Is Tenshinhan considered human? Tenshinhan vs Kuririn

BlueSky · Post by **Kaboom** » Sat Jun 17, 2006 5:26 pm

Drunken Master wrote: Okay, right now I'm drunk as hell. (still have good grammar, right?)

You must be.

Raditz was at 1200, I believe. That's actually pretty common DB knowledge, I think. You'd hafta be drunk not to remember...

Drunken Master · Post by **Drunken Master** » Wed Jun 21, 2006 4:35 pm

Heh. I meant the original scan, not just his power. I wasn't that drunk.

Rocketman · Post by **Rocketman** » Fri Jun 23, 2006 11:10 am

Maybe Goku told Krillin to leave when they meet Androids 19 and 20 because Krillin had already been brought back to life by Shenron, not because Tien was much stronger.

ChaotixXero · Post by **ChaotixXero** » Fri Jun 23, 2006 12:05 pm

That was the reason. Who'd want our little bald friend to die again?

Duo · Post by **Duo** » Fri Jun 23, 2006 2:27 pm

Rocketman wrote:Maybe Goku told Krillin to leave when they meet Androids 19 and 20 because Krillin had already been brought back to life by Shenron, not because Tenshinhan was much stronger.

Tenshinhan died too. Remember Nappa and the Kikoho?

Kuririn had actually died twice, but either way, Shenlong would laugh at both of them.

Drunken Master · Post by **Drunken Master** » Fri Jun 23, 2006 4:17 pm

I still believe it was because of the power difference. Even if Goku didn't want Piccolo and the other warrior to fight, he would want the choice that had the best chance of surviving IF something bad happened, thus the one with more ki/chi would be the one to stay. Besides, Goku and the others couldn't sense how strong the androids actually were, thus picking the two strongest choices would be the practical and logical answer.

DaemonCorps · Post by **DaemonCorps** » Fri Jun 23, 2006 11:35 pm

Drunken Master wrote:Oh yeah, not to mention that Tenshinhan's kikoho barely touched Nappa, but his shin kikoho (he probably enhanced it with North Kaio) could hold down Cell's second form. He's not pulling that ki out of thin air, it's his power that was pushing Cell down. He was much more powerful.

Also, keep in mind that when he was first introduced in DB, Roshi mentiones that using the Kikoho could kill him or, at the least, shorten his life span. But you clearly see Tenshinhan use this move a lot throughout the series, so I guess you could get away with saying that he's still alive because he's not human. Though, I think it's because Roshi was referring to "normal strangth" people dying from the Kikoho; the Z fighters are much stronger than your normal warriors (I mean, if the Ox King and Bora could survive bullet shots, then the Z fighters are pretty up there in means of power!).

Drunken Master · Post by **Drunken Master** » Mon Sep 25, 2006 9:16 pm

That could be a point, but I don't think it's enough. Thanks though. Sorry for the necro-post, but I was wondering if anyone else had something to add. Here's my main post to think about, comment on, debate, add something or whatever. Pretty interesting stuff + my awesome opinions. ;)
____________________________________________________
Hi. I've been debating these topics for a LONG time in my online DB career, and I've put together many ideas, and evidence, what have you. If you'd like to add something, comment, or debate an idea, please go ahead. I'm not biased as both Tenshinhan and Kuririn are in my top 3 favorite fighters. Although, I must admit, Tenshinhan is my favorite while Kuririn is #3. Piccolo is my second favorite by the way. Anyhow, my debate is this - Tenshinhan isn't considered a human, and is infact stronger than Kuririn. The whole ancestory thing has to do with Yamcha saying Kuririn is the strongest human fighter. I really didn't have to debate that part seeing as how Yamcha hasn't seen or sensed Tenshinhan's power in seven years, but it helps. Oh yeah, could someone verify if that interview with Toriyama happened? I'm pretty sure I read it somewhere legit, but my memory is not so good. Thanks. Also, some might not make good sense because some of it was aimed at certain debators in the past...Like someone tried to argue that Tenshinhan gave up training completely when he refused the ROSAT training in the Cell saga. Silly people. Oh yeah, by the way...I don't use the anime to back up anything. I use the Viz manga.

