The form of the legendary Super Saiyan that Goku attains during the Frieza saga has become one of the most iconic transformations in the series and perhaps arguably in all of anime.
In the manga it debuted in Chapter 317 “Life or Death”
https://dragonball.fandom.com/wiki/Life_or_Death
https://twitter.com/PiccoDamayonaiz/status/1766427017971654960
Chapter 317 was published in Weekly Shonen Jump No.15 1991
https://web.archive.org/web/20240331011946/https://www.ebay.com/itm/166286196063
*It was so hard to find a decent large resolution image of this cover and this was the best one that I could find to use
The cover date shows April 1 though there’s sources, like the Dragon Ball Wiki and Kanzenshuu, saying it released earlier on March 19
Meanwhile in the anime series it debuted in episode 95 which aired on June 19 1991
The anime would give the form color from the black & white pages of the manga with the form given distinctive green eyes.
It seems however that red eyes were considered to be given to the form as well at some point.
Before even getting to the discussion of the red eyes Super Saiyan it is notable to bring up that the Super Saiyan form was first shown in DBZ Movie 4, Lord Slug.
DBZ Movie 4 was meant to showcase the Super Saiyan form for the first time.
In fact its Japanese title “超サイヤ人だ孫悟空” when translated is “Super Saiyan Son Goku”
However since there was no color reference yet the form looked very different.
This iteration of the form would be known as Pseudo Super Saiyan
https://dragonball.fandom.com/wiki/Pseudo_Super_Saiyan
The reason there was no definitive color reference yet is actually because Movie 4 came out even before the manga debut of the form.
Movie 4 premiered on March 9 1991 in the Spring ’91 Toei Anime Fair
https://web.archive.org/web/20240329171153/https://ameblo.jp/kotokailove/entry-12340353941.html
Here is a screenshot from an ad for Movie 4 which also shows a March 9 date on it
Here is actual video of the ad
If the aforementioned Chapter 317 was published on April 1 (or March 19) this means that Movie 4 with it’s March 9th release predates it by just a margin of at least a week or two.
Keep in mind that work on Movie 4 had to be done long before it’s release so its production likely coincided with work on the manga itself so Toriyama definitely had some input at least on the movie.
Going into more research on the Pseudo form I found a page on the Kanzenshuu website, a great resource for Dragon Ball information, that says that Toriyama thought of the idea to have Goku’s hair stand up at least at that point
https://www.kanzenshuu.com/movie/dbz-04/
This page cites that all that info came from the book “Daizenshuu 7”
https://www.flickr.com/photos/artbookisland/17200660275/in/album-72157651638984769/
https://www.kanzenshuu.com/databook/daizenshuu/daiz-07/
The Daizenshuu books were essentially encyclopedias of the Dragon Ball series
https://www.kanzenshuu.com/databook/daizenshuu/
https://dragonball.fandom.com/wiki/Daizenshuu
Here are the relevant pages that were mentioned
An image of it is at the bottom right corner
I couldn’t find a good scan of the book so I just took screenshots from a video flipping through the book. Here is the video:
“Art Book en HD du Dragon Ball Daizenshuu 7 大事典 Daijiten”
Uploaded by ThéliaNooff
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_26jJRbn848
Here are the parts where the specific pages are shown:
Anyways, on to the subject of the red eyes Super Saiyan now
The red eyes Super Saiyan’s only appearances were in the trailer for DBZ Movie 5, Cooler’s Revenge, in two shots and also the poster for the movie
The trailer can be seen here and this is where I also took the screenshots from it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T51_5FMfIdQ&t=271s
https://en.dragon-ball-official.com/about/dragon_ball_history.html
The red eye color seems to have been immediately dropped afterwards as when Movie 5 finally did premiere on July 20 1991 at the Summer ’91 Toei Anime Fair it would have green eyes instead within the actual movie
Apparently at the premiere they gave out brochures/pamphlets with information about the movie and in it they show that the art of the red eyes Super Saiyan Goku now was changed to have green eyes in it
https://web.archive.org/web/20240331021317/https://www.ebay.com/itm/175566295442
The first manga appearance where the Super Saiyan form had color was in Chapter 323 from Weekly Shonen Jump #21/22 with a cover date of May 13/20 1991, though again sources say it was published earlier in April 27
Images for the cover and these pages were all sourced from here:
https://web.archive.org/web/20240328182305/https://www.ebay.com/itm/354781465823
Chapter 323 was one of just several in the entire run of the manga that was given both full color in the first few pages & then a “limited color” palette of red/orange, gray, and white following that on the next pages
https://www.kanzenshuu.com/manga/color-chp/
https://www.kanzenshuu.com/manga/chp-323/
Here are pages of both the full color and limited color pages from the chapter
By the way the limited colors weren’t just done for the Dragon Ball manga though as Weekly Shonen Jump printed pages like that for other manga series as well, done more than likely to save on color ink printing
I’ve also read others refer to these limited color pages as bichrome pages
Weekly Shonen Jump #21/22 also included a full color fold out poster of Super Saiyan Goku
https://web.archive.org/web/20240331161425/https://aucview.aucfan.com/yahoo/p1026082425/
https://twitter.com/PiccoDamayonaiz/status/1766057387021217894
What is included on the other side of the poster is of quite interest though as the reverse of the Super Saiyan poster shows a promotional ad for Movie 5 and along with it the art of the red eyes Super Saiyan
Images sourced from here:
The Daizenshuu books would also write about the red eyes Super Saiyan.
