Dragon Ball Z continues the adventures of Son Goku and his companions, who defend the Earth and other planets from various supervillains. While the original Dragon Ball anime followed Goku from childhood into adulthood, Dragon Ball Z shows Goku's adult life and the maturation of his son, Son Gohan. Piccolo and Vegeta are the main villains, and during the course of this series, the viewer sees their evolution from evil to good.
Dragon Ball Z was introduced to American audiences with FUNimation teaming up with Saban to produce an English dub of the series. Due to US broadcast standards, there was extensive editing done to the series; the amount of cuts that were made is the equivalent of cutting 14 of the first 67 episodes. This version features dialogue not found in the original script, which resulted in minor changes to the original story. The entire musical score was replaced, and many character names, terminology, and locations were renamed.
The English dub of Dragon Ball Z began airing on the WB network in September 1996. The show was canceled by the WB in May 1998 due to low ratings. In August 1998, Cartoon Network added Dragon Ball Z to their Toonami block. The series found a new life and new heights in popularity after being included in Toonami. By 1999, FUNimation had earned enough money to continue dubbing the series on their own, and dissolved their distribution agreement with Saban. FUNimation also eased up on their content restrictions a little bit.
In 2003, FUNimation began to re-dub the first 53 episodes, and ultimately restored them to the original 67. In April 2005, these new dubs were released on DVD under the name of the Ultimate Uncut Special Edition. That summer, Cartoon Network began airing these uncut episodes; this ultimately earned the series a rating of TV-PG.
In 2009, a re-working of Dragon Ball Z was produced in Japan to commemorate the series' 20th anniversary; this re-working was known as Dragon Ball Kai in Japan, while it was known as Dragon Ball Z Kai in North America. This re-working was done in such a way to remove much of the content in the original Dragon Ball Z anime that was not featured in the original manga. By removing this extra material, the story in Dragon Ball Z Kai goes at much more natural pace, and doesn't feel nearly as stretched out as the original Dragon Ball Z series did.
| Dragon Ball Z | 153 | 1989-1996 | Daisuke Nishio | Toei Animation | FUNimation Entertainment |
| Dragon Ball Z: Dead Zone | N/A | 1989 | Daisuke Nishio | Toei Animation | FUNimation Entertainment |
| Dragon Ball Z: The World's Strongest | N/A | 1990 | Daisuke Nishio | Toei Animation | FUNimation Entertainment |
| Dragon Ball Z: The Tree of Might | N/A | 1990 | Daisuke Nishio | Toei Animation | FUNimation Entertainment |
| Dragon Ball Z: Bardock, the Father of Goku | 1 | 1990 | Daisuke Nishio | Toei Animation | FUNimation Entertainment |
| Dragon Ball Z: Lord Slug | N/A | 1991 | Mitsuo Hashimoto | Toei Animation | FUNimation Entertainment |
| Dragon Ball Z: Cooler's Revenge | N/A | 1991 | Mitsuo Hashimoto | Toei Animation | FUNimation Entertainment |
| Dragon Ball Z: Return of Cooler | N/A | 1992 | Daisuke Nishio | Toei Animation | FUNimation Entertainment |
| Dragon Ball Z: Super Android 13 | N/A | 1992 | Kazuhito Kikuchi | Toei Animation | FUNimation Entertainment |
| Dragon Ball Z: Broly the Legendary Super Saiyan | N/A | 1993 | Shigeyasu Yamauchi | Toei Animation | FUNimation Entertainment |
| Dragon Ball Z: Bojack Unbound | N/A | 1993 | Yoshihiro Ueda | Toei Animation | FUNimation Entertainment |
| Dragon Ball Z: The History of Trunks | 1 | 1993 | Daisuke Nishio | Toei Animation | FUNimation Entertainment |
| Dragon Ball Z: Plan to Destroy the Saiyajin | 1 | 1993 | Shigeyasu Yamauchi | Toei Animation | N/A |
| Dragon Ball Z: Broly – Second Coming | N/A | 1994 | Shigeyasu Yamauchi | Toei Animation | FUNimation Entertainment |
| Dragon Ball Z: Bio-Broly | N/A | 1994 | Yoshihiro Ueda | Toei Animation | FUNimation Entertainment |
| Dragon Ball Z: Fusion Reborn | N/A | 1995 | Shigeyasu Yamauchi | Toei Animation | FUNimation Entertainment |
| Dragon Ball Z: Wrath of the Dragon | N/A | 1995 | Mitsuo Hashimoto | Toei Animation | FUNimation Entertainment |
| Dragon Ball: Yo! The Return of Son Goku and Friends!! | 1 | 2008 | Yoshihiro Ueda | Toei Animation | N/A |
| Dragon Ball Z Kai | 97 | 2009-2011 | Yasuhiro Nowatari | Toei Animation | FUNimation Entertainment |
| Dragon Ball: Episode of Bardock | 1 | 2011 | Yoshihiro Ueda | Toei Animation | N/A |
| Dragon Ball Z: Plan to Eradicate the Super Saiyans | N/A | 2011 | Yoshihiro Ueda | Toei Animation | N/A |
| Dragon Ball Z: Battle of Gods | N/A | 2013 | Masahiro Hosoda | Toei Animation | N/A |