Tenshinhan's Ancestory
We have a scan from the Daizenshuu stating that Tenshinhan has ancestory from different race, and it obviously shows. No human has been shown to have 3 eyes, no human has been shown to grow an extra set of arms and no human has been shown to have the ability to make living, breathing clones. There's no other being we know of that could do that, not even Piccolo. Only Tenshinhan has those special abilities. Also take note of Roshi's reaction to Ten growing those arms. You can tell that in all his years he's never seen anything like it before, he was shocked, confused and seemed horrified. Tenshinhan is either a hybrid of his ancient ancestors and the human race, or he is of pure decent from his ancestory. We don't know, but we DO know that he is not a pure human. Saying otherwise would be an assumption and would be contradicted by manga proof and by the official Dragon Ball information database, the Daizenshuu. Akira Toriyama (apparently) was asked if Tenshinhan was human in a interview, and he (apparently) avoided the question by answering something else. Hmm...why would he do that? It's pretty easy to say "Yes, he is human". I'll try looking for the interview and I will try verifying if it's true. Here's the scan of ancestory for reference. Also, in the game 'Dragon Ball Z Tenkaichi Budokai' there is a wealth of very accurate information in bios of all the characters. Tenshinhan's states the following -

"As a descendant of aliens, his body possesses unique characteristics which he demonstrates often in the Dragon Ball series, such as the ability to split himself into four seperate fighters or sprout extra arms from his shoulders- unthinkable behavior as far as normal Earthlings are concerned."

Tenshinhan's Heavenly Training
This scan shows that all the fighters want training tougher than what Goku received. This scan shows that even at a much higher power levels, the gravity still affects them. This scan is about Tenshinhan's and Piccolo's extreme will to train. Tenshinhan also has a little speech to himself about how he will train. He's very serious about this training and he's training to defeat Goku once again. Thus meaning he would train his hardest in better training conditions than what Goku received. They are all stronger, so of course North Kaio would give them stronger training conditions. This scan shows the results of Piccolo's training, even thought he trained for a short amount of time. Read Nail's dialogue. In only a few days Piccolo's power increased in a very noticeable fashion. Piccolo knows he's much stronger and Nail greatly compliments his power. Regular Namekian warriors are around the 3,000 power level marking. Notice Nail's quote: "You have an astonishing amount of power." So common sense deems that Piccolo is going to be much more than 3,000. This shows that North Kaio is indeed training them harder. Their training doesn't have to be shown for us to know that it's happening, we know that North Kaio is training them harder than Goku just by that scan. North Kaio wouldn't have announced that they wanted to train harder and then just not let it happen. Especially with Piccolo and Tenshinhan around. Tenshinhan stayed longer than what Goku did, he always had sparring partners which in every case is good, he was trained harder by North Kaio, and he has an extreme will to train his hardest and do his best because he's training ro defeat Goku. Now Goku trained with Kami and Popo for three years. Tenshinhan trained with them for less than 6 months, yet he recieved a MUCH bigger boost in power. As the enemies kept getting stronger, Akira had to make the heroes get stronger. Tenshinhan would have recieved a huge boost in power from his training with North Kaio as other allies and enemies were getting stronger by every chapter.

Tenshinhan's Android Training
He returned to the mountains to train with Chiaotzu while Kuririn trained by himself at Kame House. So let's compare some things. Tenshinhan's persona about training is much more serious than Kuririn's, that's just a fact. Like stated before, Tenshinhan trained with a partner for three years while Kuririn trained by himself. Being in the mountains, there's no distractions from training. I'm sure Tenshinhan would have trained, ate, slept, woke up and trained again. There's no way that Chiaotzu could spar with Tenshinhan right? Wrong. Gohan sparred with Piccolo and SSj Goku during the three years of training. There's many ways that he could have helped Tenshinhan with his psychic abilities anyhow. All the fighters besides Vegeta were training regularly on Earth during this saga. Now why would they train like that if regular Earthly training didn't affect them? Surely if the 10x gravity on Kaio's planet barely affected Tenshinhan anymore, then regular Earth training wouldn't have any affect at all. That’s to counter people saying that Tenshinhan couldn’t have received much good from his training with North Kaio because he was too strong for the gravity. Yet we see the results of their training. Gohan turned SSj pretty quickly in the ROSAT, thus meaning his base power should have improved very significantly from his Earthly training with Piccolo and Goku. Piccolo could take on Gero by himself, surprising nearly everyone, SSj Goku was strong as hell, and Tenshinhan held down Cell with his ki. Here's the only scan of Tenshinhan during that training.

