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aka: Dragon Ball Heroes Prison Planet

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"Well then, the actors are all assembled, the most interesting experiment in the universe can finally enter its main phase!"

Super Dragon Ball Heroes: Universe Mission (Episode 1-20), unofficially known as Dragon Ball Heroes: Prison Planet, (Episode 1-6) is an animated adaptation of the Prison Planet saga of the video game Dragon Ball Heroes, created as promotional material for the game. The first part also covers Universal Conflict saga (Episode 7-19) and a special (Episode 20). The second part is called Super Dragon Ball Heroes: Big Bang Mission (Episode 21 onwards). It covers the Universe Creation saga. It was only released in Japan. It is set some time after the Universe Survival Saga of Dragon Ball Super.

During the first arc, Trunks has been missing. However, a mysterious youth named Fu calling himself his friend appears before Goku, Vegeta and Mai, telling them Trunks has been captured in the Prison Planet, a set of planets where only the worst of the worst go. After going there, the heroes find something interesting: Goku from the Time Patrol, who wants to stop Fu, the creator of the Prison Planet.

In another place, Trunks has to deal with Cooler, who wants the Dragon Balls every prisoner has.

Every episode is six minutes long, unlike a typical anime episode. Like with other sagas from Heroes, there is a manga adaptation.


Prison Planet provides examples of:

