Gohan: What. Is your. DAMAGE!?
Vegeta: I haven't TAKEN any damage! THAT'S THE PROBLEM!
Vegeta: I haven't TAKEN any damage! THAT'S THE PROBLEM!
Episode Title: DTF
Original Airdate: September 19, 2020
"FIGHT ME!"
It's now been over a year since Cell's death and Goku's sacrifice. With no imminent threats to the world in the meantime, Gohan is enjoying his more quiet and peaceful life with his friends and family. Vegeta however, desperate for a sparring partner now that both Goku and Future Trunks are gone, repeatedly insists that Gohan come out and fight him.
You have enough tropes under that hood to destroy the planet three times over, and you're just letting them go to waste!
- Actually Pretty Funny: During the Inner Thoughts, Outsider Puzzlement bit, Piccolo is listening to an idea that turns out to be for him to break one of Mr. Popo's jars and blame it on Vegeta. Piccolo's not sure it will work in getting rid of the Saiyan, but he agrees with the later suggestion that it would certainly be funny all the same.
- Armor-Piercing Question: After learning that Vegeta has nobody else to spar with, Gohan, while sympathetic towards such, still tells Vegeta to his face that fighting him wouldn't mean a thing.Gohan: I'm sorry. But I'm still not going to fight you.
Vegeta: OH, COME ON, SERIOUSLY!?
Gohan: I don't like fighting, Vegeta! I only did it because it was literally do-or-die! And frankly, at this point, I'd be fighting you... out of pity. Is that what you want? A pity fight?
Vegeta: (dead silent)
Gohan: Yeah. Goodbye, Vegeta.- A similar Armor-Piercing Response happens at the start of the episode when Vegeta arrives at the Son residence, with Gohan threatening Vegeta that his waking up of baby Goten will for sure get him in a "fight" with Chi-Chi. Vegeta promptly ends the conversation and leaves.
- Beneath Notice: Vegeta doesn't even consider contacting Yamcha for a fight.
- Blood Knight: Deconstructed. As a Saiyan, Vegeta is always looking for a challenging fight and nobody among the Z Fighters wants to give him one. Vegeta doesn't know how to cope with the battle-lust he has beyond looking for a fight and he is the unpopular guy. See below for more details.
- Brick Joke: After Vegeta's confrontation with Piccolo, the Namekian says to himself that he should make a bed. The ending card for this episode shows a chibi-fied Piccolo sleeping in that bed.
- Call-Back:
- Vegeta is still afraid of Chi-Chi.
- Gohan uses the Briefs' telescope to view Comet Camori before Vegeta blows it up.
- In order to avoid Vegeta, Piccolo blasts apart a pot and blames Vegeta on it. We hear an offscreen Popo unhappy that someone broke the sixth rule of his training ("don't break Popo's stuff").
- Android 18 takes the Country Matters speech Vegeta gave her way back when and throws it right back in his face.
- Character Exaggeration: Played for Laughs, but one must understand that Dragon ShortZ is a parody. Vegeta's need for fighting is exaggerated for humor, but in the original source material, Vegeta gave up on fighting during the seven years of peace, something the parody quietly ignores. This said however, the short plays it up by foreshadowing Vegeta's midlife crisis in the Buu saga, which will allow Babidi to take control of him.
- Despair Event Horizon: After Gohan continues to refuse to fight Vegeta, and says that it would be mean nothing other than being a "pity fight", Vegeta is left unable to respond and stands alone long after Gohan leaves. With nobody agreeing to fight him, he resorts to calling Nappa of all people, and even he ignores Vegeta's calls.
- Downer Ending: For Vegeta, at least. By the end of the episode, he hasn't gotten anyone to fight him, and not even Nappa is returning his calls.
- Foreshadowing: Despite TFS cancelling plans to adapt the Buu saga, this episode establishes Vegeta's midlife crisis and lacking a purpose in life, causing him to eventually allow himself to be willingly enslaved by Babidi several years down the line.
- The Friend Nobody Likes: This episode is essentially one huge deconstruction of the trope, all applying to Vegeta. Having alienated pretty much anyone else left in the cast, naturally, nobody's willing to indulge Vegeta's tantrums. When pushed, they give him speeches so cruel that he's incapable of even defending himself. Sadly, given canon, things will only get worse before Vegeta finally shakes this trope.
- Fun with Acronyms: The episode's title, "DTF", typically stands for "Down To Fuck". In this case, however, it's clearly meant to stand for "Down To Fight", which certainly details Vegeta.
- Funny Background Event: While it's not necessarily "in the background", the conversation between Kami, Nail, and Piccolo can be seen in it's entirety by turning the official subtitles on.
- Hearing Voices: The Running Gag of Piccolo interacting with Nail and Kami inside his mind is seen from an outsider's perspective for once, with Vegeta being confused as the three discuss how to screw with him.
- Hollywood Midlife Crisis: The whole episode is essentially Vegeta’s midlife crisis at being unable to satisfy his lust for battle since the end of the Cell Saga.
- Inner Thoughts, Outsider Puzzlement: When Vegeta tries to get Piccolo to fight him, Nail and/or Kami has a brief mental exchange with Piccolo suggesting how he may dispose of Vegeta. Piccolo visibly reacts to what they're saying and asks them a question out loud, resulting in Vegeta being puzzled by the whole thing and asking who in the world Piccolo is talking to.
- Ironic Echo: 18 invoking Country Matters on Vegeta at the end of her "The Reason You Suck" Speech certainly counts.
- Literal-Minded: When Gohan tricks Vegeta into going into the store to buy pears for him, Vegeta comes out shortly afterwards and yells "PAIRS OF WHAT!?" and later when Gohan angrily asks him what his damage is, Vegeta retorts "I haven't taken any damage, that's the problem."
- Noodle Incident: When 18 says how she owes a lot of people a lot of things, she specifically mentions owing one person an organ and another person a live tiger. Krillin even says 17 keeps calling them about the latter.
- Not Even Bothering with an Excuse: When Piccolo refuses to fight Vegeta, Vegeta asks why not and Piccolo simply says "because I don't want to". Then Vegeta asks if he has something better to do, only for Piccolo to give another blunt "nope".
- Off the Grid: After not getting anywhere with Android 18, Vegeta says he went looking for Tien, only to find that this was the case.
- "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Android 18 gives an epic one to Vegeta, as seen below:18: I don't owe you shit. You beat your kid and ignore your wife, and when you're not doing that you're trying to start fights with people because of your screaming ego. You remind me of my dad, but at least he had the common courtesy to stay dead. So take your massive inferiority complex the hell off our beach and maybe I'll fight you again someday when you stop acting like such a massive c*nt.
- Gohan also gives Vegeta one, as seen in the Armor-Piercing Question entry.
- Shout-Out: Gohan's desk has some All Might stickers on it.
- The Sneaky Guy: After 18, Vegeta went looking for Tenshinhan, but he's "gone completely off the grid".
- Speak Ill of the Dead:
- This exchange:Vegeta: It's been over a year since your idiot father killed himself...
Gohan: Saved us all—
Vegeta: Killed himself, and I haven't had a decent challenge since! - Android 18 says that Vegeta (a guy who neglects his wife and beats his kid) reminds her of her father, and the only good thing she has to say about him is that he had the decency to stay dead.
- This exchange:
- You Remind Me of X: Android 18 says that Vegeta reminds her of her dad, in that they both beat their kidsnote , ignore their wivesnote , and constantly start fights due to their own egos.note The only difference according to her is that, unlike Vegeta, at least her dad had the "common courtesy" to stay dead.
