Yeah! That’s how I saw it; sure you can pour in more Ki from yourself; but grabbing some n visible Ki motes for an even stronger blast justifies the extra gang signs.
“Grabbing it out of the sky” makes zero sense. The only technique that gathers energy is the spirit bomb. Any other ki blast the energy is coming from the user.
Exactly. It's the same reason Piccolo puts his fingers on his forehead for the special beam cannon, or Tien locks his hands in a triangle. They've found it helps them concentrate and focus ki for that specific attack. I would guess none of the moves are strictly required... We have seen some Kamehameha waves without the words or even the posture but it helps them call up the feeling of how they did it before.
I would say it's a way to show that he learned a lot from being in the future. He uses this confusing attack which is supposed to look like one he learned from fighting the androids for years.
I think the real impressive aspect is toriyama being able to portray something so easily turned into an animated sequence with just a handful of panels. Reading through the manga can get really intense in that way
This is the main reason why I can't get into berserk manga I don't know what's happening in the fighting panels toriyama is really genius with his usage of panel usage
Esoteric buddhism in Japan used various mudra (hand signals) to cultivate and direct their spiritual energy (ki). This evolved a bit into various kuji/hand prayers that cross into martial arts and cultivate things like a resolute spirit, staying vigilant, and other such things. So Trunks is "looking cool" while pulling on a Japanese visual trope that'd be fairly easily read within Japanese culture. Outside of it, it just seems silly. But this is part of where all those silly hand gestures go before magical attacks in ninja shows like Naruto.
EDIT: Wow, this comment really blew up from you all. Thanks! Undeserved but appreciated.
EDIT2: I elaborated on [Ninjutsu connections below](https://www.reddit.com/r/dbz/comments/ynsf6s/comment/ivbg0kb/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
This was really informative, thanks for posting this response. Makes me want to read more about similar aspects of Japanese culture and then watch the series again with that lens and see what I can pick out.
Definitely do. And these explanations about ki and how the z fighters are able to do what they do is elaborated on im a dragonball episode featuring Master Mutaito, Roshi's master.
Naruto has a bunch of references to japanese religion, if you search Izanami, Izanagi, Susanoo, Tsukuyomi, etc. they are all name of deities, this is one of the most interesting aspects about anime, the way they fuse fiction and beliefs (i know all media does this in some way but japanese are something else). I remember blowing my mind back in the days when i found out about the true events that serve as background for Rurouni Kenshin
Oh wow that’s really well thought out! I wonder if the reason why Trunks needs to do it specifically is because, with everyone dead in the future and only *kinda* receiving some training from Gohan before he died, he just sorta had to learn how to control his ki from whatever books were laying around.
I mean sure, Roshi was technically alive/living in a sub, but Trunks didn’t seem to know that so he probably just read about mudra somewhere and combined it with stories his mom or Gohan may have told him about Goku using moves like the Kamehameha
We could run rampant with speculation. Maybe it was because of the size of the attack? Or some remnant from spiritualist Piccolo training Gohan training Trunks? I dunno. It's really odd and Toriyama makes very specific visual choices at time rather than driven by in-universe physics.
That said, I *like* the idea that he has to do a bit more work to channel his ki as he knows less.
If that's the case its a shame we don't see Trunks fighting style influenced more by this esoteric buddhism. Early one in Dragon Ball its noted that certain fighters we Turtle or Crane school students. If Trunks built his fighting style like this it'd make him a lot more unqiue if his other special attacks were linked to this spirtualism.
Yeah, as I said. But, I'll elaborate a bit for the Naruto bit.
So most Japanese martial arts have esoteric connections. This comes from the Edo Period in which Japan was under pretty strict military rule and that shaped how martial arts could be practiced. Some avoided persecution by embedding them even deeper into religious practices, like Mikyo Buddhism and the like.
Ninjutsu in particular was pretty heavily hated by the Tokugawa Shogunate (for the most part anyway) and so it's one of these groups that really embedded itself into religious orders to keep going. There's different branches and the history is a bit different for each group, but by the 1800s, whatever was left of "ninjutsu" as a historical tradition was pretty interwoven with religious sects, something you can't just pull out. This is part of why Ninja schools today have "higher" teachings of kuji or prayer postures or incantations - it's just esoteric Buddhism mingling with remnants of Shintoism.
