Warning: Spoilers Off applies to these pages. Proceed at your own risk.
Beware... he is coming. A Saiyan so monstrous, so powerful, so relentless that not even Hell can stop him. The legend has been unleashed... BROLY IS FINALLY HERE. After 25 years, the infamous Legendary Super Saiyan has been brought to the canon of the Dragon Ball series, and he brings with him all the power he had in his previous films... and all of the Nightmare Fuel along with it.
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General
- Three words this time in the words of Lanipator: MOTHER. FUCKING. BROLY! After years of being a non-canonical character, he has finally been added to the canon of the series. Judging by the trailers, it's safe to say that he is going to bring all his primal rage from the previous films.
- An important thing to note, is that if you look at literally all of the official art, never once does Broly sport the Slasher Smile Toei Broly did. This is because he doesn't have an ounce of the awareness or sadistic streak, but this honestly just makes him more dangerous — because what drives the canon Broly is nothing but sanity-shattering rage.
- Broly is essentially Frieza 2.0; a character who has very little formal training, but who is so innately talented at battle that he can compete with, even outclass, the mightiest warriors in the universe. That's right, in a universe that includes two Super Saiyan Blues, Golden Frieza, and Majin Buu, Broly is still one of the strongest beings in existence. Goku even mentions the possibility that Broly might actually be stronger than Beerus, their universe's God of Destruction.
Trailers
- Everything about Broly in this trailer. When he first appears, he lets off a wave of energy that already lets viewers know how dangerous he is. And when Paragus gives the order to fight, Broly turns into a screaming berserker and goes on the attack. The rest of the trailer has him fighting Goku, Vegeta, and Frieza. But the truly terrifying part is that Broly is fighting in base form. Repeat: Broly is in his base form and he is crushing the three strongest mortals in Universe 7. That's right, the trailer didn't need him to fight in his transformed state, nor have him say anything beyond grunts and roars to sell the idea of how terrifying Broly is.
- One key moment in the trailer is Broly's first attack. Vegeta blocks it with a smirk, apparently confident that his godlike strength will get him through. In the very next shot, Broly is slamming Vegeta's Super Saiyan form through a block of ice, and Vegeta is somewhat panicking on the inside that Broly's fighting ability is on another level entirely.
- The 3rd trailer takes this one step further for the Saiyan Prince. By transforming into Super Saiyan God (much to fan delight), Vegeta lands a solid punch square in Broly's face. Broly barely even seems to notice before he returns fire, and drags God Goku's head through an icy cliff as well. As has already been stated, this is still base Broly.
- And then we come to the final sequence, which has Broly rising from a hole in the ground while sporting glowing red eyes and an unholy Slasher Smile in his terrifying and iconic transformation. The sequence of Goku seeing Broly surrounded by a pillar of sickly green light is as terrifying as it is visually stunning as it makes Broly look less like a Saiyan warrior and more like an otherworldly demon that's rising from the bowels of Hell itself who Goku can never hope to defeat. And then Broly powers up, releasing a sphere of energy that nearly engulfs Goku. The sheer fact that Goku, who never shies away from strong opponents, sounds flat-out terrified pretty much tells you that our hero is in for one hell of an uphill fight.
- Adding to all of this, the 2nd half of the trailer features a deeply unnerving tone in the soundtrack, clearly signaling the Darker and Edgier nature of the film. More than anything else, it resembles a warning siren, and when combined with what looks to be a mushroom cloud of pure energy as Broly powers up, there is no doubt in anyone's mind that Broly is not to be trifled with.
The Film
- Just like in Broly's debut, King Vegeta establishes that he was not a good guy when he orders Broly to be exiled as soon as he's born solely because he's stronger than Prince Vegeta. Seeing how unfair the Saiyan society was, at least at the top, Frieza's extermination of them almost seems like a blessing in disguise.
- When Paragus and Beets are stranded in a living hellhole with a newborn Broly, Paragus shoots Beets to prolong their rations.
