Dragon Ball has some highly praised and well-executed villains. However, even this long-running shonen series has its fair share of disappointments.
As Dragon Ball continues with Dragon Ball Super, the series is bound to bring forward a few disappointing villains. Even the original Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z series aren’t completely exempt from let-down threats. From Commander Red near the beginning of the series to the most recent antagonists, such as Gas in the Granolah arc, Dragon Ball occasionally lets down its fans.
Dragon Ball Super itself tends to show an overreliance on its best villains. Frieza, for instance, can never stay gone for long as he returned to life twice over the course of Dragon Ball Super. The Granolah arc had initially promised to be one of the most interesting arcs yet but felt as if it was falling apart with the underwhelming villains called the Heeters. However, once again, the series returned Frieza, a Dragon Ball character that should have stayed dead, who briefly appeared with a new transformation.
10. Commander Red
Commander Red is the leader of the Red Ribbon Army and a major antagonist in the Red Ribbon Army Saga. However, despite his major role, he never actually faces off against Goku. This is, of course, because Officer Black murders him moments before Goku arrives.
Red is a common instigator who sends his troops to deal with Goku during the saga. Even though it isn’t by his hand, he is the reason that Bora dies at the hands of Mercenary Tao who was hired by Red. While Red throws obstacle upon obstacle in Goku’s way, the two of them never meet. Red was never going to put up a fight against Goku, however, more was expected of him in the final battle against him. Instead, it’s Officer Black who rises as the final opponent for one of Dragon Ball‘s best arcs.
9. Majin Buu
Majin Buu feels like a dry version of the two previous major antagonists in the series. While he does have some unique aspects, such as his inspiration from genies, he comes off as underwhelming. Majin Buu goes through the same pattern as the previous villains where he constantly undergoes new transformations.
While transformations have become a staple for Dragon Ball, it often feels as if Akira Toriyama could never decide what he wanted Majin Buu’s final form to be, so he kept changing it. The fights are fantastic, especially when the heroes battle Super Buu, the strongest form of Buu. However, it all seems to fall flat when Majin Buu grows even weaker and lacks even less personality than before as Kid Buu, a villain that Goku actually killed in Dragon Ball.
8. Moro
Moro has a lot of background to his character and his initial setup is great. However, that’s where everything good regarding Moro ends. He serves as a bland antagonist that appears to be a mesh of previous major villains in the franchise.
While the objective of creating Moro to be a pure evil figure was successful, it resulted in a bland and uninteresting character. Not every villain needs a sappy backstory, but Moro’s placement feels unsatisfying as one of those villains who’s evil simply for the sake of it. For a series that lacks many unique and new villains, the prospect of Moro was initially exciting, until all of his abilities and scenes ended up being complete copies of the best Dragon Ball villains.
7. Dabura
Dabura has always been a character robbed of potential and the biggest issue is that he was simply an antagonist that served as a way to set up Majin Buu. Akira Toriyama did make him insanely powerful, on the level of Cell, however, so many years have passed that such strength was nothing to characters like Goku and Vegeta.
This did offer a presenting challenge for Gohan, whose power hadn’t grown throughout the years, but the fight doesn’t even get to a conclusion. The Demon Realm is also an idea that is briefly seen and Dabura is not only the king of the realm but also the strongest warrior from it. This raises so many questions with no answers and the end of Dabura feels disappointing. Nothing has been touched upon the character or the Demon Realm in canon, which needs to appear before the conclusion of Dragon Ball Super.
6. The Androids
The Androids are simply a mess in the Cell Saga and that’s because Akira Toriyama’s editor wasn’t satisfied with the characters Toriyama created. First Androids 19 and 20 weren’t designed well enough, so Toriyama retconned that Androids 18 and 17 were the actual androids Trunks warned them about.
