is also a bit abrupt with the epilogue being around only two minutes long. Most importantly, many fans' favorite characters such as Yamcha, Trunks, Goten, Chiaotzu, Mr. Satan and Majin Boo do not make any appearances. Artificial Human #18 has a few small lines in the beginning before focus shifts to Krillin, Master Roshi, Gohan, Piccolo, Tien Shinhan, Bulma, and Freeza.

Despite its drawbacks this is the film that fans of the franchise want and will leave with their fists in the air while talking about their hero, Goku, and the amazing fight between the most evil villain of their childhood making a stupendous theatrical appearance with the latest standards in animation and a great soundtrack to boot as they watch a fierce battle just like in the old days.

The first DBZ movie in a long time and this is what we get. A film about the awakening of the God of Destruction, Lord Beerus, and his desire to fight a "Super Saiyan God" that he saw in a dream.

Story:
The film starts out interestingly enough with King Kai talking with the Supreme Kai about Beerus's awakening, and within a couple of minutes Goku has a fight with him where he is easily defeated as a Super Saiyan 3. Wanting to find out if anyone knows what the Super Saiyan God is, Beerus and his mentor, Whis, travel to Earth to find the other Saiyans ... and ask them.

First off, being the God of Destruction Lord Beerus is inherently evil, and yet while he is the film's antagonist the only reason he wants to destroy Earth is because he gets annoyed while on it, mainly from Majin Boo not sharing pudding with him. So the reasoning is stupid. Secondly there is no character development for Lord Beerus besides this. Even Freeza, Cell, and Boo from the main series had more explanation for their thoughts and actions. But here it's all over pudding and that Lord Beerus is supposed to destroy.

Art:
Second the fighting isn't amazing. There are no new moves seen here, unlike when Goku first became a Super Saiyan when he fought Freeza, pulled off the Warp Kamehameha with Cell, or when he became a Super Saiyan 3 and then merged with Vegeta to become Vegetto during the fight with Boo. All Goku does is turn into a Super Saiyan God, which makes him slimmer and have red hair. That's it.

Sound:
The music was pretty nice, but not was more complimentary than additive which is to say it wasn't anything like Bruce Faulconer's music. But it was much better than Kai's or the original soundtrack for the show when it aired in Japan.

Character Development:
As for the characters, you have to have seen the main series to understand who everyone is. They didn't take the time to introduce all the characters for newbies to the series; this show is for those of us who watched the show when we were kids. However, Lord Beerus and Whis could've been drawn out a LOT more.

Enjoyment:
Unlike the previous films, a good half of this film doesn't even have fighting. Ninety percent of the film takes place on Earth at Bulma's birthday party (her age I won't reveal here) and most of it is Vegeta trying to stop Beerus from getting mad and destroying the planet after hearing he defeated SSJ 3 Goku easily. While there are some funny moments, it's really just a bunch of filler for what could be an awesome, long fight with Goku and Beerus like in other films.

The ending to the film is weak, but I won't spoil it but it could've ended a LOT better. I'll say that the outcome of the battle is disappointing, but not terrible. But it's nothing we've seen in DBZ before. However, being a DBZ film it's still fun to watch and reminds me of my childhood days from when I used to watch it after getting home from school, so I'll give the final score a 7/10. It's still DBZ.