When Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot was still in its early stages, one of the major selling points for the game was the introduction of a new character to Dragon Ball's canon designed by none other than series creator Akira Toriyama himself. Bonyu, a former member of the Ginyu force, provided an opportunity to implement new story ideas and represent a whole new group of people within the Dragon Ball franchise, but many feel that her potential was sorely wasted. With DLC 1 already done and DLC 2 on the way soon hopefully, there doesn't seem to be much room left for Bonyu to grow.
As a reminder to those that may have forgotten, Bonyu is only seen once in Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot, though she is mentioned a few times outside of that encounter. Players have the ability to fight a replica of her created by the training room thanks to salvaged battle data found in a Ginyu Force Attack Ball. She can be fought at various levels, but never appears in the story in any other capacity other than being mentioned by both Android 21 and other members of the Ginyu force if they're revived with the Dragon Balls.
Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot - Bonyu Replaced
Though it certainly wasn't the most glamorous of positions, Bonyu at the very least was mechanically important to Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot. Her training missions was the most lucrative repeatable fight in terms of experience in the game before DLC 1 released, so fans would end up getting very familiar with her dialogue lines and fighting style. Essentially, grinding Bonyu's training was the only realistic way to reach maximum level in Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot, and although it was a slow and grueling process, it at least made the character important in some capacity.
Now that DLC 1 has released, players have a new best way to level up: training with Whis. Not only does Whis provide more experience after each battle than Bonyu ever did, he also rewards the player with experience boosting items that easily more than double the rate of growth to get to level 250. With this one change, Bonyu's already inconsequential character has been made even further obsolete, leaving fans of the promising fighter left high and dry. Many are calling for Bonyu to be reinstated in some way, and hopefully in a more meaningful position than an experience grinding method.
Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot Training Room Update
There is still potential for Bonyu to shine, however, and the most promising method lies within the already existing training room and the mysterious "Female Researcher" who runs it. Of course, this female researcher is none other than Android 21 from Dragon Ball FighterZ, and she makes various appearances throughout the game at different key locations, leading many to believe that she is in fact up to something. This is purely speculation, but it is possible that Bandai Namco will expand the uses of the training room and Android 21's role in the story as a free update, opening up new opportunities for Bonyu and so much more.
DmGaming found a secret change made to the training room recently which hints at the potential for a training room update. Previously, whenever the player would start a training, it would enter them in with whatever team they used last. This was often very annoying (especially when farming Bonyu) as it could result in entering a fight with the wrong team. Now, rather than manually pressing a button to set up the party, the game automatically prompts the player to choose their team. This is a minor change, but it seems odd that Bandai Namco would return to a system which is essentially obsolete now and make such a change without telling anyone.
Bonyu's Power Level
One major issue with reintroducing Bonyu in Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot is that Goku and Vegeta already have access to Super Saiyan God and would likely have no problem dispatching her. Pinpointing her exact power level is difficult, though, as one has to decide which holds more weight: The gameplay or the narrative. In terms of narrative, the Ginyu force refer to Bonyu as the brains of the group, and it is insinuated that she is a brilliant strategist. That said, she isn't shown to be weak either, the only reason she left is because she was too practical and found their poses to be silly.
This likely places her at around Ginyu's level of power, but still well below Frieza himself from the Namek saga. Despite this narrative idea, the level 100 Bonyu simulation that players fight in the training room is easily more powerful than Frieza, as players will have access to Super Saiyan 3 and other powerful techniques before they can take her down. Theoretically the training is taken from existing battle data, but it simply wouldn't make sense narratively for someone that powerful to have existed amidst Frieza's forces, so the previous assumption of her being comparable to Ginyu probably still holds true.
Bonyu as Future DLC
Unfortunately, it should be said that there is almost no chance of Bonyu playing a major role in any of the future DLC. Obviously anything could happen, but given that DLC 1 decided to focus on the events of Battle of the Gods rather than being an original episode as was first promised, the rest of the new content probably continue down the path of Dragon Ball Super DLC.
There are a lot of potential villains for DBZ: Kakarot DLC 2 and a lot of potential story arcs for DLC 3, so Bonyu's odds of showing up in these releases is unlikely. That's why if there is going to be more depth afforded to Bonyu's character, it will need to be as part of a free content update which is made available to everyone. Whether this would be in the form of more training room missions or sub-stories which actually introduce her to the characters for real is anyone's guess, but most would agree that Bonyu is a character with a lot of untapped potential.
Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot is available now for PC, PS4, and Xbox One.