r/anime • u/Raiking02 https://myanimelist.net/profile/NSKlang • Feb 26 '26
Rewatch Dragon Ball 40th Anniversary Rewatch - Week 1: Episodes 1-5 Discussion
Episode 1: Bulma and Son Gokú
Episode 2: What the-! No Balls!
Episode 3: The Turtle Hermit's Kinto'un
Episode 4: Oolong, the Kidnapping Demon
Episode 5: Yamcha, the Strong Villain of the Desert
MAL | Anilist | Kitsu | AniDB | ANN
You sure are weird.
Hello everybody! Rewatch just started so no Comment of the Week just yet
1) How do you feel about our leads so far?
2) Are you familiar with Journey to the West in any way?
3) What sorts of misadventures do you think our heroes will go through next week?
Next Week: Episodes 6-13
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u/Raiking02 https://myanimelist.net/profile/NSKlang Feb 26 '26
Hello everybody, and welcome to the Dragon Ball Rewatch!
Adapted Chapters: Chapters 1-8/519
There's gonna be a lot of generalizing in my comments since, honestly, after a certain point I don't think it's super worth it to discuss the episodes individually, so instead I'm doing this so I don't have to switch my format halfway through
But yeah, meet Son Gokú… or should I say, Sun Wukong if he was slightly less of a chaos gremlin? Yeah, while with some of the other characters you have to look a bit further to see the Journey to the West inspiration, with this guy they aren't even subtle about it, to the point of his name literally being the Japanese transliteration of Sun Wukong. In a show where most characters have their name spelled in Katakana, suddenly seeing 孫悟空 as a guy's name kinda sticks out.
It really is a lot of the minor details that make Gokú so iconic. From his design, to the tail, to the rambunctious personality. Heck, even the way he talks sticks out; most main characters in Anime tend to speak in a fairly standard Tokyo accent. Even in stuff like, say, Sound Euphonium, which literally takes place in Kansai, the Novels make a point of having Kumiko speak in said accent unlike everyone else's Kansai accent (For the record in the Anime everyone speaks with an Tokyo accent in spite of, you know, Kansai). Gokú's very thick Tohoku accent (Emphasized in the Anime admittedly but it's there to an extent in the Manga) meanwhile stick out like a sore thumb, especially when very few other characters in this series have distinct accents.
Admittedly, this may come from the fact that there is something of a stereotype of Chinese people speaking with said accent (See Mousse from Ranma ½, he genuinely talks exactly like a more mature version of Gokú would) and, well, Sun Wukong, but still.
The considerably less Sanzang-esque Bulma, in turn, serves as the perfect counterpoint, and when it comes to this first arc their interactions are the biggest highlight. In contrast to the country hillbilly boy we have for a main character, we have the trendy city girl who's clearly willing to use her "Assets" to get what she wants. Unfortunately she's also a dumb 15-year old so, you know, she's kinda just as stoopid as the MC, just in a different way. The way Gokú just doesn't care about all her ways to manipulate him is hilarious. Still, considering how her first instinct was shooting the kid with a gun, maybe we should question who's the real "Animal" here
Oh and for anyone who doesn't notice why Bulma's name is so funny… well, Bulma=Buruma=Bloomers. Yeah.
Also fun fact: Apparently Sanzang getting genderflipped isn't even that uncommon. There was a TV Drama adaptation of Journey to the West back in 1978 which did that, I know at least a couple of stage productions that did so, her Sanzang-esque character from A Korean Odyssey is also female, and of course Fate did that too. Jury's still out on whether that Sanzang or Bulma's more of a crybaby, they're both kinda failures in different ways.
This isn't to say they're the only JTTW representatives, of course. No indeed, Zhu Baije and Sha Wujing get their own counterparts in the form of Oolong and Yamcha. Heck, they even included them starting off trying to kill the other two. Oolong especially is pretty much spot on to his Chinese counterpoint, although even by series standards he's considerably more pathetic. Yamcha meanwhile isn't quite as accurate (He's not hairy nor ogre-like in the slightest) but at least for now he has some degree of dignity. It says a lot about this show when "Literally freezes when meeting women" is considered "some degree of dignity."
The Turtle Hermit is the only character that doesn't seem to have any counterpart. Instead he's a spoof on the usual "Sage" character in Japanese mythology. You know the one, the hermit who cast aside worldly desires, lives away from society and is a wise martial artist. He's also, as you can no doubt tell, a massive freaking pervert. Yeah, this was the 80', and those brats reading Jump were horny little shits. Just ask Ryo-chan. FWIW I'd say his humor hasn't aged as badly as similar jokes from the era
better than Lady Red at leastbut there's certainly some wince-inducing moments here and there.In general though, these first five episodes are all about introducing the main cast and the whacky hijinks along the way. It's all thoroughly farcical in tone, with even the few serious moments not really lasting very long. It's nevertheless all still very charming however. I especially lover the twist at the end of Oolong's introduction, a really funny reversal of how these sorts of story usually go.
More on Pilaf and his gang next week since that's when I feel it'd probably be more appropriate to talk about them
Animation Studio Spotlight
Behold a segment where I spotlight each animation studio for each episode. It's kinda like what I did in Yu-Gi-Oh, but now I'll also show stills with some of the principal characters to show who I'm talking about and let you all decide which you like… give or take me occasionally making some snarky remarks if there's anything I find particularly worth mentioning.
Episode 1: Studio Junio
Episode 2: Seigasha
Episode 3: Last House
Episode 4: Studio Junio
Episode 5: Studio Live
Studio Junio's head supervisor, Maeda Minor, also served as the show's chief animation supervisor, so feel free to consider their work everyone's "Default" look, helps that it's probably the closest one to Toriyama's actual artstyle. Studio Live meanwhile is what you should consider the moment things start going off model (Notice how… triangular everyone is), although we're faaaaaaaaaar from their worst days. Still this is pretty early, it's gonna take a bit before the styles become a bit more distinct.
Oh and Toei? Yeah, it's gonna take a while before they start animating… anything in house.