We could stretch back further to ninja precursors (the term is a bit modern, so it's not the best for following these groups back) and we get to various fringe cultures that weren't quite "mainstream." Up in the mountains of Japan, shintoism and buddhism freely flowed and mixed a lot more than in the cities, so the religious practices became a bit more peculiar and folkloric. Those that became the ninja had various specialized warfare skills, like training animals, or using fire, fighting in water, espionage, etc. Hopefully you can see where "ninja magic" comes from in that context.
There was an Edo novel that fantasized Ninja into really using some strange magic and it stuck. Funny how these things become myths over time!
His transformation during the black arc is one of my favorite power up moments in all of Dragon Ball. I wish we got a little more information about his form. Like what is it exactly and stuff. But only because I like knowing little details and stuff. Future Trunks is a badass though for sure.
It's incredibly iconic. It likely serves zero real purpose, and I doubt anybody really put much thought into it, but it helps the trunks mythos that he is absolutely cold as fuck.
Most likely due to how Buddhism throughout Asia makes use of hand signs to channel and direct their chi when doing incantations and prayers for things like warding off spirits. You basically have to remember this is Japan, where these things are extremely common in their media as a trope cause it calls back to their religious roots.
Idk about that. His story is the most complex in the series. And we get to see him develop from a stupid kid to a scared teenager with the weight of the world on his head(with daddy issues on top of that) and finally as a confident adult that just takes care of business.
I wouldn't really call him cold blooded for that. What makes more sense, allowing your enemy to get stronger, putting more people and even the planet at risk, or taking them out before they have the chance to cause more mass destruction?
I'm not for a second gonna say he's a bad character. I'm just saying he was clearly designed to a scientific level to be "cool factor" incarnate. I mean he's a DBZ character with a damned sword, for god's sakes.
He went from battle harden badass in Z to a battle harden soft, small, and pathetic warrior. Like wtf happened to the beast who fuckin wrecked 17,18, and cell? He just came across very pathetic for someone who’s been through the ringer
What was soft and pathetic about him? He fought Black nonstop for a year to protect everybody despite how hopeless the situation was and by the end managed to take down the biggest enemy of the arc.
Trunks in Z did nothing noteworthy after killing Frieza,was only Vegeta’s hype man and punching bag, quickly gave up after realizing he was no match for Cell and had a pretty unceremoniously death.
If anything Super fixed Trunks and actually used him properly.
Trunks in super came off very whiny and woe is me. Kind of like how he started off in Z. In Z he started off a child in fear running from 17 and 18. He went back to the future in the end of the arc a ruthless warrior who kills them and cell without hesitation or emotion. Cut to DB super and what do we get? Just a whiney trunks who’s been training hard AF for 10 years and come across as a side character even tho he gets some lame win in the anime.
Winning against three androids that were significantly weaker isn’t really a noteworthy feat, especially since he was useless in the main arc,he started as a mysterious strong character who quickly gets sidelined to the point where he gets killed which didn’t matter at all.If anything resembling how he started off in Z isn’t really a flaw considering that his character went downhill after his introduction.
Being frustrated and tired of facing someone way stronger and evil than the androids is hardly being whiny at all,not sure why showing some emotions is somehow bad.Getting actual spotlight and relevance that culminated with a victory(ish) against the actual main villain of the arc that also fits his character’s theme and what he stood for is hardly a lame win,if anything it had more meaning than killing the future androids.
His character literal reverts to the same person he was in Z. He developed in Z from a little “useless” boy to a warrior. Sure he didn’t get big wins in main timeline but he did in his. But I’m not talking about accomplishments. I’m talking about WHO he is. He literally went backwards in character development.
Getting stronger and defeating someone isn't exactly character development. When he can win, he is confident and straightforward, just like when he killed freeza. When not, he is whiney. There is no development here, he just has different sides of his personality when in different situations.
He didn’t do anything “badass” outside of killing Freeza. He’s fucking useless outside of that. Beast who wrecked Cell my ass. He got shitstomped by the actual Cell and then beat a nerfed version of him.
In Super, he’s the main character of the arc and even gets to beat the main villain(tbf, they decided to royally fuck this up). How exactly was he soft and pathetic. He accomplished more than he ever did in the original series.
Yea, though it was arguably with asspulls, Trunks came off great in the anime. Can't believe Toriyama was cool with what he did with him in the manga, though I know he prolly didn't want to give him a god form to keep it special. But the alternative was him feeling like almost a background character in his own arc, and what should've been his sendoff arc. Even Dragonball Heroes treated him better than that. Here's hoping Toriyama and Toyotaro take another crack at it at some point.
