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Dragon Ball Z Movie 3: Tree of Might

Movie time again.    This time around it’s “Tree of Might”, which premiered on July 7, 1990, between Episodes 54 and 55 of the anime.

I feel like this is one of the more popular movies of the lot, but it’s never been high on my list.   There is a lot to appreciate here, but there’s some things that bug me, and I guess they don’t bug anyone else quite as much.    It’s definitely way better than “World’s Strongest”, so I don’t want to overstate my case here.  

The movie opens with a space probe heading for Planet Earth.    Pretty sure someone making this movie had just watched “The Empire Strikes Back.”

On Earth, Bulma, Krillin, Oolong, and Gohan are on a camping trip.   Okay, so I guess there was at least one other meeting between Gohan and Oolong after Movie 2, and this was it.  I’m curious to see if they ever interact in any later films, or the TV series.  

Honestly, I’m not really sure why Oolong would be involved here.    In the last movie, it made sense, because he was the only one who would drag Gohan out on a Dragon Ball hunt, which drove the whole plot.   Here’s he’s just chilling out with the trio who went to Namek.   He feels like an odd man out. 

I feel like this movie is angling at being an epilogue to the Namek Saga, since it depicts everyone safe and sound on Earth.  It doesn’t fit well with continuity, but the Namek Saga was still in progress when this movie came out, so I can’t blame the writers there.   In any case, the implication is that Bulma, Krillin, and Gohan all got back to Earth, and the first thing they wanted to do together was spend some quality time with Oolong.  

Anyway, Gohan’s mom made him pack a ton of stuff he probably wouldn’t need for a camping trip.

Nearby, that probe lands in the forest and the heat of the impact starts a fire!  Ruh-roh!

Krillin wakes up to the smell of burning everything, and we see all the animals fleeing in terror, including this little dragon.

Krillin tells Gohan to use his ki to put out the flames.   

While they do that, Gohan notices the dragon trapped under a... log?    It looks more like a really long piece of rock, but I don’t know what you’d even call that.    Gohan lifts it up and the dragon moves to safety.

Later, the fire’s out, but the forest is still ruined, and the gang feels sorry for all the homeless animals.   I don’t know, maybe I’m jaded, but I always found it a little cloying how all the animals just stand around at the edge of the forest, looking all sad, like they’re neighbors or whatever.    I don’t know what real deer do in a real forest fire.   Maybe they just die, but I’m pretty sure the ones who don’t just keep running until they find somewhere else to live.   

Then Krillin has a great idea...

Dragon Ball Z!   Wow, this is a great idea, Krillin.   This show kicks ass, but unfortunately they already made it, so it’s not really your idea, you know?

But seriously, Krilln plans to track down the Dragon Balls just so they can wish to have the forest restored.     In lieu of the usual opening credits, we get this montage of the gang collecting the Dragon Balls.    Here’s Gohan flying an aircraft.    I’d ask why they thought this made sense, but they had Gohan fly an aircraft in the last movie, so whoever made Tree of Might can just claim that the precedent was already set.  

Just a thought, but maybe the reason Gohan does all this zany stuff is because Chi-Chi makes him study too much.   By that I mean, she wants him to become a scholar, but for some reason she made him read an entire pilot manual, just in case it ever came up in some entrance exam.    We’ve seen how well Gohan absorbs information, so naturally  he’d finish the book and want to try it out for himself.    Chi-Chi probably made him read a book about lion taming, and then she wonders why Gohan ran off to join the circus.

Here’s a variation on the OP, only with a dinosaur chasing Gohan instead of Bulma.    Gohan ought to be strong enough to kick that dinosaur’s ass, though.

For some reason, Tien and Chiaotzu happen to be jogging by while they’re at it.    Small world, I guess.

And then Gohan shows up with the last ball.  Good thing, too.   The theme song was almost over.

And finally we get the title card.   Granted, these trees in the background don’t look very mighty, but bear with us, we’re getting to that.

