Episode 67 of Dragon Ball Z, first broadcast in Japan on November 14, 1990 and titled A Legend Revealed in Funimation's uncut dub, pits Goku against the last two rank-and-file members of the Ginyu Force: red-skinned Jeice and Burter, the blue giant who brags about being the fastest in the universe. The result is a thorough humiliation, and proof that the Saiyan has become something new.
Summary
Recoome is down, and Jeice and Burter cannot believe it: it must have been a lucky shot, since their scouters still read 5,000. Goku suggests they leave, but the two attack together. They do not land a single hit: Goku dodges everything with infuriating ease. Jeice dares him to strike, and Goku obliges with a punch to the face; when Jeice complains about a cheap shot, Goku innocently replies that he thought they were ready. Burter finally figures out the trick: Goku spikes his power for an instant, just long enough to hit, and the scouters cannot register it in time.
Meanwhile Frieza flies toward Grand Elder Guru's house daydreaming about immortality, while aboard his ship Captain Ginyu, left to guard the Dragon Balls, auditions a few soldiers as potential new recruits. The entrance exam, of course, is a pose.
On the battlefield, Vegeta cannot believe how much Goku has grown since their fight on Earth. Jeice and Burter go all in with a combined attack, a swirling purple storm of energy, but Goku dispels it with a mere shout. A stray blast hits the cave where Bulma is hiding, and she is furious at everyone and everything.
The two switch tactics: Jeice will throw his Crusher Ball, and Burter will strike Goku as he dodges. But Goku does not dodge at all. He swats the fireball away with one hand like a beach ball and sends it flying at Burter, who barely avoids it. Enraged, the blue giant charges, but Goku vanishes and reappears behind him, leaving the fastest man in the universe speechless.
Our take
After the one-hit win over Recoome, the show could have jumped straight to Ginyu. Instead it spends a full episode showing the new Goku from every angle: speed, ki control, technique. The smartest touch is the scouter business. For the whole saga, numbers have dictated the pecking order; here Goku makes them useless simply by choosing when to reveal his strength, an early sign of how the series will soon move past its obsession with power levels.
There is plenty of comedy too, and not only from the Ginyu Force. Goku apologizing for hitting Jeice because he assumed they were ready is the character in a nutshell: genuinely kind, and precisely for that reason devastating to his opponents' pride.
Much of the episode is anime material. The pair's purple combined attack, the stray blast at Bulma, Frieza's daydreaming flight and Ginyu's auditions are all additions, and so are the blasts that seem to pass right through Goku while he is actually sidestepping at super speed.
Trivia
- It adapts chapter 281, with a 25.7% ratings share.
- It was directed by Daisuke Nishio, the series director at the time, with Masayuki Uchiyama as animation supervisor. Sources disagree on the screenwriter (Katsuyuki Sumisawa or Aya Matsui).
- The Ocean/Saban dub merged it with episode 66 and stopped partway through; Funimation's in-house cast picked up from the next episode, and when the uncut version was made, Funimation redubbed both halves.
- In Funimation's uncut dub, this is the last episode scored by Nathan Johnson; the Faulconer Productions score takes over from episode 68.
Did you know? The Japanese title's "red and blue light balls" refer to the colors of Jeice and Burter, who in the anime nickname themselves the Red Magma and the Blue Hurricane.