Dragon Ball Daima

Episode 9

With how stuffed last week's episode was, it's not too shocking that we're in for a bit of a breather here. For the most part, this one pretty much ends up being exactly what you'd expect from an episode called “Thieves” as both Goku and Bulma's parties get robbed on their way to meeting each other. While that doesn't exactly make for the most exciting thing we've gotten from the show so far, it's still pretty funny, and that manages to be just enough to keep this from feeling like a drag.

On Goku's end of things, the gang decides to crash at a hotel after Panzy insists that they stay somewhere relaxing for once, but face the issue of Goku's current level of notoriety. The solution? Panzy puts a cute little bear hat on Goku's head and prays that's enough to avoid getting recognized. That, of course, goes about as poorly as expected. Rather than doing the simple gag of him accidentally taking off the hat in public without thinking, he does it almost immediately because he can't stand how much it itches. It feels like a certified Goku moment and makes this much funnier. It doesn't take long for a pair of opportunistic thieves to recognize Goku and make a grab for the Dragon Balls, he quickly catches up with them and gets into another tussle. While the proceeding fight is underwhelming compared to prior episodes, it still looks pretty nice. I appreciate the punchline here being Goku offering to stand guard and keep the Dragon Ball safe for the rest of the night, only for him to end up sleeping on the job and leaving the others wondering why they bothered to trust him.

King Gomah and Degesu have finally caught on to Goku's presence in the Demon Realm, and are appropriately freaked out after how much effort they put to weaken them. While this might lead to them planning ways to deal with Goku more directly, considering how big Gomah's head gets when he yells at Degesu for letting this happen, it's sufficient to say that any future schemes these two probably won't be too menacing. Dr. Arinsu and Marba finally finish creating a seed for her new Majin (though not before we get the revelation that Marba also created the Saibamen, which makes me wonder how much of Z this old lady will be indirectly responsible for) and we get to marvel at their new creation: Majin…Kuu.

I laughed at this name way harder than I should have. Even considering he's partially made from the essence of Majin Buu, it's still pretty wild to see something as simple as swapping out a letter and calling it a day. While that might sound like I'm deriding Toriyama for the folks at Toei for lazy naming conventions, it's important to recall that Toriyama is the same man who openly admitted to making Super Saiyans blond entirely because it saved him time on inking manga pages. I'm impressed by his audacity. I'll admit that Kuu comes off as a little goofy-looking which makes it hard to take him seriously. Still, with how frequent transformations are in Dragon Ball, I'd be shocked if this ends up being his final form. I'm at least glad that it doesn't seem like it'll take too long for him to have a run-in with the others, as Dr. Arinsu decides to test his strength by having him hunt down one of the Tamagami, which will undoubtedly cause him to cross paths with Goku. Given how Goku operates, it's hard to guess if he'll be upset about Kuu here trying to swoop in on his fights or get fixated on fighting him instead.

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Dragon Ball Daima is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.