Plot Details: This opinion reveals minor details about the movie's plot.

Note: This is not a movie, but a set of tapes with episodes of the Dragon Ball Z show on them.

Runtime: 2 hours, 6 minutes

Ok, here’s the intro part:

Dragon Ball Z (DBZ) is a Japanese cartoon (anime) that was created by Akira Toriyama. I’m not sure when it first came to America, but I know I was flipping one day, saw one episode, thought, “What the heck is this?” and changed the channel. Somehow I started to watch it about a year later and realized that it was the same show I had turned off – needless to say I was amused.

Background: DBZ is a show of super-powerful beings that fight evil – most of the conflict centered around magical items called dragonballs. Dragonballs can only be created by Nameks, powerful alien beings (of which the character Piccolo is one). The idea? Collect all seven dragonballs and a dragon will appear and grant anywhere from 1-3 wishes (depending upon which set of dragonballs one is using – there are about 4 sets throughout the entire DBZ existence). The main hero of the entire series is Goku. Goku is a Saiyan – an alien race that thrives on battle (Goku is the exception) and was destroyed many years ago.

If you want to know more, I highly suggest checking out the first two sagas of the DBZ series; The Saiyan Saga, and the Namek Saga. Otherwise, you’ll come into this saga and be quite confused because there is a lot of information in the previous shows that you would want to know.

On to the actual review.

The Captain Ginyu Saga doesn’t really seem like it should be a saga – after all, it only contains 7 episodes. But I suppose it might as well exist considering the sagas before (Namek Saga) and after (Frieza Saga) are both enormous. That, and these episodes deal pretty much with only Captain Ginyu and his, er, antics. Yes, antics. I feel like they gave this character more power than he deserved. Yea, he was kind of a dork.

After Goku has made mincemeat of the remaining Ginyu Force, Captain Ginyu shows up. (Insert longer than necessary battle here.) Yes, many battles within DBZ are much longer than they need to be. The character either don’t show their full power until the end, power up forever, stand there and stare/look scared/debate what to do while the bad guy patiently waits, or talk. Which is why I liked the Saiyan Saga the best. But enough of that.

Captain Ginyu, in the end, can’t do much to Goku, so instead he uses his special technique and pulls a body replacement on him – in other words, they trade bodies. Poor Goku is stuck in Ginyu’s body and vice versa. From then on it’s a race to defeat the evil Goku and get the real Goku back into his own body. And they’d better hurry it up too because the real bad guy, Frieza (he is the head honcho of all the bad guys – he owns the Ginyu Force) is on his way and he’s not in a very good mood…

Honestly, that’s about it. I don’t want to give anything away because it’s always fun to see what twists the show can take…that and there’s only 7 episodes anyway.

The price, as usual, is about $5 per tape, which makes this set about $10. That’s been about the average amount for sets - $5 per tape. But shop around, see what you can find. Don’t pay more than you have to for this set, because even though I suppose it needs to be there as links for the story, it’s not the most exciting one to watch.

If you can get uncut versions as compared to cut versions, those are much better to watch - and getting your hands on Japanese versions with subtitles is even better.

NT

Episode List:

#54 Ginyu Assault
#55 Incredible Force
#56 Frieza Approaches
#57 Goku is Ginyu & Ginyu is Goku
#58 Calling the Eternal Dragon
#59 Gohan Defeat Your Dad and
#60 Captain Ginyu... The Frog

Other DBZ reviews:

The Series:
Sagas before this one:
Dragon Ball Z - Saiyan Saga: 8-Volume Box Set
Dragon Ball Z - Namek Saga: 9-Volume Set

Sagas after:
Dragon Ball Z - Frieza Saga: 10-Volume Box Set
Dragon Ball Z - Garlic Jr. Saga: 3-Volume Box Set
Dragon Ball Z - Trunks Saga: 4-Volume Box Set
Dragon Ball Z - Androids Saga: 4-Volume Box Set
Dragon Ball Z - Imperfect Cell Saga: 4-Volume Box Set
Dragon Ball Z - Perfect Cell Saga: 4-Volume Box Set
Dragon Ball Z - World Tournament Saga: 3-Volume Box Set
Dragon Ball Z - Babidi Saga: 4-Volume Box Set
Dragon Ball Z - Majin Buu Saga: 7-Volume Box Set

The Movies:
Dragon Ball Z: The Movie – Dead Zone
Dragon Ball Z: The Movie - The World's Strongest
Dragon Ball Z: The Movie - The Tree of Might
Dragon Ball Z: The Movie – Cooler’s Revenge
Dragon Ball Z: The Movie – The Return of Cooler
Dragon Ball Z: The Movie – Super Android 13
Dragon Ball Z: The Movie – Broly: The Legendary Super Saiyan
Dragon Ball Z: The Movie – Bojack Unbound

Recommended: Yes

Viewing Format: VHS
Video Occasion: Better than Watching TV
Suitability For Children: Suitable for Children Age 13 and Older