Herms watches the show (update: DB 29)

[TheDevilsCorpse]

Yamcha should have beaten Ran Fan in this tournament. His entire character arc in the first saga was overcoming his fear of women, and thus Ran Fan would have been the perfect match-up for him.

He got worfed far too quickly.

To be fair, according to Toriyama, he never really got over that. With the post Buu Arc content about his fear of women ruining his job at a host club, Bluma seems to have been an exception.

[RandomGuy96]

Wow. Toriyama must hate Yamcha.

I find it kind of funny that the anime added that blue ki thing to Roshi's hand. It's like they were desperately trying to make Yamcha seem even a little bit less pathetic.

[Kid Buu]

Yamcha should have beaten Ran Fan in this tournament. His entire character arc in the first saga was overcoming his fear of women, and thus Ran Fan would have been the perfect match-up for him.

He got worfed far too quickly.

To be fair, according to Toriyama, he never really got over that. With the post Buu Arc content about his fear of women ruining his job at a host club, Bluma seems to have been an exception.

He did overcome his fear of females. He never once shrieks away from Chichi and Lunch, who he spend almost the entire Cell and Daimao arc with respectively, like he did with Bulma in his debut. You can be nervous around females without fearing them to the point of running away at the sight of them.

And that is the humor of him fighting Ran Fan. The one guy who is nervous around females has to fight the female who is trying to use her sexuality as a weapon.

[Adamant]

--In the anime the announcer starts to call Goku “Mago Go-sora” again when announcing the first set of matches to the audience, but corrects himself halfway through. I don’t think he does this in the manga, but I can’t check right now.

It's anime-only.

[Herms]

Is the episode title really Quarterfinals Begin? I could've sworn it was Quarterfinals Continue...

It's "Quaterfinals Begin" on the Season One set.

Episode 23
He’s Here! The Mighty Foe Giran

--The recap starts off with some new though (mostly) still images of the tournament audience cheering. The sky is cloudy overhead, and a kid looks up in concern. Foreshadowing! Then it just shows clips of the fights from the last few episodes. Jackie Chun’s glowing blue hands when he blows Yamcha out of bounds look even weirder seeing it for a second time.

--Then there’s some more (somewhat) new stuff with the tournament announcer proclaiming the start of the fourth match. He also comments on the lousy weather. Foreshadowing, again! Giran and Goku step on out and prepare to square off, but just as the announcer is midway through shouting “begin!”, rain starts to fall. The tournament audience scurries for cover, but Goku and Giran are totally unfazed, and continue glaring at each other ready to go. Even after the announcer declares the match postponed due to rain, they just keep staring…and staring…completely motionless...while lightning flashes dramatically. There’s some nice use of shadow, to cover the lack of much actual animation. Finally, mercifully, the title card comes.

--The scene described above is mostly anime-only (the whole “match postponed due to bad weather” plot isn’t in the manga at all), but it also incorporates some manga material: Giran’s introduction, Bulma and Oolong’s reactions to same, as well as Goku arriving with a rather uncharacteristic “Kon’nichi wa! Ora Son Goku desu!” However, here Goku shows up right away, while in the manga he’s off taking a nap somewhere and has to be hauled out on stage. The anime moves this part to later, when Goku and Giran finally get to fight for real.

--Besides giraffes and dinosaurs, the fleeing audience includes a truly indescribable man who runs straight towards the camera. I should probably start taking screencaps or something. But not now. There’s also a guy near Bulma wearing a hat that seems to just say “Rain”.

--Giran’s roar as he steps into the ring is less than convincing in Japanese. He sounds like he’s yawning.

--The Funi episode title: “Monster Beast Giran”. “Monster beast” seems to be how they translate kaiju (meaning “monster”, but literally “mysterious beast”). These days the word kaiju is a lot more well-known thanks to Pacific Rim of course. I wonder if Funi would just leave the word untranslated if they were dubbing this today.

--This episode sees the debut of the cool tournament title card, which features the kanji for “martial” (the “bu” in “budokai”) being written out to the accompaniment of dramatic music. This’ll be turning up a few more times.

--After the title card, we get a pretty lengthy filler scene as everyone hangs out at the local bar waiting for the weather to improve. A guy who looks suspiciously like Papa Tsun from Dr. Slump is at the piano playing music that sounds suspiciously like what was played at the bar where Lunch first appeared in the anime. Yamcha warns Goku that Giran has won lots of tournaments here and there (backstory we never get in the manga) and has a reputation for doing anything to win (apparently just based off the one very mild trick he plays on Goku in the manga, and the cheap nature of his Guru-Guru Gum technique). And at that moment, who should stroll into the bar but Giran, wearing…a trench coat and hat to match.

