Chapter 1121: The Upheaval of the Era

Captain M

Hey crew, it's break week, so let's have another One Piece Rewrite Project release.

I expected to reconcile inconsistencies created by old translations when I started this, but here I was surprised to be confronted by inconsistent-feeling things that seem to have come from Oda himself.

When was the last time you guys looked back at Nami's initial breakdown of the world map in chapter 22? It doesn't actually hold up spectacularly, does it? Every old translation agrees that she says there are two oceans in the world, divided by the Red Line. While the Grand Line is mentioned, I guess because it's still sea it's not presented as something that divides the oceans the same way. Plus, Marie Geoise is very understatedly presented as the "town at the centre of the Red Line."

In fact, all the way through to chapter 51, the current location is referred to only as the "Eastern Sea." It's only when Mihawk restates the layout of the globe in that chapter that the furigana providing the "East Blue" reading is added (similar to how Rafteru got "Laugh Tale" furigana to provide its correct reading after decades) and the first mentions of northern and southern seas are made. If you look closely at the old translations of that section, you can see one of Krieg's epithets change from "Tyrant of the Eastern Sea" to "Tyrant of the East Blue" in real time around the new reading Mihawk provides.

Was the series softly retconned from having two seas to four within its first year? Maybe Oda always wanted four but wasn't sure he should commit that hard until things really started to pick up at the Baratie.

Anyway how does a modern rewriter reconcile chapter 22's initial suggestion of two seas with what we know now, without feeling like he's totally changing what Oda put in the speech bubbles initially?

Here's old and (proof of concept for) new:

alt text

Despite the number 2 existing in the raw text for the first bubble, it's cut here so Nami doesn't arbitrarily limit the number of seas. The two fingers she's holding up can still work as a gesture for counting off eastern and western as she mentions them.

I emphasise what the globe shows of the Grand Line's position by adding that it creates another division.

And yes, Marie Geoise is a bit more accurately built up as well. There was no way it wasn't at least going to be upgraded from a town to a city, and I don't think "capital city" is too much of a leap from 'city at the heart of...' And it tracks with Nami's education and upbringing that she would know this and use the proper terms, her mother figure having been a World Government Marine alongside her own passion for cartography.

She also uses it as a starting point for the second line without preamble, giving the impression that she sees it as assumed knowledge that there's a city up there in a key location, which it would be for most of the world.

I use my knowledge of being 27 years further ahead in the story than past translators to subtract a limiter, add an emphasiser and massage a description to make things fit better without feeling like I'm going totally off the original script.

Little nudges to the wording can create big changes in connotations and worldbuilding. It's not just the big, crowd-pleasing Zolo to Zoro fixes I want to see in a One Piece re-issue, it's things like this.

(I was kinda counting on the usual three weeks on, one week off schedule when I had the idea of making this a break week thing, so if the two on, one off pacing continues, we'll just see how long I manage to stay ahead.)

Robby

My biggest gear grinder is still them taking Nami's "The Second Person" chapter title, not realizing that was a crewmate number, and changing it to "The Other Villain." Oof. That one was so needless.

Like at least Zolo was a stupid line-wide edict that affected the anime, games and merchandising as well, that they're now stuck with, but that title was just the translator making assumptions and changing things for no reason.

cavendishsama

@Captain-M I actually do think about this quite a bit, because I think it's where you can see what may have been Oda's original 5-year-plan, and what changed. During Baratie we get: Mihawk's introduction + Jinbe and the warlords as a concept, 3 major powers, 4 seas instead of 2 , "Paradise". Chapter 22 would have been written about the time the first volume was released, so shortly after that Oda would've been aware of the sales being really good, the Pirate Ganzack special was in July 1998, so he could've known shortly after chapter 22 that an anime was likely to happen, and by the time we get to Baratie, he expands because he knows he'll have a lot more time.

I think the naming may also be hint to the Grand Line being not originally planned as an ocean; it would make more sense to name it the Grand Blue, if the current world map had been the original one.

