Akira Toriyama’s final work, Dragon Ball Daimacaused a lot of buzz with its exceptional storyline, worldbuilding, and fun adventure. The story takes Goku and his friends to the Demon Realm after they are turned back into children, when Gomah, the new Demon King, deems them as potential threats. Goku and the others navigate the unknown world and come across new threats along the way. The series even revived the forgotten Super Saiyan 3 transformation before moving on to Super Saiyan 4, which had the fandom in shambles as Goku gets a new power-up during his fight against Gomah. Although SSJ4 made its debut in the 1996 Toei Animation original series titled Dragon Ball GT, Daima reintroduced it in Toriyama’s version, and it changed everything we knew about it.
Even the reason behind Goku’s transformation was something else entirely. During the finale, the series also explained how Neva’s powers were connected to it, but now the series director, Aya Komaki, has also talked about the directing cues of SSJ4 during production. The information comes from the new SSJ4 lore booklet released in Japan. Although it hasn’t been globally released yet, @Venixys on X translated it for global fans.
Dragon Ball Daima’s Series Director Explains What Makes Super Saiyan 4 Unique
Komaki explained in the interview, “In episode 18, when Goku (Mini) becomes Super Saiyan 4, it’s a case where his ability is drawn out by Neva, so we aimed for it to look not like ‘psyching himself up,’ but like ‘Neva’s ability enters inside Goku (Mini) and blossoms inside Goku (Mini).’”
Komai further explained the red elements in the transformation, “In addition, Super Saiyan 4 carries an image of ‘red,’ so we wanted to add red elements even to the kamehameha, which is usually blue. We proceeded cut by cut while discussing with the filming team and the animators how to add it effectively. As a result, I think it became an expression that, while orthodox, has originality unique to this work.”
Additionally, in another post, the translator also shared the series’ Executive Director, Akio Iyoku’s answer, who also explained the importance of the “trigger.” He stated, “Within the flow of the story, it wouldn’t be accepted without some sort of growth or trigger, and if we were going to have him transform, we also wanted elements that would surprise everyone.”
Super Saiyan 4 was meant to be different from other transformations, so Goku couldn’t simply awaken it due to training or during the heat of the battle. When the transformation happened, Goku was already powerful, but with Neva’s help, he gained enough power to fight Gomah. In a way, this transformation is a lot similar to how Goku awakened the Super Saiyan God form at the beginning of Dragon Ball Superbefore he and Vegeta fully mastered the ability. Although this time, we only saw Goku using SSJ4, and Vegeta didn’t have another chance to shine after his SSJ3 transformation.
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