Is Akira Toriyama a good writer?

[42 Monks]

Where's the evidence, dude? "The entire focus and all that's centered around it" is your own assumption that in itself is informed by a fake rumor anyway. The main thing planting that assumption in your head to begin with is a fake rumor. Surely there's a source, an interview, or SOMETHING. What we know:

Toriyama's favorite character is Goku
Toriyama never listened to the fans
Toriyama's editor at the time was hands-off and let him do his thing
In Toriyama's own words, he didn't think Gohan was good enough

This is a 30-year old series from another country. We don't even know how the fans reacted to this shyt when it happened to begin with! What we do know is that Gohan was at the top of the popularity polls in '93 though

Toriyama never listened to fans breh WHAT

and people send off their favorite characters all the damn time man
his editor was the one that told him to throw out the clown and old man androids and keep redesigning cell
and his own words "he wanted to" "but it didn't work out " the bag definitely did
all you're doing is throwing around circumstantials, disregarding how writing/publishing interacts, and planting a flag on it

dude was wrote out with all the death foreshadowing, final moments, and tropey farewells that he could fit on the panels - and between the fans and the people writing his checks, he made the business decision

like writers do in every market in the world if you want to continue to disregard every cash move in media to put all your faith in someone towing the line that's on you.

like series never get changed and writers don't take a backseat before anyone else

 

[FunkDoc1112]

Toriyama never listened to fans breh WHAT

and people send off their favorite characters all the damn time man
his editor was the one that told him to throw out the clown and old man androids and keep redesigning cell
and his own words "he wanted to" "but it didn't work out " the bag definitely did
all you're doing is throwing around circumstantials, disregarding how writing/publishing interacts, and planting a flag on it

dude was wrote out with all the death foreshadowing, final moments, and tropey farewells that he could fit on the panels - and between the fans and the people writing his checks, he made the business decision

like writers do in every market in the world if you want to continue to disregard every cash move in media to put all your faith in someone towing the line that's on you.

like series never get changed and writers don't take a backseat before anyone else

Again, you're injecting your own opinions on what happened and presenting it as fact. I don't give a fukk about what happened with other shows or other situations in the show, I'm talking about this specific incident. You've presented opinions based on other shyt, I've presented facts.

Toriyama has said interviews that when he gets a lot of letters from fans about certain shyt, he did the opposite to fukk with their expectations.

Do you make any use of such fan opinions in the original work?
I do, in the sense of “betraying the fans’ expectations”. For instance, when I got a lot of, “Don’t kill Vegeta,” I deliberately killed him. (laughs)

So if anything, fans wanting him to bring Goku back woulda had him like, "Y'know what, maybe I'll keep him dead after all "

And like I said, his editor at the time off the Buu saga was hands off. His editor during the Cell saga only made him change Cell's appearance. The most hands on editor wasn't even working for him after the Saiyan arc, he just trolled Toriyama about the Androids being wack and he was like "Yeah, you're right"

Toriyama has no problem admitting when other people interfere with his shyt as he did with the Androids/Cell shyt, yet he went out of his way to say he made the call on Gohan. Seems obvious to me.

 

[Cadillac]

:AngledScust:

Just mentally noted that your opinion is relegated to hot garbage water status. Hovering just above neg on sight.:Egregious1:

i could care less what you think, fact is AT is better than Kishi

having a simple story that delivers, is consistent, coherent >>>>>>> having a robust story that is rugged, incoherent, and inconsistent

He's not by even by shonen standards. The big 3 aren't either.

• Kishi was fine until he wanted to incorporate a multilayer story involving everyone which left more questions than answers.
• Kubo had a myriad of issues: power levels, a cast was supposed to grow with him, but end up just being background characters, then ass pulls of the century.
• Oda has overall boring cast, with few members of the cast allowed to be something. The island hopping and the storylines of characters, and the general leave much to be desired.

But the stories are fun to watch despite all these flaws.

what is "shonen standards" idk much outside AT and those three you listed. But AT and Oda are def above whatever standard u put at

even if AT is not a great storyteller, theres more to being a graphic novel author then storytelling, theres also art, and paneling. AT is excellent in art, paneling, action etc.

and you cant be anymore wrong than @bolded. Do you read OP or skim through it. Because Oda makes it a point to make everyone relevant and be useful to the story
@underline what exactly do you want out of the story? The hopping is needed as it's an Adventure story that involves pushing forward toward the goals of the characters especially in finding One piece the treasure.

