Dragonball Book 8: Taopaipai and Master Karin

"Then there is no choice left but to battle" - Adjutant Black

This is my cut n'paste intro for my end of month indulgence (if I feel like it) as I make my way through all forty-two collected volumes of the enduringly popular and influential manga Dragonball. The series used to be split into the fantasy and whimsy filled Dragonball and the more serious, sci-fi orientated strip it became after sixteen volumes known as Dragonball Z, but now the series is being released under the one "Dragonball" title again; uncut and with a spiffy new translation.  The series first ran in the famous anthology magazine "Shonen Jump" from 1984 to 1995 and was written and drawn by Akira Toriyama (It has been translated here by Mari Morimoto and adapted into English by Gerard Jones, the western publisher is Viz Media) and pretty much set the standard for the similar shonen manga and anime that came after like Bleach and Naruto.  It follows the adventures of the kindly if somewhat sheltered and simple "Son Goku" as he trains, goes on adventures and enters competitions all with the aim of making himself a stronger and better fighter.  Along the way he accrues a colourful cast of friends and rivals in a world where humans live alongside anthropomorphised animals, dinosaurs never died out and tiny capsules can contain vehicles and houses to be easily carried around.

[Note:  This manga is "unflipped" so must be read from right to left]

Previously On Dragonball: Goku is still searching for the four star dragonball, one of seven which when gathered together summons a dragon who will grant a single wish.  Goku doesn't care about that, the four star ball is a memento of his dead grandpa and so using the dragon radar which was invented by teenage girl genius Bulma he is able to locate the balls easily.  However the evil Red Ribbon Army are also searching for the balls and they and Goku have butted heads several times now, including the wicked and closeted gay General Blue.  The last volume ended with Goku arriving on his flying cloud Kinto'un to rescue the child of the Guardian of one of the balls and also the protector of "Karin's Sanctuary" a grove with a thick wooden pole stretching up into the heavens. Back at the Red Ribbon Army base, frustrated with all their failures the leader says it is time to deploy "Taopaipai".  And now the continuation.

Karin's tower. the Guardian and Upa his son.

Goku returns the young boy to the Guardian and sees he has a dragonball.  And joy of joy, it's the "sushinchu" four star ball that his Grandpa had. The Guardian doesn't understand what the significance of the ball is.  Back at Red Ribbon Army HQ General Blue has arrived back there and is bullying the soldiers into respecting him.  Meanwhile Taopaipai has come, his is not part of the army he is a mercenary for hire.  He wants 100 million zeni for each strike. But he's having a half price sale so they can buy him for 50 million zeni.

General Blue then arrives in the meeting room, the commander wants to know how he thinks he can show his face here after losing the dragonballs to Goku.  A suddenly nervous and sweating Blue says he did manage to get the dragon radar, which the Commander admits was a "useful accomplishment".  But unfortunately those who don't bring back dragonballs are to be executed.  But if he fights Taopaipai and wins, his honour will be restored.

The pair square up to each other, Blue boasts of his fighting ability. Taopaipai says he'll just use his tongue to beat Blue.  The fight begins and Blue is completely outclassed and is quickly knocked out , maybe even killed, by Taopaipai's super tongue skills (careful now) leaving him slumped on the floor.

He is then shown a photo of Goku and agrees to kill him and take the four dragonballs he has.  Commander Red tells him to feel free to kill anyone else who gets in the way.   Then Taopaipai breaks a pillar off, hurls it into the sky and jumps on it, flying off in the direction of the Karin Santuary.  There Goku is told that if a person climbs the pole with his bare hands they'll find a hermit living at its summit and they will offer holy water that will multiply a person's strength many-fold.  His clan have guarded the pole for generations.  Goku looks up, contemplating climbing it, then Taopaipai lands.

Taopaipai.

 He introduces himself as "the world's greatest assassin" and that he only has business with Goku. Goku is baffled as to wwho he is and why he'd want anything with him.  But Taopaipai says he is here on behalf of the Red Ribbon Army and Goku gets annoyed at how stubborn they are.  The Guardian says to Taopaipai that Goku saved his son's life and so if he goes peacefully he won't stand against him.

Goku says it's OK, Taopaipai is his enemy, but the Guardian says the sacred land has been breached so he will fight Taopaipai. He jabs his spear at Taopaipai who just catches it and no matter how much pressure the Gaurdian exerts he can't move it.  Then Taopaipai flips it and sends the Guardian flying off into the air.  He lands, impaled on his side with his own spear which kills him..

This angers Goku who rushes Taopaipai who hits him in the face with a swift knee.   Angry now, Goku fires a kamehameha at him which hits Taopaipai full on.  He stays standing but the energy blast fries most of his clothes off.  This pisses him off and he fires a "dodon-pa" energy blast from his finger which sends Goku flying, blood spurting from his wound.  Taopaipai think he's completed his mission and he picks up the bag with the dragonballs in it.

Goku dead?

Upa, the Guardian's kid throws a stone at him, but Taopaipai blows it back at him and hits him on the head making Upa cry. Taopaipai then picks up his pillar, throws it in the direction of the Red Ribbon Army and leaps aboard.  However the Red Ribbon Army commander notes that Taopaipai only picked up three of the four balls and also that he's stopped off somewhere on the way back.  He's ordering a new outfit, bullying the man into making it ready in three days.  The commander phones him regarding the missing ball and Taopaipai agrees to go back and get it when his clothes are ready.

We then cut to Upa in front on a pile of dirt, he's buried his father.  He approaches Goku prone form and Goku' hand twitches.  He's alive, huzzah!  The dragonball he had stashed in his clothes absorbed some of the damage and saved him.   Goku contemplates the ball thinking that his grandpa saved him.  He then sees the grave and realises that he should now gather the dragonballs to wish Upa's dad back to life.

Upa asks if that can be done and Goku says you can have any wish so it should work. Goku realises Taopaipai will return for the four star ball, but Goku also realises he's too strong for Goku to beat.  Upa suggest Goku climb the pillar or "Karin Tower" as he calls it.   At the top is a medicine that is supposed to make you stronger.   Goku realises he can't use kinto'un to fly up, he has to climb all the way.   Goku tells Upa to hide somewhere and he begins climbing the tower.

It is a VERY tall tower.

He jump-climbs for what seems like forever, resting occasionally by hanging from his tail.   Night falls and suddenly he sees a small house like structure attached to the tower, "Yes!!!! I't' the top!!!!" yells Goku excitedly and he climbs through one of the holes in the bottom of the structure.  There is no one around as Goku pokes around nosily, then suddenly a voice summons him upstairs. 

The hermit is a cat with a wooden walking stick called Karin who congratulates Goku on making it this far.   Goku is surprised to discover he's the hermit master.

