Dragonball Evolved!

Meet Goku. Kid had a terrible time, hassled at school, grandparent smashes his face into the dirt, the hot girl is going out with a jerk and isn't hooking up with him. Fortunately, he has the script on his side and will undergo Dragonball Evolution!

Only seen a little of the series, don't know the characters, missed all the in-jokes, but beyond that there wasn't really anything new here. Kid has amazing abilities, needs to save the world, yawn, been there, seen that. Has a mixture of martial arts, wire work and CGI to help, and a range of secondary characters to help pretend the movie is about people and not just an excuse for another rip-off of Japanese culture.

Lots of big names, such as... um... James Masters! Under lots of prostheses so you don't recognise him. And Chow Yun-Fat, who had fun while not exactly playing an incredibly dignified role. And... some other people who no doubt have had great starts to careers and go on to do big things, presuming they don't overemphasize this part of their CV.

Lots of CGI to back up wonderful production values, and by 'wonderful' I mean that they clearly had lots of money behind them.

I presume all those Dragonball fans were excited, especially about the 5-hour shouting session of "Kamekameha!". The rest of us? Meh. If you happen to be there.

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