DRAGON DRAGON!   ROCK THE DRAGON!   DRAGON!   BALL! Z!

DRAGON DRAGON!   ROCK THE DRAGON!   COME!  COME GET ME!

The sight of Shenron panics that little dragon Gohan saved, and it tries to attack him?   That seems like an unusual response.   Gohan calls him “Haiya Dragon”, so I guess he named him off-screen?   

In the English dub, the dragon was named “Icarus”, which I frankly prefer, because what kind of name is “Haiya Dragon” , anyway?   That’d be like naming your son “Hello Human.”

Shenron flails his tail around, and maybe he was getting ready to slap some sense into Icarus, or maybe he didn’t even notice the guy.   Anyway, Gohan holds Icarus back and makes their wish.

And the forest is saved!   I assume the gang finished their camping trip and went home.    All the animals return to their burrows and trees and bushes or whatever, and the probe robot crawls out of its crater.   Wait, that can’t be good.

The probe sends signals back to a group of aliens.   They confirm the presence of life signs on Earth, although no one can believe it, because they know the Saiyan Kakarot was sent to Earth, and he should have wiped out all of its life a long time ago.  

Okay, but why did they bother sending the probe if they didn’t think there would be anything there worth finding?    Well, anyway, the probe reports that Earthis a suitable environment for the Shinseijuu Tree, which is Japanese for “Divine Essence Tree” Tree.    Um, I think the subtitles goofed a little.   I’m just gonna call it the Tree of Might.   

That reminds me, the actual title of this movie is Chikyū Marugoto Chōkessen, which means “A Super-decisive Battle for Earth.”   It’s also been called “Super Battle In the World”, which sounds pretty dumb.   For some reason, most of the movies have Japanese titles that absolutely refuse to indicate what they’re about.     Literally every DBZ movie could have been called “A Super-decisive Battle for Earth.”    Well, I guess Movie 6 was a battle for New Namek, but Meta-Cooler would have attacked Earth eventually.

Later, we find Goku and Gohan chillaxing in the oil drum they bathe in.    Chi-Chi’s tending the fire that keeps the water hot.    Does Chi-Chi bathe in this thing?  She’d have to, right?    I’m surprised that erotic DBZ  fan artists haven’t jumped all over that concept.    “Oh, now that the fire’s going and I’ve taken off my clothes, I can climb into this oil drum and take a bath!    It’s a good think I live in the middle of nowhere, so no one can see my boobs!”  

But then Icarus shows up and frightens Chi-Chi until Gohan explains who he is.   Chi-Chi immediately takes a dislike to the creature, and I’m with her on this one.   Icarus is a stand-up dude and all, but he looks kind of creepy.   He’s supposed to be cute, but he ends up looking like one of those Precious Moments figurines.

Chi-Chi tells Gohan to take the dragon back where he came from.   Goku tries to stick up for him, but she won’t hear of it.   

Gohan shoves Icarus away, but let’s be real here, he could carry Icarus all the way back to his forest if he really wanted to.

Then Goku leads them both to this cave he fixed up as a hideout for Icarus.   This seems pretty dumb.   Goku tells him not to let Chi-Chi know about this, but how did Chi-Chi find out about Icarus in the first place?   He followed Gohan to the house where she could see him.   

But Icarus is grateful, and he licks Goku.   See, Goku looks way, way cuter than Icarus.    They really tried to hard with Icarus’ design.  

Meanwhile, Yamcha’s cruising around in a car he bought with a 15-year loan, when suddenly he gets blasted out of the sky by...

... one of these assholes, I guess.    If I understand correctly, they blasted a big crater in the ground so they could plant their Tree of Might seed, but I don’t really understand why they couldn’t just use a gardening spade.    

Tell you what, let’s go over these guys names right now.   The big red one in the center is Amond.     The guy on the left is Daiz.   He wears pink leg warmers.  

