Authors Note: A somewhat long essay exploring the problems and issues with Gohan Goes to High School stories on Gohan High school stories

You can go to just about any fan fiction site on the web and you will find a slew of Dragon ball Z fan fiction stories. One specific type of DBZ fan fiction, as well as my favorite, that can be found is "Gohan goes to high school" stories. I shall be talking about this specific category. Even in this specific category many sub categories can be defined within it. These may include but are not limited too, Gh/V, Gh/V oneshot, Gh/Lime, Gh/Oc, Saiyaman, Gold Fighter, and many more.

Now we all know that with a popular show to write fan fiction for comes the horde of gibberish, junk, and general insanity of crap fan fics. You know, the ones riddled with Oocness and bad plots. Unfortunately "Gohan goes to high school" and DBZ fics at large are of no exception. If you go to and just click on the DBZ section you'll get a list of the latently posted or updated fics, it's a pretty good bet to estimate that at least 50 of those there are, for lack of a better word, CRAP! If anything "Gohan goes to high school stories", GGHS, are even worse. You'd be hard pressed to find a decent GGHS story on without using some authors favorites list, for even those in the C2 area are mostly crap. I recommend, as stated earlier, to find a good author of a GGHS story and start with those in his favorites list.

In this little essay, or organized rant (whatever floats your boat), I will be talking about the many things in crappy GGHS stories that makes them utter crap. If you plan on writing a GGHS story, you may find this very helpful, as I will be exploring the many problems that may turn any otherwise wonderful story to crap. However I shall begin with this little statement that many of you readers may go "DUH!" too. If you have not watched the DBZ show from at least the cell games up through the tournament saga, Do Not, I repeat, Do Not try to write a GGHS story, believe me I've seen stories that look like all their DBZ knowledge is either made up or comes from fan fictions they have read, which is a problem all in its self, but ill come back to this. Please, if you have no idea what you're writing about do not write about it, do not write, or at least slap a AU and Ooc warning in the summary for us. Who will care for our poor, poor little eyes?

Remember earlier when I said that a lot of GGHS writers attempt to write their story using only knowledge from other GGHS stories they have read? This is the root of almost every issue with GGHS stories. Here's what happens: A competent author, knowledgeable in the DBZ universe, will write a good GGHS story with something new to give the story a new edge such as….a scene with Chi Chi being overbearing and pan crazy perhaps. Then some moron author will read this story and then use the story as cannon and overdue it by making Chi Chi this way the whole story. Then a similar moron will read that story and due the same and the cycle will continue, before you know it the site is assaulted by stories all containing the same horrible trait. I have dubbed this the Monkey See Monkey Do Syndrome. This is not an exaggeration! So called sayian mind bonds, prankster Dendes, and much more all started this way. A decent author used one to change it up some and within a week slews of stories are all copying as if this were cannon. Don't believe me? Go and see for yourself how many stories you find with these things.

Okay now we've reached the point where we will explore each individual problem in detail. We'll start with common problems found in GGHS stories as well as fan fictions at large.

Common Problems

Use of Japanese and HFIL/Kami

Look even if you get the Japanese perfect I, and a lot of readers for that matter, don't want to have to deal with it even if we already know what they mean. Now using oni-chan and gomen (big brother and sorry), that's fine. At that point I'll just be annoyed that you thought that it would make your story cooler or more real. The main problem comes when one uses Japanese words in place of as many words as possible. I've seen authors try to do every greeting, good-bye, and formality. All you'll accomplish is either messing up or confusing the hell out of the reader.

Now onto the second part: HFIL/Kami. As for HFIL, don't, just don't. For peat sake the so called Hell for Infinite Losers doesn't exist. This was nothing more than bad censoring turning the word Hell on the workers shirts to HFIL. Just look at it, its hell with the bottom of the "E" and "L" cut off so the kiddies don't see "hell". Now the worst case scenario, and yes I've seen this done, is having all the characters say "what the HFIL!" The same also goes for Kami. I know it's Japanese for god, but it is also a characters name. Just stick to "God".

Overuse of Profanity

Pretty self explanatory, I think. There are two types of profanity in my book, heavy and light. Words such as: dumbass, asshole, and shit are light. Words such as: fuck, bitch, and motherfucker are heavy. Light words can be used in moderation, such as to describe Sharpner or Hercule, as long as it does not get out of hand. If you use shit more than 3 times a paragraph or any of the others more than 10 times a page it's out of hand.

Heavy words should be used sparingly. Now for those who have trouble seeing: Heavy words should be used sparingly. I have seen stories where every sentence of dialogue and descriptions has at least one profanity. Heavy profanities are a part of fan fiction stories and will be used but so that when they are used they are strong. If all the characters use them on a common basis, such as many high school American teenagers, they lose that effect. If I see a story with blatant overuse of profanity I, and I assure you many others, will leave immediately.

