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The Dragon Ball community is not happy with the people in charge of the Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero promotion. For many fans, the way the advertisement for the movie was handled is downright disrespectful, and with good reason.
Twitter is flooded with complaints about the issue, calling Toei out for its horrible treatment of this beloved franchise.
Continue reading to learn more about what the executives at Toei did to make fans so angry, and how people on Twitter are reacting to the lackluster promotional material for Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero.
Disclaimer: This article reflects the author’s opinion.
Dragon Ball fans took to Twitter to express their anger against Toei’s promotion of Gohan’s new movie
How did this all start?
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At the beginning of the year, Toei announced two major movies that fans all over the globe wanted to see: One Piece Film: Red and Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero. Things were great, with fans talking day and night about how hyped they were for both films.
Unfortunately, things started to look gloomy for Dragon Ball’s new film when the time for promotions arrived. With this year being the 25th anniversary of One Piece’s manga, Toei opted to give most of the promotional budget to Film: Red.
This meant that the advertisements and promotional material for Super Hero were almost non-existent. Most casual fans were not even aware of this new movie until weeks before it was released in Japan.
This caused the movie to be a major flop in cinemas, with a lackluster box office that does not represent the love fans feel for this franchise. To add insult to injury, Film: Red, aided by its massive promotional campaign, made ten times the amount of money Super Hero made in just one weekend.
Nevertheless, the story does not end here, as it seems like Toei’s international promotion for Super Hero is as disappointing as it was in its country of origin. The film is set to be released next week, something that most fans of the franchise are sadly unaware of.
Not only that, but the premiere for the film, which took place on Wednesday, was not even announced officially, and most fans had to find out about it through the voice actors’ social media accounts.
How did fans react to this news?
As stated before, Toei Animation is public enemy number one for most of the Dragon Ball community. The horrible treatment given to the Super Hero film is something that will not be forgotten for a long time.
Fans are complaining about the lack of awareness the company has about the massive fanbase Goku and his friends have outside of Japan. They allowed themselves to be swayed by the hype One Piece has amongst Japanese audiences and believed they could apply the same method outside their country.
The movie premiere that took place on Wednesday was basically empty, with cinemas having as few as two people showing up to watch the film. This is mind-boggling, considering that previous films in the franchise have sold out entire cinemas weeks in advance.
It is speculated that Toei was afraid of Gohan and Piccolo not being able to carry the film as Goku or Vegeta could. This was severely criticized on Twitter, where fans reminded Toei that Gohan is extremely popular in other countries.
With less than a week until the official release of the movie internationally, fans have yet to see a single commercial on either TV or social media.
Fans are reminding Toei about the massive amount of commercials, promotional material, and announcements of movies like Broly’s got. Broly’s movie was one of the most successful films in Dragon Ball’s history, which only made fans question more why Toei did not take a similar approach when promoting Super Hero.
Some fans find it amusing that even Fortnite is doing a better job promoting its collaboration with Dragon Ball than the company in charge of the franchise.
Final thoughts
It is unlikely fans will ever forgive Toei for the massive disrespect the company showed Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero. The series is beloved by millions of fans all over the world, who will most likely never even realize the film is coming out in their respective countries.
It is clear that Toei’s executives did not even try to hide the obvious disinterest the company had with the movie, seeing as not even the premier got any kind of announcement. This is an insult to both the fans who were waiting patiently for the movie’s release, as well as to the voice actors who worked hard to give fans a quality dub.
In the end, the bet Toei made with Film: Red was a massive mistake, as the film has been getting horrible reviews since it was released. Even with the scarce promotion Super Hero got, it is clearly being enjoyed by fans a lot more than One Piece’s new film.
We can only hope that Toei learns from this mistake and starts showing all their licenses the same amount of respect. Lets’ hope in the future something like this does not happen again, with Dragon Ball or any other franchise.