The alien in the silver armor is Cacao.   I think he’s a cyborg, but who cares?  And the two little purple guys are Rasin and Lakasei.   They’re all wearing Frieza Soldier gear, so does that mean they work for Frieza?   Well, we’ll get to that.

The seed starts growing almost as soon as it hits the soil.   

Meanwhile, the aliens’ mysterious leader notes that this was all made possible by Goku’s failure to destroy the planet’s population as he was supposed to do.

The Tree of Might is huge, to the point where its roots erupt underneath a whole city, which I’m pretty sure is miles away from the forest where it was planted.

In the forest, Icarus watches this enormous tree finish growing, and he knows things are looking bad.

Meanwhile, most of the major Dragon Ball characters have gotten together at Goku’s house.   I’m not sure why.    Also, they didn’t invite Launch, which is kind of bullshit.   

Bulma gives Yamcha shit for buying such an expensive car, and accuses him of trying to impress girls.   So yeah, about the continuity of this movie.     These characters won’t be reunited on Planet Earth until Episode 120 of the TV series.   By the time that happens, Gohan’s a few years older, and Goku’s learned to turn into a Super Saiyan, so this whole movie just doesn’t fit.    Nevertheless, it seems to depict a possible scenario where the good guys managed to return safely from Namek and wish all their dead friends back to life.    In other words, this is the first time Bulma and Yamcha are seen together again since his death in the Saiyans Saga, and what is she doing?    Yeah.

Same, Tien, same.    Chiaotzu’s not gonna let this stop him from enjoying free refreshments though.

Then Icarus shows up at the window, and Goku and Gohan get caught trying to keep him, but they miss the fact that Icarus came back to warn them about the Tree of Might.   Too bad he can’t talk.

Fortunately, King Kai can talk, and he can communicate with Goku telepathically, and he warns him about the Tree of Might.    Well, “warn” might not be the right word.    According to King Kai, the Earth was doomed the moment the tree took root.    It’s basically a parasite on a planetary scale.    As it grows, it sucks the nutrients and life force from the host planet, reducing the whole world to a lifeless desert.

So where does something like the Tree of Might come from?   King Kai says it was originally grown so that the gods could eat its fruit.    That sounds halfway plausible, until you consider that a lot of the “gods” in this franchise aren’t nearly as awe-striking as the Tree of Might.    It’s hard to imagine someone like Kami planting a tree like this, destroying a whole planet just to eat its fruit.    King Kai literally cooks his own meals, and he seems to eat the same stuff as everyone else.     King Yama has a tree in hell that bears fruit reserved specially for him, but it’s not nearly as big as this one.   I could imagine Beerus snacking on fruit from a tree that kills whole planets, but he’ll settle for cup ramen.    More importantly, Beerus and his ilk wouldn’t be introduced to the franchise for another 23 years.

I’m not sure what King Kai is trying to tell Goku.    If it’s too late, why bother telling him about this at all?   Is he trying to suggest that Goku should evacuate the planet? 

Well, King Kai should know better, because Goku stone cold does not give a shit.    As soon as he hears about this crisis, he immediately makes plans to go beat up a tree.   His plan: Let’s all go shoot it with our best hand lasers.   Diagnosis: Awesome.

Then they all put their hands together in a show of solidarity.     It’s time to show that tree who’s boss!    Look at Chiaotzu.    He’s literally lying on top of the table just to reach the others.

Then Gohan tries to join in, because hell yeah.   Gohan can help.   He fires some really good hand lasers, especially for his age.

But his mommy said no, so he’s gotta stay home.    Better luck next time, kid.

Krillin notes that his wish to restore the forest was a total waste, since this stupid Tree of Might wrecked it all over again.     I think the whole point of that forest fire was just to give the characters a reason to use the Dragon Balls early, so that way they wouldn’t be able to wish their way out of this situation.    I’m not sure Shenron could remove a tree this huge, but it’s a moot point now.   The Dragon Balls won’t work again for another year.