Americanization

Do I even have to explain? The story was developed in Japan, why in the world would the characters be using American slang and such. Now I can hear you already: "the fan fictions put things in our words and our language so we can relate. You see there are these wonderful things called episodes where you can see how they talk and where they shop and the common customs. Why use the American places and customs when all you need to do to relate is watch the episodes. You honestly have no business reading or writing DBZ fan fiction if you have not watched the episodes. Furthermore, if you are not doing a story reliant on places on a real map such as a "Trunks leaves for America and what's Pan to do" story then don't mention Japan, America or any other real life place, because believe it or not, DBZ takes place in a universe that only the name Earth gets passed into. Even the land masses are different. Just for your information: DBZ was made in Japan, not set there. On a final note, exactly three days prior to me writing this I read a really good GGHS story: chaptered, Oocless, good plot, and finished. Then along came Piccolo. The whole time he was in the story he spoke using American gangster rap. I swear if find you wrote a story with a gangster Piccolo, I will kill you. I will find you and kill you.

Domination of the Ooc Nation

This will be the longest section by far, and you will see why in a minute. Rampant Ooc has become so bad and repeated in GGHS stories that it has ceased to be a trait and become a characters all themselves. What I mean is that, the badass Gohan for example, has been so repeated exactly the same way that its become somewhat of a character instead of a trait. I will now break down and discuss each of these "characters" individually.

The Badass Gohan

This stems from the many fans who were disappointed in the nerdier version of Gohan displayed in the Saiyaman saga in contrast to the fighter and fierce version at the end of the cell saga. This is probably one of the few things that doesn't stem from incompetent authors. This Gohan is not to be confused with the serious Gohan that is displayed during the tournament and Buu sagas. That Gohan is completely cannon and can be used in cannon stories.

Badass Gohan is characterized by unnecessary amounts of rude and or coldness, may or may not have been adopted by the briefs, and is usually always either at odds end with Videl or Videl is turned fan girl. Now this would have made an excellent twist to spice up a GGHS story but it's been so overdone that it's sickening. If you want to attempt one, make sure you know what you're doing. I've read some really great Badass Gohan stories, it just takes talent.

Mommas Boy Gohan

Now we fly over to the opposite end of the spectrum. To be frank I don't know where the hell this came from. This is truly taking cannon to the extreme. Momma's boy Gohan is characterized by unnecessary cringing at the word "mom", having to ask for every little thing he does, and is usually accompanied by an overly crazy Chi Chi. As for writing this, unlike the badass Gohan, I see no advantage or twist from this utter crap so simply put: NO.

Depressed Gohan

Finally we make it to the last of the Gohans, the Classic depressed Gohan. Like the badass Gohan, this would also make a great plot device if done correctly. I stress correctly. Overdoing it on this one is probably the easiest of all the Ooc's. Again I have read some great Depressed Gohan stories. This character is characterized by a bad attitude (similar to Badass Gohan's), Constant worry and self loathing/blame, and sometimes accompanied by an overly sensitive Videl or sensitive by the end.

Over crazed Chi Chi

Ah, the Over crazed Chi Chi, this is probably the most overdone and common Ooc character period. This stems from many fans loving the hilarity of the extra strict nature Chi Chi takes on during the DBZ sagas. Though this is usually just funny and not really problem, so I'm just mentioning this for the sake of completeness. However, some take it way too far! Just be careful on how much you do it. If you're thinking about doing an over crazy Chi Chi, ask your self this: How about I try doing a cannon Chi Chi. Believe it or not doing Cannon Chi Chi is much harder. Don't believe me? Try it.

Prankster Dende

Now I've seen this in a lot of stories. Not as many as the other Oocs but enough to ask my self one simple question: WHY? This is another example of monkey see monkey do syndrome. One author decided that this would be cool story line to torture Gohan with, and then along comes Mr. Half assed author and he either thinks Dende is really like that or just feels like copying and….bam!

Prankster Dende is characterized by an evil disposition, urge to torture Gohan, and a fear that Gohan will beat him to a pulp afterwards. He may or may not drink and be high on drugs. Think I'm kidding? I'm not, how pathetic is that? This is one of the few things that I will not put up with. Dende is not even close to this, and unlike the others, cannot be explained why in any scope he would be like that.

Maniac/Evil Trunks and Goten

This one is really common; in fact I probably would not be able to find a single GGHS story with Goten and Trunks in it that does not have them like this at least at one point. I really don't mind this one, like over crazy Chi Chi; I'm just listing for sake of completeness. However, I would just like to point out that they don't act anything like this in the show and that if you were to write them cannon you'd get attention for breaking the mold. This is classic Monkey See Monkey Do syndrome.

Maniac/Evil Goten and Trunks are characterized for being overzealous, extreme pranksters, and very hyperactive. Trunks is usually the brains while Goten acts pretty clueless. They are commonly found having play dates at C.C. and bugging Vegeta till he tries to kill them is common.

