Broly: The Legendary Super Saiyan - ANIMATION BREAKDOWN (Dragon Ball Z)

With Dragon Ball Super Broly on the horizon, appearing to be one of, if not the greatest looking Dragon Ball feature out there, now seemed like the best time to look back on where it all began, and analyse the animation in the original Broly movie. Beyond just its story, there are actually many parallels between this new Broly film and the old one we’re covering today. They both mark a big visual change for Dragon Ball, in terms of both its character design and its direction. Up until this point

, Dragon Ball movies had character designs and supervision by Minoru Maeda, and with few exceptions, the direction largely came from the series director of Dragon Ball Z, Daisuke Nishio. The release of the Trunks TV special marked Maeda’s last contribution to the series, and Toei were looking for someone to replace him. On the TV series at the time, Tadayoshi Yamamuro was making a real impression with his episodes. He’d already impressed him mentor, Mitsuo Shindo, who allowed him to provide assi

stant supervision before eventually taking over his role entirely. While there were certainly many other supervisors on the series who produced exemplary art, none of them were as fast, consistent, and polished as Tadayoshi Yamamuro. It was really a no-brainer decision; he was made supervisor and character designer for the remaining Z films, and even became a chief animation supervisor on the TV series, in spite of Nakatsuru taking on the lead design role. In fact, he even served as a sort of su

b-designer in the Boo arc, and onwards into GT. While Akira Toriyama actually designed Broly, it was Yamamuro who developed the workable animation designs. On the direction front, the Android arc introduced a regular director who these days is considered a legend across the industry. I am of course talking about Shigeyasu Yamauchi. This man was one of the most iconic Toei directors, and his work on Dragon Ball Z at the time was mountains higher than his fellow staff. Nobody came close to the uni

que way in which he framed scenes and formed atmosphere. Regardless of how you feel about the three Broly movies and Path to Power narratively, they are some of the most visually striking of them all. The interesting connection to Dragon Ball Super Broly here is that its director, Tatsuya Nagamine, is a pupil of Yamauchi, and you can see from the trailers alone that he is very much intent on bringing the spirit of his mentor to this reimagining of the original film. Putting aside the Yamauchi-es

que colour work and framing, he’s even gone as far as to slip in a direct reference to the original storyboard. Coupling this with Naohiro Shintani taking over from Tadayoshi Yamamuro as character designer, and the parallels between these two films became incredibly clear. With the background out of the way though, let’s dive into the film itself! Yamauchi’s someone who really loves to use distinct colours to underpin his scenes, and he doesn’t waste a moment in showing that off, choosing to sur

round these opening scenes in beautifully pink and purple cherry blossoms. Much of this opening appears to be animated by Akira Inagami, who’s a key player in this film, and in spite of going on to become an animation supervisor in Dragon Ball GT, he’s rarely someone who gets much attention. His strongest contribution in this section is Roshi’s little bit of character acting as he attempts to balance plates on sticks, and appropriately, much like Inagami, Roshi’s scenes in this film are seriousl

y underrated. As nice as this scene is, let’s just ignore the deeply terrifying colouring error on Kuririn in the background! Another great quirk of Yamauchi’s colour direction goes beyond just setting; he quite likes to emphasise scenes by altering even the character’s colours. For example, in this scene where Goku is contacted by Kaio, his entire colour palette changes. This is something that fans of Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure will be intimately familiar with, as it’s kind of become a trademark

of its anime adaptation. While this film doesn’t quite own it to such extremes, as we make our way through this film, you’ll see this type of changing colour palette quite a lot. I don’t think anything embodies it quite as much as Goku’s teleportation scene. Animated by Katsuyoshi Nakatsuru, the scene depicts this move as Goku zooming through this sort of nebulous void, changing rapidly through several variations of colour. It’s rare that we really see it depicted in such a way, but it adds an i

