Of course, I'll have to start by bashing Chichi, Goku's wife and Gohan's mother. She is a horrible character. She was deliberately intended to be nothing more than a stereotypical representation of a young girl in her debut; a total brat who believes her only purpose in life is to become a man's wife and bear his children. She literally falls in love with Goku for no reason other than "he touched my vagina, so that means I must marry him!" Stupid as fuck. She asks Goku for marriage, and he dumbly agrees, thinking she just meant food. They're both just 12 years old at this point. Then, Goku leaves Fire Mountain and they literally never see each other again until the Piccolo Jr arc, when they're 19, seven years later. Chichi had last appeared in chapter 14, and she doesn't reappear until chapter 167. That's 153 chapters of her not showing up in the story. Four chapters later, in 171, they agree to marry each other.
I shouldn't even have to explain why this is awful writing. There's absolutely nothing to her character; literally her only purpose was to marry Goku and have his babies, because she is utilized for nothing else and nothing else at all. The author wrote her off for 153 chapters straight before randomly bringing her back. As soon as she reappears, she marries Goku. There's no build-up to it; they basically marry as soon as they reunite after 7 years of not seeing each other in-universe and 153 chapters in the story. Just because they met once as kids and Goku agreed to marry her all the way back then without actually knowing what the hell she meant, they must marry as adults? It's completely stupid and ridiculous. People grow up and change; the fact Chichi is dumbfounded that Goku didn't recognize her after so long is also dumb, because it had been 7 years and they both grew up. She expects him to know who she is without even telling him her name ... just because of one brief meeting they had as kids.
She's a fucking idiot. A bitch. Of course, that's the point. She's intended to be a bratty bitch with a laughably shallow perception of people and the world in general, because she's just a stereotypical and satirical representation of women in general. Even Toriyama himself admitted to disliking her, and the only reason he brought her back to marry Gocow was to punish himself. Chichi is just meant to be an insufferable bitch for nothing more than cheap laughs, because that's Toriyama's unfunny idea of funny. Making women out to be annoying, dumb bitches. The women in his works are deliberately intended to be nothing more than stereotypes; they're really nothing more than housewives, baby makers or sex pots, and regardless of these roles they get, they're always annoying bitches. The thing is, it's not funny at all; it's just sexist, misogynist and perverted. Of course, this is the same guy who drew and wrote a story about a woman turning to prostitution after repeatedly getting raped. And the same guy who admitted to wanting to spy on his own daughter bathing. So, it's no surprise that he'll write women so terribly in Dragon Ball. He's a degenerate loser.
Chichi is a garbage character, all around. It's a bit of a shame, because we did see very, very small glimpses of the better character she could have been at the 23rd Budokai, where she was a martial artist and finalist in the tournament; had she been a serious and strong fighter, then she might have been interesting. But sadly, this is Shonen, and you can't have women as strong fighters. And Chichi was never intended as such, not even when she reappeared; the only reason she even took up martial arts was to meet Goku again, because she wanted to marry him and have his babies. There was absolutely zero progression or build-up to their relationship; they met once as a kids, didn't see each other again for 7 years in-universe and 153 chapters in the story, and as soon as they reunite, they agree to marry. It's as lazy as can be. A properly written romance would show two characters gradually falling for each other over the course of the story, so their eventual coming together would feel organic.
They would have plenty of interactions over the course of the story, and they would eventually fall in love; that way, them marrying wouldn't feel one bit forced, random or lazy. When they only meet once as kids and never see each again for 7 years and 153 chapters, on the other hand? It's fucking garbage writing, plain and simple. Of course, the apologists would defend this with, "But Toriyama doesn't like writing romance!" but that's bullshit because if he doesn't like it, then he shouldn't have bothered with it at all. There should have been no romantic pairings or couples if they were never gonna be any focus in the story, because then they're just completely hollow and shallow. You don't write something just to half-ass it. Either you do it well or you don't do it at all. Dragon Ball isn't meant to be about romance? Right, and so it shouldn't have bothered with anything even remotely resembling it to begin with. Period.
Goku should have just never become a husband or father. The character isn't one bit suited for those roles at all, as the author admits, and the only reason he's given them is for cheap laughs. "Oh, look at how much of a shitty husband and father this macho manchild is. LOL" Too bad it's not fucking funny. It's just stupid. All there really is to Goku's character is that he likes fighting. He's willing to sacrifice the lives of his own family and the rest of the Earth for a good fight, because he's just that much of an awful person. A piece of shit like him shouldn't have his own family. He should really just keep to himself and do what he loves, which is fighting, because he isn't suited for anything else. It would have been one thing if Toriyama tried to develop him into a proper husband and father over the course of the story, but he didn't. Goku remains the same dumbass manchild all around. The apologists would argue "That's what makes him endearing!" but no, it really doesn't. Goku is a fucking awful character, as explained here. He should have never married or had kids.
