A story within a story is a common narrative conceit that has roots back to Shakespeare, but Dragon Ball Super, upped the ante by positing that there are comics designed and read by deities. The gods (and there are multitudes) of Dragon Ball apparently need some escapist entertainment just like mortals, but gods have their own favorite comics.
Dragon Ball Super has expanded the beloved franchise into absurd new heights with the protagonists squaring off against literal gods. While Vegeta is trying to learn the God of Destruction Beerus’ powers to obliterate matter, Beerus mentions that his comic got burned up. The feline deity is a mercurial foodie that can be easily pushed to annihilate planets if annoyed. But even destruction can be boring when you’re an eternal deity, so some fanciful escapist fiction is needed to pass the time.
Beerus has one throwaway line about burning up “this month’s issue of God Comics,” in Dragon Balls Super #70, by Akira Toriyama and Toyotarou. While the fact that manga or comics exist within some comic book universes is not something new, gods having their own comics is unique. Comic book writers often play with meta-commentary about comics by inserting glossy pages inked onto glossy pages.
This is a useful narrative trick to tease out a joke at the comic industry’s expense. Or to further enrich the lore of a given comic that its own characters can be featured within in-world books. The Boys comes to mind with its corporate-sponsored heroes. There’s a whole marketing arm for the heroes with books about their escapades and prettying them up from the morally depraved truth. Dragon Ball Super inserts its own meta comic but it is apparently out of mortal’s reach.
If this is a manga created for gods then it likely has never been witnessed by mortals. Beerus hints this is a monthly edition but doesn’t elaborate on what’s inside. It could be as simple as a newsletter put into comic format keeping the various deities (there are hundreds in the Dragon Ball universe) up to date on the gossip and happenings of the cosmos. Beerus is bored very easily so a comic he looks forward to every month must be at least interesting enough for him to be distracted from genociding an entire race of beings.
It could be that this is a current events comic that is replaying the latest exploits of the various gods in Dragon Ball Super. Similar to how meta comics work in many other franchises, embellishing and reiterating a story that readers have already read. Or this could be an altogether different form of entertainment that only the immortal understand. Like jokes about the big bang (you had to be there). Or different unfathomable dimensions that only gods could understand. Or it could be that Beerus wants to read manga like the rest of us.
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