May 8, 12:59 PM
One Piece Log #03: Water 7 Saga Concluded!
Anime Relations:
One Piece
I wasn't really feeling like immediately typing out my feelings after finishing this saga, but right now I'm in the middle of another arc in OP and i don't want to stack logs and then eventually abandon them, so here we go. This might literally be the best arc yet story-wise. A lot of things happened at similar times and I'm really excited to see how they're all going to accumulate.
Watch Point: S 12 EP 24 (EP 349)
As you can see, I'm actually already a bit far away from where the Water 7 saga ended, it was because after the arc ended, i was full on riding on the One Piece high that i just straight up continued watching without taking a break, could you blame me? It was a very exciting and hype ending to a very long for-the-most-part good saga that I didn't really feel burnt out and instead wanted to see more, more of the strawhats, more of the vibrant and fantastical world of One Piece, but I'm here to rewind, so I will do that.
First of all, I'm going to ignore the existence of the whole Davy Back Fight bullshit. It was bad, I did not have a fun time, these weird story tropes of main characters facing an obviously rigged competition but still trying to play fairly always piss me off, period.
Then, first off, the first arc of the saga: Water 7 arc. This arc is mainly introduction and exploration. The first arc that introduced large-scale strawhat crew infighting and leaving. Water 7 as a location is probably one of my favorite towns in the OP universe. It's obviously Venice-inspired for most of its city structure, mainly the canals, but as a city, Water 7 is really pretty and nice, and also, it's ruled by a government leader that with blue-collar worker origins, what a breath of fresh air from the usual cities having a very controlling military or government. I guess we needed a balancer for the introduction of the very frustrating World Government lmao, and of course the introduction of CP9.
This arc has two main storylines involving the crew; Luffy and Usopp fighting that led to Usopp leaving the crew, and Robin disappearing after getting a cryptic message from a masked dude while exploring the area. I just want to say, while i completely empathized with Usopp and his unwillingness to let go of Merry, it was a selfish choice from a man that has been having a terrible blow to his self-worth, and is now in denial, and that it's in moments like these i appreciate Zoro's "apathy" and level-headedness, truly the Captain's second. Their duel was depressing to watch and watching them separate after that left me feeling pretty miserable. It was the crew's first big rift, though it was just Usopp vs. the crew, i wonder if one day we'll have an Avengers: Civil War style infighting where there's two sides with their own agendas, that would be interesting but i kind of don't want to see that ever happening. The charm of the crew is their strong bond and loyalty to Luffy as their captain so call me weak but I'm not really a fan of these infighting conflicts.
Robin disappearing as well as the further introduction of Iceberg and his fixation towards Robin being the key to world destruction. I just want to say right now, they did a pretty great job in making me also suspicious of Iceberg. I suspected all of the Galley-la company important people were either evil or have their own agenda, but I didn't expect half of them to actually turn out to be evil /except/ Iceberg, and his connection to Franky, or Cutty Flam. It was a very exciting turn of events and really made me go on a binge just because i needed to know how it ended.
It's pretty great, I already know that Robin probably had some very valid reason to leave the crew by looking at her flashbacks when the crew met Aokiji for the first time, but knowing that part of the deal was to let the strawhats go and leave without harm is so- eugh- i felt my heart sliced to pieces.
The whole Water 7 arc is pretty dynamic honestly, really explored the city and not much of a dull moment as the crew are almost always moving to /do/ something. After letting Usopp go they immediately search for Robin, but in the middle of that they then became fugitives wanted for the attempted murder of the mayor, and then it went from searching for Robin to ambushing the Galley-la company for some answers, except for our Ladies Man Sanji-kun who was locked in on his mission to find/save Robin. It kind of dragged a little in this point but i could understand why since they're setting up for the next arc, but it's kind of unfortunate that once again it's following the "Luffy gets separated from everyone, fights one guy, is out of commission until the next big fight" formula, but it's okay, all is forgiven because that scene with Nami jumping from rooftop to rooftop in desperation to get to Luffy to scream at his face that Robin is giving up her life for the crew was gold, what would they do without Nami fr fr.
Enter Enies Lobby arc, train portion. I think the joint attacks of Sogeking, Franky, and Sanji were one of my favorite fights in this arc, it's so fun and Sanji was real cool :)
The train portion was a fine transition between two locations, made the travel pretty exciting, and also scary for all the characters involved who are underprepared in fighting the rest of the CP9 members. Usopp's desperate encouraging words trying to convince Robin to come back sounded like he's trying to convince himself instead, pretty emotional stuff. Franky also quickly rose to become one of my favorite characters not going to lie, by the end of this saga he's literally in my top 5 favorite characters, which i did NOT expect, since i usually like the visually convenient-looking characters, so this was exciting for me, it's a first!
