Synopsis: As Goku rushes towards King's Castle as quickly as he can, Piccolo tells his newest minion, Drum, not to play games and to finish off Tenshinhan quickly. Tenshinhan warns them both not to take him lightly, as he's going to take them down even if it means his own death as a result. Tenshinhan quickly rushes Drum and the pair exchange blows, but all of Tenshinhan's attacks are dodged while Drum forces him to block one of his own attacks before connecting a series of blows that sends Tenshinhan flying backwards. Piccolo thinks this is going to be a short, boring fight after all, but them both by surprise when he flips back off of the ground and slams into Drum's face with a furious headbutt. Drum is staggered but only briefly and praises Tenshinhan's skill, but Tenshinhan thinks to himself that Drum's own power and speed are beyond belief, while fretting that if only the minion is this strong, than Piccolo must be out of this world. Before Tenshinhan can react, Drum tells him he's already dead and speedily moves behind him, landing a powerful punch right into Tenshinhan's back and knocking him to the ground. As Tenshinhan tries to get back up, Piccolo praises his persistence but tells Drum to rip his heart out before he can stand. Drum prepares to do just that, but is knocked backwards suddenly to everyone's surprise. The assailant is quickly revealed to be a resolute looking Goku, whom even King Piccolo recognizes immediately. Tenshinhan can't believe that Goku is still alive after all, but Goku is happy to see that it was Tenshinhan facing Piccolo like he thought. Piccolo too is surprised that Goku is still alive since he was certain he killed him, and Goku is taken aback by Piccolo's changed appearance. Piccolo explains that he had his youth restored, meaning that he's far stronger than he was when he defeated Goku before. Tenshinhan yells for Goku to run away, but Drum says nobody gets away with knocking him down. Piccolo agrees, ordering Drum to kill both of them, and Drum moves quickly in for the kill – only for Drum himself to be killed in one blow by a kick from Goku that shatters his skull. Review: Drum went as quickly as he came, but he sure left quite an impression, right? ...Okay, maybe less an impression and more of a complete destruction of Tenshinhan's utilization in this arc, but hey, that counts for something surely. I mentioned in the last review that I didn't like how quickly the Mafuba was taken off of the table, as that made it pretty clear that Tenshinhan wasn't going to really bring anything to the table here. That quickly turned out to be more true than I remembered, as his only real contribution here is buying enough time for Goku to arrive and thus preventing West City from being destroyed. That's nice, especially considering Bulma's parents are still there, but considering what else could have been done with him here, it's still disappointing. The anime staff at Toei must have thought so as well, because there, Tenshinhan DOES get to try to use the Mafuba. I'm pulling from memory here, but in the anime version of this event, Tenshinhan is forced to try and use the Mafuba against Drum, and actually is about to succeed in sealing him away before Piccolo knocks the rice cooker away with an energy blast, saving his spawn and damaging the rice cooker in one go. While this all leads to the same thing thematically, Tenshinhan being completely ineffective against Piccolo and Drum, I can't help but feel like something similar here would have been far more satisfying, as at least then it would have felt for a moment like Tenshinhan had some sort of chance, as well as him truly expending every option available to him – though come to think of it, it's also surprising he never considers giving the Kikoho a try here. Either way, it's just disappointing and a big waste of time to show Tenshinhan learning the Mafuba only to have him do absolutely nothing with it. Honestly, a lot of this portion of the arc could have been easily fixed by Toriyama moving things around a little bit differently. Goku could have reached Karin's tower a bit earlier in comparison to other scenes we're shown, and he could have gotten the Super Holy Water – much as I still hate it – sooner and then spent a much longer time dealing with it's poisonous effects. During that downtime for him, Tenshinhan could have been revealed alive, shown to be learning the Mafuba, and then come to deal with Piccolo only to end up facing Drum instead, and attempting and failing to get anything done with the Mafuba. Heck, he could have tried to quickly turn away from Drum and use the technique on Piccolo himself only for Drum to get in the way somehow. At various points in that encounter, Goku could have been shown awakening, seemingly having become much stronger, gotten his new kinto'un, and been on his way here to save Tenshinhan in just the nick of time. Personally, I think Toriyama needed just a little more time to work this arc out better. All things told, he gets much better at choreographing how events play out after cutting his teeth on this one. Toriyama likewise may have spent too much of this particular chapter showing Tenshinhan getting his clock cleaned, because by the time Goku shows up and has some exchanges with King Piccolo, it sort of feels like someone hit fast forward on the dialogue for a moment. That does get things to the shock factor of Goku outright killing someone in brutal fashion that much quicker too, and Drum's death is definitely not a pretty one. We'll see gore of varying levels throughout the series run, but this is probably the first time that something like this has shown up in the series, and for it to come from little Goku of all people is as shocking as it is hype-building. It also gives us our first hint of just how much stronger Goku has become, as even his revenge against Tambourine didn't go this hard. Until next time! Favorite Panel: Next Time: Son Goku V.S. Demon King Piccolo – The Rematch
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About the AuthorAspiring author and big anime/manga fan, just trying to do my best in the world. For more details, go to About Me. Archives
September 2022
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