AWTY 183 - (H)Emology - (Dragon Ball: Sleeping Princess in Devil's Castle with Tyler Denering)

Most sinister legion of the underworld.

Hello, and welcome to our weed there yet in exploration and education and anime. I'm your anime idiot, patrick dugan.

I am an anime expert, D hollander.

And I'm brenda mccullough, your anime power creep that transcends this planet, galaxy, universe, and the realm of creation entirely.

He's finally revealed his final form.

Everybody been holding out for a special occasion. And you know what? 184 seems like a good number for no reason. Let me take the mask off. It's 80 springs. I already fucked it up. Never mind springs.

Yeah, well, but this is your last episode of Charging Up. And then next episode, you'll be in your full power. So there's still a chance we can stop you at the cliff hanger at the end.

Oh, boy.

But this is a special occasion as we also have a guest here with us today. We're joined by my old pal Tyler Dennering from the frenchize podcast.

Hi. Hello.

How do you know Tyler?

I'm here with my cannon ready to blow up the sun because we hate the daylight.

Well, I read it. I do. We're weeps pale.

I mean, I probably have a vitamin D deficiency. I haven't been to a doctor in years.

Yeah, the D stands for doctor.

I mean, the reason vampires drink blood is for the vitamin D deficiency. So as long as you got a lot of neighbors and a lot of ways to hide the body. Just saying.

There you go. But yes. So Tyler has joined us. He has picked what we're watching today, if you want to go ahead and introduce it, tyler sure.

And yeah, thanks so much for having me on in advance. We'll see if you're still happy with me by the end. But even certain parts in this movie, I'm just like, oh, yeah, I forgot about this part. My bad. But we'll talk about it.

You picked anime, so you already got a notch against you for dugan.

There you go. But yes, we're covering Dragon Ball sleeping princess in Demons castle, I believe it's called. Dragon Ball, sleeping Princess and devil's Castle. That's very important for posterity.

I watched the wrong movie.

I watched demon's Castle. Oh, no shit.

If you can't find it, I don't know. It'll probably pop up anyways in Google. But yeah, I was going through like a kick last year, like deep pandemic or whatever, of just watching all the Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z movies. Because I'm like, oh, I never really caught up on those. Because, I don't know, it started with watching the Dragon Ball super movies because those are more recent. And I'm like, I'm just going to go back and watch all the old stuff. I don't know. Especially Dragon Ball has such a spot of nostalgia for me even before Dragon Ball Z, because not only just because of the time I watched it in my youth and everything, but also because it's like a bunch of kids, for the most part, fighting a bunch of adults with machine guns, which I find very strange. And in this case, demons with machine guns.

Yeah, this is actually the first Dragon Ball anything we've done right on the podcast.

Yeah.

And yeah, I'm kind of in the same boat. Obviously, I grew up with Dragon Ball Z, but as I've gotten older, I've realized I prefer Dragon Ball, the prequel series with goku as a kid because, as I've heard someone described this, dragon Ball is about fun, silly, whisany adventures and goku discovering the origins of himself and just kind of having fun road trip adventures. Dragon Ball Z is, as my intro, alluded to the power creep of just screaming until the other person dies and fighting the strongest thing in existence. And it kind of just gets wildly out of hand from a story perspective. But Dragon Ball can still be real fun and grounded.

Yeah, there's a bunch of weird random characters. I mean, I guess there's weird random characters, dragon Ball Z, but everyone is less like, by Dragon Ball Z. I guess goku is basically just so powerful that you're never going to see a lot of the side characters. Or if they show up, it'll be like, I don't know, yamcha is in this. He does, like, a thing.

Love a good yamcha.

Bulma has more to do. poir turns into scissors. I don't know, there's a lot more, like, random, weird characters of four.

That's kind of my problem with Z is I'm so sick of the saiyans. I'm so sick of specifically goku vegeta and I have such an affinity for all the side characters, which we see a lot more in Dragon Ball. So, yeah, I'm excited to watch this. There's always more Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z movies than I'm aware of. Every time I find one, there's two more.

Obviously. Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z are so huge in the cultural zeitgeist, like, even in America, that I'm aware of the characters.

We've all seen the macy's Day's Thanksgiving parade. We've seen the goku balloon, of course, and who hasn't?

This is probably more of an anime fan thing, but who beat each other. The sailor Moon versus goku debate thing. I feel like any anime fan is aware of Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball, but I've never actually watched any of it aside from the abridged series.

Well, that's a different thing entirely.

It is very different.

Yeah, I'm in the similar boat where through cultural osmosis, I'm like, yeah, I know all these characters, but I remember, like, tunami as a kid having, like, flash memories of specific episodes, but that's it. I specifically remember there's one episode where he makes, like, Princess Snake on the Snake Way. I had to look at it before because I'm like, this specific episode is just ingrained in my brain. Why could that be? I look it up. Oh, it's the vor episode.

Learn a little about herself.

Everything'S got one.

Well, Dragon Ball got a few dear. Yeah. I am deep in the Dragon Ball lore and canon and, like, have head cannons with some friends about how Dragon Ball can easily be remade into a fresh prince of belair show with all the nameic starring as the what's their last names? Banks. The Banks family. So I got a lot of dumb of head cannon opinions about Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball.

