Goku Hasn't Surpassed Beerus, and I'm Fine With Changing My Mind

In November I said on Twitter that I believed Goku had surpassed Beerus. I later deleted those tweets, and people have since screenshotted them to meme me. I'm not upset about it. Toyotaro has now said Goku still has room to grow, with Beerus still ahead of him, and I'm perfectly okay with that.

I don't mind people making memes as long as they aren't mean about it. Being rude is one thing, and memeing is something else. Since some people took my view personally, I wanted to address what happened with Beerus and Goku, and why I changed my mind.

Why I never published my case that Goku had surpassed Beerus

When I made those tweets, I said I had plenty of evidence that Goku had surpassed Beerus, and I was compiling it for a full breakdown. That evidence included statements made in Jump magazine and power scaling statements made in the series itself.

I chose not to publish it. I didn't have enough evidence to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that Goku had surpassed Beerus. So I held off, and I deleted the tweets. I find it a bit weird that people saved screenshots of tweets I had deleted months earlier.

What those screenshots leave out is everything I said afterward. Numerous times during the early Granolah arc, I said Beerus had possibly still been stronger, that I wasn't 100% sold on Goku surpassing him, and that I wanted to wait for the end of the arc before making my case. That's why I postponed it. I still have the notes for the Beerus piece I planned. I haven't made it because I changed my mind, and people change their minds. It happens.

Toyotaro's interview put Beerus back as a goal post for Goku

The reason this came up again is the interview with Toyotaro that I covered. In it, Toyotaro said Goku still has room to grow and there's plenty more ahead of him: Beerus, Whis and the Grand Priest. I've also said I don't know if Goku is ever going to surpass the Grand Priest. I could be wrong, but that would be a big feat.

Based on Toyotaro's statement, Beerus is still a goal post for Goku to reach. Beerus works as a measuring stick for Goku and Vegeta, and I may take a closer look at that idea. Now we have a statement from at least one of the writers that gives us more clarity, and I have no issue with it.

Some people are now using that statement to try to discredit me. It isn't a lot of people. Still, it's interesting how seriously some took the fact that I thought Goku had surpassed Beerus. If I was rude to anybody over it, I do apologize. I wasn't trying to be rude. It's a cartoon to me, and in Dragon Ball things change all the time.

The meme uses a picture of me that's three years old

What makes me laugh is the picture people use. It has been used to meme me so many times, and it was taken three years before all this. I've lost about 70 pounds since then. Compare my face in that picture with how I look now and you can see the difference.

I posted that picture myself, so it isn't private or anything like that. It's comedy to me that people seem to forget how old it is. I do wish they'd use a newer picture of me when they meme me. These things make me laugh, and I'm not mad.

Broly and the Dragon Ball Super 2019 report follow the same pattern

To me this is another case of people trying to straw man a victory over me to discredit me. It's no different from people saying I was wrong about Broly never being canonized or never coming to Super. I was wrong about that. They remade Broly in Dragon Ball Super: Broly. I wasn't expecting it, and most Dragon Ball fans I talked to weren't either.

It also reminds me of the Dragon Ball Super 2019 situation. I reported that Super was coming back in 2019, and it didn't. I reported on what happened, because plans for Super coming back changed. Instead of focusing on that change, people have kept using it to say I'm not credible and that I'm a liar.

Multiple times I explained that plans had changed, Super got postponed, and it might be a movie. It turned out to be a movie. I put out update pieces, including one called Dragon Ball Super 2020 update pandemic, where I discussed all of it. The internet never forgets. If you make a statement, even one that ends up wrong or overtaken by changed plans, people will hound you for it.

Why I think some people keep bringing up old statements

Friends of mine have told me in the past that I have a lot of power. I never see myself that way. I make content about Dragon Ball, break news and do analysis. But for some people to go to these lengths to make it seem like I'm wrong, when I've been right so many times, I think it's got to be partly envy. It makes me wonder if I'm living rent free in their heads.

Yes, I said many things years ago. I used to use profane words 20 years ago that I don't use anymore. I used to have opinions about people that I don't have anymore. Some people gravitate toward and latch onto old statements I've either changed my mind about or where plans changed, but it doesn't upset me.

Beerus is as strong as Toriyama and Toyotaro want him to be

To me, this whole debate is irrelevant, because it's Dragon Ball. Beerus will always be as strong as Toriyama and Toyotaro want him to be, and the same goes for Goku. It's not real. Even though I cover Dragon Ball, I don't obsess over it or try to win debates about it. It's a fun show we all love, but it's nothing more than that for me. I can separate reality from fantasy, and some folks on the internet can't.

Clearly I was wrong when I made that tweet, and I had acknowledged changing my mind even before Toyotaro's comments. It happens. People reported that LeBron James was going to the New Jersey Nets, which are now the Brooklyn Nets. He didn't go, and that was the end of the story.

Next month Goku might surpass Beerus, and then they might come back and say he really didn't because Beerus has a secret power. This is Dragon Ball. It's always been this way.