Part 1 (Chapters 61 and 62)
(That can't be true, can it? It may or may not be true. Moro's a scumbag, you can't trust him. Admittedly this instalment is out a bit early, but what's a day between fellow re-readers?). Anyhow, welcome back to The Super Re-Read, one and all! We're closing in on the climax of the Galactic Patrol Prisoner arc, as we move on into Volume 14 of the Dragon Ball Super Manga - Vegeta steps into the fight, and reveals the technique he's learned to take on Moro - but the Big Bad's not done yet, and reveals what he's kept in reserve to help him turn the tables...
As ever, credit belongs to Kanzenshuu's contributors, with thanks, for the wealth of information kept on the site: The Super Re-Read uses its info pretty liberally, so I encourage everyone Re-reading along to check it out.
Righty-ho, then - time for another Re-Read...
Chapter 61 - Vegeta Reborn/Vegeta Reborn
19 June 2020
- At the outset, I guess it's most notable that this Chapter bears strong and obvious similarities to 超 #45, particularly in the way that power is secretly stolen from the stronger party - only this time, of course, it works in favour of the heroes, as Vegeta turns the theme of Stealing against the Thief. But there are also strong currents of Earning at play - in the immediate fruits of Vegeta's training, the expression of his personal outlook ("one's own inherent power", as he calls it), and his broader character arc of earning redemption for his past sins: this latter is achieved by Giving life back to the Galaxy (albeit in a limited way) by making restitution for what Moro has stolen. In terms of structure, Moro will realise too late that his energy is being stolen from him, and will fight a losing battle that strips him of his youth all over again - however, in another beat from 超 #45, he will reveal another turning of the tables at the end of the Chapter, as he regains the advantage overall - this time, by having used OG73-I's method of stealing to restore himself. Adding to this main thematic thrust, there are sub-structural beats at play of the sort that I have argued are running throughout the Final Act generally, which I'll get to later.
- Favourite Art: Toyotarou pairs some pretty art together between the end of the previous Chapter and the beginning of this one, as the dynamism of Vegeta's charge is paired with him laying a big ol' punch on Moro, which is full of really nice impact. Other pieces that are contenders here include Moro's "I still have my magic" beat, which (for me, anyway) showcases the craggy menace of Old Moro one last time in a really effectively depicted moment; the genuinely freaky panels of Moro literally eating OG73-I, and finally the full reveal of the sleek new MoroOG73-I at the end of the Chapter. All nice work.
- Given how quickly things progress here, it's easy to forget that Moro right now is so strong that SSjBe Vegeta isn't really able to actually hurt him, even after his training has massively increased his power projection capabilities to a point that seems to surpass Ultra Instinct Omen in applied strength. It's hard to overestimate how massive that difference is (and therefore will be again, once Moro gains even more power in eating OG73-I).
- Piccolo's comment that "Vegeta's never been one to misread an opponent's strength" has been widely derided by the wider fanbase as something that is obviously absurd, given Vegeta's pronounced tendency to arrogance throughout Dragon Ball. But despite the accepted wisdom behind the scorn, I think it is worth considering whether the statement might, in fact, be broadly true:
- Firstly, I think a caveat on the context for this statement is very important - Vegeta is in the middle of a battle, and is pressing an attack despite being clearly outmatched. Jaco suggests a berserk reaction thanks to denial, but Piccolo denies this specifically - on the grounds mentioned above. So it is important to bear in mind that the claim in question is really that in fights, Vegeta generally appraises the strength of his opponents accurately, rather than underestimating them. This rules things like faulty assumptions about how strong his opponents will be, or not accounting for characteristics of his opponents that he cannot reasonably be expected to know about, Out of Court. So, we have to dispense with things like whether Cell will be stronger than Vegeta in his Perfect Form, or the fact that Zarbon has a transformation up his sleeve - they're not relevant to the statement as made. We need to look for underestimating an opponent's strength during a fight, where Vegeta ought to know better.