I love that.

Yeah. I'll definitely be coming out swinging on weird standpoints of why por is the greatest mom in Dragon Ball cannon.

Yes, please. I want to hear it.

Yamcha is a big dumb himbo and needs a parent. The only parent around is a small talking cat that can change into things that is poor.

Well, it's about time we pause so Brendan can write this fan fiction, but we're going to watch the movie.

Let's go. Yeah.

I was not preferred. Cut that off.

Nope, that was it. That's the dragon.

I was not prepared for a Count Chocolate to a Dragon Ball movie from 87.

Yeah, weird choice with the licensing for this one, but yeah. So we start out the movie. Absolutely. The tone I was not expecting in this intro shot of it's just like a red hellscape and then just a deep man's voice being like in a world with a castle of five peaks known as devil's Castle, the sleeping Princess is guarded by an evil legion of demons and then just like, jump scare of a real fucked up demon face. Not in the art style of any Dragon Ball thing I've seen before.

And I was like, very spooky.

Yeah, this really got my attention because am I watching the right thing?

Yeah. Sorry to interrupt rudder, but yeah, that's partly why I wanted to pick it. Just because it's like, hey, from where that? Like I just like to think of goku in his, like, 40s. He's, like a grandpa or whatever. Just because I don't know. I think goku is a grandpa in his 40s. It's a canon or whatever. But so, like, I wonder if he ever thinks about the time you ever fought a dracula in a castle full of demons that shot machine guns at him and his other, like, eight year old friend. I wonder if he ever thinks about that in his in his spare time. It's just, like, such a strange thing to do for a movie, but yeah.

Just how often does this come up in the canon of the series? This reminds me of this puzzle I faced in the castle.

The what?

The vampire demon.

What he remember when we fought Count lucifer? I'm sorry, who?

What Bulma? That vampire that you had a crush on. Kind of, I guess.

Which one?

Isn't she married to Vegeta? Later. Yeah, just like don't talk about that in front of him.

Don't bring up my ex.

Don't don't get us wrong, but she does the bottom in that relationship. Like, hold on to that shit. Like, it's true.

So we we see our our little friend goku flying around on his little nimbus cloud. He's catching fish, he's going up and having a little flying adventure. And he arrives on a familiar thing. One of the few landmarks I can pinpoint from Dragon Ball to the kame house on the little island out in the middle of wherever. Clearly I'm going into this, watching it like, this is I'm the target audience of I'm watching this movie purely as a movie. I don't know Dragon Ball. So yeah, going into it, we see just an old man watching a sexy jazz or something.

This is the stuff I forgot.

I remembered. He is a horny old man. That's all I know.

That's the one detail.

Powers, strengths, alliances with other characters. No, I just know he loves Horn magazine. But yeah, this is Master roshi. You know, if you like anime listening to this, probably goku arrives and he's like, hey, train me, Master. And roshi is like, where did you come from, my dude? I'm having personal me time, please back up. And rosie is like, you're a little young, it's going to be tough. I don't know if you got it in you. But just then we see a challenger approaches, another person is rowing up to the island. And then we see a shiny bald head and another little boy. I don't know, he could be 6000, we don't know.

True.

But he jumps over trying to impress all of them, but he lands headfirst in the sand and gets stuck. And just the timing of this, this is much funnier than I thought it was going to be. Even just the comedic timing of him falling face in the sand, and then they just stand there for a minute, struggle, and roshi is just like, nice to meet you.

Yeah, that's why I like Dragon Ball better than Z, because it's got so much more charm. And specifically this character, krillin, he's just such a little shit in Dragon Ball. And in Dragon Ball Z, he becomes a bland oatmeal who just becomes a cop and sucks. But in Dragon Ball, he's such like a smarmy little son of a bitch. I love him. He's great.

Yeah, it's very cartoony, it's very fun. Definitely different from all the Dragon Ball Z imagery in my brain from just the world. But yeah. So he arrives and he also asks for training for Master roshi. And he's like, well, sorry, this guy's here first. But both of you are jerks. None of you even offer me a gift. Come on, I'm not doing this for free. So crellin, of course, is like, oh, I'm so sorry. Please, the customary gift. And just pulls out a porto mag and yeah, that's good enough.

Yeah, it works.

You're in, kid.

Yeah, I just forgot about Dragon Ball in general. Especially since I watched it before dragon Ball Z. For the most part, I'm like, oh, yeah. So I was really young watching it. I'm like, oh, yeah, it's like a great kid show and everything. And I know there's action and violence and everything, but all that stuff went over my head. And I guess the last time I watched it, maybe I just, I don't know, had too much of an edible or something. So past my head, I was just like, oh, cool, they're fighting a dracula. That's really sick. I just forgot about all the porno mag stuff. And I was like, oh, sorry, guys.

But yeah, it's weirdly porn.

In terms of how porn and pervianess and anime is portrayed, this is very tame, especially for an 80s anime movie.

Yeah, especially going into knowing any little bit about Dragon Ball, I feel like a lot of people would know that Master roshi is this way, so I was prepared.

But yeah. So he's like, all right, well, goku is here first. But you actually gave me money. Now I actually need to make a choice. All right, well, I can't train both of you. That would be ridiculous.

