"Good" “Ideas”, Poorly Executed
All right, so it’s finally time for Super Saiyan 4 Gogeta. This might very well be the most popular thing to come out of GT, and they waited until episode 60 of 64 to do it. This guy is a guarenteed crowd-pleaser. People love Fusion and they love Gogeta and they love Super Saiyan 4. All this shit is awesome and good, but GT only gives us one episode with this dude, and five episodes with Doltaki. Let that sink in for a moment.
Why do people love SSJ4 Gogeta? Simple: He’s the biggest, baddest cat in the whole franchise. Maybe Vegito Blue or Gogeta Blue are in his league, but he predates them both by about 20 years. Omega Shenron has been eating everyone’s lunch, and he’s the final boss of GT, which made him the de facto final boss of the whole franchise until Beerus showed up in 2013. Gogeta 4 shows up and picks Omega apart like he’s nothing.
This whole Dragon Ball thing is a power fantasy. Anyone who complains about the wishes, or the transformations, or characters being too powerful, they’ve completely missed the point. It’s like complaining that a haunted house is too spooky, or that a musical has too many songs in it. Characters like Frieza, Cell, Broly, and Gogeta are popular because they get these long sequences where they just go around whippin’ ass and no one can stop them. And then someone might whip their ass and they get a lot of popularity too.
And where GT went wrong is that they failed to understand how that power fantasy works. That’s why they did one episode of SSJ4 Gogeta, and five episodes of Doltaki. I mean, I could go on, but I think that really says everything you need to know about GT’s priorities.
Also, GT completely fucked up SSJ4 Gogeta. They had a cool thing, and they totally blew it. Let’s discuss how.
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So first of all, we need to have Goku and Vegeta do the Fusion Dance to make Gogeta. Omega Shenron refuses to allow this, even though he basically stood there like an idiot and let Vegeta turn into a Super Saiyan 4. Apparently he’s finally remembered that he wants to win this fight, and he can’t achieve this by just floating around while his enemies plot against him.
So Trunks jumps in to hold Omega off, and he does amazingly well, considering he doesn’t even bother going Super Saiyan for this. Keep in mind that Omega has already beaten up Trunks a couple of times earlier. Like, only one hit each time, but Omega’s supposed to be insanely powerful, so that should be enough to take Trunks out of the fight for good.
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Then Bulma shoots her Blutz Wave Tank at Omega, which is completely dumb, because I’m pretty sure Blutz Waves would have no effect on Omega. Maybe she was trying to hit Trunks and turn him into a Super Saiyan 4. Seriously, why didn’t she try that? Anyway, Omega takes out her tank, and she’s more furious that he didn’t warn her that he was going to fire back.
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Then Gohan and Goten try to hold off Omega, and they get creamed, and then Trunks jumps in again, and he actually drives Omega back for a decent amount of time. How the hell is he pulling this off? See, this is what GT Logic is all about. The whole premise here is that nothing short of a Super Saiyan 4 can do anything against Omega Shenron, but they need the supporting characters to jump in anyway, so we end up with this dumb paradox where Trunks can do just as well against Omega in base form as Goku was going at maximum power.
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Meanwhile, Goku’s just watching this like a dumbass, and Vegeta asks him what he’s waiting for. When the characters are complaining about the plot, you know something’s gone terribly wrong.
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So they finally go through with it, and Gogeta appears and Omega can’t even get near the guy without getting hurt, and everyone’s thrilled. Pan is especially excited, because she’s never even heard of this technique before, so this is the first time she’s seen it in action. Then Uub finally comes back from getting blasted in the face in Episode 58. Well, he’s selling his shoulder instead of his face, but you get the idea. At least Uub is more professional than Goten, Gohan, and Trunks. Each of them have gotten worked over by Omega Shenron and they keep acting like they’re completely fresh.