So they shoot their finest energy blasts at the base of the tree, and it does nothing.   Krillin suggests another try, but Yamcha points out that if they use too much power they could destroy the Earth instead.

Then these jerks show up.   Okay, so this is one thing that’s always bugged me about this movie.   From here on, much of the action takes place on the Tree of Might itself, so you end up with a lot of indistinct backgrounds which are probably meant to be super-giant tree bark.   It just makes it hard to tell where anyone is in relation to anything else.   What exactly are they sitting on here?   Why does the Tree of Might have all these convenient ledges and horizontal surfaces for people to stand on? 

Yamcha demands vengeance for his dearly departed car.   Uh, yeah...   Whatever gets you in the zone, buddy.

The boys square up for a fight.    You know, I remember watching parts of this movie on Toonami back in 1999, and scenes like this, and Yamcha’s appearancs in the Frieza Saga, were really my first introduction to the character.   What really stood out for me was that he looked almost exactly like Goku.    Kind of like how Flash Thompson was a big fan of Spider-Man, and one time he dressed up as Spidey for a Halloween party, and the real Spider-Man had to trick Green Goblin into thinking that Flash was the real thing.    It just really looks like Yamcha is this jock who decided to dress up like Goku because he loves Goku so much.

Anyway, these two guys do some dumb shit.   I really hate Rasin and Lakasei.    Just... everything about them sucks.   They sound terrible in every dub, they look like inflamed hemorrhoids, and they do absolutely nothing to move the story forward.   

Tien blinds them with the Solar Flare, and that’s about the only effective offense the Z-Figthers manage in this whole movie.

It’s really a shame, because this is one of the few movies that actually bothers to use Yamcha, Tien, an Chiaotzu, and they get jobbed out.   Would it have been so bad to have Yamcha use his Spirit Ball on Cacao and actually hurt him?  Krillin’s Kienzan is one of the more serious techniques in the series, so I might have been cool to actualy see him kill somebody with it.     I’m pretty sure Chiaotzu has never won a fight in Dragon Ball up to this point.    Would it have been so bad to just let him kill Rasin?     But no.  

I always wondered why they included Yamcha, Tien, and Chiaotzu in this particular movie, but now that I’m watching them in sequence with the anime, it makes some sense.    Around this time, the TV series had just revealed that they were training with King Kai in the afterlife, and one could certainly speculate that they would get resurrected later on, and play a role in the final battle with Frieza and/or Vegeta.   I think “Tree of Might” was trying to play along with that idea, except it never actually pays it off.    

Chiaotzu is in trouble for a while, until Gohan suddenly shows up to help.  Turns out Icarus managed to bring him to the forest where the battle was going on, so now he’s here to turn the tide.    Or something.

This attracts the attention of the boss alien, who recognizes Gohan as a Saiyan.

So he goes out to meet the kid, and realizes that he must be Kakarot’s son.   He introduces himself as Turles and...

Yeah, he looks like Goku.  That’s the big twist.  

Only it’s not much of a twist at all.   Turles explains that it’s not even that big a deal that he and Goku look alike, since they’re both “disposable, lower-class warriors.”   According to Turles, low-class Saiyans “only come in a few types.”  

I’ve seen this line interpreted in many different ways.    Some fans have suggested that the Saiyans cloned their low-class warriors.   I think a lot of fans prefer the idea that Turles an Goku might be related somehow.  Bardock and Goten’s close resemblance to Goku seems to support this.    Hell, Gohan looks a lot like Goku if you don’t take the hair into account.  

I think there’s always been a desire to make something more out of Turles than what the movie offers.    The fact that he looks like an evil Goku is easily the most intriguing thing about the character, and this movie does absolutely nothing with it.   Turles himself acts like it doesn’t matter, and Gohan is the only character who even seems to notice.   So why did they bother making him look like Goku in the first place?