The Android Threat
The fact of the matter here is that Goku picked both Tenshinhan and Piccolo over Kuririn to help him with the androids. Yamcha is nearly dead and the two androids the group trained so hard for are right in front of them. They trained their asses off because of these two threats, so wouldn't it be common sense for Goku to pick the two strongest to stay with him just in case? Especially after hearing how strong they are from Trunks, and the fact that Goku couldn't sense how strong they actually were? Of course. Not only was Tenshinhan closer to Yamcha, but he was standing right next to Goku. So why is Goku going to turn and yell over at Kuririn to take Yamcha back? This scan shows it. Proof of Tenshinhan's strength can be seen with his neo tri-beam. That's the power of his ki raining down on Cell. Also, I'd like to show you these two scans for multiple reasons. First the scans: here and here. First off, look at their stances in the first scan. They were all ready to fight the androids. This supports my assumption that Goku would have picked the two strongest fighters to stay, I mean...Isn't it common sense? Even if Goku didn't want them to fight, he'd want the strongest backup. Goku couldn't have known if the androids were going to attack them right there or not, thus why he picked the strongest to stay behind. The second scan shows Tenshinhan's new strength. Not only did he see Gero's attack coming at him, but he also dodged it with Goku. I'm not saying he was around base Goku's strength, but he has to be pretty strong to do those things. Now…Trunks, Tenshinhan and Kuririn arrive where Piccolo is after his skirmish with Imperfect Cell. A plan is made, one pair goes after Cell, while the other pair find Gero's lab with pupil Cell and destroys that. Trunks leads the team that will search for the lab because he knows where it is, and knows what's going on in this situation, and it's his sole duty to stop the threat of Cell in this timeline. Piccolo leads the team that will try to find Imperfect Cell. Piccolo has to pick between Tenshinhan and Kuririn. He'd pick the better, stronger choice to help him track down Cell, right? Of course he would. Cell is extremely strong and dangerous. Again, that seems like common sense to me. Well, anyways...Do you remember who Piccolo picked? Check it out right here. Oh yeah, now look at this scan. It seems that Tenshinhan wants to help pretty badly, doesn't it? The reason he didn't go into the ROSAT near the end of the android saga saga was because only the Saiyans had a chance against Perfect Cell. He STILL wouldn't have been able to help in any way even if he went in the ROSAT, thus why he didn't. He knew that the Saiyans were the only chance, and he knew that he would die anyways if they failed. Once again, the Saiyans were the only chance for this last battle. The lives of everyone hung on their shoulders. If they failed, then everyone would parish. There was no need for him to train for this final battle with Cell. That however does not mean he quit training for the rest of his life. That is an absurd thought and there is no proof to back up that statement.

Tenshinhan's During Those 7 Years After Cell
Krillin and Yamcha are both known to have settled down completely after Cell's death. Krillin because of his family to be, and Yamcha because he just didn't like fighting anymore. Krillin and Yamcha both hung up there martial arts training gis as shown, but Tenshinhan didn't. As for his training regimes not being shown, why would they? He told the others he wouldn't even see them again, so why would Akira show anything about him? Then again, they never really showed his training methods to begin with. Let's focus on the main training first. Did they show his training with Master Shen? Nope. Master Roshi? Nope. Kami and Popo? One scan. North Kaio? Nope. Okay, now what about his other training sessions? How about the timeline from DB-DBZ? Nope. How about that intense 3 years of training? Besides that manga cover I already shown, nope. It never shows him training in the manga like the others IE Vegeta, Piccolo, Gohan, Goku...because he is a minor supporting character. It's the same with Yamcha and Kuririn. Now, for some proof. Tenshinhan is shown in rocky area with his shirt off, in his martial arts clothing and is sweating. From my perspective it's obvious that he was training. The only other option would be that Tenshinhan sensed the energy attacks coming towards him, quickly threw off his cape and martial-arts robe for some reason and dodged the little, weak ki attacks meant for humans and sweated while dodging one of Buu's ki beams. One ki beam was meant for Choutzu and the other one was for Tenshinhan. Honestly, if Choutzu could dodge it then Tenshinhan would have no problem.Here’s the scan for reference.

