I am not sure the manga was at any point like that lol. Powerups were arbitrary since day one. What changed over time was that it left its comedic elements and transitioned into a proper action oriented shonen. That said, I loath how the anime handles powerups. I was a huge fan of the more recent DB movies (battle of gods and return of f). I bought into the SSG, then goku and vegeta growing stronger due to having god ki and then even SSB. My only issue with SS was the color. What a wasted chance to make a super saiyan red (distinct from SSG). And then DBS anime went on what seems like a cocaine induced rampage and simply fucking nothing made sense. Suddenly goku and vegeta started using any arbitrary transformation they could at any time and it became impossible to even know how strong they were or how strong their enemies were. FFS at one point krillin faced SSB. Krillin being able to do anything whatsoever against SSB is contrary to how 10 years worth of strength differences worked in DB. And then you get to the TOP... Where ultra instinct is a transformation for some reason, gohan decides to come up with his own way to grow stronger and is apparently within the same realm of strength as blue and arbitrarily decides to not use SS even though the point had been made in DB that gohan could actually go SS on top of mystic. And then the insult of SSBKKx20... And vegeta getting SSB form which gives him fucking shojo eyes. So what you have is saiyans being able to completely customize their transformations to suit their tastes. Wtf is that? That said, that is for the anime, the dbs manga is far more coherent in regards to this things in general and barring a few moments is mostly enjoyable.
Not really. Go back to the start. Goku trains hard with Krillin and Roshi before the first tournament, does work the hard way, he and Krillin power up. Later, Goku gets his ass kicked by the Pai Pai (i think that's the assassins name). He gets a power up mostly by climbing up a very tall tower, actual physical training. And his power up was in service of the story - hunting Dragon Balls, in this case to bring back his friends dead father. Over and over the power ups were from training and really just made him faster/stronger, while he and his friends were on adventures, with the occasional tournament.
That is half true IMO. Goku did train as you say but he was also taking advantage of his saiyan physiology through all of it. Even in his childhood he took advantage of the getting stronger after every fight the saiyans have going for them and on top of that he did also get stronger from recovering from life threatening wounds. Granted training was more emphasized back then however it doesn't change that goku grew arbitrarily stronger as the plot demanded it.
Dragonball was pretty much the archetype for both adventure/ exploration shonen (first part) and the ott slugfests with multi-form villains and boatloads of power-ups (the part called Z in the anime). What it always had though, was a reasonably decent and interesting story behind it and that’s what I’ve missed with Super - it’s basically a series of brawls loosely strung together with as minimal storyline as they can get away with, and when ‘power levels’ and particularly reaching new heights become as meaningless as they already were post Frieza, that gets boring very quickly. Honestly GT, for all it’s flaws was actually probably along the right lines with trying to eschew what the final parts of the manga had turned into, but it was too handicapped by Goku et al already being massively OP for the purposes of just adventuring. Really it’d have to focus on Trunks and Goten exploring, but again, that’s limited by the fact that unlike Goku, they have their comfortable home lives and families...
Simple? Yeah but effective. Complex doesn’t mean better, just more convoluted to mask its very simple goal - to provide a backdrop to the fights. I know I’m just echoing what has been said a million times before here, but Goku isn’t even Goku in Super. He’s a character that looks the same and takes on his role, but he’s a shallow parody of the character that existed in his original form. Like a more 2d parody of Luffy (who is himself a more 2d parody of the real Goku). I disagree, execution wise GT was beyond terrible.
But conceptually it was generally along the right lines. No, and honestly I don’t think you could get back to the same level with a tapped out universe like this one. It had its time a long time ago now, and while for so long I wanted it to come back, the reality is living proof of what people say about ending on a high.
Eh, that sayian stuff was a retcon later on, i don't think reading the story, or watching the anime from the start gives that impression. Certainly not so that it makes it feel like the entire point of the story was constant powerups.
I said it's more complex but not that it made it better. In the end it's still very simple, I don't see how things are convoluted. Goku isn't exactly written like in Z, but he is still essentially the same at least to me(easygoing, confidence often bordering on arrogance, love to fight, train and eat etc). As I said above, it isn't Z anymore, Goku wasn't exactly like in Z in GT either.Simple? Yeah but effective. Complex doesn’t mean better, just more convoluted to mask its very simple goal - to provide a backdrop to the fights. I know I’m just echoing what has been said a million times before here, but Goku isn’t even Goku in Super. He’s a character that looks the same and takes on his role, but he’s a shallow parody of the character that existed in his original form. Like a more 2d parody of Luffy (who is himself a more 2d parody of the real Goku). I disagree, execution wise GT was beyond terrible.
To me the character rot actually set in in Z - I would suppose following on from Toriyama’s well documented decline in interest post Frieza. Goku wasn’t meant to be a dumbass, it was naivite from having literally grown up completely isolated from anyone but Gohan until he was 12. Yes he’s also a very straightforward character, but I really don’t think stupid was what Toriyama was trying to portray to begin with (and later in the story it started to get that way only because it was an easier characterisation to maintain some of what made earlier Goku endearing).
I'd say it's fake complexity. I mean, multiverse with a hierarchy of gods sounds complex, but when it's entire purpose is...a tournament, you realize they aren't trying to use the cool ideas for a story, just an excuse for fights.
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Yes, the conclusion should not be very different.