Dragon Ball Z Episode 2: The Mightiest Warrior Is Goku's Brother!

Episode 2 of Dragon Ball Z, first aired in Japan on May 3, 1989 under the full title The Mightiest Warrior in All of History is Goku's Older Brother!, delivers the big reveal: Goku is not from Earth. During a reunion at Kame House, Raditz arrives, calls him Kakarot, explains where he really comes from and introduces himself as his older brother. In twenty minutes, the series rewrites its hero's past.

Summary

For the first time in five years, Bulma returns to Master Roshi's island, where the old hermit lives with Krillin. She brings a box of sweet buns, dodges Roshi's usual groping, and admits she is angry with Yamcha, so she did not invite him. Then the Flying Nimbus lands: Goku has arrived, and he has a child with him. Everyone is stunned to learn it is his son. Gohan is four, greets them with a polite bow, and wants to be a great scholar when he grows up, since Chi-Chi will not let him train.

Bulma notices that he has a tail too and, along with Roshi, nervously asks whether the boy ever does anything strange on nights with a full moon. Goku cheerfully replies that the family always goes to bed early. On Gohan's hat sits the Four-Star Dragon Ball, Grandpa Gohan's keepsake.

Suddenly Goku senses a terrifying presence. Raditz lands on the beach, calls Goku "Kakarot" and scolds him for failing to wipe out the planet's population. Krillin tries to send him packing and is slammed into the house by a swipe of his tail. Raditz asks Goku whether he took a hard knock on the head as a child, and Roshi recalls a story old Gohan once told him: a baby with a tail found in a capsule that fell from the sky, violent until a fall into a ravine changed him for good.

Raditz then lays it all out. Goku is a Saiyan, a member of a warrior race that conquers planets, wipes them clean and sells them; babies are sent to the weakest worlds. Planet Vegeta was destroyed by a meteor, and only four Saiyans remain, Goku included. Raditz needs him for a new conquest, but Goku refuses. So his brother floors him with a single kick and snatches Gohan: if Goku has not killed a hundred Earthlings within a day, the boy dies.

Our take

This is one of the most important episodes of the whole saga, and it works because it starts as comedy. The first half is a get-together between old friends, with Roshi's gags, Gohan's shyness, and the full-moon joke that anyone who watched Dragon Ball gets instantly. When Raditz arrives, that lightness is swept away in a moment.

The reveal changes the meaning of everything that came before: the tail, the absurd strength, the Great Ape transformation, even the bump on the head. The adaptation of chapters 196 and 197 of Akira Toriyama's manga is faithful, with no significant additions. Just as striking is how Goku reacts: for the first time, he admits he is afraid. The kick that leaves him in the sand while his son cries ends the episode on an image the original series never showed.

Trivia

Raditz is named after the radish: like Kakarot (carrot) and Vegeta (vegetable), Saiyan names are puns on vegetables.
In Japan the episode drew a 16.1% ratings share. It was directed by Osamu Kasai and written by Takao Koyama and Katsuyuki Sumisawa.
The original 1996 English dub folded this episode into The Arrival of Raditz; the uncut 2005 redub titled it Reunions.
Dragon Ball Kai, the 2009 recut, squeezes the first two episodes of Z into its first episode and part of its second.

Did you know? Goku mentions that he has also found the Three-Star and Six-Star Balls, which he keeps at home. It sounds like a throwaway detail, but it gains weight once it becomes clear how much the Dragon Balls matter in this saga.