Dragon Ball Z: Wrath of the Dragon 🐲 (ドラゴンボールZ 龍拳爆発!!悟空がやらねば誰がやる, Doragon Bōru Zetto: Ryū-Ken Bakuhatsu!!! Gokū ga Yaraneba Dare ga Yaru, lit. The Explosion of the Dragon’s Fist!!! If Goku Won’t Do It, Who Will?) is the sixteenth movie primarily based on the Dragon Ball manga and the thirteenth Dragon Ball Z movie. It was initially released in Japan on July 15, 1995, between episodes 270 and 271.

Summary

The return of Hildegarn

The movie begins with a boy, Minotia, on a distant planet looking frantically around his space, sword in hand. Suddenly a loud noise alerts him that the thing he was searching for is behind him. However, it’s too late to react and the boy is crushed by the enormous creature’s foot. In the distance, a villainous snort can be heard. Goku cannot open the music box.

The film then shifts to Earth, as a bank theft takes place. The robbers are fleeing when Great Saiyaman appears, stops the car with his foot, and throws the robbers away to confront 💪 Great Saiyaman 2. They apprehend the robbers and turn them over to the police, while being spied on by an old man in the shadows. A short while later, Gohan and Videl are called back from school to rescue an old man who wants to commit suicide. When Gohan and Videl arrive, they discover that it’s the same man who was spying on them earlier. After being rescued, the old man introduces himself as Hoi and tells the two of them about the legendary warrior Tapion, and that he needs their help to free him from the music box in which he’s trapped, because the Earth will be in danger if he isn’t freed. Gohan tries to open the box with his great power but cannot. The old man tells them that he knows about the Dragon Spheres and asks the two to use them to open the box. They agree to take the box to Bulma’s house first to see if there is another way to open the mysterious box, not knowing that Hoi has other plans in mind. Hildegarn attacks a city on Earth.

They arrive at Bulma’s house with Goku, Goten, and Krillin. After analyzing the box, Goku tries to open the box but cannot either. So they decide to gather the Dragon Spheres and call Shenron to see if he can open it. After they call Shenron, Tapion is freed and the music box breaks into pieces. Angry at the fact that he has been freed, Tapion asks to be sealed back in the box, but it is impossible because it has broken. Tapion is livid and runs away, determined to be alone to hide the fact that he was holding the top of the creature named Hildegarn in his body. He isolates himself in an abandoned building. The warrior is visited repeatedly by Trunks, who begins to like him and brings him food, but Tapion refuses to eat and denies Trunks’ attempts to approach him. Trunks becomes much more determined to join him, as he sees in Tapion something that Goten has in Gohan and he never had: an older brother. Vegeta attacks Hildegarn.

Soon after Tapion is freed, the underbelly of Hildegarn begins to attack the Western Capital. Gohan and Videl arrive to investigate, but soon after arriving, they are knocked down by the 👾 monster’s tail. Hildegarn then kicks the two heroes to reverse sides of the street, causing Videl to lose his helmet, and Gohan to lose his turban and glasses. Gohan, with Videl’s help, begins to counterattack. After Gohan increases his powers, Videl thinks Gohan has won, but Gohan says he is not finished yet. Tapion comes to Gohan and Videl’s aid by playing a magical melody on his ocarina, weakening Hildegarn, causing him to fade. Leaving the battlefield, Tapion realizes that Hoi has already killed Minotia, his younger brother.

Later, while Trunks is visiting Tapion again, Hoi tries to steal Tapion’s ocarina. Hoi is confronted by Trunks. Hoi tells Trunks that Tapion is the true monster. Trunks does not believe him and returns the instrument to Tapion. Tapion becomes friends with Trunks and asks him to eat with him. Tapion is invited by Trunks to stay at the Capsule Corporation. While staying there, Tapion explains the entire story to Bulma.🐲

