A Second Tournament of Power?

 There's been talk on and off among the Dragon Ball fandom about another Tournament of Power.  I can see the logic to an extent, a lot of characters have gotten huge power boosts (Goku, Vegeta, Gohan, and Piccolo, Frieza.)  On top of that, several powerful fighters have been introduced since (Broly, Granolah, Gamma 1.)

Still, it seems like it's too soon.  Yes, we've had two movies, two manga arcs, and the start of a third; but it still seems like the last tournament is quite recent.

OK, let's say the anime comes back: they take a cue from "Super" and re-do the Broly movie (maybe even incorporating all that footage that was supposedly cut), they do Moro, Granolah, the current manga arc (which is a lead-in to the events of "Super Hero"), and finally "Super Hero".  Heck, let's throw in a retconned "Peaceful World" saga to incorporate what still applies from the end of Z and mix it with what we've seen since.  This will have the added bonus of putting us beyond the end of Z, adding more of a time buffer, and allowing for some degree of tension should there be actual stakes.

Should there be stakes?  I'm not so sure.  It would just feel like a rehash.  Having it be a fun tournament more akin to what Goku envisioned when he pitched it could still work.  I mean, the exhibition fights were fun and there were no stakes there.

This would also be an opportunity to establish that 17's wish revived not just the 11 other universes, but the 6 that Zeno had erased back in the day.  6 more universes mean six more groups of fighters to include for added variety (and future world building.)  

On a similar note, the universes that sat out of the previous tournament can and should participate here.  You don't just want to have all the same fighters going at it again.  We're trying to buck the "rehash" possibility as much as possible.  Having the fighters partake in different matchups helps, but only so much.

The universe 7 roster is an interesting situation.  In the first tournament, they were scrambling to fill the 10 slot roster, now they seem to have too many possible fighters.  

Sadly, it seems like Krillin, Tien, and Roshi are going to have to get sidelined. One of the major selling points of the first tournament was the fact that the humans were getting brought back into the fold.  Sure, they didn't end up doing all that well (except for Roshi, oddly enough), but at least they weren't completely shoved off. However, with the addition of new fighters, their presence is harder to justify.

One other upside to moving past the end of Z, though, is that Uub can be a possible contender.  He, in addition to 17 and 18 give humans at least some presence on the team.

If Buu is going to be on the team, they'd have to commit.  Having him fall asleep again would be a potential shark jump moment.  He has things to bring to the table and it would be nice to see him be able to show them off.  In some ways, he is overpowered, but at the same time, he's been beaten enough to show that he's far from unbeatable.  On top of that, having Buu and Uub fighting side by side would be kind of cool to see.

I doubt Frieza would play a part in this go around.  He actually did a pretty good job in the first tournament and he's a lot more powerful now, but he has no reason to cooperate this time.  Goku and Vegeta were both stronger than Frieza was, and they were offering him something that he wanted (revival).  They have no leverage now.  Even if there were no stakes, Frieza would probably still gleefully kick all of his teammates out of the ring just for funsies.

So let's see

1. Goku

2. Vegeta

3. Gohan

4. Piccolo

5. 17

6. 18

7. Uub

8. Gamma 1

9. Broly

10. Granolah or Buu

The thing with Granolah is that he's probably dead by this point.  On the other hand, he could just do the 24 hour thing that Goku, Vegeta, and Frieza have used throughout the series.  That's assuming that he just doesn't get wished back outright with a different set of dragon balls.  

See what I mean when I say that there's too many options now?  It does stink that Goten and Trunks get sidelined again, especially now that they are older and more combat experienced.  However, there just aren't enough slots and while they are definitely better prepared to partake in fights like this, the other fighters are just more powerful at this point.

I've seen some people pitch the idea of Cell making a return.  He's a popular character and it would be cool to see on some level, but it doesn't seem like it's necessary here.  Unless Buu falls asleep and Granolah is gone for good, but that seems like a stretch.

Maybe the sequel arc could work some time down the line?  Dragon Ball does love its tournaments, so making a return to them is a logical choice.  I can see some potential in the idea, but it would have to be a way down the line.   

