The Real Reason Dragon Ball Super's Beerus Saga Is Getting Remade Again

A lot of people have been asking why the Dragon Ball Super Beerus remake even needs to exist, and I have seen that question all over social media. I totally understand where that confusion comes from. Battle of Gods came out as a film in 2013, we already got an extended cut of that, then a longer version, then the Dragon Ball Super anime version. Now with this new enhanced edition, it is the fifth version of Battle of Gods, and that is maybe a bit too much of the same story being retold.

I want to give some clarity on why this is happening, and I will say up front that I agree with people who do not fully understand why it is necessary. It is a bit much to retell this story again, and I think some fans would have preferred getting the Moro arc now instead of waiting another few months, or maybe even a full year, for it to begin.

Retelling stories is nothing new for Dragon Ball

Going all the way back to the original series, Dragon Ball movies one and three are basically alternate universe retellings of Dragon Ball stories. Curse of the Blood Rubies, also known as Legend of Shenron, is a loose adaptation of the early manga chapters, except King Gurumes is the villain instead of Pilaf, with some other changes. Movie three has the Red Ribbon Army characters in it, but there is no actual Red Ribbon Army in that story.

One of the other early movies is yet another retelling of that arc mixed with the Pilaf arc. So there have always been little retellings and remakes scattered through Dragon Ball's history. With Dragon Ball Super Beerus specifically though, I think it is a little bit different from those earlier examples.

Battle of Gods and Resurrection F were not really Akira Toriyama's TV vision

When Dragon Ball Super first came out, there were a lot of complaints from fans about the early episodes. Episode 4 and episode 5 in particular had terrible animation, and the Resurrection F arc had horrible animation in some episodes plus some genuinely bad storytelling. Something important to remember is that the Battle of Gods and Resurrection F stories as they appeared in Super were not Akira Toriyama's vision. His vision was the original movies.

Battle of Gods was written by Yusuke Watanabe with rewrites from Toriyama himself, and he wrote the entire script for Resurrection F. The TV version was where Toei Animation stepped in and added extra scenes, extra comedy, filler material that was not in the movies at all. I have seen people claim the Super version is, in their words, "canon" and place it above the Battle of Gods and Resurrection F movies, even though those movies were Toriyama's purest vision.

Toriyama publicly complained about the anime, which was rare for Japanese culture

Toriyama has admitted many times that he did not watch the anime and did not supervise it. He helped Toyotaro sometimes and helped the anime staff when asked, but he was not at Toei Animation making decisions himself. He left it up to the showrunners there, and when he first saw something like episode 5 of Super, he probably reacted very badly, because it was not the quality he wanted.

He complained about it publicly, which matters because in Japanese culture disagreements and complaints are usually handled behind the scenes rather than out in the open. Toriyama was infuriated enough that it was, in my view, enough to warrant Toei going back and somewhat fixing things for the Blu-ray release of Dragon Ball Super. Even so, the narrative of the first three arcs remained loose and never got properly tightened up after that.

The original production only had an eight week window before episodes started collapsing

Dragon Ball Super was announced in April and released in July of 2015, and it was not really under proper pre-production. Toei staffers were busy on other projects like One Piece films and Resurrection F itself when Super was commissioned, and it only had an eight week pre-production schedule. The first couple of episodes were fine, but then episode 5 saw a complete production collapse, with work getting outsourced more than it should have and a lot of top artists tied up elsewhere.

The show was so behind that scripts were rushed and did not get time to breathe. Things did improve once the Goku Black arc and Tournament of Power arrived, especially after a new series director came on board and helped the staff get their bearings. Even then, it probably was not the product they originally wanted to deliver.

Two things Toei did not have in 2015: time and technology

Even though I think this project may be unnecessary given that the movies already exist and are, in my opinion, the best versions of Battle of Gods and Resurrection F, I do feel the Champa arc needed some retooling because of how bad some sequences looked. In the trailer, a lot of sequences have been totally redone, and others have simply been touched up with better faces and more detail, aiming for something in line with Daima and the more recent Dragon Ball releases.

The second advantage now is technology. Graphical effects are much easier to produce than before, which takes less time overall. Even with far more time than the original Super production had, that improved tech is helping deliver both a stronger visual presentation and a stronger narrative this time around.

The story will connect the first three arcs instead of repeating them beat for beat

Dragon Ball Super Beerus is going to change the narrative in the sense that the story will not play out exactly the same as before. It is going to feel like one big connected arc, imagine the first three arcs of Dragon Ball Super flowing together better than they did originally. That should give a fresh new experience to those early arcs without it feeling repetitive, even though I understand the argument that it is repetitive since there are other stories they could have redone instead.

Toei is doing something similar with One Piece, and this is not the only franchise where this has happened. Mobile Suit Gundam's original story has been retold a few times, and Neon Genesis Evangelion was rebooted from an anime into a series of films that changed some things and went in a new direction. Dragon Ball Super Beerus will have new surprises, but it is not going a full 180. Do not expect something like Super Saiyan God Goku beating Beerus outright, that is just not going to happen. The way the story is told will be different, not the outcome.

Cutting the filler, including that infamous clip show episode

I am more excited to see the Moro arc than this remake, because we have seen this story so many times already. What excites me about the Beerus project is the surprises still to come and the fact that a lot of fluff is getting cut. Dragon Ball Super episode 30 was a clip show that recapped episodes 28 and 29, which I consider "the worst episode of Dragon Ball Super." That kind of padding is being shaved off, so whether the new series runs 19 or 20 episodes, it should deliver a more streamlined version of the first three arcs.

That does excite me a little, the idea of eventually watching a cleaner, better produced version of the Champa arc. That said, I will probably still stick with the Battle of Gods movie as my preferred way to experience this story, because it is my favorite Dragon Ball movie. When it leaked online back in 2013 after releasing in Japan, I watched it seven times in one day. As I put it, "it was a return home for me, my favorite show came back."

Why the Moro arc still matters more to me right now

I am interested in seeing how the narrative changes and what kind of surprises are coming, some of which I cannot discuss yet but plan to cover later. The bigger factor for me is that Toei now has both time and technology on its side, which is what makes Dragon Ball Super Beerus at least somewhat interesting despite my reservations. I do wish the Moro arc were already here, but production on it really began ramping up this past summer, so it is still being worked on.

Because that production has more time, better technology, and A-list talent like Shintani involved, I expect the finished Galactic Patrol arc to look spectacular and exceed expectations. I am hoping all of this ends up honoring Akira Toriyama's legacy properly rather than being a waste of time, but as I said, time will tell.

Do you think this Beerus remake is worth revisiting the Champa arc for, or would you rather Toei had gone straight to the Moro arc?