And thus, Gohan should have never existed. Goku should have never gotten married or had kids, so by extension, his son should have never existed. But even ignoring this, just looking at Gohan's own character, he's still trash. When we're first introduced to him in chapter 196, he's four years old and his dream is to be ... a scholar! Huh? Goku isn't a scholar. He's a martial artist, so you would think he would raise his son to be one like him. Whose idea is it for Gohan to become a scholar? Right, that bitch Chichi. She bans Gohan from practicing martial arts, supposedly because .... "the world is at peace". Apparently, if the world is at peace, there's no reason for someone to practice martial arts. This really just makes her a fucking hypocrite, because when she took up martial arts to meet Goku again at the 23rd Budokai, she was under the impression that the world was at peace as Piccolo Daimao was defeated and she had no idea that a clone of Piccolo was still out there, plotting to throw world in shambles again.
Making matters worse, now she knows for sure that this clone of Piccolo is still out there, plotting to kill her and her husband; she already saw Goku feed the evil fucker a Senzu and let him go five years earlier, so she has no reason to think Earth is going to stay peaceful. The threat of Piccolo looms over her, her whole family and the rest of Earth. So, according to this dumb fucking bitch, practicing martial arts during
peacetime is bad ... unless you want to fuck Goku and have his babies. You should never practice martial arts in peacetime for any other reason, not even when you know a crazy maniac is planning to kill you and everyone you love. Wanting to marry someone is the only thing that makes practicing martial arts acceptable. Garbage ass character all around.
"B-but she just wants Gohan to be a successful, productive person in society! She doesn't want him to be a dumbass like Goku!" As if they couldn't just find a way for Gohan to strike a balance between studying and training. Wake up in the morning to study the normal 8 hours, then train with his father in the afternoon. Furthermore, Gohan could easily just become a highly successful athlete; he'd make a shit ton of money by winning martial arts tournaments like the Tenkaichi Budokai. It's just stupid to think practicing martial arts = becoming a bum like Goku as if there's any correlation when there's none. And there are some particularly delusional apologists who think Chichi was just scarred from seeing Goku almost die against Piccolo when they fought at the tournament, but this is nothing but stupid head canon. That's never once even insinuated to be why she bans Gohan from martial arts; it's just said to be because she thinks martial arts are worthless during the peacetime.
Not wanting Gohan to participate in dangerous life-or-death battles is one thing, but he doesn't have to participate in those just to practice martial arts. And with Piccolo plotting to kill Goku and his whole family, it's stupid to think that Gohan won't ever run into trouble during his lifetime; that's just something that comes with being related to Goku, and she knew what the hell she was getting herself into when she married him right after he let a genocidal maniac off scot-free in front of her. There's no stopping it, so it'd be for the best that Gohan at least know how to defend himself; learning martial arts is only for his own good. Chichi is just nothing more than a half-assed, stereotypical depiction of a tiger mom; she's a garbage ass fucking character through and through. Fuck this bitch. Goddamn. This is what she deserves. Good riddance.
What the fuck does Gohan even want to be a scholar of, anyway? The first time we even got a hint would be in Dragon Ball Online, some random shitty MMORPG that was released in 2010 (15 years after the original manga ended) in just South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong before being shut down in 2013. He publishes a detailed book teaching the world how to use Ki; how to fly, how to shoot laser beams, how to power up, etc. But in the Superhero movie, released in 2022, he apparently just studies ... uh, insects so that makes him an entomologist. So, what the fuck is it? It's not even clear how canon Dragon Ball Online is to the original manga; shit like Towa, Mira, the Supreme Kai of Time, Time Patrol Trunks, Time Breaker Bardock, etc have only appeared in non-canon bullshit like Heroes and Xenoverse since Online got shut down.
We're gonna have to assume Gohan is only an entomologist going by the Superhero movie. However, none of this even matters in the first place. It's been literally 27 years since the original manga ended in 1995 and 34 years since Gohan debuted in 1988; it's way too late to reveal what he studies now. Again, it was literally never a point of focus in either the anime or manga; revealing what he studies after all this time doesn't actually give it substance or importance (it's not even important in the Superhero movie, because it's just a throwaway line that has nothing to do with the actual plot of the movie). Gohan being a scholar was never anything that mattered in the series' original run, and that's all there is to it. The fact is, it was just a very half-assed, forced way to set Gohan apart from Goku; instead of wanting to be a fighter like his father, Gohan just wants to be a scholar ... of absolutely nothing that matters in the story!
And that's really Gohan's biggest downfall as a character. This is a fighting series, for fuck's sake. The only thing in Dragon Ball that actually matters is the fighting, because that's the only thing the author bothers fleshing out. You can't expect people to give two fucks about Gohan about wanting to be a scholar, or anything else for that matter, when the plot never focuses on that. This isn't a series about studying; it's just a series about fighting. The fighting is all that really matters. Toriyama apologists argue all the time, "Gohan isn't supposed to be a fighter! He's supposed to be a scholar!" Too bad the plot never focuses on that, because it's worthless. Fuck Gohan being a scholar altogether. Not that he's a decent character as a fighter, though. LOL, he fucking sucks; Goku was already a cheaply written Gary Stu to begin with, and Gohan turns up that quality to 11.
