English Dub Review: Dragonball Super “Show us Goku! The Power of a Super Saiyan God!!”

The warm-up…

Spoilers Below

Goku succeeds in becoming a “Super Sayian God” through a ritual that involved five Saiyans where they transferred their powers into Goku in an effort to give Beerus what he wants to keep the Earth spared from his wrath. With the two feeling Antsy for battle, they proceed to fly away from Bulma’s ship. While they fly up many of them are genuinely worried for Goku, including Gohan who can’t sense his Ki/Energy until Whis points out that “God Ki” is something mortals are incapable of detecting, though Whis himself is unsure if he’s “Joined the ranks of the celestials”.

We then see King-Kai who’s running in sheer panic around his house planet after discovering that Goku has attained “Super Saiyan God” powers and to further add insult to injury, the Grand Kai telepathically admonishes King Kai for his ineptitude in keeping the two away from each other but is also understandably scared shitless for the safety of Earth and their universe.  King Kai assures Grand Kai that even if Goku has attained God-status, Beerus won’t instantly go all out against him immediately but it doesn’t help that King-Kai awkwardly tells Bubbles & Gregory to “buzz off” and Grand Kai thinks that’s an insult directed towards him but King Kai assures him it’s not while apprehensively laughing under stress.

We then see Goku & Beerus who are now in the sky away from the cruise ship where Beerus taunts Goku to make the first hit but hilariously that’s easier said than done due to Goku’s new powers making him faster than he usually is and unintentionally flies past Beerus by accident and afterwards proceeds to perform his “Kamehameha” wave.

As Goku is performing his attack, it’s laden with comedic moments such as Bulma heckling Goku to teach Beerus a lesson only for Vegeta to quickly cover her mouth making sure she doesn’t escalate things further with Beerus. Piccolo warns everyone to brace for impact when Goku’s blast sends a shock wave splitting the ocean apart. After assuring the audience that everyone on Bulma’s cruise ship is safe, we then cut back to Goku & Beerus with Goku still being amazed at this new power but is quickly admonished by Piccolo to be considerate of the people on the ship who are a little close to the actual fight to which Goku quickly apologizes.

As Beerus flies towards Goku, he asks Beerus to spare his planet if he wins the match and he agrees but with a sinister look in his eyes. Beerus remarks that “Gods fear him too”. Goku proceeds to make his first move but Beerus quickly blocks every hit he attempts to connect his punches & kicks with creating a power shockwaves in the process while everyone on the boat witness this power from a safe distance and Krillin remarking how ridiculously power Goku has gotten from this while Piccolo points out that he hasn’t landed a single blow on him yet.

Beerus proceeds to give Goku a merciless beatdown and while trying to escape, Goku quickly gets knocked out of the sky dropping into the ocean. It leaves a lot of tension and suspense due to not being able to detect him but he quickly flies up and remarks at how Beerus’ powers are “crazy” while Beerus notes about how dramatically different he is compared to their first battle at King Kai’s house-planet. They decide to pick the fight back up with Beerus waving his hands to come towards him so they fly further up in the sky but they’re too distant so they decide to go after them using their large airship to travel upwards with everyone except for Vegeta, Buu and Videl who remain on the large boat.

Pilaf’s gang stealthily comes back to the ship not knowing what’s exactly transpired but wonders why everyone’s waving “goodbye” but Whis assures them there’s still food left and offers them a meal. Goku is slowly getting use to the power to the point that he’s now caught Beerus’s fist and manages to connect a punch to his face abruptly interrupting Beerus’ compliment.

Beerus tests to see if he can handle something more advanced so he unleashes a large yellow ball of energy that causes turbulence with Bulma’s ship while Whis looks on with the Pilaf gang. Goku does his best to hold onto the blast and deflects it away which impresses Beerus further and so when Goku unleashes his full power King Kai is left in panic while he’s covered in a bright aura and fiercely attacks Beerus once more going as far as to leave a scratch on the right side of his face. When Beerus charges back Goku puts him in submission hold flicking his head and teasing him a bit but Beerus isn’t amused and slaps him with his large tail to Goku’s face and the episode ends in cliffhanger fashion when Beerus tells him his tests are now over which excites Goku and assures Beerus with the words “Just wait until I go all out!”.

Overview.

I really enjoyed this episode. Goku’s simple-minded charm is strongly present from start to finish. He gets such a proverbial boner at the idea of fighting against powerful enemies yet he’s fully aware of the danger everyone is facing and still approaches the battle with all the seriousness and emotional weight it deserves. This week’s episode was basically the warm-up before the real “Battle of Gods” that will be happening shortly between these two because while Beerus does want a real fight, he’s at least respectable enough to let Goku comprehend his new God powers after he successfully performed the ritual in episode 9.

Hopefully, this level of quality keeps up for the episodes to come. The fact this was simply the “warm-up” has me predicting that their fight will go even further. The filler was kept to a tasteful minimum and consistently remained a fun entertaining visual feast of ass-kickery. There wasn’t a lot to the episode outside of the comedic moments between Pilaf & Whis’ interactions but hopefully they’ll consistently keep this up until this arc is over since people who have already seen the “Battle of the Gods” movie pretty much know what happens at this point.