Giran. Wearing a trench coat.

With two awkward lumps on the back where his wings are.

This is easily the greatest image in the anime so far.

Anyway, Giran (who’s wearing a trench coat), sits near some more jerks from Oorin Temple, different from the two Kuririn met a few episodes ago, but about as intelligent. One of them is a big fat guy voiced by Daisuke Gori. They make fun of Giran for ordering milk, and say the tournament must be in really bad shape if losers like this can pass the preliminaries. Another Oorin jerk walks in and trips over Giran’s tail (“Why don’t you put your stupid tail somewhere else?!”), and a fight breaks out. Giran first knocks the Oorin guys off their feet with a swing of his tail. One of them comes at him with a flurry of punches, but Giran dodges them easily enough (“you’ll live 0.1 seconds longer than the others” Giran tells the guy). As the bartender pours him more milk, Giran knocks the group down for good with a series of punches and kicks. When he tries to go kick them while they’re down though, Yamcha butts in and tells him to cut it out, with Goku right behind him. Giran doesn’t like this one bit; he says goody-goodies give him a rash. After throwing off his trench coat onto Goku (who gets tangled up in it and confused), he goes after Yamcha. If you’ve been paying attention to filler so far, you won’t be surprised to know that Yamcha impressively dodges Giran’s attacks, though he hurts himself when Giran directly blocks his kick.

Giran may have lost the coat, but he still has his hat on. In case you were wondering.

Goku finally frees himself from the coat, and he and Giran start to fight, but Jackie Chun intervenes to calm things down. He points out that the two of them might as well just settle this in the ring, especially since they’re probably get disqualified if they keep this barroom brawl up. They agree and everyone goes their merry way.

--Thanks to the rain and the bar fight scene, the first half of the episode is virtually all filler, leaving the second half of the episode to cover two entire chapters. There’s a brief bit at the start showing the bruised Oorin guys crawling out of the bar, but that’s about it for filler, if you can even call that filler. Two chapters, in half an episode! As a result, the second half is pretty much just a straightforward, no frills added animated version of how Goku and Giran’s match plays out in the manga. Except when Goku bursts his way out of the Guru-Guru Gum, it’s still stretched out for damn well forever. Oh well.

--The rescheduled match features the bit where Goku oversleeps and is late for the match, as mentioned earlier. I really like how it’s Lan-Fan that finds Goku, if only because it shows she doesn’t just vanish into the aether after losing, the way Bacterian seems to have done.

--More audience member hats with random stuff on them: one guy’s hat has “U2”, while another one has “Bird” (a reference to Bird Studios).

--The episode ends with an anime-only shot of what I assume is Kinto-un flying high above the tournament ring. If it is Kinto-un, then this is a rare image of the cloud hanging out on its own, without Goku, and not zooming down to pick Goku up.

[Valerius Dover]

I have the Season 1 set, so I must've simply misremembered.

[alakazam^]

Anyway, Giran (who’s wearing a trench coat), sits near some more jerks from Oorin Temple, different from the two Kuririn met a few episodes ago, but about as intelligent. One of them is a big fat guy voiced by Daisuke Gori.

Didn't he voice the tall, skinny one?

[Gyt Kaliba]

--The Funi episode title: “Monster Beast Giran”. “Monster beast” seems to be how they translate kaiju (meaning “monster”, but literally “mysterious beast”). These days the word kaiju is a lot more well-known thanks to Pacific Rim of course. I wonder if Funi would just leave the word untranslated if they were dubbing this today.

Did Pacific Rim really make the term all the more known to US fans? I mean, it is the first movie in the US to blatantly use the term I think, but I still would have thought a lot of people would know it just from Godzilla...but I guess that would still entail more to the 'nerds' of us rather than Joe off the streets. As for if they would have left it untranslated if they were dubbing it today? Hmm...kind of hard to call really. A lot of people tend to associate kaiju only with the 'giant' monsters, so for something like Giran, I dunno if they'd have left it alone and invited in that confusion from fans who were familiar with the term but not necessarily it's real definition.

[JulieYBM]

Anyway, Giran (who’s wearing a trench coat), sits near some more jerks from Oorin Temple, different from the two Kuririn met a few episodes ago, but about as intelligent. One of them is a big fat guy voiced by Daisuke Gori.

Didn't he voice the tall, skinny one?

Gouri voices the tall skinny one in Episode #20, but the fat one in Episode #23.

[B]

--The rescheduled match features the bit where Goku oversleeps and is late for the match, as mentioned earlier. I really like how it’s Lan-Fan that finds Goku, if only because it shows she doesn’t just vanish into the aether after losing, the way Bacterian seems to have done.