With absolutely no training whatsoever, Gohan is basically born the strongest person on Earth, far outclassing Goku, Piccolo and even Raditz just by getting angry; his power level is only 1 normally, but it jumps to 710 (far greater than unweighted Goku and Piccolo, who were 416 and 408 respectively) when he gets angry the first time and 1,307 when he attacks Raditz (who is said to only be 1,200 in the manga). And that was only a headbutt; the Ki blast he fired to destroy a boulder was even greater, as noted by Piccolo. What even is the reason for Gohan being so damn powerful when he's only 4 years old? Oh, right, because half Saiyan, half human hybrids are born with a ton of potential. That's it. If you're half Saiyan and half human, you'll just be born with a lot of potential. Yeah. But one question ... why? Why exactly do half Saiyan, half human hybrids have a lot of potential? How does a Saiyan breeding with a human produce a powerful offspring? "Uh ... because that's just how it is!" Absolutely no reason whatsoever. The plot just decided that they'll produce powerful offsprings with no actual logic behind it. It's completely arbitrary and random. His rage boosts are nonsensical and only work as well as the plot wants them to. Garbage writing.
So, anyway, Piccolo abducts Gohan and forces him to live in the wilderness with bloodthirsty animals for approximately one year. He also leaves Gohan alone with those bloodthirsty animals such as this dinosaur for the first 6 months. Only for the remaining 6 months do they actually bond, and the series tries to pass it off as something touching. Even though Piccolo literally abducted Gohan when he was only 4 years old and forced him to live in the wilderness with fucking dinosaurs for a year. What spells out a touching, heartfelt bond better than almost drowning a child, threatening to break their neck straight to their face and throwing them at a boulder right after you just killed their father? "Piccolo knew he'd be fine" The look on his face here says otherwise. For fuck's sake, their relationship is literally glorified Stockholm-Lima syndrome. "Piccolo didn't have a choice because it was to protect Earth from the Saiyans", you say?
That's straight fucking cap, because he could have just 1) Used the Dragon Balls to destroy their spaceships when they were coming to Earth. 2) Used the Mafuba alongside Kami or Tenshinhan to seal them both away (and Yamcha and Krillin could have learned the Mafuba as well). 3) Assimilated Kami and drank Karin's magic Aquafina to unlock his hidden potential so he'd be strong enough to beat the Saiyans himself; even if he can't beat Vegeeta in a fight, he'd at least defeat Nappa with ease and he can just Mafuba Vegeeta away. Then, he can just take Kami's spaceship, Vegeeta's spaceship, Nappa's spaceship or Goku's spaceship to Namek and bond with his own kind there, so he can bring one of them back home to Earth so they can make Dragon Balls for him; he can also fuse with some of his people over there to get stronger. There was never any reason to rely on a little kid, and Piccolo hating Kami is no reason not to fuse with him. Piccolo is a piece of shit child abuser and there's nothing touching about his bond with Gohan.
Anyway, so the Saiyans arrive and Gohan finds himself regressing to a crybaby who is too scared to fight even though he was already supposed to have toughened up when he was training in the wilderness. We already saw him get over his fear of the dinosaur that was trying to kill him as he kicked its ass, so there's no reason why he should be so afraid of the Saiyans that he can't even fight them. "The Saiyans are stronger than the dinosaur" And the Saiyans were literally stronger than anything everyone had faced up to that point, but nobody else was backing down (sans Yajirobe, but Yajirobe is just a bitch by nature). "They've already fought plenty battles before; this was Gohan's first fight" LOL, Gohan had a number of run-ins with that fucking dinosaur! To a small child, a dinosaur is gonna be scarier than any of the human martial artists Kucklin, Tenshinhan, Yamcha and Chiaotz had fought and no less scarier than Piccolo Daimao's humanoid demons. Gohan even trained rigorously under Piccolo, the evil fucker who abducted him and threw him into a rock. There's no reason why Gohan should be too scared to fight against the Saiyans, and the regression is totally pointless when he eventually mans up to fight them in the end.
But Gohan is pretty damn useless for most of the fight, despite how hyped up his potential was. All he does is land one kick on Nappa and is back to being helpless when Nappa fires his blast at him, prompting Piccolo to sacrifice himself. Oh, how sad, Piccolo tearfully died protecting Gohan; nah, man, fuck this child abusing piece of shit. Then, Gohan fires a lazer at Nappa that doesn't do shit and is about to be stomped to death when Goku saves him. Goku beats Nappa, who is then killed by Vegeeta, and Gohan is sent away with Kucklin so Superman can fight General Zod alone, but comes back when Clark loses. He can't do anything when Donkey Kong is about to kill Mario, and after Zod turns back to normal, Jobhan can only stall him while Kucklin prepares to shoot the volleyball that Jobku gave him. Yeah, Jobhan bounces it back after Zod dodges it, but it would have hit right away had fat boy not been a dumb fuck; how useful is Jobhan really when he can only do stuff as a result of other people being idiots? Furthermore, we're pretty much at the end of the fight, which is also when Jobhan's tail conveniently grows back the instant Zod is about to kill him so he can turn into King Kong. Basically, Jobhan is useless for the whole fight until the end, which is when he just gets a bullshit deus ex machina in his tail growing back.
