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Dragon Ball AF. You hate it, you love it, or maybe you’ve never heard of it.
In any case, I doubt you know the full story.It’s a truth that Dragon Ball fandom is and always has been intense. Regardless of their preferred version, Dragon Ball fans absolutely love their Dragon Ball.Just before Dragon Ball GT concluded its original television run in Japan in 1997, a rumor spread about a new official series called Dragon Ball AF. Along the way I found a captivating story to tell.The Dragon Ball AF TrendBefore we get into the details of Dragon Ball AF, I’d like you to see just how popular it is.I’ve been a fan of Dragon Ball since 1997 when it first aired on Cartoon Network’s Toonami block and Midnight Run. Even back then I remember seeing rumors about it on the Internet.I’ve never done an article about Dragon Ball AF because frankly, I didn’t think it was worth digging into. As a kid I realized it wasn’t real after 5 seconds of seeing the first image. It was obviously poor quality and made by fans. I was curious, but since it wasn’t genuine I thought the rumor would be dead in a few years.But Dragon Ball AF continues to be talked about.
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Somehow people are still falling for the rumors. In fact it’s even more popular now than when Dragon Ball Z was syndicated on national TV.Consider the following search trends.According to Google Adwords’ keywords tool, the term “dragon ball AF” received 1,000,000 global monthly searches on average in the previous 12 months (January, 2011 to January, 2012). And at the date of this article it has 3,490,000 Google search results.For comparison, “dragon ball z kai” received the same 1,000,000 global monthly searches.This means Dragon Ball AF is currently 100% as popular of a search term as Dragon Ball Z Kai, and it’s not even real! Nor is it backed by millions of dollars in marketing.How is that possible? The rumor started in 1997 and people are STILL actively looking for it 15 years after its creation?!Query data for Dragon Ball AF on Google only begins in 2004, when Google began recording trend data.
We can see that its popularity grew gradually over the years. There was a huge spike in 2007 for Dragon Ball AF information, most likely coinciding with the end of Dragon Ball GT’s syndication across the world by fans hungry for more. Then this gradually dropped over the next few years. But there are more queries for it now between 2011 and 2012 than there were between 2004 and 2006.The term “dragon ball” has 30,400,000 monthly queries and “dragon ball z” receives 16,600,000.Comparing that to two other large series, we see that Star Wars receives 24,900,000 queries and Star Trek receives 4,090,000 queries. This helps prove that Dragon Ball fandom on the internet is still very much alive, as searches for “dragon ball” eclipses both “star wars” and “star trek” combined.What’s crazy is that the entirely fan created “dragon ball AF” is so popular when compared to these legitimate series, at 1,000,000 queries.Even more shocking, there are multiple Dragon Ball AF videos on YouTube with over 9 million views, 8 million views and 5 million views, while the incredibly popular Dragon Ball meme, “It’s Over 9,000!” only has 7 million views total. Is Dragon Ball AF really more popular than “Over 9,000!”?Some fans have speculated that when the rumor began in 1997 it was on April Fool’s Day (April 1 st), and this is why it’s called AF. There’s no proof of this, but if so, it seems like the whole world fell for it, because Dragon Ball AF is exponentially more popular now than when it started.
Where did Dragon Ball AF Come From?Dragon Ball GT completed its run in 1997 and even though fans knew it was the end, everybody was hungry for more.GT was for most people a disappointment, as it was written by someone other than Akira Toriyama. In this case, Matsui Aya, the Series Organizer at Toei. Fans wanted Akira Toriyama at the creative helm again, like he was for Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z.It’s not known where the rumor started (possibly Spain), but it mentioned a new series called Dragon Ball AF, where Goku reaches Super Saiyan 5, Pan turns Super Saiyan, and Raditz comes back alive somehow, also as a Super Saiyan.The first image associated with Dragon Ball AF was of Super Saiyan 5 Goku.Nobody knew where it came from. Rumors said it was from a fan made manga (Dojinshi), but no proof was ever provided. Others have said that it’s not Goku at all, rather his son Xicor.The AF logo was completely fabricated, but even so, fans speculated what it could mean. It was rumored to stand for “After Future,” because the series took place 200 years after the end of GT.
Others said it stood for “Alternate Future,” or “AfterliFe,” while those who didn’t believe in it, as they still explain today, said it stood for “April Fools.”A few crudely drawn images appeared of Goku Photoshopped to have different color hair, Pan with golden hair, Super Saiyan Raditz and other seemingly random combinations of Fusioned characters, like Vegetunks, the Fusion of Vegeta and Trunks.Meanwhile, Super Saiyan 5 was surpassed by Super Saiyan 6. Goku was now “Evil Goku” bec.
Wrote:I've explained before, I'll just paraphrase myself.Power levels establish tension and drama. People who care about them (well, people who care about them in a narrative) don't care about the big numbers or the fancy explosions. If you have character A who's so much above character B, who's the main character, you're gonna be left wondering how in the hell character B, the character we're supposed to care and root for, is going to escape the situation or overcome the odds. It makes us emotionally invested.If character B doesn't escape the situation in a believable way that's consistent with previous events, then that emotional investment is gone. It was pointless tension, pointless drama made just to suck in the viewer. It has no critical value whatsoever. The audience is left believing that the author can just create whatever scenarios he wants and what happens to the characters is decided by whatever the author wants to happen, regardless of the events that happened in the story.
Which, in fairness, is what happens, but the audience wants to be fooled. The audience wants to know that the world they're following has rules. That the world they're invested in isn't going to bend to external factors that are irrelevant to them.An author can do whatever he wants with the characters, that's not false. But the author should also have the responsibility to make sure it fits in cohesively with the other events in the narrative he has created. James Teal (Animerica 1996) wrote: When you think about it, there are a number of similarities between the Chinese-inspired Son Goku and that most American of superhero icons, Superman.
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Both are aliens sent to Earth shortly after birth to escape the destruction of their homeworlds; both possess super-strength, flight, super-speed, heightened senses and the ability to cast energy blasts. But the crucial difference between them lies not only in how they view the world, but in how the world views them.Superman is, and always has been, a symbol for truth, justice, and upstanding moral fortitude–a role model and leader as much as a fighter. The more down-to-earth Goku has no illusions about being responsible for maintaining social order, or for setting some kind of moral example for the entire world. Goku is simply a martial artist who’s devoted his life toward perfecting his fighting skills and other abilities.
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Though never shy about risking his life to save either one person or the entire world, he just doesn’t believe that the balance of the world rests in any way on his shoulders, and he has no need to shape any part of it in his image. Goku is an idealist, and believes that there is some good in everyone, but he is unconcerned with the big picture of the worldunless it has to do with some kind of fight. Politics, society, law and order don’t have much bearing on his life, but he’s a man who knows right from wrong.
