One Piece

Oda loves his ticking clocks so my theory is that in the Imu arc this will be having to stop I Can’t Believe It’s Not The Death Star from firing on an island we care about, probably Alabasta.

Edited by HamburgerTime on Apr 23rd 2024 at 1:38:25 PM

If Oda were to do a "Third Impact" in a similar way to Lulusia's destruction, it does make me wonder... How many people outside of the Strawhats would survive till the end of the series? Do you think Oda would be bold enough to wipe out major locations, like Alabasta, Skypiea, Water 7, Dressrosa, or Wano? Or maybe even more personal locations, like any of their home towns.

Edited by Rinsankajugin on Apr 23rd 2024 at 6:16:30 AM

So Adult Swim Latin America commited the EXACT SAME MISTAKE 4kids did. They outright skipped Loguetown, the Millenium Dragon Arc, THE FUCKING LABOON ARC AGAIN and even a bit of Whiskey Peak! I really hope this is not due to One Piece underperforming on their channel. They did this with WAY More popular anime so while its a RED FLAG its not a huge one.

Edited by AegisP on Apr 23rd 2024 at 4:22:59 AM

I just got a chance to hear that interview with Erica Schroeder. Yeah not earth shaking but I didn't know she had a meeting with 2000s era Toei about how Luffy should sound for the first 3 episodes of the 4kids dub. Thanks for the heads-up, Aegis P.

Thank you so much, I was starting to feel like I was really lame lol. BTW I wonder if Hideyuki Hori will be able to pull off the amazing gentleness of Kuma's character in the flashback. I know I should not worry, he's a veteran Seiyuu, but he also did Vinsmoke Judge and I hope that wont take over in my mind.

I saw a good joke, which went like:

• "Oh, so when Whitebeard forms a pirate crew who see him as a father and themselves as a family it's fine and everyone loves him, but when I, Donquixote Doflamingo-"

• "Oh, so when Trafalgar Law escapes his cultish pirate 'family' while stealing a Devil Fruit and killing subordinates it's fine and everyone loves him, but when I, Marshal D Teach-"

I wanna ask a question. To you, and by that I mean each one of YOU individually, what was Oda's biggest gamble in YOUR opinion. I am specific because if one if more objective there are probably bigger ones but still. Mine would be Whole Cake NOT ENDING with Judge beaten the shit out of. I already had a lot of trouble really relating to Sanji's plight, not even Ikue Ohtani's HEARTBREAKING performance as Sanji changed my mind, and with Judge not being made to face the music I didnt really feel why Oda did the arc at all. But then the Sanji vs Queen fight came and made me realize what Oda wanted to do with Sanji, living his best life and finding happiness and pursuing his dream is the best him for him to do for himself. Sanji's mask that was the last mental scar that needed to shattered in his heart. He rejected everything Judge planned out for him and became stronger for it in the end.

Is it low hanging fruit to say Yamato? We haven't seen how that'll pan out yet, of course.

Biggest gamble? Well, it's a toss-up between two choices.

1. Not having Vivi join, but instead a character who up until then had been a villain.

2. Spending two years of real time following only Luffy, with the other Straw Hats being completely absent except on cover pages.

Great choice, and dont worry, being a gamble means its a HUGE RISK not necessarily that it paid off. For me it did though, Yamato is such a great character.

Great choice too, we are off to a GREAT START.

Edited by AegisP on Apr 24th 2024 at 2:02:44 AM

Killing off Ace. Even his editor was asking him if he was sure on that decision, but i'd say it was worth it for Luffy's development.

I mean, I still like Yamato. I just mean "haven't seen how it pans out yet" as in I feel like there still needs to be more of a point to all that build up, to the point that Yamato is now one of the people who knows what Luffy's true dream is.

I mean, I suppose eventually the whole world will know, but still...

I just want it to be more then a narrative reasoning of "Yamato had to stay behind because he knows TOO much."

I do wonder if the Yamato cover story ends with him setting sail.

