Drazon Ball collection

Dragon Ball
Due to the high popularity of the Dragon Ball manga, Toei Animation produced two anime television series based on the manga chapters, and a third based on the series characters. The first series, also titled Dragon Ball, premiered in Japan on Fuji Television on February 26, 1986 and ran until April 12, 1989.[3][22] Spanning 153 episodes, it covered the first 16 volumes of the 42 volume manga series.[22]

Harmony Gold USA licensed the series for an English language release in North America in the late 1980s. In their voice dub of the series, Harmony renamed almost all of the characters, with some names appearing very odd, such as the central character Goku being renamed "Zero" and the character Korin's name changed to "Whiskers the Wonder Cat". This dub version was quickly canceled.[citation needed]

In 1995, Funimation Entertainment acquired the license for the series for broadcast and home video distribution in North America. Funimation contracted with BLT Productions to create an English voice track for the series, and the dubbed episodes were edited for content.[23] Thirteen episodes aired in syndication before Funimation canceled the project due to low ratings, switching to working on the second anime series Dragon Ball Z.[3] In March 2001, Funimation announced the return of Dragon Ball to American television, featuring a new English audio track produced in house and with less editing.[23][24] The redubbed episodes aired on Cartoon Network from August 2001[25] to December 2003. Funimation also broadcast the series on Colours TV and their own FUNimation Channel starting in 2006.[26] Funimation began releasing the uncut episodes to Region 1 DVD box sets in March 18, 2003. Each box set, spanning an entire saga of the series, included the English dub track and the original Japanese audio track with optional English subtitles. These sets were released in Australia the following year. They were eventually discontinued and the series was re-released in 2008 as two box sets, the first containing 12 discs and the second containing 10 discs.

In 2003, a new dub, produced by Blue Water Studios, was created and began to air in the United Kingdom and Canada. It used different episode titles and voice actors versus the Funimation version.[22]


Dragon Ball Z
Main article: List of Dragon Ball Z episodes
With the ending of Dragon Ball, Toei Animation quickly released a second anime television series, Dragon Ball Z (ドラゴンボールZ(ゼット), Doragon Bōru Zetto?, commonly abbreviated DBZ). Picking up where the first left off, Dragon Ball Z is adapted from the final twenty-six volumes of the manga series. It premiered in Japan on Fuji Television on April 26, 1989, taking over its predecessor's time slot, and ran for 291 episodes until its conclusion on January 31, 1996.[3][27]

Following the canceled dub of Dragon Ball, Funimation licensed Dragon Ball Z for an English language release in North America. For the dubbing of the series, the Ocean Group was contracted to produce an English dub track. Like the original dub of Dragon Ball, the Ocean Group's dub of Dragon Ball Z was heavily edited for content, reducing the first 67 episodes into 53. The dubbed episodes of the first saga premiered in the United States on Fox in September 1996 and ended in May 1997. The second saga premiered on the The WB in September 1997, though it was eventually canceled in May 1998, once again due to low ratings. Three months later, the dub began airing on Cartoon Network as part of the channel's new Toonami programming block. Soon after, Funimation continued dubbing the series from where the cancelled dub left off, now using its own in-house voice actors, a new musical score, and less editing. The new dub of Dragon Ball Z ran on Cartoon Network from September 1999 to April 2003. In August 2004, Geneon Entertainment lost its licensing rights to the old Ocean Group dubbed episodes of Dragon Ball Z, allowing Funimation to re-dub the first 67 episodes, restore the removed content and replace the old dubbing with its in-house voice cast. These re-dubbed episodes aired on Cartoon Network throughout the summer of 2005. The Funimation dubbed episodes also aired in Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, and the Republic of Ireland.[28][29]

In the United Kingdom, the Funimation dub of episodes 107 through the final episode were replaced with a new dubbed version. This version used a dub language track produced by Blue Water and dubbed by the Ocean Group.


Dragon Ball GT
Main article: List of Dragon Ball GT episodes
Produced by Toei Animation, Dragon Ball GT (ドラゴンボールGT(ジーティー), Doragon Bōru Jī Tī?, G(rand) T(our)[3]) premiered on Fuji TV on February 2, 1996, and ran until November 19, 1997.[30] Unlike the first two series, it was not based on the original Dragon Ball manga.[31] The series lasted 64 episodes.[3] In Dragon Ball GT, Goku is turned back into a child by the Black Star Dragon Balls and is forced to travel across the universe to retrieve them.

Funimation Entertainment licensed the series for an English language Region 1 DVD release and broadcast in North America. Funimation's English dub of the series aired on Cartoon Network from November 2003 to January 2005. The television broadcast skipped the first 16 episodes of the series. Instead, Funimation created a composition episode entitled "A Grand Problem", which used scenes from the skipped episodes to summarize the story. The skipped episodes were later aired after the remaining episodes of the series had been broadcast.[30] The dubbed episodes also aired in Canada on YTV, which divided the episodes into two seasons instead of sagas.[32][33]

Dragon Ball- 153 episodes
Dragon BallZ -276 episodes
Dragon BallGT-64 Episodes