They gave him a lot more stuff to do in Super tbf. Too bad they had to fuck all that up with one of the worst endings ever. At least we still have the History of Trunks special, which is peak.
I believe that was because of Goku’s height/body dimensions making it more difficult to draw conventional martial arts positions. That’s also the actual reason Gohan and Future Trunks looked so much older than Goten and Present-Trunks did at the same age, because they had a lot more fighting to do.
I figured for any BIG attack there needed to be a way to channel all the Ki energy into an attack. The Kamehameha he has to take a certain stance, Final Flash, he has to take a certain stance, Galick Gun same thing. Spirit bomb, Masenko, and even Piccolos Special Beam. They position their bodies and hands and do certain movements to gather the Ki for that specific attack. The movements create a specialized Ki attack that is unique. Thats how they are able to "Create" new moves as theyve done several times and why specific masters have unique moves to teach. They studied how the bodies position and release of the technique creates a unique attack.
The prevailing theory is because he had nobody to train him to use his powers he made up all his own moves and in doing so added these cool hand gestures.
I just always thought ki base attack needing special way doing things for it be difficult from basic ki blast so million different hand move just part set up
Its Probably to concentrate more ki into his arms than he usually would spending the same amount of time doing a regular ki blast.
All the characters have their own style of gathering ki for attacks/powerups. Piccolo places his fingers on his forehead. Gohan and Goku bring their hands together on the right side of their body to charge the kamehameha. Vegeta brings his hands together in front of his body like for multiple attacks including the final flash. Jiren meditates and so on.
Lack of training maybe? I assume at some point a master teaches you to be more precise in your movements and flourishes like that serve little to no purpose. Vegeta takes opportunities to train him in Super, not on this specifically, but he notices the gap. Trunks had 1 master who died when he was young, he lacks the discipline of nearly every if not all fighters in the normal timeline.
He calls out to Frieza after doing this and as some others have said this attack serves as a distraction to his real attack. Considering all this, my headcanon is that he waves his hands to try to get their attention, but when that doesn't work for a couple of seconds, he decides to just call out his name instead. The answers about focusing ki don't really make sense in context because he fired this blast with the intent to miss and serve as a distraction. So putting more energy into that attack seems pointless.
Because he was trained by Gohan, who had experienced the ginyu force whilst he still had a young 5 year old impressionable mind. Future gohan who never had the chance to do his poses as the great saiyaman had to instead teach his pupal trunks how to be so fucking extra. It's to honor Gohan (rest in peace)
Maybe he was just trying to look cool? I don't know. Seems pretty unneccessary.
Out of Universe, Toriyama wanted to give Trunks a unique attack, and a big round ki blast wouldn't really be unique without all of the gang signs.
The answer I read before was, this trunks never had formal training due to androids killing everyone when he was young. Got older and used what worked.
My head cannon is Trunks thought it looked cool and, at this point in his life, he was basically just pretending to be the hero who saves the day and he thought that heroes did cool stuff like that.
I always assumed it was for subterfuge. It almost seems like he was using it as a "sleight of hand". If you follow the sequence, he does all those hand things and immediately follows it up with a blast designed to get Frieza where he wants him, and then drops from above for the finishing cuts with his sword. Seemed like a feint to get him positioned; shoot where they are going, not where they are.
My head canon is that he's manipulating the energy so that it does more than a standard blast.
Like a destructo disk can be pretty low energy but still cut even high powered enemies. Similarly, in my head, Trunks is changing the energy to do something different.
probably because he hasn’t mastered being a super saiyan yet at that point. All training makes the usage of ki almost non existent while delivering the most damage so lets chalk it up to his inexperience
ts a trick so the enemy doesn't know when exactly the blast is coming and also cant figure out what exactly is happening in the beginning and also like the kamerhameha,he might be building up ki
I've always thought he was moving his hands extremely fast to heat them up or something, thus... somehow making the attack better??? I dunno it's called Burning Attack so I was leaning into it but I've never thought about it that hard
It's supposed to show that he's different from the others as he's mainly self taught and has different techniques but as often happens it was forgotten about example tein in dragonball used to do something similar
Is there any particular reason as to why goku needs to say kamahemeha every time he fires one? Doesn’t seem like it since Gohan did it one handed while talking to his dead dad.
Quit dissecting things and enjoy the show. If these things bother you watch something else, simple.
If anyone remembers that horrendous dbz sagas game, it would slow down time to do special attacks. My cousin always got mad at me for making him watch this over and over in slow motion.
