Goku is the main character for most of the Dragon Ball/Z series. Later, Goku's son Gohan is seen as the lead role after Goku dies for a second time. Goku starts the manga as a child, a young and innocent boy with black spiky hair, a strange monkey tail and an expanding stick named nyoibo.
Incredibly strong for his age, Goku is found having one of the Dragonballs which he refers to as his Grandfather. The dragonball was the only thing that his Grandfather left before dying, so he considers it to posses his soul. Goku while carrying his lunch home literally bumps into Bulma.
After a brief discussion, and Bulma explaining the power that lies in the Dragonball, both leave to search for the Dragonballs. It is in this way that the series of adventures begin. Soon after, both meet Kamessenin who then gives him his "first" magic cloud, Kintoen or Nimbus, and begins to train the young Goku right from the start.
After some 17 mangas, Goku has had many adventures and friends and is already an adult. Goku is now married to Chi Chi and has a son Gohan, who was named after Goku's Grandfather. During this time things seem to be fine, until the arrival of Goku's brother, Raditz. Through his brother, we discover that Goku isn't really human at all, but was found by his Grandfather inside a space capsule. This meant Goku's Grandfather wasn't his relative and everything was different. Raditz revealed to Goku that he had been sent to Earth in order to destroy it's inhabitants, but due to a big fall when he was young, Goku lost his memory unable to complete his mission, thus becoming the innocent boy that we meet at the beginning of the manga. Goku is really a Saiyajín from the planet Vejiita and has great powers beyond those of any human.
Finally, it was up to Goku and Piccolo, Goku's well known enemy, to destroy Raditz and rid the earth of his threats. After a long battle, Goku and Raditz end up dying, but not before revealing to Raditz the power of the overlooked dragonballs. What Goku didn't know however was that the scouter on Raditz' head also acted as a transmitter, now letting the other two Saiyajins left in the universe know about their power and set out for earth. To prepare for their arrival, the Z-fighters train harder than they ever have before, and Goku in another dimension, travels to King Kai's for training. Gohan is also taken away with Piccolo, who teaches him all he know's.
Whn the Saiyajins finally reach earth, they all clash in a battle never before seen. When Goku is wished back to earth to fight, he easily defeats Nappa, the weaker of the two saiyajins, and fights Vegita, the strongest, until neither one can fight anymore. Goku's son helped in defeating Vegita as well. The Z-fighters let Vegita go, despite their own losses, including Piccolo and the dragonballs.
As Goku recovers from the fight, Bulma, Krillin, and Gohan set off for Nammek, Piccolo's home world, to find more dragonballs to wish everyone back. The reach the planet and are faced with what was then to strongest power in the universe. Goku finally sets off for Nammek as well, traing in hightened gravity the entire way. Before Vegita, Gohan and Krillin were completely destroyed, Goku arrives with his new strength and saves his friends. Then, after wishing back Yamcha, Tien, Piccolo, and Chaosu, the entire team begins to fight with the most powerful creature in the galaxy, Frieza. After much strife and hardship, Goku's friend, Krillin, was destroyed, making Goku angrier than he'd ever been. As he gathered energy, he turned super-saiyajin, a magnified version of his old strength. In this form, Goku managed to defeat Frieza.
Much more happens in the story of Dragon Ball Z, including the cell saga, where the Z-fighters must defeat an army of killer androids, and the Buu-saga, where the must defeat the greatest warrior they had ever faced. Throughout it all however, Goku ended up being the victor, not because he fought for fame, or strived for glory, but because he did it all for others who were less fortunate and less able to protect themselves. Goku's journey eventually led him to fame, but the road he traveled was the best way to get there.
Vegeta is perhaps one of the most strong-willed characters in the Dragon Bal Z series. Like Goku, he is extremely industrious, constantly striving to be better, but different purposes drove Vegeta's spirit. Goku fought to defend the lives and others and to challenge his limitations while Vegeta fought to satiate his bloodthirsty appetite and die hard pride, which is unwilling to accept defeat. This gradually changes throughout the series.
