- Joined
- Mar 21, 2019
Okay, but you're imposing depth that isn't there. You're right that he is only 4 when he says this, but he's only 5 when he faces off against an alien invasion and decides he's going to Namek. If you want to walk down the path of what is reasonable psychologically and considering his actual age, Chichi is absolutely in the right, because it is horrifying to consider this prepubescent boy, who is so young he should still be learning how to color in a coloring book and starting his path down reading a few words at a time, is hurtling across space without his parents and getting his neck broken in battle. If you want to consider actual psychological implications of that, the fact that Gohan stopped having consistent parenting from ages 4 to maybe 6, spent his tweens isolated in an empty reality with only his dad for company and only training to do, only to immediately watch his dad die in front of him over something he blamed himself for...forget becoming a scholar, Gohan would not be functional as a person come Buu saga. He at best would be extremely developmentally stunted and behave more like Goten's age.
That is clearly not the case, and so we can't really examine too closely things like 'but he was a toddler'. The story treats Gohan as if he's old enough to make decisions, and Gohan says he wants to be a scholar. He doesn't later change this, so we should assume this persists.
Piccolo is more of the cool uncle than Gohan's dad. Gohan is like the kid that the bachelor brother of Goku could never have, who had problems with his dad growing up and doesn't think he'd be a good dad himself. People don't really trust Piccolo, but he bonds with Goku's kid anyway and while Gohan thinks Piccolo is super cool and goes through this awkward phase where he tries to dress like him and thinks it's cool while everyone else cringes about it, Gohan's trust and care for Piccolo saves Piccolo from his own daddy issues and self doubt and belief that he had only one path in life. Much like the 'cool uncle' trope, he's also made the godfather of Gohan's daughter.
It's not intentionally meant to be a mirror of that kind of trope, but if you're going to fit Piccolo into a role of male familial figure to Gohan, it's 'cool uncle' not 'real dad'. If you consider the actual role of fatherhood, Piccolo's not particularly any better at that with Gohan than Goku.