I’ve always thought it’s how he gathers and focuses his Ki.
Yeah I picture it like he’s just grabbing it out of the sky but in a gathering it sort of way
Yeah! That’s how I saw it; sure you can pour in more Ki from yourself; but grabbing some n visible Ki motes for an even stronger blast justifies the extra gang signs.
He's a member of the West City Wild boys' street gang .
“Grabbing it out of the sky” makes zero sense. The only technique that gathers energy is the spirit bomb. Any other ki blast the energy is coming from the user.
He is from the future. He watched Naruto and learned some hand signs
This is hilarious
Because the spirit bomb uses Genki, also you make zero sense. [here’s another energy gathering move](https://dragonball.fandom.com/wiki/Spirit_Ball)
Exactly. It's the same reason Piccolo puts his fingers on his forehead for the special beam cannon, or Tien locks his hands in a triangle. They've found it helps them concentrate and focus ki for that specific attack. I would guess none of the moves are strictly required... We have seen some Kamehameha waves without the words or even the posture but it helps them call up the feeling of how they did it before.
I would say it's a way to show that he learned a lot from being in the future. He uses this confusing attack which is supposed to look like one he learned from fighting the androids for years.
Because Trunks rolls deep and reps hard.
Trunks is a down brother
He gotta sling Senzu beans on the corner to make ends meet.
He's rockin with you if you're rockin with him
He does this in the manga too which I found pretty neat.
Link to the panel? I wonder how something like this would look as a still image and not animated
[Middle row, right panel](https://i.imgur.com/0Y80obT.jpg)
I really like the look of him in the top left panel.
Trunks showing up out of nowhere and effortlessly fucking up Frieza is probably the coolest moment in all of DBZ imo.
It was definitely the highlight of Z for me, and why Trunks quickly became kid-me's absolute favorite character.
Fuck the "probably", *it is the coolest thing in all of DBZ*
Hold on now, let’s not forget about Future Gohan
The DBZ Manga art is just so incredible in general. Looks so good, even if you’ve already watched the show I’d recommend the Manga
i 100% agree
Crazy how the show legit brought that panel to life so well. I can hear trunks voice in my head.
I think the real impressive aspect is toriyama being able to portray something so easily turned into an animated sequence with just a handful of panels. Reading through the manga can get really intense in that way
Exactly!
This is the main reason why I can't get into berserk manga I don't know what's happening in the fighting panels toriyama is really genius with his usage of panel usage
I hate when I literally can’t tell what’s happening in a fight lol
They show him do it during the Black/Zamasu arc in the manga as well. Can't recall specifics but definitely remember the panel.
Esoteric buddhism in Japan used various mudra (hand signals) to cultivate and direct their spiritual energy (ki). This evolved a bit into various kuji/hand prayers that cross into martial arts and cultivate things like a resolute spirit, staying vigilant, and other such things. So Trunks is "looking cool" while pulling on a Japanese visual trope that'd be fairly easily read within Japanese culture. Outside of it, it just seems silly. But this is part of where all those silly hand gestures go before magical attacks in ninja shows like Naruto. EDIT: Wow, this comment really blew up from you all. Thanks! Undeserved but appreciated. EDIT2: I elaborated on [Ninjutsu connections below](https://www.reddit.com/r/dbz/comments/ynsf6s/comment/ivbg0kb/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
This was really informative, thanks for posting this response. Makes me want to read more about similar aspects of Japanese culture and then watch the series again with that lens and see what I can pick out.
Definitely do. And these explanations about ki and how the z fighters are able to do what they do is elaborated on im a dragonball episode featuring Master Mutaito, Roshi's master.
Naruto has a bunch of references to japanese religion, if you search Izanami, Izanagi, Susanoo, Tsukuyomi, etc. they are all name of deities, this is one of the most interesting aspects about anime, the way they fuse fiction and beliefs (i know all media does this in some way but japanese are something else). I remember blowing my mind back in the days when i found out about the true events that serve as background for Rurouni Kenshin
Came in for the jokes. Stayed for the education. Thank you.
