DRAGON BALL: THE PATH TO POWER

DESCRIPTION

CAST

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ANIME ActionDragon Ball
MOVIE ActionDragon Ball: Curse of the Blood Rubies

REVIEWS

• 

  kodokunayuki

  75/100
  If you love Toei 1986's Dragonball you will hate this film, but if you are more of a manga fan you will (just) enjoy it

  Oh yeah, that OVA that was released during the forgettable years of Dragon Ball. I think it needs a little more justice and I need to point out some things about it so let me review it:

  • Story (7/10): I have a big problem with the original Dragon Ball movies plot concepts and their obsession of retelling the canon arcs in a rushed way. They always seem so shallow because they end focusing only on the original characters so the new ones don't have time to be developed. However, this film doesn't introduce anything new, they just reorganized all the stories before the Tournament Arc in order to make the characters interact and develop at the same time. This idea most of the times ends up horribly, but here it was not bad applied if we only see it as a commemorative special. I have never liked the boring and unessenced anime adaptation of the manga until Piccolo arc so this feels so nostalgic with a good mix of the latest aesthetic of the franchise coupled with the tone of the previous Toriyama works.

  • Characters (7/10): It is not easy to present characters defined in 200 episodes in a movie of just over an hour but every character have their scene to shine. The most memorable gags are remaked to quickly delimit all the personalities. I also loved some of the new scenes, like the Puar and Oolong one, it felt so fresh for the viewers that have watched the same story again ad again. The only ones who didn't have enough room where Mutenroshi and Yamcha, but I can't not demand anything more from a 76 minute OVA.

  • Animation (9/10): Surprisingly the animation was SO good. I hate the shabby art style that Toei was giving to the Dragon Ball franchise during GT era, but this TV film had the production of a cinema budget. The sceneries were always very polished and played with lots of gas and 3D effects on fighting and runaway scenes. All the movements also look so neat and dynamic. The only bad thing for me was the abuse of brightness specially on faces.

  • BSO (3/10): The music of this film was the biggest turn off for me. I understand that Shunsuke Kikuchi was not very accessible at that time, but they could search for a composer with a similar style or to aproach a new one, but we had a childish and generic western tracklist instead.

  Probably, if you love Toei 1986's Dragon Ball you will hate this film, but if you are more of a manga fan you will enjoy it. Anyway, I don't think that anybody can feel overhyped or say that this is a masterpiece, it is just made to rewatch it occasionally when you need a little dose of nostalgia or if you feel so lazy to rewatch the original series. It's easily reminiscent of the Dr. Slump remake that was aired at the same time, in both best and worst points.

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COMMENTS

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