Whenever People Bring Up The "can X Character Beat Goku?" Hypothetical, It Always Revolves Around Modern

Whenever people bring up the "can X character beat Goku?" hypothetical, it always revolves around modern DB power, like SSJ4 and Ultra Instinct, which makes sense since theyre the recent top tier power levels in a shonen sense. but the fact is, Goku aint been at his A-game since OG DB. Since like, you gotta remember, Dragonball started as another Toriyama gag manga, similar to Dr Slump.

Goku is a gag character who transitioned to a shonen fighter since fighting was more fun.

THAT is terrifying. Goku can still apply to gag manga rules if he wants to. Bullets have no effect on him, but he will scream in agony if you hit him with a small rock.

Goku is like an anime Hannah Montana, best of both worlds, a jack of all trades. He can be a cheery funny gag character when he wants, and a serious fighting protagonist when he wants. Like, one of his most famous fighting styles is biting people. He bites Frieza, he bites Buu, he bites Beerus, he bites Whis.

Goku is one of the strongest fighters in all of anime, he can take the punch of a God, or all the condensed evil in hell and not even flinch, but his wife Chi Chi, Bulma and Arale can whoop his ass because its funny.

Basically the answer to any "can X character beat Goku?" revolves around the answer "would it be funny?"

Thanos from MCU? There's nothing funny there at all, Thanos loses.

SpongeBob? Incredibly funny, SpongeBob would blow a bubble that looks like a bus at Goku and he'd be launched back past the horizon and you'd see a nuclear explosion happen.

And like the most stereotypical ones of Saitama and Luffy, thats like a draw, they all have the half and half of shonen and funny. They beat the shit out of eachother and then the next scene is them bandaged and bruised in an Applebee's chowing down on endless appetizers together, then immediately back to fighting.