Oda sensei has always played it straight with his audience – we have known from day one that Luffy is not somebody you want to piss off and his steadfast devotion to his nakama is definitely a force to be reckoned with! The “Pirate Mercenary” Hajrudin was unfortunate enough to experience Luffy’s thunderous wrath firsthand and I’m sure there’s going to be waves of commotion from this one-hit knockout – both within and beyond the arena! Needless to say, Luffy is somewhat of a square peg. Outside of the battlefield, the Straw Hat Captain is the very definition of a “baka”, and his apparent simplicity and cluelessness have always been a great running gag for One Piece! However, it’s hardly an exaggeration to say Luffy is a monster when he enters the frontline and the sheer brute force that he displayed in this chapter is simply a testament to his prodigious skill as a combatant! Hajrudin and Ucy the “the Fighting Bull” are merely cannon fodders in the overall narratives – that much is clear, and characters like them are certainly a dime a zone in One Piece. That said, I’d be lying if I say I didn’t get a charge out of seeing Luffy kicking some serious ass and the sight of him bludgeoning the arrogant giant with his mere fist was, no doubt, amply rewarding!

As for the other order of business, Oda sensei continues to hint at a certain affiliation between Gladiator Ricky and Rebecca – we have no idea what the exact nature of their relationship is, and your guess is probably as good as anyone’s. I have a sneaking suspicion it could be that of a familial bond, and the history that those two share could point to a tie-in with the legendary gladiator, Kyros! Just as expected, the spotlight was shifted back to the Thousand Sunny this week – albeit only for a brief moment! Jora of the Donquixote family has quite a unique Devil Fruit power to say the least, and her ability to disfigure the shape and appearance of any object has introduced a whole new level of tribulation for the Straw Hats. Nothing pains me more than to see Nami’s pretty face getting ruined and I certainly hope the side effects are reversible – such a blasphemous act is simply unforgivable and Jora deserves a major can of whoop ass for the things she did! Momonosuke is mostly likely the wild card in all of this – the planned abduction was not something that I was expecting and it remains to be seen what Doflamingo intends to do with the young samurai. There are definitely many possibilities, and the first one that comes to mind is, of course, Momonosuke’s connection to Vegapunk’s man-made Devil Fruit – the supposedly defunct product that he ate out of chronic hunger! It sure as hell doesn’t seem like Nami & Co. have the upper hand at this juncture and I suspect a third party, Zoro or perhaps even the Heart Pirates, could come to their rescue – there’s bound to be a pickup in both action and drama, and it goes without saying I’m very much looking forward to seeing all of that!

Random tidbits:

  • So many “derpy” faces! – I was able to recognize the work of Edvard Munch and Pablo Picasso. What else did I miss?
  • Jora looks nothing like the Mermaid Princess – They’re both giants but Shirahoshi is way cuter!
  • Bellamy seems pretty reluctant to carry out the assassination – Does that make him a potential candidate for the Straw Hat crew?
  • It appears that Bartolomeo and Luffy have a history together – Tell me something news, everybody wants a piece of the Straw Hat!
  • Cavendish is so grudging and vindictive – The day when he gets his ass handed to him can’t come soon enough!

tl;dr: @SeishunRC – #OnePiece 714: Don’t you piss Luffy off, it’s a one-hit KO! Nami & Co. are in trouble, who’s coming to their rescue? #Manga
 


29 Comments

  1. What I love about the current set up is luffy is left, for the most part, alone, and he will refuse to leave the tournament so long as he can win Ace’s fruit. Even in the Impel Down arc and Whitebeard war he had people around funneling his energy. But now he can run wild while the rest of the crew is otherwise disposed.

    Luffy, surrounded by enemies, in a fight he cant back out of, with no one to tell him what is and isnt a bad idea… this is going to be seriously chaotic.

    On a side note… I was really hoping to see a continuation of that Usopp face from last week, lol that was gold.

    Will
    1. To be fair, Franky was supposed to keep an eye on him – clearly, that didn’t go according to plan. Luffy’s on the loose and he’s kicking some serious ass, just the way we like it :3

      Seishun
  2. Seishun—this isn’t my research work, but the only one you’re missing is: Thousand sunny is Tower of the Sun from Osaka Expo in 1970.

    As for who Barto is… his line seems to be pretty ambiguous in Japanese, but there is speculation that he could be part of the revolutionaries. I do wonder what’s in the suitcase though.

  3. One thing I don’t get is the obsession over possible new additions to the crew. Why is it that almost every new character to show any sort of friendly reaction to Luffy has to be “the next nakama?” There’s been a long history of Luffy & Co. just winning over people as friends and allies without necessarily being nakama. If it were so easy to be a nakama candidate then the importance of being part of the crew starts to diminish. And sidenote I’m not specifically picking on you Seishun because this is a reaction I see a ton of on other discussion boards too. I just don’t quite understand the rush to add that label that so many fans seem to do.

    spike
    1. Hey, Rebecca and Monet, two people who will likely give nice fanservice, and Rebecca already has a head start with her current outfit. Who wouldn’t want that as a new crew member. Not to mention Nami’s obssesive greed often lowers her sexual appeal and Robin isn’t the type to give fanservice.

      L002
      1. you want someone to be in the straw hat crew just because of fanservice? that is what strike is saying “importance of being part of the crew starts to diminish”.

        Ryuuzaki
      2. That was a light joke, made from the speculation of how I seen many “who will be a new crew member” blogs that believed that Monet would be a new member, not to mention I seen how many people want the new crew member to be a woman.

        On the curious side is whether or not the new member will be strong enough to join the strawhats. Jimbei was a very GOOD candidate because he was able to go toe-to-toe with Luffy. I mean, it would be late to put up a random person who was as strong as Ussop when he first joined. It has to be someone strong to join.

        L002
    2. No worries, you guys can pick on me all you want, I’ve been told I have a very thick skin 😉
      I think it’s pretty fun to speculate – I didn’t see Nico Robin’s addition coming, but my prediction was pretty spot-on for Franky and Brook :3

      Seishun
  4. I’m glad that Oda has the balls to make Nami ugly for a few chapters. The boys get their faces messed up all the time (usually violently), so it’s only fair that Nami doesn’t get to be beautiful 100% of the time.

    Bobina
  5. I’m a massive fan of Luffy’s one-hit K.O’s, always have been, always will be. A great chapter overall but if I have one gripe with it, it’s that when attention switched to the Sunny things had already gotten underway. It’s a personal thing, but I’m not a fan of always jumping into the middle of things, especially when there’s a confusing devil fruit ability involved. I would have preferred to see events there from the beginning, like how they got kicked off the ship, but hey, Luffy’s punch at the end made it all better.

    Celecia01
  6. Criteria to be a Straw-Hat?
    An outcast of their society, that outclass their peers and later an outlaw that has no where to call home.
    However, the final deciding factor: Luffy’s liking.

    Minith

Leave a Reply to Seishun Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *