WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Dragon Ball Super Chapter #66, by Akira Toriyama, Toyotarou, Caleb Cook and Brandon Bovia, available now in English from Viz Media.
New transformations are par for the course in Dragon Ball Super, but Goku's newest, mysterious form has everyone wondering what it's capable of. Revealed in Chapter #66 of the manga, Goku is encased inside a giant, energy version of himself, surpassing Ultra Instinct Perfected. What is this new form, how does it work and how was he able to achieve it?
Goku was struggling in his fight against Moro, who had merged with the planet when he absorbed Merus' Angelic powers. Goku, not wanting to destroy his home in order to defeat Moro, is informed by Whis to destroy the gem on Moro's forehead, where Merus' powers are being stored. Goku goes in with everything he has, including Ultra Instinct Perfected and being backed up by Vegeta, but it's not enough and he's quickly knocked down.
His energy is absorbed by Moro, and his Ultra Instinct Perfected is basically nulled. The Z Fighters gather their energy together and pass it on to Goku in an attempt to get him back up to full power, but what nobody expected was a ball of Godly Ki from Uub. It's speculated by Dende that when Kid Buu was reincarnated into Uub, Grand Supreme Kai's Ki, which had been absorbed during Buu's rampage, was passed on into Uub. This Godly Ki resulted in Goku being able to surpass Ultra Instinct Perfected and form an enlarged energy projection of himself.
This is all we know about this new form at the moment, but we can speculate about the implications it has for the series. While other forms are capable of being achieved by the other Saiyans, such as Super Saiyan 3 and Ultra Instinct, it seems that this form may be a Goku-exclusive. It took Godly Ki from two beings in order to achieve this giant form, but one of those beings was the leader of the Supreme Kais. It's unlikely that the fighters would be in a position where all of the Saiyan fighters would be able to achieve this form.
It's an unusual power-up to say the least. Up until this point, many of the forms achieved by Goku have manifested through training and pushing himself. This form, on the other hand, was achieved by absorbing the energy of another being. It's not the first time Goku has absorbed energy from others, but it is the first time that it's resulted in a form like this. While it's reminiscent of the Great Ape form simply because of its sheer size, the power level is far beyond that of the Great Ape. It seems that its primary purpose was to keep Moro busy while the real Goku could go in and destroy the gem in Moro's forehead. This implies that Goku can control the form separately from his main body, but there's not enough information available at this time to be able to make any concrete conclusions.
While it's unknown if the form will make a return in the future, it's certainly made an impact on fans if Reddit is anything to go by. The reception seems mixed, with fans ranging from disappointed with the storytelling to speculating where the story will go from here. Hopefully, we'll be able to learn more about how it functions and whether Goku will be able to achieve it at will from now on.
