One Piece

I hope it's a trap. It'd suck if Oda set this up, only to then shut it down at the last second. I don't think he'd do that however.

I honestly don't have a lot to say about this chapter. I have some reservations, but I want to wait and see how things play out.

Marcus Mars and V. Nusjuro have cemented their place as the coolest of the Five Elders. They're so organized in doing what they want to do.

Also did you see Usopp immediately going for the attack once Saturn was going towards them??? Imagine if he was the one to permanently damage one of them! It would be peak.

Has anyone shared Melon Tees Sanji analysis?

I think every single one of her videos has been shared here.

Did anyone else find it visually hard to read this chapter?

Not more so than usual. Actually, less so than usual, I thought this chapter was pretty well laid-out, and I usually don't have much difficulty reading Oda's paneling. The only thing that was a bit confusing was where York was when she was talking to Mars, since I couldn't see her in the wide shots.

The most recent episode made me realize that the Dawn Rocket paralleled the Giant Pistol. I didn't notice when reading, but it was definitely on purpose, since this line:

Mirrors this line:

And as far as power scaling goes, I had the Elders on A+ tier, but now that we've seen that Warcury is so durable that a Red Roc inflicts recoil damage (the same sort of thing we saw when Luffy's punches clashed with Katakuri's Edged Mochi), I'm moving them up to S- tier, about on par with Gear 4 Luffy and the Admirals.

Though that might be something specific to Warcury rather then all of them, since from what I can find is the mythological Fengxi said to have impenetrable skin.

My boy Franky getting the OHKO! I really like Oda establishing that the non-monster trio members can now more than hold their own.

I'm with Uncertain. I feel like they're Puzzle Bosses, and once one figures out the trick... well they won't go down easy, but they'll be far more manageable.

I've made that same comparison before in either this or the spoiler thread. The Elders aren't going to be a contest of raw power and technique like Kaido was. Instead, the trick will be figuring out the particular weaknesses of their forms.

I figure Blackbeard will be more of a Final-Exam Boss due to having multiple powers to handle at once.

Edited by M84 on Apr 22nd 2024 at 12:12:11 AM

I'm of the same opinion regarding the Five Elders, and I do like it when arc antagonists aren't just getting stronger as each new on is introduced, but instead present different challenges for the protagonists.

Rurouni Kenshin did something like that, where the second arc antagonist was mentioned as being less skilled of a fighter than the previous arc antagonist, but the tricky thing about him was that he used a style specifically meant to counter the protagonist's fighting style AND the protagonist was somewhat burdened by his inner demons coming back in full force.

Edited by dragonfire5000 on Apr 21st 2024 at 9:16:12 AM

The person in charge of uploading One Piece clips to Youtube is doing great work with their titles again.

One commenter pointed something out I hadn't thought of before: This attack is like combining Red Hawk (or whatever the Conqueror's Haki version of that would be called), Jet Culverin, and of course Rocket. I think so far, Gear 5's had a really great showing of that "I can do everything I wanted to!" line of Luffy's.

Damn, I'm so excited for Luffy vs. Kizaru now. I think the anime's gonna do a fantastic job with it.

Edited by diddyknux on Apr 22nd 2024 at 3:11:40 AM

Oh God. Toei is SERIOUSLY committed to having the animation go through an animation bump EACH TIME Gear 5 appears!

Just 'cause it's on my mind, one of my big naive hopes for The One Piece is that they actually fix Sanji's moveset. Oda is actually shockingly consistent on what motions Sanji does for what moves, and the Toei anime constantly changes and alters his fight choreography. Long rant below:

There are countless more examples I could point to of this, but generally, my point is just that I hope The One Piece doesn't make this mistake in assuming that all of Sanji's moves are interchangeable kicks with no meaningful differences between them.

A pretty good theory that the Five Elders' Devil Fruits correspond to the levels of Impel Down.

• Level 1, Crimson Hell: Saturn

• Level 2, Wild Beast Hell: Warcury

• Level 3, Starvation Hell: Ju Peter

• Level 4, Blazing Hell: Mars

• Level 5, Frozen Hell: V. Nusjuro

And then Level 6, Eternal Hell, which is kept secret, would be Imu.

Though that raises the question of Level 5.5.

Edited by PushoverMediaCritic on Apr 23rd 2024 at 3:53:42 AM

Well, the Government didn't build 5.5, the inmates did. It doesn't have to match the theme.

Oh, for sure it doesn't. Especially if the similarities are intentional in-universe. But I'm sure it's not there for no reason, if this is intentional, Oda probably penned a parallel to it.

Maybe Lily will turn out to be 5.5?

For next chapter, I'm guessing Usopp, Nami, and Chopper will fight Saturn until Jimbei shows up to save them, and Franky, Bonney, and Atlas fight V. Nusjuro until Sanji arrives to save them.

I know the first 3 WILL need help no matter what, but cant we have Franky have a fight?

Inspired by the fact that I’ve had “Komm, susser tod” stuck in my head lately… think OP will have its own “Third Impact moment?” Not necessarily a direct reference like FMA did, but just in the sense of a big dramatic sequence where it seems like all is lost for literally everyone?

I don't know Full Metal Alchemist to know what that refers to, but an "all is lost" moment?

I mean, Luffy died for a bit in the last arc. Granted, it was only for a chapter.

This last chapter ended on quite a "everything seems to be turning bad" feeling, but I think in this case its the kind where next chapter that'll all be turned on its head - That's been kind of the pattern of this arc's back and forth.

Darkest Hour, basically.

The Fullmetal Alchemist moment described above is (spoilers for the manga, obviously) a moment where the big bad managed to rip out the souls of almost every person in the country, including some major character, in order to power up to god-like levels of power.

Edited by dragonfire5000 on Apr 23rd 2024 at 12:41:28 PM

I'm sure Blackbeard or Imu can provide a sufficient Darkest Hour. Lulusia Kingdom's destruction may have been a warning of a potential one.