Karin: "It's true.  Perhaps I should calll myself a hermit meowster... ho ho ho..."

Karin realise Goku is there for the holy water.  He shows Goku where it is, but also tells him to be quiet so he can read his mind. He discovers Goku must defeat Taopaipai and get the dragonballs to revive Upa's father.

He decides Goku's motives are pure.  Goku goes to where the water is, Karin tells him "I'll be happy to give you some.. but do you think you'll be able to drink it?"  Using his stick Karin knocks Goku away from the water and soon both are fighting.   Karin says to be able to drink the water Goku must first prove himself in combat.  Goku keeps trying to get to the water and  Karin keeps knocking him away until Goku is exhausted.

Goku vs Karin.

Goku says he's only doing this badly because he is starving and worn out from the climb.  Karin tosses him a small bean called a holy "senzu" bean.  This totally refills a persons energy and cures them of any non-fatal injury instantly.  Goku eats it and is amazed at how full up it makes him feel.  Now he goes for the water with much more strength and speed.

But it's not enough, and Goku is soon struggling for breath again.   He asks Karin if he is the first to climb up here but Karin said about 300 years ago there was another who climbed up.  Goku is amazed at how old that makes Karin, "you should respect me!" responds the cat.  Turns out the other person was Kame.  This gobsmacks Goku.   Karin says Goku should call him "Karin-sennin".  Goku asks how long it took Kame to drink the water, when Karin says holds up a paw showing three fingers, Goku thinks he means three minutes but actually it was three years.

Goku says Karin must be joking but Karin shrugs and asks how many years does he think he'll take?   Goku gets angry and uses hims illusion split move but  Karin sees through it and kicks the real Goku.   Thinking to himself though Karin realises Goku is good and this should be an interesting match-up.   Goku wants to know why he keeps getting out of breath so fast and Karin tells him it's the altitude.  He tells Goku he's over exerting his moves and costing himself breath.

He tells Goku that climbing the tower has been good for hims lungs but he needs "a little more conditioning than that."  And he swipes the four star dragonball and tosses it over the edge of the little house.  Goku speedily rushes down the pole after it and picks it up off the ground.   With more speed than before, he races up the pole again and back to Karin's house.

Need moar training Goku!

Crossly he asks why Karin would make him do all that, Karin says he should appreciate the extra training.   They fight some more over the water then night falls and Karin tells Goku they should call it a day for now, he's sleepy. Karin nods off by the water.  Goku wakes up and goes to grab the bottle, then stops.  He thinks to himself he'll do it "fair and square."  Karin who was really awake thiks he's a honest lad, "quite a change from his mentor."

Next day the fight carries on, and during it Karin's stick knocks the water bottle off the house, but Goku catches it anchoring himself with his tail.  And he has the water!  Karin is secretely amazed it only took three days.  Goku drinks it, then says he doesn't feel any different.

Karin: "Of course not. The 'holy water' is just ordinary rainwater.... I didn't trick you.  Your strength has already multiplied manyfold."

Everything was a training exercise, climbing the tower, fighting for the water it was all to make him stronger.  Now he should go back to the world "... and test the fruits of your training".  Goku tells Karin thankyou and sets off down the tower. As Karin watches him go, he thinks Goku's a jolly fellow who has already outstripped his mentor.

Goku manages ro catch the water.

As Upa frets at the bottom of the tower, Taopaipai picks up his new robes.  And like a dick he refuses to pay for them even though the tailor worked non-stop for three days on them.   He does offer to do a hit for free but the tailor doesn't want to kill anyone., so Taopaipai kills him by jabbing a finger through his forehead.

He then arrives via hurled pillar to he bottom of Karin Tower.  Goku still hasn't got back yet and Upa throws a small axe at him saying he must avange his father, which Taopaipai easily avoids.  He picks Upa up and starts squeezing him demanding to know where the other dragonball is, but Upa refuses to say and Taopaipai hurls him aside.
 
Goku suddenly appears, hurtling down the tower and summons kinto'un to catch Upa.  Taopaipai is shocked to see Goku alive.  Goku tells Upa not to worry and stay on the cloud while he deals with Taopaipai.   He wans to know how Goku survived his "dodon-pa" energy beam attack, Goku tells him it was blocked by the dragonball in his pocket.

Taopaipai: "What a lucky fellow you are.  If you'd been hit by that blast you'd be as dead as that dragonball.  But this is where your luck runs out.  Nothing will save you now. You should have stayed in hiding, fool!"

Goku defiantly says he won't hand oner the dragonball or knock him around again either. Taopaipai declares Goku will be dead in three seconds and they begin combat, Goku rolling with the punches and landing hits of his own.

A much fairer fight now.

They break apart for a moment and Taopaipai notes he wasn't this strong three days ago.   Goku tells him he trained at the top of the pole.  Taopaipai still can't believe only three days has seen such improvement.   He guesses that Goku was trained by Karin.  He thinks to himself that he though Karin was a legend until now. He square up for the next phase of their battle.

They fight hard, both taking vicious punches and kicks to themselves.  Once again they break apart to catch their breath.  Taopaipai's face is all bruised.  He rips off his top in anger saying he's holding back because Goku is a child. Then he fires his dodon-pa at Goku who quickly counters it with a kamehama-ha, crashing the two energy waves into each other forcing them backwards.

Completely enraged, Taopaipai uses a capsule to manifest a sword.   He swipes it madly and quickly at Goku, but Upa tosses Goku his nyoibo stick and uses it to snap Taopaipai's sword in half.  Then he tosses the stick  to one side, and grinning says he' going to "beat you bare-handed."

This outrages Taopaipai, Goku says to Upa he will avenge his dad then Taopaipai leaps at him yelling "Tsuach!!!!"  This sends him into a vicious combo of attacks on Goku who doesn't seem to be fighting back.  Taopaipai knocks Goku into the air then smashes him into the ground.  Goku lies still...

.... then he leaps up saying "man! you are good!  That really hurt!"  Taopaipai can only babble that Goku is a "monster." Goku says he's seen all his moves now and knows how to counter them and he slams into Taopaipai's stomach. Before pounding him in the head with several vicious kicks.  Before he can finish Taopaipai to the ground, Taopaipai drops to his knees and begs forviveness.

Taopaipai killed by his own bomb.

Goku is somewhat stymied. But them Taopaipai throws a small bomb at Goku and Upa.  But Goku kicks it up in the air after Taopaipai who was in the process of fleeing and it blows him up instead.   Triumphant, Goku tells Upa he'll be on his way now to collect all the dragonballs and bring Upa's dad back to life.  He boards kinto'un and sets off for Red Ribbon Army HQ.

