Frieza

, also known and spelled as Freeza in Funimation's English subtitles and Viz Media's release of the manga, is a fictional character in the Dragon Ball manga series created by Akira Toriyama. He makes his debut in Chapter #247: "Dark Clouds Swirl Over Planet Namek", first published in Weekly Shōnen Jump magazine on October 24, 1989, as the main antagonist of his eponymous saga, depicted as a galactic tyrant feared as the most powerful being in the universe. Despite not appearing until the manga's second half, Frieza is widely considered to be the most iconic villain from the Dragon Ball franchise, since he effectively serves as the catalyst of many of the events depicted in the story, due to the destruction of the Saiyan homeworld Planet Vegeta at his hands and Goku's arrival on Earth and subsequent conflicts with Raditz, Nappa and Vegeta. Frieza later appears as the primary villain in the theatrical film Dragon Ball Z: Resurrection 'F' and as a recurring character in Dragon Ball Super. Creation and conception Frieza, a broker who forcibly takes over planets to resell them, often rendering the planet's population extinct first, was created around the time of the Japanese economic bubble and was inspired by real estate speculators, whom Toriyama called the "worst kind of people." Toriyama purposely does not draw bad guys so unscrupulous that it affects one psychologically, although he admits Frieza is close. Therefore, he paid special attention to how Frieza spoke; because villains typically speak rudely, he gave him polite speech making for an unsettling contrast with his cruelty. The character's name is a pun on freezer, and because of this, his minions and the members of the Ginyu Force are named after fruits and dairy products, items one would normally put in a refrigerator. The Shenlong Times issue #2, a bonus pamphlet given to some buyers of the Daizenshuu 2: Story Guide guidebook, says that Frieza was modeled after Toriyama's editor at the time, Yū Kondō. Toriyama had the idea to bring Frieza back while attending a concert by the metal band Maximum the Hormone. It came to him while watching them perform their 2008 song "F", which is about the fictional character.