Episode 207 – Take flight, Videl/Ah, I Flew!! Videl’s Introduction to Flight

On a much lighter note, we have “Take flight, Videl,” one of my personal favorites for how it showcases Toriyama’s strength at writing relationships — something I’ve written about how much I love before. In this episode, Gohan teaches Videl, the daughter of Mr. Satan, how to fly. It’s just a damn cute episode, showing Videl enter into the world of superhuman martial arts with the kind, earnest, naive and patient guide that is Gohan, their dynamic clearly blossoming into a romance throughout the episode. The scene where she thinks he likes short-haired girls and wants to cut it for him, only for him to reveal it’s a good hairstyle for fighting? Perfection. This episode is better than most rom-coms and one of my favorite non-action-focused in the series.

On top of all the cute Videl/Gohan moments, this episode is also one of the rare lore drops of the series, and a great one at that. Flying had never been fully explained since it was first introduced in Dragon Ball’s Tien Shinhan arc, we only knew it was a ki-based technique. Not everything needs to be explained, obviously, but it’s really neat that this episode takes the time to give a fascinating, if minor, look into how ki and flight works through the lens of Videl, a beginner to the world of ki.