For Dragon Ball fans, Dragon Ball Daima made a lot of fans’ dreams come true. While the journey through the Demon Realm introduced Super Saiyan 4 to the main continuity of the shonen franchise, it also saw the Prince of all Saiyans hit a major milestone. For decades, fans were thinking that there was one specific transformation that Vegeta would never achieve, but the latest anime series proved them wrong. Taking place one year ago today, now is the time to celebrate when the Saiyan Prince achieved something that only Goku and Gotenks had previously achieved.
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One year ago, Dragon Ball Daima debuted its twelfth episode, “True Strength.” In this installment, the Prince of all Saiyans is still struggling with the Eternal Dragon wish made by the villainous Gomah. Despite being trapped inside a child-sized body, Vegeta still could access many of his powers and transformations. While fighting against Tamagami Number Two, the Z-Fighter unveils that, off-screen, Vegeta had learned to transform into a Super Saiyan 3, a form he had never accessed in canon before this installment. The form scores him a victory against the Demon Realm resident and eventually nets both himself and his allies one of the underworld’s Dragon Balls. Luckily, when the Z-Fighters eventually retain their adult bodies, Vegeta shows off the transformation that many believed he would never achieve in fighting Gomah. To this day, the form hasn’t appeared in Dragon Ball Super, though if the manga does return, we have to imagine Toyotaro will highlight the powerful transformation.
Vegeta’s Unique Super Saiyan 3 Form
While Vegeta’s Super Saiyan 3 transformation had some major elements in common with those of Gotenks’ and Goku’s forms, there was one major difference in how this controversial power appeared in the recent anime. Vegeta’s form still had the traditional long hair and protruding eyebrows, but the Saiyan Prince’s take on the ability kept his hair standing straight, versus the long hair that reached the feet of Goku and Gotenks. Of course, with the arrival of this transformation in Dragon Ball Daima, fans were questioning where the form had been in Dragon Ball Super and other anime material.
Created with the input of Akira Toriyama, Dragon Ball Daima is considered a part of Dragon Ball’s main canon, which leaves many looking at past events that could have warranted a Super Saiyan 3 transformation. The most obvious was during Dragon Ball Z: Battle of Gods, wherein the Saiyan Prince unleashed all of his power in fighting against the god of destruction, Beerus. There is an easy enough explanation for this fact, and that goes back to the major limitations that surround the controversial transformation.
Once transformations like Super Saiyan God, Super Saiyan Blue, and Ultra Instinct became a regular part of the Z-Fighters’ lexicon, Super Saiyan 3 fell to the wayside. The transformation, despite being far less powerful than the aforementioned forms, takes a bigger toll on the Saiyans’ bodies who use it, draining stamina to a far larger degree. While not a perfect explanation, it would work to explain why the Saiyan Prince might have been averse to tapping into its power while fighting Beerus.
Vegeta’s Super Saiyan 3, Past And Future
Before Dragon Ball Daima, Vegeta had never transformed into a Super Saiyan 3 in the main timeline, but this didn’t mean we never saw the form arrive in animation. Thanks to Dragon Ball Heroes, shonen fans had the chance to see what the Z-Fighter looked like sporting the transformation, though it looked far more like the traditional form than the one we came to see most recently. In Super Dragon Ball Heroes, we witnessed Time Patrol Vegeta turning into Super Saiyan 3 before once again pulling the trigger and going Super Saiyan 4.
Next month, the future of the Dragon Ball franchise across numerous media will be revealed as the Genki Dama Festival is touting some big reveals. While nothing has been set in stone, rumors are circulating regarding the future of the series, but we’ll know for certain when the event takes place on January 25th, 2026.
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Image Courtesy of Netflix