We cut to the HQ and the female Colonel Violet has returned with another dragonball, Commander Red says gleefully that once Taopaipai returns they'll have six of the seven.   They pass the stolen dragonradar to General Copper so he can locate the final ball.  They note that the four balls Taopaipai took from Goku are moving, so they assume Taopaipai is returning with the loot.

However it is actually Goku and as he flies a small remote control plane starts following him.  It's an invention of Bulma's so she and Kame can see what he's up to.  They note he's heading for the location of the other two balls.  When Lunch tells them it means he's heading to Red Ribbon Army HQ, Bulma send the "recon mech" there ahead of him. When they confirm it, even Kame is surprised "d-don't tell me he's planning to invade that...?!"

Goku arrives, whips out his nyoibo and yells, "Ooo-kay!!  Let's have some fun!!!!"  Back at Kame's, they try and figure out how they can help Goku because they believe assaulting the base alone will be too much for him.   Bulma calls up Yamcha and tells him what Goku is up to.  Yamcha agrees, looking forward for a decent fight for a change.

Goku filled with the love of the battle.

Goku smashes through the helicopter that had been sent to greet Taopaipai and Commander Red is told that it's in fact Goku not Taopaipai who is invading the base.  We then get several awesome pages of Goku kicking, punching and general destroying all the Red Ribbon Army soldiers sent to stop him.  No one can match him and Adjutant Black pleads with Commander Red to evacuate the base.

When Commander Red refuses, Adjutant Black tells him this "brat" was able to beat Taopaipai.  Commander Red just roars "The Red Ribbon Army is an invincible force!!!"  But Goku is closing in on the tower the dragonballs are in and a furious Commander Red drags Adjutant Black with him to confront Goku themselves.  Meanwhile Yamcha, Kame, Bulma, Lunch, Oolong and Puar are heading to the base in a small plane, no Kuririn as he had gone grocery shopping so they go and pick him up. They will arrive at the base in about forty minutes.

Goku is unstoppable.

Inside the tower Commander Red and Adjutant Black are standing guard over the two dragonballs. Goku is busy ascending the tower by smashing his way through the ceilings of each floor because he can't find the stairs.  Enraged Red says he will not be defeated by a boy "who doesn't even know what an elevator is!!"  As Goku continues beating the everloving shit out of every soldier he comes across they decide they don't want to face him and Black laconically notes that the "remaining troops seem to have become a retreat".

Commander Red: "G-G-Grr...!! He's just a brat!!!  Just a stupid little brat!!!"

But Black says they should abandon the two balls and retreat themselves as they massively underestimated Goku.  Commander Red bangs his fists on the table and laments he was so close and that if things had been different he would have been "tall."

This makes Black do a great WTF face, then asks if they were going to all this trouble to gather the balls to wish Red taller?  Red yells that they were and does Black have a problem with that? "I thought we were after world domination!!!" says Black disbelievingly.  Red says they would have gotten to that, but world leaders have to be "charismatic... domineering... impressive... I mean what chick looks twice at a midget?"

Black is still stunned as he says they suffered and made such an effort for something so petty.  Red says that tall people have no idea how short people feel, and rants about suffering ridicule since he was a kid for his lack of height.  Black is angry now saying he slaved and risked his life for one reason only, "to advance the Red Ribbon Army's mission of world conquest."

This sends Red onto an even more apoplectic rant saying he is the commander and what he says goes.  Black asks him about all the soldiers who have sacrificed their lives because he didn't want to be short?  Red says how dare he speak to him like that and people need to shut their mouths and follow their commander's orders.  Suddenly he is cut off courtesy of a bullet right in the centre of his forehead fired by Black, who says to Red's body "you are not competent to be commander."  He declares himself the new leader.

Red is dead, only Black can defeat Goku.

Goku arrives and asks Black if he is the boss. Then Goku tells him he's going to take the two balls.  Black however posits an alliance between them that they should finish gathering the balls and then rule the world together.  Goku says "no way" to that, he's going to revive Upa's dad and that's that. Black persists saying OK he can arrive Upa's father then join him in conquering the world, with their power they can do it without the balls.

Goku: "I told you I don't want to!! I don't even want to be friends with bad guys!!"

Black says then there is no option left but to battle and takes a couple of swings at Goku who dodges easily and thumps Black hard in the stomach.  Realising he is totally outmatched, Black takes out a capsule and manifests a mechsuit and punches Goku in the face actually hurting him.

Black thinks he's won.

As Yamcha and the gang are still travelling to the base, Goku has to face the mech alone, or "battle jacket" as Black calls it.   He fires a laserbeam at Goku who dodges just in time.  He grabs Goku and hurls him against the wall then flies in the air and fires down at the prone Goku which explodes the ground in a cloud of smoke.  Black celebrates his win, but Goku watches him from the spire he jumped to at the last minute.

Goku jumps on the mechsuit's cockpit window much to Black's surprise. Black punches at him but Goku dodges and Black smashes the window and punches himself instead. Goku mocks him and an angry Black sends the mechsuit flying up higher.  The back of the mechsuit opens up and a rocket slides out which he locks onto Goku.  But Goku kicks it away from him and it explodes taking the top of a nearby mountain with it.

But this results in a kaboom as well, and Goku defeated a whole army.

This really frightens Black and he starts to flee but Goku catches up and blasts himself through the mechsuit's body which causes it to explode.  With the entire Red Ribbon Army either dead or on the run, Goku picks up the two balls they had, adds them to the four he had from before and says he has only one more to find as we finish this volume with Goku's friends finally arrving at the base to "save" him.

Just thought I'd slip something confusing in for the end of the year.  As per usual as a western woman in her forties I'm very much the periphery demographic for a 1980's shonen manga.  But damn if I can't get enough of Akira Toriyama's joyful story of a superhuman boy who is something of an accidental hero.  In that he doesn't deliberately try and be a hero, that's just his nature.  Someone who'll think of nothing of training to beat the person who bested him, storming a military base and going on a fetch quest simply to restore the life of a man he only met briefly and whose son he instantly bonds with.  The training session with Karin is the second major power-up he'll recieve as the series progresses.  These come along fairly regularly. Goku will come up against an opponent he can't beat, he'll go away and train harder and come back and win the day.  His commitment to his fighting "craft" is very inspiring.  He never sulks or gives up, even as an adult, he'll just dust himself off, find a sensei who can teach him and returns to save the day.  This also serves to add new characters to the series and other characters reach a ceiling they just can't break through, meaning they tend to end up becoming more background support as newer, more powerful friends and foes are added to the mix.  The whole sequence with Karin is just great with the holy water, I mean what's not to love about a martial arts master who is also a cat?  And it also sees the introduction of an item that will become a staple part of the later series, the magical "senzu beans".  So with the Red Ribbon Army defeated, and just one dragonball left to collect, what will the next big challenge Goku will face?  Well keep reading this blog and you'll find out.  Anyway hope you all have a very good New Year.  Join me in a few days time for more obscure Alan Moore, this time we're going back to his time at Rob Liefeld's company to wrap up the story of Supreme. See you in 2018!