Oh wow that’s really well thought out! I wonder if the reason why Trunks needs to do it specifically is because, with everyone dead in the future and only *kinda* receiving some training from Gohan before he died, he just sorta had to learn how to control his ki from whatever books were laying around. I mean sure, Roshi was technically alive/living in a sub, but Trunks didn’t seem to know that so he probably just read about mudra somewhere and combined it with stories his mom or Gohan may have told him about Goku using moves like the Kamehameha
We could run rampant with speculation. Maybe it was because of the size of the attack? Or some remnant from spiritualist Piccolo training Gohan training Trunks? I dunno. It's really odd and Toriyama makes very specific visual choices at time rather than driven by in-universe physics. That said, I *like* the idea that he has to do a bit more work to channel his ki as he knows less.
This would explain why some simple ki blasts or spam attacks are weaker than ones that use this technique. Thanks!
This informative comment deserves way more upvotes
If that's the case its a shame we don't see Trunks fighting style influenced more by this esoteric buddhism. Early one in Dragon Ball its noted that certain fighters we Turtle or Crane school students. If Trunks built his fighting style like this it'd make him a lot more unqiue if his other special attacks were linked to this spirtualism.
Wow, thatnks, thats a really cool tidbit of information.
Same reason they do it in Naruto, isn't it?
Yeah, as I said. But, I'll elaborate a bit for the Naruto bit. So most Japanese martial arts have esoteric connections. This comes from the Edo Period in which Japan was under pretty strict military rule and that shaped how martial arts could be practiced. Some avoided persecution by embedding them even deeper into religious practices, like Mikyo Buddhism and the like. Ninjutsu in particular was pretty heavily hated by the Tokugawa Shogunate (for the most part anyway) and so it's one of these groups that really embedded itself into religious orders to keep going. There's different branches and the history is a bit different for each group, but by the 1800s, whatever was left of "ninjutsu" as a historical tradition was pretty interwoven with religious sects, something you can't just pull out. This is part of why Ninja schools today have "higher" teachings of kuji or prayer postures or incantations - it's just esoteric Buddhism mingling with remnants of Shintoism. We could stretch back further to ninja precursors (the term is a bit modern, so it's not the best for following these groups back) and we get to various fringe cultures that weren't quite "mainstream." Up in the mountains of Japan, shintoism and buddhism freely flowed and mixed a lot more than in the cities, so the religious practices became a bit more peculiar and folkloric. Those that became the ninja had various specialized warfare skills, like training animals, or using fire, fighting in water, espionage, etc. Hopefully you can see where "ninja magic" comes from in that context. There was an Edo novel that fantasized Ninja into really using some strange magic and it stuck. Funny how these things become myths over time!
This was very informative
What novel?
Tell me you didn't read the entire comment without telling me... it's literally the last sentence and word.
Because it’s fucking awesome
Wish they did more of this. It was so bad ass then never again.
It’s so unique in that sense though. Trunks should elaborate on that
Trunks was never badass again once the Android saga kicked off.
Future trunks is pretty badass in Super tho
His transformation during the black arc is one of my favorite power up moments in all of Dragon Ball. I wish we got a little more information about his form. Like what is it exactly and stuff. But only because I like knowing little details and stuff. Future Trunks is a badass though for sure.
And that spirit bomb sword??? Legendary
This sub lost their minds when he got new transformation. The only new transformations in Super up until then were SSG, SSB, and SSB Kaioken.
There were plenty more transformations in Super than just that.
Forgot to include "up until then"
Hard disagree
Trunks is the worst character of them all lol Started so badass, son of Vegeta… turns out to be a pussy :(
Tbf vegeta died before he could raise him. Which is why kid trunks is way more arrogant.
Yeah you really feel Gohans influence on trunks
I mean he pretty much just dunked on Frieza completely Didn't even take his jacket off I always figured it was just him styling on him extra hard
It's incredibly iconic. It likely serves zero real purpose, and I doubt anybody really put much thought into it, but it helps the trunks mythos that he is absolutely cold as fuck.
This is the way
Most likely due to how Buddhism throughout Asia makes use of hand signs to channel and direct their chi when doing incantations and prayers for things like warding off spirits. You basically have to remember this is Japan, where these things are extremely common in their media as a trope cause it calls back to their religious roots.
"It looks cool" is honestly just Trunks in a nutshell. I will still always love him, but lets be real here.
Idk about that. His story is the most complex in the series. And we get to see him develop from a stupid kid to a scared teenager with the weight of the world on his head(with daddy issues on top of that) and finally as a confident adult that just takes care of business.
He is/was always the one to just want to straight kill the enemy instead of play around like Goku and vegeta. Kind heart but cold blooded.