Tapion’s past

Tapion begins his story thousands of years ago. On the planet Konatsu, a planet in the southern galaxy of the universe, a group of evil mages used a spell on a statue to bring it to life, creating a war on the planet. The monster, Hildegarn, kills all who get in its way, devastating the planet. Two young heroes, Tapion and his brother Minotia, manage to freeze the monster by touching their magic ocarinas, giving a priest the opportunity to cut the monster in half with his magic sword. Since Hildegarn could not be killed at that time, his top half was sealed in Tapion and the other half in Minotia. However, for fear that the monster might reappear again, the brothers were separated, each sealed in a music box and thrown into different places in the universe. The music box holding Tapion fell to Earth. Soon after, Hoi became determined to revive the monster to dominate the universe. He released the bottom of Hildegarn on a distant planet and killed Minotia. Now on Earth, Hoi plans to unite 💪 Hildegarn’s body and release the creature on Earth.

After listening to Tapion’s story, Bulma decides to create a room based on the broken music box and the music his ocarina produces, so that Tapion can finally rest.

Z Warriors vs. Hildegarn

Goku and his sons fighting Hildegarn. Tapion tries to sleep inside the new chamber, but has a horrible nightmare that causes him to destroy the chamber. Around the same time, Hildegarn’s underside again begins to attack, and sucks several people into its tail to devour their life energy. The next morning, Goku, his sons, and Videl arrive at Bulma’s house to see the destroyed chamber. Tapion suddenly appears, warning everyone that the bottom of the creature is free. To prevent the creature from joining his body, he asks the group to kill him, to kill the top part of the creature. However, Hoi and the bottom part of Hildegarn show up to prevent anyone from killing Tapion. As Tapion was about to play the music on his ocarina, the power of the bottom half got so close to Tapion that it caused the top half on Tapion’s body to react and break away. Hoi is successful in his plan, and with the monster complete again, he believes that nothing can stop him. A battle begins. Goku transforms into his Super Saiyan 2 form, Goten transforms into Super Saiyan, and Gohan increases his powers to the maximum, thanks to Old Kai’s ritual, and they fight.

They launch their counterattack, but are easily defeated as the monster can dodge their attacks by teleporting away. Gohan is caught by the monster, but before he is crushed, Vegeta saves him by throwing a ki beam at Hildegarn’s arm and begins to fight. He transforms into Super Saiyan 2, angered at Hildegarn for ruining his home on the Capsule Corporation. After a brief fight, Vegeta is thrown into a building but is knocked down after he saves the people in the building from Hildegarn’s flame attack, when he uses all of his powers to create a barrier strong enough to survive the attack. Goku shows up to help but is still unable to defeat the monster, being crushed and knocked down. Goten and Trunks become Gotenks with the Metamoran Dance. Gotenks, transformed into Super Saiyan 3 👾, seems to be enough to fight the monster and constantly throws several ki beams at the monster. Hildegarn appears to be dead or at least neutralized, but the attack causes him to transform into his second, more powerful form. Now in his new insectoid form, Hildegarn knocks Gotenks to the ground and splits him back into Goten and Trunks. Gohan and Videl are thrown into a building and Goku into rubble. However, Goku is not finished and continues to fight with all his might.

Then Tapion plays his ocarina again and manages to seal Hildegarn inside himself. He asks Trunks to kill him with his sword, which will destroy the trapped monster. Trunks hesitates at first, but is almost finished when Hildegarn breaks free. His ocarina is destroyed in the process. Hoi, who was watching the entire fight, mocks Tapion, but is killed when Hildegarn steps on him. Then Goku reappears in his Super Saiyan 3 form and a battle begins between Goku and Hildegarn. Trunks tries to continue fighting Hildegarn with Tapion’s sword and manages to cut off the monster’s tail, but Goku stops Trunks. Gohan yells to Goku about Hildegarn’s weakness that Goku had already realized (the weakness is that Hildegarn turns solid when he attacks). He then uses the Dragon Fist to destroy Hildegarn, obliterating the monster. Hildegarn is destroyed by the Dragon’s Fist🐲.

With the monster dead forever, Tapion uses Bulma’s Time Machine to return a thousand years in time and return to his planet, after giving his sword to Trunks.

Place in the timeline

This movie takes place sometime after Majin Buu’s defeat. According to Daizenshuu 7, it takes place roughly in the year 774.