Dragonball Book 7: General Blue And The Pirate Treasure

"I don't want treasure. I want dinner" - Goku

This is my cut n'paste intro for my end of month indulgence (if I feel like it) as I make my way through all forty-two collected volumes of the enduringly popular and influential manga Dragonball. The series used to be split into the fantasy and whimsy filled Dragonball and the more serious, sci-fi orientated strip it became after sixteen volumes known as Dragonball Z, but now the series is being released under the one "Dragonball" title again; uncut and with a spiffy new translation.  The series first ran in the famous anthology magazine "Shonen Jump" from 1984 to 1995 and was written and drawn by Akira Toriyama (It has been translated here by Mari Morimoto and adapted into English by Gerard Jones, the western publisher is Viz Media) and pretty much set the standard for the similar shonen manga and anime that came after like Bleach and Naruto.  It follows the adventures of the kindly if somewhat sheltered and simple "Son Goku" as he trains, goes on adventures and enters competitions all with the aim of making himself a stronger and better fighter.  Along the way he accrues a colourful cast of friends and rivals in a world where humans live alongside anthropomorphised animals, dinosaurs never died out and tiny capsules can contain vehicles and houses to be easily carried around.

[Note:  This manga is "unflipped" so must be read from right to left]

Previously On Dragonball: Goku made it through Muscle Tower, befriending Mechanical Man No.8 a pacifistic android created by the Red Ribbon Army.  Together they rescued the town's mayor and the grateful townsfolk gave Goku the two star Dragonball.  However it's the four star Dragonball he is still after so he departed on his flying cloud kinto'un to carry on his search.  The Dragonrader he has been using to find the balls needs to be fixed so he flies to the city teen genius Bulma lives in and she mends it for him then decides to accompany him on his trip.  They run into General Blue, another Red Ribbon Army officer searching for the Dragonballs.  Goku saves Bulma from him then they travel to Kame's island (Goku's sensei) to borrow a boat and Goku's fellow student Kururin also decides to come along for the ride.  General Blue chases their sub into a set of caves the next Dragonball is located in, while more Red Ribbon Army soldiers land on Kame's island which brought that volume to an end.  And now the continuation.

Kame-Sen'in calmly faces the soldiers all pointing guns at him and asks who they are.  The leader laughs and tells him that they are the Red Ribbon Army and they want the two dragonballs he has and the radar so they can use it to find the rest.  Another soldier brings Lunch out of Kame's house.  She has a split personality.  When she has dark hair like she has now, she is gentle and kind.  If she sneezes she turns into a homicidal blonde psychopath. Kame says he has heard of the Red Ribbon Army:

Kame: "You fellows have quite the reputation... giving evil a new meaning.. loathing truth, justice, decency etc etc".

So he won't be handing anything over to them.   The commander says if he puts up a fight they'll kill him.  This doesn't faze Kame, he won the Martial Arts tourney a couple of books ago and destroyed the friggin' moon as well.  He launches into a fierce attack, taking down several men in a flash.

Don't mess with seemingly harmless, smiling old men!

The soldier holding Lunch says he'll kill her if he doesn't stop.  But the turtle tickles her nose with a long feather and she sneezes.  Now her blonde self she easily escapes the man's grip and punches his lights out.  As he lies on the ground she stamps on him until Kame tells her she's done enough.

We then join Goku, Kururin and Bulma travelling the underwater cave in their submarine, while being chased by General Blue in his sub.  They can't fire the torpedos at him in case they bring the cave down on them.  So the continue onwards.  Suddenly they surface in an interior cave that has breathable air. They get out of the sub to carry on foot.

General Blue and his men also surface, they are about to attack Goku when Blue gets orders over the phone to withdraw because of the farce at Kame's house.  Goku, ready for battle, watches them in confusion.  So they leave Blue and his men and walk deeper into the cave.  Blue however says he will destroy them by himself but takes some men with him anyway.

The cave is getting darker, but Kururin finds a light switch and turns the lights on.  This makes them realise that someone else has been using these caves.  Then Goku holds up a human skull in front of his face and yells "BOO!" at Bulma making her scream in fright.  Blue sends one of his men to sneak up and find out what's going on.

Goku laughs at his joke, but  Bulma yells angrily at him.  Kuririn asks him where he got it and Goku points to a pile of bones with a pirate hat on top of it.  Kuririn says he understands where they are now, it's a pirate base and that probably means lots of pirate treasure.   The Red Ribbon Army soldier overhears this and reports back to Blue who says that will please Commander Red almost as much as getting the dragonball.

Goku and his friends carry on until they come to a trap.  There are lots of tightly spaced holes in the floor and stepping on one will make a spear shoot out the wall.  This nearly does for Kuririn who escapes impalement on account of being so short.  Bulma freaks out thinking they are stuck between a trap and the Red Ribbon Army.  But Goku says he can make it across.

It's a trap!

He does a powerful jump and does indeed make it over.  Kururin follows and only just makes it.  Bulma however says, "Jump to what?!  My death?!! I didn't study with any old master!!" While they are dealing with that, Blue asks his men if they noticed if Goku and co. were armed.  When told no he says they are just ordinary kids then and "victory is virtually ours!!"

Bulma is crossing courtesy of Goku's staff which can stretch a long way. She dangles from it and Goku pulls the staff back slowly and she is over as well.   Blue meanwhile says there is no need to hold back and orders his men to kill Goku, Kururin and Bulma and the gun toting soldiers charge.... right into the spear trap and every single one of them is mortally wounded by the spears leaving only General Blue.  He searches around for a way to bypass the trap and finds a secret passage while the others have stumbled across a boat and a sub moored inside another big cave area, Bulma says "it's the pirates secret fort!!"

They realise that the sub moored there shows that there is more than one way in and out of the cave. Blue is watching from the shadows and decides to let them find the dragonball and the pirate treasure.  Suddenly a robot zombie thing jumps out armed with a sword.  Goku and Kuririn take it on.  But it's tough so Kuririn agrees to run on with Bulma and keep her safe while Goku battles the creature.

Robot Pirate Zombie attack!

The fight continues with the creature matching Goku blow for blow.   So Goku leaps up to the highest point in the cave and does a diving rock-paper-scissors attack on it which smashes the things head off and it blows up.  Bulma and Kuririn run down the hall but it splits in two, so they scratch an arrow into the dirt to show Goku which way to go.  But behind them Blue rubs it out and draws one pointing down the other way.  Dastardly!