  • Aborted Arc:
    • In the anime, the plot of obtaining the seven Dragon Balls to escape the Prison Planet is dropped in a egregious manner. Xeno Goku simply teleports everyone but Goku off the planet. In the manga, the Special Dragon Balls remain central to the plot throughout.
    • Toki Toki and Dogi Dogi's relevance to the plot is expanded on for a couple of episodes, and it is in fact part of the reason Beerus has to try and eliminate Goku, but after the clarification about which bird is dangerous is made, there's no more focus or expansion on the two, and they disappear for the rest of the plot while the Universe Tree overtakes their screentime instead.
  • Adaptational Badass: Xeno Goku and Xeno Vegeta are much more serious and to the point than their Super counterparts, Xeno Goku in particular seems to be much less interested in trying to find strong opponents as he does in doing his job. Likewise, while SS 4 Goku and SSB Goku seemed to be about at equal strength, later episodes treat SS 4 (and by extension, Xeno Goku, Vegeta, and Vegito) to actually be stronger, as they have more success with handling their opponents.
  • Adaptation Distillation: To an offensive degree. The anime of Heroes is made for promotional purposes, yet it doesn't adapt many of the arcade game stories, giving an incomplete and messy story. The manga adaptation, by comparison, does a more faithful adaptation to the games campaign.
    • The Prison Planet saga entirely skips introducing Future Trunks and Mai, and make Fu into more of a villainous character, and putting Goku and Vegeta on the Prison Planet to fight Xeno Goku, and to look for the villains who have the Dragon Balls to escape. Yet only Cumber is adapted, making Future Trunks and Cooler presence quite redundant as they do nothing, and by the end the plot thread of looking for the Dragon Balls is dropped, with Xeno Goku teleporting everyone out of danger while Goku remains on the destroyed planets.
    • The Universal War saga skips Oran and Kamin taking over the Saiyans from Planet Sadala, and to Vegeta fighting a mind-controlled Cabba, instead only making Oran and Kamin taking control of Caulifla and Kale. a synopsis of the first campaign of the saga can be read here.
  • Adaptation Expansion: The anime is short and goes straight to the point, leaving details aside. The manga adaptation expands details about it while not changing the overall story.
    • The mention of Ultra Instinct, letting the reader be sure the story takes place after the Universe Survival Saga of Super.
    • More exposition about the Prison Planet and Whis' commentaries indicate how aware he is of the different timelines and how he's never heard of such a place.
    • Fu and Xeno Goku's personalities are changed, with Xeno Goku being more eager and surprised to fight against his Super incarnation, and Fu is less obvious about being the Big Bad. Vegeta takes Xeno's place as the one who talks with Fu.
    • Future Trunks and Cooler have more to do by fighting the other members of the Prison Planet (Specifically Majin Ozotto, King Cold and Hatchyjack) while Goku and Vegeta deal with Cumber.
    • Lagss is simply forgotten after Golden Cooler defeats her off screen, in the manga, she's actually absorbed by Majin Ozotto.
  • Adapted Out: Many ideas from the arcade campaigns were dropped from the anime adaptation, but they remain in the manga. Among them, many of the enemies in the Prison Planet, the inclusion of Kefla, and the appearance of other characters.
  • Advertised Extra:
    • In the anime, Future Trunks and Cooler barely do anything as the plot is focused more on Goku, Vegeta and their Xeno counterparts fighting Cumber. In the manga they have more relevance.
    • Future Mai barely does anything despite being prominently featured on the Prison Planet Arc poster. The only noteworthy thing she does is give the Potara Earrings to Goku and Vegeta so they can become Vegito.
  • All There in the Manual: The anime doesn't explain why Future Trunks and Future Mai are back in the present and on Beerus' planet of all places. The manga and some supplementary material states that they went for a visit and Trunks wanted to train with Vegeta and Goku.
  • Animation Bump: For the entire series, Tadayoshi Yamamuro is the storyboard director and gives pretty unremarkable and repetitive results. By episode 12 and 13, the anime changes storyboard directors.
    • Episode 12 gives us some solid sequences, presumably done by Shintaro Mura, of Golden Meta-Cooler vs Cumber.
    • Episode 13 gives us the most fluid fights in the series, the highlight being Super Saiyan Blue Goku vs Hearts. These sequences were done by Naotoshi Shida and presumably Miyako Tsuji, with something worth mentioning is their detail to the hair.
  • Art Shift: Starting with Episode 51, it changes to 3D animation.
