Episode 126 of Dragon Ball Z, first broadcast in Japan on February 5, 1992 and titled The Androids Appear in Funimation's dub, is the long-awaited day: three years have passed since Trunks' warning, and the fighters gather where the boy from the future said the threat would strike. But the enemy cannot be sensed, quite literally. Dr. Gero's androids give off no energy, and by the time they show themselves they have already started killing.
Summary
On the morning of May 12, Goku, Gohan and Piccolo fly toward the island Trunks pointed to and meet Krillin on the way. On a bluff overlooking the city they find Yamcha and Tien, who left Chiaotzu at Master Roshi's because the fight would be too dangerous for him. The surprise is Bulma, who arrives with a baby in her arms. Gohan asks Yamcha if the child is his, Yamcha says no, and Goku blurts out that the father is Vegeta and the boy's name is Trunks, stunning everyone, Bulma included, since she had not told a soul. Of Vegeta himself, there is no sign.
It is 9:30, so they have thirty minutes to spare. The appointed hour comes and goes without anyone sensing a thing. Instead Yajirobe arrives with a bag of senzu beans from Korin. He refuses to stay and fight and leaves in his aircar, which explodes in midair moments later. Gohan realizes the androids have no energy and therefore cannot be sensed. Goku sends him to rescue Yajirobe, leaves the beans with Bulma, and the group splits up to search the streets.
Meanwhile, two figures stroll through the city: a stout, pale man and an old man with a white mustache, both wearing the Red Ribbon emblem on their caps. Anyone who annoys them dies; a motorist who scolds them for standing in the road is strangled by Android 20. Yamcha crosses their path and, spotting the emblem, realizes too late that he has found them. Android 20 grabs him by the mouth and starts draining his energy; a tanker truck swerves to avoid them and slams into a gas station, setting off a blaze. As Yamcha cries for help, the android drives a hand through his chest.
Our take
The Japanese title, "Murderers who leave no trace: which ones are the androids?", sums up the saga's best idea. Since the Saiyan Saga, fights have hinged on sensing energy; now the enemies are invisible to the heroes' senses and can walk through a crowd like anyone else. For one episode Dragon Ball Z turns into something close to a mystery, with the heroes combing the city without knowing what the killers look like.
Once again the price is paid by Yamcha, the first to fall just as he was against the Saibamen. Toriyama does give him a useful role, though: he is the one who uncovers the energy-absorption trick, which will shape the rest of the fight. And viewers do not yet know that Androids 19 and 20 are not the androids Trunks described, nor who is really hiding behind the old man's face.
The anime tweaks the manga in a few places. It tones down the motorist's death (on paper he loses his head), adds the gas-station explosion where the manga has the others notice Yamcha's energy plummeting, and fixes a continuity slip by showing Goku hand the senzu beans to Bulma.
Trivia
- It adapts chapters 337 and 338. Written by Hiroshi Toda and directed by Mitsuo Hashimoto, with animation supervision by Yukio Ebisawa, it drew a 25.5% share.
- The fighters debut new outfits here; Goku's gi, for instance, loses its kanji.
- Two passersby wear T-shirts reading "BIRD," a nod to Akira Toriyama's Bird Studio.
- A short added scene shows Dr. Brief giving baby Trunks a toy that looks like the time machine.
- Funimation's dub treats this as the first episode of the Androids Saga; in Dragon Ball Z Kai the same events open episode 59.