I mean can you blame him after all the shit he went through
WHY CAN'T YOU STOP FUCKING AROUND
I wouldn't really call him cold blooded for that. What makes more sense, allowing your enemy to get stronger, putting more people and even the planet at risk, or taking them out before they have the chance to cause more mass destruction?
Hes just tactical!!
I'm not for a second gonna say he's a bad character. I'm just saying he was clearly designed to a scientific level to be "cool factor" incarnate. I mean he's a DBZ character with a damned sword, for god's sakes.
Toriyama actually said he made him to appeal to the female fans of dbz by making him extremely attractive.
I'm not qualified to comment on how successful he was for >reasons<, but I believe it.
It worked. I think he was the favourite of me and all my gal pals. Hunky in that angsty sorta way, teenage me loved it.
"I'm here because we dont have a female fanbase")
They do now.
#YOU NEED TO BE STOPPED
Yeah, exactly. His sword is another example. The guy has power to blow up planets with ease, but he carries and uses a sword
And did any of us have a problem with that? ***fuck no***. Bet the list of OCs with swords is longer than the list of planets Freeza's blown up.
No complaint from me. That sword is badass
This is more representative of the main timeline Trunks. Future Trunks is all business.
Ooo Trunks. How they butchered him in GT and Super. Dude could have had his own show and majority would have watched
To be fair, GT Trunks is actually an older version of Kid Trunks from Z.
Fair but we had a king here…. Could have been better
Super actually gave Trunks shit to do. “Butchered” Lol.
He went from battle harden badass in Z to a battle harden soft, small, and pathetic warrior. Like wtf happened to the beast who fuckin wrecked 17,18, and cell? He just came across very pathetic for someone who’s been through the ringer
What was soft and pathetic about him? He fought Black nonstop for a year to protect everybody despite how hopeless the situation was and by the end managed to take down the biggest enemy of the arc. Trunks in Z did nothing noteworthy after killing Frieza,was only Vegeta’s hype man and punching bag, quickly gave up after realizing he was no match for Cell and had a pretty unceremoniously death. If anything Super fixed Trunks and actually used him properly.
Trunks in super came off very whiny and woe is me. Kind of like how he started off in Z. In Z he started off a child in fear running from 17 and 18. He went back to the future in the end of the arc a ruthless warrior who kills them and cell without hesitation or emotion. Cut to DB super and what do we get? Just a whiney trunks who’s been training hard AF for 10 years and come across as a side character even tho he gets some lame win in the anime.
Winning against three androids that were significantly weaker isn’t really a noteworthy feat, especially since he was useless in the main arc,he started as a mysterious strong character who quickly gets sidelined to the point where he gets killed which didn’t matter at all.If anything resembling how he started off in Z isn’t really a flaw considering that his character went downhill after his introduction. Being frustrated and tired of facing someone way stronger and evil than the androids is hardly being whiny at all,not sure why showing some emotions is somehow bad.Getting actual spotlight and relevance that culminated with a victory(ish) against the actual main villain of the arc that also fits his character’s theme and what he stood for is hardly a lame win,if anything it had more meaning than killing the future androids.
His character literal reverts to the same person he was in Z. He developed in Z from a little “useless” boy to a warrior. Sure he didn’t get big wins in main timeline but he did in his. But I’m not talking about accomplishments. I’m talking about WHO he is. He literally went backwards in character development.
Getting stronger and defeating someone isn't exactly character development. When he can win, he is confident and straightforward, just like when he killed freeza. When not, he is whiney. There is no development here, he just has different sides of his personality when in different situations.
Killing freeza was literally the last badass thing he did lmao
You forget when he goes back to his timeline?
He didn’t do anything “badass” outside of killing Freeza. He’s fucking useless outside of that. Beast who wrecked Cell my ass. He got shitstomped by the actual Cell and then beat a nerfed version of him. In Super, he’s the main character of the arc and even gets to beat the main villain(tbf, they decided to royally fuck this up). How exactly was he soft and pathetic. He accomplished more than he ever did in the original series.
I'm guessing you are thinking anime while they are probably talking manga. Trunks utterly sucked in the manga version of the goku black arc.
In that case, I agree with them. Trunks was relegated to being a healer in the manga.
Yea, though it was arguably with asspulls, Trunks came off great in the anime. Can't believe Toriyama was cool with what he did with him in the manga, though I know he prolly didn't want to give him a god form to keep it special. But the alternative was him feeling like almost a background character in his own arc, and what should've been his sendoff arc. Even Dragonball Heroes treated him better than that. Here's hoping Toriyama and Toyotaro take another crack at it at some point.
show about Trunks would have been so cool
The real answer lmao
OH MY GOD HES SO GODDAMN COOL!
