'Dragon Ball Super' episode 47: 'SOS From the Future! A New Black Enemy Appears!'

The new story arc begins and, as teased in the last episode, this one kicks off with a glimpse at a dark future where the world lays in ruins. If you thought the future with the androids was bleak, this puts that to shame. It is both figuratively and literally a much darker future than what we had seen before.

I figured that this would be an alternate version of "Future Trunks". Between the darker world, the hair color change, and the villain (whose identity I knew going in ahead of time) it seemed like the more logical approach. I was surprised to see them directly state that this is the same Trunks who appeared back in the Android/Cell saga. It's nice that they made that clear, but it was still unexpected.

The villain this time around is a being named "Black Goku". No, he's not black. He does spend a majority of the episode manifesting as a sort of shadow being and he wears black, but really, I think that "dark Goku" would be the more appropriate name. The aforementioned reveal about Trunks also makes it clear that this isn't actually Goku, as he had died long before in this timeline. Could this mark the return of Turles? We'll see, I suppose.

The episode spends about half of its run time in this future and the other half in the present. This leads to a bit of mood whiplash as Trunks' dark future is contrasted with the brighter, more humor based scenes depicted in the present. The contrast was likely intentional, but it can still be a bit jarring.

Truth be told, I thought the future material worked better. There was more emotional weight and it did a much better job pulling you in to what was happening. Seeing Goku and Piccolo "train" by racing to see who could pull the most crops was amusing, but I don't know if I'd call it essential to the plot.

The nod to Goku's roots (ha) training under Roshi was nice. You'd think that at this point, this style of training would be bush (ha) league, but Piccolo notes that the activity does still yield results. Whether this was a way to encourage kids to get out there and exercise is unclear, but it is certainly possible. It goes well with the scene where Beerus is seen to be enjoying lettuce (of all things) later on in the episode.

It isn't a total bust, however, as we get some more information on the Omni-king. While he doesn't fight directly, his ability to destroy entire universes is confirmed. Beerus and Whis explain that there used to be 18 universes, but the Omni-king had 6 of them destroyed. It's jarring given his characterization, but it's certainly important information to know for future plot lines.

All in all, this was a solid start to the story line. The stakes are established right off the bat, we're given an intriguing villain, and (not surprisingly) it was nice to see Future Trunks again. I'm looking forward to this arc; I have a feeling it's going to be an exciting one.

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