I think he’s the movie counterpart to Imperfect Cell/Android 16. The movie states Super 13 is Gero’s strongest creation, while the Daizenshuu says it’s 16 (After Cell ofc), so I give them equal status.
Fun fact: He didn’t forget her, he wrote her off the story and later thought he forgot about her because fans assumed he did.
https://www.kanzenshuu.com/rumor/akira-toriyama-forgot-lunch/
That's obvious. The question was whether it was Viz or Toyotaro that wrote it like that. This was the first time we see GF in the manga, so I could see Toyo making Goku the audience surrogate and saying "Look it's Freeza's new form!". That or awkward wording.
I remember Goku talks like he hasn't seen Golden Freeza before when Freeza transforms vs Caulifla. Not sure if that was Viz or just Toyo trying to hype the manga debut of Golden Freeza.