Hogan Reviews

It’s time for ten straight episodes of almost entirely filler as the Saiyan Arc grounds to a stop for “not catching up to the source material” reasons, something that actually stops for the most part after this, adopting the “making each episode agonisingly slow” method instead. Having said that I have strong and very happy memories of watching some of these episodes on TV when they first aired (two episodes a day, it has to be said, and some of these filler stories were cut entirely) so I don’t mind some of these stories purely with nostalgia goggles on. Let’s take a look!

Episode 11 is an odd one as it focuses entirely on our in-coming villains Vegeta and Nappa as they stop off on their way to Earth on the planet Arlia, where they get some exercise by pretending to be captured and then escaping, killing the corrupt King’s champion and then finishing off the King himself. They heralded as heroes by the resistance, only to head into space and destroy the planet with a small blast… which shows how this is filler at the ability to destroy a planet is something that was reserved for a shocking fact about Frieza later on rather than something Vegeta at this stage could do so easily, not to mention the two Saiyan standing in the void of space with no issues! Ah well, filler be filler, and it is really fun to see the duo do their thing for an extra story before they reach Earth, it’s one of the stories that always stuck with me from when I first watched the show. Unlike Episode 12, which is mostly a story featuring how Lunch continued to try and convince Tenshinhan to take her as a partner, only for him to agree to head to Kami’s Lookout with everyone else (and Chioatzu) and leave her behind. It’s fun, and just about the last time Lunch has a speaking role in the whole animated run going forward, so… Yeah.

Vegeta and Nappa are surrounded by the Arlians… Also: the first and only appearance of Vegeta’s green and orange armour and brown hair! Hooray!

The next few bits of filler are focused on Goku’s journey across Snake Way, where first he falls off into Hell (or the “Home For Infinite Losers” if you want to get Saban censored dub about it) and has to pass two tests set by a pair of Oni called Goz and Mez, which he does, so they show him the way out but the way out turns out to be back at the start, luckily though Goku ate a special fruit that makes him much quicker… man, why Toei felt the need to make Goku’s journey even longer I don’t know… Anyway, that is swiftly followed up by Goku meeting Princess Snake at her palace, where Goku is treated like a King and constantly told to stay for one more meal or a sexy dance or, um, a game of Russian Roulette, which was unsurprisingly also cut from the censored dub. Goku eventually goes to leave only to find out that the whole palace is Princess Snake as she’s, well, just a giant snake and she was trying to digest Goku within her. Bloody weird, really. Goku flies out of her mouth and then guides her body around until she ties herself in a knot and then heads on his way. These are more episodes I have fond memories of, this was really the introduction to the more carefree and silly Goku (a.k.a. his true character), given my first exposure was the more serious Raditz stuff.

A delightful game of Russian Roulette… Yes, she does blow her head off shortly after this, but it’s done in a comic way, so don’t worry!

We head over to Piccolo as he splits himself in two and then fights himself before we get an extended run of Gohan stories as he ends up on a desert island, builds a boat and then washes ashore on another island where he’s taken in by a bunch of orphans. All the kids are being hounded by a group of adults who want to “take them away” but they fight them off with stones and climbing high with the help of a teen called Pigero. After a while though our bandana wearing teen sees that the adults want to take them to an orphanage where they can get looked after so “betrays them” and leaves them to the adults and escapes with Gohan, dropping him off near his home after explaining that he had a responsibility to make sure the kids got looked after. Gohan looks at Chi Chi from afar but decides to turn away and go back to his training as he too has a responsibility he needs to focus on, something Piccolo is pleased to see as he arrives. It’s a good mini-episode, even if the orphans stuff was as cliché as you can get.

The last of the completely filler episodes sees Krillin, Yamcha, Ten and Chiaotzu get transported to the distant past to fight a pair of Saiyans as training in a special room at Kami’s Lookout. It doesn’t go well, to the point where everyone is seemingly killed only to wake up in the Lookout, now with a better idea of what’s coming for them on the horizon. I guess I’ll leave the last couple of episodes for the “spoiler section” for the sake of layout consistency, but it’s not really spoilers to say “everyone continues to train until the Saiyans arrive”…

Overall Thoughts:

Bald-on-bald action as the two “Saiyans from the Past” take on the Earthlings.

Episodes 11 to 20 of Dragon Ball Z is nearly entirely made up by Toei Animation and much like a lot of the original Dragon Ball filler it’s a mixed bag as some of the stand alone episodes are perfectly fine, even enjoyable, but a lot of them are a bit dull and if this is your first time watching the arc you’ll be bouncing up and down wondering when Goku will actually arrive at King Kai’s or when the Saiyans will arrive. Easily skippable, but not actually bad, for the most part.

Episode 18 sees Goku actually arrive at King Kai’s planet and first deal with the super-heavy gravity before having to make the apparent God laugh by coming up with a pun. After that he has to catch Bubbles, King Kai’s monkey, and then hit Gregory, a little cricket thing, with a large mallet. Odd training but it seems to work! During Episode 20 there’s an extended flashback where King Kai tells the history of the Saiyans which is, of course, completely wrong as its all Toei filler before Frieza and his history was revealed in the manga. Well, that being said, it does confirm that the Saiyans shared their planet with the weaker Tsufuls race that they then conquered, something Toei goes back to much, much later in GT which is fun.

*GASP!* This scene is actually adapted from the Manga!

That’s about it, the two Saiyans actually arrive in Episode 21, so this was literally 10 episodes of nearly nothing but filler. Only Goku arriving on King Kai’s planet and his training with Bubbles is actually manga adapted content (even Gregory was a filler character, even if it was designed by Akira Toriyama) so as I mentioned in the Overall, this is easily skippable!