Episode 4 of Dragon Ball GT, broadcast in Japan on February 28, 1996 and titled The Most Wanted List in Funimation's dub, is a proper nighttime heist. Goku, Trunks and Pan break into Don Kee's palace to recover their confiscated ship and pull it off, if with a lot less style than they hoped. The bill arrives the next day: their faces are on every poster on Imecka.
Summary
Pan stuffs the robot that swallowed the radar into her backpack, determined not to let it escape. Goku tries to get everyone to the ship with Instant Transmission, but the technique fails twice: his new child's body can no longer control it. That leaves flying to Don Kee's palace, where the ship sits in the courtyard under the watch of an army of soldiers.
The plan is to sneak up on it, and it goes wrong almost immediately. A soldier tosses away an empty can that hits Pan on the head, and Trunks has to clamp a hand over her mouth before her crying gives them away. Moments later a rock drops onto Trunks' own head and the noise draws the guards. At that point stealth is pointless: the three knock out the soldiers one after another, and Pan jumps behind the wheel of the vehicle carrying the ship and tears off at full speed. During the escape, Don Kee's bodyguard Ledgic shows up for the first time and bats away one of Goku's blasts with ease.
Don Kee is livid: as far as he is concerned, those three foreigners still owe him a pile of money. Hidden outside the city, Trunks inspects the damage. Pan's reckless driving has only made things worse, and fixing the ship will take a part they can only find at the market.
The next morning, the moment they set foot in town, people run and shopkeepers slam their shutters. The reason is plastered on every wall: Goku, Trunks and Pan top Imecka's most wanted list, complete with a bounty. When they hear the guards coming, the trio has to duck back into the alleys.
Our take
After an episode spent setting the scene, the Imecka arc gets going with a miniature heist story played more for laughs than for action. The can bouncing off Pan's head and the rock landing on Trunks are classic cartoon gags, and they work because they puncture an infiltration the heroes are taking very seriously. GT will drop this tone soon enough, but here it still feels fresh.
The most interesting moment, though, is the misfiring Instant Transmission. It is the first concrete sign that being a kid again is not just about height: Goku has lost his grip on techniques he took for granted, and the series uses it to keep him a step behind the all-powerful warrior from the end of Z. Without that handicap, the trip across the galaxy would be over in minutes.
Ledgic's brief cameo is enough to signal that Imecka has at least one opponent worth taking seriously, and the wanted poster is a fun closer that sets up the next episode's showdown nicely.
Trivia
- Written by Masashi Kubota, his first script for the series, and directed by Yoshihiro Ueda, with Toshiyuki Kanno as animation director.
- It drew a 16.5% rating share in Japan, almost three points below the first three episodes.
- Don Kee, Ledgic and the king's two aides, Sheela and Gale, all debut here.
- In Japanese, Sheela is voiced by Megumi Urawa, who had voiced young Uub in Dragon Ball Z.
- Funimation's English title, The Most Wanted List, is far tamer than the Japanese one, which brands Goku an outlaw.
Characters
- Goku, Trunks and Pan
- Giru
- Don Kee, Sheela and Gale
- Ledgic
- Soldiers of the Imeckian army