@gyuukarubi:
I caught up on the four most recent episodes yesterday, watching them back-to-back. I was also on hiatus from reading the manga when these chapters released and read them in batches — but the experiences were notably different.
I really dislike how Onigashima has been directed, recently. While Toei’s animation has certainly improved, the padding makes things a bit unbearable. Notably:
- Usopp hiding and simply watching as Nami gets attacked by Ulti – whereas they seemed to have been fighting together against Page One and Ulti in the manga. This makes both Usopp and Nami seem less courageous than they really were.
- A distinct lack of chaos and motion. Too many still frames, not enough movement. Onigashima should be a night of nonstop movement… and it is missing here.
- Marco vs Perospero & Big Mom was a mess.
- Zoro & Drake vs Apoo was slow and boring.
I could go on. Really, the speed is missing from it.
What a major, disappointing shame. At this point, One Piece just needs a reboot. Different studio, different music… maybe even CG. Different directors for sure… but the music is the only thing that remains amazing.
Personally, I can understand some of these criticisms, but I think they don't account for the limitations of a long running series, and also discount the efforts made to create that desired effect.
I also think its worth mentioning that Onigashima in the manga is a bit messy pacing wise as well. The constant shifting between sub plots within the chapters made it feel like there was constantly stuff going on, but a lot of the times it made the chapters feel very disconnected, with it often being difficult to care about some plot lines because they never had the panel space invested in them to make them that interesting or memorable.(The obvious example being the ice oni stuff, as well as the Sasaki hunting down Yamato subplot).
I don't really have an issue with Usopp's portrayal in the fight against Nami. Considering his portrayal in Dressrosa, where even before his memories of Robin got erased, he was willing to lay back and allow the Tontatta to try and take out Sugar first(he planned to scram if they failed, or just doing nothing at all), I don't think this is any further regression than Usopp already regressed. At least he didn't always plan to run away if Nami died like he did during Dressrosa(As you can tell, I really really detest what that portion of the arc did to Usopp). Him coming in at an advantageous moment seems more in character for him anyway.
There being constant movement is difficult, though it is something that has clearly been attempted to some extent, although great cost cutting measures have been taken to ensure that effect. Namely the reuse of bank animation with the same fodder cutting down the same group of enemies, or fighters clashing with one another. I will say that the battles between the foot soldiers was never really that important in the manga(as a focused aspect) so I don't think them not focusing on it a terrible amount harms the arc too much.
Marco vs Perospero and Big Mum was clearly not a key focus, and while I think it could have been handled better in the editting department, it wasn't ever really a major area of focus. My major issue comes down to them just having Perospero aim his bow for 6 minutes. That could have been easily remedied by some smarter editting which showed Carrot arriving at the start of the battle like they did before, but only highlighting their transformation into sulongs and anticipation to attack Perospero just at the moment where Marco gets caught by Big Mum. That would have flowed a lot smoother and probably would have allowed them to reuse a bit more footage as well.
Zoro and Drake vs Apoo was never really that much of a fight at all in the manga. It was some bits of sparring and some generic clashing and that was it. The fact that it was overshadowed by the other ice oni stuff is fine in my book, since the ice oni choas is the main focus of the live floor as opposed to just those three fighting. The most interesting part of that fight in the manga was the ending, and I think they more than delivered on that.
I can understand speed as a complaint, but I don't think it was ever terribly fast in the manga either. We just had a lot of cutaways(and we do in the anime as well), but even in the manga, there was rarely ever a real sense of urgency to anything.
I think this is a bit of an exaggeration, but overall, although I think the raid started off a bit slow, it has picked up a lot(namely when the raid actually started), and I think currently, its generally handling things better than its manga counter-part(though there are definitely episodes here and there that hurt the source material, those are generally not terribly common).
Considering the limitations of the current pacing of the anime, I think the current adaptation is at least more than adequate considering the source material.