However, these androids weren’t intimidating enough and Toriyama had to come up with something more terrifying, which led to Cell. While Cell himself is fantastic and saved the saga, the previous handling of the androids was a huge let-down, especially considering a pair of androids were supposed to be the real threat that Trunks had warned everyone about. Even though this gave rise to some great characters like one of the best duos in Dragon Ball, Androids 17 and 18, it was simply annoying that the main villains were changed so many times.
5. Garlic Jr.
The Dead Zone was an okay film at best, and it had no business returning as filler. It gave to rise some of the worst episodes in Dragon Ball Z, as Garlic Jr. had an entire arc dedicated to himself after he wreaked havoc on Earth.
It was a cool concept for Garlic Jr. to conquer Kami’s Lookout and become a sort of evil ruler of Earth for a time. However, the interest ends there. Aside from the rest of the scenes being awful, Garlic Jr. doesn’t do anything compelling or interesting. His fights aren’t good, and he’s stronger simply for the sake of it. And due to being immortal, he ends up being defeated in almost the exact same way as in the film, which wraps up these episodes as being the worst filler arc in Dragon Ball.
4. The Heeters
The Heeters are the most recent antagonists of Dragon Ball Super, with Gas serving as the main villain of the Granolah arc. He alone provides a bit more to the story, but the characters all around feel flat. Gas hates Saiyans and wants to be strong and that is simply the extent of his character.
The Granolah arc had a fair bit working well for it, like the motivations of Granolah as he struggles to learn whether his vengeance is really worth pursuing. There was also the character development of Vegeta and his new Ultra Ego form, which was introduced in one of the best transformation scenes in Dragon Ball and led him to realize that he can’t turn himself into a cold evil being again. However, Gas strides in as an interesting obstacle that steadily seems to grow more and more powerful. Even the writers feel as if they didn’t know how to deal with him, so they randomly had Frieza show up to eradicate him and then leave.
3. Meta-Cooler Core
The Return of Cooler was an unbelievable let-down and this once epic Dragon Ball villain doesn’t quite return in the way as expected. He returns as a large disgusting head that is creating all of his Meta-Cooler counterparts. This is a major disappointment from his previous film, The Return of Cooler, which was one of the best Dragon Ball films.
The battles against the Meta-Cooler army alone are disappointing. It offers a nice scene that shows just how hopeless the battle looks, but these versions of Cooler feel bland and unimaginative. When Goku and Vegeta finally face off against the real Cooler, it isn’t at all how one might expect. The final battle is terrible, and it’s clear that the film was simply a money grab to use a popular character rather than providing a genuinely interesting follow-up film.
2. Cell Max
It seemed pretty evident that Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero was going to resurrect Cell in one way or another. Thankfully, this didn’t end up being the true Cell but rather a new version that created the strongest android yet seen in Dragon Ball. However, bringing back one of the most interesting villains in the franchise is something that shouldn’t be done so lightly.
Cell Max was a mindless giant with absolutely no personality or dialogue. There was nothing interesting about the character other than the animation and fight. The character served solely as a purpose to parallel the Cell Games, with Gohan unlocking his new transformation, Beast. Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero was a ton of fun with great action. However, the final battle just felt like a bland rehash of the Cell Games and stole some importance from the amazing fight in the past.
1. Bio-Broly
Broly, one of the few Saiyans alive in Dragon Ball Super‘s Universe 7, has had a total of four major films in the Dragon Ball franchise. He was easily the most popular non-canon character in the franchise for years until he was made canon in Dragon Ball Super Broly. However, not all of his films were well-loved.
While his first two were fantastic, his third was a huge cash grab meant to bring viewers in simply because it had Broly in the title. Broly is seen for a couple of scenes before he’s swallowed up by the odd syrup form, where he remains a weird misshapen form for the rest of the movie. He’s simply a powerful blob with no dialogue, and it’s simply painful to watch him in action. There isn’t a greater villain disgrace in the entire Dragon Ball franchise, one of the best martial arts anime series.
Source: Screenrant.com
