Synopsis: Goku and Kuririn rush out of the preliminary area to find Roshi and Goku's friends, but the crowd is so thick that they have trouble locating them until Goku stands atop someone's head to get a better look around the area. With the others, Roshi asks Bulma how she's been doing, but Bulma wants to know where in the world he's been – they went to his island to visit Goku a while ago but found the whole place deserted. Roshi explains that they had to move to a larger island to train properly, but then asks for some 'puff-puff' for old time's sake, a request that earns him a mallet hit from Bulma. Goku rushes over and happily reunites with his old friends, introducing them to his new friend Kuririn, and confirms that both of them qualified for the tournament, as did Yamcha. Everyone congratulates them, but a voice over the intercom interrupts to ask all competitors to assemble in the main hall. Goku and Kuririn rush off, and when nobody is looking, Roshi disappears as well. The eight participants are gathered, and Yamcha and Goku are chatting when a large, incredibly smelly man crosses their path. Yamcha says that he's heard of this guy before: he's a legend in the martial arts community, equally as strong as he is stinky, and when your hand instinctively covers your nose, he goes on the offensive. He's so smelly in fact that when the tournament announcer asks everyone to step forward, the man is asked to instead step back a few feet. The announcer explains how the tournament is set up. The eight fighters will draw lots to decide their placement in one of four matches, and the winner of each match will progress onwards to the next round of the tournament, until ultimately there is only one left standing and that person is declared the victor. Each of our three heroes, plus the other five fighters we've seen briefly are named as their lots are drawn. The announcer further explains that each match has no time limit, and you lose if you fall out of the ring or give up. He further explains that hitting the eyes or below the belt are both considered violations, and Goku has to have what 'below the belt' means explained to him. With all of the preparation out of the way, the announcer asks everyone to wait there until their names are called for their match, but Goku wants lunch first. The announcer confusedly has one of the monks on staff prepare lunch for the boy, while he goes out and announces that the 21st Tenkaichi Budokai is just about to begin! He then reveals the match-ups: Match 1 features Kuririn V.S. Bacterian (the smelly man from before); Match 2 features Jackie Chun (a mysterious old man who seemed very interested in the tournament's only female fighter) V.S. Yamcha; Match 3 features Namu (a thin man wearing a turban) V.S. Ranfan (a beautiful and alluring woman); and Match 4 feature Goku V.S. Giran (a monster that looks somewhat like a dinosaur). Review: We've had a few looks at the tournament grounds thus far, but it's here that we really get our first good look at the main attraction, that being the ring itself and it's immediate surroundings. The Budokai arena is easily one of the other most recognizable locations in the entire franchise. While the ring itself is fairly plain, the background behind it is intricately detailed to the extreme, and it all comes together to look great aesthetically. It's little wonder that this is one of the select few locations in the series that we'll revisit fairly often, at least for a good while. The introductions are kept to a minimum, but there is something charming about seeing Goku introducing his new friend Kuririn to his old group of friends. Prior to this, they've all known each other at least in passing, so Kuririn's really the only new face to the group, something that I'm sure isn't lost on the little guy. They seem to accept him readily enough though, and Bulma at least I'm sure would rather hang out with him than with Roshi. She seems to have psychically picked up a few pointers from Lunch on how to deal with the old man's perversion though, which is nice to see. Still not exactly sure where that mallet came from though... The main purpose of this chapter though is to introduce us to the eight competitors in the tournament, at least in passing. For the most part, you won't really get to know what any of these new faces are about until we get to see them fight, but it's still valuable to be able to put a name to a face when we're supposed to be getting excited to see them fight each other. The new fighters that get the most to go on are definitely Bacterian and Jackie Chun. In the case of Bacterian, that's because he's going to be around for the least amount of time since his fight's up first, and for Jackie Chun...well, let's just say the secret about him is probably incredibly obvious to just about everyone even upon first laying eyes on him. Good lord Toriyama's not very good at weaving a mystery at this point, is he? The chapter reviews seem to be getting shorter and shorter for the most part, but that's sadly going to be the case outside of more plot or character important ones as the series begins to focus more and more on the fighting elements. Thankfully there's still tons to dig into regardless though, it'll just come as we come to it. Until next time! Favorite Panel
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September 2022
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