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'Iron Fist' Season 2, Episode 3: 'This Deadly Secret'

 

After learning of the the association between Joy and Davos (as well as the potential implications), Ward and Danny decide to host a dinner.  It is unofficially a Festivus dinner as the main purpose is for everybody to air their respective grievances, clear the air, and potentially mend some fences.

It's not a terrible idea.  The problems they all have do seem like things that can be rectified.  Even Davos, who has the deepest enmity still shows to have a bond with Danny as they reminisce over their experiences in K'un L'un.  There's a lot of fake niceties during the amusingly awkward dinner, but that moment over the grill seemed a lot more genuine.

Despite this, things go South, and it seems like there's little hope of reconciliation.  It isn't helped by the fact that Ward wanted to keep his presence secret, which ties into Joy's resentment of being kept out of the loop for her presumable protection.  It was well intentioned, as he didn't think Joy would show (which she admitted during Danny's confession) but she's still more than a little peeved.  

The latter half of the episode shifts its focus to the gang war and the attempted truce negotiation.  It's a pretty jarring plot and tone shift, but thematically, it actually makes for a nice parallel.  You have two aggrieved parties who can potentially stop a greater conflict through dialogue, at a table no less.  It goes about as well as the dinner did.  Actually, no, to be fair, there were no punches thrown or weapons drawn at the dinner party, so at least Danny and Colleen have that win under their belt.

What's weird is that the whole fight is kind of Danny's fault.  He looks out the window and sees people who he thinks are involved in some sort of trap.  As a result, he promptly cuts things short, and a fight ensues.  The people who Danny saw are never a factor after this.  Maybe they were mooks who Danny and Colleen took out, but if they were just random people who happened to be doing their own thing, shouldn't the gang leader have expressed confusion or said something to the effect of "there is no trap, stop being paranoid"?  Maybe the next episode will elaborate on it because it was a little strange how that played out.

Mary doesn't have a whole lot of screentime, but the episode manages to do a lot with it and even give her some of the episode's best scenes.  She initially comes to Danny to warn him that he's being followed and watched.  Despite her concern, he's convinced that it's just some tabloid papparazzi looking for something to sell.

It turns out that Walker is in the employ of Joy and Davos, acting as a sort of recon agent keeping tabs on him.  The mystery of Walker's identity isn't held too long, being revealed at this episode's end.  It turns out that Mary herself is Walker.  It doesn't appear to be an act, though.  Given what we've seen, she seems to have a split personality.  This is made evident by the fact that Mary's actions actually set Walker's efforts back and get her in hot water with Davos.  

To Walker's credit, she does not take kindly to Davos' threats.  She actually ends the episode with two blades held to the warrior's throat.  Between that and her creepy speech patterns, it made one hell of a first impression, that's for sure.

This episode was a quieter, more dialogue driven affair, but it worked well.  There were plenty of great character moments peppered throughout.  It did move the plot along quite nicely and it gave characters chances to progress in various ways.  I was never bored and I'm looking forward to seeing what comes next.

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'Iron Fist' Season 2, Episode 2: 'The City's Not For Burning'

 

This episode does a good job of picking up where the last one left off.  It, naturally, puts the focus on the brewing gang war and Danny's attempts to stop it.

To his credit, he and Colleen actually do a good job of pitching more peaceful resolutions. It helps that the gang leader that they interact with is quite reasonable and the motivation for the conflict is one that is easily resolved (control of a dock to facilitate business dealings.)

Still, outside forces result in it not working out as well as one would have hoped, though the heroes are not aware of this quite yet.

On a similar note, Colleen is able to plead her case when the gang of street kids who she fought before come back for revenge.  Again, the gang leader is pretty reasonable and is willing to let bygones be bygones when he finds out that she actually did have their best interests in mind.  I was a little disappointed that despite his name, there's nothing really "rhino" about him. I head the name and immediately thought that the Spider-man villain was working his way to the MCU, but no dice.  That would have been cool, though.

The episode also manages to substantially elaborate on other sub-plots.  We see Joy and Davos scheming to acquire some sort of artifact that is critical to their plot.  There's some "Young and the Restless" style scheming as the two create a honeypot to blackmail the wife of a congressman.  Ward also deduces that a lot of the rights that Joy acquired in her divestment package were a deliberate smokescreen to mask what she was really after.  We still don't know what that is.

