Dragon Ball: Every Goku Lookalike Explained

Key Takeaways

• Bardock, Goku’s father, was the first character who looked like Goku with an X-shaped scar on his cheek.
• Turles’ appearance as a Goku lookalike was purely coincidental, not because they are related.
• Goten is Goku’s second son who resembles him, but his appearance changes as he grows up, unlike Goku.

Goku’s face isn’t just the most recognizable one in Dragon Ball, but in all of anime in general. So, it can get really confusing when characters just start appearing out of nowhere who look exactly like him. It might be a character that’s Goku’s family member, a body-stealing villain, or someone that just coincidentally looks like him. Allies and villains alike just seem keen on looking like Akira Toriyama’s golden boy.

This list will include characters from the original Dragon Ball series up to Super, and will also include the non-canon Dragon Ball Z movies and GT. There are technically alternate timeline Gokus from games and other media, as well as alternate versions of the Goku lookalikes, but this article will not be including them for now.

Characters Who Were Just Born Looking Like Goku

Bardock: Goku’s Father

Bardock is Goku’s, or perhaps more fittingly, Kakarot’s Saiyan father, who perished when Frieza destroyed Planet Vegeta. Now technically, you could say that Bardock isn’t copying Goku, and if anything, it’s the other way around, since Bardock was obviously born before Goku. However, Toriyama never really intended to give Goku an alien heritage back in the days of the original Dragon Ball series. Bardock’s concept and appearance came long after Goku, and the only reason Bardock was drawn to look that way was because Goku looked like that.

One way to discern father and son apart is that Bardock has an X-shaped scar on his left cheek. It’s unknown what exactly gave him that scar; Saiyans got to battle practically every other day, so it could have been from anything. Another way to distinguish them is their outfits, with Bardock sporting the classic Saiyan Battle Armor and is occasionally seen with a scouter. Another iconic feature is his red headband that’s soaked with the blood of his friend Tora, who fell to Dodoria.

Turles’ Look Is Completely Coincidental?

Not as iconic as Bardock and not even canon to the main series, Turles is a Saiyan who deserted Frieza’s army, allowing him to survive the destruction of Planet Vegeta. He discovered the Tree of Might, which required the life force of entire planets to produce a fruit that made anyone who ate it immensely stronger. He went to Earth in hopes of planting the Tree of Might there but was confronted by someone who looked exactly like him, the Saiyan Kakarot. The main difference between the two is that Turles’ hairstyle includes “devil horns” where some of the spiky parts of his hair curl slightly upward, and the black Saiyan Battle Armor he wears.

Turles isn’t related to Goku, although an old issue of V-Jump and some localizations of the Tree of Might movie mistakenly stated that they’re brothers. The reason Turles looks like Goku is that low-class Saiyans were all raised similarly, and so several of them grew up to look alike. But obviously, not all low-class Saiyans look like Goku, and not all Goku lookalikes are low-class warriors. Case in point, the next Goku lookalike could have given Namek Saga Frieza a run for his money even as a kid.

Goten Is Goku’s Second Son

First appearing near the beginning of the Buu Saga, Goku’s second son and Gohan’s younger brother, Goten, is the spitting image of his father. Not only do their faces look the same, but Goten also wears an orange gi very similar to what Goku always wears, except Goten’s gi lacks a symbol on the chest and back. However, viewers will no longer be confused when Goten grows up, as his appearance is shown to change when he appears at the end of Dragon Ball Z, where his hairstyle resembles Yamcha’s more than it does Goku’s. In Dragon Ball GT, Goten resembles Gohan but with longer and slanted hair. This makes Goten unique in that he’s the only Goku lookalike whose appearance changes upon hitting puberty.

“Hey, I think there’s a little me hiding behind your leg, Chi-Chi!” – Goku upon first meeting Goten

Goku Jr. Is Goku’s Descendant

The second non-canon character to appear on this list is Goku’s descendant 100 years after the events of Dragon Ball GT, Goku Jr. Apart from him being descended from Goku, very little is known about Goku Jr. since his only appearance is toward the end of the series. Like Goten, he looks exactly like a young Goku, but instead of an orange gi, Goku Jr. has the outfit Goku wore for most of GT with the addition of a red headband.

Characters Who Look Like Goku Because They Stole His Body

Ginyu Is A Frieza Force Elite Who Body-Swapped with Goku

During the Namek Saga, Frieza realized that he needed reinforcements to help him gather the Dragon Balls and achieve immortality; and so he called on his most elite squad, the Ginyu Force. The team’s leader, Ginyu, had the unique power to switch bodies with anyone he wanted, and after seeing the battle potential a certain Saiyan from Earth had, he decided to switch bodies with him. Since this is literally Ginyu in Goku’s body, there’s almost no way to physically distinguish him from regular Goku. The only difference is that Ginyu in Goku’s body wears a scouter because he lacks the ability to detect ki signatures.

Goku Black Is a Supreme Kai Trainee Turned Evil

Zamasu, the next in line to be the Supreme Kai of Universe 10, viewed mortals as a plague upon the multiverse and must be purged. Ironically, he met Goku, a mortal who somehow had the power to keep up with, and sometimes even surpass the gods, including him. Wanting Goku’s power for himself to help him achieve his goal of eradicating all mortal life, Zamasu collected the Super Dragon Balls and wished to switch bodies with him. While in Goku’s body, Zamasu gains the monicker of Goku Black due to his outfit change, which, as you could probably guess, was mostly black.

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