Anyway, Jobhan goes to Slug World so he can revive his abuser. He doesn't do much in this arc, either; sure, he jumps to saves Mini Pickles from being killed by the pink fat man, but ultimately it comes down to Kucklin to save them by blinding fatty with the Sun. Jobhan gets his potential unlocked by some fat old fuck, but he and Kucklin job to some ugly green midget and need to be saved by Jobgeta. Jobhan saves Jobgeta from ginger Dolph Lundgren in return, but then he gets his neck broken and needs to be saved by daddy again. Jobhan then fights a bad guy who stole his daddy's body, but fails to put him down even with Kucklin's help and Jobgeta takes the lead. Then, Gocow is the one who stops the purple Power Ranger from stealing Vegeeta's body by throwing a frog. Then, Jobhan fights Freezit and while he lands some hits on his second form, he ends up jobbing and needing to be saved again by Kucklin, who was healed by Mini Pickles; Jobhan is healed by Mini Pickles as well. Then, Jobhan saves Pickles from Freezit's third form and while he almost hits him with his blast, Freezit bounces it back and Pickles has to save him. Then, Jobhan fights Freezit's final form and needs to be saved by Jobgeta when he's about to be shot to death. Then, Jobhan can't do shit when Freezit reappears after surviving the Spirit Ballsack, knocking out Pickles and killing Kucklin; Gocow has to save the day by turning Aryan.
The reason I'm bringing all of this up is to show that Gohan really wasn't all that much of a significant character for the first two arcs he appeared in. He was mostly just another useless side character, and another cheerleader for his father Goku. And for most of the Android/Cell arc, he wasn't that important, either; all he really does in the earlier portions of the arc is save Piccolo from being drained by Gero. He never actually fights at all; not against Nineteen, not against Gero, not against Seventeen, not against Eighteen, not against Sixteen and not against either of Cell's first two forms. He really just spends most of the arc just staying behind while other people fight; the fact is, he wasn't a major focus at all. And that's why it feels forced and random when the plot does start to focus on him later; it's only when he and Goku go in the Time Chamber and Goku says that he'll make Gohan the strongest does any build-up to him taking over start. Anyone claiming that Gohan was set up to take over from his debut in the series is full of shit, because Toriyama himself admitted that he had absolutely no intention of making him the protagonist at first. It was basically just midway through the Android/Cell arc that the idea entered his head, because he felt Goku was getting old. He decided to have Gohan take over simply because he thought it was cool, and nothing more.
Something isn't actually built up when the build-up only starts right before it actually happens, no. The decision to make Gohan the protagonist was just random and forced. Anyway, so Gocow loses to Bug Boy and Jobhan must now fight in his father's place. Oh, but then it suddenly turns out Gohan doesn't want to fight because he doesn't like it. This pacifism comes right out of nowhere, because nothing about Gohan disliking fighting was even alluded to before. You never saw Gohan backing down from a fight once he manned up against Vegeeta to protect his father; he didn't back down against Dodoria (not willingly, anyway; he only ran off because Kucklin told him, too), he didn't back down against Gurd, he didn't back down against Reacoom, he didn't back down against Ginyu and he didn't back down against Freeza. For all this time, he was proactive and courageous against enemies, even if he never accomplished much. So, where does this "violence is not the answer" bullshit come from?
"Gohan was just a little kid doing what he was told before; now that he's older, he's started to think for himself and he no longer wants to fight" That'd be totally fine if not for the fact that it still comes out of nowhere. We already saw him training hard in the Time Chamber to get the hang of being a Super Saiyan, and when Goku tells him that they'll start training to make Super Saiyan like their regular forms, he's excited. After coming out of the Time Chamber, he only wants to keep training for the Cell Games and isn't interested in doing anything else. You'd think that if he was beginning to realize that he dislikes fighting, he would have mentioned it after training in the Time Chamber for about a year, in the days leading up to the Cell Games. But there's absolutely no mention of it at all, so it comes out of nowhere.
Gohan was expecting to fight the whole time, which is why he trained so hard in the first place, and the entire reason he wants to fight is to protect Earth. There was literally nothing suggesting that he didn't want to fight, and that's why it's stupid for him to suddenly become a pacifist as soon as it's his turn. It's also completely stupid that he thought an evil monster like Cell, who he already knew had slaughtered tons and tons of innocent people, would ever listen to reason. "He knew Cell had DNA from his father, Vegeeta and Piccolo, so he thought maybe he'd listen" That's more stupid head canon, and him possessing DNA from an evil fuck like Vegeeta (the genocidal mass murderer who let Cell become Perfect) shouldn't be reassuring, especially when he also possesses DNA from Freeza and Cold, who are even bigger evil fucks than Vegeeta is. Really, there's no way around it; Gohan's pacifism was just written for the sake of implementing more artificial tension in an arc that was entirely contrived to begin with.