Yeah, I feel it would've really opened up the Dragon World ever-so-slightly more if the tournament peeps had stuck around/popped up more. They're a colorful, lively bunch. But alas, considering how much Saiyans dwarf everybody, what could the likes of Ran-Fan or Panpoot have even done?

[MCDaveG]

I really enjoy this topic!
Go on Herms! I wonder how quickly you will finish the series and what will be your toughts
I see that you are more fan of the manga?

I remember that filler in rainy day as Giran fights the monks in German trailer for DB on RTL II
when I was watching it as a kid. It was somewhat recorded to my head forever, as I saw it like 200 times.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjQzbah9qCE

[DNA]

But alas, considering how much Saiyans dwarf everybody, what could the likes of Ran-Fan or Panpoot have even done?

Funny you should mention Panpoot. I've been thinking about that and it would have made much more sense to have Panpoot be eliminated by Goku in the preliminaries and have King Chapa take his place; you know, a much more interesting characater?

[Kid Buu]

But alas, considering how much Saiyans dwarf everybody, what could the likes of Ran-Fan or Panpoot have even done?

Funny you should mention Panpoot. I've been thinking about that and it would have made much more sense to have Panpoot be eliminated by Goku in the preliminaries and have King Chapa take his place; you know, a much more interesting characater?

Someone made a point (I *think* JulieYBM) that it would have been interesting had Goku battled Bora at the 22nd Budokai. I would have to agree.

[RandomGuy96]

After throwing off his trench coat onto Goku (who gets tangled up in it and confused), he goes after Yamcha. If you’ve been paying attention to filler so far, you won’t be surprised to know that Yamcha impressively dodges Giran’s attacks, though he hurts himself when Giran directly blocks his kick.

Okay, so now we have a firmly established pecking order: Giran (+hat) >= Yamcha, and trench coat > Goku. Also, Goku > Giran. Therefore trench coat > Giran. Giran should have brought one to his match instead of relying on that ineffective technique he actually used.

In all seriousness, this isn't a big deal compared to the later exploits of Filler Yamcha. You may not decide to watch far enough to see the episode with that Filler Yamcha feat everyone always talks about (it's literally hundreds of episodes away, after all), but Filler Yamcha does make a memorable appearance with a fight in the Daimao arc.

--The Funi episode title: “Monster Beast Giran”. “Monster beast” seems to be how they translate kaiju (meaning “monster”, but literally “mysterious beast”). These days the word kaiju is a lot more well-known thanks to Pacific Rim of course. I wonder if Funi would just leave the word untranslated if they were dubbing this today.

Probably not. The viewers would probably just be confused as to why he's so small (6'5.5), and wonder if he's a baby.

Anyway, Giran (who’s wearing a trench coat), sits near some more jerks from Oorin Temple, different from the two Kuririn met a few episodes ago, but about as intelligent. One of them is a big fat guy voiced by Daisuke Gori

You should start a RBGVBDG count. They're EVERYWHERE.

[Kid Buu]

You know, this Yamcha>RBGVBDG thing has got me wondering:

Is Yamcha the only character to be killed by someone with a mutual voice actor?

[ABED]

What is RBGVBDG?

[Kid Buu]

Really
Big
Guy
Voiced
By
Daisuke
Gori

[dbgtFO]

Really
Big
Guy
Voiced
By
Daisuke
Gori

I think Herms had the R stand for "Requisite."

[Herms]

It's been a little while, but to make up for it here's a double episode, semi-finals special!

Episode 24
Kuririn’s Desperate Offensive-Defensive Battle

--The Funi episode title is “Krillin’s Frantic Attack!”, which is pretty much the same thing.

--This episode and the next both cover three whole manga chapters, so there’s pretty much no filler worth mentioning. Like, at all. Unless you count the opening recap or that brief moment where the tournament announcer almost drops Kuririn while carrying him for the battle reenactment thingy. That’s about it.

--This is where we learn that Goku is actually 12, rather than 14 as initially claimed (strictly speaking, he’s currently 12 going on 13 according to the official timeline). It seems like Toriyama eventually decided that Goku looked too young to be 14, and threw in this little retcon. Still, the gag that Goku thought 14 came after 11 is pretty good. Perhaps mirroring Toriyama’s thoughts, Bulma says she always thought Goku was way too little to be 14, and that “his hair hadn’t even come in!” I assume she’s not talking about chest hair…

--The bit where the announcer asks if Goku’s tail is real, and he demonstrates it is by mooning the whole audience, really reminds me of Forrest Gump. Of course, this came out about 10 years earlier.