- When we first see Vegeta, he only steps in to fight Goku - and he's pretty confident that Goku can't match him, on his current performance, which is perfectly true: Vegeta remains well ahead both against Goku's full power or in Kaio-Ken (DB #228-229), which is all he's seen. But when Goku pulls out Kaio-Ken x3, although Vegeta is amazed and does indeed go berserk, he nevertheless says "H-he surpassed my power..!!" (DB #230), so he clearly does read Goku's strength correctly in this fight. Again, in DB #232, he rages at being beaten by Goku, but it's clear he hasn't misread Goku's strength in his raging (despite his denial driven by elitism), because he calms down and determines he needs to transform to win; and win he does (DB #231-235). So, although he rages at his treasured self-image being challenged here, and he's surprised by Goku's hidden abilities, he doesn't misread Goku's strength at any point when fighting him.
- On Namek, he gets in a few fights which he wins quite easily until Zarbon transforms and stops him for the first time (DB #265-266). Of course, he laughs at the idea that Zarbon has hidden power, but this belongs in the realm of a faulty assumption rather than a misreading of Zarbon's strength - Vegeta has no reason to expect that Zarbon is hiding a transformation, and doesn't believe him, but he's under no illusions once they're in that fight. Conversely, on the rematch, Vegeta sees things with clarity, and gains the upper hand against Zarbon - but it is Zarbon who misjudges Vegeta's strength after experiencing it mid-fight, saying "Don't make me laugh!! I'm still more powerful than you!!!" (DB #268), which Vegeta quickly disproves.
- Against the Ginyu Force, Vegeta is never under any illusions at all, whether before or during the fight: he knows he's going to lose. He makes a fight of it, and though he's surprised that he's "treated like a plaything" in the fight, he clearly hasn't misjudged Recoome's strength, or how this will go (DB #275-276).
- Against Freeza, Vegeta tells him to transform, on the (incorrect) assumption that he won't change that much (DB #296) - he is probably making comparisons on the basis of his experience with Zarbon, and in any case, as he notes, there is little point in making headway against Freeza when he isn't giving his all - it's also a faulty assumption of the number of transformations Freeza has in store as well; but Vegeta has just come off of demonstrating a reasonable judgement of where the group stands in their chances against Freeza (DB #295): with trends continuing as they have, and on the assumption that Freeza only has one transformation with a moderate increase in power, even Vegeta's faulty assumptions aren't unreasonable ones (they are wrong, of course, but again that's not in view here). But of course, when Freeza actually reveals his power, Vegeta's quite clear on how outmatched he is, and aside from an attempt at a sneak attack in DB #298, he barely participates until his near-death power-up, and generally asserts Freeza's basic invincibility, which is vindicated several times over.
- But upon the encounter with Freeza's final form (DB #305-306), this is probably the first time we get what might be considered an out-and out misreading of his opponent's strength, leading to the sort of berserk denial that Jaco postulates (however briefly). Arguably, this is really attributable to a delusion about himself and his own power as a "Super Saiyan", and it vanishes with an appropriate demonstration, but if we're looking for something that seems like the terms described at the outset, this instance certainly qualifies.
- Next, we have Vegeta's fight with Android #18 (DB #352-354) - we have the caveats that he can't judge strength by sensing #18's power while they're fighting, and she has the advantage of infinite stamina, which gives her an added edge (though Vegeta knows about this one, thanks to Trunks: DB #348). The only other thing to say is that the pair are seen to be basically comparable for much of the fight. Since he cannot know whether #18 is holding back or not, and she is stronger even than Trunks expects, one would have to be actively predisposed to read this as a real case of Vegeta underestimating her strength to uphold this. I guess you could, though.
- With respect to Cell, Vegeta obviously makes an infamously boneheaded move in letting him go so that he can obtain his Perfect Form, and again his assumption that he'll win anyway even once Cell is Perfect is...faulty. However, even after a brief "warm-up" exchange, Vegeta can tell that Cell isn't taking the fight seriously, and of course he has no illusions when his kick is ineffectual (DB #383). He has a trick up his sleeve in the Final Flash, but when that achieves nothing, it's clear there's no denial (DB #385); Vegeta's not misreading their respective strengths in this fight.