The primary driver of his will is Goku. Vegeta's defeat in his first encounter with Goku and his unwillingness to accept Goku being more powerful had constantly fuelled his strong will to continue to train himself. After seeing Goku turn into Super Saiyajin and defeating Freiza, he grew even more jealous of Gokus achievements and immersed himself in intensive training. After much sweat and frustration, he finally became Super Saiyajin. He only enjoyed a fleeting moment of pride in destroying #20, before being defeated by #18.
Vegetas first catharsis occurred during Gohans battle with Cell. Because of his rash decision to attack Cell when he did not have the power to, he had caused Gohans arm to be seriously injured when Gohan saved his life. Not only was he not even close to Cells ability, but also served as a hindrance to Gohan. That was the first time Vegeta accepted his capabilities by making an apology to Gohan. This was most suprising to those who had followed the series and had seen just how evil at heart Vegeta could be. None the less, Vegeta was changing and would soon see the error of his ways.
By the time Majin Buu appeared, what used to be a cold-hearted Vegeta changed. Right before he proceeded to sacrifice his life in an attempt to destroy Buu, he told Trunks that he cared about him and how he felt bad about giving Trunks much less attention then Trunks deserved.
During Goku's final battle with Majin Buu, possibly the most intense moment of the series, Vegeta comes to a realization of why exactly Goku has always been so much stronger than himself, but has made it look so easy. He undertood that Goku's pure and kind heart gave him the power that Vegeta never had. As Vegeta had always fought for personal gain and glory, Goku fought for his friends and not himself. Due to this, Goku always had at least one more reason than Vegeta to succeed in everything he did. Vegeta finally realizes that the good ultimately prevails and is much more rewarding than evil.
NAME: Trunks
Trunks son of Vegeta and Bulma. He was able to reach super saiyan at a young age and can fuse with Goten to become Gotenks. In Dragon Ball GT he journeyed with Goku and Pan in search for the Black Star Dragon Ballz.
Trunks Future
Furture Trunks who travelled back in time in hope to alter the future, He grew up in a world were Goku Died of an Hart attack. Because goku was dead no one could be able to defeat Androids 17 and 18. The Androids killed the rest of the Z warriors and terrorized the world. Trunks travelled back in time to give Goku medicine to prevent death from the hart attack. Upon arrival Trunks killed Freeza and his crew. Later, he was killed by cell but was revived by a wish from the dragon balls. Afterwards, Future Trunks returned to the future which remain unchanged, and easily killed Androids 17 and 18 because of his training in the "present" timeline. At the same time Cell was about to steal Trunks time machine, but Trunks easily killed him to.
Gohan, he is the first child of Son Goku. Named after Goku's adopted grandfather, his tremendous talent and power was readily apparent in his childhood. In the battle against Radditz, Gohan's horrifying power substantially injured him, assisting both Piccolo and Goku.
As Piccolo said, he was too pampered by his parents in the early ages to even realize his talent. Piccolo decided to start training him by leaving him in an island for six months to learn independence before teaching him anything at all. After one year of training, Gohan became a much more independent and strong in character.
Even though Gohan became more independent, he still lacked the kind of confidence that his father had, which was evident when he fled from where he was supposed to attack Nappa in his first battle against the Saiyajins. His lack of confidence persisted even after he became the most powerful warrior (Super Gohan) in the epic battle against Cell. During the "Kame Hame Ha" final confrontation between the two of them, Gohan was about to give up the battle. During that time, his father had more confidence in him then he did himself as Goku motivated Gohan to unleash his full potential to completely destroy Cell.
Because his mother had always wanted him to be a scholar, Gohan has a dilemma between fighting and studying, even though he is equally assiduous in both. Because of the constant invasion of "evil," Gohan focused on fighting. However, he finally got the opportunity to become a scholar after Buu was defeated and realized his mother's wishes.
Piccolo
He is one of the characters who was originally "evil", but through series of unexpected events, the "evil" in him was slowly washed away as Piccolo took different forms.