Chams 0

@zeltrax225 said in Chapter 1121: The Upheaval of the Era:

I was re-watching parts of Skypiea last night while drunk and I was thinking to myself, isn't the Giant electrical sphere from Enel kind of OP?
Come to think of it, the Goro Goro no mi is pretty broken. I mean, that sphere nuked an entire city in a span of a few minutes.

So I thought to myself, what if Uranus is Enel's DF? What if to complete Uranus, you need Enel's DF + A certain machine?
And then I thought to myself, since I think we won't have One Piece: Space Pirates spin off and Enel needs to be relevant again, what if his relevancy was staring at our face the whole time? And the whole reason the WG can't get their hands of Uranus is because its in the sky and is constantly roaming around. Keep in mind that we have no idea about Enel's backstory.

Why did Oda showed Vivi(Pluton, Alabasta), Shirahoshi(Poseidon) and then Skypiea? Because he can't show Enel as that'll outright tell you what uranus is.

It also makes sense that Uranus=electricity=infinite energy. Like, that's pretty fucking op.

So here's my theory, either Uranus is Goro goro mi awakened or it is a combination of a device + Goro goro mi. And I think the fact that he can throw a sphere and nuke an entire town/village is similar to the WG's mother flame weapon nuking an entire island. Except that Enel doesn't need the Mother flame to do so.

For those who skip Skypiea because it’s filler: this arc is basically the whole manga’s plot condensed. There is a powerful individual who considers himself the God of this world (Imu, Enel) and has the power to destroy islands. There is a famous figure from the past that didn’t fulfill a promise to a close friend (Norland and Joy Boy), but whose will is inherited and fulfilled by Luffy, even if Luffy himself didn’t do it on purpose or knew about it (ringing the bell). There’s an independent factor trying to destroy God, fighting for justice and freedom, although independently from the Strawhats (revolutionary army, Wiper). And the Strawhats themselves are just having an adventure and looking for a famous treasure.
I like this structure, I hope it works in the big picture scale as well as it did in the arc.

zeltrax225

@Chams-0 nothing much to say but yes definitely.
It was the only arc where the straw hats weren't "involved" with the main conflict of the arc and felt the most like a bystander. It has almost everything that an epic has. History, adventure, and a hero-tyrant story.

And if we were to believe that the One Piece will share the same significance as the Golden Bell (it is valuable(gold), has historical significance, and is revered/held in great importance by every single person involved in the arc) , then it is my personal belief that it is not something that is of construction or destruction(a weapon, sea levels manipulation) but rather an object of significance that everyone is aware of or knows of. What it might be may lead to the Red Line falling but what it is by itself is not the object that is used for it.

Captain M

@cavendishsama Yeah, it's interesting how the Grand Line is usually described early on as a 'route' rather than a whole separate ocean. You have to wonder if the idea for All Blue came up suddenly and influenced the idea of having more oceans to make the possibility of one spot having sea life from every other sea feel more fantastical.

Even the Warlords thing comes up different from how it seems to get remembered. Like, everyone knows that Mihawk is the original Warlord, in that he was the first one introduced, and for a long time his employment to the Government was the most we knew about his place in the world, so obviously he gets introduced as a warlord, right? No way, the concept doesn't get floated until nearly 20 chapters after he leaves, by Yosaku and Johnny on the way to Arlong Park.

It probably won't happen because it would ruin the mystique of the creative process (and maybe give away what is essential to the ending and what isn't) but I'd love for Oda to give an unrestrained interview where he lays out at what point what ideas were actually implemented.

Captain M

@Robby Yeah that's awful. Viz's phrasing isn't even consistent across the ones they do keep. "Number One," "Third and Seventh," "Eighth Person." And I get it, none of those are wrong translations in isolation, and they were all in the catch-up period where multiple translators were working at once.

But man, it's these long-term connections that make One Piece so damn good, and it's such a for so many English readers to not even get the chance to catch them.