- Finally, in the Buu arc, Vegeta goes into the fight with Majin Buu expecting to die (DB #464), and the only thing that really surprises him is the extent of Buu's regenerative ability. While, again, he assumed wrongly in thinking Buu would be weaker than he is, when it comes to the fight, he misjudges nothing about Buu's power. When he returns to Earth, he goes into it expecting to achieve nothing again (DB #500, 503), and when the time comes to fight Kid Buu, he already knows he can't stand up against him (DB #510), so again, misreads nothing in the fight.
- I like seeing the visual 'beats' of the unfolding revelation of what Vegeta's doing here. It's reminiscent of 超 #45, not only in terms of basic structural resemblance (as mentioned above), but also simply as a 'beat': when Moro grabs Vegeta and dumps him into the ground, he breathes heavily like Vegeta did in 超 #45, and looks at his hands in the same way Goku did when starting to understand there was something wrong with the situation, and then the revelation of ki being stolen. The likeness to the initial encounter helps to sell the ensuing theme-work.
- Artistically, I feel like the next stage in Toyotarou's development will come once he puts enough confidence in himself (and his audience) to be able to miss a few things out here and there. While over-panelling and inserting panels depicting movements between actions has been a fairly regular criticism of Toyotarou's work (I think the former has been mostly rectified and the latter is a little bit overstated as an issue - it was also a feature of the original work, and is sometimes necessary to articulate the different actions), the thing that has occasioned this comment is the awkward long-range panel shot from behind the observing trio - it takes up about a sixth of the page, and does nothing but tell us that Vegeta zips back to fight Moro again. It makes logical sense that he must, but it doesn't need depiction: while I appreciate Toyotarou's logical approach to his work generally, the audience can figure this sort of thing out without being shown it. There was the same kind of thing going on in 超 #52, when he bothered to show Piccolo take off after the crashing Macareni ship once he’d shot it down. When Toyotarou starts omitting more and leaves us to infer logically necessary but dramatically superfluous content, it'll be a step forward.
- The liberated ki collects in a fashion similar to the Genki Dama. While the revelation of the gathered energy here is vaguely reminiscent of the Genki Dama on Namek, this will get a more decisive payoff in 超 #66 when Vegeta gathers gifted energy to power Goku with at the climax of the arc, so structurally, this is really more of a foreshadowing of that victorious resolution. Vegeta likewise describes his action as a liberation of what Moro has stolen, and will mention that his counter-theft from Moro now is "the same principle" as gathering a willing gift of ki (which is something else that characterises the Genki Dama), so the visual and conceptual resonances combine not only on the thematic 'Stealing/Giving' level (as already mentioned), but also on a sub-structural level (Level 3, if you've been keeping up with my personal pet interpretation) as Vegeta's use of the technique will mirror Goku's use of the Genki Dama from the Buu arc, which will bring the arc to its culmination as its substructures fold into the superstructure and Moro is defeated.
- This issue broadly 'resolves' Vegeta's character arc, in the way he gets the better of Moro and begins to answer the challenge of his own past, to emerge as a fully-fledged hero of the series who is developing beyond a powerful but stunted character (but still has not abandoned the characteristics that identify him, and who still has further to go, as 超 #69 demonstrates). The aspects of this character arc unite across a couple of main trajectories at this point:
- We get the first key aspect to the resolution of Vegeta' character arc coming out to play in this scene, where he mentions fighting in a way that reflects one's "own inherent power". This stands of a piece with his outburst in 超 #50 that "We Saiyans pride ourselves on our physical might, and nothing more. A warrior race has no need for fancy parlor tricks!!" Thematically, this stands with Earning, as Vegeta has trained to obtain this greater power (and the means of depriving Moro of his own means of Stealing), as Vegeta taunts Moro to "stop relying on strength stolen from others and simply fight with your own power" - Vegeta prides himself on the strength he's earned, and in his own view, he is simply restoring the playing field so that the things he prizes stand supreme, and he comes out as the strongest along this theme; this fulfils the vow he made to himself in 超 #51, where he swore he would earn victory over Moro and Goku, and he can't resist the dig where he declares that victory (including the reversal of where he regards true 'talent' lying: compare with DB #459). This is the high point of Earning as an opposing theme to Stealing, and Vegeta embodies it in the most obvious way: his success is totally bound up in earning the power that is the due reward of his hard work (as Pybara noted in the last Chapter).
