Lunch
From Dragon Ball Encyclopedia
"Doesn't he know it's an offer he can't refuse!?"
— Lunch in "Global Training"
Lunch (ランチ, Ranchi; FUNimation "Launch", Viz "Lunch") is a girl with a strange disorder which changes between two personalities everytime she sneezes. Her first personality is that of a sweet, blue-haired woman, but her other personality is an angry, trigger-happy, machine gun-wielding, blonde woman who commits crimes for fun and is quick to respond with gunfire when angry. Neither of Launch’s personalities remembers what the other says or does.
Contents
Appearance
Launch's outfits changed often, but they all consisted of a red ribbon on the top of her hair. Launch's initial appearance consisted of a light green tanktop, yellow short shorts, brown fingerless gloves, and red shoes worn with green socks. Launch's primary appearance changes during the General Blue saga to a pink tanktop and a black pair of pants with knee pads. In the 22nd Tenkaichi Tournament, she wore a black shirt with green pants. In the 23rd Tenkaichi Tournament, she wore a red dress (which was disliked by her bad half).
Personalities
Good Launch
The innocent persona of Launch is pure of heart as she is quite capable of riding the Kinto Un with Son Goku and Krillin in the anime. Launch is happy to carry out her work for Muten Roshi, never realizing that he is constantly trying to grab, poke, rub, or catch a glimpse of her breasts, panties, or bra. However, many of his schemes are foiled – if not by his own mistakes, then when Launch's nose is tickled and she sneezed, causing her to change into her violent half. Launch has a very sensitive nose that, when irritated by even the smallest things, can result in a sneeze. Her sneezes are often provoked by things such as flowers, pepper, dust, and other common allergens. This version of Launch has blue hair.
Bad Launch
Goku, Roshi, and Krillin are all deeply afraid of her bad side after an incident in which she shoots them all with a machine gun and they have to run behind a boulder several meters away in fear. After being victims of her first assault, they are more careful around, observing if she will sneeze during dinner and ready to run away at the first sign of a sneeze. She somehow always appears to have a machine gun on her.
Her transformations come in handy in the 22nd Tenkaichi Tournament and 23rd Tenkaichi Tournament when she clears the crowd and allows her friends to get up in front. Additionally, in the later episodes of the series, she seems to be more in control of her blonde form, whereas her earlier transformations in the series turned her into a berserk maniac with no control. In fact, later on in the story, she begins to control her blonde form completely – though it is still more aggresive than her other half. This tranformation has blonde hair.
Biography
Dragon Ball
Tournament Saga
Main article: Tournament Saga
Launch's blonde counterpart was the highest wanted criminal in Brown County. One day, she robbed a train causing the police to chase her. During the chase, she accidently sneezed and switched back to her weak and innocent form. Launch was saved by the young martial artists Son Goku and Krillin, who thought the police officers were just impersonators. Launch was brought to Kame House where she was introduced to Muten Roshi, the Turtle Hermit. She agreed to stay with them so that she could train with them and lay low from the authorities. Once they moved to Training Island, Launch decided to just cook and clean the house instead since she did not like fighting. Launch spent the next 8 months cooking for Goku, Krillin, and Roshi as they prepared for the 21st Tenkaichi Tournament, while at the same time she tried to avoid her bade side. Launch stayed at the house while they went to the tournament.
Helping against the Red Ribbon Army
Main article: General Blue Saga Main article: Commander Red Saga
After the World Martial Tournament was over Launch, Krillin and Roshi moved back to the island and Launch continued her duties of cooking and cleaning. When Goku and Bulma came to the get a submarine from Roshi he recieved her Micro Band which led Roshi into constantly bug Launch into to taking a bath so he can spy on her. Launches bad form came out and took command which then came to an agreeement to not shoot him as long as he did what she said. Turtle who came back from vacation recently brought Launch back to her good form by rubbing her nose with a weed. After returning to her normal form some Red Ribbon Army troops led by Captain Dark show up demanding the Dragon Balls Goku left behind. Roshi easily defeats them but one threatend to shoot Launch if he did not give up. Turtle luckily turns Launch back to her bad form resulting in her beating the soldier herself. Later on Launch joins Yamcha, Roshi, Bulma, Turtle and Krillin to go help Goku fight the Red Ribbon Army at their main base but by the time they got there all the troops were single handedly defeated by Goku.