Insane.

So I need you all to go off. What will your test be? Oh, if only there was a convenient title of this movie. I need you to go find the Sleeping Princess in devil's Castle and bring her back to me. And we get more backstory of long ago, the evil counter lucifer kidnapped the princess and put her under a sleep spell. And the first kid to rescue her and bring her back will become roshi's student. So they're like, all right, sick cool. It's going to be super dangerous, but we can handle it. We'll prove ourselves to you, Master. Where is it? And roshi just points like that way.

He's like it's over there. Go also, it's made me laugh out.

Loud several times, which was very nice. And this was number one.

I also began to question why Master roshi wanted them to return the Sleeping Princess to his island. And I'm like, I shouldn't think about this anymore.

No, the less you think about roshi, the better.

Yeah, no, thank you.

We'll take it at face value. Okay.

I do like that goku is like, she must be starving if she's been asleep this whole time just because one of his character things, he's just always hungry and always wants to eat.

But roshi is like, yeah, sorry. goku. It's kind of cheating if you use your cloud to travel. So you both just have to swim there. All right, bye. Just tells them to go, and so they take off. And then we get a little run and montage where they're just chasing each other and doing some wily coyote shit, like knocking out wooden bridges and riding on buffalo and stuff like that. But yeah, eventually they still get there. Around the same time, goku mostly gets there first, though. So back on the island, we see Bulma comes to visit roshi, and they're looking for goku. And there's a bunch of other people here, but they didn't get introduced. So I was like, Hi, I know you're assuming I watched this series. I am so sorry, but these are just weird pig men to me.

They really explain Bulma and bulma's friends.

Yeah, they really don't explain ulang at all. It's just like, okay, well, we got.

Bulma, which we know. We got Yamchi, who's just balma's boyfriend at this time. We got Poor, who's yamcha's mom, and then we got ulong, who really doesn't need attention at all. He's up there with roshi of the less you think about him, the better.

Perfect. And they're like, hey, we're looking for goku. And roshi is like, oh, yeah. Well, I sent him to his death.

Anyways, back to porn.

He, like, tries to sell it. He sent them to, like, a theme park or something. He's like, oh, yeah. devil's hand. It's like an amusement park kind of just like, no, that's a fun time.

You sent a couple of children to their dad.

We can read between the lines. We know you. So that group, they're going to go follow and try to make sure the child doesn't die. So goku and krillin get to the castle, which is just this terrifying landscape. And Crylan is scared because, as the name suggests, the devil's Hand Castle looks like the devil's Hand just popping out of the ocean.

Bit spooky.

But goku just leads the charge, and they find this big, scary cave with rocks that look like teeth, and then they enter and make their way inside.

Yeah, goku is the textbook example prime king of, like, shonen protagonist, where he's not afraid of anything because he's just, frankly, too stupid to be aware of what's happening. He's also just too strong to ever be in any real danger. And krillin is human and can die and has multiple times so skoku. So, yeah, he's actually scared of what's going on. But we see Ballman the Gang flying after him in a little ship. And we see, as they're going through, they're looking around the landscape, also scared because also mortal human beings with flesh of blood and can die. And while they're going we see the camera cut away to another scene and we hear deep resonant voicing Eagle ascend out the welcoming ponty waha, obviously the devil of titular Devil Castle and cuts back to Ballman the gang in their ship as they get attacked by these just peak toriama design of like they're not devils, they're not ogres. They're just anything but human. They're just whatever he wants. There's no consistency to them. There doesn't need to be consistency. I want to draw some funky little guys. And that's all he does. So they attack Bonus ship and they crash it. And as they're going down, we cut away back to the lads. The two lads in an underground cave exploring. And cornell keeps pretending to not be scared by getting jump, scared by just rocks or stalagtites or just anything. And while they're going through, we see someone following behind them. Who could this be? Dragon Ball fans? Is it the character that has no presence whatsoever in Dragon Ball and God knows not in Dragon Ball?

Z.

Even though she deserves it. Yes. We'll get to her, and while they're exploring, we cut back to baldwin, who's waking up in a very fancy, ornate room. He got that fancy princess loft bed, and there's, like, a monster movie playing onto the TV near her.

Yeah, I really like that touch, where it's just like lucifer, who's a vampire, also likes to watch old horror movies and put them on for his guests when they're waking up.

Get them dragon bars.

You can just make a Halloween special. You can call it that. It's fine.

Exactly.

No, we got to get the universal monster movie tie in.

Man, I love Vincent Price.

God, if it was just, like a real life footage of Vincent Price, I would love for no reason. No one addresses it, but yeah, so she wakes up and she startled by igor, and she's like, who the hell are you? And he's like, oh, excuse me. And we see a very debonair, well dressed man in a suit walk in. Very similar to goku's hair, which I found weird out of all the hair you could have drawn, toriyama. Yeah. And he's like, oh, let me introduce myself. I'm Count lucifer.

It's like, this is like cheap vampire design, though. Yeah, he's perfect and I love him.

Even if you don't know what a vampire is, you're like, something's up with this guy.

Clearly evil.

Yeah, he has the skin of a killer.

Stella.