- Despite the bombast, Piccolo picks up on the second, more important key aspect to the resolution of Vegeta's character arc - which is his own personal growth in facing the past, which was raised even earlier, in 超 #44. Vegeta took the fight to Moro on Namek with the intention of protecting the people he had once harmed, and the attempt was thwarted. By employing the hard work of the first key aspect of his character arc just mentioned, Vegeta manages finally to come full circle now and achieve the success in saving the Namekians that eluded him earlier in the arc. His heroic determination has allied with his unstinting effort to pull this off now, as a remnant of the Namekians are revived by his liberation of their life force from Moro. This is with another goal of earning - that is, earning redemption - but it is only really by uniting Earning with Giving that Vegeta is seen to have begun achieving what he has previously simply lacked.
- Vegeta's union of these two main trajectories might be summarised as Facing the Past, Forging the Future - This isn't solely Vegeta's trajectory in this arc; rather, it serves more broadly as a functioning description of what I have called the 'substructure' of the arc's climax, only expressed thematically (as opposed to 'mechanically'). Vegeta has sought to atone for his past sins to progress from the sort of character we saw in the Buu arc towards a doer of good deeds that will "wipe the slate clean" and allow a fresh start. For his part, Goku's past fashions the general direction of the climactic Act, as I have argued several times previously, in a way that allows him to surpass the Gods once again and forge a future where...he's still got a long way to go to reach his goals (in true Dragon Ball style), only with this Divine Power. Even Merus (the other key hero of the arc) faces his own past in his birth as an Angel and the way his intrinsic Neutrality has clashed with his learned sense of justice - he faces the dilemma this represents and chooses a future for the things he loves, and ultimately finds he has a place in it doing the things he has learned to love in his past.
- Piccolo credits Goku with changing Vegeta, which is a fairly straightforward observation - Vegeta himself says things along these lines in DB #510, in supposing that Goku almost knew he would grow to have a soul. But Piccolo also pairs this with the observation that Goku never changes at all, because the way he is "works for you". This touches off a series of motifs that play with the ideas of change and the unchanging; I mentioned in a previous instalment, for instance, that Goku and Moro's basic interactions don't change across the arc from Goku's initial demand that Moro return to prison (and Moro ignores him) in 超 #44 - this is because the pair never change in and of themselves (compare with the dialogue that points up people changing 'beyond recognition' in some way, and the more general discussion around this broad point in the few posts that came before this instalment). Visibly, Moro passes through a number of changes in this Chapter alone, and in the arc more broadly, but as a character, he never deviates from his original depiction. Goku, for his part, doesn't change either, and while Piccolo says it "works" for him, he nevertheless dissembles when Goku asks if he's saying that's a good thing - Goku goes about justifying both sides of that ambiguous response, as the positive facets of his influence in changing formerly incorrigible villains is shown here, and his easy connections with others and tireless work to improve himself yield their due in 超 #64 when he achieves True Ultra Instinct, but also the limits of his influence are on display in 超 #65 when he again insists on Moro's return to prison, hoping for some small sign that he might one day change and justify Goku's interest in his potential, just like has happened thanks to the same approach at various points in his past - only for Moro to be as unchanging as Goku, resolving to continue his thefts and eventually ratcheting up the crisis to its final point.
