Dragon Ball Episode 133: Reunion Before the Storm

Dragon Ball Episode 133: three years later, a tall, grown-up Goku shows up for the 23rd World Martial Arts Tournament. Then Ma Junior appears at the prelims.

Updated on October 19, 20264 min read

Episode 133 of Dragon Ball, first broadcast in Japan on November 9, 1988 and known in the English dub as Changes, is the big time skip: three years have passed since King Piccolo's defeat, and everyone gathers for the 23rd World Martial Arts Tournament. The Goku who turns up at registration has changed so much that nobody recognizes him. After a run of anime-original episodes, the series goes back to following the manga here, and it does so with one of its warmest reunions.

Summary

Outside the tournament registration desk, Master Roshi and Launch are waiting for the others. Oolong, Puar and Bulma arrive first, Bulma sporting yet another new look. While she struggles to retrieve a little girl's balloon caught in a tree, a tall young man wearing a turban helps her out and calls her by name. It is Goku, but nobody realizes it until he takes off the turban and reveals his unmistakable spiky hair. Everyone is stunned by how much he has grown, and Bulma even finds him rather handsome.

Tien, Krillin, Yamcha and Chiaotzu keep everyone waiting and show up with barely a minute left before registration closes. Krillin, proud of having grown a little, finds himself facing a Goku who is two heads taller. After a moment of hesitation the two best friends hug, and Krillin finally gets to thank Goku for bringing him back to life. Roshi has booked a hotel for the whole group, and that evening they sit and talk while rain pours outside. The old master announces that he will not compete this year, and explains that he did not hand out the school uniforms the boys are wearing: they had them made themselves, out of respect. Meanwhile lightning strikes the town's clock tower, and a mysterious fighter saves a mother and her child from the falling debris.

The next morning, at the preliminary grounds, Krillin and Yamcha notice that Goku's tail is gone. He explains that Kami removed it so that the moon could be put back. At that moment Goku and Tien sense a familiar presence: among the entrants is a tall young man in a turban, with green skin. It is Ma Junior, King Piccolo's heir.

Our take

This is the episode where Dragon Ball sheds its skin. Goku is no longer the little boy with a tail, and the direction underlines it by building everything around recognition: the turban, the hair, the hug with Krillin. These scenes run on the affection built up over 132 episodes, and they land.

The anime additions pull in two directions. The balloon and the rainy night at the hotel stretch the reunion out, sometimes a little too far. The scene of Piccolo saving a mother and child, on the other hand, is an odd choice for a character introduced as the new demon to beat, and it almost seems to foreshadow the more nuanced Piccolo still to come.

The original title, "Reunion Before the Storm", says it all: the celebration is short-lived, and the final shot already hints at war.

Trivia

  • The episode adapts chapter 166 of Akira Toriyama's manga. It drew a 19.0% ratings share in Japan.
  • The balloon, the night at the hotel and the rescue of the mother and child are anime-only. In the manga, Krillin and the others also arrive almost right after Goku rather than at the last minute.
  • It was written by Takao Koyama and directed by Yoshihiro Ueda, with Katsumi Aoshima as animation supervisor.
  • In the Funimation dub, Sean Schemmel and Sonny Strait take over as Goku and Krillin from this episode, now that both characters have grown up.
  • Goku debuts the short-sleeved undershirt that becomes part of his signature outfit for the rest of the series and much of Dragon Ball Z. Bulma and Yamcha get makeovers too: shoulder-length hair for her, long hair and facial scars for him.
  • In Japanese, both Goku and the narrator describe Ma Junior as King Piccolo's alter ego rather than his reincarnation.

Did you know? From this episode on, the Japanese version uses the fourth and final version of the ending sequence. In that footage, for reasons never explained, Yamcha's scars are missing.

Characters