Goku and Fortnite could not be a better match

The weekend was almost over, and I did just what I had hoped for: I downloaded Fortnite again. Many of my friends took the plunge, and filled my social media with videos. They also talked about Victory Royales (with Cheese) for the very first time in over a year. Why? Goku. Son Goku, the star of Dragon Ball, is still the key to my jaded heart — and many others’, it seems.

A hot FortniteA collab, as well as a new movie, reminds us that Dragon Ball remains, and will continue to be, the top. It is all fine with me. I am not someone who needs to know whether or not Goku could beat someone else in a fight — that stuff is for the birds. Goku is just cool. It’s also very funny to see Goku outside of Dragon Ball.

Goku in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade? Incredible. Goku hitting Griddy? Divine. Goku with a sniper rifle? We could never have imagined our greatest humorists.

It can be credited that Goku/Dragon Ball was the first anime property to hit the big time in America, which accounts for a lot of their cultural appeal. But I also think there’s something more there. Besides being an essentially perfect character design from the legendary Akira Toriyama, Goku’s characteristically jacked and serious appearance is almost always immediately undercut by context. No matter how badass a given fight may be, it’s never very long before he’s getting into some kind of family hijinks or himbo trouble, eating too much or lifting too many weights and ruining someone’s yard. While he may be the greatest warrior of all time, he also has the same social graces as a labrador retriever who is only partially-trained.

Now he can Dougie.

Fortnite is, ironically, the perfect place for Goku, a character that doesn’t really exist in his own canon as much as he does in fans’ minds. It’s as absurdly cynical as it gets. Fortnite can be — in some ways it’s the most successful new advertising platform to emerge in the last decade, in others it’s a late-capitalist nightmare — it is also one of the best expressions of modern fandom. It’s not really a place to win battle royales, it’s a place to go Like All thingsTo be able to get along with them.

This is where Goku and Dragon Ball thrive. It doesn’t really matter if you are current with the latest adventures of Goku and his pals — I’m not, although all this has inspired me to finally watch all of Dragon Ball Super. It just matters that you’re able to plug into the grand tradition of thinking Goku looks cool, and how goofy and fun it would be if that guy, and all of his friends — Bulma, Piccolo, Krillin, Vegeta, et. al — could run around in whatever context you think up for them.

This is five years ago, after the Dragon Ball Series’ last installment. Dragon Ball SuperThis only underscores the fact that he, wrapped. Nearly 40 years after his 1984 debut in the pages of Toriyama’s Dragon Ball, Goku and his crew are more than just manga and anime characters, they’re avatars of fandom — a foundational touchpoint that’s crossed over from one generation to the next surprisingly intact. If Goku is involved, I’ll check it out. As it turned out, there were many others.