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TransmorpherDDS

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I'll be really surprised if this is where you learn this, but Akira Toriyama has passed away.


When I first started drawing comics, they were simple, childhood drawings on lined paper telling very basic stories, and every character was named after someone I knew in real life, even if they didn't look or act anything like the person they were named after. If anything, they looked and acted more like the characters from Chrono Trigger.


it wasn't just the in-game sprites, but obviously that was a big inspiration, but those amazing watercolor illustrations in the instruction manual and on the front of the SNES cartridge. I remember staring at them for hours, looking at all the little details hidden in every aspect. The creativity in the designs that were simultaneously so complex, yet also simple and iconic. The main character of my comic wore a headband over spiky hair and wielded a katana. One of the other characters was a giant frog for absolutely no reason.


At the time I was already aware of Dragonball, since some of the original series had aired briefly on my local Fox station, but I didn't really make the connection between the two until Dragonball Z started airing on Sundays on UPN. It almost felt like a secret club... this amazing show full of backstory on a channel that practically nobody was watching on the morning when most people were sleeping in. I remember getting a Dragonball Z shirt at an import store and getting teased at school for wearing a shirt that said "BallZ" on it.... it made it feel all the more special when I met others who recognized it and knew exactly where it came from. A secret club of weirdoes and nerds where the password was "Kamehameha".


The thing about Dragonball was that the world it inhabited felt so fresh and creative. I loved American comics at the time as well, but the ones I was aware of were basically all set in New York City, or some ficitional equivalent. They endeavored to appear as though they're taking place in the Real World, with only the superhero shenanigans differentiating the two. But here you had Dragonball... mixed among crowds of people there are just dog people, because why not? Cars and buildings were these stout, rounded little things that felt real enough to accept, but had personality all on their own. Anything could happen in that world and all looked Just. So. Cool!


American comics made me intimidated. I didn't know anything about New York City, or crime, or how Radiation works (although, in retrospect, apparently neither did anyone working at Marvel). But Dragonball felt freeing. The world can be whatever works for the story. A character can have powers just because they figured out how to do it... they didn't need to bitten by a radioactive animal, or fall in a vat of chemicals, or get exposed to gamma radiation (again... nobody knew how radiation worked). And there's always a convenient giant empty field where the hero can battle the villain and have cool, earth shattering energy blasts go off without constantly thinking, "Hey, shouldn't that have killed like... a whole bunch of innocent people?"


I think one thing that I've seen a lot of other creatives bring up following this tragedy is appreciation for how there was just something about Toriyama's work that wasn't just entertaining... it was inspiring. He created works that made others want to create as well. You'd have a lot more trouble finding an artist on sites like this that weren't inspired by Toriyama than those who are, even if it was only a little bit. The world has changed because of him in ways we're only beginning to understand... I know so many people today who I met because of a shared love of something Toriyama created. He brought people together. He created a legacy that will outlive all of us. He changed the perception of Anime in the West... of cartoons, of comics, everything. But, in the end, there's one thing he did that stayed with me beyond anything else he ever accomplished...


He made me feel like I could be an artist too.


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