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"The following is a (non-profit) fan-based parody. Dragon Ball, Dragon Ball Z, Dragon Ball GT, and Dragon Ball Super are all owned by Funimation, Toei Animation, Shueisha, and Akira Toriyama. Please support the official release."
— Once an Episode disclaimer.

DragonBall Z Abridged (abbreviated as DBZA) is the title of Team Four Star's abridged series based on the original Dragon Ball Z anime. Though it is not official, this abridged series is one of, if not the most successful web series created and was featured on That Guy with The Glasses' official website under "Inked Reality".

On February 1, 2020, KaiserNeko announced that the series was officially over, and that Team Four Star's future focus will be on original content such as Dragon ShortZ.[1] A later video by KaiserNeko on Team Four Star's YouTube channel confirmed that all plans to adapt the Majin Buu Saga had been scrapped.[2]

On September 2, 2023, TotallyNotMark released his retrospective of the Buu Saga. In honor of this achievement, and out of genuine friendship, Team Four Star returned to adapt certain segments and moments of the Buu Saga for his video in the form of the Buu Bits.

Background[]

DragonBall Z Abridged is a direct parody with most characters and plot lines remaining relatively unchanged. Origins of concepts and names within the series often alternate between the FUNimation Dub and the original Japanese version. For example, the character Tien is sometimes referred to as "Tenshinhan", which is his name in the original Japanese version. Some original attack names are preserved as well, such as Tien's "Kikōhō," instead of "Tri-beam." Many of the characters have many personality changes (i.e. Goku being an energetic and caring in the original series, he is now a dumb, one-track-minded man-child). Some of the biggest changes are to Mr. Popo, Nappa, Mr. Perfect Cell, Bubbles, etc.

Episodes[]

Main article: List of DragonBall Z Abridged episodes
Season Episodes Originally aired
First aired Last aired
1 10* June 6, 2008 June 12, 2009
2 20* January 26, 2010 June 25, 2012
3 30* December 19, 2012 December 25, 2018

*Seasons 1, 2 and 3 have a total of 12, 22 and 33 episodes respectively if all parts of the final episode are considered separate episodes.

Season 1 (2008-2009)[]

# Name Air Date
1 The Return of Raditz! ... Wait... June 6, 2008
2 And They All Lived Happily Ever... Oh... July 9, 2008
3 Happily Ever Afterlife August 7, 2008
4 Snakeway to Heaven August 21, 2008
5 Vegeta: Kills Bugs Dead September 3, 2008
6 No One Ever Listens to the Magical Dragon October 25, 2008
7 Saiyans? On My Planet? (It's More Likely Than You Think) December 25, 2008
8 Nappa's Best Day Ever January 15, 2009
9 The Set Up February 27, 2009
10-1 The Punchline (Part 1) May 25, 2009
10-2 The Punchline (Part 2) June 8, 2009
10-3 The Punchline (Part 3) June 12, 2009

Season 2 (2010-2012)[]

# Name Air Date
11 Looks Like The Z-Warriors Are Blasting Off Again! January 26, 2010
12 A Rose By Any Other Namek March 1, 2010
13 Dr. Briefs Made This Episode In a Cave... WITHABOXOFSCRAPS! April 7, 2010
14 No Country For Old Namekians April 29, 2010
15 Operation: Dodoria Drop May 27, 2010
16 Vam qan Namek July 5, 2010
17 A Lovely Bunch of Dragonballs August 15, 2010
18 It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad Saiyan September 28, 2010
19 到着を恐怖!! 敬礼, ギニュー特戦隊!! November 1, 2010
20 Namekimania 2011 January 29, 2011
21 Stop! Celebrate and Witness, Goku's Back From 100x Fitness! February 21, 2011
22 The Good, The Bad, and The Purple April 16, 2011
23 Grand Theft Goku May 27, 2011
24 The Best Laid Plans of Saiyans and Namekians June 29, 2011
25 Nail is Piccolo, and So Can You! August 26, 2011
26 Alien VS. Piccolo December 12, 2011
27 The Saiyan Formerly Known As Prince January 26, 2012
28 Leave It To Freezer March 23, 2012
29 Freeza Burn April 15, 2012
30-1 Freeza: The Final Cut (Part 1) June 17, 2012
30-2 Freeza: The Final Cut (Part 2) June 20, 2012
30-3 Freeza: The Final Cut (Part 3) June 25, 2012

