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Master Roshi
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This article is about the original character. For the character portrayed in live-action by Chow Yun-Fat, see Roshi/Dragonball Evolution.

"Goku... Krillin... You're the ones who showed this old fossil he still had something left to give. That it was too soon to let the limits of age sentence him to sit idly by on the sidelines. You boys who were never content to stop, who kept aiming for and climbing greater and greater heights want me to take it easy? Now, listen to me, boys! Always remember these words: Work hard, study well, and eat and sleep plenty! That is the Turtle Hermit way! We must master the art of peace in addition to the art of war! The Turtle Hermit School will be with you... always! This will be my greatest, most powerful Kamehameha!"
— Master Roshi towards Goku and Krillin in "A Valiant Fight! Master Roshi's Blaze of Glory!"


Master Roshi (てんろう Muten Rōshi, lit. "Old Heavenly Martial Arts Master"), also known as the Turtle Hermit (かめせんにん Kame Sen'nin) (or Turtle ( Kame)[6] in his youth) and God of Martial Arts (武道の神様 Budō no Kami-sama), is a perverted hermit and a master of martial arts. He lives on his own isolated island called Kame House, where he may be willing to train students who travel to his doorstep. He is also the originator of the Kamehameha Wave.

Despite his lecherous tendencies and his old age, Roshi is an extremely respected and capable warrior, serving as the master of Gohan, Ox-King, Goku, Krillin, and Yamcha. His drive to push his students to new heights and support them on their martial arts journeys makes him one of the most notable supporting characters in the series.

Appearance[]

Master Roshi is bald, with a thick white fu manchu mustache and beard. He is almost always seen wearing his trademark sunglasses; sometime later Master Roshi left his old sunglasses and began to wear more futuristic ones. He wears beach clothes or a martial arts suit and a Turtle Shell on his back. He usually wields a walking stick. His bust, waist and hip measurement are all 73cm.[7] When disguised as Jackie Chun, Master Roshi glues a wig of white hair onto his head.

In Dragon Ball Z: Battle of Gods, Master Roshi wears a pink shirt and white shorts with crocs. In Dragon Ball Z: Resurrection ‘F’, Master Roshi wears a white tank top and green flip flops.

When he was a teenager while training under Master Mutaito and Korin, it is shown that he had black hair and wore a black pair of sunglasses along with a bluish-purple Qipao style martial arts uniform. He was also noted by Bulma to be very handsome, shocked to see how Roshi turned out in old age. During the King Piccolo wars, his head was shaven, and he wore a purple Mutaito Training Academy Gi like the rest of Mutaito's students at the time including Master Shen. He also did not wear any sunglasses during this time.

In Dragon Ball Super, Master Roshi wears the pink shirt outfit in the God of Destruction Beerus Saga and the white tank top outfit in the Golden Frieza Saga as he did in the movies.

During the Galactic Patrol Prisoner Saga, while acting as a Deputized Galactic Patrolman, his white shirt similar to the one he wore during the Tournament of Power features the Galactic Patrol symbol.

Personality[]

"But, you know, my lessons don't come free. You must find me a young gal! It's the only way I can start training you."
— Master Roshi towards Goku in "Goku's Rival"

Roshi nose bleeding

Roshi gets a nosebleed after seeing Bulma lift up her nightgown

Master Roshi is over three hundred years old at the start of the series and provides various stories to explain his longevity. Roshi enjoys eating home delivered pizza,[3] which serves as a tongue-in-cheek joke because Roshi lives so far out into the ocean. He also enjoys reading, watching TV, using the internet (mainly for adult sites), playing video games and taking afternoon naps.[3] He is a very lecherous pervert who constantly watches Wide-Thigh Aerobics on television or looks at Dirty Magazines in his spare time. He even accepts a bribe from Bulma to show him her panties in exchange for a Dragon Ball early in the series (and got a very big surprise, as Bulma unknowingly was not wearing any panties when she exposed herself). Master Roshi often makes humorous sexual advances on any beautiful woman he can get close enough to; usually Bulma or Launch in Dragon Ball or Maron, Android 18, or Chi-Chi in Dragon Ball Z. He firmly believes that he is the ultimate stud and very cool, even though his fashion sense and mannerisms seem to be at least a few generations out of style. His lechery is apparently a relatively recent development, as he was once able to ride the Flying Nimbus, an ability he has lost by the time he passes it on to Goku. Aside from his lechery, he was also somewhat of an alcoholic, as implied in the Japanese version of The Fire-Eater where he admitted he gave misleading information about the Hikui Bird in his book regarding the Bansho Fan because at the time he wrote it, he had been severely drunk (the dub changes this to him admitting he made the entire thing up so he could impress girls), and confirmed in the Japanese version of Broly - The Legendary Super Saiyan. Although he is dedicated to training his students in the way of the Turtle School, he will nonetheless tell off his students when they are practicing the Kamehameha wave because the water is ruining his magazines. The only time he did not tell off one of his students for this when practicing the Kamehameha wave was when Krillin tried to practice it in order to get his mind off his breakup with Maron, partially because he was asleep when it happened.

