"The Ultimate Sacrifice" (孫悟空ついに発進!! Son Gokū Tsui ni Hasshin!!, lit. "Son Goku Finally Departs!!") is the sixteenth episode of the King Piccolo Saga and the one hundred seventeenth episode in the Dragon Ball series. This episode first aired in Japan on June 29, 1988. Its original American airdate was September 25, 2003.
Summary[]
Goku with his new Nimbus
Goku has survived the Ultra Divine Water and vaults his and Yajirobe's way out of the Land of Ice with the Power Pole. Meanwhile, a crime wave spreads throughout the world. Eighter has travelled to Central City to find Suno. Suno is making use of herself, helping those in casualty as Eighter finds her. Eighter forcefully persuades a band of rogues to aid the casualties.
Tien Shinhan finally masters the Evil Containment Wave and makes his way to confront King Piccolo so that he can seal him away. Goku and Yajirobe manage to get back to Korin Tower. Goku feels the new power soaring within him and can now sense where Piccolo is currently located, now prepared to go and confront King Piccolo immediately. Before he leaves, Korin gives Goku a new Nimbus cloud after his previous one was destroyed and Goku makes his way to face King Piccolo once more.
Major Events[]
- Goku makes his way to King's Castle to confront King Piccolo.
Battles[]
- Android 8 vs. Hooligans
Appearances[]
Characters[]
Locations[]
Objects[]
Differences from the Manga[]
- Piccolo and his kind have five fingers in the anime but only four in the manga.
- Korin already has the Ultra Divine Water for Goku in the manga. The entire subplot of Goku going to find the water in the ice labyrinth is exclusive to the anime.
- In the manga, it is never shown outright that anyone commits any crime or evil deeds upon hearing Piccolo's announcement. Here, however, people are explicitly shown creating chaos from looting, shooting up correction facilities, freeing criminals, assaulting authority figures, amongst other atrocities.
- Eighter and Suno's involvement in the arc is mainly filler. In the manga, while Eighter makes no appearance, Suno appears briefly with her family watching Piccolo's initial announcement about him taking over.
- People around the world, including the Z gang and the biker gang, reacting in horror to Piccolo's rule is mostly filler. Tien finds out in the manga as Piccolo is making his doomsday broadcast and as he's flying to confront the latter. Here, he's still on the ground where he's training at and he finds out after pandemonium has broken out.
- In the manga, when the Z gang contacts Tien, he explains about how they (Roshi, Chiaotzu, and himself) failed in their objective and Piccolo making his wish as well as about Shenron and the others' deaths. He then tells them about how he's mastered the Evil Containment Wave and is going to confront Piccolo alone and how he's not doing it to be a martyr. In the anime, due to the others' already knowing most of the above from earlier events, the conversation is much shorter with Launch getting on him for trying to throw his life away, only for Tien to give the same line about not doing this for himself before hanging up.
Trivia[]
- One of the members of the biker gang, the one with blonde hair, is named Ken in the Japanese version, but the English version does not mention it.
- In the Japanese version, the boar biker asks Ken how to write the symbol meaning "demon" or "ma" on the Indian biker's shirt. The English dub alters the line to how to spell "annihilation".
- The leader of the biker gang is voiced in the Funimation dub by Aaron Hatch, which may be an allusion to his role as Kaname Hagiri a.k.a. Sniper from Yu Yu Hakusho, another series that Funimation was dubbing at the time.
- Tien's motivation for beating Piccolo is different between languages. In the manga and Japanese anime, he states it's because of his pride as a martial artist that won't allow him to let Piccolo run free and that he's not doing it to be a martyr. The English anime has him saying he's doing it out of atonement for the cruel deeds he committed in the past that made him no better than Piccolo, possibly referencing his run-in with the man he injured as revealed in "Tien's Atonement".
- The English dub adds in the line about Goku sensing Piccolo's power level as a more explicit explanation to how he can tell where the latter is. The manga and Japanese version offers no such confirmation and it's implied (more strongly in the anime) that Goku didn't fully learn this ability until his training with Kami and Mr. Popo, which occurred after Piccolo's death.
- Goku gains his second Flying Nimbus, which will be utilized for the remainder of the series by him and his sons.
- In the original Japanese broadcast, the first 15 seconds of the next episode preview were devoted to next week's show, and the other 15 seconds were devoted to a movie ticket lottery drawing for Dragon Ball: Mystical Adventure (Released in theaters on July 9, 1988). This preview was not included in the Dragon Box. Instead, the preview used was the rerun version for the next normal episode, "Prelude to Vengeance".
Gallery[]
 Female gang member panties after falling over  Tien practices the Evil Containment Wave  Goku feels his new power  The Enormous Nimbus  Goku on his new Nimbus |
[]
| ← Tien Shinhan Saga |  |
Piccolo Jr. Saga→ | |||||||
| Manga | |||||||||
| Chapters | 135 • 136 • 137 • 138 • 139 • 140 • 141 • 142 • 143 • 144 • 145 • 146 • 147 • 148 • 149 • 150 • 151 • 152 • 153 • 154 • 155 • 156 • 157 • 158 • 159 • 160 • 161 | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Volumes | 12 • 13 • 14 | ||||||||
| Anime | |||||||||
| Episodes | 102 • 103 • 104 • 105 • 106 • 107 • 108 • 109 • 110 • 111 • 112 • 113 • 114 • 115 • 116 • 117 • 118 • 119 • 120 • 121 • 122 | ||||||||