Season 3 (2012-2018)[]

# Name Air Date
31 There's Something About Maron December 19, 2012
32 Battlefield Ee-arth January 28, 2013
33 Cold Cuts March 23, 2013
34 News of Future Past April 29, 2013
35 The Island of Dr. Gero June 9, 2013
36 Super Saiyan Swagger July 24, 2013
37 Catch Me If You Can-droid September 9, 2013
38 Dr. Gero or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Androids December 21, 2013
39 Blood, Sweat, and Gears January 16, 2014
40 16, 17, and 18 Things I Hate About You March 7, 2014
41 The Trouble With Time Travel April 6, 2014
42 Fear and Loathing in Ginger Town May 15, 2014
43 Cell Service August 24, 2014
44 Cell Reception September 30, 2014
45 Hyperbolic Plot Device November 24, 2014
46 Percussive Maintenance December 25, 2014
47 Family Reunion May 12, 2015
48 Advanced Geometry May 30, 2015
49 Group Therapy August 1, 2015
50 A Raging Semi September 14, 2015
51 The "Perfect" Guy December 25, 2015
52 Flashpoint February 16, 2016
53 My Body is a Temple'O'Trunks June 2, 2016
54 Tiles and Tribulations August 22, 2016
55 It's Been A Year If It's Been A Day September 28, 2016
56 Deities, Devils, and Doing the Dirty November 25, 2016
57 Opening Serumonies* March 24, 2017
58 Cell Mates May 12, 2017
59 The Hard Cell June 23, 2017
60-1 Cell-Out (Part 1: The Lone Warrior) August 31, 2018
60-2 Cell-Out (Part 2: Raging Storm) September 7, 2018
60-3 Cell-Out (Part 3: Everlasting Legend) September 14, 2018
60-E Die, Robot December 25, 2018

Musical Numbers[]

Thumbnail Name Release Date
Make A Man Out Of You December 23, 2008
Killing in the Nappof January 6, 2010
Bald This Way July 11, 2011
Do You Want to Kill a Planet March 20, 2014
Moustache August 23, 2015
Grab a Bowl September 16, 2016
The Final Flash September 19, 2016
Super Saiyan October 26, 2016
Just Give Up December 7, 2016
Popo The Genie December 13, 2016
Hey Vegeta Happy Freeza Day December 23, 2016
Broly Chronicles January 14, 2017
We Are Number One (But It's Perfect) May 17, 2017
Day of Fate ~Spirit VS Spirit~ (feat. Paolo Cuevas & Ani Djirdjirian) September 4, 2018
My Way (Perfect Cell Cover) September 19, 2018

Cancellation[]

At the end of Cell-Out (Part 3), a short teaser was shown of Season 4, revealing that Team Four Star, at the time, was going to adapt the Majin Buu Saga. However, then-CEO Hbi2k revealed on Reddit that Dragon Ball Z Abridged would be on hiatus as they wanted to focus on other projects such as the series finale of Hellsing Ultimate Abridged and Season 3 of Final Fantasy VII Machinabridged. Afterwards, the epilogue was released on Christmas Day 2018, and in 2019, three DBZ Kai Abridged episodes were released.

On February 1st 2020, KaiserNeko announced on Twitter that Dragon Ball Z Abridged was officially over, and that Team Four Star's future focus will be on original content. Although the original plan was to adapt the Majin Buu Saga in the style of Dragon ShortZ, a post on the company's Patreon on February 6th, 2020 later revealed that they would not. The reasons for this are because the main trio was too burned out to abridge any more episodes, that they felt that the Majin Buu Saga was the point where the Dragon Ball franchise jumped the shark, felt that Cell-Out was a perfect finale overall, and Toei was ramping up its crackdown against TFS, going as far as to ban FUNimation from allowing them to participate in any official Dragon Ball material. The post added that the decision to cancel the series was made around October 2019, around the same time Bojack Unbound Abridged's cancellation was announced.

Return (Sort of...)[]

In 2023, as part of Totally Not Mark's review/retrospective series on Dragon Ball, TFS would collaborate with Mark on the video covering the Buu Saga, producing DBZA-style scenes which they called "Buu Bits" interspersed throughout the review. While not a full fourth season, Team Four Star announced that these "Buu Bits" are as close as they're ever going to get to doing one.

References[]

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