--Everyone at the tournament is completely amazed to hear that Goku and Kuririn were trained by Muten Roshi. I guess this cements the idea that he’s world famous under the name “Muten Roshi” but not as “Kame-sennin”. Back in episode 3 Pilaf and co. had no clue who Kame-sennin was, though that whole segment was filler.

--A three second long bit of “filler” that I ordinarily wouldn’t bother with but will write up because this episode is so annoyingly faithful to the manga: Yamcha tries to pull off Jackie Chun’s wig to prove he’s Muten Roshi, but Jackie dodges so fast that he leaves behind an afterimage. A nice bit of foreshadowing for the end of Jackie and Kuririn’s match.

--Jackie Chun on the subject of anatomy: “That cute kid over there is a girl! She’s got boobies, but she hasn’t got a winky!”

--In the shot of Bulma and her fellow audience members’ appalled reaction to Jackie Chun’s song, there’s a little girl who looks suspiciously like Arale over to the left.

--The scene where Jackie and Kuririn have to slowly reenact a ridiculously long sequence of events that occurred during one brief instant of their fight so that the audience can understand what’s going on is great, but logically this ought to be a constant problem in virtually all fights we see from here on out. But, nothing like this ever happens again. Well, you know what they say about a foolish consistency…

--In the manga, the pair of panties that Kuririn pulls out to distract Jackie are labelled “girl’s panties”, as if he got them from a museum exhibit or something. They’re not labelled in the anime. As a side note, the Viz manga for some strange reason changed the label to “If found, please return to Bulma”, which is pretty weird considering Kuririn and Bulma only just briefly met each other right before the tournament started. Kuririn…acts fast. Apparently.

--Jackie’s the first person we see using the Kamehameha to propel himself in a certain direction, rather than as a direct attack. Goku’s going to be doing that quite a lot, until Bukujutsu makes it obsolete.

--I understand the idea behind afterimages, but the way the series portrays them as just hanging in the air long, long after the fact makes no sense. It’s one of those stylization things you just have to go with.

Episode 25
Get Up, Goku! The Fearsome Tenku Peke-ji Ken

--The opening recap shows scenes from all the matches so far, with the appropriate section of the tournament chart superimposed. Pretty neat, though it’s kind of a waste for anyone who can’t read Japanese.

--Before the match starts, in the manga there’s a panel of Namu remembering all the annoying villagers who are relying on him to bring back water. The anime expands this slightly by showing another replay of the flashback from a few episodes ago. And…that’s basically it for filler this episode.

--The tournament audience this episode includes dead-ringers for the Oorin Temple seniors Kuririn encountered during the preliminaries, Sherman Priest and Grampa Baozi from episode 4, and…Android No.8, putting in a very early appearance. OK, that’s probably just a generic Frankenstein monster, but still.

--The anime keeps showing Namu’s custom background with floating Buddha statues, whenever he’s praying/concentrating/looking intense.

--Namu counters Goku’s afterimage technique by closing his eyes and concentrating, which allows him to home in on the real Goku. It seems like an extension of the way he beats Lan-Fan, but it also seems like a precursor to ki-sensing. A little bit.

--The Funi subtitles never provide a translation for Tenku Peke-ji Ken, but it’s basically “Heavenly X-Mark Attack”. Specifically, peke refers to x-marks as used to indicate the wrong answer on tests and whatnot. I think the joke is that it seems a bit out of place in an otherwise traditional fancy kanji attack name.

--While using said X attack, Namu intones “Namu Amida Butsu”, a traditional prayer to Amitabha Buddhe. As you might guess, this is where Namu’s name comes from in the first place (as well as his two brothers, Ami and Dabu). Namu later tells the crowd that “I too believe in the Buddha. I will not take a life”. This is all probably the most direct reference we get to a real world religion in the series, as opposed to all that nonsense with slug men and fruit people.

--When Namu learns Jackie Chun’s true identity, he starts to shout out “so you really are Muten Roshi”, but Jackie stops him, saying that the others might overhear. Pan over to Goku, Kuririn, and Yamcha, who are standing about six, seven feet away, tops. Yeah, they might possibly overhear.

--As Jackie’s thinking about how he’ll have to go all-out against Goku and can’t underestimate him, the anime shows him up against an abstract background that features a dragon, for some reason.

[Kamiccolo9]

--The bit where the announcer asks if Goku’s tail is real, and he demonstrates it is by mooning the whole audience, really reminds me of Forrest Gump. Of course, this came out about 10 years earlier.

About this, the Forrest Gump book was published in 1986. Not sure if that particular scene is in the book, though.