Dragon Ball Daima is in a unique position: it’s the first time since the debut of a brand new Dragon Ball anime Dragonball great in 2015. It is a sequel to Dragon Ball Zbut a prequel to Supersetting Daima in one of the few places in canon where we don’t actually have much information about what Goku and his friends were up to. And if you haven’t followed Dragon Ball since then Z ended in 2003, then the idea of a new series may seem more daunting than exciting. Happy Daima‘s first few episodes are here to help.
The pilot for the new anime debuted last week, and it’s proving to be the perfect entry point for lapsed fans of the series. Without delving too far into spoilers if you haven’t watched the show yet, Daima begins with a thorough recap of the final arc of Dragon Ball Zincluding everything about Goku’s fight against Majin Buu, and a pretty good explanation of where Babidi and Dabura fit into the series’ universe. While an episode summary may sound a bit boring at first glance, Daima adds a fun, fresh and evil perspective to the events, making it worthwhile even for devotees DBZ fans.
(Ed. remark: The rest of this story contains spoilers for the first two episodes of Dragon Ball Daima.)
Daima‘s first episode eschews our regular main characters and focuses on Gomah and Degesu, who appear to be the villains of the new series. Gomah is second in line to become king of the Demon Realm, while Degesu is the younger brother of Shin, the Supreme Kai. The pair spent most of the episode watching a recap of the Majin Buu saga Dragon Ball Zwhich they took interest in as soon as they saw that Babidi had somehow taken over the mind of Dabura the Demon King. As they track the events of Dragon Ball Z which fans are certainly familiar with, often peppering in comments about things like the characters’ strengths, and occasionally cracking jokes. It serves a useful purpose — to remind the audience where things stand in the Dragon Ball timeline, and to introduce us to these pair of important characters — but it also feels normal pleasure.
Dragon Ball is a universe where a lot has happened over the course of a handful of shows, manga, and universes. At some point it all made so much sense that it became easy to rule it out. But Buckskina’s opening puts everything, from Dragon Ball Z power-ups to color comments back in the text. And introducing this new story by having two new characters revisit some of the show’s iconic events feels both very silly and like a perfect fit for the Dragon Ball universe.
Once Debura dies, Degesu reminds Gomah that he is the new king of the Demon Realm, and suggests that the pair should do something about Goku and Vegeta before they decide to invade the Demon Realm to prevent it from destroying the Earth threatens the future. That’s true Daima‘s real story begins: now that our pair of villains is already terrified of the Z fighters, thanks to defeating Dabura and Buu, they try to reduce the power of their enemies a little by using the dragon balls to turn them into children .
Episode 2 keeps this all going and shows us how all the main characters react when they’re turned into kids, and sends Goku on a few errands so we can see some of our favorite Dragon Ball characters as cute kids – it even reunites Goku with his nyoibo ! But beyond this little bit of fanservice, the episode also gives us a much clearer idea of what this plot is going to be: Goku and Supreme Kai head to the Demon Realm to face Gomah, while the rest of the Z fighters prepare to later join him on the ship Bulma is repairing.
All of this is presented as relatively stupid and wacky, which seems like the perfect setup Daima. With all the Z fighters turned into young children, the new series goes for a tone a little closer to the original Dragon ball than the more serious fights fans might be used to Dragonball great. Dragon Ball creator Akira Toriyama has always been a master of balancing action-packed moments, and considering this was the last Dragon Ball project he worked on before his death. And Daima it seems to have already made a good start.
New episodes of Dragonball: Daima drop on Crunchyroll every Friday at 1pm ET.