Dragon Ball Z episode 14: Princess Snake's risque filler

Dragon Ball Z episode 14, the one where Goku stops at Princess Snake's castle on Snake Way, is the most suggestive episode in the entire series. It's also one of my favorite filler episodes of all time. The episode is packed with innuendo, and some of it would never fly even by Japanese standards nowadays.

Dragon Ball Z first aired in 1989 and was made by Toei Animation. This episode isn't in the manga. It's anime-only filler, and I don't care. I'm having a good time with it, and anyone determined to watch only canon material can complain all they like.

Princess Snake's castle sucks Goku in on Snake Way

The story starts with Goku on Snake Way, the serpentine road he's traveling to reach King Kai and train with him. Along the way he spots an enormous castle. He thinks it might belong to King Kai, because he doesn't know any better. He has no idea what King Kai looks like, so he's simply impressed by a cool castle.

It's the castle of Princess Snake. The building transforms into a giant snake statue and sucks Goku inside. That's the first of many double meanings in this episode, and the episode only gets wilder from there.

The moment Princess Snake lays eyes on Goku, she's smitten and keeps talking about how handsome he is. She's also attractive herself, and she's probably already been the subject of fan art. The first thing Goku says to her is that she's cute. He isn't being a player. He's trying to be nice, but it's funny to hear Goku call a woman cute. Then she blushes, even though in the anime's version of the lore, as I've always understood it, she's the ruler of Snake Way.

The King Yemma line and 500 lonely years

One of the funniest lines didn't hit me until I saw the episode again recently. Princess Snake's assistants say they haven't seen her this worked up since Great King Yemma. That raises some questions. Did King Yemma have a romance with her? If so, was she in her human form or her snake form? King Yemma is a very big man, so I'm guessing it was her snake form. I'll never look at King Yemma the same way again.

Then Princess Snake mentions that it's been 500 years, and Goku repeats it back in surprise. In other words, she hasn't had any romance in five centuries. Can you imagine?

A tango, a judo flip and a drugged dinner

Next comes one of the weirdest scenes in all of Dragon Ball Z. Princess Snake and Goku dance the tango. Goku says something about doing this at his wedding, but he still believes Princess Snake is King Kai, so he assumes the dance is some strange training technique. This is tremendous writing. I love this episode because it's just so wacky.

Goku picks up the technique and then judo flips her. Once he's told she isn't King Kai, he loses complete interest in her. Not in that way, but you know what I mean. She begs him to stay for dinner, and of course Goku can't resist a meal. The plan is to slip a sleeping potion into his food so he'll fall asleep and not leave.

The food looks tasty, especially the bowl of steam sitting in the middle of the table. Princess Snake is stunned by how Goku eats. In one shot he finishes his food with two fingers in his mouth, and I'm sure Princess Snake had other ideas about that. I'll leave that to your imagination.

The bath scene Toonami cut down

Goku wants to leave, but the household insists he take a bath first, and he agrees. That's where the innuendo really gets turned up. Princess Snake's assistants have a giant supercomputer and a satellite that can control whether it's day or night. That detail puts a big smile on my face because it's so wacky. Suddenly it's nighttime, which is more seductive, and the heat is rising.

Princess Snake goes out to see Goku and finds his hairy Saiyan backside sticking up out of the water, because he's holding his breath underneath. If you only ever saw this episode on Toonami, you saw a heavily censored version and missed much of it. Goku even climbs out of the water with his rear end on full display and walks off to the right. Goku's adult backside is in the episode.

A Russian roulette joke that would never air today

Speaking of things that were censored and would never make it to television now, there's a scene where one of Princess Snake's assistants teaches Goku how to play Russian roulette. It was completely cut from the Toonami broadcast, for obvious reasons. She pulls out a revolver, shows him how the game works, shoots herself and dies.

There are suicide jokes in Dragon Ball Z. This material would never fly now, even by Japanese standards. It's mind blowing. The whole episode is nuts. The scene is even stranger because Russia doesn't exist in the world of Dragon Ball, which makes the game's name extra wacky.

Princess Snake learns Goku is married to Chi-Chi

Meanwhile, Princess Snake is frustrated because, to put it bluntly, she badly wants Goku. This next part gets a bit dark. They give Goku orange juice, or at least I think it's orange juice, with extra sleeping potion. That made me wonder whether this was meant as a date rape joke. Once again, this episode crosses every line of morality. The people who made it plainly didn't care.

The drink and the hypnotic dancing of Princess Snake's dancers finally knock Goku out. Then he starts talking in his sleep, saying Chi-Chi and Gohan. Princess Snake assumes he's dreaming and calls for the dream viewing mirror. That's when she realizes Goku has a wife and child, and that he loves them.

Remember what the Dragon Ball fandom will tell you: Goku doesn't care about his wife and kid, and he's a bad father and husband. Well, "this filler says otherwise pal."

Princess Snake is not happy that he's married. Instead of seducing him, she decides to eat him. She transforms into an actual snake, and that's the big twist. She's like a black widow spider. If you won't be with her, she will eat you. I don't mean that as innuendo. She will actually digest you.

Goku's dream of Vegeta and Nappa makes no sense

Before the episode gets to that, there's a dumb scene in Goku's dream. He's dreaming about Gohan and Chi-Chi, then a door opens and Vegeta and Nappa walk in. That's silly, because at this point Goku has no idea what Vegeta and Nappa look like. He has never seen them, yet somehow he knows in his dreams.

The same thing happens later in the Cell saga, when Goku dreams about the androids without ever having seen them. I don't know why the show does this. It reminds me of the movie Invasion U.S.A., where the villain has dreams about Chuck Norris even though he doesn't see Chuck Norris until later in the film. It makes me smile, but it's also dumb. Wacky and dumb can sometimes go together.

Goku escapes Princess Snake and spares her life

The big reveal is that Goku has been inside Princess Snake's stomach the entire time. When I look at that scene, though, I don't think it's her stomach. It looks to me like a far more intimate part of her anatomy. Is it just me? I don't think it is. I think the studio that animated this episode did it on purpose.

Goku bursts out through her mouth and realizes she's a giant snake. He's about to finish her off with a Kamehameha, but he holds back. She took care of him, fed him and gave him a hot bath, and she was offering herself to him even though he didn't accept, so he decides not to kill her. Instead, she falls for the old trick of tying herself up in a knot.

Goku heads on to King Kai to learn the Kaioken, and that's where one of my favorite filler episodes of all time comes to an end. More than anything, it's the time Princess Snake tried to seduce Goku.