Gotenks is one of the standout characters in the classic anime Dragon Ball Z. A fusion of Goten and Trunks, he was one I never expected to see. While his potential ultimately fell short, it’s hard to dislike him. Even when you realize he accidentally played a role in the Earth’s destruction.
It was hilarious seeing the really skinny and really fat versions of Gotenks when the boys didn’t fuse properly the first time. I actually tried the fusion pose with my friend once, and we managed to pull it off much better than those two did initially.
His time to shine came in the Hyperbolic Time Chamber against Super Buu, right after the pink demon annihilated almost all the humans left on Earth.
And while the Super Ghost Kamikaze Attack was clever, Gotenks completely blew his chance to finish Super Buu by stalling for a “cool moment” to use something stronger, even though he only had thirty minutes to fight.
That “something stronger” was Super Saiyan 3, which genuinely surprised me. Theoretically, he should have been stronger than Goku at SSJ3, but power scaling in Dragon Ball Z gets really inconsistent later on, so we’ll just forget about that.
Anyway, after Gotenks leaves the Hyperbolic Time Chamber, Buu kills all their family and friends by turning them into chocolate and eating them. Their fight on Earth afterward is honestly pretty forgettable. Then the fusion ends, and Gohan arrives from the Kai Planet.
Gohan and Gotenks team up but take a major loss by not taking Buu seriously, with Gotenks goofing around for… reasons.
That gave Super Buu the perfect chance to absorb Gotenks… and he didn’t even put up much of a fight. How does a warrior strong enough to destroy a planet lose to what’s essentially a magical alien made of deadly bubble gum?
After absorbing Gotenks, Super Buu becomes “Buutenks,” combining all of Gotenks’ power with his own base strength and techniques like the Ghost Kamikaze Attack. This gives him the upper hand against Gohan, despite Gohan’s power boost. And that’s pretty much the last we see of Gotenks until after the events of Dragon Ball Z.