Bulma yells at him about, like, hey, you got a bunch of goons flying around here attacking people. He's like, oh, apologies for them. They're a bit overprotective. It's like, they destroyed my ship.

Yeah, sorry.

And she's like, well, now that I'm up, can I see my friends? I noticed they're not in the room with me. And igor is like, yes, let's go see your friends. And pulls out a giant needle.

Okay, this is normal.

Thanks, igor. Yeah, so he cut back to the two little lads in the cave, and they stumble across kind of an open area with a bunch of big pillars in it. If this is a video game, there'd be a save point nearby, because, you know, a boss fights about to go down yeah. And goku. Notices. He's like, oh, here they come. crown's like, what do you mean, here they come? What the hell are you talking about? And I was like, Give it a minute. And then you just see an army of demons running at cron is like, what is happening? And it's a lot of ogre demon looking guys. We saw before, but these guys are all in like armor and they have like bullet straps across them. I forget what they're called. And they're just running at goku and krill and like stamp eating at them. And it's like, oh god, here it comes. And they just run past them and trample them. And we see goku and grill, like pop back up, like rubbing their heads. Like, oh, they step all over us. What the hell is that? And one big guy in the back, he's a different color than all the rest, so I assume he's the boss. And he's like, I noticed you too, trying to play dead so he didn't see you. It's like they they weren't playing dead. They just got actually trampled. Like the other demon guys were just dumb and didn't see him. And goku pops up and he was like, hey mess, you were here to rescue the princess. And the big Ray was like, ah, well, the princess isn't a person. Like, you can't save her. Cook was like, what? And we see this, right, when he says what? Guru is like, ah, what the hell? And notices this little pink demon thing biting at his ankles. It's basically a kirby swallowed like a little bat. And it's just like gnawing at him. And he kicks him off. Because even being an itty bitty baby Go Go so stronger than everyone else in existence.

Yeah.

And once he kicks him off, big red Uber guy starts attacking him and Crowland's like, oh boy, I'm glad I'm not fighting him. As the entire army turns around and comes back to fight frilly. Shit. So frilly takes on roughly like 300 demons and goku takes on a slightly larger one. And while they're fighting, goku knocks them out, is able to come help Krylin, as the demons are, as you would assume from demons shooting them with submachine guns. Of course, we all know the lore.

I truly, at this point, did not realize just straight up guns were that active in Dragon Ball. So I was like, oh, cool, cool. Just full on just fire and lead.

A primary villain in the Dragon Ball series against Gooku is the Red Ribbon Army, which is just a literal army with guns and robots.

Yeah, I love that's. So funny, though. Like big strong man versus gun.

It's not even so much the guns, but I just like a lot in these the earlier Dragon Ball Z movies too, but just the power. Like we said earlier, some of the other characters have things to do, like krillin. And he's also kind of an audience surrogate where he can't see the army as as fast as goku because goku is just way too overpowered. But he this is in 1987. This is like the last time. He's not even an equal to goku, but can actually like, do stuff with him.

So yeah, I think at this point they weren't even like, aware of goku being like a like a saiyan wasn't really that big of a thing. goku's just some mountain kid with a tail, and that's it. So it's not surprising when goku can leap to the top of a tree easily or yeah, has superhuman abilities. Everyone's like, I don't know. He's just a feral mountain shot.

He's just a freak.

He's just a weirdo. So they start fighting off the army, and they're able to take on a bunch of them, but not all of them. So they get a little overwhelmed, and the big red guy wakes back up and follows them. And the little gremlin thing starts biting goku again. And goku once again just kicks it off. And the big guy, big red guy starts attacking, and he's got this pink ribbon that he's had draped around him and starts attacking with the ribbon and cutting through the pillars and through stone around them. So he starts fighting with goku again because he was actually a rival. And while he's busy, Crown is like, Ha ha. Now is my chance to get ahead and sneaks off because he's a little shit alone. Cut to Bulma is getting a tour of the castle by Count lucifer and igor. And she's like, oh, yeah, nice place you got here, but I'm still feeling a little dizzy. And igor is like, ah, that's the altitude. It bends your blood out. And it's like the third time Igorce talked about blood. It's like, we get it.

Vampire wink.

Yeah, even lucifer is like, oh, yeah, he's like, the leading scientist on blood, I guess.

Yeah, he's got a PhD in hemocraft. No, with hemocraft. Blood magic. The study of hemology. That's not a thing, hematology. He likes the blood, is it?

I don't know.

It doesn't sound real.

Based on how gothic he is, I believe he studies immology.

There it is.

Hot Topicology.

So countless first, like, leading the way and gets these giant doors. And as they enter this giant room, just it's a colossal room with, like, a dome top and a hole in the ceiling for the moon. There's just demons and ought and all these guys everywhere lining the room, and they're just hooting and hollering and screaming. And there's like, wow, I guess they were expecting me. They sure are excited. And Kent Luisford leads Bulma to this raised platform in the center of the room. Not suspicious at all. And it's also got a very ornate, like, bed, I think. Or it's just an ornate, like, platform. It's got, like, drapes and pillars around it, too.

Yeah, you would think that. There's a bed in there.

