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.
Ever since the start of the original Dragon Ball, Akira Toriyama's perennially popular franchise has been led by its protagonist, Goku. The various series have traced Goku's childhood training under Master Roshi to him becoming an adult and starting a family of his own, eventually going on to become a grandfather during Dragon Ball Super. And while several other characters were poised to take the reins as the protagonist to succeed Goku, none ever quite could fully inhabit the role of Earth's greatest protector. However, the latest chapter of Dragon Ball Super's manga continuation sets up another often overlooked character to potentially replace Goku moving forward: Uub.
Uub is the good-hearted reincarnation of Kid Buu, created when King Yemma overheard Goku's wish for the villain to return someday as a good guy for a rematch to Dragon Ball Z's climactic battle on the Supreme Kai's planet. The epilogue for DBZ was set ten years later, during the 28th World Martial Arts Tournament as Uub entered the contest hoping to use the winnings to save his beleaguered village. Realizing Uub's true lineage, Goku mentored the powerful, young fighter, completing his training years later at the start of the non-canonical Dragon Ball GT, where he eventually absorbed Majin Buu to grow even stronger and helped the Z Fighters defend the Earth against new threats.
At the end of DBS, as Goku engages Moro for a final showdown after the villain merges with the Earth itself, the Z Fighters lend their combat energy to Goku to give him the additional strength to stay in the fight. Majin Buu, channeling the Supreme Kai he absorbed millennia ago, coaches a young Uub in donating his combat energy to Goku. Visibly younger and presumably years before his first actual meeting with Goku at the martial arts tournament, Uub is revealed to have the divine energy of the Supreme Kai that Buu absorbed all those years ago instead of that of his larger, less evil counterpart. This divine energy is enough to push Goku over the edge to trigger a new combat transformation to overpower Moro once and for all.
Uub's divine energy suggests that, in addition to possessing all the evil magical strength available to Kid Buu, he could attain godly transformations of his own. The Ultra Instinct transformation is not one exclusive to Saiyans like many of the franchise's altered states, but one that can be achieved by anyone channeling the divine combat energy in the heart of battle. This is a transformation that has eluded Vegeta and that even Beerus, Universe 7's God of Destruction, has trouble maintaining and would effectively making Uub the heir apparent to Goku as Earth's defender after extensively training under the Super Saiyan for years.
While Gohan and even Goku's distant descendant, Goku Jr., had been introduced as a possible means to carry the Dragon Ball franchise forward without its iconic protagonist, neither character quite fit the role, with fans leaning to Goku always standing front and center. And while Goku doesn't appear to be looking to hang up his gi anytime in the near future, the reintroduction of Uub and impressive display of his combat potential sets up big moves for the reincarnated fighter as he eventually grows older. Goku will always be the figurehead for Dragon Ball but should the story ever become a more generational one, Uub is the prime candidate to take the lead.