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So Uub suggests that one of them fuse with him, and they all look at each other like dopes. Then Gohan says they need to heal Uub’s arm first. Okay, yeah, that’s a good point. He probably can’t do the Fusion dance correctly with a bad wing, but it doesn’t address his point. Goten and Trunks can do fusion right now. They could have done it several episodes ago. They could have done it during the Baby Saga. Uub is literally asking them why they don’t use that thing they know that makes them stronger and helps them win, and they’re all gawking at each other like Uub has a second head.
It would have been funnier if Trunks had said “Sorry, Uub, but this is GT. We have to fight in base form for no reason at all. Just trust me.”
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Let’s get back to the fight. Yeah, Omega can’t do shit against Gogeta. Cool. Here’s the problem.
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Nobody, and I mean nobody, in this show is interested in winning a fight. When Omega has the advantage he just toys with his opponents and gloats. Now Gogeta has the advantage, and he starts toying with Omega. He makes four copies of himself and they all shoot Kamehameha’s at him, but instead of ki blasts they shoot confetti.
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Then Omega gets flustered and prepares his ultimate attack, the Revenge Death Ball. No, wait, it’s the Electric Eclipse Bomb! No wait, I’m sorry, it’s the Minus Energy Power Ball. I don’t know why I keep getting these techniques confused. They’re each so distinctive and innovative.
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So Gogeta just waits until the last second and kicks the thing up into outer space. Just like Vegito did when he repelled a big planet-busting ki ball launched by Super Buu. This whole fight is just Vegito vs. Super Buu, only shorter and dumber and without Vegito’s rationale for toying with his opponent. Vegito was baiting Buu in order to get absorbed so he could rescue Piccolo and the boys. Gogeta is screwing around because… well, that’s what Vegito did in DBZ, so I guess Toei thought it would be okay if they did it too.
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So one side-effect of this is that Gogeta’s deflection somehow dismantles the minus energy field surrounding the Earth. Up to now, it’s been cutting off the Earth from the rest of the universe, and not even the Supreme Kai could monitor what was happening there.
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Gogeta explains that when he kicked the Power Ball, he used his ki to convert the entire thing into Plus Energy, which then neutralized the Minus Energy field around the Earth. This is pretty dumb, but it’s kind of like how Movie 12 Gogeta just somehow knew how to turn Janemba back into a regular oni kid, so I’ll allow it.
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What I won’t allow is the part where Omega stupidly repeats everything Gogeta just said, almost word for word, like he still hasn’t grasped what happened. It’s not that complicated, and Omega isn’t this dumb. Toei just stuck this in here to pad out the episode.
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So then Gogeta blows Omega Shenron away with the Big Bang Kamehameha, and you’d think that would be the end of the big dope…
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I mean, he explodes and the Dragon Balls get scattered around, so it sure looks like he’s toast, but I know better, because the last three episodes have featured false finishes like this, and he always comes back.
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And there he is, a little singed, but basically unharmed. Seriously, this guy took a Big Bang Kamehameha from Super Gogeta 4, right in the face, and he’s not even hurt. But somehow Trunks was keeping him busy at the start of the episode? GT Logic is one hell of a drug.
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So Gogeta just sets up another one, which is a great opportunity for Toei to reuse the animation cells. Seriously, though, if I were Gogeta, I’d be a little nervous about this. If he survived one of these things, maybe Gogeta’s not strong enough to beat him.
Actually, maybe that’s the whole deal with Omega Shenron. He’s strong, sure, but he’s not that much stronger than Goku. It’s just that he’s so damn tough that he can take almost any offense and shrug it off. That might explain why he never kills the others with his attacks. He has to save his offensive power for when it really counts, because he doesn’t have that much to work with. His main strategy is waiting for Goku to wear himself out in a vain attempt to kill him.
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Well, in this case, it totally works. Gogeta comes apart before he can deliver the final blow. Goku speculates it’s because all that Super Saiyan 4 power burned out the fusion time. That’s actually a legitimate point, since Gotenks could only hold Super Saiyan 3 for five minutes before unfusing. From what we’ve seen, SSJ4 seems to be much more stable than SSJ3, but maybe that doesn’t matter when it comes to Fusion.
