Episode 28 of Dragon Ball Super, first broadcast in Japan on January 24, 2016 and titled The 6th Universe's Destroyer! His Name is Champa! in the English dub, opens the Universe 6 Saga. Champa, Beerus's twin brother, crash-lands on Beerus's planet, and with him comes an idea that reshapes the series: there are twelve universes, and Goku's has a twin.
Summary
Some time after Frieza's defeat, Goku and Vegeta are training under Whis in absurdly heavy suits, doing push-ups on a single finger. Something slams into the planet, and a grumpy, freshly woken Beerus takes it out on the two Saiyans. The visitors turn out to be Champa, pot-bellied and vain, and his attendant Vados, whom Whis addresses as his big sister.
Over a meal, Champa tries to humiliate his brother with boiled eggs from a newly discovered bird. Vegeta finds them perfectly ordinary, while Beerus answers with a cup of instant ramen: Champa pretends not to care, but he is hooked. Whis explains to Goku and Vegeta that there are twelve universes, paired off like twins whose numbers always add up to thirteen. Theirs is Universe 7; Champa rules Universe 6.
Champa orders Vados to find his own universe's Earth, sure he can enjoy the same food there. Her staff shows a barren rock instead: its humans wiped themselves out in a war long ago. The brothers come to blows, and Whis and Vados have to step in before the fight endangers both universes. Champa then proposes a contest between five fighters from each side, with the winner allowed to swap Earths. The means is a set of planet-sized wish orbs, the originals from which the Namekians carved their Dragon Balls. Champa holds six and puts them up as the prize. The seventh is missing, but Goku is sure Bulma can build a radar. Beerus accepts, and Goku can barely contain himself.
Our take
This is a setup episode, almost all talk, but it lays the groundwork smartly. Champa is built as a funhouse mirror of Beerus: the same whims, the same obsession with food, the opposite body type, which becomes an instant source of jokes. It works because sibling rivalry is a simple, readable comic engine, and because Vados, polite and razor-sharp, steals every scene in which she corrects her god.
The real novelty is the cosmology. Until now Dragon Ball had a single universe. With the rule of twins adding up to thirteen, Super opens the multiverse without overcomplicating it, and instant ramen as the cause of a divine feud remains one of the show's best gags: these gods can erase planets, yet they squabble over dinner.
Trivia
- Written by King Ryū and directed by Yukihiko Nakao, with Yoshitaka Yashima handling both storyboards and animation direction.
- It drew a 6.0% rating in Japan.
- The matching part of Toyotarō's manga is chapter 5.
- In Japanese, Champa is voiced by Mitsuo Iwata rather than by Kōichi Yamadera, who voices Beerus; in Funimation's dub he is played by Jason Liebrecht.
- The wish orbs are later called Super Dragon Balls, the name the rest of the saga uses.
Did you know? Goku points out that Universe 7's Earth has come close to destruction plenty of times too, and names Vegeta as one of the people who tried. The prince tells him not to drag up ancient history.
Characters
- Goku, Vegeta, Beerus and Whis
- Champa and Vados