Episode 58 of Dragon Ball Super, first broadcast in Japan on September 11, 2016, is an investigation episode. After their defeat in the future, the heroes lick their wounds and try to line up the clues, while in the past Zamasu gathers the information he needs. Whis's theory looks airtight, but it leaves a hole at the most crucial point.
Summary
On Zuno's planet, Zamasu sits through the same lecture Bulma once heard: the Super Dragon Balls were made by the Dragon God Zalama and are scattered across Universes 6 and 7. Losing patience, he only wants to know how to use them. Zuno explains that the wish must be made in the language of the gods, with a rather silly pun to summon the dragon, and that after the last use one must wait the lifespan of a cockroach, roughly a year. Under threat, the know-it-all also reveals where the balls are and everything he knows about Son Goku.
At Capsule Corporation, Bulma patches up Goku, Vegeta and Trunks with senzu beans and scolds Goku for leaving the bag in the bathroom. Their account of the future stuns her: Zamasu is immortal and Black has a new form with what she considers a terrible name. Goku wants to head straight back, but how do you beat an enemy who cannot be hurt? His idea, becoming immortal by eating senzu beans nonstop, runs into the limits of their supply.
Beerus, Whis and Shin arrive with news: Zuno has warned the Supreme Kai that Zamasu asked him about the Super Dragon Balls and about Goku. Whis then pieces together a theory. Beaten by Goku, Zamasu might have used the balls to create a copy of the Saiyan and, a year later, to make himself immortal; with a Time Ring he could even skip the wait. But only a Supreme Kai can use a Time Ring, and Zamasu is still an apprentice, so the obvious conclusion is that he will kill Gowasu to take his. One mystery remains: a copy of Goku should have Goku's energy, not Zamasu's.
In the future, Mai and Yajirobe rejoin the survivors, including the children Haru and Maki, and she urges everyone not to give up. In the present, Shin takes Goku, Beerus and Whis to Universe 10 while Vegeta stays on Earth. Gowasu says Zamasu has been gone since morning and that his doubts about mortals seem to be behind him. Goku blurts out that Zamasu is doing terrible things in the future, and Beerus shuts him up. Right then the apprentice walks in with a tray: "I've brought the tea."
Our take
The episode is almost all talk, yet it holds up. The Zuno scene plays as dark comedy, and Whis's turn as a drawing-room mystery, with the angel as the detective laying out the solution before admitting that one piece does not fit. Anyone who knows what comes next knows that piece, the energy signature, is the key to everything.
The return to the future is a welcome touch too, with Mai keeping the survivors' spirits up. The series finally gives her an adult role, far from the comic sidekick she was in Pilaf's gang.
Trivia
- Written by Toshio Yoshitaka and directed by Hideki Hiroshima; it drew a 6.4% rating.
- The summoning pun only works in Japanese: instead of chōdai ("please"), the summoner has to say chonmage, the name of the samurai topknot.
- Funimation's English dub aired on Toonami on April 7, 2018.
- Kanzenshuu's credits list Yukio Kaizawa as storyboard artist and Yoshitaka Yashima as animation director.
Did you know? The Super Dragon Balls created by Zalama are the size of planets, which is why they hung in the sky above the arena during the Universe 6 versus 7 tournament, where Zamasu spots them.