nteresting new layer to a familiar move. Tatsuya Nagamine mentioned that for Dragon Ball Super Broly, he wants to really challenge the way transformations are depicted, so I can’t help but wonder if perhaps he was inspired by his mentor once again. At the very least, as the film moves up onto New Planet Vegeta, we’re shown the palace on top of the cliff, which is a design that Nagamine 100% reused in the new Broly movie as the design for the original Planet Vegeta. As they reach the top, that re

curring pink colour theme rears its head once again, making its way into not only the characters in the world, but even into the hues that don the grounds of the palace. The storyboarding in this section is particularly striking too; Yamauchi is huge fan layering up objects or characters to convey depth, and you can see this all over, here. Whether it be the unconventional framing of Broly and Vegeta’s ship taking off, or the view of the palace and surrounding area, it all has this phenomenal se

nse of scale. It very much fits the “frame within a frame” rule of cinematography that’s very commonly taught at film school, and yet in spite of being such a simple concept, when combined with interesting colour and lighting, it really transforms into something quite unique. As Gohan, Trunks, and Kuririn begin to explore the area, there’s a scene of them flying through some trees, which although is really just some simple background animation, it does give us our first look at Masahiro Shimanuk

i’s assistant supervision. In spite of Yamamuro’s overall corrections taking over most of this cut, you can actually see a couple of frames of his work between them. Weirdly, Yamamuro largely lets a lot of the big-name animators on this film shine either uncorrected or only partially corrected, yet with few exceptions, Shimanuki’s erased. I don’t know if it’s just because his style is pretty unique, but it’s interesting to note all the same. Skipping forward a little, as Paragus begins to rant a

bout Comet Gumori, there’s this phenomenal bit of directing featuring… you guessed it: a PINK bit of glass that slowly rotates, revealing Paragus’ face, which quickly distorts, reflecting the comet. The next section has him murder one of his underlings, and the way it’s handled is quite consistent throughout this film. A lot of Dragon Ball fans have expressed their disappointment over the lack of blood in the modern series, and while there’s some validity to that, it’s the lack of on-screen brut

ality in this film that is so effective. At several points, whether it be this murder or Goku being assaulted later, Yamauchi chooses to emphasise the brutality through means other than on-screen violence. In this case, the underling’s scream rings out as it cuts away to a long shot of the exterior, which lights up, and then fades alongside the scream. What you don’t see is often more effective than what you do, and this is the basis for the vast majority of successful horror films. Uncertainty

leads to your imagination conjuring up all kinds of scenarios, and that immeasurable weight is incredibly effective. A short while after, Goku and Broly meet for the first time, and although the colourful juxtaposition between the two is effective, it’s actually Roshi and Oolong’s disruption of this face-off that sits as the real highlight, here. This great bit of character acting is packed with exaggerated expressions and smears. Unfortunately, although there’s a loose resemblance to Naoki Miya

hara’s style, I can’t say for sure who animated this. It’s a shame cause it’s probably one of my favourite scenes from the many Roshi character acting highlights in this film. With the comic relief over, the film jumps into a flashback detailing Broly and Paragus’ past. This is perhaps my favourite of all of Yamauchi’s colourful contributions to this film. It more or less takes on a subdued sepia tone, which culminates in this phenomenal panning shot on Broly drenched in pink hues against a blac

k, spacy background. As Paragus’ narration begins to detail the device used to control Broly, the scene is then showered in sinister green hues, which only get stronger as Broly’s aura appears. This particular section appears to have been supervised or perhaps even animated by Masahiro Shimanuki, whose distinctive style is visible during the section where Broly screams just prior to falling under Paragus’ control. As Broly in the present remembers Goku’s crying, he launches into the room where e

veryone’s sleeping, and the action finally begins! This initial section appears to be animated by Yoichi Onishi, who’s someone we got to know properly on Dragon Ball Super, yet their Z work remains largely unspoken about. It’s a pretty short contribution, I appreciate the poses and expressions. Kazuya Hisada jumps in shortly after, animating the scene where Broly comes bursting through a wall after Goku. His effects are pretty distinct, and being one of more successful supervisors on the TV seri