Master Roshi angry

Master Roshi wishing he could have done something to prevent the death of his students

Roshi cares deeply for his students to the point he entered the World Martial Arts Tournament in the guise of a martial named "Jackie Chun" to ensure they would lose the tournament as he felt they might lose interest in the martial arts if they won it too easily due to the great strength they had obtained through his training. While this may have been true for a fellow Earthling martial artist like Krillin, Roshi was unaware that Goku was actually a Saiyan who would never lose interest in fighting due to the Saiyan's inborn love of fighting until many years later after the arrival of Raditz, though through a story he heard from Goku's Grandpa Gohan he did known that Goku was the elder Gohan's adoptive grandson and may have suspected the boy's potential alien origins from the story Gohan told him. As a result, Roshi found a tough opponent in the young Saiyan, and it took all of his skill, power, and abilities to defeat Goku during final match of the tournament. Also during the tournament he showed compassion to Nam by explaining he did not need the prize money to buy water after he was defeated by Goku and gives him a capsule to store water from a well, although in exchange for his help Roshi asks Nam to help him protect his secret identity from his students by having him impersonate Master Roshi in the audience and convince his students that Jackie Chun and Master Roshi were separate people. He is also shown to be quite intelligent as he managed to figure out the Moon was the cause of Goku's Great Ape transformation and correctly deduced that destroying it would cause Goku to return to normal and prevent any further transformations (Piccolo would later use this very same tactic in Dragon Ball Z to stop Gohan's transformation in the Vegeta Saga as well as prevent Nappa and Vegeta from using the Moon to transform). Despite his skirt-chasing antics, Master Roshi is still a very wise and kind-hearted person who loves those around him like his own grandchildren. He openly enjoys life and its simple pleasures but is willing to die for an honorable cause if necessary. Despite being immortal Roshi dies when attempting to utilize the Evil Containment Wave against King Piccolo (who was freed during the King Piccolo Saga), which shows that his immortality only prevents him from dying from old age and thus is not completely immortal. He appears in most of the Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z movies, usually as comic relief, though in The World's Strongest and Resurrection ‘F’ he actively participates in the fight alongside the other Z Fighters.

In Dragon Ball Super, it is implied that the Paradise Herb is the source of Master Roshi's unnaturally long life. He claims that eating some of it will allow him to live on for another 1,000 years.[8]

In the Universe Survival Saga of Dragon Ball Super, he is recruited as a member of Team Universe 7 after Goku fights Master Roshi at 100% MAX Power when he is turned into a Jiang Shi controlled by Yurin. It is revealed that Master Roshi had secretly been training, and even Goku is surprised at how powerful he is and is excited by the idea of fighting his former master again when he is serious (Goku is still unaware that he fought Roshi in the World Martial Arts Tournament, having never learned that Master Roshi was Jackie Chun).

During the Tournament of Power, Roshi's compassion for his students and tactical fighting style were made prominent when he focused on eliminating the trickier fighters (such as Dercori), knowing that Goku (and his teammates by extension) were prone to getting tripped up by deceptive foes. In addition, he was wary of fighters such as Ganos who rapidly improved their fighting performance and sought to deal with them before they became a threat to Team Universe 7. He was also willing to put his life on the line to eliminate Ganos by using a Kamehameha powered by his own life energy. This compassion was reciprocated by his students, who were both desperate to save Roshi when he nearly passed away afterwards (Goku succeeding in doing so and tearfully embracing him when he got back up).

In the manga version of the tournament, Roshi's influence on Goku extended more directly to his fight against Jiren when Roshi himself confronted the Pride Trooper in order to teach Goku a valuable martial arts lesson, reminding him about the Turtle School way and the advice of his other mentors before using his experience to briefly and surprisingly outmaneuver Jiren. Despite Jiren eliminating Roshi soon after, the hermit's words impacted Goku so greatly that it enabled him to tap into a sign of the answer Roshi told him to search for, ultimately allowing Goku to - as Roshi taught him - conquer himself. In addition, during the Galactic Patrol Prisoner Saga, it was mentioned by Merus that Ultra Instinct would activate when the user achieved self-control in the face of a jarring shock to their emotions, further pronouncing Goku's value of Roshi's teachings.

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