Miscellaneous
1. Tenshinhan vs. Kuririn
If Kuririn was stronger, Tenshinhan would have had a little comment about it. He was training to surpass Goku afterall. When the androids appear he complains that he doesn't like how strong Piccolo and Vegeta have become. Well, wouldn't he say something about the little monk? Tenshinhan has always been stronger than Kuririn. Then one day Kuririn somehow surpasses him and Ten doesn't say anything about it...? The thing is, he didn't say anything even close to hinting it, and Tenshinhan probably has the second most pride next to Vegeta. This is not exactly evidence, but more of a personality trait, and something I'm pretty sure would have happened if Kuririn was indeed stronger, which I think I proved he wasn't.
2. Goku's Ancestory in 'Dragon Ball'
People considered Goku human in 'Dragon Ball', so they probably considered Tenshinhan human as well. Not at all. The manga holds the anime of DB and DBZ, and is called "Dragon Ball". Thus, we later discovery down the line of the manga that Goku is infact NOT human. This however never happened with Tenshinhan. Besides, people were always shocked when Goku showed off his tail, or turned into a giant monkey. They were the same shocked looks like when Tenshinhan split, or grew extra limbs. I'm pretty sure they knew Goku wasn't 'normal'. I also remember quotes like "what is he?" many times in the manga.
3. How strong and excellent of a fighter is Tenshinhan?
Tenshinhan should be use to comments about his strength and technique, as almost every fighter who fights him or at least witnesses him fight gives him at least one good comment. Even the strongest villian in the Dragon Ball manga seems to be impressed about his skill as seen here. As you can see, Boo says Tenshinhan is a "legendary fighter". Boo's knowledge of Tenshinhan should be derived from Piccolo as well, thus making this statement that much better. Kuririn gets get comments as well of course, but as the series progresses, no one even really comments about him anymore.

EDIT
If you want to take DBGT into account, then it once again points to Tenshinhan being stronger. Not only is Tenshinhan still in peak condition, but it looks like he hasn't aged AT ALL. Plus it helps that it looks like he was training when pans to him in GT.

Tenshinhan
Kuririn

Rocketman · Post by **Rocketman** » Mon Sep 25, 2006 9:49 pm

Duo wrote:
Rocketman wrote:Maybe Goku told Krillin to leave when they meet Androids 19 and 20 because Krillin had already been brought back to life by Shenron, not because Tenshinhan was much stronger.
Tenshinhan died too. Remember Nappa and the Kikoho?

Kuririn had actually died twice, but either way, Shenlong would laugh at both of them.

But Shenron's restriction is that he can't grant the same wish twice, not that he can't bring someone back who died before. Tien was brought back by Porunga.

Synthe · Post by **Synthe** » Mon Sep 25, 2006 9:55 pm

I'm confused are you talking about Tenshinhan Race or somethin else?

Drunken Master · Post by **Drunken Master** » Tue Sep 26, 2006 12:47 am

The general discussion is about how Tenshinhan isn't considered human or 100% human and how I think he was stronger than Kuririn 95% of the time.

Stoney · Post by **Stoney** » Tue Sep 26, 2006 8:59 am

I can't see how anybody could disagree with you anymore, you've become over obsessed.

Tenshinhan was always stronger then Kuririn, I think you've proven that. People are still uncertain about the whole race issue though. I'm still not sure, I wouldn't call him an alien, maybe just a different species of human. He certainly is different, but so are many other characters.