es, his character art is largely left untouched, which is a pretty common theme for this section of the film. As Goku blasts away Broly, Katsuyoshi Nakatsuru takes over for a sizeable portion. Both his character art and animation are just sublime; it’s really no surprise that he ended up as the character designer for the Boo arc. There are some stunning water effects here, and of course, the iconic pan as Broly looms over the water is his doing, too. My favourite part of his contribution follows

this, with Broly gliding effortlessly over the water, as the camera tilts upside down, and Goku lands one hell of a kick to the face, before flipping away. Nakatsuru finishes his scene with Broly licking the blood from lips and grinning, and then it’s fellow Studio Junio animator, Masaki Sato’s turn to animate, beginning with Goku’s reaction. Sato’s perhaps most well-known for his stunning artwork; he was the animator behind Goku’s Super Saiyan debut, for example. His work here really is no exc

eption; there’s a level of depth to his artwork that’s simply unmatched. Following some cool water explosions, Broly powers up, and it’s here his artwork really shines. There’s a fantastic impact frame on the close-up, and when the camera pulls out, he executes Yamauchi’s board flawlessly. Broly’s sheer size and terror is conveyed perfectly, and yet so is the delicate transition from rage to calm, as he powers down. Sato might not be the most adept animator as far as complex motion goes, but his

raw artistic talent allows him to convey a wide array of emotions through pristine artwork. With the fight over, Yamauchi makes a pretty bold move considering this is an action movie aimed at kids; he specifically opts out of any music or dialogue, instead letting the calm roar of Comet Gumori’s approach ring out to help bring the tensions down following the fight. It’s a small detail, but a recurring and effective one, as there’s very little downtime here between this section and the start of

the main fight we’re moving onto now. As Broly gets mad once again, Kazuya Hisada animates the short walk and power-up, with one hell of an impact frame. As he continues to walk, Naotoshi Shida takes over, with his ever so distinctive smoke billowing up from around Broly’s feet. It’s spliced in with a cut of Vegeta throwing a blast from an unknown animator, but the actual travelling of the blast that causes the camera to rotate around Broly, leading to one awesome explosion – that is all Shida.

I absolutely love the four-way blue shadow against the white background – that’s such a neat touch from Yamauchi – and of course, Shida’s character art is just great to go frame by frame through. As Broly begins to power up into his iconic form, Yamauchi starts go all-out once again. The world becomes near-monochrome, and much like earlier in the film, everyone’s colour palette entirely shifts. He composes shots by layering up character upon character; it’s absurdly effective. There’s just so mu

ch going on here. As Broly begins to literally break apart, Akira Inagami really shines. The impact frame, the detailed effects work, the sheer quality of the artwork. It’s seriously stunning stuff, and it continues right through to Broly dashing at Goku and Gohan. You get a quick little snippet of background animation before one hell of an impact frame that leads into an explosion, causing Goku and Gohan to fly off. Broly follows, smashing into Gohan, which causes yet another fantastic impact f

rame and explosion. Inagami does a seriously great job here. To break up the fight, Paragus begins explaining his hatred of King Vegeta over a flashback in yet another stunning demonstration of Yamauchi’s skill as a director. The throne room is covered in pinks and blues, and the most intense lighting. This section is supervised by Shimanuki, and it’s interesting to compare the Yamamuro-corrected shot of King Vegeta, with his own untouched version slightly later in the scene. I particularly love

the pink beam that sends Paragus flying into darkness that than transitions seamlessly into the next scene that likewise continues this use of pink. The silhouettes, much like earlier, imply more than they show as baby Broly’s life is threatened. Only the results of the horror show are conveyed visually, and they erupt into this stunning orange imagery. Again, these are all such little touches, but they do a great job selling the plot points, the atmosphere, and on a basic level, just creating

