Dragonball Movie, due 2009

[Boo]

[size=1]Someone had to post this thread, so let it be me.

Okay, so the movie is finally very much in production (post-production, even) and all, after 5, 6 years under direction of James Wong ([i]The One[/i], [i]Final Destination[/i]). The list of the cast is already available on the [url=http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1098327/][u]imdb page[/u][/url] and supposedly the [url=http://dbthemovie.com/Dragonball Z.pdf][u]script[/u][/url] is out as well. Stunts are done by 87Eleven, the same team that did [i]The Matrix[/i] and [i]300[/i].

And well, that's about all the information there is for the western world at the moment. Apart from some pictures of course. But well, they should be easy to find. Even Wikipedia has them.

So, everybody. What do you think? :^D

Personally, I think from what I've seen so far that it will be incredibly bad. The only positive aspect I could see was that Emmy Rossum was playing in it, but well, apart from looking pretty I'm not sure how well she's at performing. Besides, her hair is funny her being Bulma and all.

Either way, I haven't seen Dragonball itself. Only Dragonball Z really, so I'm not sure what to think anyway. If they would make a movie of Dragonball Z, then I'd be a lot more interested. :( Besides, they seem to have left the whole tournament with Tien (my favourite :^D) out, which is the only part I actually know of Dragonball.[/size]

[Vicky]

[size=1]I guess the only reason they put this off for so long is because they didn't invent a strong enough hair product XD.

I've seen a lot of pictures, but it's hard to distinguish which are fan-made ones or not. I haven't checked Wikipedia, though. I don't know about you but I can only assume that it's going to be one of the cheesiest films ever... I mean, Dragonball was pretty cheesy in its own right... I have no idea how people are going to take the movie seriously.

I'd be a lot more interesting if it were a DBZ movie, too, but I'm not sure how that'd go down. I can see that going badly too... just like the series went towards the end XD.[/size]

[Cat]

I think its going to be far stranger then any movie I've seen in a while and I still can't picture half of the actors playing the characters they are. James Marsters as Piccolo is just one interesting casting on its own, mix it with the rest of the cast I just don't know how well its going go acting wise or visually. I got a feeling this movie is going be something that you need to see it to believe any of it.

[The Spectacular Professor]

[FONT="Comic Sans MS"]Honestly I'm trying to keep open-minded about all this. While I agree it's a pretty silly idea and there are a few changes that might bother a number of people, I see it no different as Batman or Spider-Man. It's a comic book that someone's making into a live-action movie. Besides, ever think about the rest of American Cinema and how downright weird it can be?

Spider-Man is a movie about a guy who dresses up in tights and swings through New York like a red and blue Tarzan fighting a green Power Rangers reject. It's a good movie, though.

Ghostbusters is about a bunch of comedians running around New York zapping paintings and Marshmallow men. They're both American classics.

Star Wars? Don't get me started.

See, these are all just strange. The thing that makes the difference is the people behind and in front of the camera making these bizarre concepts super special awesome. And that, my friends, is the difference between [B]Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade[/B] and [B]Batman & Robin.[/B] Hopefully, this one goes the way of the former. If it doesn't, it doesn't. I can see this actually working out quite well, though.[/FONT]

[Guest CellReborn]

I always thought a live action Dragonball movie series could be really cool, but I gotta say that I'm disappointed in what I've seen so far. I'm not very excited.

Plus I don't know how many of you know this but it's going to be PG and marketed for 6-12 year olds. I've been following the movie for awhile and used to be a member of a forum called the unofficial live action dragonball movie forum. Some of you may or may not remember it. It used to be pretty big. Well now they're liveactionanime.org so if anyone is curious as to what is real and what isn't in the way of news I'd suggest checking them out because they'll have everything you want to know about it.

[url]http://liveactionanime.org/[/url] or [url]http://liveactionanime.org/DBZ_LamDBZ.html[/url]

also just a good place to get live action anime movie news. But I think I mentioned that already in the voltron article. Sorry, I'm just a big mark for their site. :catgirl::catgirl:


OH! And I read the supposed script. Did anyone realize that they "play" dragonball within the dragonball movie. There's even a dragonball video game and trading cards in the movie. lol. Hopefully that doesn't make it in the actual film.

[The Spectacular Professor]

[quote name='CellReborn']OH! And I read the supposed script. Did anyone realize that they "play" dragonball within the dragonball movie. There's even a dragonball video game and trading cards in the movie. lol. Hopefully that doesn't make it in the actual film.[/QUOTE]

[FONT="Comic Sans MS"]Hmmm. That may not be so wise. I'm not liking that concept.

Then again, it worked with the third season of Digimon. And that's my favorite season.

That's a totally different matter, though.[/FONT]

[eleanor]

[font=trebuchet ms] So how legit is that script? I've read the beginning of it, and I'm just wondering I guess. [/font]

[Raiha]

[COLOR="DarkOrchid"][FONT="Times New Roman"]You know, I think that picture of Goku is very distressing. He better go on some form of Spartanification diet before I can believe that he can pick up trees and shoot ki balls and make bad guys explodie.