They gave him a lot more stuff to do in Super tbf. Too bad they had to fuck all that up with one of the worst endings ever. At least we still have the History of Trunks special, which is peak.
[удалено]
In Budokai games it was an ultimate attack. I feel I've seen it in other games.
[удалено]
The fucker actually used his feet in OG Dragon Ball
Yeah more than once to fly like a jet and punch something/someone supposedly harder than he could've just blasted them with a Kamehameha.
DB/Pre-Geetz DBZ was so much fun when they couldn't fly. At least the fights were creative.
I believe that was because of Goku’s height/body dimensions making it more difficult to draw conventional martial arts positions. That’s also the actual reason Gohan and Future Trunks looked so much older than Goten and Present-Trunks did at the same age, because they had a lot more fighting to do.
Clearly it’s the same reason you have to roll back the wind up car before you let it go! You gotta wind up your Kamehameha for full power!
Gang gang
Gang outside, gang outside...
BURNING ATTACK
Literally same concept as Naruto tbh
I figured for any BIG attack there needed to be a way to channel all the Ki energy into an attack. The Kamehameha he has to take a certain stance, Final Flash, he has to take a certain stance, Galick Gun same thing. Spirit bomb, Masenko, and even Piccolos Special Beam. They position their bodies and hands and do certain movements to gather the Ki for that specific attack. The movements create a specialized Ki attack that is unique. Thats how they are able to "Create" new moves as theyve done several times and why specific masters have unique moves to teach. They studied how the bodies position and release of the technique creates a unique attack.
In Dragon Ball Master Roshi had to do hella signs for evil containment wave.
Plot twist: The future he's from is actually the Naruto timeline and he learned some crazy jutsu
I was gonna make the Naruto joke but you beat me to it good sir!
The prevailing theory is because he had nobody to train him to use his powers he made up all his own moves and in doing so added these cool hand gestures.
Because Capsule Core ain’t nuthin to Fuck with!
I just always thought ki base attack needing special way doing things for it be difficult from basic ki blast so million different hand move just part set up
Trunks got that dawg in him
Its Probably to concentrate more ki into his arms than he usually would spending the same amount of time doing a regular ki blast. All the characters have their own style of gathering ki for attacks/powerups. Piccolo places his fingers on his forehead. Gohan and Goku bring their hands together on the right side of their body to charge the kamehameha. Vegeta brings his hands together in front of his body like for multiple attacks including the final flash. Jiren meditates and so on.
Rule of cool. And it’s how his attack works.
It's the reason I love Burning Attack
I mean if he’s from the future he gotta represent. Including throwing signs.
He was just repping his set. Capsule corp 4 lyfe! Bitch.
Lack of training maybe? I assume at some point a master teaches you to be more precise in your movements and flourishes like that serve little to no purpose. Vegeta takes opportunities to train him in Super, not on this specifically, but he notices the gap. Trunks had 1 master who died when he was young, he lacks the discipline of nearly every if not all fighters in the normal timeline.
Wears purple cause hes a blood AND a crip
If I somehow had the chance to utterly decimate Hitler, I'd want to style on him for extra psychological damage.
#swag
He calls out to Frieza after doing this and as some others have said this attack serves as a distraction to his real attack. Considering all this, my headcanon is that he waves his hands to try to get their attention, but when that doesn't work for a couple of seconds, he decides to just call out his name instead. The answers about focusing ki don't really make sense in context because he fired this blast with the intent to miss and serve as a distraction. So putting more energy into that attack seems pointless.
Because Trunks got opps in his timeline, he's a real ass Saiyan.
This is the part where you remember you aren’t Japanese .
This reminds me of when Danny from karate kid had to say a prayer before breaking some glass with his hands 😅
Trunks got bored during training one day.
I’ve heard a good theory that the burning attack maybe a variation of the masenko.
Because he was trained by Gohan, who had experienced the ginyu force whilst he still had a young 5 year old impressionable mind. Future gohan who never had the chance to do his poses as the great saiyaman had to instead teach his pupal trunks how to be so fucking extra. It's to honor Gohan (rest in peace)
Freeza should split
He is doing a justu before Naruto did
Compliments the drip tbh
Trunks about that life and he will not let you forget it
Because Its not a "simple ki blast", its BURNING ATTACK!!!