Drunken Master · Post by **Drunken Master** » Wed Sep 27, 2006 6:42 pm

I am obssesed. I'm going to make that post perfect! That's why I go around posting it, to see if someone can argue some points, add more to it, blah blah and ect.

Since the Daizenshuu states that he comes from another race other than human, I'm going to believe it. I mean, It's a fact that he's at least not considered 100% human now. 'Alien' in Dragon Ball isn't that weird, I mean...Saiyans don't look that alien-like. So many races are considered alien in Dragon Ball that I could easily believe that Tenshinhan isn't from Earth, or at least his ancestors.

Pedro The Hutt · Post by **Pedro The Hutt** » Wed Sep 27, 2006 7:49 pm

I like to think that Tenshinhan is human. The third eye and four arms can be nods at hinduism (where a third eye is the sign of someone who reached enlightment, and then there's Shiva).

And besides, around the time Toriyama introduced him Dragonball didn't take itself all that seriously yet. We still had guys winning thanks to not having a nose and weremen being put out of their wolf form forever by using the bald skull of the aforementioned guy. The third eye was probably a means of making the design more interesting (for one) and to keep Tenshinhan from being a giant sized version of Kuririn. (aka: So that Kuririn could keep on getting referred to as "the bald one" without causing confusion between the two)

Olivier Hague · Post by **Olivier Hague** » Wed Sep 27, 2006 7:53 pm

Pedro The Hutt wrote:I like to think that Tenshinhan is human. The third eye and four arms can be nods at hinduism (where a third eye is the sign of someone who reached enlightment, and then there's Shiva).

And Gokû's tail might be a nod to "The Journey to the West".

And besides, around the time Toriyama introduced him Dragonball didn't take itself all that seriously yet.

Around the time Toriyama introduced Gokû, "Dragon Ball" didn't take itself seriously at all.

Again, let's not confuse how Toriyama came up with the characters, and their origins in the story.

Pedro The Hutt · Post by **Pedro The Hutt** » Wed Sep 27, 2006 8:08 pm

Well, at the time he might as well have meant Goku to be human. The saiyajin thing didn't come along until quite a while into the story.

Buuuut that's a whole different debate.

Olivier Hague · Post by **Olivier Hague** » Wed Sep 27, 2006 9:07 pm

Pedro The Hutt wrote:Well, at the time he might as well have meant Goku to be human. The saiyajin thing didn't come along until quite a while into the story.

... and that's precisely my point.

Buuuut that's a whole different debate.

It's pretty much the same thing, on the contrary...

Post by **desirecampbell** » Wed Sep 27, 2006 9:49 pm

The difference between Goku, Piccolo, and Tien is that Toriyama made it very clear that Goku and Piccolo were aliens. There was never any mention that Tien might be anything except human.

Other than this one Daizenshuu entry, is there any reason to think he's not human? The third eye could simply be a nod to Journey to the west. It's a little physical quirk - it doesn't mean he's not human. Krillin (or whatever his name's supposed to be

) has no nose, and Choatzu may or may not be wearing makeup - they're still human. The extra arms and clone techniques are not indicative of alien ancestry - they're just techniques noone's seen before.

Casual Matt · Post by **Casual Matt** » Wed Sep 27, 2006 10:07 pm

desirecampbell wrote:Choatzu may or may not be wearing makeup

Well, excuse me if I'm quoting "filler" (I'm only really familiar with the anime) but I've seen Chaozu standing under a waterfall. Pretty sure the makeup would have come off if that's what it was.

Also, as much as I hate applying Math to Dragon Ball, here's a little formula I conjured up.

Tenshinhan > Kuririn

Olivier Hague · Post by **Olivier Hague** » Wed Sep 27, 2006 10:07 pm

desirecampbell wrote:The difference between Goku, Piccolo, and Tenshinhan is that Toriyama made it very clear that Goku and Piccolo were aliens. There was never any mention that Tenshinhan might be anything except human.

... except in the Daizenshû.
So the only difference is that Tenshinhan's ancestry never factored in the story. That's about it.

Other than this one Daizenshuu entry, is there any reason to think he's not human?

Why look for a second reason?