so many lovely wallpaper-worthy moments. As things jump back to the present, Shimanuki’s own key animation actually comes in for once, with Goku and Gohan feeling through the trees, and Broly blowing up the dig site. It’s super easy to see his character art as one cut happens to go uncorrected, and despite the rest being redrawn by Yamamuro, you can see Shimanuki’s distinctive debris and effects during the explosion. As Trunks, Goku, and Gohan reconvene, and Broly charges at them, a bizarrely un

known animator comes in considering the complexity of the scene. He has very distinctively rough linework, but what’s weird is that the final cut of this sequence is by Naotoshi Shida. The style totally changes when he pops up – you see his familiar shading on the debris, and of course the poses are so him. In spite of this, the next cut returns to this rough-lined unknown animator. These little snippets of Shida are strangely all over this movie between other animators’ work; the cuts are very

peculiarly divided up. Hopefully one day we find out who this mysterious guy is cause he’s got some extraordinary talent as I’m sure you can see. With that out of the way, it’s time for Roshi’s third and final shining moment, possibly handled by Tatsuya Saeki. The hilarious storyboarding aside, the comedic timing of the animation is great; I think the morphing between the various forms and Oolong kicking him away at the end is by far the competent part. Although the intentional comedy is over, I

can’t help but laugh as Studio Live’s Yukio Ebisawa takes over animating this section. Ebisawa was of course one of the, uh… less refined supervisors on Z, and although he’s largely corrected here, it’s impossible to ignore the odd uncorrected shot creeping in here and there. He has incredibly distinctive muscle design, and his eyebrows and ears in the close-up are a dead give-away. Thankfully, Live’s top animator Toshiyuki Kanno is here to save the day, animating Broly’s assault on Gohan, whic

h is just amazing. The background animation as he slides him along the wall is perfect, and it continues on as Broly bursts through the wall as the interior is also animated by hand. His part wraps up as Goku tries to get up and save Gohan, and it’s here Kazuya Hisada delivers his standout scene. He really has some of the most stunning effects work out of everyone working on this movie. As the pace of the scene slows, you can really get a sense of the interesting shapes he uses, and of course th

at fantastic character art. It’s a shame his scenes are so scattered apart; it would have nice to have gotten one lengthy cut from him as he’s typically capable of some incredible stuff, but at least we see that in the sequel! As Broly goes to attack Gohan, Piccolo makes his iconic grand entrance, framed on a pole between several distorted buildings, and a desolate Mad Max-inspired landscape. Either Hisada’s own animation or perhaps just supervision persists during this part as Piccolo goes to c

heck on everyone, and Yamauchi takes this opportunity to emphasise this calm before the climax by once again focusing on the comet looming right over the surface of the planet. When the action begins again, it’s not quite clear who animates this four-way assault, but at the very least, the scene right after as Piccolo dashes towards the ground comes from Tatsuya Saeki. It’s a pretty brutal stomp here, backed up by some cool storyboarding; I like how Piccolo getting kicked away seamlessly transit

ions into Trunks and Gohan attacking too. We once again get a weird slice of Shida as Piccolo gets kicked up into the air, despite the before and after cuts coming from other animators. It’s no biggy though, as Shida comes back strong as Broly punches Goku in the face. It gets corrected by Yamamuro, but thankfully we do have the original genga. Though I largely have no issues with Yamamuro’s corrections in this era, I have to say, I do prefer Shida’s original take here. Do let me know in the com

ments below what you think, though! His scene continues as Goku is sent flying into the wall, which heads into one of the most iconic scenes of the film. Goku tanks several of Broly’s blasts, erupting with gorgeous Shida smoke that eventually leads into the most insane Kamehameha. The colours, the artwork, it’s so damn good. The scale of this section is just phenomenal. Shida’s smoke billows out across the landscape, and yet Broly is entirely unaffected. It finishes with the most perfect example

