Dragon Ball

Dragon Ball is a manga series created by Akira Toriyama in 1984. It has since spawned a 42 volume manga series, multiple anime series and a huge amount of spin off material.

Plot
The story is originally a tale of the boy Son Goku, who follows a girl named Bulma on the quest to find the wish-granting Dragon Balls, as well as Goku's training to become stronger. Throughout the series, Goku faces many adversaries such as the Red Ribbon Army and Piccolo Daimao, with a new plateau of strength constantly being realised.

In the second part of the manga known as Dragon Ball Z, Goku has become a husband and father. However, after the arrival of his brother Raditz, Goku learns that he is of the alien race of Saiyans. In new battles for planet Earth against the other Saiyans, the tyrant Freeza, the Artificial Humans and Majin Boo, Goku and his allies, the Zet-Senshi are constantly forced to push themselves to new levels in order to defend the universe.

Standing as a Manga/Animeverse
Dragon Ball is quite notable for being a powerful universe, with the previous highest level of power being constantly surpassed. As early as the 2nd story arc, characters already present Hypersonic speeds and by the end of the first section of the manga (volume 16), the strongest characters such as Goku and Piccolo are shown to endure island level attacks.

By the time of the Freeza Arc of Dragon Ball, characters show Massively Hypersonic speeds and are noted as planet busters. Even Large Planet busters such as Freeza are only mid tier characters in the long run. If taking statements into account, Upper-High Tier characters such as Super Perfect Cell and many Boo Arc characters are Star busters, as well as Solar System busters via chain reaction.

In the non-canon spin off, Dragon Ball GT, Super Saiyan Goku and Super #17 also present sub-relativistic speed when Goku knocks #17 a large distance across the Earth in a matter of seconds.

In the new movie, Battle of Gods, Uis also states that "The entire Solar System will be destroyed instantly" by Birusu, and information on Birusu's speed suggests that he, along with Uis and Super Saiyan God Goku, could be FTL.

The Dragon Ball universe is however heavily overrated by many fans. For instance, any claims of characters being anything above Star level prior to Battle of Gods or having speeds of Relativistic or beyond lack any proof whatsoever. Many of this originates from dub inaccuracies, poor interpretations or complete fanboyism.

Canonciaty
The original manga is considered canon. Many parts of anime filler blatantly contradict what's shown in the manga and as such, should be ignored as non-canon if contradictive. Toriyama also stated that he considers the movies "in their own universe" and referred to GT as "a fun side story", rendering all movies, GT and most spin offs non-canon. Toriyama has however referred to Battle of Gods as "Neither a spin off nor side story. To be enjoyed by manga and anime fans alike." This suggests it to be canon, and by extention, so is the JSAT special "Yo! Son Goku and his friends return!" (At least it's manga adaption).

Zet-Senshi

 * Son Goku


 * Son Gohan


 * Vegeta


 * Piccolo


 * Kuririn


 * Yamcha


 * Tenshinhan


 * Chaozu


 * Future Trunks


 * Trunks


 * Son Goten

Antagonists

 * Taopaipai


 * Piccolo Daimao


 * Raditz


 * Nappa


 * Ginyu


 * Gurd


 * Freeza


 * Doctor Gero


 * Cell


 * Dabura


 * Majin Boo


 * Birusu


 * Uis