Episode 9 of Dragon Ball Z, Sorry, Robot-san – The Desert of Vanishing Tears, first aired in Japan on June 28, 1989, is the series' first filler: a self-contained story made up for the anime, with no counterpart in the manga. Gohan, still alone in the wilderness, stumbles into a buried temple and meets a robot the world has forgotten. The result is a small, melancholy fable with an ending that hits harder than you might expect.
Summary
Gohan wakes up after the night of his transformation and remembers nothing. He discovers that his tail is gone, notices he is wearing new clothes and finds the sword Piccolo left beside him. There is no time for questions: a crocodile and a tiger chase him, a giant bird snatches him and, after a scuffle with a dinosaur, drops him into a sinkhole.
At the bottom is a cave with ancient drawings on the walls, which Gohan recognizes from his picture books: the remains of a lost civilization. There is also a sand-covered robot, an old Capsule Corporation model. Gohan switches it on, but the robot is grouchy: it tells him to keep his voice down, because the slightest vibration could bring everything crashing down, then to turn it off and leave through the exit behind it. Too bad the exit opens onto a ravine.
Between tears and repeated switching on and off, the two learn to put up with each other. Gohan repairs its visual sensors, the robot helps him find mushrooms and cooks them, and eventually it tells its story: it was there to survey an archaeological dig when an earthquake buried it, eighty years ago. Gohan decides to free it and starts digging, but in doing so he triggers the cave's collapse.
The robot holds up a pillar to give him time to escape. When Gohan runs back to switch it off, the pillar comes down on it; following its instructions, the boy connects two wires, the robot regains its strength, moves the pillar and throws Gohan out of the cave just before it caves in. In the rubble, with its last bit of energy, it tells him not to cry, even when he is all alone. Then it shuts down for good. On Snake Way, meanwhile, a starving Goku tries eating the clouds.
Our take
Filler has a bad reputation, often deservedly, but this is one of the best examples in Dragon Ball Z. The story is small and self-contained, almost a children's tale, and that is exactly why it works: the gruff robot who grows fond of the child is an archetype, but Katsuyuki Sumisawa's script handles it with restraint, saving the tears for the last scene.
It also serves a clear purpose in Gohan's arc. Until now the boy has mostly cried; here, for the first time, he takes care of someone else and makes a decision on his own, even a wrong one. The robot's last advice, to get by without relying on others, is the same lesson Piccolo gave him, delivered with affection instead of harshness.
Viewers who only want the story of Akira Toriyama's manga can skip it without missing anything. But that would be a shame.
Trivia
- No footage from this episode was reused in Dragon Ball Kai, which drops filler. Its only link to the manga is a shot of Goku asleep on Snake Way, expanded from a panel in chapter 208.
- Gohan identifies the robot as a 3-S Series prototype built by Capsule Corporation, the company owned by Bulma's family.
- In Japan the episode drew a 15.7% ratings share. It was directed by Osamu Kasai.
- The 1996 English dub cut almost the entire episode; the 2005 redub changed the robot's eighty years underground to thirty.
Did you know? When the robot asks Gohan whether he wants his mushrooms Chinese-style or Western-style, the boy answers "the way my mom makes them": one line that says more about homesickness than many whole scenes.