Meeting Tenshinhan
Main article: Tien Shinhan Saga
After 3 years had past and the 22nd Tenkaichi Tournament was approaching, the good Launch was going to stay behind at the Kame House, but she sneezed and her bad form decided to go along. While there, Roshi met up with his rival, Master Shen, the Crane Hermit. While getting annoyed with him, Launch tried shooting him with her machine gun, but Master Shen was able to catch all of the bullets with his hand not hurting him. Launch was able to get through crowd and to front row by shooting a gun up in the air, thus causing people to get scared and move. Later on when Goku was matched against Pamput, Pamput's manager tricked Goku into leaving the arena so he would be disqualified for not showing up to the match, but Launch, who was getting ice cream at the time, saw this and chased after the limo on a motorcycle. Launch chased them into an alleyway and beat up his bodyguards and the manager allowed Goku to get to the fight on time. In the final match, Master Shen had Chiaotzu stun Goku so that Tien coukd easily beat him. Launch went over and tried to smash Chiaotzu with a mallet, but the Crane Hermit interfered with his pinky and easily pushed Launch out of the way. After the tournament was over, Launch became attracted to Tien.
Attending the 23rd World Martial Arts Tournament
Main article: Piccolo Jr. Saga
Three years after Goku defeated Piccolo Daimao, Launch attended the 23rd Tenkaichi Tournament with Roshi where they met back up with everyone. Launch spectated the fights of the tournament.
Dragon Ball Z
Her first appearance in Dragon Ball Z was during the Vegeta Saga as her blonde self. Apparently, she had stayed with Tenshinhan and Chaozu after the end of Dragon Ball. After Tenshinhan was killed, she was seen in a bar drowning her sorrows. She does not appear again for the majority of the series except in a flashback from Goku when he was losing badly against Freeza.
She reappeared as her innocent self in the last episodes of Dragon Ball Z to give her energy to Son Goku for his Ultimate Genki Dama. She seemed to have aged somewhat. Although this did not occur in the manga by Akira Toriyama, it was one of the many filler stories written in Dragon Ball Z: Son Gokū Densetsu by Toriyama and his staff.
Lunch's final appearance in the manga was actually in a filler scene during the Frieza Saga, the only instance where she appeared after the 23rd Tenkaichi Tournament. Such filler scenes were inserts to the chapters found in Weekly Shonen Jump 1991 #3 and #4. Since they were only gag-manga done at the request of the magazine, resulting in each author from those two issues contributing holiday-themed gag-manga inserts, they were not considered canon and were never included in the tankobon (compilation volume).
Films
In Dragon Ball: Sleeping Princess in Devil's Castle, Launch (in her evil, blond state) arrived to steal the Sleeping Princess – which was really a giant jewel. Everyone was captured and encased within a wall of rock. It was the night of a full moon, and the moonlight was used to power the jewel. The moonlight also turned Goku into a Great Ape, and everyone escaped. Goku and Krillin returned to the Kame House with Launch and Muten Roshi took them both on as students.
In Dragon Ball: Mystical Adventure, Bulma, Oolong, Launch, and Puar were looking for the Dragon Balls so Bulma could wish for a boyfriend. During the film, Launch demonstrated more reserve and compassion in her violent state than normally expected, especially considering that she was one of the lead characters here and was only seen in her innocent state during an early scene in the film.
Launch appeared in Dragon Ball: Ossu! Kaette Kita Son Goku to Nakama-tachi!! as a background character. She appears to once again live at the Kame House with Roshi, Artificial Human No. 18, Krillin, and Marron.
Video game appearances
In Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 3, Launch continues to appear until the end of the series, always looking for Tien. In addition to that, she also sells capsules in the Skill Shop, switching between her good and evil side randomly. She is also present in the two more recent video games, Dragon Ball: Origins and Dragon Ball Z: Attack of the Saiyans. In Dragon Ball Z: Budokai Tenkaichi 3, she also appears as the Z Item shop owner. In Dragon Ball Z: Budokai Tenkaichi 2, she is not seen but is mentioned in the Character Illustration of Tenshinhan.
