Synopsis: With the Red Ribbon Army defeated at last but one final Dragon Ball left to find, Goku checks the radar again to see where it could be, only to find out something surprising when he does. Elsewhere, Yamcha and the others have finally arrived outside the Red Ribbon Army's HQ and land outside of it. Lunch asks why they're landing so far away, and Yamcha explains they'll get shot down if they land too close to it – their only chance is to storm the place without getting seen first.
Yamcha prepares to lead the charge, but Roshi stops him and says they can't head in somewhere like that without a plan first. Oolong wishes them all luck, but Bulma tells him that they're so desperate they'll even need his help and she and Lunch force Oolong to come along despite his whining. As the gang discusses various plans of action ranging from Bulma taking her clothes off to distract the soldiers and Roshi attacking from the left, Kuririn spots something in the skies above them. Bulma shouts for Puar to quickly return their plane to capsule form so they can hide, and Yamcha hopes that they haven't already been spotted. As they watch the object get closer though, they soon realize that what they've spotted is Goku on kinto'un. Goku curses his luck as the radar seems to be broken once again, leaving him no choice but to go back to Kame House and have Bulma fix it again, but he has no idea where that is from here. Suddenly, he hears everyone shouting up at him from down below on the ground, and zooms down to join them, asking what they're doing all the way out here. Roshi says that Goku must've thought twice about attacking the base after all, and Kuririn tells Goku they came because they heard of the crazy thing he was thinking of doing. Yamcha says it's a good thing Goku didn't attack the Red Ribbon Army after all, but Goku surprises everyone by saying that he did attack them, and now that they're beaten, he has six of the Dragon Balls. Kuririn asks Goku if he really beat the entire Red Ribbon Army by himself, and Goku says that he beat everyone except for the ones that ran away. Yamcha sends Puar to check out the base, and Puar returns to confirm that it's empty and destroyed. Everyone is in disbelief that Goku managed to do what even the police and army weren't able to do, but Goku shrugs it off by saying he just got stronger. He tells Roshi that he did it to, referring to Karin's tower, and Roshi is surprised to hear that Goku has climbed it and trained with Karin as well – Roshi chooses not to mention that it took him a full three years to get the water from Karin, compared to the much shorter time in which Goku did it. Goku tells Bulma that the radar is broken again and asks her to fix it, and Bulma is surprised that Goku's found six of the seven balls but still doesn't have his grandpa's four-star ball. Goku explains the situation with Upa, and Roshi is proud of his student's kind aspirations. Bulma says she can fix the radar but they'll have to go back to Kame House for her to do it. As Goku flies on kinto'un, everyone else gets back in the plane and talks about how amazingly strong Goku has become. Roshi surprises them by saying that Goku might even be stronger than him now – he can't say with any certainty that even he would've had the stamina to take down the entire Red Ribbon Army, and he suspects that Goku has it in him to get even stronger than he is now. Yamcha says this probably means that if any of them planned to enter the next Tenkaichi Budokai, they'd probably better give up hoping for first place now, with Roshi confirming that's a wise idea. Yamcha can't believe how strong Goku has gotten, when it hasn't been that long since they were roughly even...he decides to go with Goku to find the last Dragon Ball so that maybe he can get some training in as well, with Kuririn thinking of doing the same thing. Once back at Kame House, Bulma is surprised when she takes a look at the radar. It doesn't appear to be broken, but the last Dragon Ball isn't showing up on it at all. Oolong suggests that maybe it flew into space, but Bulma says they shouldn't be able to fly that far. Goku even says that until recently they did all show up on it, so Bulma theorizes that someone or something may have swallowed it, and the signal the ball gives off is being blocked by biological matter. Goku frets that he'll never find it at that rate, with Yamcha grossly suggesting that maybe it'll get pooped out. Roshi suggests that there might be one way they can find the last Dragon Ball, by visiting the palace of Uranai Baba, the “All-Seeing Crone”. Yamcha seems to have heard of her, and Roshi explains that she has the power to divine the location of any lost object. Goku is overjoyed and asks where she is, so Roshi uses a map to show them where her palace is. Goku, Yamcha, Puar, and Kuririn board the plane to go see her, with Oolong and Bulma planning to head home via another airplane capsule while everyone else stays behind. Yamcha thinks this should be