That and Bulma looks like a dithering moron. Oh wait...

ANYWAYS I will withhold my complete judgement until I see it, which seems fair. And I will hold this 'Certificate of not Crap' to be awarded or perhaps not awarded.[/FONT][/COLOR]

[SaiyanPrincessX]

[SIZE="1"]I've been worried about this for awhile, and after seeing the cast a few months back, I'm not too confident about it. The cast selection sucks. The guy playing Goku has got to be one of the worst casting errors. He looks like someone I'd like to punch. :animesmil

The others arn't mcuh better.

I love DB/Z, and I still want to see it, but I don't hold my hopes too high for it.[/SIZE]

[Nerdsy]

[quote name='CellReborn']Plus I don't know how many of you know this but it's going to be PG and marketed for 6-12 year olds.[/QUOTE]

[color=deeppink]You mean like they've always done with Dragonball?

THis looks like it's going to be the greatest move ever. I was sold when Roshi was cast.[/color]

[Gavin]

[SIZE="1"]Wow, I had very little hope that this movie would be any good before I read what it was about, and now that I have, I have absolutely no doubt it'll suck beyond any form of redemption.[/SIZE]

[Foredaddy]

This is about 6 or 7 seven years too late...
Anybody who was a fan has probably grown out of it and moved on by now (cough cough me cough cough).
Which sucks.

[Raiha]

[quote name='Foredaddy']This is about 6 or 7 seven years too late...
Anybody who was a fan has probably grown out of it and moved on by now (cough cough me cough cough).
Which sucks.[/QUOTE]
[COLOR="DarkOrchid"][FONT="Times New Roman"]We're also the same people who remember the bloody Toonami on Cartoon Network and waiting FOREVER for Freiza to blow up that planet...[/FONT][/COLOR]

[Gavin]

[quote name='Raiha'][COLOR="DarkOrchid"][FONT="Times New Roman"]We're also the same people who remember the bloody Toonami on Cartoon Network and waiting FOREVER for Freiza to blow up that planet...[/FONT][/COLOR][/QUOTE]

[SIZE="1"]Yep, Dragonball Z, the only show where a supposedly five minute fight took more than twelve episodes.[/SIZE]

[Rachmaninoff]

[quote name='Gavin'][SIZE="1"]Wow, I had very little hope that this movie would be any good before I read what it was about, and now that I have, I have absolutely no doubt it'll suck beyond any form of redemption.[/SIZE][/QUOTE]I'm not even a fan of this show and yet after looking out of curiosity... I agree with this statement. And the one you just posted about a five minute fight taking twelve episodes. I made the mistake of watching some of it just to satisfy my curiosity... never again. XP

[Raiha]

[URL="http://io9.com/5044681/a-first-look-at-dragonballs-live+action-lord-piccolo"]WTF?![/URL]
[COLOR="DarkOrchid"][FONT="Times New Roman"]Houston... we appear to have run out of green body paint.

We can't find anything but pasty bug yellow.

WARNING WARNING WARNING!

[IMG]http://cache.io9.com/assets/images/io9/2008/09/piccolo_01.jpg[/IMG]

Good lord how hard could it be to get ONE THING RIGHT?! Sure he's bald and veiny and pointy but JESUS! What the hell were they thinking?[/FONT][/COLOR]

[Allamorph]

[FONT=Arial]What she said.


And yes, you moronic juvenile joke-crackers, that [I]is[/I] what she said. Criminy.[/FONT]

[The Spectacular Professor]

[FONT="Comic Sans MS"]Eh. As far as I'm concerned, Piccolo's green is like Bulma's hair. It's a cosmetic change. Some may consider it major, but it's not going to make or break the movie. At least he still looks somewhat intimidating. If they made him, say, Piccolo the Fluffy Bunny Man, then I'd definitely be a bit concerned.[/FONT]

[Raiha]

[COLOR="DarkOrchid"][FONT="Times New Roman"]Dude. He's a Namek. He's also missing his antenae. This is like making them go Super Saiay-jin but making their hair pink.

Don't tell me that's just a 'cosmetic' change. That and nobody gives a crap about Bulma's hair. Stupid spoiled bimbo with bad taste in men...[SIZE="1"]*grumble grumble*[/SIZE][/FONT][/COLOR]

[Petie]

