Dragon Ball Z Box Set

Dragon Ball Box Sets #2

by Akira Toriyama

The greatest fighting manga ever Why is the word "Saiyan" synonymous with fear and power? Because Saiyans are an alien race of deadly warriors who wipe out entire planets for their own profit and gain. When the Saiyans set their sights on Earth, it's up to Son Goku to fight off these invaders with his superhuman strength

Widely acclaimed as an action-adventure masterpiece, Dragon Ball Z is now available in this complete box set - all manga volumes 1-26 at an amazing price. Also included is an exclusive double-sided poster and a DragonBall Z collector's booklet

Genres: Manga, Comics, Humor, Graphic Novels, Comics Manga, Fantasy, Action

Paperback

First published February 3, 2009

About the author

Akira Toriyama (鳥山明) was a Japanese manga artist and character designer. He first achieved mainstream recognition for creating the popular manga series Dr. Slump, before going on to create Dragon Ball (his most famous work) and acting as a character designer for several popular video games such as the Dragon Quest series, Chrono Trigger, and Blue Dragon. Toriyama came to be regarded as one of the most important authors in the history of manga with his works highly influential and popular, particularly Dragon Ball, which many manga artists cite as a source of inspiration.
He earned the 1981 Shogakukan Manga Award for best shōnen/shōjo manga with Dr. Slump, and it went on to sell over 35 million copies in Japan. It was adapted into a successful anime series, with a second anime created in 1997, 13 years after the manga ended.
His next series, Dragon Ball, would become one of the most popular and successful manga in the world. Having sold 260 million copies worldwide, it is one of the best-selling manga series of all time and is considered a key work in increasing manga circulation to its peak in the mid-1980s and mid-1990s. Overseas, Dragon Ball's anime adaptations have been more successful than the manga and are credited with boosting anime's popularity in the Western world. In 2019, Toriyama was decorated a Chevalier of the French Ordre des Arts et des Lettres for his contributions to the arts.
In October 2024, Toriyama was inducted into the Harvey Awards Hall of Fame.

Reviews

[Drew Canole]

Finally read Dragon Ball Z. This was a series I'd always wanted to watch... all the cool kids were into it! But besides for a few random episodes on TV I never got much into it.

I would definitely recommend reading Dragon Ball first, and would probably put that as a better series overall. This one kind of fizzles out a bit near the last few story arcs.

The introduction of the Saiyans, the battles on Namek with Frieza was all amazing. I'd have to say the first half of this series is the strongest. I'd give the first half a 5 and the second half a strong 4.

Once Trunks comes in and introduces the Androids, things fizzle out. I did like the Cell arc but it felt a bit repetitive (just one super powerful dude that Goku and co. need to power up for and defeat). After Cell things seem to repeat once again with Boo being super powerful.

The series comes to a really great conclusion with the Boo arc and we see what the gang are up to in the near future after that too.

[Keshav]

I was a little bit disappointed with DBZ after DB, but i slightly expected how it'd turn out. As it progresses, the series becomes obsessed with increasing Goku and his ilk's 'strength' through various Deus Ex Machina' s, and the entirety of Toriyama's effort is to draw male action figures with rectangular chests delivering punches (or Kamehahas). Over time the series takes a very obvious toll on him, with his humour completely vanishing towards the end and he sounding like a short broken record, portraying his own (originally inspiring) protagonist as the paragon of exercising hard in the world (impressing his peers, teacher, earthlings, lord of earth, lord of world and lord of lords in the way (you can see how it drags on. Toriyama first uses adjectives, then brings in a unit to measure power, has it revved up , then introduces another one, and finally moves to adjectives again)). On a seperate note, the series os replete with misogyny and harrassment and the frequency with which old lechers appear reminds you of a certain movie industry. I dont mean to undermine Toriyama's obvious effort in drawing explosive battles with great cleanliness, but i wish he had hired a storyteller
(Edit: spellings)

[Jesse Graczyk]

I felt like I was stepping back into my 8 year old self reading this and couldn't have loved the experience more. It was very cool to see where the show was adapted from. RIP Akira, thanks for giving us the world of dragon ball.

