Akira Toriyama’s Dragon Ball is one of the best anime to ever exist. After Dragon Ball came Dragon Ball Z, and then Dragon Ball: Super. Soon, it became one of the largest anime franchises in the world. The fans have already given the legendary status to Goku and Vegeta. Even after three decades, their popularity remains the same.
Apart from these two, several other characters are quite popular among the fans. Master Roshi, Krillin, Piccolo, Bulma, Gohan, etc., are all fa-favorite characters. Krillin was introduced in the Tournament Saga in Dragon Ball. Akira Toriyama revealed that the Tournament Saga was created from his vengeance. This comment piqued everyone’s interest, and fans wanted to know more about it.
Akira Toriyama’s Vengeful Reason Behind The Tournament Saga
During an interview, Akira Toriyama revealed that he had a vengeful reason for creating the Tournament Saga in Dragon Ball. He was asked the reason behind developing the Tournament Saga (Tenka’ichi Budōkai) to an unexpected extent during his interview with Kanzenshuu. He answered, “Up until the Tenka’ichi Budōkai began, the series hadn’t been all that popular. That’s what Torishima-san had told me. “Your protagonist is rather plain. That’s why it’s not popular.”, he said.”
Akira Toriyama continued, “Personally, since I was doing a fighting story for this series, I had intentionally made the protagonist’s clothing excessively plain. So this annoyed me, but then I figured it out. “Well, let’s increase its popularity,” I thought. When I had designed Goku’s character, the words that best represented him were “I want to become strong”.”
He added, “So I thought I’d bring that to the front. Even during “Dr. Slump”, the tournament-like events such as the Penguin Village Gran Prix or the Mini-Event had been amazingly popular. So I’d simply make the story into a tournament format. From there the Tenka’ichi Budōkai was born. I temporarily withdrew the other characters besides Goku, brought back Kame-Sen’nin (Master Roshi), and added Kuririn (Krillin) as a new character. From there it got popular before I knew it.”
More On the Dragon Ball Franchise
Both Master Roshi and Krillin play an important role in Goku’s life. The introduction of these characters not only changed Goku’s life but also had a massive impact on the popularity of Dragon Ball. Akira Toriyama’s love for martial arts could truly be understood from the Tournament Saga. Even though Goku did not win the tournament, it had a few intense fights and wholesome moments.
Fans were surprised to hear such an incident about their favorite anime. Dragon Ball: Super was the last anime of the franchise. Even though the manga is ongoing, the anime went on a hiatus in 2018. It is truly marvelous to think that someone’s vengeful reason could change the course of an anime. Goku’s plain clothes were not pushing the anime towards popularity, yet now everybody is a fan of his costume.
Source: Kanzenshuu