Getting it out of the way, i'm just going to complain right now about my two main annoyances of the Enies Lobby arc. First, i don't know what the fuck they were thinking of throwing all these fucking fillers and recap episodes in the MIDDLE of a very serious showdown after Luffy just fucking declared a war on the World Fucking Government. As you can probably tell i remember nothing about those fillers and i pretty much sped up and skip over all of the recap scenes because i was so annoyed. BUT! The filler i appreciated kind of was the Edo period AU filler, i would've LOVED a back-to-back 5 or even 10 episode filler set in that AU, if the shitty Davy Back Fight could have a dozen episodes dedicated to it then so can this one. But no, they fumbled and instead dropped this in the middle of possibly the most intense and high-stakes One Piece has ever been at that point, and to that i stressfully raise my shoulders and ask, /WHY?/
Second, very quick because i could go on but bitchass Spanda motherfucker needs to die, fuckass useless fucking dude, nepo baby weakling coward motherfucker who's only brave enough to be violent when the other literally couldn't fight back. I was very satisfied seeing what happened to him and i genuinely hope there's zero fucking redemption for him, i hope he dies, he needs to pay for what he did to Robin. Thank you for coming to my TED talk, continuing on.
Ah, Nico Robin-chan, the light of my life. Her origin story ruined me. It was so heartbreaking, and it's pretty obvious before but it really made me appreciate the way Oda presented that in the world of One Piece, there is no good and bad organizations, but good people are good and evil people are truly, my god, eugh. Robin who never trusted anyone because of how they all treated her, how she's trying her best to live as her mother's wishes but because of it she has to constantly be in survival mode. Then, when she finally thought she found her peace they came back for her and threaten her new found family. I think I genuinely cried when she shouted "I want to live!" that's just, raw emotional truth. So good, probably one of my favorite moments yet.
I don't really want to talk about the strawhats vs. CP9 showdowns because for most of it it was pretty meh for me. One improvement was Nami's, i love it, it's a major upgrade compared to her plot armor fight in Alabasta arc. Zoro and Sogeking's goofy fight was fine, loved the Ashura imagery on his nine-sword style, Usopp having his moment, Chopper introducing Monster Point, and Sanji being out of commission early on because of his fuckass chivalry but was redeemed after he introduced Diable Jamble. And of course, star of the upgrade showcases: Luffy's gear second and third!
While i see a lot of people complain on their out-of-nowhere upgrades, in this case i actually like it, OP is clearly a very compact show with a lot of things to show and tell, so a training arc could maybe slow it down a bit and kind of, i guess, dampen the hype of an upgrade being introduced? Also I don't know if it's confirmed or anything but I'd like to think that they've always been able to do their upgrades, they just don't because they don't have enough energy or the skill yet to make it stable, anyway!
I've mentioned how the main storyline involving the crew are Usopp vs. Luffy and Robin disappearing, but there's actually also one more. It's Merry :( The reveal that the ghost Usopp saw fixing the ship during the Skypiea arc was Merry's soul materializing out of the crew's love for it was so :( It was honestly a great set-up for making Merry the Deus Ex Machina during the near end of the arc, it made it make sense and also more emotional. In the world of OP where you eat a fruit and gain devil powers, of course a ship could manifest a sentient soul when the ones aboard treasure it so :( I didn't cry during the funeral scene but man was it sad, a goodbye to an old friend.
It's mostly my opinions but objectively, this is the best arc/saga yet for me, the flaws are the fuckass fillers in the middle of high tension scenes but if we ignore that this was the most packed, engaging, full of rollercoaster moments arc I've experienced. The length between arcs could've been shorter, but that's just classic OP for you. And we actually got a new member not only joining the crew and build them a new and improved ship, but /also/ entered my top 5 favorite OP characters! Welcome aboard Franky!
+ the post-Enies Lobby filler arcs while they prepare for the new arc were pretty good too, my favorite of course is the Sanji-focused episode :) But the Zoro one was pretty fun too. Luffy's grandpa and dad was introduced very out of the blue too that made me go w h a t, and also old friends! I was told Koby would get a glow up and glow up he did. And lastly, they all have bounties now! The way they've somehow turned getting a bounty to a wholesome reunion with the ones the crew left behind to go on their journey, I love it.
If i were to rank it now, it would be:
1. Water 7 Saga (4/5)
2. Sky Island Saga (2.5/5)
= East Blue Saga (3.5/5)
3. Alabasta Saga (mainly Alabasta arc) (2.5/5)
I feel like my ranking isn't that controversial, my One Piece experience pretty much been universal. Once you get the groove of OP's pacing (well for me i kind of cheated by watching it in 1.5x) and get sucked into the world and care deeply for these characters, you'd have a real good time, and endless, bottomless, infinite, and i just have to clarify, a LOT of content, even outside the anime itself. So I'm very excited, multiple friends have told me that the next arc is really sad, even sadder than this one so I'm looking forward to it!