Yeah, it looks like a bed. And he introduces Bulma and he's like, ah. Everyone, please welcome our guest of the evening. And he presented Bulma and all the demons. Go, like, absolute ape shit and screaming and hollering and, like, even in my mind, I'm like, yeah, I get it, like, her blood. But, like, she's like one like, 16 year old girl at this point. And there's like 400 deep. Like that's not enough blood for anyone.

Like, just logistically it's not enough blood.

He showed up at the frat party with a personal pan pizza.

Or the throne room. This whole segment reminds me of Rise of skywalker. Maybe that's just my rain, but it definitely has those vibes of palpatine's. Throne room.

Oh God, we can't go into it.

With the random audience of ghosts.

Yeah, whatever they are. And the Bulmas is like, oh wow, they're really getting a chuckle out of me. Why are they all laughing? Counsel is like, oh, they're laughing because you're missing the point. You know the point. And igor is there with this giant needle. We've seen her last like ten minutes. Like, yeah, we get it. And we see her get strapped down to this chair and tied down. They're like, we're going to drain your blood and use it as a sacrifice. And when the Count says that, he goes from like the Devon air pretty boy and it talks to like a more sinister, like a lot more lines drawn on his face. Like turns out he's evil.

Who to guess? Who to thunk? I didn't see it coming.

Not at all. And when bowman gets strapped out of the chair, she yells out for Yamsha, who at this point we haven't seen yet. And it just comes to Yamsha far and oolong like, wandering around in the castle. And yama is like, did you hear that? Bulma cried out for me. It's like, where are you, my beloved?

I'd hear her anywhere.

We can't tell if he's searching the gift shop.

Yeah, I can't tell if he's in the next room over or he's on the other side of the island, but he hears it. And then so the three of them go running to help Bulma. And we cut to crillon still trying to find his way through the castle when he got his head start sneaking off. And he gets picked up by this like, two headed dragon thing. He's like God beans. goku. And goku is able to see this somehow. I guess he's not that far yet. And so goku breaks off the fight with the ogre guy and runs off after him. And while krillin is being kidnapped, he's in the talents of this big dragon thing and just bites it and gets him to drop him. And I love like the 2 seconds of Krellin being really smuggling, like haha, can't get one over him. I'm falling. I just remembered I'm falling to my death. He's very proud of himself. And we see as he's falling like a giant fish creature comes out of the water and is about to eat him. But right before he gets goku comes flying in on his flying nimbus. This little yellow cloud is able to pick up crying and he's like, don't worry buddy. Here, let me put you. Down on the nimbus. And krillin falls through the nimbus immediately and is about to get eaten by the fish again. And goo Go has to fly back down and catch him again. He goes, ah, sorry, I forgot. You have to be pure of heart to ride on the nimbus. And I guess you're a sinner crowlen.

I loved that reused animation also, though.

Yeah, just go again. Yes, one more time. We got a fluff. Like, we got to stretch out this, like, minute to fit the runtime. So, yeah, krillin is not so much riding on the nimbus so much as he is just hanging on goku because he is filthy little child. Pure thoughts. So when we cut back to we see, like, the red Greg guy running after them, and he summons, like, fireballs to lift them up underneath his feet so he can fly after him and chase them. And while they're flying around, kuka notices like, oh, here they come again. Crown is like, what? What are you talking about this time? And it's just a wave of flying demons at the time with machine guns.

Like, nonstop, just constant.

Once again, I don't know how one teenage girl's blood is going to say she and all of these guys. So they're able to dip and swerve around all the gunfire from the demons and the red guys are chasing after them, and they're fighting in mid air. And goku is able to trick him and lead him into a chase as they fly over the water one more time and zip through the giant fish right as it closes the mouth on the red guy and eats him instead of krillin this time. Got him.

Got him. Big red ogre man got by the swamp monster.

I know it's Master roshi says earlier. He says something along lines where it's like, oh, they send them to, like, a theme park or whatever. And this whole sequence just feels very much like it could be a ride. It reminds me of, like, the Harry Potter ride or something at Universal. If you guys have ever been on that, where it's just like a bunch of scenes pushed together and it's like trying to escape from this scene. There's a dragon. Now there's spiders. Now there's a giant monster scene. I'm like, this is fun. It's like a roller coaster.

Yeah, one where it stops in front of movie screens and stuff. Yeah, I could definitely see that.

There's probably been some Dragon Ball or dragon Ball z ride like in Japan. Universal Studios. I feel like they have a lot of anime rides.

I'm sure it's a 40 year old. Oh, my God, it's almost 40 years old. Yeah, there's got to be some amusement park thing for Dragon Ball.

Yeah, it looks like there is a jump theme park jayworld in Tokyo. J world pretty shitty.

It's one of those theme parks in Japan where they don't have the land for it. So it's built in a building, so it's never bigger than, like, a floor.

Yeah, it's an indoor theme park. So it's like oh, yeah. Just pose in front of this themed room. Okay, cool.

It's like a really neat mall.

So Bulna is still with all these monsters. Lucifer makes a toast, says that bulma will be providing refreshments and that the princess will awaken. So we see Krylin and goku are still trying to escape the machine gun monsters on the nimbus cloud.

What a sentence.

