Tomb

This week, Video Vulture takes a look at the glorious strangeness that is the original Dragon Ball cartoon. Some readers will be familiar with the more famous sequel, Dragon Ball Z, which is pitched at a slightly older audience and mainly consists of ludicrously powerful characters shouting, fighting, training to be better fighters, talking endlessly about future fights and fighting some more.

The original Dragon Ball (1986 to 1989) is considerably goofier and more lighthearted than its better-known followup. Although it was intended for a younger audience than Dragon Ball Z, its appeal is more universal. Consider it a sort of Looney Tunes compared to DBZ’s Transformers.

The hero is a little kid with a tail (Goku) who lives alone in the woods and has super strength. He teams up with some bizarre friends to track down the seven “Dragon Balls,” mystical talismans that can grant wishes if all of them are gathered together in one place. Standing in their way is the villainous Emperor Pilaf, a short blue dude who’s about as intimidating as Elmer Fudd and who provides a similar level of comic relief.

The world of Dragon Ball is like Earth in some ways, but is crammed full of whatever cool stuff an eight-year-old might imagine while telling a thrilling story. There are modern cars and airplanes, as well as talking dinosaurs and tiny capsules that change into vehicles or houses when tossed on the ground. We’re never more than five minutes away from something utterly ridiculous happening, and the series is extremely lively and funny. There’s also plenty of stuff you’d never expect to find in a kid’s cartoon, including:

· Nudity! Unfortunately, it’s little kid hero Goku who gets naked, and yes, it’s full frontal. His boy-parts are drawn with the same lack of detail as those of Bart Simpson, so viewers are more likely to giggle than be traumatized. Feisty heroine Bulma gets naked too, but her good bits are obscured by shower steam or camera angles or suchlike.

· Plenty of double-entendres about “balls.” Well, in the subtitles, at least.

· Panties equal currency. Some of the dirtier male characters insist on seeing or stealing the panties of innocent heroine Bulma before offering to help the good guys. Bulma typically reacts with anger, but she doesn’t always refuse.

· Flatulence! When childish despot Emperor Pilaf gets angry, he accidentally lets out a mighty fart that fills the screen with stink-vapour lines.

· Chainsaw fart bondage! After the aforementioned eruption of intestinal gas, an embarrassed Emperor Pilaf accuses one of his hapless underlings of the smelly deed. When the guy protests, Pilaf immobilizes him with robotic restraining arms and brandishes a chainsaw, demanding that the captive take the blame for the eggy toot.

· Gunplay! On two separate occasions, Bulma whips out a firearm and pops a cap in Goku’s ass. This is how we learn that the little tyke is bulletproof.

· Underwear obsession! An obnoxious pig-like character named Oolong looooves ladies’ panties. In one scene, he uses his magical transforming ability to turn into a pair of panties, and begs Bulma to wear him. Another time, he attempts to run away by turning into a fish, but Bulma baits a fishhook with her panties and catches him. The censored-for-YTV version of this scene replaces the underwear with a roll of cash, and when it gets reeled in, Goku comments “Oh look! A fishful of dollars!” as a few bars from one of Ennio Morricone’s famous spaghetti western scores plays in the background.

· Explosive diarrhea! Oolong is reluctant to help the heroes until they trick him into eating a pill that makes him poop uncontrollably whenever someone says “piggy piggy.” After that, he pretty much has to obey their every command, or else wind up running for the bushes.

· Urination! The Dragon Ball world is full of monsters and dinosaurs, so it’s not surprising that some characters have an occasional fraidy-piss when things get scary.

· Crotch grabbing! Semi-feral Goku learns to tell the difference between men and women by innocently patting them on the crotch. Hilarity ensues!

Most of these bizarre elements were missing from the censored version that aired on YTV a while back, but are restored on the Dragon Ball DVD sets, released by Funimation. All five seasons are available, but newbies should take care to differentiate between this series and the similar-looking Dragon Ball Z sets. The discs include a fine English language dub, as well as the original (much dirtier) Japanese language track.

Oh, and avoid the live-action film Dragonball: Evolution (2009). It’s garbage.