Akira Toriyama’s Dragon Ball Z: Fusion Reborn is often considered one of the best non-canon DBZ films. The film captivated the audience with its thrilling action sequences, with a gripping narrative that followed the epic fusion of Goku and Vegeta, the two iconic characters from the series, creating one of the strongest and coolest characters, Gogeta.
While the Shonen series is renowned for featuring jaw-dropping villains such as Frieza, Cooler, Cell, Majin Buu, and many more, there’s perhaps none more sinister than Janemba. The non-canonical film showcased the character as the physical embodiment of pure evil, who unleashed chaos in Earth and Hell, giving a tough time to our protagonists.
The character was so perfect that he got Toriyama-Sensei’s praise, as he was not the brain behind the design of the character.
Janemba Earned Akira Toriyama’s Vote of Confidence For Its “Cool” Character Design
Despite being a part of only one movie in Akira Toriyama’s Dragon Ball franchise, Janemba has managed to have a significant fan following from the OG fans of the series. The antagonist’s looks were quite unique as his base form looked quite harmless, with a humongous yellow body with a large smile on his face.
However, looks can be deceiving because despite having an unintimidating look, he outmatched Son-Goku, until the Z-Fighter decided to transform into SSJ3. This escalated the situation, as the innocent-looking being decided to flaunt his transformation and become Super Janemba. From a large bulky figure to a humanoid transformation in purple and red, and wielding a sword projecting energy blasts.
The character was a true menace, he forced the Saiyan warriors to put aside their pride and differences and do the peculiar Fusion dance to fuse into Gogeta and destroy the demon, once and for all. During one of Akira Toriyama’s old interviews translated by Kanzenshuu, the mangaka was asked how he came up with the characters for each film.
The mangaka answered,
“Toei shows me the project draft for each movie, and I design characters appropriate to the story.”
Toriyama-Sensei added, how Janemba’s “post-transformation” looked “cool.”
“Of the characters designed by Toei Animation, I thought post-transformation Janenba was “cool”. His movements in the battle scenes are nice and lively. Incidentally, I don’t have any favorites of the ones I designed.”
While the Goku and Vegeta bits were great from the 1995 film, however, even after 29 years having a significant fan following and being part of every DBZ game is not an easy task, unless you are Janemba.
Akira Toriyama Shared How He Used To Come Up With The Striking Character Design For The Series’ Villains
In the same interview, the mangaka was asked “How did you come up with the villains in the original work?” Toriyama-Sensei stated that he initially decided the story of the series, and then he brainstormed the character’s looks. However, coming up with villains was “pretty difficult” and often, he would not be sure of it.
He said,
“Pretty much, after I’d come up with the story, thinking “maybe I’ll do this next”, I’d come up with the characters. But you know, I’d always try and come up with “villains unlike those up to now”, and it was pretty difficult… But with regards to Majin Boo, I think “it went well”. Apart from that, things would often end without me being entirely convinced.”
He added, that he began with the face of the character, and while drawing it, he would simultaneously imagine their “body type,” which led him to the villain’s costume.
“First, the face. While I’m thinking up the face, I imagine their body type. When the face and the body are set, I’ve already come up with a general idea of the costume. For clothes, I design them while thinking about something that fits the world the characters inhabit, or in the case of fighting characters, “I wonder if they’ll be able to move properly in this”.”
Despite following this pattern to come up with the villains in his series, he could not decide and it often took him over “thirty-odd drawings” to feel that the character was just “about right.”
Dragon Ball Z: Fusion Reborn can be streamed on Crunchyroll.
