Dragon Ball Super‘s anime is currently on hiatus, but it is soon time for the anime series to move forward, and for the manga to introduce a new storyline, after the current “Galactic Patrol Prisoner” series soon comes to an end. The future of Dragon Ball Super is bright, and rife with wide-ranging potential for spinoffs and some game-changing new developments, but the series has also been giving fans a lot of nostalgia love since the Tournament of Power arc ended. The only element of Dragon Ball Z that Dragon Ball Super hasn’t really brought back is the character of Cell, but now it’s officially time for Dragon Ball Super to revist Cell… and soon.
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As stated, Dragon Ball Super has been none too shy about pulling up pieces of Dragon Ball Z‘s saga, as fodder for new Dragon Ball Super storylines. The Dragon Ball Super: Broly movie rebooted the iconic Saiyan Berserker within Dragon Ball Super canon, while also redefining the backstory of DBZ’s Saiyan Saga. Meanwhile, the Dragon Ball Super manga’s Galactic Patrol Prisoner storyline has seen an ancient villain named Moro return to terrorize the galaxy, and his first stop was the planet New Namek, which is steeped in the history of Dragon Ball Z‘s Namek/Freeza Sagas. Galactic Patrol Prisoner also redefines and exposes key new elements of the Majin Buu Saga and some of its key players, which means that between its first movie and first manga arc since the Tournament of Power, Dragon Ball Super has basically revisited all of Dragon Ball Z except for the Cell Saga!
That’s a pretty aggressive case of avoidance – especially since fans have been clamoring for “Super Cell” to debut in Dragon Ball Super for years now. We’ve already broken down why bringing Cell to Dragon Ball Super would be great, as well as how the series could easily and logically create a compelling story arc around how Cell made his return. The doorways to that storyline have already been opened by Dragon Ball Super. Radically different alternate DBZ timelines have already been explored in DBS’s “Future Trunks Saga” (the only tangential Cell callback in the series), while a back up manga story has revealed that Android 17 is keeping Cell Jr.’s as guards for his island preserve. The Dragon Ball FighterZ video game has also introduced a villain (Android 21) who is deeply connected to Cell’s story – and fans want to see her in Dragon Ball Super canon, as well. The upcoming game Kakarot will be bringing Cell back in a major way, as fans get a chance to play through that Dragon Ball Z saga in game form, and relive Gohan’s epic rise to the warrior who beats Cell. Once Cell hype is in full effect come 2020, the rally cry for the villains return in Dragon Ball Super is only going to get that much louder.
In fact, Toei and the manga team could really kill two birds with one stone, giving Dragon Ball Super fans an epic revisit / retcon to the entire Android saga, that at once brings back Cell, gives fan-fav Androids 17 and 18 a major spotlight, and brings back the likes of Android 16, while also introducing No. 21. When you look at it like that, the only really question left: why is this not happening right now?
Dragon Ball Super currently airs its English dub on Adult Swim during the Toonami programming block on Saturday evenings, and 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, and Dragon Ball Super’s big movie, Dragon Ball Super: Broly, is now available on Blu-ray and DVD.
Photo Credit: “Cell’s Plot” by Suniaiyan