 

[KingJay]

He said how he just had to start coming up with the plot on the fly eventually. I think a lot of DB and DBZ's flaws are the result of writing for weekly shounen jump and being its most popular author as well as being a trailblazer re-crafting a genre really. He didn't have the works to learn from, compare to, base off of, reference, etc. that modern authors now have. Now we can look back and see the flaws of something like a Dragon Ball, Naruto, etc., learn from those mistakes, and make something better.

This is basically My Hero Academia, the shounen genre and its tropes executed to near-perfection.

Likewise, this is how you get the birth of a Hunter x Hunter 2011 subverting much of what Toriyama crafted.

 

[Cadillac]

I know you don't have much depth with anime but No the fukk he ain't to the bolded. I like the Cell saga and all but the writing is basic as fukk and say what you want about Kishi and where he got his influences but he created an entire ninja world based on rules and a rich history with clans and villages. The story did fall off a bit after Shippuuden but not enough for me to flat out say it was wack when it wrapped up. Classic fights, characters, with strategies and rules and not just yelling reaching new Saiyan forms like in DBZ has done for damn near 20 years. And just to be clear I liked DB and liked Super for what it was but good writing and Toriyama should not go hand in hand. Just b/c you keep it simple doesn't mean you have good writing especially when you know what the outcome is gonna be with the same character over and over.
You also need to watch Hunter X Hunter and Full Metal Alchemist Brotherhood if you want to see good writing.

Narutos world history is not rich, we barely know much of anything besides the ninja wars and a few other instances. Plus the villages are almost all the same but with different color palletes

only thing I will give u is the clans with the kekkei genkai.

as for fights, naruto has evolved into being just like DBZ and using energy blast just like DBZ. Granted they still use some strategy. But Naruto has dabbled in that field that people critiqued DBZ for. Which DBZ is not always just yelling either.

@bolded you cant be serious, you say this like that doesnt apply with Naruto, just as there is the formula to DBZ that they will prevail same applies to Naruto


keeping it simple and making the story both good and entertaining is good writing, in this case of AT with DB he has done that through majority of DBs run with bumpy roads in Cell and def Buu saga.

That method is better than making shyt one big mess with Kishi and Naruto and contradicting the themes of your series. Naruto as a series tried so hard to be convoluted and layered only to fall on its face.
People can talk all this stuff about Naruto's story not being so "simple" but being simple and good >>>>> complex and bad

I have seen FMA, and dont care for HxH, I have no interest in reading any manga, outside of the ones im following(One piece and Attack on titan)

 

[LordDeathwatch]

I have no interest in reading any manga, outside of the ones im following(One piece and Attack on titan)

THIS is precisely why I made it perfectly clear that your opinion is invalid. You want to ramble on about the quality of the writers and then not actually read manga outside the microscopic sample size you have.

Just shut all the way the fukk up.:Boshfukkery:

 

[Cadillac]

THIS is precisely why I made it perfectly clear that your opinion is invalid. You want to ramble on about the quality of the writers and then not actually read manga outside the microscopic sample size you have.

Just shut all the way the fukk up.:Boshfukkery:

You dont have to read tons manga to know what good writing is idiot.

there are books and other mediums that involve storytelling like movies, that you can learn what composes good storytelling that you can learn from

 

[David_TheMan]

No he isn't
Yu Yu Hakasho, Inuyasha, The Breaker, hell EyeShield 21 and One Piece (the GOAT) and Berserk are far better story lines than anything Toriyama ever did.

 

[Monoblock]

Narutos world history is not rich, we barely know much of anything besides the ninja wars and a few other instances. Plus the villages are almost all the same but with different color palletes

only thing I will give u is the clans with the kekkei genkai.

as for fights, naruto has evolved into being just like DBZ and using energy blast just like DBZ. Granted they still use some strategy. But Naruto has dabbled in that field that people critiqued DBZ for. Which DBZ is not always just yelling either.

@bolded you cant be serious, you say this like that doesnt apply with Naruto, just as there is the formula to DBZ that they will prevail same applies to Naruto


keeping it simple and making the story both good and entertaining is good writing, in this case of AT with DB he has done that through majority of DBs run with bumpy roads in Cell and def Buu saga.

