This might be one of the hardest things that I have ever had to write on here, but it needs to be done. I’m sure plenty of you have heard by now, but last night, news broke online that Akira Toriyama, the legendary creator of Dragon Ball, Dr. Slump, and countless other works, had died. And it feels like the entire world is mourning for him.
I must confess something. I know that Dragon Ball Z was the gateway anime for many people. That it helped bring anime to the West and turn it into a big part of our culture today. But I wasn’t one of those people. Heck, I didn’t even get into Dragon Ball until I was in high school, well after it had finished airing on Toonami. But after I did start enjoying it, I never looked back.
Almost everyone I follow on social media has been impacted by Toriyama in some way, big or small. His work has inspired so many amazing people around the world, many of whom have gone on to create their own, incredible works of storytelling and art. Words cannot properly express how hard it is to lose someone like Toriyama so soon. Though even if he had died forty years from now, it still would’ve felt too soon.
I will be doing more content about this over on the D&A Anime Blog in the coming days, but for now, I shall join everyone who’s celebrating the life of one of the greatest storytellers of our time, and mourning his loss. He’s in Otherworld now with all the greats.
It doesn’t quite feel real yet, does it? I saw it online last night, and I was met with more “disbelief” than outright sadness. But I could sleep all last night; I mostly thought about everything I wanted to say.
This means so much to so many- seeing everyone on social media chare their stories of being bullied over and simultaneously connected to each other by their love of the world he created back in 1984 made me happy. And yet as I wrote my own post, it started to hit that he was no longer with us.
And yet……… I don’t think he’d want us to be sad or crying. In all honesty, I think he’d probably want us to say “See You Later.” Because so long as we remember him, he’s not really gone. Just……… Off To His Next Adventure. That’s what I think he’d want for us.