  • Back from the Dead: Exaggerated in Zamasu's case. In the original series, Zamasu was erased along with an entire timeline by Zeno, yet somehow he returns with bionic elements, as if that was all he needed to keep him alive.
  • Big Bad:
    • Fu is the main villain of the Prison Planet, and Universe Creation Sagas. He's also pretty much the main antagonist for the majority of the series until he’s finally defeated.
    • Hearts is the main antagonist of the Universal Conflict Saga. He is a major threat to the entire multiverse by trying to kill the Omni King.
    • Aeos is the main threat for the Supreme Kai of Time Saga. It’s unknown what she’s up to but it’s obviously no good.
  • Big Damn Heroes: Shin teleports in to rescue Goku and the gang from Hearts' gravity attack in episode 11. Jiren and Hit arrive to save Goku from Zamasu in episode 16.
  • Blood Knight: Goku, as always. In one of the show's rare character beats, Hearts reads Goku's mind, surmising that Goku is a warrior who lives to fight and can never be satisfied. Goku smiles, never being one to deny facts.
  • Came Back Strong: Golden Cooler is flashy, but his only feats in the Prison Planet Saga consist of knocking out a Brainwashed and Crazy Super Saiyan 2 Goku and briefly contending with Cumber. When he returns as Meta-Cooler in the Universal Conflict Saga, he defeats Super Saiyan 3 Cumber single-handed thanks to Fu's cybernetic upgrades.
  • The Cameo: Bojack can be seen on a computer screen in Fu's lair in the first episode, implying that he's on the Prison Planet too.
  • Canon Character All Along: The mysterious new villain Dr W ends up being Dr Wheelo, in a human disguise, which he sheds to reveal a new, significantly smaller, robotic body.
  • Composite Character: Zamasu obtains bionic elements just like Frieza did. And like Mecha-Frieza, Fused Zamasu gets killed again without accomplishing much of anything.
  • Continuity Snarl: There are some minor inconsistencies with the main canon. For example, in the anime, Goku teleports to the Prison Planet, where there was nobody around. Goku can't teleport anywhere unless he senses the energy of someone. The manga adaptation simply has Fu teleporting them to Prison Planet himself.
  • Darker and Edgier: The manga allows blood and extreme violence to be shown compared to the anime.
  • Enemy Mine: Cooler decides to team up with Trunks and the others so that they can escape the Prison Planet.
    • Later on,not only him but Turles and even Cell and Frieza help the heroes fight Goku Black, since his plans of multiversal omnicide on mortals would mean the end for them as well.
  • Eviler than Thou: Goku Black ultimately shows he is this to the other villains, with Turles, Cell, Cooler and Frieza are assisting in the fight against since his goals of eradicating mortals across the multiverse will kill them as well.
  • Evil Versus Evil: When Hearts and his team are introduced, Fu is initially implied to their ally, but Fu is later shown working against Hearts, sending a freshly-upgraded Cooler to attack Cumber in Universe 3.
    • Frieza and Cooler indirectly help Goku and Vegeta fight the Crimson Masked Saiyan, eventually revealed to be Goku Black from an alternate timeline, because he humiliated them earlier whereas Cell and Turles help them because his plan of genocide of mortals would kill them too.
  • Excuse Plot: While the manga and even the game try to have a structured story, the anime gives the bare minimum needed in the eight minutes per episode it has to justify any of the fights.
  • Flat Character: In the anime, The whole cast. As pointed out in Excuse Plot, the anime does a lousy job of making the story flows, and one of those sacrifices was characterization for the characters. It doesn't help that due to the very wide cast of characters, the screen time is not nearly evenly diveded, some characters such as Vegeta comes off as heavily stitedin characterization and motives
    • While the heroes and Cooler and Zamasu do retain their basic characteristics, the writing in them is heavily subdued to the point you could take them out and nothing would be changed. To wit, they hardly partake in the action, their motives have either decayed or are outright unstated, Zamasu doesn't even properly get focus or get a proper fight until the episode Hearts betrays and kills him.
    • The villains likewise are baddies for the sake of a baddie, although Hearts does show some Hidden Depths by respecting Oren and Kamin; allowing them to continue the slaughter like if he was their father figure, even saying he will honor their deaths, ignoring the fact he ensured their deaths by turning them into an insane rampaging monster. The one with most characterization is the Crimson masked Saiyan, who is later shown to be an alternate version of Goku Black.
