Akira Toriyama's Dragon Ball began serialisation in Weekly Shōnen Jump in November 1984 and ran until 1995, 519 chapters across 42 volumes. The Toei Animation TV adaptations — Dragon Ball (1986–1989), Dragon Ball Z (1989–1996), and the post-author Dragon Ball Super (2015–2018) — are commercially among the most successful properties in anime history and the works most directly responsible for the establishment of an international anime audience outside Japan.
The manga (1984–1995)
Dragon Ball began as a Journey-to-the-West parody centred on a small child named Son Goku searching for the seven Dragon Balls. The first long arc (the original 'Dragon Ball' material, roughly the first 16 volumes) operated as comedy-action. From the Saiyan arc onward, the manga shifted into extended martial-arts and science-fictional action, with the comedic register receding. The shift is often credited with defining the 'tournament arc' as a shōnen-manga structural form.
Toei's anime adaptations
Toei Animation began broadcasting Dragon Ball in February 1986. Dragon Ball Z, beginning in April 1989, adapted the later material and reached 291 episodes by 1996. The animation production schedule was punishing — Toei was producing one episode per week, often outpacing the source material and producing 'filler' episodes from the studio's own scripts. The visual style established by character designer Minoru Maeda's adaptation of Toriyama's manga remained stable across the franchise's many later productions.
International export
Dragon Ball Z's overseas broadcast through the 1990s — particularly in France (TF1's Club Dorothée from 1988), Italy (Mediaset), Spain, and Latin America — created the audience for the broader anime export wave that followed. Funimation's 1996 acquisition of the North American rights and its subsequent dub broadcasts on Cartoon Network's Toonami block (from 1998) created the equivalent audience in English-speaking markets. The franchise's global penetration is one of the central factors in modern anime's economic structure.