some great training, though Kuririn thinks it can't be that dangerous to go see an old lady. As the group flies off, Roshi says that with Goku's strength, they should be able to get Baba to help them...at least, he hopes so... Review: And so begins the Uranai Baba arc, one of (if not the) shortest arcs in the series. It's brevity is understandable though, as the scope of what it's trying to do is fairly simple. Unlike the first search for all seven balls, the Tenkaichi Budokai that brought forth a contest against a handful of strong opponents, and the second search for all seven balls that lead to a conflict with an entire Army, this time Goku's just looking for one more Dragon Ball and can't find it. This simple scenario, it's brevity, and it's ties to the previous arc (the wish being needed to revive Bora after he was killed by Taopaipai) are all reasons that a lot of people consider this to actually be part of the Red Ribbon arc rather than being one of it's own. Honestly, I can see an argument for that really – the Red Ribbon arc started as a search for the Dragon Balls that wasn't complete by the time the Red Ribbon was dealt with, so it makes a certain amount of sense that that story doesn't end until the search is finished and a wish is made. At the same time, everything in this arc other than the ultimate wish feels very much like it's own thing, with no real connective tissue to the previous arc. There's really no other arc in Dragon Ball that's as curiously placed as this one, so it's fine either way really, but I personally choose to look at this as it's own arc that serves as a bit of an epilogue to the previous one. Goku's friends being entirely surprised by Goku crushing the Red Ribbon serves as a final reminder of just how far the boy has come since we first met him. All of them by this point know of his previous run-ins with the militia, as well as them all knowing (personally in the case of everyone except Yamcha, Oolong, and Puar) exactly how dangerous the army can be too, so seeing that Goku apparently took them on head on and own is mind-blowing for them. Roshi's comments on the subject especially end up highlighting the two big questions we have now in regards to Goku – just how strong is he in comparison to his friends when they're used as a previous measuring stick (especially Roshi, who fought Goku in the final round of the previous Budokai), and how much stronger is he going to become in the future? The latter is an ever growing answer, even nowadays, but the former is something that I think both Kuririn and Yamcha are thinking a lot about and why they decide to go with Goku wherever he ends up next. Kuririn doesn't seem to have made many strides in growing stronger since the Budokai, and that goes double for Yamcha who hasn't even appeared in this arc until now and was already a good few steps behind both of them in the first place. The idea of being left that far behind by their friend and rival is undoubtedly bugging them, so it's nice to see them want to try and catch up before it's too late (ha...haha...ha...) And as crazy as it may seem, it's not even that wild for Roshi to assume that Goku may have surpassed him at this point. Considering how close Goku was to matching him before, and the fact that Goku has climbed Karin tower and received further training (and beaten Taopaipai, though Roshi is unaware of that fact), it's entirely possible Goku has far outstripped the old man in pure power, not even having to come down to the stamina of youth versus old age. Roshi too is likely thinking about this in his own way, though it'd be somewhat different from how Yamcha and Kuririn are feeling about it. If we were to consider this part of the Red Ribbon Army arc however, I think it can be agreed upon that the true villain of this entire part of the series is that damned radar not working. It's been broken at least twice, an entirely new one has been built, and it still manages to end up not being useful yet again. Just like real life technology, we love it when it works, but when it doesn't, we're tempted to see how far we can throw it (and I'd bet Goku's got one hell of a pitch by this point). Of course, this time it turns out the radar isn't broken at all, it's simply not picking up the last ball's signal, meaning it's being blocked somehow. Everyone's theories on what this could mean are interesting, but I especially like the idea of someone eating it being brought up. That's just such a crazy idea that they haven't encountered yet, I love it. Goku and Upa's only hope turns out to be an old psychic lady that we haven't met yet, but even with everything that Roshi was surprised to hear about from Goku earlier, Roshi's still not 100% certain that they'll be able to get her to help. Just who IS this Uranai Baba anyway? Until next time! Favorite Panel:
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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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