- Deviating from character stuff for a moment, the Namekians are revived by the restoration of their energy. Pybara mentions that this would only have happened for "tribes with potent life force" - on a power-scaling level, I guess this might imply that the average Namekian is stronger than the average denizen of Zoon (though this doesn't necessarily imply anything about Pui Pui's strength under Babidi's charm). In addition, we get an esoteric effect of the Dragon Balls wedged into Esca's exposition that the Namekians have been revived: the Dragon Balls have apparently preserved the condition of the dead. This obviously doesn’t happen with Earth’s Dragon Balls (see, e.g., DB #165, or DB #242), so whatever is being done here is unique to the Namekian Dragon Balls – this may or may not be related to the fact that they are effectively direct scrapings taken from the Super Dragon Balls (超 #6), unlike Earth’s Dragon Balls which were created anew.
- Returning to character matters, we get the other ‘controversial’ piece of dialogue in this Chapter: namely, Vegeta saying that he expects to go to Hell, just like Moro, and specifically the line, “At the end of the day, I’m a villain. I’ve been prepared for the consequences for quite some time”. Despite fan annoyance at this line, I tend to look at it as the surest proof that Vegeta has actually managed to truly begin to outgrow his past (that ‘first step’ I mentioned above) and become more the hero that such objectors esteem him to be – his own condemnatory (yet matter-of-fact) self-judgement that his sins are too great to have been fully atoned for (despite making the attempt) testifies to the development of his own moral sense to one more consonant with that of a ‘good guy’, unlike his nostalgia for his “evil” aggression in DB #459. It is true that Porunga revived Vegeta in DB #514, thereby not defining him by the terms of the wish as “very evil”, but on the other hand, Vegeta had been fished out of Hell (where Piccolo told him he would end up, in DB #467) that very same day to go fight Buu (DB #500), and a few days prior had been excluded from revival by Shenron, who therefore defined him by the terms of the wish as a “bad guy” (DB #469). So, even though he has apparently developed in the few days between those events, it’s hardly an open-and-shut case that should make his sentiments here particularly objectionable. Moreover, despite the eventual conclusion that he qualified as “righteous” in Battle of Gods, there still needed to be some hemming and hawing over it. But as I’ve said, despite the substance of the claim here, it really sets the seal on Vegeta’s personal trajectory, which will continue to be investigated in the Granolah arc as he bears guilt for the actions of all Saiyans (超 #69) – I think it’s an important indication of his change of heart, and it is equally important that this is revealed in conversation with Moro, who will never experience such a change.
- Moro pulls another switcheroo by escaping with his magic. I do like the ‘beat’ this moment conveys, as he returns to misdirection in service of a bigger aim again, in which his magic plays a key role (just like in 超 #45). We also get the return of his ‘wicked’ flight aura after having had a few ‘full-power aura’ Chapters, so like much about Moro’s elderly design, I find this a welcome change. The menace is almost immediately back in his depiction – from the moment he starts chuckling, at any rate – and his looming above Saganbo’s ship, summary dispatch of Shimorekka (good) and extremely creepy (and pretty graphic) eating of OG73-I all plays to this sense really effectively.