And now it's time. igor is about to take Bulna's blood when Krellin and goku bust through the wall and they fall into the princess's bed, into that draped thing on the platform. But they find it is not a princess. It is, in fact, a diamond or.

Gem of some kind of some high value.

And then a hot blonde lady comes in on a motorcycle and grabs the diamond. I don't know her, but I like her.

I'm realizing now, I don't think they ever say her name. Her name is Launch.

Launch?

Yeah.

All right. Is it different when she's in her other form?

No.

Still just launch.

Cool.

She's one of the best.

Well, I know a few other Dragon Ball women, but I was like, Is that cheeky? That can't be cheechy. So goku goes after her, leaves the others behind. bulma is upset. The other guys are still there. They were in disguise as some Ogre monster guys. But the disguise drops.

Yeah. For anyone who doesn't know oolong, the little pig, and por the cat met at shapeshifting school, so they shift.

Shape shifting academy. Yeah.

Apparently, you just go to school for.

It, realistic, more and more. There's a lot of characters in here with no explanation.

No, you just get the wrong end.

So Launch is she's just fucking going and shooting guys down, but then she sneezes, and then she turns into somebody else with black hair, different eyes, and she's like, how did I get here? What's going on? And she falls off the motorcycle. And as she falls, goku grabs the diamond. But Lucifer grabbed krillin, and he's like, if you give me back the diamond, I will let your friend go. And the power of friendship. goku gives the diamond back. How nice. But the monsters attack him anyway.

Through the power of friendship. They beat his ass.

Yeah. They beat goku to a pulp. And all seems doomed. We see all the monsters reconvene. It's time to bring chaos to the world. Count lucifer says monsters will even be on cereal boxes.

Does he say that? I miss that.

He does.

That really took you. I think Master roshi said it's putts. krillin says viva condios. Launch says Aveder zane. I'm like the localizers for this had just a lot of fun. This is English and those are not English.

Krillins is viacondios. monkey void.

Coke.

I'm like, why? I like it.

So we established Spanish exist in this world.

When Launch launch comes in on her motorcycle, she says, monster mash graveyard smash. I'm like, oh, yes.

I was so mad about that.

I was going to write it down, but I forgot.

How dare they?

It's so good. But I love that. That's the goal. It's like we're going to normalize monsters to the point that we're on cereal.

Boxes, we're going to have shitty seasonal cereal.

And you know what? You said Count chaka before. He got his wish.

He got it.

I would say they want their time in the sun, but that's kind of the opposite of what they want.

But I'm bump.

They awaken the princess.

Okay, sorry.

They awaken the princess by letting moonlight hit the diamond. It like, gets all rainbowy and pretty. And then Lucifer, this whole part, this whole last 15 minutes is just the hits don't stop coming. He tells all of the monsters to hold hands. I wrote in a moment of silent reflection.

That's cute.

Yeah.

Take your partner by the hand. Say a little prayer.

Yeah. I love it.

Now I kind of feel bad. They're being attacked.

So we see our crew of good guys. They're all trapped in a wall. They admire the moon's beauty, despite their circumstances. But then goku looks at it and he starts shaking, and carillon is like, ha. Even you get scared of stuff sometimes. But no. goku is going into gorilla mode.

I was afraid of not being a gorilla.

So he busts out of the wall. The wall crumbles. So everybody else gets out, too. He runs after our crew, apparently not recognizing them. While he's in gorilla mode, he grabs a Launch and is going to chomp on her. Oh, no. Very King Kong.

Wink.

Two audience, and then what's his yamcha? Is that the guy in white?

Yeah.

So he says, you got to go for his tail. His tail is the weak point. Get on the hydra's back. So they go for the tail, and he tells is that the pig or the cat?

Oolong, is the pig par is the cat.

Okay, well, he tells the cat thing to transform into scissors, and he does that easy. What? Because in my head, I was like, if you can shape shift this whole thing, I feel like it could have been so much easier. You know what I mean? They could have used that earlier.

You know what? You're right.

You can turn into anything, right? Yeah. Scissors. That's what we need in this moment.

Gun.

Only that will do.

Or is kind of like ditto where they shapeshift, but they kind of keep their face all the time. It's not a perfect transformation.

Even better.

So big scissors snip off goku's tail. He wails causing the part of the castle that they're in to crack and collapse. Lucifer notices, and igor tells him not to worry, the master plan will still work. And bulma is like, what is the master plan? And igor is like, because Master made it up. He's called the master plan.

Boo.

So we see our crew again. goku is baby again, and he's naked and he's freaking out because his tail is gone. But then he's just like, oh, well, whatever.

Yeah, when he's freaking out, he says, It's gone again. I was like, what point of the Dragon Ball canon does this exist? I don't know. It's confusing.

Yeah, apparently, I do like all the sorry.

No, go ahead.

I just like that they incorporate, like, the great apsa and stuff in this with the full moon and everything. Just because I'm like, yeah, somebody said it earlier. And I'm like, oh, yeah, this is mind. You were recording us in April. But I'm like, oh, yeah, this is incredibly Dragon Ball to Halloween special, because great ape transformation is, like, very werewolf like, except he turns into a massive gorilla instead.

Yeah, exactly.

