If “Namek’s Defense” was the action, “The Hunted” is the reaction, detailing the first ever—if indirect—confrontation Krillin and Gohan both have with Frieza, through the thwarting of Dodoria’s attempt to, for no good reason at all, murder a Namekian child. After he already murdered one a moment ago. Real stand-up guy, that Dodoria.
Dodoria really pulls the most weight this episode, which is
a funny metaphor to use given the shape of his strange body. He starts to kill
the Namekian village elder, but Frieza stops him, telling him he needs to focus
on the three Namekian warriors first. He knows the more immediate threat has to
be taken care of first, and he also knows that the village elder is more scared
of watching more of his people die than he is of dying himself. So it makes the
most sense to coerce the dragon ball out of him by killing more of his friends
and guaranteeing safety for the ones that remain… if he just hands over that
ball.
The Namekian warriors, of course, don’t stand a chance
against Dodoria, who is over twice as strong as all of them put together,
assuming they all peak at around 3,000. Even if they don’t, they’re just so out
of their league, it’s tragic. Dodoria literally stabs his hand through the back
of one of them, then unceremoniously mouth-beams another one into oblivion. The
third one puts up a bit more of a resistance, dodging a few attacks and
striking Dodoria with an energy beam, but it’s no use. Dodoria is a Namek
saga-level warrior and the Namekian defense was made up of Saiyan saga-level
fighters. It was never going to go in their favor.
Frieza proceeds to get truly slimy after the Namekian
warriors are disposed of. He presents the idea of a trade, the elder’s dragon
ball in exchange for the scouters he destroyed. The village elder, who at this
point has exhausted all of his resources and has two children left he needs to
protect, finally just gives in and agrees to give Frieza the ball. That alone
must be incredibly painful for him, because he knows Frieza is going to get one
step closer to immortality, and by extension becoming unstoppable. But as soon
as the elder gives over the ball, Frieza demands the location of the last two
balls. Any protestations made by the elder are, of course, useless, because
Frieza is too strong and too evil to be held to any sort of deal. He has no
moral qualms whatsoever about what he’s doing, he’s strong enough to make the
laws rather than be held by them, and he green-lights Dodoria, in one of the
most horrific scenes in this show yet, to murder the two Namekian children that
the elder’s trying to save.
We talked a bit in the last review about Gohan’s moral
compass, and it’s fair to say that after Dodoria mouth-beams one of the two
Namekian children—named Cargo—into smithereens, that moral compass starts pointing
hard in Dodoria’s direction, demanding some sort of retribution. But it’s not
quite retribution that pushes Gohan into finally acting after so much time.
Dodoria breaks the neck of the village elder, deciding to just go full
blood-lust on the hapless remainers, and you just know in your bones it was
always going to end this way. Dende, the other Namekian child, finds himself
completely trapped by Dodoria, who raises his fist and…
Gets kicked the fuck away by Gohan. At long last, the heroes
intervene.
Now, I feel I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that
Krillin goes along with it entirely once Gohan commits. Krillin may have been
content to let Frieza and his gang slaughter a village of Namekians before his
very eyes, but only because he knew that they might just become another
statistic if they were to intervene. Again, Krillin is acutely aware of his
limits as a fighter. Gohan, if he is aware at all, doesn’t give a shit, and
this is what separates him from Krillin and makes him display his father’s dual
traits of heroism and recklessness.
The rest of the episode is basically a chase between our
heroes, with Dende in tow, and Dodoria, who has been ordered by Frieza to get
off his “fat butt” and go get those motherfuckers. Frieza, as annoyed as he is,
continues to be fully self-assured in his powers, and proves as such to Zarbon
by blowing up a mountain range miles away with nothing but his fucking mind.
These are just the kind of frightening little glimpses into Frieza’s
off-the-scale powers that make it perfectly reasonable that Vegeta and the
heroes wouldn’t go for a direct attack approach. At this point, every other
character in the show is a flea in the face of Frieza’s awe-inspiring power,
and nothing I’m saying is a spoiler, because we know this from the very
beginning. If even Vegeta, the blood-knight to end all blood-knights, won’t take
on Frieza head-to-head, we know we’re dealing with something special.
Anyway, Dodoria gives
chase, and for a big boy, he’s pretty fast. He fires some energy beams, one of
which manages to skirt Krillin, and he drops Dende. As he’s flying down to get
the Namekian child, Dodoria grabs his foot, but Krillin, ever the wise man,
uses his head. To headbutt the shit out of Dodoria’s face. Dodoria whines in
pain as Gohan and Krillin rescue Dende and continue to put distance between
themselves and the roly-poly bastard chasing after them.
I think what happens next is the second instance of Solar
Flare being used in the entire series, as Krillin demonstrates it for Dodoria
to see, and then promptly not see. This attack might as well be called “Get The
Fuck Away From Me” because in all of my years of watching this show, I don’t
think I can name an instance of Solar Flare being used to incapacitate an
opponent so that the user can actually attack them. It’s always just, “okay,
blind them, then fly as fast as you can away until it wears off.” It feels like
a missed opportunity, especially against a villain like Dodoria who can’t sense
power levels. Krillin and Gohan could probably devastate Dodoria with a few
well-placed attacks, no matter how much stronger he is than them.
If I were a DBZ character who used Solar Flare, I’d be using
it all the fucking time, even in situations where me and my opponent are the
same in strength. There’s just no disadvantage to you for taking away your
opponent’s sight for a brief period, especially since it also seems to cause
pain in the person it’s used against. In particular, the trope I always hear
is, “Krillin should use the Solar Flare and then strike his enemy with the
Destructo Disk,” and I completely agree with that scenario. A lot of lives
could have been saved over the course of many sagas had Krillin simply decided
to use Solar Flare for a practical purpose instead of just pussing out of a
fight.
Well, anyway, it works for the purposes of Gohan and
Krillin, as they are able to suppress their power levels and hide away in a
nook amongst some mountains. Now Dodoria, who doesn’t even have his scouter
anymore, has to search for them with just his eyes, and the scenery of Namek
doesn’t exactly work well for his purposes. And there the episode ends, with
Dodoria circling the air above Krillin, Gohan and Dende, looking out for a sign
of their existence.
(4/5)
A Few Final Thoughts:
--“They’re quick! Just makes killing them all the more fun!”
--Gohan asks Krillin what he used against Dodoria, Krillin
tells him “it’s just a little trick [he] learned from Tien.” At least Tien gets
to have some smidge of relevance for the rest of the series.
--Let it not be said that Gohan cares about architecture.
When he kicks Dodoria, he does so straight into a Namekian house. I’d love it
if there was a Namekian sleeping in there who thought Gohan was one of Frieza’s
guys bullying Dodoria.
No comments:
Post a Comment