From Daizenshuu 6: Movies & TV Specials which was published in 1995
https://www.flickr.com/photos/artbookisland/16600693319/in/album-72157651291457331/
https://twitter.com/PiccoDamayonaiz/status/1773944902583529722
A translation of what the text says for the red eyes Super Saiyan art on that page
https://www.kanzenshuu.com/animation-production/toriyama-contributions/
https://twitter.com/PiccoDamayonaiz/status/1761390084769919487
Also from Daizenshuu: TV Animation Part 3 which was published in 1996
https://www.flickr.com/photos/artbookisland/21154543752/in/album-72157658226672935/
https://twitter.com/PiccoDamayonaiz/status/1774061650968269011
Here is a version of the image with translated text to go along with it:
https://www.kanzenshuu.com/translations/supplemental-daizenshuu-tv-animation-part-3-animations-gleanings/
Asides from these two Daizenshuu books there was another book that showed the red eyes Super Saiyan. This book being Dragon Ball Z TV Anime Guide Son Goku Densetsu which was published in 2003
https://www.kanzenshuu.com/databook/other/son-goku-densetsu/
https://artbookisland.tumblr.com/post/137668610197/tv-anime-guide-dragon-ball-z-son-goku-densetsu
https://twitter.com/PiccoDamayonaiz/status/1716424888787886323
The closest thing I found to a translation came from a forum page that translated the pages of this book. Here is the section
I am not too sure if the translation is accurate as I got it from a forum but I will still use it as I think it looks fine.
Sourced from here:
Under post #5 that says “Pages 92-191”:
https://archive.ph/tx1i3#selection-8941.0-8975.256
Something I noticed on that page is that one of the color palette choices they demonstrated seems to have been previously used on the brochure/pamphlet that was given at the DBZ Movie 5 premiere
Well that’s about all that can be said about the red eyes Super Saiyan. It was a color design choice that was at one point considered and then abandoned in favor of green eyes.
Something that I came across while doing research on this topic was a Facebook post that was claiming that a Thai magazine called “The Talent” had the coloring of the Super Saiyan, including the red eyes, before Japan’s Weekly Shonen Jump #21/22
The image claims that the Thai magazine was released on March (มีนาคม) 19 1991
Archived source:
https://www.facebook.com/dbthfan/posts/pfbid02rECBw5WpiMPZ9F9FD7UQVw79GDNM2eF2UFQRUpHsKWbWQuCSoo5xRvQy83FKKj5sl
Archived source:
https://archive.ph/93VXl
I can’t see a date on the cover itself so I can’t determine where they got that info from. If it really did come out in March it’s possible whoever colored the cover may have seen the red eyes art from somewhere else or it could’ve just been a really good guess.
https://archive.ph/5grAr
I also found an image that shows a batch of “The Talent” magazines. I noticed Zarbon and the first & second forms of Frieza having different color schemes so perhaps the colors for the Super Saiyan cover really were just guessed upon if the actual red eyes Super Saiyan art didn’t exist at that point
https://archive.ph/bhy4i
The topic of the cover art for the Thai magazine is interesting to me so I figured I would share it here since it sort of loosely involves the red eyes Super Saiyan
Now don’t get me started on the whole debate on whether or not they are definitively green eyes or blue eyes because that is whole other thing in itself 😆
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The last thing I would like to say is that I want to give special thanks to the Twitter account (@PiccoDamayonaiz) as they post very high quality scans of Dragon Ball art and other Akira Toriyama art in general. Please visit there page if you’re interested:
https://twitter.com/PiccoDamayonaiz
They actually helped provide me a scan of the page from Daizenshuu: TV Animation Part 3 as I was not able to find a good quality image for it. I asked if they could scan the page and they fulfilled what I asked for them to do
https://twitter.com/zedm256/status/1774120176822173894
There only seemed to be this photo for the section showing the red eyes Super Saiyan in that page but it was under very yellow lighting:
With all of this being said thanks for reading this article!
Zed's Writings 