The life of the DRAGON BALL is really starting to look like
- - I don’t know - - a soft rock act
who spent their younger, wilder years as a punk band. Like, they’ve got this
profitable, family-friendly image now, and they’re utterly embarrassed by all the lewd
things they used to spout off on their early records.
I mean, I always assumed that Shen Long’s first appearance
would’ve come after somebody died and needed resurrecting. The Z-Fighters
eventually did that so often that, by the time they got around to the Saiyan
Saga, they basically just started shrugging off anybody’s death. “Oh hey -- that’s really horrible that Yamcha got killed. Don’t sweat
it, though, we can just gather the Dragon Balls and wish him back.” They
even took it so far beyond that point of exhaustion that Shen Long would even
flat-out tell them that all the wishes were used up.
BOTTOM LINE: I had no idea that the first wish in this epic
would be used to gift a pair of panties to Oolong. That’s like a twist of the
HITCHHIKER’S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY. All these questing characters go through all
this trouble, chasing after this boon, and by the end, it’s wasted on something
incredibly stupid. That’s brilliant.
Conversely, the revelation of Goku’s ‘Kong-turn’ is more in
line with what I expected. It makes Gohan’s transformations during the Saiyan
Saga seem more natural to the mythos, obviously. However, watching it with the
foreknowledge of what’s to come does underline the whole scene with even more
menace. Oolong wonders if Goku might actually be an alien. It’s clear that the
little tyke was just so powerful as a Saiyan baby that he accidentally murdered
his grandfather, and so on. There’s even a dangerous significance to the monkey tail, now (which won’t be paid off until Raditz shows up in a few hundred episodes, natch).
For a show about poop and panty jokes, there’s actually a
lot to wrap your mind around…
Watch "A Wish to the Eternal
Dragon" and decide for yourself, then read my comments on the
previous episode.
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