Basically, Toriyama wanted Gohan to be the one who beats Cell by unleashing his hidden power, but it wouldn't be exciting if Gohan unleashed it right away, so he made him reluctant to fight and unable to get stronger from getting angry on his own. The fact we saw Gohan immediately become angry enough for a rage boost (so much that he nearly went Super Saiyan) just from visualizing his loved ones getting killed, however, makes this fall completely flat. It's not that Gohan should have immediately turned Super Saiyan 2 right off the bat, but he should have been fully motivated to fight right away so he could protect Earth and he should have been able to access at least some of his hidden power just by getting angry from imagining his loved ones being killed. There's literally no reason why he should be against fighting or unable to quickly get angry enough for a rage boost. This writing is just ass.
Anyway, so Gohan turns Super Saiyan 2 and kicks Cell's ass. He receives a lot of flak in the fandom for choosing to torture Cell instead of killing him right away because he wants him to suffer as revenge for destroying Sixteen, which leads to Cell attempting to blow up Earth by self-destructing while Gohan can only helplessly despair and Goku has to step in, but really, it's not any worse than Goku choosing to let Freeza power up to his max just because he wants to fight him and make him suffer as revenge for killing Krillin. Gohan simply didn't have as much plot armor as his father and he's only a kid, anyway; what a shocker that a little boy would let his power go to his head, not. Goku's worse because he's a grown ass man! There's no reason to blame a little boy for screwing up when he has the burden of an entire planet on his shoulder; you should just blame his dumbass father for choosing to rely on him in the first place. And it was Goku's fault Gero even created the androids and Cell to begin with, so he should be blamed for this entire arc happening. And he never even had to sacrifice his life to stop Cell; he literally had an entire minute to teleport Cell away to Kaio's planet and teleport back to Earth with Kaio and Bubbles (and Gregory, in the anime); Gohan shouldn't be blamed for his dad dying when his dad brought it on himself. The entire scene was just more artificial, fake ass tension. Anyway, Cell comes back and Gohan kills him in the end. With Goku dead, Gohan is now the main character and we get into the Boo arc.
What's the first thing that happens with Gohan as the main character? Well, we jump 7 years later when he's a teenager in high school. Instead of immediately jumping into the important plot stuff, we instead get a couple of boring "slice of life" chapters focusing on him going to school and fighting crime as the Great Saiyaman, a half-assed Kamen Rider parody. Seeing Gohan do these goofy poses in a ridiculous costume is just cringe; he thought the Ginyu Force's poses were stupid as a kid, so why is he doing the same thing as them when he's a teenager? Because "hehe it's funny man" Too bad it's not; just forcing another dumb gag at the expense of logic. There's no reason why Gohan should even bother with such a dumb persona when he could have just kept fighting crime as a Super Saiyan and used a special watch made by Bulma that would change his outfit into a regular gi or Saiyan suit when he fights crime to conceal his identity; hell, he didn't even need a disguise when he could have just fought at high speed without anyone seeing him, like Kale does in DBS.
Great Saiyaman fucking sucked all around and there was zero reason for it. These chapters were a total waste of time. Toriyama was just burnt out from the Cell arc and didn't actually know where to take the story next, so he winged these lazy, uneventful chapters to pass the time until he realized what he wanted the arc to actually be about. In the meantime, and as a result of his lack of creativity, he turned Gohan into a laughing stock, which was especially jarring after people saw him as a super strong badass in the Cell arc. "B-but Gohan wasn't supposed to be badass" He sure wasn't supposed to be a clown with no self-awareness, but the Boo arc randomly turns him into one for no reason. "Gohan has arrested development as a result of his traumatic upbringing!" This is more worthless head canon that isn't insinuated once in the series; Gohan's mental state is totally fine.
But the biggest issue with Gohan in the Boo arc is that he's become a total slacker who doesn't keep up his training. Guy literally has no problem letting himself become weaker instead of keeping up his training to be prepared for any future threats Earth may face, which endangers everyone including his family. The arguments apologists pull out of their asses to defend this are awful. "He had no reason to think Earth will be in danger after defeating Cell"? What reason did he have to think Earth wouldn't be in danger again when he had absolutely no idea what sort of things might be lurking out there in the vast, vast universe? It doesn't matter how peaceful things may seem to be on Earth; there's no telling what sort of things may exist elsewhere. "He didn't have any reason to think there was anything dangerous out there when he knew Freeza and his father were dead!"