Weapons and vehicles
Launch's arsenal is carried via capsules. This was revealed during the King Piccolo Saga when she opened a capsule to use a pistol and a machine pistol to clear away a crowd in order that Bulma and the others could get a better seat for the Tenkaichi Tournament. It is highly conceivable that Launch could have an entire arsenal of weaponry at her disposal, all within the size-reducing capsules. Here now is what was revealed to be in her possession:
- Launch's Bazooka - Launch uses a bazooka to stop a train that she is about to rob. She is later seen attempting to shoot Piccolo Daimao with it but she changes back to her nice form before she can, later on she accidentally activates it nearly blowing up herself, Yamucha, and Bulma.
- Launch's Machine Gun - Roshi gives Launch some lingerie to change into, and after she changes she sneezes. She quickly pulls out machine gun and fills the boys full of bullets for making her wear such a thing. This gun is also used during the saloon scene at the beginning of Episode 15, appearing much sooner in the anime than it does in the manga, later in the series in order to protect Yamcha from Tambourine she tries to kill him with this but the bullets have no effect. According to Launch, it "is a high-performance, automatic weapon," and "it fires 100 rounds in less than 10 seconds.
- Launch's Shotgun - This is a short barreled pump-action shotgun that Launch tries to use against the police that are chasing her. Fortunately she doesn't get the chance to use it, as she sneezes just before she is about to shoot.
- Launch's Hammer - It is a huge mallet that she used once in the 22nd Tankaichi Tournament to stop Chiaotzu from controlling Goku. Master Shen stopped it and threw Launch at a wall and the hammer was not seen after that.
- One-Wheeled Bike - Launch is seen driving the "S-Cargo" one-wheeled bike as she's being chased by the police after robbing a bank. The name itself is a pun, with "escargot" being the French word for "snail". The bike's design actually resembles a snail.
Voice actresses
- Japanese dub: Mami Koyama
- Funimation dub: Meredith McCoy (Most media), Christine Marten (Mean, DB Movie 2 only), Monika Antonelli (Nice, DB Movie 2 only)
- Ocean Group dub: Teryl Rothery (Mean), Cathy Weseluck (Nice)
- Blue Water dub: Kris Rundle
- Harmony Gold dub: Edie Mirman (Movie 3)
- Latin American dub: Cristina Camargo
- Portuguese dub: Cristina Cavalinhos
- Italian dub: Marina Massironi (Mean), Cinzia Massironi (Nice)
Trivia
- Launch's bounty is $2,000,000 as shown in "Look out for Launch".
- Akira Toriyama has stated that the reason Launch stopped appearing during Dragon Ball Z was because he simply forgot about her and that her bad state would have caused confusion because of it's similarity to the Super Saiyan transformation.
- The Traffic Agent Lady from "Goku's Traffic Safety" is often mistake by translations for being Launch because they are both voiced by Mami Koyama and have a similar character design which is of Launch's good form but with blonde hair.
- After defeating a Red Ribbon army soldier in "Roshi Surprise", she gives a soldier "the middle finger".
- Interestingly, Launch is in the first ending sequence for Dragon Ball Kai when she was only in filler scenes in Dragon Ball Z that were cut out of Kai.
- While shown in her blonde state in the promotional poster of Dragon Ball: Yo! Son Goku and His Friends Return!!, she only appears in her innocent state during all the film.
- The personality of Launch's bad form seems to be modeled after Polly Buckets from Akira Toriyama's previous series Dr. Slump all though their roles are the opposite since Launch is a criminal and Polly Buckets is a cop.
- Launch doesn't appear at all in Dragon Ball GT, but she is shown in the flashback montage of the three Dragon Ball series at the very end when Goku is leaving the World Martial Arts Tournament 100 years later.
- Launch looks very similar to Ayla from Chrono Trigger. Both characters were created by Akira Toriyama.
- Some fans call her blond incarnation Kushami, a name used in old fan summaries of the then untranslated manga in order to distinguish the two.
- Her line "Doesn't he know it's an offer he can't refuse!" is a reference to the famous gangster film The Godfather.
- Launch makes a cameo appearance while in her good state in the 7th Dr. Slump film in a crowd with Oolong, the Pilaf Gang, and the two main characters from Akira Toriyama's one-shot manga Pink.