Piccolo is the offspring of Daimon, who was the pure "evil" which separated from Kami-sama as another body. Piccolo and Kami-sama is one person in two bodies. If one of them die, both will die. When Daimon was killed by Son Goku, he vowed that his offspring Piccolo will avenge him. Thus, Piccolo's character is not just pure "evil" the way Daimon is. He is simply focused on destroying Son Goku. The two of them first met in the Budokai.
With the arrival of Raditz, Piccolo found himself an unwilling partner of Son Goku and together defeated Raditz. When he learned that two more poweful Saiyajin will avenge Raditz, Piccolo only found himself even more unwillingly on Goku's side by volunteering to train his Son, Gohan to become a warrior to fight against the Saiyajin. Piccolo's militant training style made Gohan a stronger person, gradually unleashing Gohan's tremendous talent. During the time he spent with Gohan, Piccolo began to develop love and care for Gohan, which was fully realized when he sacrificed his life for Gohan in the battle against Nappa. His love and care for Gohan is readily apparent throughout the Freeza and Cell series.
Bulma
Bulma is the daughter of Dr. Briefs, and her mother only known as Mama. Her father is the founder of the Capsule Corporation, and the inventor of the Capsule. She was 16 when the series started and ROUGHLY 61 when Z ends. She is a scientific genius, and she's got good looks to go along with them. Some of her achievements are; building the Dragon Radar, inventing a shrinking ray mounted in a watch, rebuilding an alien scouter, learning how to use an alien ship, and repairing an artificial human with her dad, just to name a few things. In the beginning of Dragon Ball she is very important as a character, but she becomes less of a focus as the series progresses. Her husband is Vegeta, and she has two children. Trunks is their son, and Bra is their daughter.
Bulma was the second character to appear in Dragon Ball after Son Goku. When the series started out she was a young girl, 16 years of age, who was out on her own spending her summer break from school searching for magical spheres called the Dragon Balls. Her wish was originally to have all the strawberries she could eat, but she later changed her mind and wanted a perfect boyfriend. When she first met Goku, she wasn't very nice. She wanted to take his Dragon Ball from him, but he refused because he believed his grandfather's soul was in it. She then tried to bribe him by letting him touch her panties, but Goku had no desire to touch her "dirty butt.". Finally she asked if he could come with her and bring along his Dragon Ball. He liked the idea, but Bulma was going to use his Dragon Ball when she got all of them, and use him as a bodyguard. She was pretty sly for a kid her age.
Later on, Bulma met Yamcha. The two became girlfriend and boyfriend, and Yamcha lived with her at her parent's house, the Capsule Corporation. As time went by, Bulma grew up, and became very, uh, touchy. Much more so than when she was a kid. She breaks up with Yamcha because he fools around with other women, but when he's killed by the Saibaman, she realized she truly loved him. She tagged along with the guys on Nameck because she suffers from a great deal of self pride, and didn't think anyone else could use the Nameckian ship, and partly because she wanted to help get Yamcha back. After the Nameck ordeal, Bulma and Yamcha got back together, and seemed happy, (with an occasional slip-up on Yamcha's part).
However, when Vegeta trains at the Capsule Corp. in her father's gravity room, she seems to gain some affection for him. After the three years pass when everyone was training for their confrontation with the Artificial Humans, Bulma shows up with a kid in her arms. His name is Trunks, and he's Vegeta and Bulma's son. Sometime later, after the death of Cell, Bulma and Vegeta get hitched, and Vegeta learns to actually care for his family, although he doesn't let his emotions truly show until a while later. But Bulma really loves him, and shows it as well. During the Buu saga, Bulma is pretty much a useless character. She doesn't invent anything, or assist in a fight; she's just there as drama. She dearly loves her son Trunks, but she's pretty stern with him sometimes, a la Chi Chi. At the very end of Z after the death of Buu, she's twice as "touchy" as before, and she really looks as if she's aged. Once again, she's not important at the end, but just a nice face to see at the end of the series.
