If Literally Every Character Of Dragonball/Z Would Have Been The Opposite Sex, Would The Franchise Be Just As Beloved?

[Sovran Nila]

A bunch of females fighting a bunch of other females, as their male supporters cheer from the background. Would this idea of a gender reversal fantasy have made the show as beloved as it is today?

 

[Son Gokū]

If released back then, no.
If now, maybe.
If now+fan service, yes.

 

[Warmmedown]

It's hard to see it being as popular here if it was women fighting (seems like there's often a decent amount of backlash against female action characters today and in the 90s I remember Powerpuff Girls being seen as "only for girls" by a lot of young kids in the 90s, even though it probably had the most violent fighting of any kids' show after DBZ), dunno about in Japan though.
In fact, if wasn't just 90% of the time women fighting but also there males cheering on the female fights, I think there's basically no chance of it being popular with guys and I don't think the increase in female fans would make up for the decrease in male fans.

I do wonder if it would do better now than in the 90s though. There are a lot of female fans of Marvel superheroes now - dunno if that size of female audience was ready for it in the 90s.

 

[Pocket-Gog~]

No. Probably not ever, DB, DBZ, etc, are for boys and very clearly aimed at them. Changing everyone's gender would just alienate the boys and not draw any girls

 

[The_Authority]

There was Sailor Moon, which was popular. I think if the machine known as Cartoon Network/Toonami got behind that, it would be a huge hit in the US too. I can't speak for Japan--I don't know what their views were at the time.

But, Sailor Moon had its following in the US, as censored as it was. With DBZ (more than any other of the series in the franchise) was constantly bombarding the TV with how cool and edgy it was. I think that would work with the gender reversal.

 

[Boo Brand Milk]

Considering Videl vs Spopovich was one of the best fights of the series DB could have kicked serious ass with female protagonists and super villains. It could be done if isn't done in a condescending way to it's Audience. Considering it's 2022 we know it'd just be woke trash.

Edit: the spopobitch emoji was removed. He was good competition for Donovan 5 years ago.

 

[Papasmurf]

#bringbackspopovich