Before venturing into Babidi's spaceship, Shin reveals the reason why he recruited Goku's crew: Apparently, Babidi's magic is so strong that anyone with the slightest bit of evil in their hearts will fall prey to it. And somehow, nobody predicts Vegeta, the guy who sends a death threat to everybody every 5 seconds, would have any evil in his heart. Of course, that require the main characters to be smart in the first place.
Vegeta's Un-Redemption Arc Round #3
So, Vegeta, obviously having evil in his heart, is possessed by Babidi and starts throwing a massive tantrum to fight Goku. When Goku doesn't want to, Vegeta goes and kills hundreds of people, some of which came dangerously close to be his wife and friends... but that's before the story reveals Vegeta was never possessed at all and just used Babidi to get stronger.
The funniest is the character reactions, including Goku's "Vegeta, how could you?!" Yeah, he just slaughtered a village of innocent Namekians, laughed about it, swore he would become the next Freeza, threatened to kill you multiple times, threatened to kill Bulma if she killed Gero before he developed the Androids, let Cell absorb No. 18 and become Perfect, among numerous other things. Who could even imagine Vegeta would ever do such a thing? Toriyama sure loves to pretend Vegeta is already redeemed when he never was.
And then, comes the kicker: Vegeta, after wasting everybody's time and willingly giving his energy to Majin Boo just so he could fight Goku, grows a heart out of absolutely nowhere, knocks Goku out cold and goes to challenge Majin Boo alone. I'm sorry, what the hell just happened?!
In the end, Vegeta sacrifices himself to absolutely no effect, with Piccolo even reminding the audience that this would be his final death, because evil people lose their bodies and memories and get reincarnated as other life forms. (Man, I'm glad Super isn't canon, right?)
The Dragon Balls Don't Matter Anymore
After Vegeta kills people, the rest of the cast try to find the original Dragon Balls. Bulma is sad that her husband is a mass murderer who killed hundreds of people on a temper tantrum, but Yamcha comforts her with the following line: "Who cares? That's what the Dragons Balls are for! :D"
I guess that sums up Z's sense of tension pretty well: The Dragon Balls went from the focus of the show to a mere plot device that nullifies whatever bit of consequence there is left. Who cares if people die? We'll just resurrect them anyway. Shen Long used to have rules against reviving people twice and Porunga used to have rules against reviving multiple people at once, but by the end of the show, those rules are discarded.
What makes it even funnier is that not even an episode goes by and they all start freaking out and screaming in pain because they think Vegeta, Goten, Trunks and Gohan all died. Let me reuse Yamcha's phrase: "Who cares? That's what the Dragons Balls are for! :D"
Final Thoughts
So, let's recap: Vegeta goes from sorta-good-but-mind-controlled, to not-mind-controlled-just-likes-evil, to killing people and throwing tantrums just to fight Goku without caring about Majin Boo, to not wanting to fight Goku and wanting to be good and defeat Majin Boo.
In the end, all he accomplished was waste everybody's time and provide more plot-induced stupidity. It's clear why Akira did it, there was no damn way Goku/Gohan/Vegeta wouldn't defeat Babidi if he didn't make Vegeta evil. But the problem is that he kept zig-zagging between Vegeta being mind-controlled and not-mind-controlled, which made the whole thing nonsensical.
Also, when you have a line in your show that literally says "Who cares? That's what the Dragons Balls are for! :D" Then you're basically telling me there's no reason to keep watching.
Boo Saga - Majin-Vegeta
Before venturing into Babidi's spaceship, Shin reveals the reason why he recruited Goku's crew: Apparently, Babidi's magic is so strong that anyone with the slightest bit of evil in their hearts will fall prey to it. And somehow, nobody predicts Vegeta, the guy who sends a death threat to everybody every 5 seconds, would have any evil in his heart. Of course, that require the main characters to be smart in the first place.
Vegeta's Un-Redemption Arc Round #3
So, Vegeta, obviously having evil in his heart, is possessed by Babidi and starts throwing a massive tantrum to fight Goku. When Goku doesn't want to, Vegeta goes and kills hundreds of people, some of which came dangerously close to be his wife and friends... but that's before the story reveals Vegeta was never possessed at all and just used Babidi to get stronger.
The funniest is the character reactions, including Goku's "Vegeta, how could you?!" Yeah, he just slaughtered a village of innocent Namekians, laughed about it, swore he would become the next Freeza, threatened to kill you multiple times, threatened to kill Bulma if she killed Gero before he developed the Androids, let Cell absorb No. 18 and become Perfect, among numerous other things. Who could even imagine Vegeta would ever do such a thing? Toriyama sure loves to pretend Vegeta is already redeemed when he never was.
And then, comes the kicker: Vegeta, after wasting everybody's time and willingly giving his energy to Majin Boo just so he could fight Goku, grows a heart out of absolutely nowhere, knocks Goku out cold and goes to challenge Majin Boo alone. I'm sorry, what the hell just happened?!
In the end, Vegeta sacrifices himself to absolutely no effect, with Piccolo even reminding the audience that this would be his final death, because evil people lose their bodies and memories and get reincarnated as other life forms. (Man, I'm glad Super isn't canon, right?)
The Dragon Balls Don't Matter Anymore
After Vegeta kills people, the rest of the cast try to find the original Dragon Balls. Bulma is sad that her husband is a mass murderer who killed hundreds of people on a temper tantrum, but Yamcha comforts her with the following line: "Who cares? That's what the Dragons Balls are for! :D"
I guess that sums up Z's sense of tension pretty well: The Dragon Balls went from the focus of the show to a mere plot device that nullifies whatever bit of consequence there is left. Who cares if people die? We'll just resurrect them anyway. Shen Long used to have rules against reviving people twice and Porunga used to have rules against reviving multiple people at once, but by the end of the show, those rules are discarded.
What makes it even funnier is that not even an episode goes by and they all start freaking out and screaming in pain because they think Vegeta, Goten, Trunks and Gohan all died. Let me reuse Yamcha's phrase: "Who cares? That's what the Dragons Balls are for! :D"
Final Thoughts
So, let's recap: Vegeta goes from sorta-good-but-mind-controlled, to not-mind-controlled-just-likes-evil, to killing people and throwing tantrums just to fight Goku without caring about Majin Boo, to not wanting to fight Goku and wanting to be good and defeat Majin Boo.
In the end, all he accomplished was waste everybody's time and provide more plot-induced stupidity. It's clear why Akira did it, there was no damn way Goku/Gohan/Vegeta wouldn't defeat Babidi if he didn't make Vegeta evil. But the problem is that he kept zig-zagging between Vegeta being mind-controlled and not-mind-controlled, which made the whole thing nonsensical.
Also, when you have a line in your show that literally says "Who cares? That's what the Dragons Balls are for! :D" Then you're basically telling me there's no reason to keep watching.
Rating: 1/5