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.