| abstract
| - In the earliest stages of The Forgotten's existence, long before anything was written for the story, this saga was the first saga. The story was going to begin when Ledas, a Saiyan who survived by being in Cooler's region (training on a moon outpost with 10 Appule and 10 Cui soldiers) during the genocide of the Saiyans, travels to Earth. He has SS1 through SS4 by that point. And he comes to Earth to see who the strongest Saiyan is and is the villain. He wants to use the Dragon Balls to become immortal. It was an atrocious idea, an atrocious story, and I'm glad that long before I joined this wiki, I fleshed out TF enough to see that. Ledas' backstory was originally going to be either said through dialogue or by the narrator or just on his character page. I eventually expanded that into the first three sagas by the final draft of TF, splitting the story into two overall arcs - the PTO arc and the Earth arc. This arc was going to be the whole story originally. But it's important to note now that it isn't. The previous sagas build up to this one, but they are not solely build up. They do give a good explanation for Ledas' power and transformations and personality, which would all be lost if this was the first saga. So around the time I started writing scenes for TF on my my original works document, there were a few scenes from this saga and beyond, though there were far fewer of these Earth scenes than there were scenes for the earlier PTO-related sagas. I found it much harder to write for Ledas on Earth and it required me to be in a different state of mind as well, since Ledas doesn't do as much fighting in this saga (although I think that perhaps his best fight happens in this saga, funnily enough). Drama was introduced with the others humans, both with the children like Ryori and the adults like Mr. Kyokatoshi (who was, in the first version of this story referred to as "Mr. Kyokatshi"). Once I realized how hard this Earth stuff was to write, I began to focus more on the earlier sagas. I had some ideas for this saga even as I began to focus on the earlier PTO sagas. I wrote mostly what happens in the first five or so chapters in my works document, along with some additional scenes that ended up being deleted. There were scenes with Ryori's deleted sister Aka; there were additional scenes with Mr. Kyokatoshi; there were additional scenes with Mrs. Fanshi. When I came up with Cardinal and his lackeys, though, that really gave this saga a sense of a plot to me. I finally had a villain, a conflict, and direction. Direction was important for me. The past few sagas all had direction. There were established characters and whatnot that made coming up with the plots for them rather easy. Even the Prince Vegeta Saga, which has a very atypical plot, still had the confines of the canon world and Frieza and King Vegeta's plot. This saga felt directionless to me until I came up with Cardinal. So Cardinal and Kindler and Dewberry were originally part of an investigation team sent to check out the space pod that landed near the town (this pod being, of course, Ledas' ship). They were, in the earliest, earliest drafts, working with this dude named Detective Ishida. This saga was basically going to have them trying to find Ledas while Ledas struggles with becoming "civilized" as a normal human while also dealing with his Saiyan instincts. This created a plot similar to the one I thought up at the beginning of TF, with Ledas being the villain by this point. He was going to struggle with not killing people and wanting to use his powers. That was drastically reduced in the final version, and he's no longer a villain in this saga, but there are still elements of that. Like with the natives plot in the previous two sagas, Ledas' villain plot in this saga was too ambitious and too on-the-nose to be good literary writing. I pulled it back, made it more subtle and character-driven in this final version to rectify that. So the thing about Ishida and Cardinal developed as I was working on this saga. Indeed, there was going to be a saga after this one called the "Kyokatshi Saga" featuring them searching for Ledas. That was based on Death Note, which was influencing me at the time I was writing TF's first draft, since it was my favorite anime at the time. However, I soon realized that DBZ is in fact very different from Death Note. The psychological mystery of Death Note doesn't work too well in this universe. Or, rather, I didn't feel like writing that. I wanted to get back to the heart of DBZ with fights and whatnot. Themes and subtle plots are good, too, but it didn't feel right for this story. So once that was decided, I began to formulate the plot more specifically. This saga's plot was very nebulous to me even in late November 2010 (after the first draft of the Lauto Saga had been completed). I took an extended break before starting this saga. During that time, I continued to reformat the chapters (which can be seen on the Planet Earth Saga's page history), reducing the story from 18 or so chapters to 12. This removal of chapters had a lot to do with me removing the Kyokatshi Saga and Ishida's investigation. I still kept elements of mystery and some thriller aspects to the plot, but they were reduced to make everything work better in the Dragon Ball universe. Much of the plot that exists now is what I came up with in the coming months after the completion of the first draft of the Lauto Saga. I began publishing this saga on this site on February 15, 2011; this means that there was about a three month gap between the second and