Tien Shinhan may have been a little forgetable in Dragon Ball Z but he was technically one of the major antagonists of the series.

The only antagonist in Dragon Ball that wasn’t really evil, he was just a very talented martial artist trying to make a name for himself by being a little bit too ruthless.

But Master Roshi decides that he’s actually a fairly good person and whether or not Goku beats Tien doesn’t really matter in the long run.

And Goku’s fight against him is one of the best in the series. His tri-beam attack is so strong that if he used that full force, he would die.

And you can see what the diluted version does. This is also a reason he was able to hold off Semi-Perfect Cell in Dragon Ball Z.

And by a stroke of luck, he manages to beat Goku officially and becomes the champion and Goku’s new friend.

I will say that Akira Toriyama did him a little dirty by letting him get absolutely beaten by King Piccolo’s freshly hatched child Drum.

He fights in the last tournament, with his most notable fight against his teacher’s brother, Mercenary Tao. And Tien absolutely humiliates him. But funny enough, during his rematch with Goku, he doesn’t even come close to winning the match.

And by this time, he became mid-ranked in the series in terms of power, before being largely forgotten by the end of Dragon Ball Z.