Dragon Ball Super Episode 59 Review: Protect The Supreme Kai Gowasu – Destroy Zamasu!

This Dragon Ball Super review contains spoilers

Dragon Ball Super Episode 59

“There’s no mistaking it. He’s out to kill Gowasu.”

If last week’s episodewas all about battle tactics and putting together a strong, smart attack strategy, then “Protect The Supreme Kai Gowasu” is the sweet, sweet follow-through where that plan gets put into action. And boy does it make for an entertaining episode of Dragon Ball Super

“Protect The Supreme Kai Gowasu” is definitely one of the most suspenseful episodes that the series has ever done and a lot of this installment revolves around patience and perception. After the information that Goku, Beerus, and Whis learned from their recent visit to Universe 10, the gang has never been more eager to act on their suspicions about Zamasu. They just need to wait for the perfect moment when the Supreme Kai-in-training finally lets his true colors come forward.

During their time in Universe 10, it’s little unnerving to watch everyone act so coy and play everything so close to their chests through their exchanges with Gowasu and Zamasu. There’s a lot more tact and secrecy than Dragon Ballis used to operating with (and Goku doesn’t exactly understand what’s going on here), but it helps establish the high stakes and tension in this situation right from the episode’s opening minutes. 

This is very much the calm right before the storm. Even for those viewers that don’t get excited over these more methodical, slower installments, there are still big events that go down in the final minutes that catapult the story forward in a drastic way.

It doesn’t take Beerus, Whis, and Supreme Kai long to determine that Zamasu does intend to assassinate Gowasu. “The killing intent is strong on his spirit,” Whis adds as he elaborates on their investigation. Goku voices hesitation over how he didn’t sense anything on Zamasu’s spirit, but Whis reiterates that he and Beerus are more attune to sensing these things thanks to their God of Destruction and Celestial status. 

Since Supreme Kai also wasn’t able to detect anything, they worry that the same is true of Gowasu and that his life hangs in the balance unless they take action. Now that they all know that Zamasu plans to execute his mentor, it’s finally time to wait for the right moment and method to stop him.

It’s pretty satisfying that throughout this vigilant stakeout, Goku is eager to just launch an attack and not take any chances. This strategy isn’t exactly Goku’s forte and he’s kind of like dead weight while these deities do all the heavy lifting here. Instead of just storming Zamasu with Kamehamehas a-blazing, Whis reinforces the unique moral quandary that they’re in here. Zamasu is about to be Universe 10’s Supreme Kai and they can’t just murder him. That means that a lot of this entry turns into the crew watching over Zamasu and Gowasu with intense detail until they get the proof that they need.

The episode has a lot of fun with this premise. It’s essentially like Beerus has his finger on a Destructo-Gun that’s aimed at Zamasu and just waiting for the okay to pull the trigger. The installment plays into this and presents many false starts and close calls, like when it looks like Zamasu might have poisoned Gowasu’s tea, but he’s just having indigestion. It’s a fun, panicked place for the episode to exist in and it’s the sort of tension that’s not always present in the series, but it works well here. 

It’s a lot like that incredible King of the Hill episode (which is of course the best anime) where Hank has to watch over a damaged dam and decide if he wants to open the floodgates or risk the dam’s destruction and endanger even more lives. It’s territory that yields such big results because it places characters in such a fascinating mental space.

And then all of a sudden Zamasu freaking kills Gowasu. Just like that.

This is the proof that Beerus and Whis have been waiting for all of this time. They had to let things go this far. Whis is able to put his only-in-emergencies time rewind ability into play so they can prevent Gowasu’s death and then swoop into the scene to deliver some necessary justice. The way in which they stop Zamasu’s attack is also such a troll move. 

“Protect The Supreme Kai Gowasu” features Beerus at his most ferocious and it’s always nice when the show can present excuses for his God of Destruction tendencies to come out. His annihilation of Zamasu is a strong reminder of just how powerful the God is. It’s also considerably awesome when Beerus’ theme music kicks in right when he obliterates Zamasu. It’s such a simple touch that goes a long ways. He best be respected.

There’s an interesting development here that while Future Trunks is happy for the team’s success, he laments that he will still return to a broken world (much like how when they beat Cell his old timeline didn’t change at all). However, Beerus explains that when a God destroys another God like what’s happened here then there most definitely willbe timeline changes.

Beerus confirms that his world will be fixed, but Future Trunks remains cautiously skeptical over this. He’s been let down too many times before to get his hopes up and Goku Black has proven to be too formidable up until this point. If everything went according to plan then this should technically be the end of the arc, but of course it’s not going to be that easy.

In spite of how it looks like Universe 7 has just delivered a win, there’s an incredibly important, albeit brief, scene between Goku Black and another Zamasu (look at the earrings) where they talk about how all of this is exactly what they want for their “Zero Humanity Plan” to come to fruition. They discuss how keeping Goku alive is the key to Goku Black accessing even deeper reservoirs of power, but Goku Black seems content with the immense strength that’s already at his disposal. 

Zamasu raises the important point that it’s not significant to have an immortal body if that body isn’t powerful (somewhere Garlic Jr. just got a chill). The two remain resolved for more strength, but it doesn’t bode well for Goku and company that the bad guys appear to still be several steps ahead of them. Just when it seems like the heroes gain the upper hand this storyline adds another curious wrinkle to its villain situation. At the same time though, this scene is crucial to the larger picture of this arc and it’s important to understand that as omnipotent as Goku and company may feel at the moment, they’re still not in control.

“Protect The Supreme Kai Gowasu” is sure to do a minor check-in with Mai and the resistance fighters back in the ruined timeline, too. The most crucial detail here is that Mai encounters two super cute children who will become recurring sources of joy and hope for Mai and that world. On that note, Future Trunks is caught in a real funk over “abandoning” Future Mai once more and leaving her back in that dystopia. Pilaf and Shu insist that this is the perfect opportunity for young Mai to console Future Trunks and get close to him (something that you illustrate in a deeply humorous sequence), but instead Future Trunks’ younger counterpart is the one that comes to his aid. 

Future Trunks is originally reluctant to take advice from a child, but the kid finally breaks through to him and his challenge to Future Trunks to take his aggression out on him is pretty badass. A Super Saiyan child Trunks even shouts at his older, future self, “You’re supposed to be a Saiyan!” Major burn. 

That’s enough to get Future Trunks’ blood boiling and the idea of a legitimate fight between these two versions of the same character holds a ton of potential, especially since young Trunks is plenty strong in his own right and he likely couldgive Future Trunks a run for his money. I mean, he’s technically turned Super Saiyan 3 before (with the help of fusion) and Future Trunks is sill boasting about his Ultra Super Saiyan skills.

Dragon Ball Super has been on a solid run lately, but “Protect The Supreme Kai Gowasu” is a particularly strong effort where some major events go down, too. It’s an episode that’s technically light on action, but it manages to juggle humor and suspense rather well through its various storylines. The material with Zamasu connects successfully and pays off in a way that feels significant. 

The series should enjoy these more tender moments while it still can because it looks like Future Zamasu and Goku Black are ready to turn things up a notch with their Zero Humanity Plan.