third sagas. Such a gap was quite unexpected, and I remember at the time that I was disappointed that I had to take such a break. But it all turned out for the better. The Planet Earth Saga turned out better than most of the other sagas as a result. I spent a lot of time and effort coming up with a unique, cool, and realistic plot. Like with the Prince Vegeta Saga, there were few overall changes during the final edits, with me mostly adding in scenes, not changing or removing scenes, which happened quite a bit with the other four sagas. I attribute this to the fact that each saga is the beginning of an arc, and smaller changes are required for them than what was required for the final edits of the later sagas (the butterfly effect, in effect). I finished the first version of this saga on March 10, 2011. I was quite proud of it, for it was a new direction in the story. I wasn't resting on my laurels. This was also seen with the transition from the Prince Vegeta Saga to the Lauto Saga. I remember that Destructivedisk loved this saga the most of any of the TF sagas, and even with later versions, he found this saga to be his favorite. It certainly has a different tone to it than the previous ones. It's almost similar to the Prince Vegeta Saga in tone, but not quite. I was always fond of this saga because of how little it's changed over the years. I've added things in with the final edits, particularly in regards to Ledas' Saibamen and the expanding of Cardinal's group, but otherwise, it's still much like it once was. There's a lot of comedy in this saga; a lot of oddball actions and characters are also present. Korin and Yajirobe are major players because I loved them in DBZ and DB. They were some of Destructivedisk's favorite characters as well, which influenced me to put them in here, as I wanted to write something he would like. He was one of my greatest friends at the time, so I wanted to make sure TF appealed to him. But make no mistake, I wouldn't have put them in had I not considered them some of my favorite characters as well. Yajirobe is my third overall favorite character in the Dragon Ball universe. I just had to have Ledas meet him. I did the final edits for this saga very quickly. I started on August 13, 2013, and finished on August 15th. Of course, minor edits persisted for much longer, but all of the major changes were done in those two days. That is because I didn't make many changes; and most of what I did change were additions, not subtractions of text or changing of text. Just adding things in is much easier than doing the other two. As a result, the final edits for this saga went by in a blur and I don't remember doing them at all. I should also mention that in the original idea for this saga, I had Ledas arrive on Earth before Cell. I thought it would be cool if he was in class with Ryori unable to concentrate on a test because he felt the powers of the Z Fighters fighting Cell. While that is a really cool scene idea, it didn't work because it meant that Ledas would then have to stay on Earth with Ryori for like 7 years. That was never going to happen; it couldn't if I wanted to keep a logical plot. Ledas' confrontation with The Benefactor couldn't take place until after Buu because I needed everyone to be at their strongest and together. If I did it after Cell, Goku wouldn't be there, and the fight against The Benefactor would feel cheapened as a result. And Goku having Super Saiyan 3 was also desired, since at this early stage, I planned on giving Ledas Super Saiyan 3 during the fight against The Benefactor, and there's no way Ledas should unlock that transformation years before Goku (I ended up changing this to giving Vegeta SS3 in the final version, while Ledas only has SS2 by the end of TF). So yeah, Ledas needed to arrive slightly before Buu and then "reappear" after Buu's defeat. This created a bit of a complication as I didn't want Ledas to die with the Earth when Kid Buu blows it up. That spawned the plot of the last chapter, which spilled over into the first three chapters of the next saga as well. Anyways, once I got all of that figured out, that left Ledas searching for Earth for many years from his departure from Planet Cooler 92. When I came to my final departure date during the final edits of the 766 Age, this meant that Ledas spends roughly 8 years in space looking for Vegeta and Earth. This was very desirable, to be honest. It allows Ledas much time to train in his new Super Saiyan form, allowing him to grow quickly in power. Since he is significantly weaker than Vegeta (even in SS) at the end of the Stomping Grounds Saga, I needed him to gain power quickly so that he can get close to his old friend's power by the time he gets to Earth. Now, I didn't want him to be stronger, but he needed to be relatively close. SGS Ledas is like less than 1% of Vegeta's power at that time. That's unacceptable; it means they can't spar or fight or go up against the same opponent. Ledas had to be stronger; he had to get close to Vegeta's power for this saga's plot (and the next few sagas') to work. And so 8 years on his own, training as much as he can, allows me to make that work. Thematically, this saga is an evolution of the last saga. It deals with some of the same themes, expands on others, and introduces even others. I won't go into too much detail on that stuff, as it's not my place to reveal both my conscious and subconscious thematic constructions. One thing I will say is that Ledas' inferiority complex re-emerges when he arrives on Earth and realizes how much stronger Vegeta has become compared