May 15th, Age 767: after three days of rest, Goku recovers from his heart disease (a week earlier than Trunks expected). The situation may be dire, but Goku knows the perfect place where Vegeta and Trunks can finally spend some quality father/son time together... #HistoryofEver
Speaking of quality time, Goku and Chi Chi get a nice moment together in the anime, sharing a kiss far too hot to actually show on screen. Or include in the canon, for that matter.
Alright, so…in the original manga, Goku and Chi Chi are never shown kissing. In DBZ ep.147 they share an offscreen kiss (they later made a figurine based on this). In the DBS anime and manga, Goku claims never to have kissed his wife. Draw your own conclusions.
Trunks initially estimates Goku’s recovery time as roughly 10 days, but in fact the narrator says a total of three days pass, at which point Goku wakes up. Accordingly, the Daizenshuu 7 timeline dates this to May 15th, three days after all the excitement on May 12th.
(Compare Goku’s early recovery to Vegeta’s surprisingly rapid recovery in the Namek arc, which allows him to catch Zarbon and Appule off-guard)
And what’s Vegeta been doing during these last three days? Standing around staring off into space. Sounds stupid, but apparently this is key to visualizing how to surpass Super Saiyan. Now if only he had a good place to train…
As Piccolo and co fruitlessly chase after Cell, the androids reach Goku’s house but find he’s not home. They decide to go see if he’s at Roshi’s instead. We next jump forward to nearly a day after Vegeta+Trunks entered the time chamber (gee whiz, I wonder how this’ll play out?)
According to Trunks, Vegeta surpasses Super Saiyan after only about two months in the room (so four hours on the outside). Eventually, Trunks obtains a power even greater than Vegeta’s…or so he thinks. In truth, his new transformation turns out to be more trouble than it’s worth
Trunks surmises that Vegeta avoided this powerful-but-slow Super Saiyan form because he recognized its drawbacks. The Super Saiyan guide included in the Trunks TV special animanga likewise notes that Vegeta is apparently capable of this transformation.
Meanwhile in movie land, DBZ Movie 7 (Android 13) theoretically happens around now. Daizenshuu 6 places it between Gero’s death and Cell becoming perfect, while noting that it can be called “the events of a parallel world” since Goku should be either sick or at the time chamber.
The manga’s android history chart tantalizing describes 13/14/15 as pretty close to complete (compared with Gero’s other failures), a possible nod to the movie. Much later, Toriyama avoids mentioning them at all in one of his Full Color manga Q&As. kanzenshuu.com/translations/d…
Toriyama provided the character designs for 13/14/15, but no plot details for the film (as was the norm pre-BoG). It seems that early on 14 was numbered as 15 and vice-versa, but this was later changed for God knows what reason. kanzenshuu.com/animation-prod…
Tomorrow: the enemy of the good!
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Toyotaro’s postscript for DBS vol.24 details the creation process of the ch.104 one-shot: originally this was a text prologue he got from Toriyama, which he revised and put into manga form. And now the Super Hero arc is really, truly done: “Look forward to future developments!”
Toriyama also designed the Red Pharmaceutical Company air truck for the Super Hero arc epilogue:
Toyotaro’s vol.24 author’s comment explains how Toriyama’s corrections were typically about how manga ought to be, rather than simply how DB should be. He was a manga artist above all. “I will never forget the approach to manga which sensei taught me, and continue to do my best!”
Dragon Ball Daima, ep.20: it’s the end, but the moment has been prepared for. The fight with Gomah is samey but looks amazing and is over soon enough for Kuu to ascend the Iron Throne, plus other fun wrap-up stuff. Thanks for everything Toriyama, and farewell. #DAIMA #ep20
Since Daima airs at 11:40 PM in Japan, the final episode on February 28th ended right as the date ticked over into March 1st, marking the one year anniversary of Toriyama’s death. So far there’s no word on if this was intentional on the part of the production team, though.
The title ゼンカイ/Zenkai comes from 全開, meaning “full power”, hence the translation “Maximun” (see also the DBZ ending theme ZENKAI Power). I’ll give it another week, but if there’s no further clues on the red letters, I’ll assume it was just about using all 20 dakuten letters
Executive producer Akio Iyoku discusses Daima’s origin: 6 years ago during DBS: Super Hero’s production, they decided to do a new TV series. At first Toriyama’s involvement was going to be minimal, but he really got into it, creating most of it in the end. mantan-web.jp/article/202502…
Iyoku says Daima was intended as a show that parents could watch with their children, so it was made to appeal both to kids and adults in their 30s who were kids back when DBGT first aired. So yes, making Goku and co kids was specifically done to appeal to the GT generation.
While making Goku a kid was seen as making the series accessible to a wider audience, it was Toriyama’s idea to turn the entire main cast into kids too. Toriyama was also concerned many people wouldn’t know DB’s story, hence the general overview at the start of each Daima episode
It’s already November 20th in Japan, which means Dragon Ball has officially reached its 40th anniversary. In case you weren’t paying attention and/or born at the time, here are some highlights from the first 40 years of DB history… #DragonBall40th
1984: gag manga superstar Akira Toriyama concludes megahit Dr. Slump, and in November debuts its follow-up in Weekly Jump. This Journey to the West-inspired kung-fu adventure kicks off as inventor girl Bulma recruits monkey boy Goku to track down the titular dragon balls.
1985: after last year’s tail-end teaser, things begin in earnest. The initial “quest for the dragon balls” arc wraps up in May, and Toriyama shifts gears to a tournament arc (always a fan favorite in his Dr. Slump days) with the lecherous Roshi and Goku’s new cueball-esque BFF.
According to Bunshun Online, Dragon Room head honcho Akio Iyoku has stepped down from Shueisha and established his own company, Capsule Corporation Tokyo. Supposedly he wants Shueisha to keep DB’s manga publishing rights but for CC Tokyo to handle DB games/anime/etc.
As you might imagine, Shueisha is reluctant to part with DB to any extent, and negotiations are still ongoing. According to this article, anyway. Shueisha has apparently confirmed that Iyoku is stepping down, but not confirmed any of the particulars so far.
Bunshun Online reached out to Toriyama and asked if he would be working with Iyoku in future, but Toriyama said he couldn’t comment publicly, only through Shueisha. He also said the company name “Capsule Corporation Tokyo” was Iyoku’s idea, not his own.
Dragon Quest: The Adventure of Dai ep.41: Pissed Myst’s great and the logistics of Dai’s sword are interesting, while the castle’s just there to be knocked down. But it knocks down well. 4/5 #DragonQuest#ep41