Dragon Ball's New Villains Have Goku Hopelessly Outpowered

Super Dragon Ball Heroes' latest promo anime arc has introduced a powerful new team of villains known as the Core Area Warriors to the franchise, and they've wasted no time causing havoc throughout the Dragon Ball Super multiverse! The Core Area Warriors have been systematically hopping form universe to universe, siphoning energy from powerful fighters to power a new weapon called the Universe Seed.

The Core Area Warriors' end goal seems to be the elimination of Grand Zeno himself, using the god-killing power of the Universe Seed. It's a pretty lofty goal, but after seeing just how badly the Core Area Warriors have been thrashing Goku and Co., it now seems like the team of villains could actually achieve their dark goal!

Since the very beginning of Super Dragon Ball Heroes, it's been clear that Goku and Vegeta are dealing with an entire new bred of enemy, dealing with the Core Area Warriors. Their battle with the villain group actually started with Cumber, the Evil Saiyan that kicked off the promo anime's initial "Prison Planet" arc. The battle with Cumber proved that Goku wasn't up to the necessary level he needed to be to take the villain down - even with all of his recent Dragon Ball Super power-ups.

The loss to Cumber forced Goku to undergo some serious new training under Grand Priest, allowing him to better master his Ultra Instinct state. The next time Goku met the Core Area Warriors it was the full team; Goku's improved Ultra Instinct Omen power was enough to take on Core Area Warrior's evil android siblings Oren and Kamin, but the villain group's member bench proves to hold some terrible surprises, in the form of powerhouse fighters that seem to outclass Goku, Vegeta, and even Jiren!

In the previous episode of Super Dragon Ball Heroes (no. 10), Goku got nearly eviscerated by Dragon Ball's newest female villain, the crystal-slinging Lagss. Now, in Dragon Ball Heroes episode 11 we once again see Goku getting beaten down - this time by the Core Area Warriors' leader, Hearts. A powerful psychic, Hearts has both telepathy and telekinesis, and uses the latter to attempt to crush Goku, SSBSSE Vegeta and Future Trunks like ants. It's only because of a save from Supreme Kai that Goku even gets out of there alive, while poor Jiren is forced to learn that the Resurrected Zamasu is truly unbeatable.

The fact that Goku cannot beat the Core Area Warriors is pretty significant, as the villain team has now targeted Universe 7 for attack, knowing that Goku and Co. have fled back there. If the most powerful fighter in Universe 7 doesn't stand a chance against these foes, who does?

Dragon Ball Super currently airs its English dub on Adult Swim during the Toonami programming block Saturday evenings. It is also available to stream on Funimation and Amazon Video. The Japanese language release of the series is complete, and available to stream on FunimationNOW and Crunchyroll. The manga has chapters that can currently be read for free thanks to Viz Media. Dragon Ball Super: Broly is now available on Blu-ray and DVD.