readingwithkelsey 's review for:

Dragon Ball, Vol. 1 (Vizbig Edition) by Akira Toriyama

4.0

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I love Dragon Ball Z so I have a lot of nostalgia for this series. I love how innocent Goku is and how much he learns about the world through the course of the manga. His youthfulness adds a sweet charm to an overall battle heavy series. The world Toriyama created is so interesting and full of great fight scenes, teachings and funny moments - especially as we start to push more into the series. I will say however that this series is extremely vulgar and sexual especially towards women, so I don't believe I could never fully give it 5 stars. Bulma (and other female characters later on) does have more agency than others and often argues about the treatment of her character within the manga itself, but many female characters are often included to work as the butt of jokes. I do think Toriyama paints it off as the male characters being gross and silly, but it is heavily seeped into these first 3 volumes and in Dragon Ball as a whole (less so in DBZ which I will hopefully read right after this).