Coming home after school at the end of the 1990s, lounging in front of the clunky JVC tube television and watching an episode of Dragon Ball on RTL 2 was brilliant. Although I watched far more DBZ in the following years simply because of the sheer volume of episodes, the first adventures of the insatiable, fearless 11-year-old Goku with the red monk's staff and his fight against the Red Ribbon Army and Chief Devil Piccolo remain with me to this day something very special.
In Dragon Ball Daima, time has been turned back for five weeks now with the young versions of my childhood heroes. It couldn't be more obvious that, as a child of the Chupa Chups and Super Soaker decade, I am completely the target group here. But as fun as the nostalgia trip is, if I had one wish at Shenlong, could the green dragon conjure up a portion of patience for me? or alternatively put all the episodes on Netflix at once.
I'm too impatient for Dragon Ball Daima
As much as I enjoy watching the new episode of Dragon Ball Daima every Friday, the anime feels like it drags on forever, I'm just not cut out for it. I used to be able to watch one episode a day on RTL 2. But the fact that Daima's story is advanced by about 20 minutes per week, minus the recap, intro and outro, is incredibly taxing on my patience and for two reasons!
A very leisurely start
Point 1 is that I could easily summarize the plot of the first five episodes on a beer mat. Daima is only supposed to be 20 episodes strong and so far there hasn't been much more than exposition. With such a short anime, it would have been nice if the story got going faster.
The pacing thing is different
The second reason why Daima strains my patience so much is the absurdly long release rhythm with only one new episode per week. While Dragon Ball Z was criticized for all of its filler episodes, in which stones were kicked up in the fight for an exaggerated ten episodes and this had a noticeable effect on the pacing, the relatively short Daima takes almost five months to finish.
In contrast to DBZ, Daima doesn't even have to wait for the new manga chapter to appear and advance the story. After all, Daima isn't available as a manga and, according to Toei Animation, the episodes are already finished.
Interesting facts about DB Daima
It doesn't have to be a binge marathon, but?
Most recently, the Fallout series received great praise from me because all the episodes were published directly and I could choose when I continued watching. 86% of you also thought the full release was really great. In the age of streaming services, such conveniences have simply become a habit for me
By the way, the lack of patience in our fast-moving times is not my only problem. If I only watch the anime in bulk after all the episodes have been published, I run the risk of stumbling across countless spoilers online or among my friends. Of course, there are also subscription costs. If I want to jump in right when the first episode is released and watch it until the end, I can't even just get Netflix, ADN or Crunchyroll for a month.
It doesn't always have to be a binge marathon, butA middle ground would have been much more fun for me. Arcane on Netflix, where three episodes of Season 2 are released weekly, is exactly such a middle ground. I learn a lot in the fantastic (!) League of Legends series, there is room for cliffhangers and exchanges with friends and the anticipation for the new episodes is fueled.
Of course, as a huge Dragon Ball fan, I will continue watching Daima until February. After all, the anticipation for the fights against the Tamagami and a possible new fusion between Goku and Vegeta is great. But as someone who, unlike many anime fans, is not used to this very leisurely rhythm, I would have liked Daima to get going a little faster.
How are you doing with Dragon Ball Daima right now? Do you like the new anime or is the process or what is shown a little too slow for you?
