Dragon Ball Super: Who Is Black Frieza And How Powerful Is He?
Over the course of the story's multiple series run, the "Dragon Ball" saga has had no shortage of memorable villains. From Piccolo (Takeshi Aono/Christopher Sabat) in the original series to Vegeta (Ryo Horikawa/Christopher Sabat) in "Dragon Ball Z" to Broly (Bin Shamada/Vic Mignogna) in three of the series' movies, there are many key villains across the franchise.
Still, few are as memorable as Frieza (Ryusei Nakao/Linda Young). The first universal threat in "Dragon Ball Z," the character is known for raising the stakes considerably by killing off multiple characters and ultimately causing Goku (Masako Nozawa/Sean Schemmel) to go Super Saiyan for the first time as a result.
However, there's a new iteration of Frieza in the "Dragon Ball Super" manga. First appearing last summer, Black Frieza is the most powerful version of the character yet. In fact, Black Frieza is so intensely formidable that he struck down both Goku and Vegeta with a single blow when he showed up at the end of the Granolah the Survivor Saga. Though the character has yet to appear in the anime version of "Dragon Ball Super," fans can likely look forward to seeing him on the small screen soon, as the latest arc of the show saw him returning as a villain.
How did Frieza come back and how did Black Frieza come to be?
Though "Dragon Ball Z" fans will no doubt recall that the villain was struck down once by Goku and then again by Trunks (Takeshi Kusao/Laura Bailey) in "Dragon Ball Z," the character was resurrected by Sorbet (Shiro Saito/Jeremy Schwartz) in "Dragon Ball Z: Resurrection F" and has only grown stronger since.
After this, Frieza learns that Goku has become so formidable that he defeated both Beerus (Koichi Yamadera/Jason Douglas) and Buu (Kozo Shioya/Justin Cook), the two precise figures that Frieza's father warned him about ever going up against. This motivates Frieza to train harder than ever before for four months, which ultimately leads to his Golden Frieza form.
Still, this form is not enough to best Goku and Vegeta, which is what makes the Black Frieza form so terrifying. With the current iterations of the Saiyans and their exceptional power levels, the fact that both could be defeated by Black Frieza with only a single blow is a frightening testament to the new power that the villain has achieved and will no doubt help to return him to the top tier of powerful villains in the "Dragon Ball" saga.