So they still got to save bulma. Lucifer places the diamond into this huge contraption, and he says they're going to blow up the sun. I was watching watching this on my ipad with my headphones in, and I laughed out loud and paused it, and Paul just looked at me and smiled, and he was like, what happened? And I was like, they're going to blow up the sun. And I don't know if he's seen this, but he was like, yeah, that's Dragon Ball.

Yeah, that's right.

So funny. And the only reason he wants to blow up the sun is because monsters don't need it. And they love darkness.

I think they probably mildly inconvenient.

They probably still do need it because then, I don't know, Earth will rotate out of orbit, right? And just like, I guess they'll be.

Fine unless gravity they're not thinking about the science. They're like, who needs it? So the crew runs in and Lucifer attacks them. A fight happens. curling and goku are working together as pals. Very cute. Bulmo tells goku to not let Lucifer fire the machine. And then oh, boy. goku does the kamehameha. That's the thing. That's the Dragonfall thing he did the.

Thing he learns from Master roshi, which I guess didn't technically happen. All right.

Oh, dear.

Real quick, I love that. The count's giant gun for the targeting system has a sun on it, but the sun has a face like a medieval portrait of the sun. It's not like a viewfinder. It's like a stylized targeting system.

Yeah, it would make sense more if it was like other tech of his was like that, but then he just has, like, a normal television, so it's just like I don't know.

He's so out of place.

It's a slayer, I guess. I don't know.

You don't understand. I have to aim for the vibe of the sun.

Just a general feel for it.

And that gun looks so cool, too.

Yeah. The very painterly style and like the greens. Very nice.

Yeah, it's like an organic based technology, very out of place for this vampire.

Yeah, it's like a mixture of the thing from Alien when they land on the alien ship and sell, I guess, from Dragon ballsy.

Yeah. Very geeks esque.

So, yes, he kamihamehas the machine, the machine collapses, takes Lucifer with it, the crew runs away, and then the diamond explodes and blows everything up, including Lucifer. We see it happen. He gets dusted. Mission accomplished. krillin is sad because they didn't get the princess to bring back to Master roshi. But goku is like, well, we did our best and save the day, and that's what matters. So they go back to roshi, and he says that they did it. He thinks that Launch is the princess. She's not. But he, like, takes her hand and is like, Come inside with me. And he's like, I'll let you both be my students because you did it. And they're so excited.

Hooray.

Yay.

Hey, you could have avoided this whole thing if you just said that in the first place. You know that, right?

But then he wouldn't have a girl to smooch on. He still doesn't.

Yeah. The two kids are blissfully unaware of the sex crimes going on behind them.

Yes. Luckily, she turns blonde again, her blonde mode, and shoots at him, and he runs outside, and then she sneezes again and turns back into the black haired version of her, and she's like, what the heck is a gun? oops.

I keep appearing in my hands.

Then the credits roll, and that's the movie.

I got one thing I really got to point out. It kind of just broke me. So after they destroy the castle, they get back to the mainland somehow. We don't have to worry about that. And they're talking, being like, oh, boy, we didn't get the gym. Well and then a voice out of nowhere goes, hey, kids, look at the camera. And they all turn and pose. And we hear a click, like a shutterstock. And then we move on.

I didn't even think about it.

So confused.

When is this?

This is after they defeat Count Lucifer and they escaped the island. And Gooku is like, oh, we didn't get the sleeping princess, but we tried our best.

Like, the picture of them with the castle looking like it's doing a peace sign.

Yeah, exactly. It's some, like, narrator voice of God is like, hey, kids, pose for the camera. And they do. And I'm like, what?

Don't question it.

I'd like to think they weren't sure if they would have the budget for the actual ending, so they were like, hey, let's just have a freeze frame. Like, yeah, we can end the movie here. And then they got to that point, and they're like, oh, wait, no, we have to resolve stuff at roshi's house. Never mind number one, just keep going.

They're, like, two weeks out before it has to air, and someone's just like.

Masaroshi.

Yeah, it felt like that.

So how are we feeling? Did those who haven't seen it enjoy it? I thought it was a hoot.

Yeah, this was definitely a lot of fun. Especially with it being like Dragon Ball. Not Dragon Ball, z. It definitely has that fun, goofy energy to it. At no point could you make the argument that this movie is trying to take itself too seriously. It is absolutely just a lot of fun and a weirdly good introduction to some Dragon Ball stuff if you're like. I don't know anything about the franchise. Watch this. This is fun. They literally don't introduce you to half the characters, so you are not expected to remember them. So don't even worry about it.

Just enjoy the ride.

Yay I picked something fun.

I knew goku was like a kid in the show at some point, but like I said, I've never actually seen any of it. So yeah, this was super fun. And his inquiry and relationship is really sweet. They're just a couple of little buddies. Yeah, it was very nice.

I enjoyed it. Like I said.

It actually made me laugh. And not just like a quiet exhale through the nose thing. I burst out laughing, which is always good. I love that.

Got a good chuckle at destroying the sun.

Yes, it was so funny. And also as soon as I saw Lucifer again, I paused it and I said, look at this guy.

And I showed him to come off, check him out.

What a man.

Add him to the simplest.

