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I was browsing through a list of currently airing anime when the word “Dragonball” popped out at me.  Apparently Dragonball Z is being recut, remastered and replayed under a new name.  Like most kids my age, I was a fairly big, but not obsessive, fan of Dragonball and Dragonball Z when I was young, right up until about my junior high years.  I remember coming home on Thursdays, turning on the television (back when we didn’t know that anime was from Japan or originally in another language) and hoping for a new episode instead of a rerun.  I also remember going to school the next day and hearing everyone excitedly discuss what had happened the night before.  One of the downsides of this “on-demand” age of media we’re living in is the lack of shared community experience with moments like that.

But the original question here is, why was Dragonball (and Dragonball Z) as popular as it was?  It has become the “archetype” of shounen series, and the current king of shounen, Naruto, has many similar elements, for better or for worse.  Certainly there is the simple explanation – young boys like watching people fight on screen, and Dragonball Z, with it’s massive explosions and light-speed punching and kicking, delivered on that front.  I’m not sure that explains why I liked it, however.  “Jock” isn’t exactly a word that would describe me well, and I can’t say that the violence is what made me a fan.

Instead, it was probably pure idealism.  Now, I know what you’re thinking – what’s idealistic about evil villains destroying the world and it’s inhabitants.  Well, I mean idealistic in a moral sense.  Take Goku for example – he was a fighter who had a great deal of power and defeated many, many opponents in Dragonball Z (which was the series that I was most familiar with).  Yet even after being harmed by many of his enemies, he always had the instinct to forgive them and convince them to become good people.  Is that kind of idealistic forgiveness plausible in the real world?  Probably not for the majority.  Indeed, for the majority of the series Goku has the potential to kill anyone, but his instinct is not to harm a fly.  Doesn’t that appeal to the optimistic heart of a young kid in front of his television?

Not only is he inherently pacifistic, when the time does come, both he and other Dragonball characters selflessly sacrifice themselves for the sake of friends or family without hesitation.  Again, I ask, how could a young kid watching this not look up to these characters and their idealistic loyalty and courage?  Then we have the notion of energy-based power instead of physical power leading to the next point.  In one of the subplots of Dragonball Z, Goku’s son is pitted against a much stronger opponent, but the thought of wanting to protect his friends (again, the loyalty) allows him to bring out a “hidden” power despite his small size and original strength and defeat the enemy.  Do I need to even ask again?  Who doesn’t wish that in times of adversity, we could all summon some special power given only to those who morally deserve it?

Most of us want to believe that good will always prevail over evil, or that even when things look bleak, noble ideals like wanting to protect others will somehow give you all you need to overcome any obstacle.  So I submit that the popularity of of shows like Dragonball Z and Naruto are not merely due to a testosterone-driven need for violence and action, but also in part to the youthful satisfaction in seeing these idealistic concepts of good, evil, loyalty, friendship and righteousness come to life.