Dragon Ball Z Movie 11: Super Senshi Gekiha!! Katsu no wa Ore da

Holy crap, a great Dragon Ball movie out of nowhere!

What do you get when you take the plot of a gore-heavy sci-fi B-movie and put it in the world of Dragon Ball? You get a movie where a rich snob, basically Augustus St. Cloud from Venture Bros., challenges world-famous "hero" Mr. Satan to a duel as revenge for ruining his childhood, and then sics a bunch of ooze-covered bio-warriors on him. And then Broly comes back, this time in the form of a clone covered in ooze, and he looks like Swamp Thing.

This is everything I want out of an action-packed anime movie, and ... I had no idea I'd be getting it out of the, what, eleventh one of these stupid things? The movie is filled with fighting and action and danger but it's not all about one overly-powerful buff dude beating everyone up; instead, it focuses on the bizarre sci-fi elements, which includes a lot of gross-out horror with dudes getting melted by acid and stuff. Thankfully (sadly?) it's not graphic at all, and the movie is more geared towards the ridiculous humor of it all.

What kind of Dragon Ball movie has a cast like this? Our main heroes are... wait for it... Goten, Trunks, Mr. Satan, and... Android 18? Krillin makes an appearance too, but other than that, we don't have any of the usual cast coming in here and turning things into a monotonous punchfest.

Crazy good stuff, and I might recommend it even more highly on a rewatch. Since it's just 46 minutes long including credits, it's also a zippy-fast watch, and the first one since Dead Zone I can recommend with zero caveats. We've got a few more DBZ movies to go, and I have high hopes for Fusion Reborn based on my knowledge of it, but Bio-Broly could end up being the tops, and that's crazy.

As for the timeline, this is a direct sequel to the previous Broly movie, featuring some of the same plot threads and apparently taking place very shortly afterwards. It would also be set shortly before the Budokai Tenkaichi though Mr. Satan's prominent role makes it a bit suspect considering how shocked he was about having to duel one of these two kids during the tournament. Once again it can't be "canon" because of the Super Broly movie, but "canon" is stupid anyway.

[Spoilers]
This Dragon Ball Z movie was very unnecessary, i'm very positive Akira Toriyama was going through mid-life crisis and needed money badly, so voilà! I present to you Swamp Monster! I mean Bio-Broly! What is the point of bringing back Broly if you're literally going to make him walking fecal-matter! I should have watched this movie in Japanese and without subtitles just so I didn't have to worry about missing any important piece to the movie, because literally story is not a thing here. Toriyama looked up to the sky, shed a tear and said "Lord, do not smite me for what I have bestowed ... on the people who made me successful and is the reason why I sleep comfortably and eat every night and day, but muah! muah! My latest masterpiece! A silver platter of spicy sh*t!" I have not seen a larger disaster since the 2010 BP Oil Spill, or even worse, shall I even say it, the birth of Jaden Smith. Goku, our lord and savior wasn't even in the film, and i'm sure he couldn't have saved this catastrophe of a DBZ movie. Goku shows up at the very last few seconds of the movie and is shown eating. That's about it, just eating. I'm sure Toriyama only added that last scene of Goku eating because that is what they think us "Westerners" can relate to. Eating. Well Toriyama, i'm ending this on the note of saying that I am appalled that you created this movie and i'm shocked to see that you didn't make this a hentai film because that is another stereotype of your western fans. No, not all of us eat a lot and no, not all of us touch ourselves to animated drawings doing obscene things like getting penetrated by 8 ft tentacles! At least you got that one right, good thing you have loyal fans because i'm sure if they weren't loyal you'd be creating mediocre flash "dress up games" like "Dress up Selena Gomez" or "Dress up Whoopi Goldberg!" Anyway, this has been a Clams review. Barely. I can't review a 40 minute milked movie with no story or good characters. If you'd like me to review anything just message me.

One of the worst Dragon Ball movies!

This film is a direct sequel to the tenth film (The Return of Broly). And honestly, being a continuation of that disaster, it was to be expected that nothing very good would come of it. The problem is that it not only fails to improve on the previous one, but manages to be even weaker and more pointless. It's almost as if it was made just to fill a quota, without any real intention of delivering something of quality.