The explosion destablised the cave and it's starting to collapse, Kuririn, Blue and Bulma going one way, Goku another. The three find their route end with a hole to dive in and swim through.  They all do so, Kuririn and Bulma unaware they are being followed. Goku however is panicking that he hasn't caught up with the others yet and then falls through a trapdoor and lands on a giant octopus.

Goku doesn't seem to fazed by this, calling the octopus a squid which insults it. He grabs Goku and declares he's going eat him.  He squeezes Goku hard but doesn't manage to kill him. Goku responds with his signature energy attack the Kamehameha. Which hits the octopus hard between the eyes.

General Blue reveals himself.

Meanwhile Bulma and Kururin surface to find a large treasure chest full of treasure.  Their glee is cut short by Blue appearing behind them saying the treasure is claimed by the Red Ribbon Army.  Bulma decides to try and win him over by flirting.  He responds "G-g-get away from me, woman!! Brrrr!!! How disgusting!!!"  Bulma immediately decides he must be gay.  "I didn't know there were gay bad guys" muses Kuririn.

Blue makes a rather pathetic denial then says that if they anger him he'll attack.  Kururin squares up to him saying that he's picked the wrong guy to mess with.  Goku is tucking into some roasted octopus, then hears Bulma scream and dives into the water to go looking for them.  Blue has the upper-hand in the fight and Kuririn is taking a beating.  Bulma cheers him on but it's obvious that Blue is more skilled than Kuririn.

But Kuririn is a tough little fighter and he manages to land a flying kick onto Blues face which breaks his nose.   This sends Blue into a rage.

Blue: "My beautiful face! Blood?! A bloody nose?!! A proud general of the Red Ribbon Army.. does not suffer from a lowly n-n-nose bleed".

He carries yelling about the "shame" and "humiliation" he's suffered.  He turns back to Kuririn snarling that anyone who has seen him like this must die.

Then his eyes glow and Kuririn is paralysed and Blue gloats about his telekinesis.   He then starts smacking the frozen Kururin around, kicking and punching him against the wall.  Bulma says that she'll be next as Blue stands ready to finish Kuririn off.  She goes into super-flirt mode, shoving her arse at him.  Annoyed he says "will you please quit that?!!! You sicken me!!!" She says he definitely must be gay then, and asks him what he would think if she told him she was really a man.  He roars that "I'd say you were a freak of nature!!!"  She cringes against the wall as he tells her to pray before he kills her slowly.

Just in the nick of time.

He picks up a rock to brain Kuririn with but thankfully all the silliness with Bulma gave Goku enough time to find them and he rises from the water with a powerful jump.  Bulma yells at him to deal with Blue before he kills them all. Goku asks if Blue is the one who beat up Kuririn, Blue says yes he is.  He and Goku then square off against each other and Goku hits him hard in the stomach and hits him so hard in the back of the head his eyes pop out comically.

Thinking he's beaten Blue, Goku calls him "all talk" but Blue is angry and uses his telekinesis to freeze Goku as well. He picks up the rock and walks over to the motionless Goku.   But every bad guy likes to draw things out, so he punts Goku round the cave a few times.  Then decides as the cave is getting more insecure it's time to wrap things up and activates a capsule which gives him a shotgun.  He tells Bulma to tell him where the dragonball is or he'll empty the gun into Goku.  Bulma says it's likely at the bottom of the pool.  So he thanks her then says it's time for them all to die.

But an unlikely saviour appears in the form of a mouse which runs in front of Blue and causes him to freak out screaming that it's "DIRTY!!!!!" over and over.  This breaks his hold over Goku.  Goku immediately gets down to business with a rock-paper-scissors attack and jams his two fingers hard into Blue's eyes. Then punches him clear across the room knocking him out.

General Blue is finally downed.

Bulma and Kuririn cheer for him but the cave is really collapsing fast now, so Goku tells Kuririn and Bulma to make their way out while he dives into the pool to fetch up the dragonball.  He collects it while the other two head back to where the sub was parked.  Goku resurfaces and sees the mouse.  He grabs it and holds it in his mouth so he can save it like it saved him.

He then starts to make his way back as well. Blue wakes up and grumbles that at least he can claim the treasure.   Bulma and Kuririn are waiting in the submarine in a panic over how dangerous it's getting.  They decide to leave but Goku appears in the nick of time and they all cram into the small submarine.  They dive as the cave fully disintegrates.

They find a tunnel that they go down but the sub sputters out of fuel. Goku has an idea though.  He hands the mouse to Kuririn and quickly opens the sub and performs a Kamehameha attack which propels the sub fast down the collapsing tunnel. And they come bursting out of the sea's surface.  Goku quickly calls for his flying cloud kinto'un and sits on it grabbing hold of Kuririn who holds onto Bulma and they fly off.  Behind them General Blue surfaces and regards their retreating forms with a dark look...

But he isn't out yet.

The three have landed on some solid ground where they parked the chopper they stole from the Red Ribbon Army.  They take stock of what they have.  Unfortunately the dragonball is the three star one not the four star one Goku wants which is his momento of his dead grandfather so his search will continue. Bulma managed to swipe a huge diamond which she his in her knickers, "I thought your pants were bulging too much for a girl..." says Kuririn.

Bulma declares that she is not going to carry on helping Goku in his search, Goku is bewildered at her anger because she forced him to let her come along. She said she wouldn't have if he'd warned her about the Red Ribbon Army.  They all fly off as Bulma tells Kuririn to have the diamond. It'll pay for the submarine they borrowed from Kamesen'in which got destroyed and they can keep the change.  She is a "rich man's daughter you know!"

Back at Kame House he's overwhelmed with gratitude for the diamond.  Unfortunately Lunch sneezes turning from her mild mannered cute self into her blonde haired psycho self.  She relieves Kame of the diamond and takes off in the chopper saying "so long suckers!!!"  Bulma is shocked but Kame aimiably says that she'll sneeze soon and bring it right back.  Above them is Blue who followed them in his own chopper, he skydives out of it and lands on Kame's island.

He hides behind the house as Bulma is told there are no more vehicles to get her off the island and she is unenthused about living with Kame. Goku asks Kame to hold onto the three dragonballs he has already found.  Then Blue appears and using his psychic powers throws ropes that immediately bind them all before they even register his presence.  He goes into the house and gets the other balls, Bulma asks him what he plan to do with them  He says he is not privy to his commanders thoughts.  He leaves them with a bomb on a five minute timer and activates a capsule holding a jet and flies away.

Fortunately four the four of them after Blue is gone, Lunch back in her meek persona lands back on the island.  She unties Goku and with seconds left he hurls the bomb into the air where it explodes harmlessly.   Angry now, Goku summons Kinto'un and goes roaring after General Blue.

Goku is super pissed now.

