Well, if you really want to talk turkey about the major differences
in cultural mores…
Japanese kids shows have no problem with child endangerment,
whatsoever. While the fight with Yamcha certainly isn’t as intense as the
trials of flesh that Gon and Killua endure throughout HUNTER X HUNTER (which has 20 odd years of additional escalation,
mind you), this episode still largely focuses on a grown-up man
straight-up thrashing a little kid around the desert. It’s taken to such an
excessive degree, there’s some brutal dark humor to it - - like an especially
brutal Tom & Jerry slapstick routine.
The other half of that ol’ mores coin is lewd humor, of
course. These J-kids-shows find an infinite
amount of humor in panties. I guess it should’ve been obvious all along, but
since I’ve always come at this franchise through the lens of DBZ, I never thought
Bulma Briefs was this close to Little Annie Fanny in wordplay and intent. I
mean, she’s actually going fishing with her underwear in this one. That’s… ribald.
I read the first volume of the manga, way back, so it’s
funny to see them rearranging the chronology of events. As I recall, Goku and
Bulma encountered Yamcha almost immediately in the comic - - well before they
met Master Roshi or ran afoul of Emperor Pilaf. My guess is that, in the interests
of pacing, the animation crew felt it’d hook audiences faster if they threw the
hero against a real villain, right away, and established some stakes; as opposed
to showing him go through some misunderstandings with a roguish n’er-do-well
who eventually joins him.
It’s also odd seeing Puar have such an important role at this
point. She ends up being kind-of… vestigial by the time DBZ rolls on. From distinctive antagonist to background filler.
Watch "Yamcha,
The Strong Yet Cruel Desert Bandit" and decide for yourself, then read my
comments on the previous episode.
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