Is Sand Land Anime Related To Dragon Ball? Resemblance Explained

The passing of Akira Toriyama highlights his work beyond Dragon Ball, namely a manga from 2000, Sand Land that's now being turned into an anime series. However, some fans speculate that both the Anime's are connected.

Published on May 08, 2024  |  12:30 PM IST |  243.6K
Know more about Sand Land Anime
Sand Land and Dragon Ball (PC: Disney+/Toei Animation)

Akira Toriyama's The Dragon Ball franchise is one of the most beloved and legendary anime and manga series. Now another anime is gaining popularity that is Toriyama's manga, Sand Land. Toriyama, who recently passed away, created the series in 2000, a time when no new Dragon Ball manga was being produced.

Despite its succinct nature, Sand Land was considered the ultimate encapsulation of Toriyama's style. Now, it's being adapted into multiple works, providing fans with a chance to enjoy one of Toriyama's most well-known manga. Despite Dragon Ball’s immense popularity and cultural impact, Sand Land stands out as a distinct creation in Toriyama’s portfolio. 

IS Sand Land connected to Dragon Ball?

Sand Land and Dragon Ball share artistic style and thematic elements, featuring Akira Toriyama's signature character designs and imaginative worlds. However, these similarities may suggest a deeper narrative connection.

Sand Land (pc: Disney+)

Fans have noticed a striking resemblance between Beelzebub's father, Lucifer, in Sand Land and Dabura from Dragon Ball Z, leading to speculation about a possible familial or conceptual connection.

However, in Sand Land, Beelzebub addresses the demon king as Lord Lucifer, distinct from the character Dabura in Dragon Ball Z. This distinction underscores the separate identities of these characters within their respective narratives, despite sharing design elements.

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While fans may find intriguing parallels and references across Toriyama’s works, Sand Land and Dragon Ball remain independent storylines with unique plots, characters, and settings.

Akira Toriyama's artistic consistency and occasional references to other works create an impression of interconnectedness, but each series maintains its individuality and narrative integrity. Sand Land and Dragon Ball share similarities but exist separately, each adding unique charm to manga and anime.

What is Sand Land about?

Sand Land is a humid place with war and natural disasters ravaging the world's water supply. A greedy king exploits this situation, taking up water reserves and forcing citizens to suffer. Sherrif Rao, desperate to save the world, pleads with the demons of Sand Land, who offer their prince Beelzebub to help. However, they steal from the king and end up in a dry bed, which turns out to be the king's private water supply.

The discovery sees this supply destroyed, and the water freed for all to take, ending the king's wicked monopoly. Sand Land only ran in Weekly Shonen Jump for four months, but not because it was canceled. The story was merely a quick and simple affair, which was likely a reprieve for Akira Toriyama after how long the original version of the Dragon Ball manga had been.

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This culminated in the series being collected into a single manga volume. Despite this, there was a fairly large cast for such a short story, and this was reflective of how talented its creator was. Now, over 20 years later, Sand Land is finally becoming a larger franchise. Even before this happened, however, it was far more than merely the sum of its parts.

Sand Land (PC: Disney+)

Sand Land's art style, reminiscent of Dragon Ball and Dragon Quest video games, is a winning element. Characters, like Beelzebub, a trickster demon, and Rao, a weary and age-weary demon, have charm and energy. Beelzebub's look perfectly embodies his character, while Rao's age and weariness reveal his true strengths. The characters' charm and energy make Sand Land a captivating and engaging experience for fans.

The storytelling feels right in line with what Akira Toriyama was doing in the initial chapters of the Dragon Ball manga, before the scope and tone of the zany material switched to the somewhat more serious science fiction focus of Dragon Ball Z. Full of adventure and swashbuckling intrigue, it's a lot less focused on over-the-top attacks or grandiose fighting sequences.

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Everything embodies the pure fun and liveliness that fans had come to know the creator for, and even the static images are full of bounce. There's also a sense of comedy from not only the overtly humorous aspects of the story but also the general cheer of the work. In these ways, it takes narrative directions that Toriyama enjoyed working in the most and melting them down into the quintessential representation of his art.

The series can be streamed worldwide on Disney+, though US fans will have to catch it through Hulu.

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With a Masters in English, Barsha is a movie buff and a K-pop stan who is fascinated by the

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