Dragon Ball Super’s Kid Goku Gets Old-School Toriyama Makeover

Dragon Ball Super: Broly introduced a new side of the Saiyan culture. Giving viewers an inside look into the world of Planet Vegeta before its destruction at the hands of the tiny despot, Freeza, audiences also got a brand new look at Goku, Saiyan armor and all. Now, one fan decided to take this new interpretation of our Saiyan protagonist and bring it back a few years to a design that is more in style with the Akira Toryiama designs of yesteryear.

Reddit User Roserivy posted this new interpretation of the young Goku, prior to being blasted to Earth and being adopted by his grandfather, Gohan:

Broly created a whole new origin story for Goku, making some slight tweaks to Goku, Bardock, and Gine, Goku’s mother. In this new interpretation, Goku was blasted off of Planet Vegeta as a toddler rather than as a baby that was only a few days old. Ultimately, the rest of Goku’s story remains the same as he landed on earth, was adopted by Gohan, and changed his murderous ways when he fell down a gorge and cracked his head on a rock.

What many fans of the Dragon Ball franchise may not realize is that Goku’s origin was kept a secret for a REALLY long time. In the first Dragon Ball series, Goku was thought of as a tiny monkey like boy who just so happened to have a tail. In a world where dinosaurs still exist and human/animal hybrids walk around the streets on a regular basis, this didn’t necessarily seem out of the ordinary, even with his ability to transform into the giant ape, Oozaru. It wasn’t until the opening episodes of Dragon Ball Z, where Goku’s brother Raditz appeared, that his Saiyan origin was revealed.

While Goku did wear Saiyan armor in the Hyperbolic Time Chamber to train during the Cell Saga, we haven’t seen him sporting his original alien attire in quite some time. We’ll have to keep reading the manga and watching the anime to see if another opportunity arises for Kakarot to strap on that patented armor!

What do you think of this re-interpretation of young Goku’s design from Dragon Ball Super: Broly? What other characters would you like to see given an old school Toriyama makeover? Feel free to let us know in the comments or hit me up directly on Twitter @EVComedy to talk all things comics, anime, and Dragon Ball!

Dragon Ball Super is currently airing its English dub on Adult Swim during the Toonami programming block on 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 Funimation, VRV and Crunchyroll.