of Yamauchi’s off-screen brutality as Broly’s punch comes flying at Goku, and instead of seeing the impact, we see nothing but Goku’s face smashing up like glass. This causes Vegeta to finally enter the fight, and Shida’s section continues on once more. He comes flying at Broly with Shida’s trademark pinsharp linework covering the background animation, and that very modern stop-start timing between attacks pops up over and over again. His section only ends once Vegeta is thrown into the rocks,

causing a massive crater to form. It’s by far the biggest highlight for Shida in this movie, and definitely one of the strongest sections within this climax. In the next section we see Paragus trying to escape, which of course fails, and Broly kills him. It’s pretty well animated, with one awesome rotation in there before the pod is thrown. If you frame step it, you can see rough linework that really resembles that mysterious animator from earlier, so I have to wonder if it’s perhaps the same pe

rson. Again, it’s another one of those well animated but mysterious scenes throughout this movie. The rest of the film is pretty straight forward, at least. As Goku jumps back into the fight, he’s blasted away, and you can spy a very cheeky little Shimanuki correction slipping in there. Shida dives back in as Broly dives into ground onto Goku, and this continues onward, with Shida going largely uncorrected. Broly bounces up and down, crushing Goku, and yet all you hear are the horrific screams e

choing out of the crater, before it eventually swallows him up. As he gets back up and Broly charges at him, the cut order gets really messy, with this background animation and the subsequent effects not matching Shida at all, yet the impact as Goku slams into the rocks is 100% Shida. Again, I think it’s just another one of those cases of Shida picking up the slack. With Goku screaming at everyone to lend him power, Takeo Ide comes in, and it’s his work that dominates this entire final portion o

f the fight. The beatdown that ensues is brutal, devastating, and most importantly, animated to perfection. Ide’s always been a very idiosyncratic animator, and it’s plain to see here. The jerky reactions from Goku with all these different pained expressions are just amazing. There’s a rustic quality to his artwork that just works so well in these types of scenes. You just can’t beat the raw energy and expression exuding from each and every cut; it’s really remarkable. The final scene is really

just a culmination of all of these aspects. The debris launching out of the ground, the background animation, the intense expressions, and of course, the final impact is just to die for. And well, that very literally happens as Broly erupts in one glorious explosion. Takeo Ide in this era is just incredible. As the planet explodes, Goku teleports into the ship that escaped prior, and Gen Takase draws this hilariously charming pan of everyone crammed into the ship. It’s corrected by Yamamuro, but

with the exception of Trunks, it’s not particularly severe. With that final noteworthy scene out of the way, the film ends, and that it is for the first ever Broly movie. I have many complex feelings on the narrative of this film and Broly as a character, but it’s very easy for me to say that this is one of the best animated movies from the original series, and of course as I pointed out many times, one of the most interesting as far as direction and art direction goes. Shida was still a pretty

fresh discovery at this point as an insanely talented action animator, and this is by far the most he contributed to a film up to this point. I think both him and Yamamuro really wanted to prove themselves, and I think they both did an excellent job. Ide is by far the biggest highlight for me, but perhaps you feel differently, so let me know what you loved the most out of what we looked at today. I think it’ll be interesting to compare once the new Broly film is out; there are already parallels

as I mentioned earlier, but movies often see new animators go out of their way to really make an impact, so I wonder if Super Broly will offer a similar outcome. Either way, I hope you enjoyed this breakdown, and I hope it got you in the mood for the upcoming movie! Before I go, I wanna give a quick shoutout to Datwerg on Twitter who’s a huge collector of genga, and who helped identify some of the more obscure scenes. Also, a big thanks to DBAnimators who likewise helped with some scenes I wasn

’t 100% on. But that is it for now. Thank you so much for watching. If you enjoyed this, be sure to rate the video, subscribe if you’re new, and I will see you next time.