Before creating Dragon Ball, Akira Toriyama faced quite the uphill battle in the manga industry. You’d be surprised to learn he started in 1978 with numerous failed attempts before landing his first hit with Dr. Slump – a comedy series that earned him the Shogakukan Manga Award. Through his Bird Studio and experimental works like Dragon Boy, Toriyama kept pushing creative boundaries despite early setbacks. His journey from struggling artist to manga legend showcases the power of persistence and adaptation.
While Akira Toriyama‘s name is now synonymous with the global phenomenon Dragon Ball, his path to success wasn’t exactly a walk through Snake Way. When you plunge into his early career starting in 1978, you’ll find a determined manga artist who faced his fair share of creative hurdles before striking gold.
You might be surprised to learn that Toriyama’s first major breakthrough actually wasn’t Dragon Ball at all – it was a quirky comedy series called Dr. Slump. The series earned him the prestigious Shogakukan Manga Award in 1981 and sold an impressive 35 million copies in Japan, but Toriyama wasn’t content to rest on his laurels. He kept pushing himself, churning out one-shot stories that met with mixed reactions, all while managing his newly established Bird Studio to handle the increasing workload. His inspiration came from watching One Hundred and Dalmatians during his elementary school years, which sparked his interest in animation and storytelling.
What’s particularly fascinating is how Toriyama’s creative evolution unfolded. When his editor, Kazuhiko Torishima, suggested blending kung fu elements with manga, Toriyama took the ball and ran with it. This led to Dragon Boy in 1983, which you could call Dragon Ball’s scrappy older cousin.
Dragon Boy emerged in 1983 as Toriyama experimented with kung fu manga, laying the groundwork for his masterpiece Dragon Ball.
It’s like watching a chef experiment with ingredients before creating their signature dish – Toriyama was mixing and matching elements, letting his spontaneous storytelling style guide him rather than meticulously planning every detail.
You’ve got to appreciate the irony that the man who’d later design characters for legendary video games like Dragon Quest and Chrono Trigger initially knew nothing about RPGs. Yet, there he was in 1986, plunging headfirst into game design and leaving his mark on an entirely new medium.
The pressure wasn’t always easy to handle, though – just look at how he was pushed to continue Dragon Ball beyond his intended endpoint after the Cell Saga, or his limited control over adaptations like Dragonball Evolution.
But these early struggles and creative pivots shaped Toriyama into the versatile artist who’d eventually influence pop culture on a global scale.
