'One Piece' Gives Yamcha A Straw Hat Makeover

Eiichiro Oda's One Piece has some of the most distinct and recognizable characters in anime and manga, but another series with just as valuable of a reputation is Akira Toriyama's Dragon Ball.

In fact, Oda once put his own artistic spin on Toriyama's character Yamcha, giving the fighter the respect he deserves with a fierce Wolf Fang Fist.

Oda Has Also Drawn Dragon Ball's Yamcha, one of his favorite characters. from r/OnePiece

Yamcha may not have survived very long in the Saiyan arc, but his status as the first ancillary casualty of the arc cemented the strength of the new villains Nappa and Vegeta. Yamcha's death served as a catalyst that quickly raised the stakes in the series far beyond anything that had been seen in the past.

In the Saiyan arc, Nappa toys with the Z Warriors by growing Saibamen, little green aliens that emerge from the ground like plants, and uses them to fight in his stead. The first to challenge these aliens is Yamcha, and after a (hilariously) too close fight with the Saibaman, it latches onto him and kamikazes in order to take out Yamcha. Thus, resulting in the famous image of Yamcha in a crater.

On the other hand, his death is so infamous that the new famous image of his body lying in the crater has become a huge online joke in the community.

Eiichiro Oda's One Piece first began serialization in Shueisha's Weekly Shonen Jump in 1997. It has been collected into 87 volumes, with a few chapters yet to be included. It has been a critical and commercial success worldwide with many of the volumes breaking printing records in Japan. The manga has even set a Guinness World Record for the most copies published for the same comic book by a single author, and is the best selling manga series worldwide with 430 million copies sold worldwide.

Dragon Ball Super airs on Crunchyroll Saturday evenings at 7:15 p.m. CST. Adult Swim airs the English dub during its Toonami block Saturday evenings at 9:30 p.m, and is now available to stream on FunimationNOW and Amazon Video.

There is also currently a new Dragon Ball film in the works for 2018. The film will focus on the Saiyans, the "origins of Goku's power," and potentially the story of the very first Super Saiyan God. Not only does it aim to be the best film in the series, original creator Akira Toriyama will be contributing to the film's script and new character designs.