I feel like part of the idea here was to explore the idea of what Goku might have been like if he hadn’t hit his head and turned good.  Turles could be a glimpse into what Kakarot might have done as a villain, although he’s so different from the real Goku that it doesn’t seem all that convincing.   They could have made him look like another Saiyan, and it wouldn’t really affect anything.  

Turles’ main personality trait is that he seems to want to recruit Gohan and Goku to his cause, saying that Saiyans should stick together.    I’m not sure if he truly believes that, or if he just thinks that his gang could use a couple more Saiyan lackeys.   He talks up the space pirate life as an endless romp around the universe, taking whatever he wants and enjoying food and drink as he pleases.  Again, I don’t know if that’s a genuine sentiment, or if it’s just his recruitment pitch.

Piccolo shows up and tries to save Gohan, but Turles makes short work of him, and goes back to tormenting the kid.

Turns out he can make one of those fake moon things just like Vegeta.

He forces Gohan to look at it, and then he destroys it as soon as Gohan turns into a giant ape.

He says it’s because he doesn’t want to turn into a giant ape himself, but why wouldn’t he?    Why did he turn Gohan into a giant ape?    He doesn’t need any help to beat the Z-Fighters.   Is he trying to prove a point?  Gohan won’t even remember anything he did in ape form.   Also, shouldn’t the transformation wear off once the fake moon is gone?   Turles accounts for this by saying it’ll stick for a little while, even after the power ball is gone, but that doesn’t sound right.    When Piccolo blew up the moon, Gohan changed back immediately.

For that matter, what good is the fake moon technique if it can be dispersed so easily?    Krillin could have attacked it during the Goku/Vegeta fight instead of trying to cut off Vegeta’s tail.

So now Goku has to fight his own son in giant ape form.    To the movie’s credit, this is a big highlight, because it’s the only DBZ movie to feature a giant ape transformation.    And that’s all well and good, but it seems kind of empty to me because I have no idea why Turles set this up.   Does he want Gohan to kill Goku?   Is that supposed to make Gohan more eager to join him?

The fight ends up in a cavern, which I think turns out to be the same cave Goku used as a home for Icarus.   That, or Icarus just happened to be here.   Either way, just seeing Icarus calms Gohan down.

This is cute and all, but it seems odd that Oozaru Gohan would react so strongly to Icarus when he didn’t even recognize his own father.

Irritated, Turles tries to attack Icarus, which turns Gohan against him.    Turles tries to kill Gohan with a laser donut...

But Goku cuts off Gohan’s tail before it can hit him, and he shrinks back to little kid size just in time to fall through the donut.   I guess it’s lucky that Turles relies on donut-shaped attacks.

Turles then offers to spare Goku if he pledges to join him, but Goku refuses.   He came her to whip a tree’s ass, and if Turles is pro-tree, then he can get wrecked along with it.   

Then all of these creeps show up to fight Goku first.    See, this is dumb.    They not only made a clean sweep of Goku’s teammates, they didn’t even defeat them on screen!   

Here’s a shot of Tien passing out from the hypothetical beating he took from Amond or some other guy.   

Well, at least this sets up a cool scene where Goku has to fight them all by himself, right?   Not really, Goku squashes them all in  matter of seconds.

Meanwhile, Piccolo tries to take on Turles, but he’s just no match for him.

Boom, roasted.

I mean, why couldn’t Yamcha take this guy out?  What was the point of having Yamcha in the movie if Goku was going to beat all the bad guys by himself?

With the rabble cleared away, Goku finally gets down to business.   Turles panics when he sees how strong Goku is, so he runs away...

...and picks a piece of fruit from the Tree of Might.    Why does he stick his tongue out to eat it?   That just looks kind of weird.  

Basically, the fruit of the Tree of Might ramps up a person’s battle power, which allows Turles to overpower Goku with ease.    This is the core concept with Turles, I think.    The challenge with this movie was to invent a new villain who could challenge Goku in the same manner as Vegeta and Frieza.   Well, that’s a tall order, because Frieza was hyped as the strongest guy in the whole universe.    A Saiyan villain would have made sense, except Vegeta was the strongest Saiyan, and the only one left.     To introduce a new Saiyan, you’d have to explain why he’d be strong enough to rival Vegeta or Frieza.

