One Piece Weekly Chapter Discussion

They were freed off-screen, because ridiculously fast pacing interchanged with ridiculously slow pacing is the norm for this arc.

Yeah, I recall Brooke sending his soul outside to get help, then Zoro saying he'd cut the cage in half, then suddenly everyone's free. No dubt we'll see there escape via flashback in a chapter or two's time.

100,000 v 10 was a pretty good chapter.

Yes, it flashes back to the conception of the plan, but it was kept brief and to the point, and we also got another glimpse of Luffy's Sovereign Haki. You also just knew when Hody declared that he would be Pirate King that Luffy would respond, and he didn't disappoint.

Jinbe will join the crew. He's weaker than Zoro and Sanji now, he's involved in gags now and it's 10,000 vs. 10, not 9.

Yeah, Jinbe joining has been pretty much a given since at least the halfway point in the arc. What would his role be though? He's strong, but not enough to make the monster trio a quartet, and I can't see what he'd do aboard sunny; everyone bar Zoro has a definite role to play, and I can't see Jinbe adding much other than perhaps some specialised under water muscle.

Every crew needs a minority character. It's PC.

He'll be the tool used to check the dangers that lie before the rest of the crew on mysterious islands and such. If he comes back harmed, then they'll know that they must take extra precaution. That''ll be all the damn fishface's good for.

Junbe us the obvious choice for the next crewmate. I was expecting Caribou because Oda's just quirky like that but the less I see of that asshole, the better.

I'd wager money that Caribou will end up absorbing Noah; not because he cares about saving the Island, but because it's the only way to save himself. Something like that. Even as a logia, I doubt any of the monster trio would have the slightest difficulty with him, so I don't see him being a direct threat to the SH crew.

Anyone else rather underwhelmed by 635? We get to see a couple of Franky's new toys, but otherwise nothing really new. Robin made huge limbs out of lots of little ones? Seen it before. Zoro making a whirwind attack? Badass, but seen it before. Sanji knows CP9's Geppou technique? That was cool two hundred chapters ago, but now...? Yep, seen it before.

They were just toying around. I'm expecting new attacks once the one-on-one battles start.

I liked that Zoro's twister is actually has super "Fuck you" properties and that they pretty much wasted the entire crew in two chapters... now hopefully that will happen to the assholes with names.

SimianWonder wrote:

Anyone else rather underwhelmed by 635?

This whole arc has been underwhelming. Just annoying, slow pacing and having another formulaic OP plot(they go some place new, we get some bad comedy, they meet someone, we get an angsty flashback about that person, they fight some douche who has a ludicrous goal, they fight some more, they fight again, rinse and repeat).

It's most likely SJ's fault for all this. Hounding Oda to keep doing the same thing over and over because they fear that the series will lose attention if it actually tries to do something new. That or Oda is really a hack and we've been too blind to see it all this time, but I doubt that.

Remember the Straw Hats being separated, the amazon women, and Impel Down? The pacing in all those parts was rather slow but it still captivated me because of Luffy being in a new situation and siding with unlikely allies. We need more original arcs like that, especially since the story has taken a time-skip and the gang is entering dangerous waters.

[quote="SOK"]

SimianWonder wrote:

Just annoying, slow pacing

I'd rather have slow pacing than the jumpcuts that have been made throughout the arc (most notably in the flashback and the off-screen escape from the castle).

Kaio wrote:

I'd rather have slow pacing than the jumpcuts that have been made throughout the arc (most notably in the flashback and the off-screen escape from the castle).

I'd rather have neither.

Is it just me or does it look like Zoro's got both eyes open in the panel bottom left of page 12?

For future reference when I'm caught up in this, which day do the translated chapters come out online?

Usually on Wednesday or Thursday.

Last two chapters have been pretty solid. In fact this arc reminds me a bit of Thriller Bark - slow beginning, excellent finale. Not that this is the finale of course - there's still a lot to get through before the loose ends are tied up - but things feel like they're approaching the endgame.

I gotta admit, I'm really liking this arc after it finally went batshit crazy. I agree with Simian in it being a bit like Thriller Bark, but I'm like the only one who liked Thriller Bark's slow beginning because of the whole setting so there's that compared to Fishman Island which felt like it should've been paced better.

Whatever though, Hody being completely insane has pretty much made him a good villain along with the fact he's evil solely because that's how he was raised. He's not as good as Arlong is, but Arlong's a pretty fucking awesome villain, so I shouldn't compare.

Fishman Island has felt very slow in places, but I'm putting a lot of that down to it being my first OP arc read at rate-of-release. As a relative newcomer to One Piece, I've previously been able to power through the arcs so pacing hasn't been such an issue - heck, I read all the way through to the end of Alabasta in a matter of days the first time I picked it up. Thriller Bark was noticably slow, but it was tolerable because I did the slow part in a single sitting, and the ending made up for all of it. With Fishman Island, that hasn't been possible - it's been ongoing for six months so far - which I'm certain is contributing to the rather slower feel.

When the arc is done, I'll re-read it, and I'm pretty sure I'll like it more. It's got some good world building, some funny moments, some moments of SH badassery, a very relevant point to make on the dangers of prejudice and racism, and an increasingly more realistic bad guy in Hody. No, he's not going to stand toe-to-toe with the greatest OP villains in a popularity contest, but he's been very cleverly written, going from laughable fodder for Zoro / Luffy to one of the most relatable nutjobs we've yet seen in OP.

Well, he's better than Lucci and we had to tolerate that guy for even longer.

I found it difficult to enjoy this arc. Aside from the other problems such as the slow pacing and obnoxious flashbacks, none of the new characters have any charisma. They're boring, unlikeable, and flat out unmemorable.

Even Hody failed to be fun. He's just some insane, awful product of society's ills. So what if that makes him more relatable to the racist psychos of this world? It still doesn't change the fact that he's about as fun as watching paint dry.

new crewmate get

I swear to god if it's Shirahoshi...

EDIT: Okay, good.