Dragon Ball Z and Black Empowerment

 Harlee Harris 

Professor Harris 

ENGL 2016 

15 November 2022 

Dragon Ball Z and Black Empowerment 

Ever since my childhood as some kid who watched anime Saturday nights on Toonami,  almost every fan of Dragon Ball Z I’ve met has also happened to be Black. They’ve also been the biggest, most enthusiastic fans of the show. This coincidence has been something to pique my curiosity. I wondered whether it went any further than chance, and it was here in African  American Literature where I determined the truth to be something far greater. Since its original airing in America in the late nineties, Dragon Ball Z has risen to become one of the most well known pinnacles of pop culture and motivational masculinity for men growing up watching cable TV cartoons and anime. Something apparent though is that the show has grown to a level  of distinguishment that goes much further beyond specifically in Black communities and facets  of culture. It has been references a dozen times in hip-hop by Black artists like Kendrick Lamar,  Soulja Boy, Joey Basa$$, Denzel Curry, and Childish Gambino. Main characters such as Goku and Vegeta have been reimagined countless times as Black in fanart countless times, far more than any other contemporary shows in the medium. Another character, Piccolo, also is agreed by many in the community to be Black representation even though he is a green-skinned member of the alien Namekian race. Something’s here, and it’s important.  

For Dragon Ball Z to rise to such acclaim within the community, its themes, characters,  and conflicts must relate significantly to the Black experience. Although most of the main  characters in the show do not share ethnicity, great similarities can be found between the 

Black experience and reality, Black Gothic media, and Dragon Ball Z. Many characters share  circumstances of diaspora and intergenerational trauma that cause their backstories to be relatable to African Americans with ancestors separated from their homelands by the  Transatlantic Slave Trade. Goku and Vegeta, our two focus characters of Dragon Ball Z, are of the Saiyan race and natives to Planet Vegeta, which is destroyed alongside the entirety of their people. The enslavement and eventual genocide of the Saiyans may be relatable to the Africans who faced similar horrors. Looking closer at our protagonist, Goku, he is sent off to crash onto  Earth after his home planet’s destruction and awakens to live in a foreign place with no memories of his native people and old life. He experiences a cultural disconnection from one’s roots similar to some Black Americans who grow up today wondering about their ancestry and lineage but struggle to find definite answers. Vegeta is Goku’s antithesis as someone aware and proud of their culture and lineage. He is someone who radiates Saiyan pride and power who endeavors to teach Goku the significance of it. Another notable feature of Vegeta is how he refuses to call Goku his new Earth name. Instead, he only calls him Kakarot, Goku’s lost Saiyan name, out of respect for their culture. The relationship between these two may be comparable to the son and father of Yaa Gyasi’s Homegoing, Marcus and Sonny. Though their treatment of one another isn’t similar, Sonny endeavors to educate and remind Marcus of the terrible things unwritten in the history books so that he may never forget the crimes committed against their people.  

Piccolo is another character of Dragon Ball Z especially relatable to Black men. As stated earlier, it’s commonly agreed among fans that this character is Black, no matter his green skin.  This is for many reasons. As a character, he possesses a stoic masculinity and cold, cautious air  about him as if always expecting hardship or enemies. Unlike people like Goku or Vegeta who 

are always looking for fights and challenges, he exercises strong situational and environmental  awareness skills to avoid them. Time and time again, he avoids, escapes, or survives encounters  with forces he knows he cannot overpower with his physical strength (Not to mention that he’s  

often minding his business alone when attacked for no good reason). If you were to take such enemies as Cell or Frieza away and instead replace them with real world worries such as law  enforcement capable of racial profiling and police brutality, then Piccolo’s experiences in a way  mirrors the dangers found to disproportionately plague people of color in our streets. Piccolo is  also, like Goku, someone facing diaspora from their home culture. Until it is revealed in Dragon  Ball Z that he is a Namekian estranged from his home planet, everyone including himself  legitimately thought he was an evil demon.  

The first big bad of Dragon Ball Z, Frieza, also possesses some uncanny valley level of  resemblance to historical circumstance. This racist, foreign alien possessing white skin responsible for the Saiyan enslavement and eradication may very well be the white man. Both the Saiyans, Namekians, and the rest of the galaxy forced to suffer under this tyrant represent minorities repressed by imperialism. The main cast including Goku, Vegeta, and Piccolo fight against him in the climax of the story ark on Planet Namek where they confront Frieza directly.  While at first lacking the strength to defeat this villain, the characters pull through and develop newfound power through the discovery and embracement of their long-lost cultures. These powers lead to their victory and the conquering of the one who conquered them. Looking at  Piccolo’s specific empowerment, one must acknowledge that, before visiting Namek, he had  never seen another of his own kind. When he does happen upon a brother there, he meets a fallen  warrior near death, Nail. Nail offers Piccolo a proposition. He reveals their race’s hidden ability  to fuse into one, which results in the combining of their strengths and consciousnesses. After the 

fusion, Piccolo transforms into a new man with renewed confidence. Most importantly though,  the scene displays that he grows significantly more powerful through his union with his people and their ways. This reminded me of Daughters of The Dust where Nana Peazant begs her extended family leaving for the mainland to take a part of her with them with her charms. She  wants them to remain connected to their ancestors, and to seek power from them, no matter  where they go. In Piccolo’s case, he is also taking the weight of Nail into himself through his consciousness and spirit; something he would permanently carry with him even after eventually leaving Namek. After this fusion, and also his second one with another Namekian named Kami  much later in the series, Piccolo changes completely as a person. He goes even as far as claiming  to be, “The Namekian who has long since forgotten his name.” 

Goku also showcases similar transformations as well. Before the Planet Namek Saga, he  was very far disconnected from his identity as a Saiyan. But through his connection with Vegeta  who taught him about what it meant to be Saiyan, Goku goes on to fulfill his people’s  superstitious legend of the Super Saiyan in his final battle with Frieza. Fueled by rage after  witnessing the death of his best childhood friend Krillen as well as Vegeta, he changes into a  form showcasing golden spiked hair. This form, Super Saiyan, is what leads to Frieza’s death  and, subsequently, the death of his people’s oppressor. There aren’t many other pop culture contemporaries out there capable of empowering young, disadvantaged Black viewers in the same way. Dragon Ball Z summons people to stand up to the impossible and challenge their  hurdles by going Super Saiyan. Black rapper RZA from the hip hop group Wu-Tang Clan spoke of his similar beliefs in his recent book, The Tao of Wu. In his words, “ Dragon Ball Z represents  the journey of the Black man… Son Goku has superpowers and doesn’t realize it—a head injury  destroyed his memory, robbed his knowledge of self. Then one day, gets stressed beyond his 

limits and Hulks out into his alter ego, Super Saiyan—a ni*** with dreadlocks.” Both Goku and  Piccolo’s empowerment caused by the reconnection with one’s roots is also reminiscent of the ending of Homegoing where Marcus receives Marjorie’s jet-black necklace, wears it proudly,  and gains the strength to wade into the waters he’d been afraid of until then. Perhaps his necklace  is one’s ancestral pride and power that drives them forward. Perhaps it conveys what it meant for  Piccolo to take on the power of Nail and Kami. Perhaps it’s what it’s always meant for one to  become a Super Saiyan.