Dragon Ball Z - Seasons 1-3 Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		5.0
Video		1.0
Audio		3.5
Extras		1.0
Overall		3.0

Dragon Ball Z - Seasons 1-3 Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Neil Lumbard November 14, 2022

Dragon Ball Z is an essential anime classic: a masterpiece of action-adventure that hits so many right notes throughout the series run. The introductory season of the series is one of the best and kicks the series off in high-gear. Based on the original manga series created by Akira Toriyama, the beloved classic is essential viewing for anime fans. A sequel series to Dragon Ball (which can be viewed afterwards if one desires), Dragon Ball Z has a firm hold in the history of the medium as one of the greatest action series of all time. Take the journey of a lifetime with this masterful gem.

The world's greatest hero, the kind-hearted Goku, faces one of his biggest threats to date: the evil Saiyan Raditz. As the super-strong villain arrives on Earth with diabolical plans, the entire population of the planet is in danger as Raditz aims to annihilate everything in sight. Can Goku and his friends save the world from total destruction? Non-stop action awaits!

A classic series revisited.

As the plot thickens, a new threat is on the way to Earth: Vegeta. An even more powerful Saiyan, Vegeta is a threat unlike anything else earth's mightiest heroes have ever faced. With only one year to train and prepare for the arrival of the Saiyan, can the heroes train themselves to defeat the biggest threat to them yet? With changing alliances and surprises along the way, Dragon Ball Z amps up the action.

Season 1 of Dragon Ball Z includes episodes 01-39 and both the Raditz and Vegeta story arcs. Season 2 of  Dragon Ball Z includes episodes 40-74 and features the first half of the action-packed Frieza saga. Season 3 of  Dragon Ball Z includes episodes 75-107 and focuses on the second half of the Frieza saga – bringing the action-packed storyline to an out-of-this-world conclusion.

Dragon Ball Z - Seasons 1-3 Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Arriving on Blu-ray from Funimation Entertainment, Dragon Ball Z is presented in 1.78:1 widescreen. The release is one of the more disastrous looking releases available from the anime distributor. The presentation is presented in a cropped widescreen presentation. The widescreen framing is not the result of open-matte framing (as is common with some live-action series) but severe cropping in order to achieve the widescreen ratio. The result? The animation looks terrible. There are so many shots with character heads partly missing, entire details devoid, and artistic background scenery missing (without) action. The animation was also "enhanced" with boosted colors to achieve a more "modern" aesthetic.

The result is the animation looks less like Japanese anime and more like a modern cartoon at times. It certainly suffers from egregious DNR (digital noise reduction) and it appears as though all of the film grain was removed. The video quality is also quite noisy at times (despite the DNR application) with digital noise causing the video to sometimes suffer from macroblocking and other video detriments. Likewise, the release has an abundance of banding and it is one of the more severe examples. The extravagant banding issue may even be related to the remastering process used for these half- baked widescreen masters.

Dragon Ball Z - Seasons 1-3 Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The audio quality on the release is far from exceptional but it is a bit better sounding than the video counterpart. The audio presentation includes English Dolby TrueHD 5.1 surround sound and 2.0 stereo options. The release also includes the original Japanese language audio track in Dolby TrueHD mono. It is unfortunately not a pristine audio presentation but it is certainly serviceable. The original Japanese track sounds a bit less clear and robust compared to the English dub (which is perhaps understandable given the production-year differences).

Dragon Ball Z - Seasons 1-3 Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Season 1:

Disc 4 –

Upcoming Special Feature Sneak Peek (HD, 5:00)

Textless Opening Song (HD, 1:51)

Textless Closing Song (HD, 1:41)

U.S. Trailer (HD, 1:11)

Trailers:

Akira (HD, 00:55)

Aquarion Evol (HD, 1:27)

Fairy Tail (HD, 1:30)

One Piece (SD, 1:09)

Lastexile-fam, the Silver Wing (HD, 1:42)

Serial Experiments Lain (HD, 1:45)

Anime Classics (HD, 00:56)

Funimation.com (HD, 00:32)

Season 2:

Disc 4 –

Inside Dragon Ball Z: Interview with Christopher R. Sabat (HD, 19:03)

Inside Dragon Ball Z: Interview with Sean Schemmel (HD, 18:23)

Justin Cook Shares His Headshot Collection (HD, 9:41)

Textless Opening Song (HD, 1:54)

Textless Closing Song (HD, 1:41)

U.S. Trailer (HD, 00:17)

Trailers:

One Piece (HD, 1:32)

Fairy Tail (HD, 1:30)

Appleseed XIII (HD, 2:02)

Wolf Children (HD, 2:33)

Serial Experiments Lain (HD, 1:45)

Aquarion Evol (HD, 1:27)

Anime Classics (HD, 00:56)

Funimation.com (HD, 00:32)

Season 3:

Disc 4 –

Inside Dragon Ball Z: Interview with Gen Fukunaga (HD, 20:05)

Inside Dragon Ball Z: Interview with John Burgmeier (HD, 18:55)

Look Back at the Hummer Tour: With Sonny Strait (HD, 11:10)

Textless Opening Song (HD, 1:54)

Textless Closing Song (HD, 1:43)

U.S. Trailer (HD, 00:17)

Trailers:

One Piece (SD, 1:10)

Eureka Seven (HD, 1:44)

Shangri-La (SD, 1:44)

Robotics; Notes (HD, 1:20)

Wolf Children (HD, 2:33)

Spice & Wolf (HD, 1:02)

Anime Classics (HD, 00:56)

Funimation.com (HD, 00:32)

Dragon Ball Z - Seasons 1-3 Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Dragon Ball Z is one of the most essential anime classics. The series has outstanding action sequences and an incredible cast of characters to keep audiences entertained. One of the best action-anime series ever produced, it is an essential series. Unfortunately, Funimation provides a disastrous presentation in the Season 1-3 collection. The set includes cropped widescreen presentations with boosted colors and excessive DNR. The encoding is problematic as well. Comparatively, the 30^th anniversary steelbook editions are far superior and provide the original 4:3 aspect ratio and a new restoration. Skip the collection set and spring for the steelbook editions.