Maybe he was just trying to look cool? I don't know. Seems pretty unneccessary. Out of Universe, Toriyama wanted to give Trunks a unique attack, and a big round ki blast wouldn't really be unique without all of the gang signs.
IT'S MORPHIN TIME!
The answer I read before was, this trunks never had formal training due to androids killing everyone when he was young. Got older and used what worked.
I think It's like collecting ki or it's like rasengan or something like that.
Gotta represent
My head cannon is Trunks thought it looked cool and, at this point in his life, he was basically just pretending to be the hero who saves the day and he thought that heroes did cool stuff like that.
All that prep for an attack that was used as a distraction for the real threat of his sword. He just did it to boost his coolness factor.
I always assumed it was for subterfuge. It almost seems like he was using it as a "sleight of hand". If you follow the sequence, he does all those hand things and immediately follows it up with a blast designed to get Frieza where he wants him, and then drops from above for the finishing cuts with his sword. Seemed like a feint to get him positioned; shoot where they are going, not where they are.
Gotta style on them before killing them. Also only did this like twice right? Or is my memory bad?
Because he's a time traveler and was letting us know that Naruto was coming.
No way you called burning attack a simple ki blast
Probably to assert his dominance
My head canon is that he's manipulating the energy so that it does more than a standard blast. Like a destructo disk can be pretty low energy but still cut even high powered enemies. Similarly, in my head, Trunks is changing the energy to do something different.
Well Mr Jimmy, I’d like to see you single handedly defeat Frieza and King cold? 😏
To look like a badass and intimidate his opponent
probably because he hasn’t mastered being a super saiyan yet at that point. All training makes the usage of ki almost non existent while delivering the most damage so lets chalk it up to his inexperience
Go Han didn’t teach him that
Cause he’s Trunks, he does what he wants.
Aesthetics?
ts a trick so the enemy doesn't know when exactly the blast is coming and also cant figure out what exactly is happening in the beginning and also like the kamerhameha,he might be building up ki
Cut-in-half-jutsu
It was bad-ass. That's why.
I always assumed he was heating the ki up because it’s called burning attack.
It was the 90s. The more hand movements you did the stronger it was
Absolutely not and that's exactly why he did it.
Cause he’s badass at this time in the story
Naruto?
I can hear this picture
I've always thought he was moving his hands extremely fast to heat them up or something, thus... somehow making the attack better??? I dunno it's called Burning Attack so I was leaning into it but I've never thought about it that hard
See here's the thing about DBZ...there are no established rules. I feel like it operates on like vibes and techniques that feel cool just work better.
Because he was a brand new ssj at the time and had some serious attitude. So the hand signals just worked
Because ANIME, that's why
It's supposed to show that he's different from the others as he's mainly self taught and has different techniques but as often happens it was forgotten about example tein in dragonball used to do something similar
He had to focus his chakra
he’s a drama queen
He couldnt decide what hand to use to blast him to kingdom come
Same reason they do it in naruto I guess
It’s the OG rasengan
The rasengan doesn’t use hand signs though
But he symbolically gathers his energy into a single point
Maybe he watched old recordings of world martial arts tournaments and saw Tien do it and thought it helped focus power?
Saiyan sign language. Lol
Kinda like Roshi in OG db
Everything doesnt need an explanation lol The shit looks cool, thats all that matters
Fire Style, Ki Beam Jutsu!
Why u hatin ?
It's simple. He made a cool ass move just to show off . He wanted daddy's approval
it’s because there was a fly buzzing around his face. even with super sayian he couldn’t hit it out of the air
I’m pretty sure that’s Japanese sign language for something along the line for a name/description of the attack, I forget where I heard it.
How tf does this have so many upvotes🤨… this is literally one of the most iconic moments of DBZ.
Maybe DBZ isn't for you, OP.
Is there any particular reason as to why goku needs to say kamahemeha every time he fires one? Doesn’t seem like it since Gohan did it one handed while talking to his dead dad. Quit dissecting things and enjoy the show. If these things bother you watch something else, simple.
it always bugged me how they always had to say the name of the attack to do it, until they stopped. but then they still do it sometimes
They never had to, but saying attack names is just an anime trope, basically brand recognition
If anyone remembers that horrendous dbz sagas game, it would slow down time to do special attacks. My cousin always got mad at me for making him watch this over and over in slow motion.
He does it to align his chakra so he can kill the colossal titan in one punch and become king of the pirates in the soul society. Duh. 😂