I assume the "Yamato stays behind to protect Wano" plot point is going to lead to a Blackbeard vs Yamato+Scabbards fight at some point in the future, when Blackbeard comes to steal Pluton.

You think The Five Elders will take the place of the next volume cover much like the CP9 on Volume 42?

(x9) Oda doing a gamble, eh...?

I will likely have to say Nico Robin joining, honestly. That was one of those slow burns: at the tail end of the masterful Baroque Works Saga (I am not calling it "The Alabasta Saga", bite me), the idea is that it's Vivi who's joining... so when she stays behind, with Robin joining instead, questions obviously get raised. Who the hell is this woman, to just... set up house at this Pirate Crew who, before this point she was against, and why is Luffy so on-board with her joining? (Sanji doesn't count, he's too easy.) And this was a slowburn that involved the Jaya Arc, the Skypeia Arc, and the Foxy Arc, absolutely legendary though Afro Luffy was, Luffy at peak power, for he was king... and honestly, the build-up was even worse for me, because back then, I was watching the anime, which added in a whole bunch of unwanted filler arcs (and the surprising banger of G8), and Foxy Round 3 was ongoing as well... but one has to wonder... what is up? Like, what is... happening here, why... wait, what are those... bicycle tire tracks there, and why is Robin looking... uncomfortable all of a sudden... and what is that mush-

Oh shit, that's not a mushroom, that's a Marine. Admiral. And instead of it being Usopp freaking out, it's Robin? What the FUCK was I looking at?

That, my friends... is the ominous signal... that The CP9 Saga had begun. An arc... to tell us everything about Robin. And bring in Franky, right, him.

Edited by Ego-Man25 on Apr 24th 2024 at 6:34:48 AM

Thanks for bringing the topic back, not because I am an attention whore but because I wanted to know more.

@Pushover Media Critic

In reference to the gag:

And you all thought it was a coincidence that Blackbeard and Trafalgar Law fought each other.

I'd say the biggest gamble is the mystical zoan Nika reveal. Not gear 5, but the part where the name and type of the DF is revealed to be a lie.

Honestly, much of that comes from the fact... that there was always something... off, about Luffy's Devil Fruit, even way back when we took it being a Paramecia at face value. Sure, the Paramecia part made sense, but it was doing things... weirdly well-suited for transformations, bringing about fire, electricity, and hell, even some flight, and obviously, the fact that Gear 4 was explicitly based on a Buddhist Wrath Deity, kinda made things weird there as well. Clearly there was a God Of Rubber in SOME mythology or another.

In retrospect, it being a Zoan also explains Luffy's stupidly high levels stamina levels.

Actually, a bit of a detour: a frequent co-writing buddy of mine (fellow insanely big mega One Piece fan), proposed an interesting saga name: The SMILE Saga. A saga name, entailing the following arcs in order:

• Punk Hazard
• Dressrosa
• Zou
• Totland Archipelago
• Reverie
• Wano

What do we think? Honestly, I agree with him, it makes sense, and honestly, Caeser Clown and the Fake Devil Fruit operations DO ultimately tie everything together.

I have seen people group those arcs into one big saga before. Though so far I had only seen it be called the "Emperor/Yonko Saga".

Edited by uncertanSearcher on Apr 25th 2024 at 7:13:54 PM

The way I like to look at the structure of Post-Timeskip is like this:

I'll definitely say that Oda has bled these sagas into each other, far more than he ever did before, in which you weave in one, out the other, cross them over together, before they finally collide together at terminal impact, pertaining to the Raid At Onigashima. These sagas, these arcs for that matter, weren't cleanly divided up, or neatly organized, in contrast with Pre-Timeskip having it as East Blue Saga, Baroque Works Saga, Skypeia Saga, CP9 Saga, and Paramount War Saga. It was deliberately very murky with the timeskip there... and I think that was by design. Things only cleared up, the instant that Kaido was finally defeated.