How do you pad for time between arcs? Are those Crows? What awaits us as we begin a new story arc?
Join Jelli and Bekinney as they continue breaking down Akira Toriyama's worldwide manga and anime phenomenon Dragon Ball Z by looking at episodes 41 through 45: "Look Out Below," "The Search Continues," "A Friendly Surprise," "Brood of Evil," and "Frieza Strikes." We begin discussing the Namek Saga and attempt to break down some filler episodes and preview this new arc.
In this episode:
- Jelli and Bekinney try to plot their next move
- The run of great episodes is over, but let's not lose hope.
- Breaking down the names for Raiti and Zaacro, as well as Cui
- Attempting to evaluate the Treedon birds through the lens that they might be crows and looking at how crows are viewed in Japan
- Cannibalism? One of us totally would. Which one will (not) shock you
- Jack and the Beanstalk and its origins as a very different story from the one we know
- A little bit about Group TAC, which allows us to talk about the voice talents behind Pokemon's Mewtwo, and get tangentially into a wild tokusatsu movie...
- ...Rex: A Dinosaur's Story, the tale of how a baby tyrannosaurus rex is raised by a little girl, gets in a food fight, escapes marketing executives on a snowmobile after stealing a Christmas cloak from Colonel Sanders and the story of how the movie's production led to the arrest of the head of Kadokawa for smuggling drugs
- A bit about Japan's Sesssho-seki, or Killing Stone famous in Tochigi Prefecture
- Nautilus, their shells, the Golden Ratio, the Fibonacci Sequence, and illusions
- We're not grasping at straws AT ALL
- Setting the stage using examples from X-Men, DCEU and Journey to the West
- Vegeta's history as the heir to the throne, and his early life
- Some of Toriyama's thoughts on Vegeta, at least early in the story
- Vegeta and Goku: Opposite sides of the same coin
- How Vegeta so internalizes the lessons he learns as a child that it shapes his entire worldview, and how the very existence of Goku flies in the face of said worldview
- The Six-Eared Macaque from Journey to the West, one of Sun Wukong's most formidable foes
- Some researched theories about the relationship between Wukong and Six-Ears and how that is mirrored by the relationship between Goku and Vegeta
- The Lego series Lego Monkie Kid and its portrayal of Six Ears
- Why Vegeta is always invoking his prince status as if it is a boast, despite there being only a handful of Saiyans left
- Why Vegeta is so relatable
- and more, including some general pop culture, trivia, and editorializing, as usual
Join us as we continue to uncover the cultural meanings, publication facts, inspirations and more behind the wildly popular Dragon Ball franchise.
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