Back to Where It All Began: Reflecting on Weekly Shonen Jump No. 51 with Akira Toriyama!

It's been 37 years to the day since Dragon Ball made its fateful debut on the manga scene.
Using nostalgic pages taken straight from the source, the very issue of Weekly Shonen Jump where Dragon Ball began, we're going to give you all a taste of the thrill and excitement that came with reading a brand-new chapter of the hottest manga in town at the time of its release!
And as a special treat, Akira Toriyama himself was kind enough to drop by and share some behind-the-scenes secrets from Dragon Ball's serialization!!

A fresh-faced Goku & Bulma are joined on the front cover with the tagline "Hit-Maker Akira Toriyama Is Back in Action!!"
This image of a monkey boy grinning wildly and a stylish young lady riding a futuristic hoverbike was a fresh new look that surely made a big impression on readers.
It makes for tantalizing cover that just begs you to open up the pages and find out for yourself what kind of adventure awaits!

Tale 1 "Bulma & Goku" Synopsis

A young boy named Goku is living deep in the mountains far from civilization.
One day, a city-girl named Bulma appears and claims to be searching for the "Dragon Balls".

The wild-child Goku spots Bulma's car and mistakes it for some kind of monster, which he promptly destroys with his considerable power!
Having discovered that Goku happened to be in possession of the Four-Star Dragon Ball and seeing the young boy's strength, Bulma decides to take him along on her quest as her own personal bodyguard.
Just thinking about all the adventures that lie ahead for the oil-and-water duo of the super powerful Goku and the fiery Bulma fills us with excitement!

Spotlight Panel!

This panel shows Goku's first ever appearance on the manga page—and in full color, no less! Riding on a barrel-like log holding a comically oversized saw effortlessly over his shoulder sure makes for a memorable debut! Even at just a glance you can tell this is no ordinary kid! The way he greets the monkeys dangling down from the tree gives us just a taste of Goku's simple charm and kind-hearted nature.
But we've got to give some love to the beautifully illustrated, Chinese-style background! Other manga series at the time were veering towards a more manly, tough-guy aesthetic, but Dragon Ball defied the trend and made a big splash by embracing the fantastical nature of its world.

Trivia Time

In celebration of the serialization's release, this special title page was gifted to 100 readers. The editor themself thought the idea was a little out there, and even commented, "It's a bold move!" It seems they too had high hopes for Dragon Ball.

Bonus Feature!

Let's take a look at the preview pages from the Shonen Weekly Jump edition that preceded the release of Tale 1! These illustrations were all made specifically to promote the next edition of the magazine and, as you'd expect, they're chock full of tantalizing teasers for the soon-to-begin "Dragon Ball"!

Here we see Goku gripping his Nyoibo in a kick-ass pose and a cute, slightly ditsy-looking Bulma. Both illustrations have short introductions to the characters next to them, giving this preview page more bang for your buck than most! There's tons of other info sprawled on the page, including info on the bonus manga panel fans could receive with the next release. This preview is more than enough to get us excited!

The next preview page from issue no. 50 was actually spread over two pages! With chunky lines giving Shenron's design a cool pop twist, the tagline reads, "Action! Laughs! A Cute Girl!!" It's short, snappy, and gives the readers a hint of all the fun that awaits in Dragon Ball!

And there's still one more! This preview page is all about Dragon Ball!! It's easy to get a sense of how highly anticipated a series Dragon Ball was. Accompanying Shenron as he does his best to balance atop a Dragon Ball is the tagline "The ultimate comedy manga begins next week!!", which illustrates that, in the runup to its release, Dragon Ball was being pushed first and foremost as a comedy series.

Bonus announcement! In conjunction with this article celebrating the anniversary of the Dragon Ball serialization, we've also updated the name of the Dragon Ball Official Site twitter account!
From here on, we'll be continuing to bring you all the latest Dragon Ball news and other fun tweets via "DRAGON BALL OFFICIAL", so be sure to give us a follow!

Japanese account: ドラゴンボールオフィシャル
@DB_official_jp
English account: DRAGON BALL OFFICIAL
@DB_official_en

*All images are taken from the Japanese version.