Famous and beloved manga creator Akira Toriyama has passed away at the age of 68. According to an official blog post made by Bird Studio--Toriyama's manga company--he passed away on March 1st, of an acute subdural hematoma. He was known for a wide variety of works, most notably as the creator of the Dragon Ball and Dr. Slump manga series, and having an influential affect on the industry. Toriyama also contributed as an art director and character designer for video games such as the Dragon Quest Series, Chrono Trigger, Blue Dragon, and more. He had several projects both announced and unannounced that he was currently working on, including the anime Dragon Ball Daima, and a video game based on a manga series, Sand Land.

Information ; Dear Friends and Partnershttps://t.co/85dXseckzJ pic.twitter.com/aHlx8CGA2M

— DRAGON BALL OFFICIAL (@DB_official_en) March 8, 2024

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[DrgnMasterKota]

It's sad, Akira Toriyama was a monumental part of almost all of our childhoods. This man was a LEGEND beyond words. And his legendary work will live on through the ripples of time through all of us. Rest well king, we will forever carry on your legacy!

 

[Noctosphere]

Even if Dragon Ball wasn't my favorite manga, it is undeniable that it opened the path to a new style of writing.
Mont Corvo recently made a video about the past of Eiichiro Oda (Father of One Piece) and how Akira Toriyama was not only his model, but also a rival.
68 years old is so young.
Rest in peace, Akira-Sensei

 

[CoolMe]

DB/DBZ's literally my childhood.. The first ever anime that i loved so much, loved the characters, art-style, i simple loved everything about DB.. Thank you Akira sama for making it happen, and may you Rest in Peace!

 

[LoggerMan]

I hope one day we can make 1:1 willing digital clones of people so they can still hang around and create faithful works instantaneously. He was in the middle of works and had future works planned according to a statement put out.

 

[Noctosphere]

I hope one day we can make 1:1 willing digital clones of people so they can still hang around and create faithful works instantaneously. He was in the middle of works and had future works planned according to a statement put out.

sadly, that's called "milking dry someone", something we see a lot in the mangaka world/business.
tons of mangaka will sacrifice their health for this job. Let's say that their culture and their bosses doesn't help at all
He was in the middle of many other works, but he was also 68, which means he would still be at work at 75.

Mangaka is such a fantastic job while being a very sad and terrible job at the same time :'(

 

[J-Will]

very sad

 

[DS1]

RIP to a legend.

Dating myself a bit here, but when I was a kid, Dragon Ball Z was the first wholly-serial cartoon show anybody had seen. Other shows might have had some overarching plotline or two-parter episodes, bu nothing like Dragon Ball. They'd end the show on some insane cliffhanger (like are they about to blow the bad guys up finally or not!?) and you'd be waiting a whole week - may as well have been a year in a kid's brain - to find out what happens Saturday morning.

There was something weird about the original syndication where they hadn't licensed enough episodes for a full American television season - BUT instead of running through all the ones they had and then starting over from the beginning, they would pick RANDOM points at which to restart the series. So you'd get to "Goku's almost at the end of Snake road!" and then it would rewind back to the episode where Raditz arrives.

It took a full two years to get from the beginning to where the boys defeat Vegeta - after which they changed the schedule from Saturday mornings to like 4AM on a weekday and I never saw it again, lol.

 

[Ligeia]

I hope one day we can make 1:1 willing digital clones of people so they can still hang around and create faithful works instantaneously. He was in the middle of works and had future works planned according to a statement put out.

There's an end to everything and wanting to dodge that truth is unhealthy. It's sad but that's life. Nothing lasts forever.

I am dreading what will become of the DB franchise from now on. Well it has already jumped the shark with Dragon Ball Super sadly, but we can now expect tons and tons of spin-offs and whatnot I guess...

 

[CoolMe]

So...I'm guessing Toriyama owned the IP?

From a quick Google search: "The ownership of Dragon Ball is a collaborative effort between Akira Toriyama, Shueisha, Toei Animation, Funimation, Bandai Namco Entertainment, and several other entities involved in publishing, distributing, and licensing the franchise."

Will see what'll happen next with the franchise, i guess?

This certainly means TOEI will be free to do as they wish and so DB is about to become TOEI's Star Wars.

Oh God i really hope not. I don't want to see a live-action DB, or a dumb down of future DB anime projects..

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Mangaka is such a fantastic job while being a very sad and terrible job at the same time :'(

Agreed! Also very stressful (specially for anime animators)..

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- BUT instead of running through all the ones they had and then starting over from the beginning,

As in from the beginning of the original Dragon Ball? Yea, i wished they did that, back then i've only seen it once too, I was keeping up with it up to the tournament arc, but i missed some after that on the Red Ribbon army arc because of school etc. And then a bit on King Piccolo..

they would pick RANDOM points at which to restart the series. So you'd get to "Goku's almost at the end of Snake road!" and then it would rewind back to the episode where Raditz arrives.

The reason why is that's the start of Z, Raditz arrives on the first ep. For a while only the first 2 seasons were dubbed, it took quite some time to finally continue the story with the Ginyu saga. As a result i've seen the first 2 seasons atleast 4-5 times..

 

[Nerdtendo]

What a legend. I never interacted with much of his media outside of Chrono Trigger and the first season of dragon ball z but his art was always such a standout

 

[CrazySquid]

Dang it. He wasn't even THAT old... rip.

 

[xdarkx]

Like some of the other guys here, Dragon Balls is one of my childhood manga/anime. RIP

 

[ZeroT21]

RIP GOAT

 

[shinwg]

Rip this dude definitely the goat . I wonder if dragon ball super or anything related to dragon ball will continue?

 

[NeoGranzon]

Without this man, i probably wouldn't be into anime, jrpgs and such. I love Dragon Ball and the Dragon Quest series. Chrono Trigger is still dear to my heart. Without Dragon Quest, Pokémon (and in relation to that: Palworld) wouldn't even probably existed

@PopcornSweetie ,let's not forget that in addition to being the character design of Chrono Trigger(SuperFamicom/SuperNes),he was also the character design of Tobal N.1&N.2 (Playstation).

 

[CoolMe]

Rip this dude definitely the goat . I wonder if dragon ball super or anything related to dragon ball will continue?

Im curious as well. Specially about DB Daima. As for Super there's a bit of material from the manga, still no news about the anime returning though.

 

[Marc_LFD]

Rip this dude definitely the goat . I wonder if dragon ball super or anything related to dragon ball will continue?

TOEI will be more or less free to milk the shit out of Dragon Ball now that Toriyama is gone.

Once Masako Nozawa the voice of Goku is gone, I'm done with the DB franchise (I'll still enjoy it, but only older releases).

I personally didn't like the Super series it just wasn't very interesting, IMO. Great for new gen kids, though.

 

[SAIYAN48]

RIP to the architect of so many childhoods.

 

[Bladexdsl]

oh no the future dragon quest games are gonna suck now without his designs

 

[Marc_LFD]

oh no the future dragon quest games are gonna suck now without his designs

Or they'll have AI do the work.