Dragon Ball: Curse of the Blood Rubies

Deep within a once-prosperous kingdom, a ruler named King Gurumes has become consumed by his obsession with Blood Rubies, precious gemstones buried beneath his own lands. The mining operation has devastated the countryside, destroying crops and displacing the people who depend on the soil for their survival. Gurumes himself has transformed into a grotesque, bloated creature, endlessly hungry and never satisfied, a living embodiment of his own unchecked avarice. His soldiers, led by the cunning Major Bongo and the resourceful Pasta, enforce his will without question.

A young village girl named Pansy refuses to accept this fate. Armed with nothing but a slingshot and fierce determination, she sets out to find the legendary martial arts master, Master Roshi, hoping he can liberate her homeland. Her journey eventually crosses paths with Goku, a wild, tail-sporting boy living alone in the mountains with his grandfather's prized Four-Star Dragon Ball, and Bulma, a brilliant teenager on her own quest to collect all seven Dragon Balls.

The Race for the Dragon Balls

When Gurumes's soldiers steal Goku's Dragon Ball from his home, the stakes become personal. Goku, Bulma, and Pansy join forces, picking up the shapeshifting pig Oolong along the way and tangling with the desert bandit Yamcha and his floating companion Puar. Their journey takes them to Master Roshi's tiny island, where the old hermit gifts Goku the Flying Nimbus cloud and demonstrates the devastating power of his MAX Power Kamehameha, obliterating a Gurumes Army submarine in a single blast.

Armed with Roshi's blessing rather than his physical presence, the ragtag group storms Gurumes's castle. While Goku battles through the king's forces and Yamcha sneaks inside for his own reasons, the fully mutated Gurumes reveals just how far his transformation has gone. He towers over them all, a rampaging beast with the Dragon Balls glowing inside his own stomach. In a flash of insight, Bulma throws the final Dragon Ball into his gaping mouth, completing the set and summoning Shenron from within the monster himself.

A Wish That Heals

With the eternal dragon looming overhead and the castle crumbling around them, Pansy steps forward to make the wish. Rather than asking for riches or power, she simply wishes for her land to be peaceful and beautiful again. Shenron obliges, ripping every Blood Ruby from the soil and restoring the countryside to its former glory. Gurumes reverts to his human form, small and bewildered, and when Pansy offers him an apple, he discovers that simple food can taste wonderful when greed no longer clouds everything. Goku returns a gold coin to Pasta, calls his Nimbus, and soars into the sky as his new friends watch from below.

For a 51-minute film, Curse of the Blood Rubies packs in a surprising number of action sequences. The standout early encounter is Goku versus Yamcha in the desert, a compact fight that introduces the Wolf Fang Fist in spectacular fashion. Yamcha's rapid-fire punches drive Goku into a stone wall, but Goku counters with his grandfather's jan-ken-pon technique, poking Yamcha's eyes and slapping him across the face hard enough to send him bouncing off the rocks. The fight only ends because Bulma arrives and triggers Yamcha's crippling shyness around women.

Master Roshi's demonstration of the Kamehameha is the film's most visually impressive moment. The old hermit powers up his body to maximum bulk, and the energy beam he unleashes completely annihilates the submarine and its full payload of missiles. The sequence establishes the Kamehameha as a technique of terrifying destructive potential, making Goku's immediate, smaller-scale imitation all the more charming.

The climactic battle inside Gurumes's castle weaves combat and puzzle-solving together. Goku's Kamehameha barely scratches the mutated king, forcing the group to find a creative solution rather than simply overpowering him. Bulma's quick thinking with the final Dragon Ball turns the fight into something no amount of punching could have resolved, reinforcing one of Dragon Ball's earliest lessons: brains and heart matter as much as raw strength.

Released on December 20, 1986, as part of the Toei Cartoon Festival alongside GeGeGe no Kitaro and Kinnikuman, Curse of the Blood Rubies holds the distinction of being the very first Dragon Ball theatrical film. Directed by Daisuke Nishio and written by Toshiki Inoue, the film grossed 1.36 billion yen during its original Japanese run, a strong showing that confirmed Dragon Ball's viability as a theatrical property.

The film's original Japanese title was simply "Dragon Ball," and it was only given its subtitle for subsequent home video releases. Western audiences experienced a complicated localization history. Harmony Gold produced an English dub in 1989, BLT Productions created another in 1995, and Funimation finally released an uncut version in 2010 after acquiring the rights from Lionsgate. Each version made different editorial choices, from renaming characters to removing scenes of Bulma being shot or Roshi's more risque requests.

As a retelling of the Emperor Pilaf Saga, the film established a template that the original Dragon Ball series would return to multiple times: take familiar characters and scenarios, remix them with new villains and settings, and compress the adventure into a tight theatrical package. King Gurumes serves as a more physically threatening antagonist than Emperor Pilaf, and the film's environmental message about greed destroying the land gives it thematic weight that many later Dragon Ball movies would not attempt. For fans looking to understand where the franchise's theatrical ambitions began, this is the starting line.