Watch Point: S 12 EP 24 (EP 349)
As you can see, I'm actually already a bit far away from where the Water 7 saga ended, it was because after the arc ended, i was full on riding on the One Piece high that i just straight up continued watching without taking a break, could you blame me? It was a very exciting and hype ending to a very long for-the-most-part good saga that I didn't really feel burnt out and instead wanted to see more, more of the strawhats, more of the vibrant and fantastical world of One Piece, but I'm here to rewind, so I will do that.
First of all, I'm going to ignore the existence of the whole Davy Back Fight bullshit. It was bad, I did not have a fun time, these weird story tropes of main characters facing an obviously rigged competition but still trying to play fairly always piss me off, period.
Then, first off, the first arc of the saga: Water 7 arc. This arc is mainly introduction and exploration. The first arc that introduced large-scale strawhat crew infighting and leaving. Water 7 as a location is probably one of my favorite towns in the OP universe. It's obviously Venice-inspired for most of its city structure, mainly the canals, but as a city, Water 7 is really pretty and nice, and also, it's ruled by a government leader that with blue-collar worker origins, what a breath of fresh air from the usual cities having a very controlling military or government. I guess we needed a balancer for the introduction of the very frustrating World Government lmao, and of course the introduction of CP9.
This arc has two main storylines involving the crew; Luffy and Usopp fighting that led to Usopp leaving the crew, and Robin disappearing after getting a cryptic message from a masked dude while exploring the area. I just want to say, while i completely empathized with Usopp and his unwillingness to let go of Merry, it was a selfish choice from a man that has been having a terrible blow to his self-worth, and is now in denial, and that it's in moments like these i appreciate Zoro's "apathy" and level-headedness, truly the Captain's second. Their duel was depressing to watch and watching them separate after that left me feeling pretty miserable. It was the crew's first big rift, though it was just Usopp vs. the crew, i wonder if one day we'll have an Avengers: Civil War style infighting where there's two sides with their own agendas, that would be interesting but i kind of don't want to see that ever happening. The charm of the crew is their strong bond and loyalty to Luffy as their captain so call me weak but I'm not really a fan of these infighting conflicts.
Robin disappearing as well as the further introduction of Iceberg and his fixation towards Robin being the key to world destruction. I just want to say right now, they did a pretty great job in making me also suspicious of Iceberg. I suspected all of the Galley-la company important people were either evil or have their own agenda, but I didn't expect half of them to actually turn out to be evil /except/ Iceberg, and his connection to Franky, or Cutty Flam. It was a very exciting turn of events and really made me go on a binge just because i needed to know how it ended.
It's pretty great, I already know that Robin probably had some very valid reason to leave the crew by looking at her flashbacks when the crew met Aokiji for the first time, but knowing that part of the deal was to let the strawhats go and leave without harm is so- eugh- i felt my heart sliced to pieces.
The whole Water 7 arc is pretty dynamic honestly, really explored the city and not much of a dull moment as the crew are almost always moving to /do/ something. After letting Usopp go they immediately search for Robin, but in the middle of that they then became fugitives wanted for the attempted murder of the mayor, and then it went from searching for Robin to ambushing the Galley-la company for some answers, except for our Ladies Man Sanji-kun who was locked in on his mission to find/save Robin. It kind of dragged a little in this point but i could understand why since they're setting up for the next arc, but it's kind of unfortunate that once again it's following the "Luffy gets separated from everyone, fights one guy, is out of commission until the next big fight" formula, but it's okay, all is forgiven because that scene with Nami jumping from rooftop to rooftop in desperation to get to Luffy to scream at his face that Robin is giving up her life for the crew was gold, what would they do without Nami fr fr.
Enter Enies Lobby arc, train portion. I think the joint attacks of Sogeking, Franky, and Sanji were one of my favorite fights in this arc, it's so fun and Sanji was real cool :)
The train portion was a fine transition between two locations, made the travel pretty exciting, and also scary for all the characters involved who are underprepared in fighting the rest of the CP9 members. Usopp's desperate encouraging words trying to convince Robin to come back sounded like he's trying to convince himself instead, pretty emotional stuff. Franky also quickly rose to become one of my favorite characters not going to lie, by the end of this saga he's literally in my top 5 favorite characters, which i did NOT expect, since i usually like the visually convenient-looking characters, so this was exciting for me, it's a first!
