Release: Nov 7, 2017
Film: Dragonball Evolution
Tagline: LittleKuriboh and MasakoX join the fight against the worst anime adaptation of all time, Dragonball Evolution. It kicks you right in the Dragon Nards.
This review contains examples of:
- Actor Allusion: Three cases:
- The Critic theorizes that the film's version of Son Goku is the same annoying character his actor Justin Chatwin played in War of the Worlds (2005).
- When he learns that Bulma is played by Emmy Rossum, the Critic asks if she sings in this film, and is relieved when LittleKuriboh says she doesn't.
- The trio refer to Ernie Hudson (Sifu) as the "underappreciated Ghostbuster" whose temple Goku and co. visit to obtain another Mafuba, which the Critic mocks by dubbing lines into Roshi stating that the previous one failed, while showing a clip from Ghostbusters (1984) showing their firehouse HQ imploding.
- Adaptation Decay: The trio's verdict on the film.
- Affectionate Parody: The opening sketch pokes fun at the source material (featuring MasakoX as Goku, LittleKuriboh as Vegeta, and the Critic as Krillin) but in a way that's ironically way more faithful than the actual movie. The Critic even lampshades it within the review itself, with a lot of hands raised in agreement when he suggested so.
- Age Lift: It's pointed out changing Goku's age in and of itself makes the movie worse.
- The Bully: The group make fun of how generic the bullies are. And also point out that said bullies have zero reason to actually bully Goku.
- The Cameo:
- Kyle Hebert, the English voice actor of teenage Son Gohan and the second narrator of Dragon Ball Z, reprises his role as the latter.
- Honest Trailers' Jon Bailey temporarily substitutes for Hebert after the latter bolts out at the The Last Airbender reference.
- Cliché Storm: In-Universe, the trio pick the film apart for being a mishmash of stock cliches, such as I Just Want to Be Normal, the romantic subplot, bullies that pick on Goku for no real reason, as well as various stock phrases.
- Contrived Coincidence: They point out how Chi-Chi just happens to be at the tournament, as well as the fact that a Dragon Ball just happened to be located where they were trapped.
- Crossover: With Team Four Star's Lawrence "MasakoX" Simpson (himself also a Channel Awesome reviewer, currently covering Dragon Ball Super) and Martin Piers "LittleKuriboh" Billany.
- Dull Surprise: The trio mocks Justin Chatwin's acting as Goku in the scene where he explains to Roshi what his quest is, theorizing that the direction for the scene was non-existent.
- Enemy Mine: Masako!Goku and Kuriboh!Vegeta team up against the despised live-action movie.
- Fight Scene Failure: In-Universe, they feel this way about the Final Battle of the movie, and consider it even worse given the source material is known for its fight scenes.
- Forgot About His Powers: In-Universe, the trio point out how Goku, Bulma and Roshi spent hours in a hole dug by Yamcha despite Roshi having superhuman jumping powers.
- Generic Doomsday Villain: The film's version of Piccolo, according to MasakoX, who calls him "just a colossal twat".
- Hong Kong Dub: Relentlessly mocked during the opening sequence.
- Makes Just as Much Sense in Context: In the beginning, as the Critic announces that MasakoX and LittleKuriboh are collaborating with him to review this movie, LittleKuriboh admits that "a Japanese anime dubbed by Americans and now reviewed by two Brits" makes as much sense as the movie itself.
- Melting-Pot Nomenclature: They mock this movie's Goku having a Japanese name despite being played by a white actor (although being an alien, it doesn't qualify as being a full-on Race Lift) with the only reason being his adopted grandfather being Asian.
- Mind Screw:
- MasakoX: So digging through a hole somehow leads them to the top of a volcano... (cue scene of the group smoking weed and lazing around)
- Narrator: Hebert is enlisted for the opening sketch and to punctuate the movie's fight scenes with "Next Time On..."s.
- Overly Long Gag: In reaction to an overly-long mid-credits stinger which shows that Piccolo survived his defeat to Goku, LittleKuriboh puts his own spin, feigning excitement as said stinger played out, with both the Critic and MasakoX being bored to sleep.
- Readings Are Off the Scale: The famous "Over 9000" gag is played with by Kuriboh!Vegeta, who crushes his smartphone when he discovers that the film's Rotten Tomatoes freshness rating went up from 9% to 14%.
- Running Gag:
- Malcolm, a real-life fan of Dragon Ball, attempting to shoot down the film for the damage it did to the Dragon Ball franchise, with the trio trying to restrain him.
- The trio, Malcolm, and the Slumming-It Fairy lazing around and smoking weed for every scene they gave up on trying to understand.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Kyle Hebert, once the film references The Last Airbender (
Even though that film came one year later than ''Dragonball Evolution''). - Shout-Out: When Roshi is shown packed up to bring Goku and Bulma to his training land, the Critic dubs into him screaming "Shitter was full!"
- Take That!:
- At the opening sketch, Hebert!Narrator describes Critic!Krillin as fighting against one of the worst anime adaptations of all time, while showing a poster of Death Note (2017) before he switches it to Dragonball Evolution.
- While trying to comprehend how bad Dragonball Evolution was compared to the source material, the Critic compares it to the film adaptation of Ghost in the Shell (1995) (one of Doug's favorite anime), with LittleKuriboh confirming his guess.
- When Goku kicks Agudes, one of his bullies, into a fountain, that scene is played in such gratuitous slow-mo the trio imitate him, with the Critic imitating him and exclaiming that he got "Snydered".
- When Master Roshi first appears in the film, Little Kuriboh snarks that his actor Chow Yun-fat found a worse role than Captain Sao Feng.
- During one of the "Next Time on Dragonball" scenes, when the movie gets compared to The Last Airbender, Hebert bails out when he realizes it was directed by M. Night Shyamalan.
- When the dragon shows up near the end of the movie, the Critic says "The putrid puss looks so fake, you could have Sean Connery voicing it."
- There Are No Rules: The trio mocks the film's use of this, which they point out counts as a rule anyway. They parody it by MasakoX suggesting that this means they have no need for the source material while the Critic shoots down DVD boxes of Dragon Ball Z.
- This Is Gonna Suck: When the Critic finds himself both confused and bored with the opening narration, MasakoX and LittleKuriboh warn him to get used to that feeling.
- Toilet Humor: Several of Goku's facial expressions are so hilarious the trio parody it with a clip compilation dubbed in with farting sounds.
- Wangst: In-Universe, the trio parody Goku's insecurities about his uniqueness by summoning the "Slumming-It Fairy" (Tamara), who gives them a box full of stock angst lines.
"DBE." Catchy name.
