English Dub Review: Dragon Ball Super “Warriors of Justice Close In! The Pride Troopers!”

The Pride Troopers assemble! But they’re no Ginyu Force.

Overview (Spoilers Below)

Jiren has finally shown himself to Goku, and Goku is eager to face the mysterious alien from Universe 11 in battle. However, it looks like that will have to wait, because Top ushers Jiren away so five other members of the Pride Troopers can take on Goku, Kale, and Caulifla. Meanwhile, Master Roshi unleashes a powerful new attack that can hold an enemy in place, which allows his teammates to follow up with their own attacks to defeat foes.

The Pride Troopers reveal themselves to Goku and do a choreographed introductory sequence auspiciously similar to the Ginyu Force. Despite their wacky introduction, the Pride Troopers are more than capable of holding their own. Using their powers, they’re able to separate Goku from Kale and Caulifla while also disabling Goku from fighting by having one of their members crush him with his weight-increasing ability. However, Android 17 and 18 arrive just in time aid Goku in his fight.

With the help of Android 17 and Android 18, along with Kale learning to control her Legendary Super Saiyan ability, Goku and the team are able to defeat the five Pride Troopers one-by-one. Suddenly, Universe 11 finds itself losing a good chunk of its warriors in one fell swoop.

Things are looking up for Universe 7, which is on a hot streak, having only lost Krillin in the tournament so far. But there is a mysterious new challenger watching Goku from afar, who will no doubt be the next obstacle for Universe 7 in its battle for universe survival.

Our Take:

Things really pick up this week on Dragon Ball Super, which has had a pretty rocky array of episodes in the last few weeks. I can’t say I’ve been too impressed by this tournament so far, having found it to be too small and unfocused to have the appeal of a tournament arc while not having a lot of time to develop out the characters and conflicts integral to making an exciting plot. However, there is still a certain style of action that Dragon Ball Super and its predecessor series are known for, and this is an episode that uses that style superbly to deliver on some exciting action sequences.

The Pride Troopers are just mooks for sure, so it’s unsurprising for them to end up not being very dangerous in the long run. However, the cleverness of their teamwork and their unique abilities make them interesting technique fighters who actually manage to make short work of Goku before 17 and 18 are able to step in, which makes them seem actually threatening. Once that is established, the rest of the episode focuses entirely on the thrill of its action, only pausing for a couple of moments with the characters in-between.

This may not make the episode to be too involved in terms of plot and development, but it does make for an entertaining episode. One might argue that the “Dragon Ball” franchise has never had plots worth writing home about, but survives on the quality of its action mixed with some high-stakes and creative setups.

There is a hiccup involved with Kale and her sudden ability to control the power of the Legendary Super Saiyan which seemingly comes out of nowhere. It has a reason, of course, but it seems like something of this magnitude that had been giving her so much trouble in literally the last episode would take a little more time to develop through and learn to control. The moment between Kale and Caulifla is still strong, just done too quickly to have the kind of impact I’d like to see from it. Pacing and rushing through things are problems that this series has had no shortage of, and I don’t think those issues are going to start going away here.

When all is said and done, the episode is strong for its variety of good fighting sequences and badass moments that involve your favorite characters. It’s important for a show like this to make good use of its expansive cast, and bringing in Android 17 and Android 18 was a great move. The Universe 7 fighters are much more interesting together than they are apart, so seeing them work together is a real joy.

Score
7/10