Dragon Ball SD Creator Shares New Dragon Ball Cover Art

The creator behind the Dragon Ball SD spin-off series has shared some new cover art for Dragon Ball in celebration of the manga’s upcoming 40th Anniversary! Dragon Ball will be kicking off its 40th anniversary of the late Akira Toriyama’s original manga first being published in the pages of Shueisha’s Weekly Shonen Jump magazine later this year with a special exhibition celebration how far the franchise has come in that time. Part of that exhibition will not only feature Toriyama’s art, but tributes from many of Shonen Jump’s famous creators and illustrators as well in cool new ways. 

With the special Dragon Ball 40th Anniversary exhibition opening in Japan later this year, Shueisha has been building to this event with a series of special new cover art makeovers. Recruiting Shueisha’s talented artists such as Jujutsu Kaisen creator Gege Akutami, Black Clover creator Yuki Tabata, Tokyo Ghoul creator Sui Ishida and more to revamp the 40 covers of Akira Toriyama’s original series, the latest cover art makeover comes from Dragon Ball SD artist Naho Oishi showing off a new take on Volume 18 of the original series. Check it out below: 

What’s Next for Dragon Ball? 

This 40th anniversary exhibition will not be the only major celebration for the franchise as we’ll get to see a brand new anime hitting this year too. Dragon Ball Daima will be releasing in Japan some time later this Fall, but has yet to confirm a concrete release date as of the time of this publication. The late Dragon Ball creator Akira Toriyama helped to craft the original main story and character designs for Dragon Ball Daima with Yoshitaka Yashima and Aya Komaki directing the series for Toei Animation, Katsuyoshi Nakatsuru adapting Toriyama’s designs for animation, and Yuuko Kakihara supervising and writing the scripts.

Masako Nozawa will once again be providing the voice for Kid Goku, and she is currently the only confirmed member of Dragon Ball Daima‘s voice cast announced so far. Akira Toriyama previously teased the original story for Dragon Ball Daima as such when it was initially announced, “Due to a conspiracy, Goku and his friends are turned small. In order to fix things, they’ll head off to a new world! It’s a grand adventure with intense action in an unknown and mysterious world. Since Goku has to make up for his petite size, he uses his Power Pole to fight, something not seen in a long time.”

What do you think of this newest Dragon Ball manga makeover? Let us know all of your thoughts about it in the comments! You can even reach out to me directly about all things animation and other cool stuff @Valdezology on X (formerly known as Twitter)!