Synopsis: Taopaipai tells Goku he'll show him what happens to those that underestimate him, but Goku tells him to stop talking and make his move, causing Taopaipai to remark on how annoying Goku is. Upa cheers for Goku, and the fight begins. Taopaipai rushes Goku, and the two exchange blows, with only Goku's kick eventually connecting with Taopaipai's jaw. This outrages Taopaipai, who launches another attack on Goku that Goku dodges by leaping into the air. Taopaipai leaps after him and punches him, sending him into the tower's base, but Goku rebounds off of it and punches Taopaipai further into the air. Rebounding once more off of the ground, Goku leaps after Taopaipai, kicking him and sending him crashing into the ground. Battered, bruised, and extremely angry, Taopaipai rips off his shirt and says this is what he gets for holding back due to Goku being a child. Goku says he told him he'd be serious, and Taopaipai says he's going to be serious for real now, and unleashes his ultimate move – the Dodonpa! Upa yells for Goku to watch out as the beam heads straight for him, but Goku reacts quickly and cups his hands in front of him. He catches the beam, and though it pushes him backward and leaves the ground ripped up, Goku stops the beam with only somewhat singed hands as a result. Taopaipai can't believe that Goku stopped his Dodonpa, and Goku says they're even now that his Kamehameha didn't work on Taopaipai before and Taopaipai's Dodonpa doesn't work on him either. Frustrated, Taopaipai pulls a capsule from his waistband and brings out a sword. He lashes out at Goku with the blade, proving it's sharpness and his strength as he even manages to cut down a tree with it. Taopaipai continues to chase Goku, saying that even he is no match for a sword, and Goku is left with no choice but to keep dodging. Seeing that Goku is in trouble, Upa leaps off of kinto'un and runs back inside he and his father's teepee, retrieving the nyoibo that Goku left behind before and tossing it to him. Goku catches it, and quickly unsheathes his weapon using it to snap Taopaipai's sword in half. Taopaipai is stunned, but Goku smiles before tossing his nyoibo aside again, proclaiming that he's going to beat Taopaipai with his bare hands. Review: And so begins the first fight in a long while where things actually feel exciting just from the fisticuffs alone, not just the surrounding plot details supporting the fight. This bout certainly has that in spades too though, don't get me wrong. With everything Taopaipai, and even the Red Ribbon Army behind him, has done so far, and the fact that Goku lost his first encounter with him, it's extremely cathartic to see Goku hold his own this time around. As usual with a chapter that's primarily focused on fighting though, it does sort of leave for a bit of a shorter review. This chapter does feature the first non-tournament use of a format that's going to be used incredibly frequently moving forward, that being Goku fighting an opponent that's too tough for anyone else around to beat while his friends cheer for him from the sidelines. In fact, you could almost say that basically every fight for Goku moving forward features this format to some degree. It's repetitive, and it's one of the things people that don't like Dragon Ball often criticize the series for, but while they're not wrong to say it's overused, there's really no denying that it's more than effective for Toriyama's purposes. He gets to illustrate multiple panels of Goku and someone else exchanging blows, and other than a few brief stopgaps in the fight where Goku and his opponent exchange words, most of the dialogue moving the story along gets handed to the characters on the sideline who aren't currently fighting. This gets used even more frequently once there are enough regularly recurring characters that can fight but aren't at that exact moment, because they're able to give more feedback on what's happening than the non-fighting characters would. It's an ingenious setup really, just one that we really, really need to see the series break away from more and more often in the modern day, because it's all over the place from here on out. And let's have a brief moment of silence for poor Taopaipai's tailor. He died for nothing as Taopaipai himself is the one to rip apart his clothes this time, though I guess Goku had roughed them up a little bit first. They probably could have been patched up this time around though. If Goku's fighting back, and frankly knocking Taopaipai around like a ragdoll, wasn't enough of an indication of how much stronger Goku's gotten, then him taking Taopaipai's Dodonpa head on certainly is. This is the move that would have killed Goku before if he hadn't been extremely lucky and had the four-star Dragon Ball on his person at the time, so for him to withstand it this time is an important benchmark for his growth. It's also the point at which Taopaipai fully snaps I think, as his attacks become much more sporadic and he even resorts to a weapon, something I doubt he's had to do in a long, long time. Speaking of weapons, this might be one of the last times in the manga that we see Goku wield nyoibo briefly as well. Moving forward, weapons being used in fights – serious fights, at any rate – are going to largely be a thing of the past, as the series begins to focus more and more on hand-to-hand combat and energy attacks. Goku will still use the staff on occasions, especially in movies and filler, but it's mostly in cases where he's up against an opponent that's also wielding a weapon. It's hard to say if this is some sort of fair play on Goku's part, or if he's just growing to like using his own two fists more than the staff, or maybe even because we're finally hitting a point where he can hit harder with his fist than he can with it. The kinto'un will largely be phased out in a similar fashion once it's need for flying at fast speeds is eclipsed, so it's possible. Until next time! Favorite Panel: Next Time: A “Dynamite” Finale!
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September 2022
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