Looking back, did the Cell Games really have anything going for it?
>no interesting fight choreography whatsoever with Gohan vs Cell
>SSJ2 Gohan starts off cool and badass, then becomes an arrogant dumbass
>Gohan uses no real intelligence against Cell whatsoever
>Gohan needs his dad to walk him through the entire process of beating Cell
>Gohan and Cell don't even get to have an actual fight after Goku's death
Like, is there anything redeeming about it at all?
Back to your general.
???
There's a DBZ general?
The entire Cell Android are was trash. Directionless plothole filled trash that spammed stupidity and made every Dragon Team member look like shit and loses. And started the chiche of transformations and power up. Useless too Ill add. And hero at the end was gone 93% of the arc and added nothing to the plot. Infact didnt even have a interaction with any villain.
I'm glad nobody likes the Cell arc anymore. It's a sign that even the DBZ fanbase can grow some intelligence.
B-B-B-But Gohan's hair is so spiky and he's so edgy and so coooooooooooool and he has the ultimate power that'll beat up all my bullies
Another problem with the android saga is that it pointlessly increased the supposed scale of powers while not ever actually demonstrating it. Every major player is said to eclipse frieza, but the fights LOOK fucking weak compared to when goku and frieza were tearing up an entire planet in their brawl. And for no reason! There was no reason to hand out super saiyan to everyone and then say thag it wasn't enough. Just make it so that goku doesn't know how to reach it again, it's not like he did it intentionally the first time!
>>SSJ2 Gohan starts off cool and badass, then becomes an arrogant dumbass
That's part of what was good about his arc though though, that he fucked up and got too cocky and paid the price.
>Just make it so that goku doesn't know how to reach it again, it's not like he did it intentionally the first time!
At one point during his fight with Freeza, he willingly reverts back to his base form and then turns back into SSJ.
Cell games should have been the end. Afterwards, everyone should have gotten their own spinoff. Goten & Videl vigilante stories, Tien and Chao's adventures on the road, a Bulma and Vegeta SoL romcom, Goten and Trunks' shenanigans as a kid detective agency, and so on with occasional crossovers during dragonball gatherings.
Gohan vs Cell was always massively overrated.
SSJ1 Gohan starts being pacifist doing nothing to fight back - where did this trait even come from, Gohan was ready to fight opponents plenty of times in Freeza and in the Android arc.
Then SSJ2 Gohan vs Cell isn't even a fight, its literally 2 blows with a quick Kamehameha war.
Cell goes Super Perfect, it looks like we'll get a real fight...and then Gohan has to go cripple himself to save Vegeta, so Cell just decides to go for another Kamehameha beam war instead of actually fighting Gohan. Just lame.
How was Gohan a pacifist? He didn't refuse to fight Cell, and he kicked him square in the face at one point.
S-Shut up... S-Schoolshooterhan, haha... So cool
Z wasnt that good. The Sayajin Saga and the Namek Sage were great, everything else was Trash.
Super honestly is superior.
Only a single kick when Cell started focusing on trying to make him mad.
The rest of the fight wasn't long, but he was basically just dodging and blocking instead of going on the offensive.
>The rest of the fight wasn't long, but he was basically just dodging and blocking instead of going on the offensive.
Because Gohan was understandably nervous by getting suddenly pressured into fighting someone not even his Dad could beat. He's more cautious as a result.
>Super honestly is superior.
Let's not get crazy here
Wrong, the Buu Saga is the best part of DBZ. Best fights, best art and animation, best character development, best humor.
No
Fucking this.
But he willingly went after Freeza thou. Weaker than everyone I'll add.
I'd like to agree with this. For years, I have no idea why this arc is so praised. I get that a lot of people like Gohan vs. Cell and I'll agree the way the arc ends is great but inbetween that and Trunks showing up, it's a whole lot of nothing
Think about this objectively, the entire arc is jumping from bad guy to the REAL bad guy to the ACTUAL real bad guy who isn't even at his full power and the rest of the cast learning how to power up harder. There are no notable "fights". Just one-sided stomping until someone powers up and then they start stomping (I guess Piccolo vs 17 was okay). That is literally the entire arc.
Read Goku vs Cell again right now
But that's what he's trying to say. Gohan's never been like that. The only time he was nervous before this was vs. Nappa, ie, his first actual fight ever. After that, he goes at Vegeta, Dodoria, the Ginyus, Freeza on two separate occasions and intends to fight 19 and 20 before leaving. All of these opponents were significantly stronger than he was but he still went fought them anyway
The situation with the Cell Games isn't quite the same as what happened against Vegeta and on Namek. Firstly, many of the times Gohan fought stronger opponents, he was pissed off at them. Vegeta was torturing his Dad, Dodoria was killing innocents, the Ginyus stole the Dragon Balls, and Freeza did a whole bunch of shit to piss him off. Cell, on the other hand, had yet to do anything to anger Gohan, so he wasn't quite as gung-ho about fighting him as he was past opponents. He didn't have the same drive as he did when he was angry.
Secondly, Gohan is fighting Cell all on his own. He's not simply providing support or fighting as a team like before. The sole hope for beating Cell, the thing not even Goku could beat, rested strictly on his shoulders. That's a much more overwhelming task than just briefly stopping someone who was beating someone else up.
It's also worth noting that Gohan isn't 5 years old anymore, and thus likely isn't as impulsive as he was before.
>Gohan fought stronger opponents, he was pissed off at.
Reminder Gohan was pissed Piccolo got hurt by Cell then forgot all about that after Piccolo came back to the lookout.
>The sole hope for beating Cell, the thing not even Goku could beat, rested strictly on his shoulders
Yeah but at the same time
>many of the times Gohan fought stronger opponents, he was pissed off at them.
Surely you remember that this was the thing Goku was counting on in the first place right?
And when Piccolo almost killed Cell, all that resulted from Gohan was simply yelling out his name. He didn't even try to go and fight Cell or anything, he was just worried about Piccolo.
And obviously the whole thing becomes irrelevant anyway by the time the Cell Games starts. Piccolo ended up getting saved and was standing right with Gohan. Cell didn't do anything to set Gohan off in the Cell Games until the Cell Jrs. came into play.
Yeah, but I don't know what that has to do with anything. It's not like Goku was expecting Gohan to instantly get enraged or anything, he had to keep telling everybody else to wait.
Editor bullshit ruined whatever consistency Toriyama was going for in that arc.
this