- Looking at the progress of the arc from a structural standpoint, the three putative storytelling ‘levels’ unite again in a single plot beat, with the transformation of Moro following his consumption of OG73-I. On Level 1 (immediate structure), this is Moro’s characteristic caution coming out to help him turn the tables on the heroes once again, and he does it in a characteristic way: by literally eating a target, predating on his ally. As OG73-I has been the other key practical bearer of the arc theme of Stealing (as a copycat thief of other people’s abilities), Moro doing unto him as he did unto others is singularly fitting, and exposes the lengths that Moro will go to in his thefts in order to maintain his position (though he isn’t done yet). Standing under this surface reading on Level 2 (intermediate structure), Moro experiences a rebirth on the edge of final defeat thanks to the use of a shade of himself, and becomes more powerful than ever: these are features of the Piccolo Daimao-23rd Budokai cycle, as the Daimao spat out a shade of himself to ensure his own rebirth in a more powerful form (Moro here ingests the shade instead) – the ultimate demonic challenge to Son Goku, who had himself surpassed the Gods, and whose character arc here will result in the surpassing of the Gods once again, so Moro’s retention of this character connection works here not only to advance the plot with a twist, but also to build the emerging culmination of Goku’s own arc in this Act: in 超 #62 he will take the alignment with Piccolo Jr. further by piercing Goku in the same place Piccolo did at the 23rd Budokai – he retains a scar in exactly the same place this time around – and in 超 #65, Goku will give him a Senzu Bean in the hope of eliciting a small sign of willingness to change, along with getting a rival he might continue to test himself against, as he did with Piccolo also. Under this, on Level 3 (ultimate structure), we move through Dragon Ball across a wide sweep of the Cell arc, with Vegeta at the centre of the action, but with the main villain absorbing an artificial life-form in order to transform into a being of terrifying power, who will bring the heroes close to a final defeat, until the main protagonist is finally able to access the power they trained to use in the Room of Spirit and Time, and turns the tables once more. This is one of those times when I think the union of the three structural levels of this arc’s final Act come together very well, to form a solid new ‘beat’ that draws on them all to perform this new function for the arc.
21 July 2020
- While 超 #61 used 超 #45’s good beats and a whole lot of well-employed theme and character work to give us what had a decent claim to be the most important Chapter of the arc so far, 超 #62 is rather more…functional, all told: since 超 #61 pulled a last-minute switcheroo in giving Moro the advantage again, 超 #62 is really just the logical (and occasionally very pretty) follow-through. The heightening of the doom is almost monotonous, but it’s necessary to get us to the next beats, essentially, so that’s where it goes. Slowly.
- Moro’s design has, of course, changed, as we saw at the end of the last Chapter. Despite the fact that I’ve posited a Cell arc substructural beat here (as have many others), I don’t think Moro’s design is as evocative of Perfect Cell as a number of fans have suggested. Apart from the flashes on the cheeks of what is otherwise quite a generic face, there really isn’t anything that I can see to commend this point of view, when we’re talking about a svelte goat-man against Cell’s very square-ish bug-man aesthetic. Really, Moro’s transformation is just a direct accommodation to OG73-I’s design, and otherwise a rearrangement of features that are unique to him. OG73-I is probably based on a rejected design for Shiirasu, a Toyotarou-designed antagonist for Super Dragon Ball Heroes. Moro’s design accommodates to OG73-I most prominently by his more humanoid appearance, but also by the incorporation of his copy jewels – one remains on the head, but the others transfer to his hands. His goat horns previously gave Toyotarou some grief, so these are straighter and simpler (and perhaps modified by OG73-I’s simpler cranial spikes). We’ve also already mentioned the cheek flashes, which were in evidence for both of them already, but it stands out now as a solid dark colour instead of their skin colours. Otherwise, the rump pelt moves up and within the neckline to drape over his back, and the shoulder fur moves down to the lower legs to mostly replace the cloth bindings Moro originally had. His arm bindings have also become much thinner, more like typical wristbands (and more like OG73-I’s armoured bands). There’s quite a pleasing layering of the tone, black, and white portions of Moro’s design, from head to toe (usually regularised in that order), and I, for one, like this fusion of features overall. While this was doubtless designed for colour (like much in Dragon Ball Super), I think the design comes off very well in Black-and-White as a result (arguably better). I think it’s well balanced overall, and changes enough while keeping enough familiar in order to convey both the sense of a powerful, sleek new threat and the sense that this is still the same Moro (importantly, he’s kept the serpentine eyes).
