The Crowning of a Legend: Goku vs Demon King Piccolo
By Sam Scott
Every hero has one moment, one victory that everyone can point to and acknowledge as the point where they officially arrived. These are not to be mistaken with their first successful battle or outing. These are the moments where the stakes were the highest and they had to push past their limits or else all would be lost. The moments that were not only personal to them, but mattered to everyone around them. The moments that if our hero lost then everyone lost. For Dragon Ball’s Son Goku, most people would point to the first time he transformed into a Super Saiyan as his crowning moment, but he actually reached this point long before his battle with Freiza.
The moment Goku cemented himself as a true hero was during his battle against Demon King Piccolo when he was still just a kid. This was the battle and storyline that would change the tone of the series forever going forward. Up to this point Dragon Ball was mainly a fun adventure series about Goku and his friends trying to find the dragon balls and fighting in martial arts tournaments. While Goku was the strongest among the main cast of characters up to this point, he still hadn’t achieved the one victory that meant he could sit alone at the top of the podium. He couldn’t outlast Master Roshi in the first tournament and despite surpassing his mentor years later he would fall to Tien Shinhan in the following tournament so the title of strongest in the land still didn’t belong to him. Now enters the biggest threat the series has seen to that point, Demon King Piccolo.
Up to this point all the villains Goku and his friends would face weren’t much to take serious but here it all changed. The moment we find out about this threat is when Goku discovers his best friend Krillin dead after finishing the recent martial arts tournament and immediately the stakes are raised as Master Roshi recalls the tale of the demon Piccolo who once almost conquered their world before his master sacrificed himself to seal him away. From this moment forward everyone’s focus would shift to stopping this monster by any means necessary. All the fighters we were introduced to all line up and they all fall one by one to the sons of the demon king with Goku and Master Roshi being the only ones to fight him directly and they both were defeated, with Master Roshi losing his life. With all the fighters being killed off the stage was set for our hero to rise to the occasions and save the day.
Goku stepped to King Piccolo a second time with a new demeanor and focus as the world’s final hope. He quickly disposed of Piccolo’s son standing in the way and then Goku and the demon would face off in the biggest fight of the series. With the stakes at their highest and with the weight of the world on his shoulder our young hero went all out. Both fighters would unleash all the power and techniques they had and prove to be equals on the battlefield. With both approaching their limits, King Piccolo would hold Tien hostage to distract Goku and stop him from attacking and use this time to break both his arm and leg rendering him immobile.
With the use of his legs gone, King Piccolo would take to the sky to launch one final attack and ensure his victory and this is the moment a legend one was born. While laying face flat on the ground Goku would channel all the energy he had left into his only working arm and fire a blast of energy to launch himself into the air at his opponent. While flying fist first at an opponent who counted him out too soon, Goku’s first crowning moment was cemented as he thrust through the body of Demon King Piccolo, thus ending the monster’s life.
Through this iconic moment and battle the legend of Son Goku was born and Dragon Ball was forever changed. Every storyline after this the stakes were raised and each major battle was an earth shattering brawl. From this point forward everyone Goku knew and would encounter along the way would one way or another come to acknowledge and respect him as the greatest fighter. While the first super saiyan transformation may the most iconic in all of Dragon Ball, and arguably the most impactful moment in all of Shonen manga, it was no doubt that through this victory Son Goku had his first crowning moment and cemented himself as a legend. This was the first time Goku defeated anyone who was on the verge of conquering and destroying the world and it was far from his last.
