Has One Piece surpassed Dragon Ball or is DB still king?

DBZAOTA482

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To clarify I mean in popularity and legacy not standalone quality.

Throughout the mid-80's to the early-90's, Dragon Ball had taken the world by storm. Nothing before was quite like it and it was like the largest thing in Japan. It's also a major inspiration for many other titles (even YYH and HxH take some major cues from DB) with no better example than One Piece.

I had always viewed One Piece as the true spiritual successor to Dragon Ball as no series besides really gave that same feeling... that quirky, simplex and epic story but the student may have surpassed the master. The One Piece manga has outsold the Dragon Ball manga making it the current best-selling manga series, the anime gets better tv ratings than Super (which is somewhat new), and the Film Z movie grossed more than either Battle of Gods or Resurrection F worldwide in Japan alone.

So how is it... did One Piece officially take the throne or does Dragon Ball still sit on top of it?
 

SSJ2

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Yes sir. DB is more well known in America, but OP is far superior in Yapan and everywhere else.
 

sei'taer

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One piece has always lagged behind in america, probably because of that horrible 4kids dub, or the just overall slowness of the anime.

It's the most successful in japan by a large margin outselling the next several most popular series combined.
 

Captain Cadaver

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In popularity, definitely. The difference in in sales for both worldwide an purely Japanese sales between the two is massive, not to mention OP's annual sales, especially in comparison to it's peers, outclass those of DB's in comparison to it's peers of the 80s and 90s. OP merchandising is also a lot more widespread than for DB, even after Super and the new DB idea room at Shueisha. Super is more popular than the OP anime, though considering that's comparing a series with a manga that's far behind the anime to an anime that's far behind the manga, that's understandable.

As far as legacy goes, however, OP has yet to surpass DB in anything but sales and quality. From my knowledge, the only manga to have thus far been clearly inspired by OP was Toriko, which had equal inspiration from DB and other 80s Shonen. OP's legacy has yet to do anything as substantial as DB did, especially in terms of worldwide appeal.
 
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Papasmurf

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The fact that DB's return even with Super's flawed nature sparked Shueisha to create an entire DB Room for milking it says enough.
 

Captain Cadaver

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As far as influence and legacy goes, yes. The amount of series to have been influenced by DB vastly trump those of OP, not to mention how large it's international appeal is by comparison, mainly due to 4kids' poor handling of OP.
 

sei'taer

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The only thing one piece is blowing is cocaine off of high priced hookers backs with 100 dollar bills on it's way to the bank.
 

SSJ2

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It is what you meant, because nobody can think OP is bad because that's factually wrong and fuck you.
 

Satsuki

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The only real opinion I have on OP is that I don't like the art style. Stirring up the fanboys is fun though :rape
 

SSJ2

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Yeah I'm just fucking around. I agree the art can be off-putting, but I general find it good unless in battles where it can be hard to know what the fuck's going on. The full colour version looks much better.
 

Satsuki

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Just not the style of art I usually like. But to be fair, I watch completely different shit
 

Captain Cadaver

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I honestly don't see why so many people have a problem with the art, considering it's level of expression and Oda's attention to detail. It's not in the same league as top tier manga art such as those of Miura, Inoue or Hara by any means, though it's at least a lot better than any Shonen series of recent years, aside from Toriko, as well as a lot more unique than 90% of modern anime/manga. Anyone who's appreciative of Part 1 DB's art shouldn't really find a problem with that of OP, but maybe that's just me.
 
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