[quote name='Ace'][FONT=Comic Sans MS]Eh. As far as I'm concerned, Piccolo's green is like Bulma's hair. It's a cosmetic change. Some may consider it major, but it's not going to make or break the movie. At least he still looks somewhat intimidating. If they made him, say, Piccolo the Fluffy Bunny Man, then I'd definitely be a bit concerned.[/FONT][/quote]
[FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue]I have to disagree here. It's one thing to cast actors that look nothing like the characters they are playing but Piccolo is green (and yes, Raiha, has antenae). That is not something you can mess with. Sure, his being green does not affect his power but it's like taking Batman and putting him in a Nemo suit. He may perform exactly the same but he is no longer Batman. Piccolo's green skin is a mark of his race just as much as ridiculous hair and tails are a mark of the Saiyans. (Oh, and Bulma's hair needs to be blue too but I won't argue that for now.)[/COLOR][/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana][/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue]Piccolo, among just about everything else with this movie, has been bothering me since I found out about it months ago. It's like they're completely disregarding everything that makes Dragon Ball Dragon Ball. What especially bothers me is that Goku, besides not looking like Goku at all, is far too old. Sure, there was a point in Dragon Ball where he was older but you can't make a movie about five episodes. They really needed a kid to play Goku. And, from what I've read, they also took out Krillin, an exceedingly important character to the Dragon Ball story.[/COLOR][/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana][/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue]I think I'll stop here before this turns into an unnecessarily long rant. This pretty accurately covers my opinion of the movie thus far anyway.[/COLOR][/FONT]

[visualkei]

Alright, besides being in the anime scene for over ten years, I've never had the motivation to watch the Dragonbal seriesl.

I'm a bit iffy about the cast. I mean, why are they casting some girl from that MTV reality show? Should've stuck with Chow's original plan for another actress, though I can see there may be a language issue. Anyways, I'm interested to know Stephen Chow's hand in producing this bit. I'm usually very satisfied with his movies. I am curious about how this movie will come to the big screens and be changed to appeal to westerners.

From someone who's never read/watch the original Dragonball, I've got to say that the thought of a main character being green is distracting, and it would take mad skillz to make a character such as Piccolo in real life not look hokey. So I could see why he looks the way he does. Looking at pictures of Goku and Bulma, I wonder, why don't they just make their hair look a little bit more... normal? Anime is anime, and real life is real life. Some things like wild hair from anime just looks lame in real life. Just my opinion.

And for the complaints about this movie being geared towards kids, well, wasn't the original t.v. series geared towards kids as well? I do hope that the director interprets this movie in a way to appeal to a larger age range of viewers, but just reading the whole setting of this movie, well, sounds like one of those "magical" teen flicks, you know, almost like Transformers, but more cheesy. I thought Transformers was going to turn out a bit lame, and though some parts were, I was overall quite satisfied with it. So, I'm not completely hopeless when it comes to this Dragonball movie coming to theaters.

[Allamorph]

[quote name='visualkei']From someone who's never read/watch the original Dragonball, I've got to say that the thought of a main character being green is distracting, and it would take mad skillz to make a character such as Piccolo in real life not look hokey.[/quote]
[FONT=Arial]The Hulk comes to mind. Also Yoda.

Also, 'mad skillz' are what the people in Hollywood are supposed to have. That's why they're there. If they have the skills enough to pull off Transformers so well to the point where I wasn't bothered by the token hot chick, if they have the skills enough to make Gotham look absolutely epic, then they can sure as heck make one person green and give him antennae.

I mean, criminy. The Andorians had antennae (that moved), and were [I]blue[/I]. The Borg Queen is a slimy pallid half-corpse who still manages to make half the male trekkies warm in places (which is just weird), Hell Boy is bright flaming red, and the vampire-lycan hybrid from Underworld was what, cobalt?

Bulma I could care less about. Hair is hair, and all the live-action anime-based shows I've seen glimpses of where they kept the original hair color looked atrocious, so I can understand going more for reality in that sense. But Hollywood [I]has the capability[/I] to do this right. It's not outside their means. So why this . . . thing?[/FONT]

[Sabrina]

[FONT="Tahoma"]I agree with Sir Allamorph. I may not have seen this show, but being able to make a character look green shouldn't be all that difficult. What's the point in having unique features for a character if you're going to turn around and abandon them? Sounds like they're just too lazy to put the effort into making him look right. =P[/FONT]

[Cat]

I don't really mind Piccolo not being green. After staring at my James Marsters poster and seeing his skin color both pale and tan, green would look like a mess. Then watching the bright green color with quick movements on the big screen is going to make people eyes hurt. I know they would make mine hurt. Dulling the color and changing it to make it less bright is going to look better to the eye. I can understand why people are up set about the color though. Piccolo being green is one of his trade marks. Its one of the reason that makes piccolo awesome.

[youtube=James Marsters about Piccolo in the Dragonball Movie]qDwtEDm3UTY[/youtube]

[youtube= James Marsters about Piccolo in the Dragonball Movie Part 2

]q74-EZ2c62U[/youtube]

[visualkei]

[quote name='Allamorph'][FONT=Arial]Also, 'mad skillz' are what the people in Hollywood are supposed to have. That's why they're there.[/FONT][/QUOTE]

I don't doubt that Hollywood has the capacity to make a realistic looking Piccolo. Nor do I doubt that they've tried. I think that they've tried, realized he didn't look so great, so they went with the other alternative. A part of me did consider that perhaps the production budget didn't make them flexible enough to create a good-looking green character, but I think it's more of the reason I stated above. I think that the choices made in depicting the characters in real life took into consideration the appeal to an audience mostly unaware of the original series and wouldn't care what color Piccolo is and maybe even production limitations.