That method is better than making shyt one big mess with Kishi and Naruto and contradicting the themes of your series. Naruto as a series tried so hard to be convoluted and layered only to fall on its face.
People can talk all this stuff about Naruto's story not being so "simple" but being simple and good >>>>> complex and bad

I have seen FMA, and dont care for HxH, I have no interest in reading any manga, outside of the ones im following(One piece and Attack on titan)

Safe writing does not make it good writing or even better than Naruto. I think a lot of yall are caught up in the nostalgia of when you first saw DB and DBZ when you were young and it held a special place for yall but go back and look at that shyt with adult eyes and pay attention. shyt is just power levels to the point its crazy and the story falls apart quickly. I'm not saying the same thing didn't happen with Naruto towards the second half but at least they came up with ways to try and combat or form a strategy while fighting even when the opponent was stronger. How the hell is Naruto's world not rich compared to DBZ? They went into the whole back drop of how ninshu was created, how the tailed beast were created, how the village was formed, Clans that formed that village, how those villages earned income (bingo book), the spoils of those wars and the enemies it created (Nagato), the origin of the clans and how they all related. The dirt that was going on inside Konoha with Danzo and the Anbu, MUTHAfukkKIN ITACHI being a child soldier becoming a professional assassin at 11 and used to kill his whole clan at 13. fukkIN PERVY SAGE JIRAYA'S DEATH. They created rules and a hierarchy in every village. I really don't see how you can say DBZ's writing is better. How Sway? The writing is laughable man. At least with Naruto we got amazing fights from people not named Naruto and Sasuke. (I still love the 8 tails putting the beats to Sasuke's ass and almost killing him within an inch of his life). Gohan is literally the most disappointing joke of a character ever and Vegeta (I love this cat) is a literal punching bag that always ends up getting his ass kicked and getting embarrassed. Like I said safe does not equal good and this shyt is as plain as day that writing isn't Toriyama's strong suit

 

[Amor fati]

Yeah he's good if you are wearing the nostalgia glasses. He's straight garbage like the majority of most shounen writers with IP's that consist of asspulls, Gary Stu characters and major plot holes. Dragon Super showed that Toriyama's writing ain't all that. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt though he was never serious with DB anyway but because of DB's popularity, he just decided to phone it in.

 

[Amor fati]

No he isn't
Yu Yu Hakasho, Inuyasha, The Breaker, hell EyeShield 21 and One Piece (the GOAT) and Berserk are far better story lines than anything Toriyama ever did.

I also believe that Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind has a better storyline than anything Toriyama wrote. He's probably better than most or on the same level with other shounen writers and he ain't got shyt on Seinen writers though.

 

[FunkDoc1112]

He said how he just had to start coming up with the plot on the fly eventually. I think a lot of DB and DBZ's flaws are the result of writing for weekly shounen jump and being its most popular author as well as being a trailblazer re-crafting a genre really. He didn't have the works to learn from, compare to, base off of, reference, etc. that modern authors now have. Now we can look back and see the flaws of something like a Dragon Ball, Naruto, etc., learn from those mistakes, and make something better.

This is basically My Hero Academia, the shounen genre and its tropes executed to near-perfection.

Likewise, this is how you get the birth of a Hunter x Hunter 2011 subverting much of what Toriyama crafted.

Toriyama did have influences, but they weren't other anime and manga. Most of Toriyama's influences for Dragon Ball were Kung-Fu and Wuxia flicks. Jackie Chan in particular.

Toriyama damn near worked himself to death on Dr. Slump and the only reason he even started Dragon Ball was because he promised to his editor, Torishima, that if he ended Dr. Slump he'd have a new series ready in a year. So his creative process with Dragon Ball was all about minimizing the amount of stress he had to deal with. nikka said he wouldn't even start working on chapters until 2 days before the deadline, no rough draft or anything . He'd just goof off for 5 days and then stay up 2 days straight getting the manga done. So we're talking about a guy who was doing EVERYTHING on the fly.

 

[Versa]

Dragonball is the greatest Shonen Manga/Anime of all time

 

[KingJay]

Spoiler

runner up from the same author as Hakusho

 

[Uitomy]

he was writing an issue a week for 10 years straight without breaks or hiatus... you can’t expect a deeply complex narrative. he was basically making it up as he went along.

when you take that into consideration what he was actually able to do is kind of amazing. it wasn’t shakespeare but there were definitely enough twists and turns to keep things interesting and anything that was built up usually paid off.

you could also say the saiyan-freiza saga was one of the most emotional and twisted arcs in anime too, if you look at only those sagas in comparison to DB it gets really really deep, it wasnt till the android saga that the story started to falter so his fatigue showed