Now this is where I get a bit confused.  General Blue is brought down in a surreal place called "Penguin Village" which I believe was where Akira Toriyama's first manga series "Doctor Slump" was set.  I don't know who any of the characters are, with the original manga being so obscure in the west it ranks as what TV Tropes would call a "Big Lipped Alligator Moment".   So I'll mainly stick with what I know.

Goku smashes Blue's jet and after an aerial battle he crashes it into a mountain. Goku flies overhead and a young robot girl called "Arale" shouts that he's cool and can she play with him.  Blue has survived the explosion and thinks to himself that he's going to have to kill Goku or he'll "never stop pestering me!"

Goku searches the rubble of the chopper and realises Blue is still alive.  Then Arale comes running up and Goku is impressed with how fast she got to him.   But he has more important things on his mind and summons kinto'un.  Blue is in the village and hijacks a car.  But the man inside runs out changes in a phone-booth into "Suppa-Man" and tells Blue to run away.  Without speaking Blue smiles sinisterly at him and then crushes the phone booth.

Cowed, Suppa-Man asks how he can help and Blue asks for a capsule with an aeroplane in it.  But Suppa-Man has never heard of capsules. Annoyed Blue asks if there is anyone in the village who has a plane.  Suppa-Man says says a fellow called "Norimaki Senbei" has one and he directs him there.  Blue drives off in his car while Suppa-Man tries to regain his dignity by thinking he went easy on him this time.

Goku realises he can use the dragonradar to track where Blue is.  But it's broken again and he irritatedly says he'll have to go back to Bulma and get it fixed.  But he was so fixated on the chase he now has no idea where he is. Arale appears again and tells him the doctor can fix it.  So Goku gets on his cloud as does Arale and the two fairy things that float above her head.  Being able to sit on the cloud means they are pure of heart.

They arrive at the doctor and after some confused conversation he takes a look inside the radar and declares that it's the most complex device he's ever seen.  He is surprised that there exists a greater genius than even him. He pokes around in it but thinks that it's way too advanced for him, but then a floating bald child appears behind his head and magics the thing fixed.  Er... OK.

Yes that happened.

Then Blue appears behind the house as Goku registers him on the radar as on top of them.  Blue grabs Arale and holds a knife to her throat saying everyone must do what he says.  He freezes Goku who desperately tries to communicate to the others that Blue is a bad guy.  Blue snatches the dragon radar from Goku's hand.  He puts everything in the plane then starts beating Goku to death.

This finally goads the doctor into action as he tells Arale that the man wants to "wrestle".   She rushes Blue and kicks him hard into a tree, then punts him into the air and hits him with a flying headbutt.  Then she telekinetically hurls Blue a very long way away.  Goku thanks her then thinks that he needs to train harder because there are lots of people here who are stronger than him.  He retrieves the dragonballs but Blue put the radar in his pocket so that's gone.

But the floating child says with a few parts from the aeroplane he can magic up a new radar for Goku.  He took a really good look at it earlier so he can replicate it easily.  He assembles it and much to Goku's joy it works just like the old one. He thanks them all, then tells Arale she ought to attend the next Strongest Under The Heavens Martial Arts Tourney.  He summons kinto'un and flies away and we get a shot of Blue in a payphone next to a pyramid as he apologises to his boss that it's going take him a while to get back to base with the radar.

This actually starts a new arc but because of the way the chapters have been divided up, the volumes don't fit precisely to the start and end of the various storylines.  At the Red Ribbon Army base they realise that Goku is heading west towards Colonel Yellow's base, who already has found where a dragonball is but doesn't have it in his hands yet.

Colonel Yellow demands the dragonball.

We then are shown the "Karin Sanctuary", a wooded grove with a large carved wooden pole heading up into the clouds.  Guarding it is a burly fellow who looks like a stereotypical Native American. Some thugs are demanding that he hand over the dragonball, but the man says he is the Guardian of this sanctuary and he will defend it.   They brawl and bullets bounces off the huge guardian as he takes the thugs down.  The tiger-man flees in a plane and radios into the Red Ribbon Army base, he is in fact Colonel Yellow.

Adjutant Black tells him he must do everything neccessary to get that dragonball or he'll be "erased."  Commander Red grabs the phone and tells him he has one hour to get the ball or "I'm going to deploy Taopaipai!!"  Yellow then snatches the Guardian's young kid to exchange for the ball.

The Guardian reluctantly agrees to the trade as Yellow circles the grove saying he's not coming down to be attacked, the ball has to be thrown up to him.  But Goku then arrives and recognises the Red Ribbon Army logo on the plane.  He smashes the plane and Goku grabs the kid who is called "Upa" as the Guardian looks on confused.  With contact with Yellow lost, Commander Red makes the decison.  Time to call Taopaipai.  End of volume.

Goku gets straight to the point.

So once again a tonne of fun if you can get yourself in the right mindset.  Bear in mind this early part of the saga was aimed at the younger end of the shonen market, basically pre-teen boys so all the naughty stuff is more playful than creepy.  Actually it's interesting that the story doesn't get all homophobic when General Blue's sexuality is revealed (and he is gay, there is no denying that) especially given the mid-eighties original publishing date. There is no disgusted response from our heroes just frustration that he won't fall for Bulma's rather clumsy feminine wiles and wonderment that gay people can be baddies.  It's certainly better than what we got in the anime where he was shown to not only be gay, but a paedophile as well as he slavered over one of the boys in Penguin Village.  Score one for the manga for not going there. As for the Penguin Village stuff, the story just about gets away with it, but it's definitely the weirdest and most out of genre Dragonball will get.  I'm sure at the time it was a delightful bit of meta for audiences, but thirty years and another culture away it all falls a bit flat.  As always though the art is impeccable, giving us cools fights and action scenes that really stand the test of time.  Akira Toriyama has a signature style that is recognisable in all his works and it was this series he really honed it in.  The dragonballs remain an excellent Maguffin to keep our hero in action and with two dragon radars in play the battle between Goku and the Red Ribbon Army can only get more intense.  We're left with the promise of a major showndown with Taopaipai and maybe learning more about the Karin Sanctuary and where the giant wooden pole goes.  Which I'll cover next month... maybe.

Dragonball Book 6: Bulma's Return

"That speed... That power... It's incredible" - Major Purple

This is my cut n'paste intro for my end of month indulgence (if I feel like it) as I make my way through all forty-two collected volumes of the enduringly popular and influential manga Dragonball. The series used to be split into the fantasy and whimsy filled Dragonball and the more serious, sci-fi orientated strip it became after sixteen volumes known as Dragonball Z, but now the series is being released under the one "Dragonball" title again; uncut and with a spiffy new translation.  The series first ran in the famous anthology magazine "Shonen Jump" from 1984 to 1995 and was written and drawn by Akira Toriyama (It has been translated here by Mari Morimoto and adapted into English by Gerard Jones, the western publisher is Viz Media) and pretty much set the standard for the similar shonen manga and anime that came after like Bleach and Naruto.  It follows the adventures of the kindly if somewhat sheltered and simple "Son Goku" as he trains, goes on adventures and enters competitions all with the aim of making himself a stronger and better fighter.  Along the way he accrues a colourful cast of friends and rivals in a world where humans live alongside anthropomorphised animals, dinosaurs never died out and tiny capsules can contain vehicles and houses to be easily carried around.

