The twenty-seventh episode of Dragon Ball Super, broadcast in Japan on January 17, 2016, closes the Resurrection 'F' Saga with the most drastic ending possible. Vegeta reveals he has reached the divine form on his own and humiliates Frieza, who destroys the planet out of spite. It takes a power nobody knew about, Whis', to give Goku a second chance.
Summary
Vegeta explains he cannot let Goku die, because he needs him to keep getting stronger, and scolds him for being caught off guard after Whis' warnings. He orders Krillin to give him a senzu bean and, when Frieza tries to stop it, deflects the beam into Sorbet, who dies instantly. Goku is back on his feet; Vegeta warns him that in return he is taking the best part for himself. Then he too transforms into the blue-haired Super Saiyan.
Master Roshi is stunned, and Goku points out that, unlike him, Vegeta got there on his own power. Frieza bombards him with blasts, the prince swats them all away and pounds him mercilessly: the tyrant is out of stamina, and Vegeta has the ruthlessness Goku lacks. Golden Frieza reverts to his normal form. Vegeta raises his hand for the final blow: Frieza's era is over. The tyrant replies that none of them will ever come back to life either, and blows up Earth.
As the planet crumbles, the warriors' families go about their day unaware: Videl and Pan, Android 18 and Marron, Mr. Satan and Buu, Goten and Trunks at the Lookout, Bulma's parents at the table. Among the debris floats a chunk of land protected by Whis' shield, with Beerus, Bulma, Goku and the other onlookers; Vegeta and everyone else are dead. Beerus and Whis point out that Frieza can survive in a vacuum, so he is almost certainly alive.
Goku blames himself for not finishing him when he could, and Whis offers him a way to fix it: he can rewind time. Goku remembers the moon Whis did not want to "fix", and the angel recalls the time Beerus destroyed their sun and he went back to stop him. The limit is three minutes, and afterwards he will not be able to do it again for a long while: Goku gets one shot. Time returns to the moment Vegeta is about to deliver the final blow; this time Goku transforms, flies up and erases Frieza with a Kamehameha. Vegeta protests until the others explain what happened. Jaco swears he saw no time crime, Goku goes to revive Piccolo with the Namekian Dragon Balls, and Gohan rushes home to hug Videl and Pan.
At the dinner at Capsule Corporation, Trunks says that if Frieza ever comes back, he and Goten will slice him in two, and the adults all turn to stare. Gohan asks Piccolo to take him on as a student again, and Goku and Vegeta agree, for the first time ever, that they do not want to work together. In Hell, Frieza is once again hanging from his tree among the fairies and stuffed animals.
Our take
The ending is the film's, including the much-debated time rewind, which takes the sting out of Earth's destruction. But the TV series sets it up better, with the unrepaired moon from episode 20, and adds a precious epilogue: Gohan asking his master for help again closes the arc that began with Piccolo's death. And Trunks' line is a little gem for anyone who remembers his future self.
Trivia
- Written by Yoshifumi Fukushima and directed by Takao Iwai, with Shūichirō Manabe, Kazuhiro Koyama and Tatsuya Oka as animation directors. It drew a 5.2% rating in Japan.
- It is Vegeta's first transformation into the form later called Super Saiyan Blue.
- The series continues with the Universe 6 Saga.