List of Dragon Ball Z episodes (season 1)

The Saiyan Saga is the first season of the Dragon Ball Z anime series. The episodes are produced by Toei Animation, and are based on volumes 17-21 of the Dragon Ball manga series by Akira Toriyama. The episodes focus on Son Goku as he learned about his Saiyan heritage and battles Raditz, Nappa, and Vegeta, three other Saiyans who want Goku to join them and help them destroy all life on Earth.

The 39-episode season originally ran from April 1989 until March 1990 in Japan on Fuji Television. The first English airing of the series was from September 1996 until September 1997 on The WB and UPN in the United States, in a heavily edited, dubbed format released by Geneon Entertainment. In August 2004, Geneon lost its license for the first 67 episodes of the series, and it was relicensed by Funimation, which already owned the license for the remainder of the Dragon Ball Z series. Funimation redubbed the episodes, restoring the removed content and redoing the voiced cast. The new dub aired on Cartoon Network in 2005. They also aired in Canada, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Australia, and the Republic of Ireland.

Funimation originally released these episodes in their edited, dub-only format in 1999, but were later re-released as "Ultimate Uncut Edition" volumes in 2005 where the new dub was used. These volumes were later cancelled and Funimation began releasing season box sets, with the first released on February 6, 2007. In June 2009, Funimation announced that they would be re-releasing Dragon Ball Z in a new seven volume set called the "Dragon Boxes". Based on the original series masters with frame-by-frame restoration, the first set was released November 10, 2009.

Two pieces of theme music were used throughout the season. The opening theme, "Cha-La Head-Cha-La", is performed by Hironobu Kageyama and the ending theme, "Detekoi Tobikiri Zenkai Power!" (でてこいとびきりＺＥＮＫＡＩパワー！) is performed by Manna.