What reason does he have to think there was no one stronger than Freeza in the universe? Because someone like Vegeeta told him? Hearsay. There's no reason for him to assume there couldn't be anyone stronger than Freeza on a distant planet somewhere, and even if there's no one stronger in the present, there's no telling what the future may bring. For all he knows, there could be people from Freeza's family or army out there, training to kill everyone. They don't even need to necessarily be "strong" to be dangerous as they could be formidable threats through other abilities. Hell, there could be something dangerous on Earth, too; everyone assumed that the Red Ribbon army was destroyed after Goku beat them years ago, but that didn't stop Dr. Gero from taking everyone by surprise by creating the androids and Cell. How does he know nobody else related to the Red Ribbon army is out there, plotting to kill everyone?
Anyone and their grandma would be smart enough to realize that Earth is guaranteed to continue running into danger just by looking at its track record. Just three years after Piccolo Daimao terrorized Earth, the second Piccolo terrorized it. Just five years after the second Piccolo terrorized it, the Saiyans terrorized it. Just one year after the Saiyans terrorized it, Freeza and his father terrorized it. Just three years after Freeza and his father terrorized it, the androids and Cell terrorized it. These threats keep showing up in relatively rapid succession, with each of them being progressively stronger than the last. There's absolutely no reason for Gohan to just assume Earth will never be in danger again. If he didn't know what sort of dangers could be out there on Earth or the rest of the universe, then he should actually make an effort to find out himself. He literally could ask Shenlong to find out about the many potential dangers lurking in the universe. But instead he makes zero effort whatsoever to find out and just lazes around to study pointless shit because he's a dumb fuck. He doesn't even know much about the universe's long history or the many threats that it faced before he was even born; you'd think he want to learn about it if he's all about being a scholar and acquiring knowledge, but no, he's more interested in just studying pointless shit.
Unsurprisingly, as the story continues, it turns out there are a lot of dangerous threats that Gohan doesn't know about, even though he could have easily found out for himself before they actually showed up. Had he just asked Shenlong a few questions ("Is there anyone as strong or stronger than Cell? Was there anyone as strong or stronger than Cell? Are there any other scientists related to the Red Ribbon army? Does Gero have any living relatives? Are there any other living Saiyans? What are the planets that the Saiyans attacked? Are there any living members of Freeza's race? What's Freeza's army doing? How is law and order managed elsewhere in the universe, or galaxy? Who is the highest of all Gods? Are there other Dragon Balls? Is there another universe?" etc. And asking doesn't even take up wishes. He can also ask the two Kaioshin about all the monsters they've fought), he could have found out about Boo's shell that was literally on the very same planet he lives on. He could have found out there was a warlock literally trying to revive Boo, the monster that had terrorized the universe and slaughtered the gods eons ago.
He could have found out about the Demon Realm, and that its king was serving Bobbidi, the one trying to revive Boo, with power on par with or greater than Cell. He could have found out about the sleeping God of Destruction who goes around destroying planets and will eventually wake up in his lifetime. He could have found out about the many criminals that are held captive in the Galactic Prison, like the warlock Moro. He could have found out there was another set of Dragon Balls on the home planet of someone with a grudge towards the Saiyans. He could have found out about the multiverse, that there are literally 12 other universes and it's possible for a monster from one of those universes to show up in his. He could have found out about Zeno, the childish King of Everything who could always erase the entire multiverse on a whim. He could have found out all sorts of things, but he doesn't because that would be too smart of him and everyone else in the story for that matter; they all have to be kept one-dimensional dumbasses who let shit hit the fan because Toriyama doesn't know how to write a story that isn't contrived to save his miserable life.
"There's no way Gohan could have found all of this out when they didn't even exist in the story yet!" In-universe, Gohan could have definitely found these things out but he doesn't because he's an idiot. Out of universe, the reason he doesn't is because that would be too complicated for the author to write, which isn't an excuse for his stupidity in-universe. He'd also be able to find out the many ways he can get stronger, and the other transformations he can unlock like Super Saiyan 3, a souped up Super Saiyan 2 equal to or beyond Super Saiyan 3, Super Saiyan God, Super Saiyan Blue, Mystic, Beast, Ultra Instinct, Ultra Ego, etc. "But those weren't thought up yet either!" No excuse; every single one of these ideas that Toriyama pulls out of his ass as the story goes along only makes Gohan look even stupider, because in-universe, it was possible for him to discover all of them before. The fact is, Gohan is only kept a slacking idiot because it would be too difficult for Toriyama to actually a write a story where he's smart and proactive. A talentless, hack ass writer who can only rely on fake, artificial tension.