  • Formula-Breaking Episode: In Episode 20, the story suddenly jumps ship to the arcade game's concurrent Dark King Mechikabura Saga (see the Dragon Ball Heroes page for more info on it), before the following episode jumps back to a new storyline, the Universe Creation Saga. Western viewers unfamiliar with the game's storyline were understandably confused.
  • Fusion Dance: Fusion is handed out like candy in this series:
    • Goku and Vegeta fuse with Potara to form Vegito in order to fight Cumber and later in the series, Fu.
    • Xeno Goku and Xeno Vegeta later teleport in, fuse with the Potara and transform into the never-before-seen Super Saiyan 4 Vegito, again to fight Cumber.
    • Kami and Oren naturally fuse to become Kamioren.
    • Goku and Vegeta fuse yet again, this time with the Fusion Dance technique, to become Gogeta in order to fight Ultimate Godslayer Hearts and the Crimson Mask Saiyan.
    • Surprisingly, Kale and Caulifla do not fuse despite the popularity of their Potara fused form, Kefla.
  • Golden Super Mode: Cooler gained his brother's golden transformation in this mini-series. He retains it after being upgraded by Fu into Meta-Cooler.
  • Gotta Catch Them All: Goku and pals have to gather seven special Dragon Balls by defeating many of the prisoners so they can escape the Prison Planet.
  • History Repeats: In the Prison Planet Saga, Trunks and Mai of the Future are once again involved in a conflict with an identical doppelganger of Goku. Fortunately, this red Goku quickly proves to be much friendlier and is known as Xeno Goku a member of the Time Patrol.
  • Legion of Doom: The Core Area Warriors are a mismatched group of past and new villains. They consist of a mysterious Visionary Villain with gravity-manipulation powers (Hearts), a waifish girl who can control glass (Lagss), a pair of psychotic Tuffle Machine Mutant twins (Kamin and Oren), an insanely powerful, bloodthirsty Super Saiyan from ancient times (Cumber) and a cyborg fallen Kaioshin who hates mortals (Zamasu).
  • Let's You and Him Fight: Played With when Xeno Goku attacks regular Goku as soon as he meets the heroes. When the brief clash is over, he apologizes and explains that he was hoping a Kamehameha beam struggle between them would be powerful enough to break the force field trapping everybody, which didn't work. The series plays this trope completely straight as it goes on and the battle scenarios get increasingly wacky.
  • Idiot Ball: There is a recurring trend of characters simply forgetting they can fight just for the villains to show their powers, possibly to promote the cards the characters are based on. This is especially grating with the slow pacing.
    • Despite being fully Super Saiyan in episode 7, Kale simply depowers off-screen for no reason in episode 8 so Kamin may take her body. This is done because the Kamin Kale card in the game only has the possession in her base form. At least Caulifla was injured last episode, what is her excuse?
  • Make My Monster Grow: Hearts uses the Universe Seed's energy to make Kamioren grow into a giant Kaiju.
  • Merchandise-Driven: One of the biggest criticism of the show for some people in the anime with the worst offense is with Cabba who fades out after one episode or Golden Cooler who fights Super Saiyan (Berserk) Goku and end up doing nothing afterward.
  • Mythology Gag: When Oren possesses Vegeta, he looks just like Baby Vegeta in his Strongest Form 1 transformation. Not surprising considering Oren is a Machine Mutant Tuffle just like Baby.
  • Nature Hero: When Chronoa's pet bird Tokitoki mysteriously arrives at Capsule Corp at the start of the Universe Creation Saga, Goku takes an instant liking to the old owl, hearkening back to his country roots.
  • Non-Serial Movie: Or in this case, Non serial mini-series. The anime is not in the same canon as any of the other series, and is just an excuse to see characters like Cooler return.
  • Obviously Evil: The anime doesn't try to hide away the fact that Fu's the Big Bad.
  • One-Winged Angel: Hearts absorbs the Universe Seed to transform into the Godslayer. He becomes powerful enough to effortlessly fight Goku, Vegeta, Future Trunks, Piccolo, Android 17, Hit and Jiren all at once.
  • Outgambitted: Hearts and Zamasu work together despite their goals being fundamentally incompatible: Hearts wants to Kill the Gods, whereas Zamasu still wants to enact the Zero Mortals Plan. Therefore, Zamasu plans on usurping Hearts when the opportunity arises. Unfortunately for him, Hearts had the same idea, and acted on it first.
  • Overheating: Meta-Cooler's only weakness is that his cybernetics malfunction when he gets too heated in his Golden transformation. This causes his eye to explode while he fights Cumber, but he works through the pain and manages to finish Cumber off in time.
