Remember playing with your friends as a child, pretending to power up and reach Super Saiyan status? At the time, the golden hair that accompanied the transformation didn't warrant any questions. It just was. As we got older though, we started to question its purpose. Why is it that Goku's hair changes color when he powers up to the Super Saiyan level? The answer to that question has finally been revealed.
According to Kotaku and the Japanese publication Topic News, Weekly Jump editor Hiroyuki Nakano appeared on Japanese television to finally answer fan's questions about Goku's hair change. Although many Dragon Ball fans were expecting something much more complicated, the answer was simple. Dragon Ball started as a manga, or Japanese comic book, before it was converted into an anime show. Dragon Ball creator and illustrator Akira Toriyama spent hours drawing the manga every day, and yearned for a way to utilize his time. According to Nakano, Toriyama decided to make Super Saiyan hair golden, because it saved time. For the manga, which is published in black and white, Toriyama would spend a good portion of his time coloring in the black hair that Goku, Vegeta, and other Saiyans normally have. By turning their hair gold, Toriyama eliminated the necessity to color their hair, because it would print in the comics as white regardless.
We're glad that Toriyama decided to maximize his time, or else we would never have our golden-haired Super Saiyans!