On Sunday, October 11, the <em>Dragon Ball</em> franchise finally returns with its first new anime installment in over four years. However, we won’t be visiting other universes, new planets, or even new parts of Earth. The new series <em>Dragon Ball Super: Beerus</em> will take fans back to a very familiar part of the timeline — the first meeting of Goku (Masako Nozawa) and the God of Destruction, Beerus (Kōichi Yamadera). This story was first told in the 2013 movie Dragon Ball Z: Battle of Gods, then reworked into the first arc of both the Dragon Ball Super anime and manga. At first glance, it’s not the most exciting thing to revisit this story yet again. However, after the death of franchise creator Akira Toriyama and a long hiatus for the Z Fighters, this might be the best way to get the story going again.

Dragon Ball Super: Beerus aims to be the definitive version of this all-important arc in Goku’s story. Battle of Gods could have been a one-off back in 2013, but it grew into a series with 131 episodes, and even more material in the manga that hasn’t been adapted yet. From here on out, the franchise will be moving forward without the oversight of Toriyama, so it’s the perfect time to look back on the foundation he has laid before moving forward. Considering all the controversy and baggage attached to the Dragon Ball Super anime, this re-animated version may be just what is needed to reset fans’ expectations and set a new course for this iconic franchise.

‘Dragon Ball Super: Beerus’ Will Do Justice to the ‘Battle of Gods’

While this will be the fourth time that Goku and Beerus’ first meeting is retold in the Dragon Ball franchise, it may also be the first time the story’s full potential is realized. Dragon Ball Z: Battle of Gods was created as a one-off movie, and it doesn’t quite have the gravitas to kick off a whole new generation of Dragon Ball stories. It also lacks the Dragon Ball Super branding, so it’s no surprise that studios and advertisers wanted a more definitive version when Dragon Ball Super premiered in 2015.

That said, the Dragon Ball Super version of this arc was infamous for its low animation quality at the time of its premiere. Some aspects of the art have been touched up in subsequent releases on streaming and Blu-ray, but it’s still not quite up to the standard of the Dragon Ball franchise. As for the manga, it was created after the anime, with a few slight differences here and there. It was overseen by Toriyama, but ultimately, it’s not enough to stand as the definitive, canonical version of the story.

This storyline is not just significant as it marks the start of the Super generation for the franchise — it’s an important final push by Toriyama as a storyteller. The mangaka was hesitant to pick up the Dragon Ball franchise again, and while he remained involved in Dragon Ball Super up until his death, he never quite took on full control as a writer or artist. It’s unclear how much of the series Toriyama wrote and how much he simply approved, as mangaka Toyotarou described in one interview. Dragon Ball Super: Beerus returns to a point in the story that we know for sure was Toriyama’s idea, making it a good place to pick up after his death.

‘Dragon Ball Super: Beerus’ Will Launch Into New Stories

It’s also important to keep in mind that the Dragon Ball franchise is not stopping here. There are plans in place to adapt two latest storylines from the Dragon Ball Super manga into anime form — the Moro arc and the Granolah arc. From there, the franchise could go in all kinds of new directions, with Dragon Ball Super: Beerus as its launching pad. It’s like the franchise is taking a couple of steps back so it can have a running start when it kicks off again.

This may even signal that the Dragon Ball Super storyline is heading for its climactic moment. The entire series serves as an interlude set between two final episodes of Dragon Ball Z. The original series concluded with an epilogue set ten years into the future, but Super fills in adventures that occurred during that time. Many fans have wondered how Goku will end up back on Earth training his granddaughter Pan for that final episode when Beerus and Whis are nowhere to be seen. It could be that revisiting Beerus’ introduction prepares for that big reveal before resetting the entire timeline.

No matter what plan is set forth, Dragon Ball Super: Beerus promises to elevate expectations for this entire franchise before launching into something new. The series premieres on Sunday, October 11 on Crunchyroll in the U.S. — and many other parts of the world.