However, GT pulls a 180 degree turn, and she becomes fairly important again. First she helps to get Goku a ship to fly around the universe in, and later in the series, she becomes VERY important when Bebi takes over her body. He makes her his assistant, and she figures out weaknesses of Son, and how to turn Bebi into a Golden Ozaru. During the Evil Shenlon saga she's not important, and hardly seen until the end, where Goku and Vegeta face off against Ii Shenlon. She invents the Brute Ray, a special tank that shoots off high amounts of Brute Waves, causing Vegeta to turn Super Saiyan 4.
She and Vegeta disappear at the end, and lose contact with the Sons, but in the last episode, you can tell Bulma's grand daughter, and Vegeta's great grandson. And that's about it for Bulma.
Krillin
As a kid he was Goku's rival in training. And at that time he wanted to be the best and strongest just like Goku, infact at one time Krillin was stronger than Goku. Overtime though Krillin and Goku became good friends. Throughout the series there is one thing Krillin kept in the back of his mind. He always wanted to get married (this is not shown much at all the american version). Eventually, Krillin did get married to Andorid #18 after she was turned into a full human by a wish from the dragon, Krillin and #18 even have a child together. While Krillin is a pretty important character in DB and the first half of DBZ after that his significance as a character becomes pretty small, and even less by DBGT. 
Brolly
A Saiyan who was born on the same day as Goku. He seemed to have a natural hatred towards Goku. He was sentanced to be executed by Vegeta who feared Brolly's potential power, but somehow he survived. Many years later Broli meets up with Goku and defeats most of the Dragon Ball team but is later subdued by Goku. 
Cell
Cell was a powerful android created by Dr. Gero. He is also known as Android 21. He was completed in Future Trunk's time. Cell kills Trunks and steals his time machine and travels back in time to absorb #17 and #18 to reach perfect form. The Z warriors manage to defeat him. He kills himself by setting off the bombs in his body as a last attempt to win the battle. Before Cell can explode, Goku teleports him to Kaio's planet to prevent the Earth from blowing up with him. Cell manages to regenerate from a brain cell that survived after he died. He later is killed by Gohan. Cell allies with Freeza in hell in an attempt to take it over. They of course are stopped by Goku and Paiku-Han. Later he is rebuilt and upgraded by Dr. Gero and defeated one last time by Goku. 
Freeza
He is one of the major villains who appears after the epic battle between Son Goku and Vegeta. The battle against Freeza was the longest segment of the entire series.
He was the villain who destroyed Gokus home planet. Even though Freeza would not openly admit, his greatest nightmare is the Saiyajin, that is why their home planet must be destroyed.
Shortly after Vegeta finished his battle with Goku, we encounter Freeza in the planet of the Namek. Both the Dragon Ball Warriors and Freeza and his minions arrived at the planet to acquire the more powerful Dragon Balls. Although both arrived with the same purpose, their motives were quite different. The Dragon Ball Warriors wanted to revive Piccolo and his other half, Tenshin, while Freeza, with his insatiable appetite for power, wanted eternal life.
He did not begin to demonstrate his capabilities until he started the battle against Vegeta when he took his first transformation. Freeza is capable of three transformations, becoming more powerful each time, during which, Vegeta was killed and Piccolo met nearly the same fate. Then, Son Goku joined the battle.
This is the battle where first saw the Super Saiyajin. Freeza served as the catalyst for that when he killed Kuririn out of his frustration. The angry Son Goku became Super Saiyajin and eventually overcame Freeza. Goku, being a good sportsman like always spares Freeza's life so he could challege Freeza again. But Freeza's uncontainable pride and unwillingless to accept defeat sealed his fate. Miracalously, he still managed to survive until recued by his father
After being rescued by his Father, Freeza decided to go to earth for his revenge, but only to seal his fate by the arrival of Future Trunks.
Cooler
Cooler is the brother of Freeza. He watched Freeza destroy planet Vegeta. After Freeza was defeated he went to earth seeking revenge against Goku, but was thrown into the sun by Goku's fireball. In movie 6 he tried to take over planet Namek by merging with an alien ship. He fails of course and killed by Goku. |