The solution is the Tree of Might.    I can’t find the line now, but there’s a part of the movie where Turles or one of his crew mention that the Tree of Might will make Turles strong enough to defeat Frieza.   It’s pretty clear, then, that he’s a renegade from Frieza’s organization.     They have their old uniforms, but instead of working for Frieza, they just roam the universe looking for places to plant their Tree of Might seeds.    They grow a new tree, eat the fruit, get stronger, and then repeat the process.   Turles started out as a weakling like Goku once was, but he found a way to cheat the system, and now he’s on his way to becoming the strongest in the universe.  

Turles leaves Goku when he refuses to surrender, and then Goku’s friends speak to him telepathically.   I’m not sure when they learned to do that, but whatever.   They beg Goku to get up and try a Spirit Bomb, and Goku finally musters the strength to try it.

While he does that, the Z-Fighters assemble for one last stand against Turles.   I guess this is supposed to buy time for Goku, but I’m not sure he needs it.   Turles isn’t actually doing anything at the moment.  

But it doesn’t work.   The Spirit Bomb relies on borrowng life energy from everything on the planet, and that’s been drained away by the Tree of Might, so Turles thwarts Goku’s attack with ease.    Oh, he also clobbered the Z-Fighters, so they’re down too.  Triumphantly, Turles looks at his fruit crop.    Where exactly is this that he’s standing right now?   

But Goku isn’t beaten yet.    He drags himself back into the fight, and confronts Turles one more time.

See, this time, Goku has a way to make the Spirit Bomb work.   If all of the Earth’s energy is in the Tree of Might...

... then he’ll just draw the energy from the fruit instead of the planet, and make a Spirit Bomb from that.

There’s this tense standoff, and then they both attack each other in a single instant, and Goku’s Spirit Bomb wins out.    I always have trouble remembering how this movie ends, and I think it’s because the climactic moment is so quick.    I’m pretty sure they tried to imitate a gunfight from a western. 

Turles gets consumed by the Spirit Bomb, and it drives him up through the trunk of the Tree of Might.   Really, this makes a lot of sense as a finale.   Turles’ trump card was to eat one piece of fruit from the tree, but Goku drew power from all of the fruit, so naturally his Spirit Bomb would be stronger than anything Turles could handle.   And it’s an elegant solution to the problem posed by the tree.   It was completely invulnerable to Goku’s own power, so he ended up using the Tree of Might’s own energy against itself.

All of this causes the Tree to glow yellow and disintigrate into sparkles of light, which rejuvenate all life on Earth.

So this dying deer is okay again, and presumably so is everything else.

Later, everyone celebrates with another camping trip.    Launch got snubbed again.

Oolong tries to praise Icarus for his role in the battle, but Icarus nearly bites him.

And Piccolo sort of chills out by a waterfall somewhere, and that’s the end of the movie.   

So it’s a pretty decent entry in the movie series, but I find it to be a mixed bag.   The highlights are things that don’t quite get developed enough.   Yeah, you have Turles, Great Ape Gohan, Yamcha, Tien, and Chiaotzu, but for my money, merely having those things in the movie isn’t enough.    It’s what you do with them that counts.    I find it particularly frustrating that the Dragon Ball Wiki has all this lore on Turles’ gang, but none of it ever made it into the movie itself, which is their only appearance.    What’s the point in having a backstory for Daiz if it never comes up anywhere?     His entire character arc was blowing up Yamcha’s car, and then getting decked by Goku. 

Still, if you like Spirit Bombs, this is one of the best Spirit Bomb finishes ever.    And the Tree of Might is a pretty cool idea.   And the visuals are a big step up from World’s Strongest.