  • Poor Communication Kills: The Universe Creation Saga begins with all twelve Hakaishins (Gods of Destruction) arriving in Universe 7 in search of an evil bird that threatens the multiverse. Fu appears to Frame-Up Tokitoki, Chronoa's innocent pet owl. Goku and Xeno Trunks' refusal to relinquish the bird prompts Beerus to reluctantly attack them all.
  • Red Herring: The Universe Creation Saga initially sets up Beerus as returning to his original role as a leading antagonist, but this is quickly dropped with Fu revealing himself as the real culprit.
  • Remember the New Guy?:
    • Cooler is acknowledged by Vegeta, despite him being a Canon Foreigner that only existed outside the Dragon Ball manga continuity. What's weirder is that in the Non-Serial Movies, Vegeta only ever fought Meta-Cooler and never saw Cooler's distinct-looking Fifth Form (the original "Cooler" movie didn't feature Vegeta at all), yet he recognises him on sight. This isn't the first time it happened, with Freeza knowing who he is in Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2.
    • This is repeated with both Turles and Bojack, who Goku and Vegeta recognize. Neither Dragon Ball Z: The Tree of Might nor Dragon Ball Z: Bojack Unbound are part of the series main continuities, and the movies have a few inconsistencies for either of them to work.
  • Rule of Cool: At least in the anime, nothing about the story or power-scaling makes sense even to casual fans. The characters' battle powers are very inconsistent. Just to give on early example, Super Saiyan Blue Vegito (powered up with Kaio-ken for good measure) has difficulty taking on base-form Cumber. Later, Goku, in the weaker Super Saiyan God form, battles evenly with Cumber. However, the show is all about contriving crazy scenarios for strong guys to fight and is not meant to be thought through seriously. It's just a promo anime, relax.
  • Skewed Priorities: Goku becomes interested in finding strong opponents on the Prison Planet. Vegeta yells at him and says they should focus on finding Trunks first.
  • Stock Footage: The opening of every episode show animations from the episode in question, alongside scenes from other Heroes commercials unrelated to the series.
  • Story-Breaker Power: Hearts' gravity and energy cube powers, which can restrain even Jiren. Until episode 13, whenever he gets involved in any of the fights, they are pretty much over when he uses his powers.
  • Teleport Interdiction: Goku is able to teleport himself and his allies to the Prison Planet, but once there, they find that there's a force field around the planet that prevents them from leaving.
  • Time Travel Taboo: Fu states he wants to punish Trunks for being a time-traveler.
  • Throw the Dog a Bone:
    • The special episode "Push Forward to the Battlefield! Dragon Ball Heroes" is where Beat and Note play each other in a Dragon Ball Heroes arcade game. Beat has Yamcha on his team, and he helps save Beat and Vegito and heals them by donating energy, leading to Beat's victory.
    • After missing out on the Tournament of Power, Yamcha gets to be on the team in the Super Space-Time Tournament. He single-handedly helps the team advance to the second round (the first round was a timed scavenger hunt) and even gets an opponent to fall in love with him after he saves her from getting killed by Hit. He later teams with the girl, Vidro, and manages to defeat Chilled.
  • Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny: The Show. The Universal Conflict arc epitomises this trope, bringing back Future Trunks, Team Universe 6, Zamasu, Jiren, Android 17, Meta-Cooler, Tuffle Machine Mutants and Gogeta for a high-stakes, multiverse-spanning royal rumble of epic proportions.
  • Unexplained Recovery: It's never properly explained how Goku managed to escape the exploding Prison Planet. His later appearance implies that the Grand Priest saved him.
  • Villainous Rescue: Both Cell and Turles pull one, saving the heroes from dying to Goku Black. Later, Frieza and Cooler perform one as Goku and Vegeta are being over-powered by Black to get back at him for their earlier humiliation.
  • We Can Rebuild Him: Zamasu returns in this series with an eyepatch implied to be bionic.
  • What Happened to the Mouse?: Many characters are almost egregiously forgotten as soon as they are not relevant to what's going on at the moment. At one point even Goku just disappears from the story and goes without mention after an apparent death.
  • The Worf Effect: Cumber was pretty much established to be The Juggernaut of the villains, with Super Saiyan 4 Xeno Vegito, Ultra Instinct Goku, and Jiren being the only ones able to gain the upper hand against him. Then Golden Meta-Cooler arrives and beats him so hard that he faints.
  • You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Hearts kills Zamasu upon achieving his final form.

Alternative Title(s): Dragon Ball Heroes Prison Planet

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