[Anne keijser]

Ik deed er een jaar over, maaar nu is ie eindelijk uit. DBZ is een van de eerste anime en manga die ik heb gekeken en gelezen en om de volledige serie de hebben in mn boekenkast is een zege (en een blessing in disguise, want nu heb ik minder plek voor andere boeken) :))

[Iain]

Son Goku is the greatest hero on Earth. Five years after defeating the demon king Piccolo, he’s grown up and had a family—he’s married, and he has a child, Son Gohan. But what is the real reason for Goku’s incredible strength? A visitor from outer space arrives bearing terrible news—Goku is an alien, and the visitor, Raditz, is Goku’s brother! When Raditz turns out to be a ruthless killer, Goku must fight his incredibly strong brother to save his family and the entire human race. A surprising alliance may be Earth’s last hope: Goku will team up with his old enemy Piccolo…archenemies united to save the world!

[ellis]

this series is a ride. the humor - especially the subtler stuff - was top tier and the art was really amazing.
(i skimmed the fights, tbh)
i really hoped that we'd get more domestic/high school type drama when gohan went to school, but it wasn't meant to be.
the characters from this series are so pure of heart and well written. they're genuinely good and it's great to see, especially in the most popular manga of all time.
now back to my regularly scheduled shoujo.

[Aditya Watts]

I loved this so much. What a great artist Akira Toriyama is! One of the few experiences in my life i've had tears in my eyes as I bid this universe goodbye :)

[Brandon]

Like many growing up in the 90s I was introduced to Dragonball Z first not Dragonball. That came much later.
My family got me the box set on my birthday this year, and I took my time reading all of them. Like a fine wine or something I sat down some evenings and read one volume after another. The drawings, the storyline, all familiar to me from years past. But some things are of course different than the anime I grew up with, more things are explicit like, the violence, or Toriyama's humor of course. Yeah some things don't age well in modern times, but who cares, its absolutely amazing. The story has withstood the test of time. If anything the whole idea of Dragonball is the aim to make oneself better, and give others second chances. Be stronger than before, and push yourself. Every page was detailed and was thoughtfully considered by Akira, no doubt. This man was I never met, or will ever meet now, taught a lot of young men that there's more to being just good, you have to be able to strong to protect the ones you love. Thanks Toriyama for everything!

[David]

This is one of the most revolutionary manga ever made. It was a fantastic read and I am well aware of this series faults, but I don't care much about them because of what this series did for manga. It literally revolutionized the medium creating a path for every major shonen series after it to follow. Not the best manga ever made but still very enjoyable and good. Overall I would give this a 9/10 (this is both my dragon ball and dragon ball z manga review)

[MJ]

It's all about giving it all you've got.


Favorite quotes:


"Power comes in response to a need, not a desire. You have to create that need."


"You'll laugh at your fears when you find out who you are."


"My greatest opponent is myself."


"But really what's draining your strength is your own doubt."


"It's not over when you lose, it's over when you quit."

....

[Seban Pulickan]

Man,...was this beautiful. I love the original, but hands down Z was better. It has the strong points of the original, fun and comedic but deathly serious and emotional when it needed to be. There are moments I will cherish on my death bed. Z isn't just a product of it's time either. It still holds up and is far better than the majority of Manga that took inspiration from it afterwards.

[Deth T.]

Tooooodas las sagas de la etapa conocida en anime como Dragon Ball Z en toda su salvaje gloria. Muertes a cascoporro. Ultraviolencia de la buena. Revelaciones inesperadas, razas invasoras, viajes en el tiempo, males antiguos resurgidos en el presente, no le falta nada.

[Jack]

dragon ball z

[Ragesh Thulasimani]

The Manga version was well drawn and engaging from start to finish. A delight to read.

[Gašper Vrhovšek]

KAMEEEEHAMEEEHAAAAAA

[Ryan]

Phenomenal!

[Joe of Gilead]

Amazing, Freeza/Namek saga is the best one in all of DB.

[me22luss]

I re-read this series more times than I can count. Just recently re-read as an adult and it’s amazing how they still hold up. Deserves its place as one of the best Shonen fighting series of all time.

[Jacob James]

Demolished a 26-volume book series in days get on my level (this was almost entirely pictures and it was fantastic). The inner child in me has been sated.