Anyway, the one bright side to all of this is that Omega has lost the other six Dragon Balls, so now he’s back to being plain old Syn Shenron, and Goku or Vegeta can beat him solo when he’s like this.
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Except, no, because Syn just uses the exact same trick he used before and swallows all the Dragon Balls again. And the good guys just stand there like idiots and let this happen…
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… Except for the four-star ball, which Goku manages to grab before it can fly into Omega’s mouth. Well, that’s something at least, but it would have been more interesting if they had intercepted a few more Dragon Balls. Let Vegeta take on Omega with only three Dragon Balls and see how well that goes.
So there you have it. Hopefully I don’t have to explain how Super Saiyan 4 Gogeta doesn’t count as an idea. It’s just a combination of three pre-existing ideas: Oozaru, Super Saiyan, and the Fusion Technique. That doesn’t make it a bad thing. They were right to put SSJ4 Gogeta in this show. It’s a great call, just don’t try to tell me it was some brilliant innovation that GT came up with.
There’s nothing fresh in any of this. Gogeta 4 vs. Omega Shenron is just Vegito vs. Super Buu. Only the jokes don’t work and the techniques are dumber and Omega doesn’t do anything cool to put up a fight. He just keeps making idle threats and getting his ass kicked.
Is This Episode Worse than “The Roaming Lake”?
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You can defend this episode by saying “Well, at least they gave us Gogeta”, but that’s kind of the point I’m trying to make here. Like I said from the beginning, Dragon Ball is a power fantasy. That’s the appeal to it. And GT keeps screwing up that appeal by giving the audience a taste of power fantasy, only to snatch it away.
Super Saiyan 4 is a great example of this. It’s supposed to be this ultimate power, but Goku keeps getting his ass kicked whenever he uses it. He’s constantly talking a big game, only to get wrecked, and then he has to ask his kids to give him their power so he can finish the fight. Now he’s got Vegeta backing him up and that still isn’t enough, so they fuse into Gogeta and that doesn’t work either.
GT loves to say “no”. Can we see more of Bulla, Goten, and Marron? No. Can we see Pan turn Super Saiyan? No. Can we check out adult Gotenks? No. Can Vegeta be a Super Saiyan 4? Well, okay, but only long enough to fuse into Gogeta. Oh, well can we see Gogeta win a fight? No.
The thing is, in a story arc like this, you could at least have some fun rooting for the villain, since he seems to be cleaning house so far. That’s how I found a favorite character in Cell, and I think that’s why a lot of fans enjoy Broly and Majin Buu. The thing is, Omega Shenron isn’t really getting that kind of dominant portrayal. I mean, sure, he’s having his way with the heroes. Nobody can stop him, but he’s so damn lethargic about it all. Also, it doesn’t matter much that he survived a Big Bang Kamehameha to the face when he keeps getting flustered by guys like Trunks and Uub. He can’t even kill Mr. Satan, so how big a badass can he be? Omega Shenron keeps mocking all the “small fries”, but he hasn’t been able to do anything about them. You know what Majin Buu did to all of Goku’s little pals? He ate and killed them! Omega just doesn’t have that same energy to him.
So what you end up with his is this lackluster final battle where nothing ever seems to get done. We’ve seen a lot of big power-ups and transformations here. Limit Breaker Super Saiyan 4 Goku. Syn Sheron becomes Omega Shenron. Vegeta turns SSJ4 and fuses with Goku. Goku even pulled off a Super Dragon Fist in the previous episode. But none of it matters. This is part four of a seven-episode battle, and it feels like we’re right back to square one. ‘
“The Roaming Lake” may not have the power scaling of this episode, but at least when Goku blows up an indestructible dam, it stays destroyed. TRL wins again, 61-0.
"Good" “Ideas”, Poorly Executed