- On that note, just Planet Vampa in general. This is considered a Death World even by Saiyan standards, and Broly lived his entire life there. Not only is the planet rampant with gigantic spider monsters plenty capable of killing an adult Saiyan, but the conditions of survival are absurd. Sure, Broly was desensitized to the taste of the monsters from an early age, food wasn't impossible, but as a later interaction shows, he doesn't even know what water is. In other words, there was no water on Planet Vampa. Broly, and by extension Paragus, had to hydrate themselves with the fluids of what they hunted to survive.
- Paragus was stronger than Saiyan Saga Piccolo, but seems unable to beat a giant Bug, as a way of comparison Nappa was the same guy who managed to destroy a city by simply raising two fingers and was practically unstoppable for human warriors and Piccolo. The worst part is that these same creatures are treated as prey by even larger creatures.
- Paragus may be an even worse father to Broly than he was in the old canon. Instead of using a Hypno Trinket to keep Broly passive, he uses a Shock Collar. Broly's reaction to Paragus actually using the device is to scream out in terrible pain and agony, despite the fact that Paragus assured Frieza that the collar would only administer a "mild" shock.
- Broly’s Super Saiyan transformation is seen in its full glory, with Frieza kickstarting the process via showing Broly his father’s body (of which Frieza killed him while simultaneously lying to Broly about how his death was indirectly caused by his battle with Goku). As Broly sees his father’s body, he just... BREAKS. He first flails around holding his head, looking like the poor man’s about to cry, and then as you see his schlera turn red and his pupils shatter, all while his screams rise in emotional and sheer unimaginable, Earth-splitting fury as all vestige of sanity and self-control is forcibly, painfully, stripped from his psyche as he literally explodes, rising to the heavens in a green Pillar of Light and screaming incoherently as the transformation finalizes, before he unleashes everything he has to offer on anything he sees.
- What’s more terrifying about this is that Broly’s transformation is perhaps the most astoundingly furious one out of the entire history of the franchise so far. Goku’s reactions to both of Krillin’s deaths at the hands of Tambourine and Frieza, Gohan’s Super Saiyan 2 transformation, Goku and Vegeta’s reaction to Goku Black going after their families, it beats the lot of them. Broly is ABSOLUTELY LIVID and his utter rage is in a whole class of its own.
- Broly thrashes the living hell out of both Vegeta and Goku, with Vegeta deciding to fight alongside Goku with zero complaint. They're still too weak and Goku is forced to retreat. Broly's power is so great he makes the two greatest warriors in the universe act out of character.
- The way this circumstance is portrayed is Nightmare Fuel in and of itself due to the visual storytelling of the animation. As Broly powers up throughout the fight, there is a notable change in the looks of the characters to a Z-Era design, only used to show Broly's continuously decreasing sanity and his Adaptive Ability making him slowly go from being no match for Base Vegeta to slowly overpowering all but their strongest form, Blue. And every moment in between where Goku and Vegeta are caught flatfooted by Broly's increasing strength, the Art Shift kicks in, most jarringly when the fluid and free-moving portion of the fight that is Goku's first bout with him suddenly shifts to this more intense linework to show just how truly brutal a dormant Legendary Super Saiyan is in canon, as well as just how much of a tier and a half above the original Broly this new Broly is. Vegeta wasn't kidding about the fight being tougher than they thought.
- In the English dub, Goku's absolutely agonized screams of pain while Broly viciously decimates him in less than 3 minutes only serve to make this usually welcome and nostalgic artstyle suddenly feel frighteningly real. The coughing when Goku gets up doesn't help, either, and NEITHER does Broly's sinister chuckle before Goku transforms into his Super Saiyan Blue form...
- While Goku and Vegeta attempt the Fusion Dance through trial-and-error, Frieza fights Broly for the better part of an hour, and Broly was winning. Frieza has been established to have, pound for pound, the greatest potential for power and growth of anyone in the entire franchise, and Broly was smacking him around like a punching bag.