Getting it out of the way, i'm just going to complain right now about my two main annoyances of the Enies Lobby arc. First, i don't know what the fuck they were thinking of throwing all these fucking fillers and recap episodes in the MIDDLE of a very serious showdown after Luffy just fucking declared a war on the World Fucking Government. As you can probably tell i remember nothing about those fillers and i pretty much sped up and skip over all of the recap scenes because i was so annoyed. BUT! The filler i appreciated kind of was the Edo period AU filler, i would've LOVED a back-to-back 5 or even 10 episode filler set in that AU, if the shitty Davy Back Fight could have a dozen episodes dedicated to it then so can this one. But no, they fumbled and instead dropped this in the middle of possibly the most intense and high-stakes One Piece has ever been at that point, and to that i stressfully raise my shoulders and ask, /WHY?/
Second, very quick because i could go on but bitchass Spanda motherfucker needs to die, fuckass useless fucking dude, nepo baby weakling coward motherfucker who's only brave enough to be violent when the other literally couldn't fight back. I was very satisfied seeing what happened to him and i genuinely hope there's zero fucking redemption for him, i hope he dies, he needs to pay for what he did to Robin. Thank you for coming to my TED talk, continuing on.
Ah, Nico Robin-chan, the light of my life. Her origin story ruined me. It was so heartbreaking, and it's pretty obvious before but it really made me appreciate the way Oda presented that in the world of One Piece, there is no good and bad organizations, but good people are good and evil people are truly, my god, eugh. Robin who never trusted anyone because of how they all treated her, how she's trying her best to live as her mother's wishes but because of it she has to constantly be in survival mode. Then, when she finally thought she found her peace they came back for her and threaten her new found family. I think I genuinely cried when she shouted "I want to live!" that's just, raw emotional truth. So good, probably one of my favorite moments yet.
I don't really want to talk about the strawhats vs. CP9 showdowns because for most of it it was pretty meh for me. One improvement was Nami's, i love it, it's a major upgrade compared to her plot armor fight in Alabasta arc. Zoro and Sogeking's goofy fight was fine, loved the Ashura imagery on his nine-sword style, Usopp having his moment, Chopper introducing Monster Point, and Sanji being out of commission early on because of his fuckass chivalry but was redeemed after he introduced Diable Jamble. And of course, star of the upgrade showcases: Luffy's gear second and third!
While i see a lot of people complain on their out-of-nowhere upgrades, in this case i actually like it, OP is clearly a very compact show with a lot of things to show and tell, so a training arc could maybe slow it down a bit and kind of, i guess, dampen the hype of an upgrade being introduced? Also I don't know if it's confirmed or anything but I'd like to think that they've always been able to do their upgrades, they just don't because they don't have enough energy or the skill yet to make it stable, anyway!
I've mentioned how the main storyline involving the crew are Usopp vs. Luffy and Robin disappearing, but there's actually also one more. It's Merry :( The reveal that the ghost Usopp saw fixing the ship during the Skypiea arc was Merry's soul materializing out of the crew's love for it was so :( It was honestly a great set-up for making Merry the Deus Ex Machina during the near end of the arc, it made it make sense and also more emotional. In the world of OP where you eat a fruit and gain devil powers, of course a ship could manifest a sentient soul when the ones aboard treasure it so :( I didn't cry during the funeral scene but man was it sad, a goodbye to an old friend.
It's mostly my opinions but objectively, this is the best arc/saga yet for me, the flaws are the fuckass fillers in the middle of high tension scenes but if we ignore that this was the most packed, engaging, full of rollercoaster moments arc I've experienced. The length between arcs could've been shorter, but that's just classic OP for you. And we actually got a new member not only joining the crew and build them a new and improved ship, but /also/ entered my top 5 favorite OP characters! Welcome aboard Franky!
+ the post-Enies Lobby filler arcs while they prepare for the new arc were pretty good too, my favorite of course is the Sanji-focused episode :) But the Zoro one was pretty fun too. Luffy's grandpa and dad was introduced very out of the blue too that made me go w h a t, and also old friends! I was told Koby would get a glow up and glow up he did. And lastly, they all have bounties now! The way they've somehow turned getting a bounty to a wholesome reunion with the ones the crew left behind to go on their journey, I love it.
If i were to rank it now, it would be:
1. Water 7 Saga (4/5)
2. Sky Island Saga (2.5/5)
= East Blue Saga (3.5/5)
3. Alabasta Saga (mainly Alabasta arc) (2.5/5)
I feel like my ranking isn't that controversial, my One Piece experience pretty much been universal. Once you get the groove of OP's pacing (well for me i kind of cheated by watching it in 1.5x) and get sucked into the world and care deeply for these characters, you'd have a real good time, and endless, bottomless, infinite, and i just have to clarify, a LOT of content, even outside the anime itself. So I'm very excited, multiple friends have told me that the next arc is really sad, even sadder than this one so I'm looking forward to it!
Posted by
kejora
| May 8, 12:59 PM |
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