Going into this episode, I expected it to be bad. I expected it to be a drawn out fight between Luffy and Bellamy, full of flashbacks, and the One Piece anime audience collectively letting out a sigh of relief. Bellamy is dead and we can finally move on. But, that’s not what I got. I thought this was a great episode, one full of interesting and heartfelt content.
Firstly, Zoro and Mihawk. The second I heard Mihawk’s voice through that dark screen I audibly gasped. I wasn’t expecting a flashback with him and our young two eyed Zoro like that. Mihawk started by asking Zoro if his sword has ever broken, something a little funny in itself seeing that Mihawk has broken his swords in the past. But, I don’t think Mihawk forgot because it was insignificant for him, he showed Zoro great respect and pledged to be there for Zoro to surpass, followed his adventures, and trained him. Rather, I think he wanted to make Zoro recall how it felt losing to Mihawk back in the day, and have a reflection on how it feels for Zoro to lose his swords; he has had funerals for them after all. Because after he made Zoro think about this he taught him it’s key to feel ashamed of hurting your blade, and what he’s ought to do is to master haki as any blade can be the black blade. A suggestion that it’s the swordsman who makes the blade strong. To make sure Zoro learned this he took away his ability to drink until it was mastered, which made me curious if he hadn’t drunk in the series since Sabaody and took up habits like fishing to cope with his lack of alcohol!! But going back to Punk Hazard he absolutely drinks sake. It was nice to see Perona again and to see some of the expansive time we missed, Zoro’s life with his second family over there is one I’m super interested in. From there, I would say we saw Zoro slightly in awe of his own power, it worked, his sword is in perfect condition. He had a burst of confidence and I think it goes to show that he was viewing Pica as some great practice for his lessons, kind of how he viewed Baroque works at Whiskey Peak. Of course, let’s not forget the scene of Usopp showing how much he cares about Zoro. With them being one of my favorite duo’s in anime, to have him bawl, so grateful Zoro is okay, and hug him put a huge smile on my face.
Fujitora focused on protecting the civilians of Dressrosa and his inaction was made a bit better because of this. As if he knew that they would be in danger with his supernatural sense of things, he went to their side and stopped Pica’s remains from killing many. Pica’s sliced head and the hill being covered in spikes is radical, but the giant pair of legs sitting in the middle of town made me chuckle. Meanwhile, Sabo was doing similar, the two aren’t so different. He was making sure to evacuate the prisoners until Koala called him, asking for help regarding something with Luffy. Looks like Luffy versus Trebol and Doflamingo won’t be all that’s left. Doflamingo can see what's been going on from above, but they are not worried as if Mansherry is still in their control, which they think she is from what I can tell, as long as Doflamingo slaughters everyone and fixes the factory all is not lost. It was nice to see Leo able to meet Kyros in the flesh too. :)
As for Bellamy! He’s finally down! The melancholic combat of two people who should be friends but can’t be is somewhat of a theme here. It reminded me of Franky and Senor Pink. However, with Senor Pink and Franky, their fight was suited to be paced the way it was, trading blows over and over. Luffy has felt like he was being battered by Bellamy for ages which definitely takes away from the punch. But, it was still strong. Like how Senor Pink sounded as if he wanted to die but felt an obligation to fight for me with his rumination of how he would like to visit his family in the afterlife if it weren’t for the shackles of life he carries, Bellamy wanted that too; just for different reasons. He couldn't let go of his last ounce of pride. Everything he worked for may be for nothing but he can at least hold on to his loyalty and go out as something. And what’s better than to hold onto his pride and die by the man he should have followed all along? That’s a pretty notion, and the sadness of it all is how every acknowledged that, even without strings, Doflamingo was still controlling Bellamy. Quite poetic if you ask me. Bellamy exclaiming stuff like: “IF YOU DON’T ACCEPT MY CHALLENGE I’LL KILL YOU” reminded me of when Garp tells Luffy that if Luffy didn’t kill him, Ace would die. In other words, it was a request. With that and Law down, Luffy has gone super saiyan and leveled up, Doflamingo acts like he doesn’t want to underestimate Luffy and Law talks about how Doflamingo likes to make people angry, but I have to question if enraging Luffy is the right call.
Speaking of Bellamy and Law, I think this is a good time to speak of the curse that “no one ever dies”. I think this first started in Alabasta with the two fake out deaths, Igaram and Pell. Igaram blew up and everyone acted like he was dead, and Pell had a self sacrificing death scene and outlived a direct nuke to the face. What’s key to the idea that no one ever dies is that people should be dying. The set up of Bellamy wanting to die and Luffy refusing to kill him, and Law being “killed” isn’t as bad as Alabasta, we have a character with the power to heal people so if they have a modicum of life within them they will be saved and we know that, but regardless due to the precedent set, it can feel lacking. We can feel lied to, or if we expect people not to die then the emotions we feel in scenes like these are dulled. This huge build up with Bellamy, in these terms, can be seen as simply delaying Luffy knocking someone out and that can feel insignificant. In Impel Down, the fact that Blackbeard ended up breaking out with the mega criminals even makes me feel there’s a good chance Bon Clay is alive. Another ramification of this is the actual deaths, such as Ace and Whitebeard, are thus amplified to the point that it’s nearly impossible to speak about the characters without someone mentioning their death and thus everyone ends up learning about the key deaths that will occur before they see them taking away some of the shock. I don’t mind this much but I think it’s a valid criticism of Oda, that is fake out deaths. Luckily the story and characters and ideas and emotional weight of the overall series aren’t often crippled by this in my mind. |