[Note:  This manga is "unflipped" so must be read from right to left]

Previously On Dragonball:  Goku made it to the final of the Strongest Under Heaven Tournament and after a long and valiant fight against his disguised master he was beaten.  Kamesen'in then told him that he had trained him as much as he could and now Goku must blaze his own trail.  Goku decides to search for one of the fabled Dragonballs, seven balls that when bought together, summon a dragon who can grant a wish.  The Four Star ball belonged to his deceased grandpa and because the balls fly off once the wish is granted he needs to hunt it down, his friend Bulma gives him the Dragon Radar that will help him locate the balls and he flies off on his cloud Kinto'un to start his search.  Unfortunately a nefarious organisation called "The Red Ribbon Army" is looking for them as well.  Their radar isn't as precise as Goku's though.  Goku first tangles with them when he finds the Seven Star ball, and his cloud is blown apart by a rocket launcher.  Using a plane he flies to the next location, a snowy village whose mayor has been kidnapped to force the townsfolk into looking for the balls.  Goku decides to ascend "Muscle Tower" which has a fight on each floor, to rescue the mayor. We left him in the middle of his battle against the idiotic ninja Sergeant Major Purple.  And now the continuation.

Facing off against each other, Goku armed with his Nyoi-Bo a stick that can telescope almost infinitely, Major Purple goes on the attack.  And Goku shoves the Nyoi-Bo right up his bum.  He yanks it back out and Major Purple rages that he'll pay for that humiliation.  But Goku then smashes Major Purple's legendary blade.   So Major Purple throws a boomerang shuriken at Goku which knocks him down as it returns.

Goku vs. Major Purple

But Goku isn't out and gets up angrily, chasing Major Purple into a hut.  After throwing tatami mats at Goku, Major Purple decides it's time to break out his ultimate attack.  And he splits himself into five versions of himself.  Four are an illusion so Goku has to guess which.   But as they press their attack Major Purple says the secret is "we are all real!!!"

But in a display of the kind of kung fu that saw him nearly beat his master Goku takes them all down bar one who makes his way to a creature in a cage who looks like Frankenstein's Monster.  He lets him out calling him "Mechanical Man No. 8".  He orders the Mechanical Man to attack Goku, but it says "it's bad to kill.  I don't like bad."  Major Purple yells at him that the Red Ribbon Army made him so he can't disobey.

Mechanical Man No.8

But Mechanical Man No. 8 stands firm, he will not fight.  So Major Purple pulls out a remote control saying he'll set off the bomb implanted inside him if he doesn't act.  Mechanical Man No. 8 responds, "if I have to be bad... I want to be blown up."  But Goku won't let that happen and manages to kick the remot out of Major Purple's hand and smashes it.  Then Goku delivers a hard punch to his face knocking him out.

Mechanical man No. 8 says he's happy and thanks Goku.  Goku says he should have defended himself, but Mechanical Man No.8 is resolute and admits, "I'm scared to fight".  He asks if Goku is here to save the village Mayor and Goku says yes, so he says he'll come with him.   Goku decides "Mechanical Man No.8" is too much of a mouthful so renames him "8-Man".

They climb the stairs, passing floor five which has no door to it, they reach floor six and enter the room.  It's the control room with General White and the hostage Mayor in it.  8-Man asks him to let the Mayor go.

General White: "So... the treacherous tinker-toy dares to speak does he...? I'll give you one last chance to cooperate!!!"

And he presses a button opening a trap door under them, dropping them into floor five.  Looking down General White demands the Dragonballs and the radar he has, but Goku says no.  So the wall opens and reveals a huge reptilian blob monster, called "The Jiggler".

Goku vs. The Jiggler.

Goku goes on the attack but just bounces off the Jiggler's body.   After a few tries, Goku realises his punches and kicks aren't working.  Then a huge tongue flops out of the Jiggler's mouth and wraps around him and then swallows him.  But Goku pries his mouth open from the inside and climbs out.  The Jiggler then fires electric bolts from it's antennae. Goku unleashes the energy attack, the Kamehame-ha.  But that bounces off the Jiggler as well.

However, Goku remembers how cold it was outside and decides this is the weapon he can use against the Jiggler.  He smashes a hole in the wall then jumps inside 8-Man's coat as a freezing wind blows in and ices the Jiggler up.   then Goku hits it hard and the Jiggler cracks into many pieces.  Then Goku jumps up and crashes through the floor where General White is.

Goku: "Now let that Mayor Guy go!!!  Or you're really gonna get it!!!"

Facing off, Goku starts beating General White up.  White ends up cowering behind a control panel thinking tha Goku is "some kind of monster."

Then he grabs his gun and holds it to the Mayor's head.  8-Man begs him to "stop doing bad things".    The Mayor yells that they can sacrifice him to save the village.  But when Goku takes him seriously he adds he'd prefer not to die if it's all the same.   So Goku is ordered to show his back to General White who shoots him with the "Hyper Gun".

Goku takes a bullet.

Goku topples forwards but when General White fires again, 8-Man takes the bullet.  And in a furious rage, punches General White hard in the face smashing him through the wall and out of the tower.  Goku isn't dead, he's just had the wind knocked out of him, and 8-Man carries him down into the village accompanied by the Mayor.

They all gather together for a hearty meal, Goku pigging out as usual.   Everyone is very grateful to him and 8-Man, and 8-Man reveals he had the Dragonball everyone was after all the time, he'd found it while out walking one day.  Sadly it's the two star ball not the four star, but everyone agrees keeping it in the village would be more trouble than it's worth so Goku keeps a hold of it.

The Mayor also invites 8-Man to come live with them, 8-Man says he's just an android but the Mayor tells him "you're a better man than most of the 'real' people I know".  8-Man is overcome with gratitude and he and Goku bed down for the nigt.  Goku checks the Dragon Radar ad discovers it got broken in one of the fights, so he's going to have to return to Bulma the teen genius who invented it to get it fixed.

He wonders how he'll get there now that Kinto'Un his flying cloud is gone.  But the villagers tell him you can't destroy a Kinto'un and so Goku calls it and it whooshed down to him much to his delight.   He bids everyone farewell and they all wave him off as he flies off to the city in the west where he'll find his friend.

Kinto'un's back!

