Synopsis: With Goku seemingly able to be hurt after all, Black laughs and says he'll use this robot Battle Jacket to make him the first casualty of the reborn Red Ribbon Army. Black uses the machine to fire a laser at Goku, which Goku narrowly dodges only to be caught in the Jacket's hand. Black throws Goku hard enough into a nearby wall to send him flying through it, and Black follows after, bursting through the roof and telling Goku not to worry – it'll all be over soon.
Black fires another laser at Goku, seemingly connecting this time and leaving a giant hole in the ground where Goku was. Black begins to celebrate his victory while Goku watches overhead from a nearby roof, noting that Black doesn't seem to know about how fast he is. Black comments to himself that it's a shame the other Dragon Balls were destroyed along with Goku, but he receives a shock when Goku lands on the Jacket's cockpit and starts sticking his tongue out at him. Enraged, Black sends a powerful punch from the Jacket's fist towards Goku, but Goku leaps out of the way, leaving the fist to break through the cockpit and hit Black. Goku laughs at the man's misfortune, and Black angrily jets off higher into the sky as Goku lands on another rooftop. Seeing that there's no other choice, Black prepares to deploy the Jacket and the Army's most powerful weapon – a missile that will kill Goku as well as destroy the entire base. The Battle Jacket turns over in mid-air and fires the missile at Goku, who recognizes it as another one of those 'bomb' things the Army keeps using. Leaping into the air, Goku kicks the missile, re-routing it's trajectory into a nearby mountain. As Goku recovers from his hurt knee and laments the loss of such a nice looking mountain, Black is mortified at just how strong Goku really is. He begins to fly away in the Battle Jacket, vowing to kill Goku someday, but Goku spots him and says he doesn't let bad guys get away. Leaping after him, Goku crashes into and through the Battle Jacket, causing it to explode and kill Black in the process. Having landed on kinto'un, Goku heads back into the Red Ribbon HQ's tower and retrieves their two Dragon Balls, leaving only one more to go before he has all seven! Up in the skies above, Yamcha and the others have finally arrived in their aircraft and swear that they're going to save Goku. Review: And so, the Red Ribbon Army arc comes to it's conclusion, and just like I warned, it's a little bit on the abrupt side all things told. The payoff was already achieved in the last couple of chapters, so this one really basically just serves to finish the fight between Goku and Black so that the story can start moving onward in it's next direction. As such, I can definitely see why a lot of people wouldn't be fond of this ending or even this arc as a whole as a result of it. For me though, this is definitely a case of the storyline's highs far outweighing it's lows. And it's not as if Toriyama's not trying to make this finale as impactful or as exciting as it can be under the circumstances, due in no small part to the Battle Jacket and it's feats of strength. Not only do we see that being hit with it actually throws Goku for a loop, it's able to fire lasers that leave craters in the ground, and even comes packed with a missile that blows up an entire mountain. It might not quite be Roshi blowing up the moon, but that's definitely one hell of an impressive showing for a mere machine, and does set the stakes fairly high for Goku to win against this thing. All that aside though, it's clear that Goku wasn't ever really in too great of danger here, and Black is taken down...pretty easily, really. Poor guy has just had one hell of a bad day, hasn't he? The Red Ribbon Army arc is unique in that it's the easiest one to further divide into a number of smaller story arcs that aren't entirely based around who the lead villain is at the time, but also by location and supporting characters. There's the opening snippet introducing us to the Red Ribbon Army by way of Colonel Silver, with Goku all on his own; there's the snowy village where Muscle Tower resides and Goku meets Suno and her family as well as Android 8; there's General Blue, that sees Goku through various locales such as a pirate cave and Penguin Village (along with familiar ones like Kame House), as well as a variety of old friends and even a crossover experience; there's the run-in with Taopaipai in the land of Karin; and finally there's this final assault on Red Ribbon HQ itself. If I were to personally rank each of these sections, it would probably go something like this – first would be everything with General Blue, just for it's great variety of characters and locales, plus I'm a sucker for Dr. Slump; second would be this finale, for bringing everything together into a conclusion that while lackluster in some ways, was entirely unexpected and enjoyable overall; third would be dealing with Taopaipai, as he makes for a great tonal change for the series as a whole; fourth would be Muscle Tower, which also gave us a fun variety of challenges for Goku to encounter, but could feel a little tedious in places; and dead last would be the opening bit with Silver, which is just dull and unfulfilling as an introduction can get. The Red Ribbon Arc really had nowhere to go but up, but I'd say it went as high as at least halfway up Karin's tower before it was through. The Red Ribbon Army arc is also unique in that it's conclusion...really doesn't conclude very much. Sure, the Army has been dealt with and won't be a problem anymore, but there's still the problem of that last missing Dragon Ball to contend with. Hmm... Until next time! Favorite Panel:
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September 2022
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