to him. Even with his 8 years of training, Vegeta is still quite a bit above him in power. That produces an interesting dynamic, where Ledas feels guilt for his weakness. This hearkens back to the Prince Vegeta Saga, where Ledas and Vegeta only became friends because Ledas was close in power to the prince. Ledas fears that now, since he's no longer as close as he once was to Vegeta's power, they can no longer be friends. His Saiyan instincts lead him to believe that (whether that is actually true or not is not stated in TF). This is all related to quite a sad theme. It's sad to think that Ledas has spent all of his life searching for Vegeta and now that he's found him, he's too embarrassed to reunite with him because Ledas feels he's too weak. There's a lot going on with that thematically, and I will discuss some of it in the below endnotes. It is one of my favorite developments in TF. I think it's interesting how short this saga is. I guess it makes sense, though, that this and PVS are the shortest (each serving as the first saga in each TF arc) while the two middle sagas are the next longest, and the two arc finales are the longest. It really gives this saga a feeling of being a "reset" to a certain degree, although the Lauto Saga also had that to a lesser degree. Only Ledas, The Benefactor, Vegeta, Guva, and Banas have survived from the first three sagas. And one of the more interesting things about this saga is how I handled the Guva and Banas plot. Their plot doesn't take place at the same time as Ledas' plot. It takes place immediately after the Stomping Grounds Saga finale, whereas Ledas' story timeskips 8 years into the future. Banas and Guva feel like a remnant of the previous saga in a way, and that was deliberate. Guva ends up becoming very important, so his story still had to be told. Yet it resonated with me in a weird way to see how their roles have been reduced, how their conflict is like this desperate fight in a far-distant cave unconnected from the rest of the universe. How far they have fallen. Just from the overview, their plot illustrates the ruination of the Planet Trade Organization I think. There was originally going to be a special tied to this saga, which at previous times was tied to the Lauto Saga and at later times tied to the Reunion Saga. This special, "Our Brotherhood", was never written. It was going to be about the trials Guva and Banas had to go through for one of them (the winner) to become the governor of Planet Cooler 92. By this point in the story, the PTO plotline is fading. As I mentioned above, just looking at their scenes gives this feeling of ruination, of an old world slowly dying out and fading away. A special about them felt unnecessary, tone-deaf, and I could never muster the will to write it. So it was eventually deleted. You can read more about that here. So the theme song for this saga is much different from the previous theme songs. They are all rocking action songs (trailer songs, really), highly dramatic and bombastic, reflecting the high energy and all of the battles that take place in those sagas. This saga's theme song is really funny to me because of how ironic it is. It's a tonal shift from the previous theme songs and it is also ironic because Ledas struggles so much with his emotions in this saga. This idea that all he needs to do is calm down and be happy is perhaps what he should have done, but it's not what he actually does. He's too damaged, pessimistic, and lonely for that message to reach him. But the message in the theme song is still important and it draws a contrast between the ideal and Ledas that highlights several themes in this saga. This saga's tagline (pictured above) was one of the harder ones for me to come up with. But I like how it turned out. It reflects the same kind of irony in the theme song. This idea that reality and idealism are not the same is a big theme in this saga. Things are not just like old times. Things have deteriorated. Vegeta has become far stronger than Ledas. Ledas is depressed, alone, and plagued by hallucinations perhaps caused by his horrible life in the PTO. Things could not be worse. Yet, Ledas is finally back with Vegeta. He's not officially reunited with Vegeta in this saga, though he does have one explicit scene where they are face-to-face (where Vegeta doesn't recognize Ledas), so there is still a sense of things returning to normal. But it's more of a kind of thing like "the puzzle pieces don't fit the way they used to". The puzzle pieces haven't been lost; they've changed their shapes. The old picture can no longer be created. The old friendship the two had, the old reality they had together, their old happiness and friendship, can never return. Things were better then; yet those times can never come back. And that tagline highlights the dislocation of idealism from reality, showcasing the desperation Ledas has to return to those happier times despite that simply not being possible any longer. Ledas wants it to be just like old times; but he cannot will it to be so. I find that to be heartbreaking. So yeah that's about it for this saga. I think this saga was the second easiest to do the final edits for - the Prince Vegeta Saga was slightly easier, I believe. Still, this saga's final edits were overall quite easy because I think this saga, even in its first draft, was quite good. Aside from the Prince Vegeta Saga, it's the only saga I would say could have still stood as a great piece of literature even without the final edits. Anyways, onto the endnotes!
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