- The way this circumstance is portrayed is Nightmare Fuel in and of itself due to the visual storytelling of the animation. As Broly powers up throughout the fight, there is a notable change in the looks of the characters to a Z-Era design, only used to show Broly's continuously decreasing sanity and his Adaptive Ability making him slowly go from being no match for Base Vegeta to slowly overpowering all but their strongest form, Blue. And every moment in between where Goku and Vegeta are caught flatfooted by Broly's increasing strength, the Art Shift kicks in, most jarringly when the fluid and free-moving portion of the fight that is Goku's first bout with him suddenly shifts to this more intense linework to show just how truly brutal a dormant Legendary Super Saiyan is in canon, as well as just how much of a tier and a half above the original Broly this new Broly is. Vegeta wasn't kidding about the fight being tougher than they thought.
- How about the fact that Gogeta nearly killed Broly. Normally this wouldn't be such a problem if Broly was as monstrous as his original version, but this Broly is just a pure innocent soul who was raised as a weapon of revenge by his father, and later manipulated by Frieza and is currently undergoing the biggest psychological breakdown seen in the entire franchise. What makes this even more horrifying is the face Broly makes when he knows Gogeta's Kamehameha is going to kill him, since his eyes have regained their pupils and his expression is pure fear and terror that he's going to die.
- The absolutely merciless beatdown Gogeta delivers unto Broly when he finally gets serious, from the moment he goes Blue, Broly does not land a single hit on him. What follows is less of a fight and more of an execution, as Gogeta dodges every attack sent his way and retaliates with blows so brutal one can clearly hear Broly's shouts going from rage to primal fear and desperation. As the music shifts to a far more ominous tone
Gogeta emerges from the flames, charges up so much ki it creates two rings of light around him and fires a Kamehameha so powerful it pushes him back several feet! Had Broly been hit, not even atoms would have been left. - There's also the fact as to why Gogeta was going so far: He felt it was the only choice as with Broly's quickly escalating power levels, he'd become too strong for even them if given more time and the danger to Earth he poses. This finishing blow isn't a victorious strike against a villain but a case of Shoot the Dog and Mercy Kill.
- The Full-Force Kamehameha manages to make Goku's Signature Move look terrifying. Gogeta's cold Death Glare as he begins to charge the attack, the massive aura that cracks the earth around him, the distortion on his pupils, and the sheer Scenery Gorn that results from the mere act of firing the beam (which looks more like a massive afterburner for a fighter jet) ... It all comes together to turn the symbol of a heroic victory into something almost akin to a Weapon of Mass Destruction.
- The absolutely merciless beatdown Gogeta delivers unto Broly when he finally gets serious, from the moment he goes Blue, Broly does not land a single hit on him. What follows is less of a fight and more of an execution, as Gogeta dodges every attack sent his way and retaliates with blows so brutal one can clearly hear Broly's shouts going from rage to primal fear and desperation. As the music shifts to a far more ominous tone
- In the old anime canon, Frieza was Laughing Mad through the destruction of Planet Vegeta. In the current continuity, however, he's terrifyingly cold and casual about it, marking the genocide of an entire species with a simple snide remark.
- We see the destruction of Planet Vegeta through Freeza's scouter. The collective power level of the saiyan race didn't hit zero until the planet was well and truly vaporised, implying that some Saiyans survived the initial explosion and died in the vacuum of space. That's a pretty chilling way to go.
- The fact that Frieza is allowed to rebuild his old empire, once again subjugating planets full of innocents with his tyranny. His final scene in the movie has him doing this to one unfortunate planet, with its residents trembling in fear...
- What makes this worse is that beings as powerful as Goku and Beerus know what Frieza is and the trouble he can potentially cause but they are just so apathetic about it. note
- Frieza also mentions that he knows where Broly, Cheelai and Lemo are. Instead of taking revenge on the three by, oh say, blowing up Vampa from space, vaporizing Cheelai and Lemo and letting the Saiyan suffocate to death in the coldness of space, he plans to use Broly in the future against Goku and Vegeta, after training for years to ensure he's able to handle the task of keeping him in line. How he plans to do so remains a mystery, since Broly is unlikely to just willingly go back to working for Frieza now that his father is dead. Is Broly going to be subjected to another control device? Or will Frieza threaten his new friends Cheelai and Lemo into compliance?
