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One thingDragon Ballfans will do is ask who can beat whom in a fight. Given the fact that the series has its origins in a martial arts-inspired narrative that later got blown to planetary, and even universal proportions in later installments of the franchise,the idea of power scalinghas grown more and more attractive to fans of the series.
However, as the story has progressed, the idea of comparing characters by virtue of their strength has only become more dubious, especially withDragon Ball Superauthor Toyotaroconfirming that the series' big 5 are basically equal in strength. What exactly do we mean by “power scaling”, and has it become a futile exercise inDragon Ball?
What Is Power Scaling, Exactly?
Talking Facts and Figures
Put simply, “power scaling” refers to theranking of a series' characters in terms of their strength. A “who can believably beat whom” within the logical boundaries of a particular fictional universe. Power scaling wasn’t really a thing in the earlyDragon Ball, as it was usually the case that Goku ranked very high when it came to strength, given the fact that at the time, humans were the sole point of comparison (oh, and dinosaurs). Goku’s superhuman feats of strength when he was a kid meant that, for the most part, he was the bar, at least untilthe introduction of Demon King Piccolo, who completely outclassed Goku when they first met.
With the introduction ofDragon Ball’ssequel,Dragon Ball Z, which in turn revealed the true nature of Goku’s alien heritage, blew open the limitations that we once thought were fast in the series' logic. The Saiyans' use of the iconic Scouters meant that, for the first time ever in the series, it was possible to give a numerical representation of a character’s power, the aptly named “Power Level”. This is, of course,the source of the series' iconic Vegeta quote, “IT’S OVER 9000!”, which was his response to his companion Nappa asking what Goku’s power level was at the time.
However, despite the fact that it seemed that Power Levels would be relevant for sagas to come, it didn’t take very long for the series to completely blow them out of proportion in the Frieza Saga that followed. By the end of the Saiyan Saga, Goku’s Power Level was comparable to that of Vegeta, which is estimated to be between 18 000 and 24 000. The reason whythe Frieza Saga completely broke the Power Level conceptearly on is because upon introduction, in his very first form, Frieza’s Power Level was touted to be around 530 000, with his 2nd form bringing that figure up to over 1 million (at least according to Frieza himself).
After Frieza goes beyond his 2nd form, the Power Level concept ceases to be used as vociferously as it was in the early days ofDragon Ball Z. By the time Frieza hit his iconic final form, it was completely pointless to continue to use numbers to illustrate character power, especially considering that even in his 2nd form, Frieza found himselfcornered by the likes of a 7-year-old Gohanand even Krillin managed to put in a decent shift. Clearly, even at the height of its usage, the Power Level concept wasn’t the be-all-and-end-all it was chalked up to be.
The Problem of Power Creep
Here Comes the Inconsistency
Dragon Ball, particularly during and afterZ, suffers from a malaise known in various fandom circles as “power creep”. Basically, as each subsequent antagonist is rated to be stronger than the last, the main characters of a given work have to up the ante to keep up. In theDragon Balluniverse, the end of the age of humans was clearly when the Saiyans first came to Earth, as they ended up being the weakest antagonists of the franchise since the original series.
Withthe establishment of the Super Saiyan transformations, the only characters who could feasibly keep up with the demands of facing planetary-level threats were the Saiyans themselves, which led to the sidelining of some of the franchise’s legacy characters. Despite being humanity’s best, characters like Krillin, Tien, Yamcha, and even Piccolo; the reincarnation of the original series' biggest threat, wound up being fodder for each new villain who showed up in theDragon Ballfranchise.
This proved to be disastrous for power scaling, as these characters still needed to be useful on some level, and were in some instances, like Piccolo’s bout against 17, or Tien’s spirited onslaught against Android 17-absorbed Cell, but this only made the idea of power scaling even more dubious. Yes, these characters all did the utmost when it came to training, but the ceiling they were trying to reach was simply too high. When the story needed them, they were able to hold their own, albeit briefly, against characters who completely decimated allies who were far stronger than they were. It doesn’t follow thata Super Saiyan Vegetacan be totally outclassed against Android 18, yet Piccolo can exchange blows with Android 17; someone on the same level as 18 (and revealed to be ever-increasing in proportion to Goku’s growing might inDragon Ball Super). It doesn’t make sense, and quite frankly, maybe it doesn’t have to. Why it doesn’t need to make sense in the case of power scaling is the fact that power scaling may have always been an exercise in futility. When it comes to battle shōnen, battles are used as a narrative device.
The Narrative Purpose of Battle
The Exercise in Futility That Is Power Scaling
Shōnen battles, viewed simply as a contest of power, no matter how much the series in question may position them as such, is a myopic view that ignores significant thematic explorations or character journeys, which are ultimately what is being communicated when battles are waged. The fights are vehicles through which these explorations can be made, and so, the key takeaways from them should very rarely be “X defeated Y, therefore he should be able to fold Z”, but rather more insightful forays intothe significance of the battles to the charactersand to the narrative as a whole. No doubt, there should still be some kind of believable set of rules followed within these battles to maintain the audience’s suspension of disbelief.
When Tien challenged Cell, rather than consider him dead meat, the idea was that the situation was so do-or-die that Tien stepped up to the plate. Emotions are a key driving force and have always been inDragon Ball, to the point that a four-year-old Gohan could inflict damage on his Uncle Raditz, or three years later go toe-to-toe with a Frieza whose power level was over a million at the time. This isn’t to say Hercule should be able towin a battle against Beerussimply because he had enough “pashun” [sic] and some kind of character arc to complete, but to illustrate that strength inDragon Ball, and the battles in the series ought to be engaged with more context than “, =”.
The idea behind these incidents is tocreate markers of growth, identity or some kind of personal arc, and for Gohan, the aforementioned moments were positioned to illustrate his potential to become the most powerful warrior in the entire narrative, a premise that came to pass at least twice over the course ofDragon Ball. In the same vein, when villains become allies, they appear to become much weaker compared to the menace they were upon introduction, potentially to illustrate a softening due to the removal of their malice.
Transformations have become a staple mechanism in the franchise to communicate the thematic and/or character journeys being presented to us, and unfortunately, they have been the biggest site of inconsistency when it comes to trying to put together a “rock-beats-paper” kind of guide to better understanding the battles that take place, especially because the series itself is constantly throwing out provocative, yet ultimately ambiguous statements about how characterscompare to each other in terms of strength. Throw in a concept like “divine Ki” and well…
Whatever the case may be, power scaling has always been an undertaking that attempts to highlight discrepancies within the narrative and hold it to a standard of consistency, but has sometimes been at the cost of more interesting engagements with the story.