The beginning of the film even seemed promising. The proposal to highlight secondary characters like Goten, Trunks, Android 18, and Mr. ... Satan seemed like a different and interesting choice. A plot focused on characters who are usually on the sidelines of the main action could bring a freshness to the franchise, a way to explore less seen dynamics and perhaps even enrich the universe between major sagas. Only God knows how wrong I was.

The decision to bring Broly back as the antagonist once again was, without exaggeration, one of the worst choices ever made in the Dragon Ball films. This sequel managed to destroy the character in an almost irreversible way, pushing its concept to the brink of ridicule. It's impressive how something that started with such impact in the first film degraded to such a grotesque level. After these two films, the least one can do is consider only the first Broly as valid and pretend that these two sequels simply don't exist. In narrative terms, they are an absolute disaster.

The animation, on the other hand, is decent. It's not revolutionary, but it has its positive moments and you can see that there was technical effort. Unfortunately, with so many overwhelming flaws in the script, the villain's construction, the story structure, and even the way the fights are choreographed, the animation ends up being completely overshadowed. It's difficult to appreciate any visual quality when the content behind it is so weak.

Honestly, there's not much more to say. My rating of 2 isn't a 1 only because seeing Android 18 showing her strength again was minimally entertaining and reminded me of when she actually had a real impact on the story. Aside from that, absolutely everything here is bad: the story, the main villain, the poorly placed humor, the tiresome pacing, the emotionless fights… it's exhausting even to write this review because of so much wrong stuff condensed into a single film.

If there's a bottom to the Dragon Ball movies, this one is definitely digging right below it.

=================================================================================================================Versão em Português=====================================

Um dos piores filmes de Dragon Ball!

Esse filme é uma sequência direta do filme dez (O Retorno de Broly). E, honestamente, por se tratar da continuação daquele desastre, já era de se esperar que nada de muito bom viria daqui. O problema é que ele não só falha em melhorar o anterior, como consegue ser ainda mais fraco e sem propósito. É quase como se tivesse sido feito apenas para cumprir tabela, sem qualquer intenção real de entregar algo de qualidade.

O começo do filme até parecia promissor. A proposta de dar destaque aos personagens secundários como Goten, Trunks, Androide Nº 18 e Mr. Satan parecia uma escolha diferente e interessante. Um enredo voltado para personagens que normalmente ficam à margem da ação principal poderia trazer um frescor à franquia, uma forma de explorar dinâmicas menos vistas e talvez até enriquecer o universo entre grandes sagas. Só Deus sabe o quanto eu estava enganado.

A decisão de trazer o Broly como antagonista mais uma vez foi, sem exagero, uma das piores escolhas já feitas nos filmes de Dragon Ball. Essa sequência conseguiu destruir o personagem de uma forma quase irreversível, levando seu conceito ao limite do ridículo. É impressionante como algo que começou com tanto impacto no primeiro filme foi se degradando em um nível tão grotesco. Depois desses dois filmes, o mínimo que se pode fazer é considerar apenas o primeiro Broly como válido e fingir que essas duas continuações simplesmente não existem. Em termos narrativos, elas são um desastre absoluto.

A animação, por outro lado, até que é decente. Não chega a ser revolucionária, mas tem seus momentos positivos e dá para perceber que houve esforço técnico. Infelizmente, com tantos defeitos esmagadores no roteiro, na construção do vilão, na estrutura da história e até mesmo na forma como as lutas são coreografadas, a animação acaba sendo totalmente ofuscada. É difícil apreciar qualquer qualidade visual quando o conteúdo por trás dela é tão fraco.

Sinceramente, não há muito mais a ser dito. Minha nota 2 só não é 1 porque ver a Androide Nº 18 mostrando sua força novamente foi minimamente divertido e me lembrou de quando ela realmente tinha impacto real na história. Fora isso, absolutamente tudo aqui é ruim: história, vilão principal, humor mal encaixado, ritmo cansativo, lutas sem emoção… chega a ser exaustivo até escrever essa review de tanta coisa errada condensada em um único filme.

Se existe um fundo do poço nos filmes de Dragon Ball, esse aqui com certeza está cavando logo abaixo dele.