Arriving in the city, Goku is immediately a bit overwhelmed. He starts asking random strangers where Bulma is, and of course he gets brushed off.  Realising he needs some money he comes across a martial artist challenging people to fight him, if they win they get 30,000 zeni.  So Goku challenges him and everyone is amused that a kid would try and fight.  But he dodges all the blows and punches at the fighter so hard he smashes a hole in the wall.  Fearful, the fighter submits and gives him the money.

Some robbers try and hold him up to take his money, but he beats them senseless. Finally someone advises him to ask a policeman and Goku does so.  The policeman searches for Bulma and finds her on his computer.  When he realises she's the daughter of the head of Capsule Corporation he is suspicious that Goku might be up to something so he takes Goku there on the back of his bike.

They arrive at Capsule Corp and the cop says she's probably at school, but then Bulma pulls up on her bike and has a happy reunion with Goku.  He tells her the radar is broken so she takes him inside to meet her parents.  Professor Briefs is her dad, and is a great character simply because he always has a small, wide-eyed black cat hanging onto his shoulder.  Inside the huge dome is a big garden for all his pet cats and dogs and dinosaurs.

Bulma, her dad and her dad's cute cat.

Bulma tells her dad to fix the policeman's bike while she and Goku go upstairs. He asks if they are going to make out much to her annoyance.  Actually she's going to fix the radar and when Goku asks her what "make out" means, she snaps that children don't need to know.

Elsewhere the Red Ribbon Army leader is checking his radar which only gives a rough idea where the Dragonballs are.   A photo of Goku is sent through to them, Commander Red tells his lackeys to have it faxed to all units, "kill him on sight!!! Got that?!"  He grumbles that Goku is having more success than they are finding the Dragonballs, and his right hand man says Goku must have a more sophisticated device for finding them.

Back with Goku and Bulma, she fixes up the radar, then she decides as it's the weekend tommorrow, she'll come with him. Goku says she'll just get in the way but she shows him a watch she's invented that shrinks her down to afew inches in height.   She demonstrates and gets trodden on by her mum.  She tells Goku that Bulma and Yamcha are are fighting right now because Bulma can't stand the fact he's popular with the girls. Bulma puts on her jacket and picks up a box of capsules and shrinks herself down so Goku can carry her on Kinto'un.  He calls it down and they speed off.  Unfortunately then Professor Briefs realises she picked up his capsules not hers.

While they travel to the ocean for the next ball, they are also going to bump into the sadistic General Blue who is also searching the area.  They land on the beach and Bulma gets out her capsules so she can pop out a boat.  Sadly it's only her dad's capsule and it's full of porn mags.  Goku looks with interest saying "how come they're naked if they're not having baths?"  A furious Bulma rips them all up.

Goku scouts the terrain out.

So Goku swims out to where the Dragonball is located, but it's down in a sea trench and he can't hold his breath long enough to get to it.   Meanwhile Bulma is attacked by some of General Blue's forces, they land their chopper and imply they are going to sexually assault her.  Leaning on the fourth wall Bulma says:

Bulma: "You mean those naughty things you aren't even allowed to describe in a comic book, don't you?"

Luckily Goku returns and smashes up their helicopters, saving Bulma.  She is somewhat impressed by what he did, even thinking maybe he went overboard a bit.

Goku then says they are not far from his master, Kamesen'nin, he'll probably have a boat they can use, so off they fly. Kame is pleased to see him and even more pleased to see Bulma when she returns to he normal height, him being such and old perve and all.  He says he'll loan then a boat but he wants to borrow the shrinking device in return.   Bulma says that's a relief, "I thought you were going to ask for something sleazy like you always do!"

Kame is happy to see Bulma as she grows to normal height

Cut to the Red Ribbon Army Commander.  They have tracked Goku to Kame's island, they figure he must have accomplices and that the island is their base of operations, so Commander Red orders General Blue to reconnoitre the area. Back at Kame's place, Bulma needs to use the toilet, so pervey McPerveson Kame shrinks himself and hides in behind the toilet so he can peek at her going.   But when she's done he slips off the cistern and into the bowl, she doesn't see him and flushes it.  He has to escape via the pipes to the outside.

Then a vehicle approaches, it's Kuririn and Lunch back from a shopping trip which ended in a shoot out when mild mannered Lunch sneezed and turned into her psycho alter-ego. They tell him why they are here and he says they might find pirate treasure down there.  Kuririn says it sounds like it'll be fun, so Kame grants his pupil leave to join them in their Dragonball hunt.

They fly off, and Goku realises he left the backpack with two Dragonballs in it back at Kame's place.   Kuririn says the invincible old master will protect them.  General Blue meanwhile is checking the island out, only Kame, Turtle and Lunch are on it. 

Goku and the other two land the hovervehicle onto the sea and then dive under. The radar shows the Dragonball is in a twisty passageway.  Goku, wearing scuba gear and with a communication radio swims outside the sub, helping to direct it to the cave entrance. Before returning inside

Meanwhile General Blue has also got in a sub and are following close behind, as Goku's sub reaches the cave, General Blue orders and attack and they fire missiles at them.  Goku grumbles that it's the Red Ribbon Army after him and both Bulma and Kuririn freak out at this news:

Kuririn: "Y-you've got to be kidding!!! You're being pesonally targeted by the world's most evil crime organisation!!!"
They manage to get into the cave before their sub is disabled, but the enemy sub is still on their tail. Fortunately the passageway narrows so the larger Red Ribbon Army sub can't get any further. Meanwhile  several Red Ribbon Army planes habe converged on Kame's island and they order him to surrender much to his bemusement.  And that brings this volume to a close.

A submarine race to the Dragonball.

I think it's safe to say this is my guilty pleasure.  Despite it's often juvenile humour their is a warmth to the story telling that renders it quite charming.  Goku's main superpower really is his kindness, his abilty to bring out the best in people and generally just get along with folk.  Although he's not at all worldly in any other way, when it comes to fighting he has few people who can keep up with him, even using cunning tactics like freezing the Jiggler when his fists and feet couldn't do the job.  He's no mindless brute, despite displaying fearsome strength in battle.  Akira Toriyama knows how to choreograph a fight scene properly, the fights are depicted in a thrilling and sometimes amusing way. Goku's true nature wont be revealed until many volumes down the line, but already his ability to shake off bullets without being wounded at all shows he is something more than human.  It's good to have Bulma and Kuririn back in the story, one thing I like is how Goku will drift in and out of their lives, but you always feel that they've been living and doing things when he's not there.  Every named character has a believable inner life to them and as Goku travels we get a sense that it's a strange world he lives in, very different from our own in many ways not just the animal people and dinosaurs.  So how will Kamesen'nin deal with the Red Ribbon Army?  Will Goku face down General Blue in battle and claim the next Dragonball for himself?  Find out sometime soon, at the end of the month, when I feel like it.