- Moro is, as we saw at the end of 超 #61, stronger than he was even at his previous peak, to the sum of one elderly version of himself with “barely a scrap of power” and a being who is…arguably about the same level as pre-training Piccolo. So, not much different (which is probably why Goku had to stop and correct himself after quickly thinking Moro was back to normal), so the difference in performance by Vegeta now, as he can’t even touch Moro no matter how hard he tries, underscores the fact that he only made so much headway in the first place because Moro let him before he realised what he was doing – the difference in conventional power is simply massive here, and Moro has no trouble leveraging it this time around. In addition, he progressively reveals a series of notable adjustments to OG73-I’s powers when used by him, which aren’t really explained (the specifics of OG73-I’s powers were examined in a previous instalment). If one had to speculate, the permanent integration of his erstwhile ally is what gives the resulting merger its additional features – the powers that OG73-I copied (Piccolo’s, Gohan’s, and Moro’s) were part of him when he was absorbed, so any facet of his being – including this – is permanently integrated too. As an extension of Moro receiving the “complete back-up” of himself permanently, this would make a kind of sense. It could’ve used an explicit explanation, though.
- Moro copies Vegeta’s powers, showing that he also has OG73-I’s copy ability. It isn’t stated that anything MoroOG73-I copies is permanent – only the powers OG73-I had already copied. So this would fit with the foregoing – the powers Moro has inherited are permanent because they’re not simply copied any more, but intrinsic to his very being. The powers he copies from now on are, however, subject to the same 30-minute rule as OG73-I. In copying Vegeta’s powers, it’s made transparent that the main upshot of this is that Fusion won’t be used by the heroes this time (which was something of a relief on the first read through, and remains something I can get behind on the re-read; Fusion needs basically to be retired as a major plot point for the main heroes at this stage, though if it isn’t addressed, there will always be questions around why it wasn’t used…).
- Question: I get that Moro can use the Big Bang Attack, but how does he know it’s called that? Maybe an OG73-I data collection dealie (see 超 #67, 超 #69)? Actually, scratch that: Moro has demonstrated the ability to read minds and memories before in the arc (e.g., 超 #49). I find his trash-talk afterwards quite funny. He’s not wrong that, name aside, the attack is basically just a ki blast (though Daizenshuu #7 points out that “his ki is condensed down into one big lump and can deal heavy damage inside one specific range”, so it has amplified destructive power within those specific bounds when compared with other attacks), but one can’t avoid the feeling that this is rather like stealing from a store and then complaining about the quality of the product. It’s also more than a little rich, as Moro himself is a petty thing in a grandiose package.
- In keeping with the Cell arc (‘Level 3’) sub-structural beats of this part of the Act, the focus shifts briefly to Dende and his status as God of Earth. Dende was first employed in his Godly position in DB #393-394 (shortly after Perfect Cell had newly established his supremacy, like Moro does here), and now he resolves to get involved again, precisely because he is the God of Earth. There’s a nice symmetry there, and it plays well with the broader motifs of Divine intervention in this arc with Beerus, Whis, and Merus, and also it compares productively with a ‘Level 2’ reading, given that Kami-Sama had said it wouldn’t do for God to step in and fix things: Dende feels differently, that as a God the onus is upon him to be actively responsible for his world.
- Favourite Art: There’s a lot of strong work done in the fight between Moro and Piccolo, Gohan, and Goku. Even at the outset, I like the composition of Gohan and Piccolo’s charge, with the sort of ‘Yin-Yang’ compositional symmetry in that panel. Moro’s moves are also sharp and well-executed; the moves seem to suit his sleeker appearance somehow. Of course, for me the winner here is the piercing of Goku and its aftermath, but actually it has to be said that for all the stretching of the action that this Chapter is guilty of when performing its overall bridging function, it at least makes it quite pretty. A lot of that is to do with Moro’s depiction, I think, but it’s a definite plus all the same.
- The ‘combo moves’ as such continue to try to oppose the singular bad guy, as Piccolo and Gohan both use moves to hold Moro in place so Goku can land a more substantial attack. I enjoyed seeing Gohan employ a Galactica Doughnut to this end, not only because it makes sense he’d remember it since it was used on him in DB #499, but there’s also a nice little play on using other people’s moves in this Chapter – Moro has obviously started using the copied moves of the heroes (he uses the Big Bang Attack, Piccolo’s regeneration, and the Makankosappo in this Chapter alone); for Gohan to respond in kind with the Galactica Doughnut (particularly with Super Buu’s question, “How does it feel to be hurt by your friends’ techniques?” hovering in the background), is particularly fitting.
