Episode 106 of Dragon Ball Super, first broadcast in Japan on September 3, 2017 and titled Find them Out! Deathmatch with a Furtive Attacker! in Funimation's dub, turns the Tournament of Power into a war movie for twenty minutes. A shooter nobody can see picks fighters off from afar, Piccolo loses his arms twice, and Tien leaves the tournament with a final move that earns him a draw.
Summary
After his battle with Ganos, Master Roshi asks Goku to let him rest in a quiet corner of the arena. Nearby, Gohan and Piccolo are facing Dr. Rota, the boar-like fighter from Universe 6, who is about to explain why he is called "doctor". He never gets the chance: a beam out of nowhere knocks him flat mid-sentence.
The sniper is invisible and gives off no ki to sense. The shots are pinpoint, and when Piccolo breaks cover to change position, one of them takes his arm clean off. He regrows it, then stretches the other one out as bait to work out where the fire is coming from. The pair spot small red orbs floating over the field: they serve as eyes and as mirrors for the shots. Even inside a smokescreen the enemy finds them, because he is tracking their body heat. Piccolo loses both arms again, and regenerating that often is starting to drain him.
Meanwhile Tien finds the unconscious Rota and warns Goku and Vegeta as they arrive. The Saiyan prince waves the threat away until a beam grazes his head. Watching from a distance, the three work out the trick: Prum of Universe 2, the one producing the orbs, is not shooting at all. He only reflects the blasts of the real sniper, his teammate Harmira, who is hidden somewhere else.
Goku and Vegeta go after Prum, but their energy waves bounce right off him, so they switch to hurling boulders, which he cannot deflect. Tien splits into four to hunt Harmira down: more eyes to search with, but four weaker, slower bodies. Three copies are shot down, and the fourth gets close enough to hit Harmira with a Neo Tri-Beam. The sniper seems to give up, then fires at the ground under Tien's feet and sends him falling off the stage. The three copies, however, reappear and drag Harmira down with them. With no one left to reflect, Prum is helpless; Rota gets back up looking for revenge, and Vegeta clears both of them out with a Galick Gun. Thirty-two minutes remain.
Our take
This is one of the tournament episodes that switches genre without warning, and that is its strength. For most of the runtime there is no head-on fight, just a hunt: cover, decoys, heat signatures, the fear of raising your head. The idea of a fake sniper reflecting a hidden partner's shots is simple and effective, because it forces the heroes to think instead of charge.
The heart of it, though, is Tien. The series had sidelined him for years, and here it gives him a veteran's exit: he uses a classic technique, figures out where the enemy is before anyone else, and when he gets tricked he already has the counter in place. Beerus praises him for forcing a draw, but Tien is not satisfied, and rightly so: for a martial artist of his school, leaving the ring is still a loss. After Krillin and Roshi, Universe 7 is down another man, and Vegeta closes with his usual arrogance: fine, he will just take care of everyone left himself.
Trivia
- Written by Hiroshi Yamaguchi and directed by Takahiro Imamura, with Yūichi Karasawa and Masahiro Shimanuki as animation directors. It drew a 5.0% rating in Japan.
- The Grand Minister has to explain to the two Zenos what a "sniper" is.
- Toyotarō's manga has no equivalent: Tien is knocked out by Frost there, and Prum, Harmira and Rota exit without showing any special abilities.
Did you know? The sniper only stuns Rota for a reason: in the Tournament of Power, killing an opponent means disqualification, so even the most ruthless marksman has to hold back.
Characters
- Gohan, Piccolo, Tien, Goku and Vegeta
- Prum, Harmira and Dr. Rota
- Master Roshi
- Beerus, Whis, the Grand Minister and the two Zenos