Goddamn is the type. Phil once I heard this is Dragon Ball, like I said, I haven't watched all the Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z movies because there's just so many. But once I heard it was specifically Dragon Ball, I was like, oh boy, I'm excited because yeah, that's the fun of Dragon Ball. It's fun, it's charming, it's silly. And yeah, I knew I definitely would have was going to enjoy it. But I'm glad to hear that even without having the context of all the character stuff, it was still a fun ride because they don't tell you shit. yasha is kind of an important character. oolong and Poor, not so much. Launch, unfortunately, not so much. I think she's wonderful, but she never really gets much time. bulma is a massive character in both series. She's like seven lines of dialogue, maybe at most.

Yeah.

But yeah, it's fun. Definitely weren't the voices I remember from this Dragon Ball series. But I know with Dragon Ball in particular, they have a lot of different localized dubs depending on the region. So we might have gotten like a different one. Or maybe this was just so old it was before they got like a concrete cast maybe, or at least the one I'm familiar with.

Yeah, I think so. I think some of these, they went back and re dubbed them. But I watched this on the funimation app. And some of the dubs are the older style and kind of like with the miyazaki's movies or whatever. They redub some of those. Again, all that.

Yeah. krillin sounds the same to me. And like, yamiche kind of did, but, like, bulma and goku definitely didn't sound familiar, but at least for the Japanese, the original Japanese, like, fun fact, the woman that plays goku played goku back when he was a kid at Dragon Ball. She's played him the whole time. She's playing him now in Dragon Ball Z for the last, like, 40 years. People are like, oh, why is goku's voice so high pitched and kind of nasally in the Japanese? Because it's a woman, and she played him as a child or when goku was a child. So I'm like, I love that they kept her around, and they're just like, yeah, it's illegal to cast anyone besides her. You can't do it.

Great.

Yeah. It's a fun time.

Yay. Yeah.

Well, thank you for bringing us a fun movie, Tyler.

Thanks for bringing me on.

Any time.

Yeah. This is like, very Temple of doomy and somewhat I was getting Indiana Jones box, and that's my favorite Indiana Jones movie. I know it has its issues, but it's just a lot of fun, too, I think. And this also has some Shrek vibes, which I like.

Yeah, I know exactly what you mean.

But I can't be specific about it. You're not wrong. But wow, what a statement.

Like, truly the approach of two unlikely heroes going up to this castle to rescue a princess.

Yes, absolutely.

Grilling a donkey, clearly.

Even down to the scene of, like, climbing over the cliff edge and just seeing a hellscape. And one of them being like, oh, no, we're going back. And the other is like, no, got to keep going. We made it all the way here.

If you want to take it a step further, donkey marries a dragon as kids with the dragon, KIRLIN marries an android, and as a kid with the android.

There you go.

Kind of works.

You can go so deep.

I bet shrek rinse off Dragon Ball.

Oh, no.

We're starting.

Well, if people want to read Thesis, the master's thesis that you're about to get your degree in, where can people find you online and read this great work that is coming, I assume very soon?

Oh, yeah. You can look out for it on my Twitter. It'll be one tweet long. Now I'll do the whole thread. Don't worry. dang it. Now I feel obligated to do this. Now I'll actually pursue it.

You can follow me homework.

Yeah. You can follow me at Taiami Vice on Instagram, Twitter, and letterbox, which I use to log movies, write little reviews and stuff that's tyam I-V-I-C-E from a handle. And you can follow my podcast and listen to it with my co host, connery hansen. It's called the franchise. You can follow us at franchise pod on Instagram and Twitter, and you can listen to it on Apple, podcast, spotify, wherever. And we've just covered a bunch of different movie franchises like Indiana Jones and twilight and The Santa claus, the godfather, mama mia, Legally Blonde and 50 Shades of Gray.

So many.

We have quite the gamut. We're covering sonic right now because the new movie just came out and dee was just on. It's coming out soon, depending on when this episode is coming out. But we covered our first anime series. We're doing the original gundam movies. They're like the cut down from the original gundam show.

Yeah.

But yeah, that's where you can find my stuff.

Nice.

Awesome. And if you, the listener, have a show recommendation for us, you can send those to our email Are We There Yet@gmail.com? Or you can reach out to us on Twitter or Instagram at. Are we there yet? On both.

You can find me on no. You can find me on Instagram and TikTok at Honey D or on Twitter at honeyd eight and Honeydart. Honey is spelled H-U-N-N-I-E. You can find.

Me on Twitter at abts Brendan. It's just not a lot going on. I'm going to be real with you. Not a lot going on. Instead, I would also recommend following an artist I really enjoy on Twitter, unsta Monster who if you want just good, high quality fan art of just this really dumb Dragon Ball zimbo named Yamsha. That's the account watching the series. I did not have a lot of opinions about Yamsha. After following on samantha on Twitter, I got a lot of opinions about Yamsha.

Wonderful. Thank you to camille ruley for our artwork. Not of yamcha, unfortunately, but someday. Thank you to Louis zong for themesong, stories. You can find all of Louis music at Louisong bandcamp.com. Thank you and we hope you'll join us next week as we learn to.

Live with anime kamehameha or whatever monster.

Mash, Grave Guard smash. They steal it from you. Thank you.