- This is all prelude to another Cell arc (Level 3) beat, as Goku pulls out a Shunkan Idou Kamehameha for the first time since that fight (DB #401). Like Cell, Moro just comes right back from it thanks to Piccolo’s regenerative abilities (which were first displayed in the 23rd Budokai in DB #189, after his left arm was disabled by a blast: ta-daaa). That Moro combines this regeneration with piercing Goku in the same place as Piccolo did back then (DB #191-192) also plays as a strong ‘Level 2’ beat, uniting all of this in a single, shocking exchange now. Goku’s resilience to this kind of ill-use now is less impressive than back then, I think chiefly because in terms of Goku’s character arc right now, and the way it is governed by these sub-structural levels, he has much farther to go - a ‘push’ needs to be given to complete his Divine power before the road to victory can open up, whereas back then, he already had the power and this was the final dramatic prelude to victory in a scenario where Goku was in control and held all the cards, all appearances to the contrary. To underscore the sense that Divine power and the completion of this cycle will be the only way out of all this, we get treated to a trademark Gohan rage boost (which we might have expected for a Cell arc substructure alone, I guess), which Moro no-sells utterly. The ‘push’ that is needed now is a different one, dynamically modified to the immediate themes and needs of this arc.
- From this point, the Chapter does seem to over-relish the ‘doominess’ of the whole scenario, lingering over it as the heroes dutifully line up to get merked: Gohan gets a brutal, nose-and-tooth-breaking backfist, Dende and Kuririn get walled off from the beaten and dying in the group, the Androids get a blast each to the face, and Piccolo gets a torso-piercing of his own. I guess its intent is to make the tension go further, but to me the whole depiction seems a little lavish generally, when all it does is underscore the simple point that the night is darkest before the dawn.
- Dende gets let through Moro’s barrier by an Angel. Even at the time, there was speculation over whether this might, in fact, be Whis given Beerus’s demand to go get some tasty food (which would naturally lead the pair to Earth), but it is certainly Merus talking to Dende: firstly, his tabard is unadorned with sigils (as shown of Angelic Merus in 超 #55), whereas Whis’s tabard bears the same Universe 7 diamonds as Beerus; and secondly, we see the him wearing some relatively standard-looking boots, whereas Whis wears loafers (see, e.g., 超 #27). Of course, we will see that Whis is also involved here, but this specific intervention belongs to Merus, before he does a quick-change into his Galactic Patrol guise.
- Which, while entirely expected, telegraphed as it has been over the last few Chapters, is no less satisfying for that when it actually comes. I guess it’s not wrong to say that stretching the problem over the Chapter winds it tighter so that the emergence of Merus can be more satisfying, but I don’t think that’s incongruous with saying that it nevertheless goes on a bit too long – this is an instance of the Chapter format working against the telling of a relatively straightforward story beat. On the one hand, it makes sense to wind this tension over a Chapter, taken purely as a storytelling increment; if we’d been looking at a 20-page Chapter format like the early Dragon Ball Super Chapters, I’d think nothing of a whole Chapter being given over to the purpose. But I think the 45-page format decompresses the whole thing to the extent that I get the feeling that it’s just being dwelt on too much, to the extent that the lavishness of the depiction almost seems to veer into some sort of rote ‘doom porn’; there isn't a great deal at play here to make it seem like a dynamic encounter, but rather one focused on the functionally 'negative' aim of systematically shutting down potential avenues of resistance for the heroes and telling us 'it won't be fusion, it won't be teamwork, it won't be a rage-boost', etc. But not stretching the beat across the Chapter would rob the beat of the sense of ‘release’ that Merus’s revelation undoubtedly gives, and we’re not in a stretch of the arc where it would make a great deal of sense to intersperse what we see with any sort of ‘B Plot’ to leaven the whole thing, even had one been cultivated for the purpose. As long as the format stays like this, I feel that bridging Chapters like 超 #62 will always be something of a problem.