[Axon Figure]

Si algo tuvo de premio consuelo la pandemia fue el coleccionable de La Nación que equivalía a todo Dragon Ball Z.

[Versus Tai]

El cielo resplandece a mi alrededor.

[Desire Manara]

Tengo una mezcla de las dos versiones que hubo de esta colección, la primera como coleccionable de kioscos y la segunda más serie de comiquerías, aunque el contenido es exactamente igual.

[Graham Oliver]

I wanted more androids.

[Ciaran Hyland]

The Saiyan, Namek into the Freeza arc is Toriyama at his absolute finest. The following arcs are flawed but still tremendous fun.

[Max McKinnon]

I’ve read this three times now. (This review is for both dragon ball and dragon ball z mangas)

Once as a kid who loved Dragon Ball Z on cartoon network but didn’t see or understand much of it, I went to Barnes and Noble and read the whole thing in a day. Unfortunately Barnes and Noble didn’t have every book in the series so I missed some

I again read it in college, this time everything, from Dragon Ball’s stories of Goku and Bulma to Dragon Ball Z with Frieza, Cell, and Buu.

This weekend I binged through the whole series again, up until the new Dragon Ball Super books that I’m excited to get into now.

There’s so many nice memories in these stories. So much intensity, struggle, and progression. The philosophy scattered in is really great too, such as an Android being the one that snaps Gohan into harnessing his emotion.

Dragon Ball is more of the backstory of Goku.

There are a number of metaphors of the journey being the destination. Two examples are when Goku dies and has to run the 1 million km road above hell to meet his next trainer, doesn’t need any water/food/sleep since already dead, the challenge is pushing harder and harder, and that itself is the training. Similarly with the legendary Z sword, Gohan training to pull it out, as well as training to use the stupidly heavy thing, was the reward itself. It turned out the sword was just a dumb very heavy sword.

Lots of comedy as well. The weigh in world tournament where everyone was trying to hide their real strength on the measurement device then Vegeta simply destroyed it was so funny.

Also it was a great scene funny and feel good scene where Hercule takes credit for the victory over Cell, befriends the nice Buu, and through this he is actually the one that helps defeat evil Buu by asking his fans to hold up their arms after Goku and Vegeta fail to get any response on their same request.

Adding to the top all time list. Looking forward to my fourth read through at some point.

[Tegan]

My first attempt at reading manga ( or comic/graphic novel of any kind) and I only choose Dragonball as my brother has gotten me hooked on the anime. I was not disappointment ( except maybe only when it ended). The art work ( in my opinion anyway) is great considering the amount of expected fight scenes and does not over power the story, rather the story is told ( with fantastic pacing) with both the dialogue and the art ( well duh I guess thats what a good comic/manga/ graphic novel does). All I know is that I enjoyed this box set immensely and read all volumes back to back and you know its good when all you thick about at work all day is going home and snuggling in your favorite chair with a cuppa, a blanket and both your cat and dog and getting stuck into the next volume.
A must read for any fan of the anime who will enjoy the pretty much non stop action and who likes to appreciate the origin of their favorite show. Also a great introduction into the manga world and has left me wanting to explore more.

[Oliver Bateman]

not as good as the piccolo jr arc that preceded it, but everything up until the end of the cell saga is solid. after that, the humor of the earlier series returns, albeit in a context that makes little sense.

[Vaith Schmitz]

Goku is an adult with children and the stakes are getting much more serious than in the previous Dragon Ball series. The enemies Goku and the gang are facing this time around no longer only threaten earth, but the whole universe. The fights are getting longer, enemies have more phases and we learn a lot about Goku's backstory and how he came to be the strongest in the universe.

A great finish to the series, with whacky, evil characters and even more absurd displays of otherworldly strength than in the preceding series.

[Nicolas Maldonado]

Because of the passing of Akira Toriyama Sensei I decided to honor him by reading all of the Dragon Ball manga. I watched DB and DBZ anime when I was in college and have always been a fan, but never had the chance to read the manga up until now. I read all of it, and loved it. I hadn't watched Super, but that's also something I'm doing now. Reading it in manga form is a little bit different, but you can appreciate the genius of Toriyama, the graphic design, the values, the fun, it was a great experience.

[Caothanhtrung]

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