The biggest benefactor is Mary, the young woman who Danny met whilst working.  She's not the main focus, but her screen time does give her arc the biggest boost as we see that she has issues.  The episode hints at the idea of a love triangle, but Danny is upfront about the fact that he's in a relationship and even introduces Colleen as his girlfriend when he brings Mary up to the apartment to get her some water after one of her spells.  

Of course, Colleen has her own friend/potential romantic rival in the form of a fellow volunteer with whom Colleen shares some pretty good banter.  I'm not sure how he didn't get the "forget it, it's Chinatown" reference.  I've never seen the movie, but I still would have known what she was talking about.  If anything, he should have raised an eyebrow at how on the nose it was, but oh well.

A good portion of the episode is focused on a flashback showing the duel between Danny and Davos, where the prior was given the honor of fighting the dragon.  It does allow for the episode to pepper in some action amongst the plot developments.  Having the two wear masks that look like the one that Danny wears in the comics was a nice touch, though it was a detriment at points as it could get hard to tell who was who. 

Eventually, the masks do come off and even the belt that ties the two together gets severed, which results in a more straight forward fight.

Actually seeing the fight, you really have to wonder why Davos is bitter against Danny.  Danny won fair and square.  The one thing that comes close to a grievance is the fact that at one point, Davos has Danny pinned and demands that he yield.  Danny doesn't and is able to get a second wind.  Later on, Danny has Davos pinned and the judges call it. OK, yeah, they don't give him the same window of time, but shouldn't Davos' beef be with the judges?  I'm not sure why he resents Danny for what went down.  Maybe that will get elaborated on, but as of now, it seems like Davos' beef is misplaced.

All in all, this was a solid episode.  It did a good job of juggling a lot of sub-plots and gave multiple characters highlights as well as further development.  It's still early, but it does seem like this season is starting off with some solid momentum.

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2023 Docket and Goals

 A new year is upon us, as such, I wanted to start by laying out a sort of itinerary.  I used to do it back in the day and I thought it would be nice to bring it back.  The blog itself has been dormant, so hopefully this will be a sort of kickstart and help get back into the groove.

A lot of this year is going to be clearing out backlog.

For example, I want to finally get caught up on the MCU, both TV and movie sides.  The prior is relevant as I plan to keep the write ups going.  The movies I just want to watch for fun.  All work and no play and all that.

On a similar note, the same principle goes for the Arrowverse.  "Legends of Tomorrow" is the only one pertinent to the blog but checking the other shows off the list at long last will be satisfying.

I also hope to dive back into "Attack on Titan".  I actually did start to rewatch it from the beginning so that I can get back up to speed so when those write ups do resume, I'll be aware of who is who and what is happening.

Over on the other blog, I intend to wrap up the Brad Thor books.  I obviously need to pick up the pace, but that's kind of the idea.  I should also probably dive back into the King library at some point too.  It's been a while since I did anything on that front.

Will Reviewstream re-enter the picture?  I like the idea, but it's something I've said before.  It does make for an OK side hustle, and with 2023 set to be the year that it is, it may finally get the attention it deserves.

Speaking of side hustles, I did apply to be a transcriptionist for Rev.  Might amount to nothing, but it's an intriguing idea.

I also heard about something called Kindlevella.  It allows writers to submit fiction in smaller, serialized bites. My sister's been using it quite a bit and it seems like an interesting endeavor.

Beyond "work" stuff, I plan to meditate 10 minutes a day.  I've been doing 5 a day for the past couple of months and it's been working pretty well, so I'm going to kick things up a notch with more time devoted to it.

This being a new year, of course, fitness needs to be brought up.  It's a running joke (ha) as far as new year's plans go, but I actually did an OK job on that front.   I do need to work on the consistency.  I had a habit of starting and stopping throughout the past year.  If I can keep the momentum going, I think the progress will be more notable.  

So, that's the planned blueprint for the next year. We'll see how things pan out.  Ideally, I'll be able to go above and beyond, but one step at a time.

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