As wishes are being made to try and bring Goku back to earth after defeating Frieza, he declines the wish to come home (and who could blame him with his hard headed son, idiotic friends, and stupidly emotional and hot-tempered wife?). So the rest of the Z Fighters have to fend for themselves in the meantime. Krillin finally gets himself a girlfriend named Maron who only seems to be with Krillin because she’s bored and he’s simply there to pass the time. Garlic Jr returns from the Dead Zone thanks to the power of the Makyo Star. With the help of his Spice Boys (seriously, that’s their name!) Mustard, Vinegar, Salt, and Spice, Garlic Jr takes over Kami’s lookout with the intention of becoming the new guardian of earth and taking over the world with the Black Water Mist; which turns its victims into brainwashed “vampires.”
What’s unfortunate about this saga is that not only is it complete filler (it wasn’t in the manga at all), but it really just isn’t very good. To make matters worse, the animation is rather superb for most of the episodes which makes you wonder why they’d put so much effort into something so bland. The dialogue of the show has always been questionable. How questionable, you may ask? Piccolo calls Garlic Jr. “Garlic breath” right before he heals himself even though he had to rely on Dende during the Frieza saga. Black Water Mist is a pretty lame name to begin with, but its effects are even worse. A couple is mauled to death by rats and cats infected by the mist with the trademark lonesome shoe as the only remaining evidence. Meanwhile, on Kami’s lookout, Garlic Jr and his remaining Spice Boys yell and grunt at a red star in the sky. As Super Garlic Jr (Garlic Jr after his transformation) fights Piccolo, he says, “Peek-a-boo! Come to Big Daddy Garlic!”
Gohan was the one who sent Garlic Jr into the Dead Zone before, so he’s obviously the biggest threat in this mini saga. He eventually becomes more powerful and when he defeats Spice and Vinegar they have this rather ridiculous exchange of words; “Oh man. No way!” “Yes way! Darn!” Then they’re swallowed by a blast of light.
Piccolo and Kami are still connected during this time and Kami runs off with Mr. Popo to try and save the world by releasing the Sacred Water, but the former guardian of earth has other plans for Kami and electrocutes the holy hell out of him causing both Kami and Piccolo to nearly fade from existence. Back on Kami’s Lookout, as Piccolo becomes transparent, Krillin points out that something terrible has happened to Kami and Piccolo is in trouble. Moments later, Krillin acts completely shocked to hear the same news come from Piccolo’s mouth at the beginning of the next episode.
Gohan’s stubbornness gets the best of him again as he refuses to see the only way to defeat Garlic Jr and a simple solution is stretched into a ten minute segment. Piccolo comes up with the idea to blast the Makyo Star to which Krillin says, “That plan sounds half baked to me,” and Piccolo replies, “No, it’s fully baked.” Turns out, he was right. The moral of the story is Piccolo knows his way around the kitchen or something. He should probably lay off snorting that Black Water Mist. After Garlic Jr. is defeated, Krillin goes shopping with Maron who insists on looking for wedding clothes even though she has no intention of marrying Krillin. After a birthday party with the thousand year old turtle on Roshi’s island, the turtle tells Krillin of a giant pearl at the bottom of the ocean. On the way down there, Gohan asks a fish if it’s late for school. Once Krillin and Maron call it quits, Chi Chi gets Gohan a tutor named Mr. Shu who does nothing but abuse Gohan with a whip and talk trash about Goku since he’s not around. Shu is nothing but a wimpy douche and is eventually thrown out of a window and chased away by Chi Chi.
Sources: dragonball.wikia.com, thedragonballblog.blogspot.com, tumblr.com, imdb.com, wikipedia.org
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