"There's no reason for Gohan to train when he can just rely on other people to protect Earth!" Who was there to rely on after Goku died? The humans like Yamcha, Tenshinhan and Krillin are worthless fodder. Vegeeta is literally an evil mass murderer who was literally trying to destroy Earth and slaughtered an entire Namekian village just a few years ago. "But Vegeeta is a changed man!" A few years of good behavior doesn't suddenly turn him into a good person, and it was literally his fault Cell became Perfect which nearly led to Earth being destroyed. Gohan should be training in case Vegeeta were to ever do something evil again, and unsurprisingly, that's exactly what happens in the Boo arc; Vegeeta lets himself be enchanted by Bobbidi just so he can rival and fight Goku, which leads to Boo coming out and eventually destroying Earth. We even see Vegeeta going on a killing spree at the Budokai, killing hundreds of people to bait Goku into fighting him. Look, a mass murderer who's already killed tons of people in his life ... has gone back to killing tons of people! What a surprise! Not. And there's no reason Gohan should even be relying on him or Piccolo when his potential far exceeds theirs; case in point, neither of them could measure up to Cell, who Gohan surpassed and defeated.
It wouldn't even matter if Goku was still alive; Goku's a dumbass fucking manchild who literally spares villains just so he can fight him, like he did when he spared Piccolo and Vegeeta when they tried to kill him and everyone he cared about. The entire Android/Cell arc is Goku's fault for letting Gero make the androids, for crying out loud. And it's also largely Goku's fault that Boo comes out as he chose to fight Vegeeta as a Super Saiyan 2 instead of just stomping him with SS3, even when he knew right away that Vegeeta was his equal in SS2; this leads to Vegeeta beating him up and his energy is used to revive Boo. And then there's Goku sparing Boo as a Super Saiyan 3 just because he wants little kids to clean up his own mess, a plan that fails utterly as Boo ends up destroying Earth and killing everyone. Gohan absolutely should not be relying on dumbass, fight-horny manbabies like Goku and Vegeeta to keep anything safe; he should rely on himself and nobody else. "B-but if Gohan kept up his training, then he would just become Goku 2.0!" Another dumbass argument, because simply training doesn't make someone a Goku clone. Goku's defining character trait is that he's a fighting enthusiast who fights mainly for the thrill of it, not to protect others; Gohan would be fighting only for the sake of protecting his loved ones, and that would be enough to set him apart from Goku. Just look at Future Trunks; he keeps up his training mainly to stay in shape for any threats his timeline may face, not because he enjoys fighting, and his personality is very different to Goku's. If anything, Gohan would be more like Trunks, not Goku.
"B-but he wants to be successful in society!" He could easily just wish for a lot of money with the Dragon Balls. "He wants to work for it!" So he can just become a professional athlete or martial artist to make a lot of money. "He doesn't want the exposure" Boo hoo. He should suck it up and make sacrifices, because the safety of his loved ones is on the line here. He shouldn't deliberately hold himself back by looking for bullshit excuses not to train. And we even see that his job as a grown man in Dragon Ball Super doesn't pay much, so this isn't even a matter of money here; hell, he even marries into the riches by making Videl, daughter of Mr. Satan, his wife. That shoots the whole argument that he wants to work to become successful dead, point-blank in the ass; he just mooches off his wife!
All of the arguments apologists pull out their asses to defend Gohan slacking off from training are nonsense. "He wants to work to become successful on Earth" He literally mooches off his wife's money, so that can't be it. "He wants to spend time with his family!" He's literally so engrossed in his stupid insect studies that he can't even pick up his daughter from school in the Superhero movie, so that can't be it, either. "He doesn't see a reason to train when there isn't an active threat!" He continues to slack off in Dragon Ball Super even after Freeza (the same piece of shit who literally kills Gohan's wife, daughter, mother, brother and grandfather) is resurrected, knowing full well that he's plotting to destroy him and everyone he loves, so that's also bullshit. "He can just rely on Goku and Vegeeta!" Goku and Vegeeta are unreliable manbabies who cause innocent people to die with their stupidity all the time. "He has no reason to think anything could be out there!" Except he did and he could have easily found out if he didn't know. Instead he doesn't bother making an effort to find out because he's a dumb fuck. Gohan slacking off from his training after defeating Cell is pretty much the equivalent of a country abolishing its military after winning a war, stupidly assuming that things will never go bad again just because they've achieved peace for the time being. Completely and utterly moronic.
With great power comes great responsibility. When you're literally the strongest person in the universe, when you have the power to destroy the universe, when you have the potential to become even stronger than that, etc you have the responsibility of protecting the universe. At the very least, if you have a family like Gohan does, it's most definitely your responsibility to train to protect them. It doesn't matter if you don't personally enjoy fighting; it's your responsibility to keep other people safe, so you're supposed to suck it up and fight anyway. Especially if your world and universe have a lengthy track record of being threatened by supervillains. There are tons of characters who don't personally enjoy conflict like Superman, Spiderman and Megaman X, but they suck it up and fight anyway, because they realize they have a moral obligation to protect people. Gohan has zero excuse to slack off; he just does it because he's a selfish bastard who only cares about pleasing himself. He just wants to study, because that's what he personally enjoys doing, even if it means endangering his family by becoming weaker and unprepared for when another supervillain does appear. He's a piece of shit and that's all there to this.