Girly Girl Videl/Shallow Videl

This character is most likely the rarest of the Ooc characters. She usually appears to foil Badass Gohan. Some authors think that if they over Badass Gohan enough they can cancel it out by Turning Videl girly girl. Though I can see where some might be interested in this type of Videl, I personally don't care much for her. If you write a story with this Videl I recommend putting an Ooc label in the summary so you don't get flames from the equally stupid reviewers.

Girly Girl/Shallow Videl is characterized by either being shallow or fan girlish. Most likely by the end of the story will be turned into weak in the knees with love Videl, the common Cliché.

Other

Here I'll just mention a few things that I've seen before but don't warrant character status……yet. First up is extra dumb blonde Erasa and extra nice Sharpener, self explanatory. Finally there is extra evil Vegeta. We all know Vegeta is not exactly happy or kind, but for peat sake keep it to cannon unless you want to stick an Ooc warning in your summary.

Common Clichés

Now its time to talk about the common clichés that are apparent in GGHS story, nearly every GGHS story has at least one of the following. As stated earlier most of these came from the Monkey See Monkey Do Syndrome.

Saiyan Mind Bonds

Perhaps one of the more commonly seen clichés, in the most tolerable level merely saiyans with training can talk to one another. Then on the most atrocious level, the saiyans can communicate to those who they bond or "mated for life". I've seen stories where Gohan thinks that he might like Videl then bam she starts reading his mind and talking to him telepathically. Then in comes Vegeta, out of nowhere, to explain that he's bound to her because they have bonded and mated for life. This can only be a fans obsession with the guardians and Kais abilities to telepathically communicate taken too far. Then insert Monkey See Monkey Do and bam you got Saiyan Mind Bonds. I would have said it would be a good idea, but thanks to overuse, if it's not important to the story line or if you can't explain why they can, throw it out! And "because they are saiyans who have mated for life" does not count as an explanation!

Drunken Saiyan Scenes

A couple of choice words: #$ you #$&#&. If you're thinking it: NO! This does nothing but demeans the characters and does not move the plot forward. If it's important to the plot, then please find another way, favorably one that does not throw the entire DBZ universe rules out the window. Saiyans with there huge food intake should be more tolerant to alcohol, especially since the more food in you belly the less it effects you, or at least longer it takes. Drinking spiked party punch does not equal to Gohan getting drunk off his ass. No, no, no, no, and finally No!

Cheesy Cell Footage Reveals

One of the more common, yet annoying, methods authors choose to reveal what really happened at the cell games. No such footage should be able to exist, Furthermore there are a multitude of better, less cheesy, ways of going about this. The most annoying way this is done is that Bulma and the C.C. team will use there technology bordering on magic to get this footage and then just happen to decide to show it to Gohan's class. Just answer me this: Why in the hell would Bulma do something like that? And if you say Prankster Dende made her I will shoot you! Even if Vegeta attempted this, I think she would be more than capable of stopping him, and why would Vegeta care to do this? I don't think he wants to do anything other than being in his Gravity Room.

Field Trip to Capsule Corp

Ahh, the "field trip to C.C.", it seems no GGHS story is complete without one. Now I love these, so don't get me wrong, but I have seen it done so much that most of them were really bad. First of all this is supposed to be a part of your story, not an entire story unto itself. If you try and do more than a one-shot on this alone, your going to dry up out of ideas fast. If you do decide to do a chaptered story on this alone then keep it short and good. Do not, I repeat do not do more than 15 chapters on this alone. If doing a major chaptered story and include this do not spend more than two chapters on it. And anyone who attempts to make Gohan pick a fight with Vegeta in front of his entire class will be rectally violated. Why in the hell does Gohan always go Ooc during this part of a story? Go and find a GGHS story with field trip scene and you'll see what I mean.

Saiyan Eating Habits

Thanks to scenes such as those seen during the tournament saga, every GGHS story includes scene after scene of Gohan eating tons of food. Now I wont stay long on this one. Just simply put: we know Gohan eats a lot, but we don't need to be reminded at every lunch, dinner, or snack scene. We are not stupid.

Overly Strong Videl

I've seen stories where, after Gohan trains her, Videl becomes super strong. Now I would expect Videl to become stronger after Gohan teaches her flying and other things, but when your story describes a battle where she gives Krillen and Piccolo a run for their money you have gone too far. Humans have limits. There is no way you could justify Videl getting that strong from merely training without throwing the rules of the DBZ universe out the window.

Well congratulations you have made it to the end of my little essay. For all those who have read the previous points and taken them to heart or at least keep them in mind I thank you. I plan on using this essay my self to write my very own GGHS story. Now that its typed up it'll be much easier to remember not to do any of these things my self. Anyone who has anything to add you can leave it in a review and ill add all submitted ideas in another chapter with the names of those who submitted it. Now for those who may be insulted and thinking about running to that button to flame it up, I'd just like to say that I accept flames but I'll probably wont take you seriously.

Anyone with a serious argument to dispute anything mentioned, you're welcome to post a review with exactly what the problem is. But please leave an email address to contact you at so that I may send counter arguments. If you happen to convince me your write ill change that part in a heartbeat, with you mentioned if you so happen to want credit.