Piccolo (Dragon Ball) - Appearance

Appearance

When King Piccolo was introduced in chapter #135 The Conspiracy of Kuririn's Death Comes Fearfully (クリリンの死そして恐ろしき陰謀, Kuririn no Shi Soshite Osoroshiki Inbō?) first published in Shonen Jump on August 10, 1987, he was designed to appear as a strange-looking divine creature, who had pointy ears, antennae, fangs and four-fingers (changed to five in the anime). The audience is later introduced to Kami, who is King Piccolo's good counterpart, and the two share an almost identical resemblance. Like Kami, King Piccolo wore a kanji on the front of his gi, symbolizing the kanji that represented himself. When Piccolo Jr. is introduced, Toriyama designed him to appear roughly the same as King Piccolo, but Piccolo Jr. looked younger even after King Piccolo regained his youth. Piccolo Jr. also wore a large white cape with shoulder spikes all throughout the series and a white turban (His weighted training gear.) King Piccolo only wore a cape (without shoulder spikes) before he fought kid Goku and did not have it after the battle. He also made the character discard the kanji. Even though Piccolo Jr. discards the kanji, he uses it once in the series when he made his pupil, Gohan, a uniform.

Piccolo is one of the few major characters in the series whose appearance does not drastically change as the series continues except that he is noticeably taller by the end of the series. Being from another planet called Namek, Piccolo appears as a typical Namekian: green-skinned, tall, and hairless. Note that in the manga, Piccolo, as well as all other Namekians, have only three fingers and an opposable thumb on each hand. In the anime, all Namekians (Piccolo included) have an additional finger on each hand, making it more human-like. Piccolo is known for his white turban and long white cape. He wears purple pants and shirt underneath his cape, with a red belt in the Manga (as seen on the cover illustrations) and a blue belt in the Anime. In a single filler episode in the anime, Piccolo is seen wearing an old outfit of Goku's when both of them are forced to go to driving school by Goku's wife, Chi-Chi.