"But what the fuck about you? What do you do to protect other people" A weak ass strawman made by apologists, resorting to ad hominem instead of actually trying to debunk what's being argued. It could be said we all have to play our parts in making the world a better place, yes, and we can do so by becoming doctors, scientists, philanthropists who donate to the poor, firefighters, soldiers who fight against terrorism overseas, etc but no regular person can even come close to what Gohan can do with his power. Furthermore, we don't live in a world that's constantly being endangered by supervillains. Because Gohan does live in that sort of crazy universe, and is capable of things far greater than any of us are, he needs to go to far greater lengths to keep his family safe. As far as protecting our families goes, living in safe communities, getting home security to be protected from intruders, keeping them healthy by feeding them proper meals and getting them to exercise, etc is enough to cut it. Those are just basic tasks and common courtesy, which isn't going to cut in Dragon World. In a world that constantly faces extermination by supervillains, the only thing that's going to cut it is becoming powerful enough to defeat said supervillains and nothing else. Gohan is just an awful person and a shitty character for choosing to repeatedly endanger his family by slacking off.
Anyway, Gohan goes through the Boo arc as a bitch. He's too weak to break out of Kaioshin's paralysis, which results in his energy being stolen. He fails to beat Dabra and turn his master Piccolo back to normal from stone, which pisses Vegeeta off and gives Dabra the idea to have Bobbidi brainwash Vegeeta. This results in Boo coming out; Gohan gets his ass rekt. He then pulls out a sword and breaks it, which results in Old Kaioshin unlocking his hidden potential; Gohan just sits on his ass while Old Kaioshin does it. He fights Boo, but fucks around to talk shit, which results in Boo absorbing Gotenks and Piccolo. Gohan then jobs one last time before being absorbed and now he's no longer the main character. Oh, yeah, and he also couldn't even catch a fucking earring. Goku is back and Gohan is now a worthless side character again. While it's certainly bad, inconsistent writing to suddenly backpedal on Gohan being the main character after all this time, the fact is he should have never taken the reins in the first place.
The decision for him to replace Goku in the Cell arc came out of nowhere to begin with, and Goku is just too iconic to replace. There was no reason for Gohan to replace his father just because he became a bit more popular than him in the Cell arc, because ultimately, Goku was always going to be the face of the series. While their personalities are different enough, Gohan always lives in the shadow of his father; he only ever amounts to an inferior substitution for Goku when he's put in the role of protagonist, because he's not the face of the series. It's the same reason why someone other than Bruce Wayne becoming Batman, someone other than Peter Parker becoming Spiderman, someone other than Clark Kent becoming Superman, etc never works out in the long run. The successors simply aren't iconic enough to keep the mantle. It doesn't matter what personality Gohan has; he could be a fighting enthusiast like Goku, or he can be a pacifist superhero, but it doesn't matter either way, because he's just not iconic enough for the role of main character. You just can't have Dragon Ball without Goku.
So, then, the original manga ends and we get to Dragon Ball GT. Gohan's a fucking jobber bitch who apparently kept up his training as implied by Vegeeta in episode 2 (outright said in the Blue Water dub), which is why Goten and Trunks are going with Goku to space instead of him as they were the only ones who slacked off ... but for some reason, Gohan is no longer in his Mystic form. He also doesn't do jack shit in the story other than get his body stolen, get his ass beaten or just be a cheerleader for his daddy. GT ends and then DBS comes out 18 years later. Gohan pretty much sucks just as badly as he did in GT for the first four story arcs, reaching an all-time low in the Golden Freeza arc. Just one year after Battle of Gods, when he was supposed to be at his peak strength, he's become a twig who can barely become a Super Saiyan. He beats some worthless fodder before getting one-shotted by Freeza Form 1. Then, his family gets killed when Freeza blows up Earth and what does he do? Continue slacking off. What a piece of shit. "He has Whis to fix everything in case everything goes wrong!" Except Beerus and Whis make it clear to the Dragon Team that they're not always gonna help out when things go bad, so that's bullshit. Just what do these delusional apologists think will happen when a bad guy attacks Earth and Goku, Vegeeta, Beerus, and Whis aren't there, and Bulma can't reach them?
Gohan does go back to fighting and training in the Jiren and Moro arcs, but he does nothing of actual relevance, beating no one important. By the Superhero movie/arc, Gohan's back to slacking and getting weaker like a dumbass. Trash writing. He's so engrossed in his worthless insect studies that he doesn't even pick up his daughter from school (so much for wanting to spend time with his family, right?). Of course, he gets back into gears when his daughter gets kidnapped, and even gets a new recolor transformation called Gohan Blanco at the end of the movie. Piccolo scolds Gohan for slacking off from his training, and it seems like Gohan has finally learned his lesson. Right? Right? Frankly, it doesn't matter at this point. The original manga ended in 1995. 27 years later, it's too late to try making Gohan "cool" again. Not like he ever was cool, though; he was always a terrible character.
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