Robby

It's always been pretty clear to me that Baratie is the arc where Oda got comfortable and knew the series was going to be a long runner. The previous arcs all had REALLY SHORT flashbacks of just a few pages, while Sanji's is full blown multiple chapters and really nails it. The world is expanded immensely with the intro of Mihawk, (and ZOro's long term goal tangibly introduced at the same time) and the fight with Krieg goes on for a while.

Arlong Park is the arc most people feel it really hit on all cylinders, and that's true... but Baratie is definitely the point it started breaking out of the five year plan that would have had the entire crew assembled within a year or two. If Oda hadn't started getting comfortable in Baratie, Arlong wouldn't have been as epic and as many chapters as it was.

Captain M

@Robby It's also where you can see the storytelling get more serialised for the first time.

Those year one arcs are super episodic and isolated from each other. Aside from the order of the crew members joining up, have very little act to arc flow. The closest thing you get is Zoro sleeping of his wounds from the Cabaji fight while Luffy and Nami visit Gaimon. Almost to prove this, the anime changes the order of Gaimon's island and Syrup Village without causing any issues.

But Baratie starts introducing problems that can't be solved in a single arc. Zoro's injury and Nami's betrayal are huge lingering threads that take until the end of the next arc to wrap up.

It feels like the practice run for things like the overarching Baroque Works storyline, the narrative continuity of Jaya to Skypiea and Water Seven to Ennies Lobby, and all of the ongoing conflicts that come in and out of the post-timeskip arcs as they build up to Wano. Getting to the end of East Blue is good advice for a first timer, but Baratie is truly the place One Piece started to be what it is now.

MetaMario

@Robby said in Chapter 1121: The Upheaval of the Era:

My biggest gear grinder is still them taking Nami's "The Second Person" chapter title, not realizing that was a crewmate number, and changing it to "The Other Villain." Oof. That one was so needless.

legit had no idea about this, oof.

hideoushorrendous

I don't think Skypiea was any different from most arcs

They arrive > find a tyrant > picks up fights > liberates the island

it's the same idea with 90% of the story's other arcs. And the final arc is also the same exact idea but it's the world to liberate instead of an island.

this absurd repetitiveness is why i cannot designate high ratings to this work, every arc feels similar to a previous one with barely few exceptions.

I wish if the story focused more on pirates being pirates doing piracy instead of focusing on saving random people continuously like a generic shounen.

RomanceDawn

@hideoushorrendous It’s That repetitiveness coupled with One Piece’s nature of new land/new rules that make it such a wonderful experience. For the most part anyway.

You might have a better idea of what should be but there is a general reason why stories are structured the way that they are. There are tried and true structures, formulas, tropes, etc.

And One Piece has been varied enough that a tyrant isn’t always suppressing the masses and their island needs liberation. It’s just when that does happen it generally feels great because it’s usually wrapped in a completely different package from before.

hideoushorrendous

those islands that didn't need saving or liberating are always short ( Gaimon was one chapter lol )

so every effort had always been towards the same content of saving random people from bad guys

that's not what a pirate story should be in my opinion. the treasure hunt is there for the big picture only.

Luffy is yet to kill someone over a treasure and it's been 27 years. all he did was charity work so far.

RomanceDawn

Now I understand your frustrations and anger! Good show old man!

Captain M

@hideoushorrendous said in Chapter 1121: The Upheaval of the Era:

Luffy is yet to kill someone over a treasure and it's been 27 years. all he did was charity work so far.

HideousHorrendous on his 27 year wait for One Piece to complete its promised (by the presence of the word pirate) transformation into Black Sails or at least Pirates of the Caribbean. Next year for sure.

Alfiere

Well, to be fair, the concept of piracy in this world was never really made clear, which is crazy given that it's supposedly the core concept of the story.

I mean, pillaging cities seems something only low level scum does, I don't remember ever seeing any hint of international sea trade or hearing of commercial ships, and in general pirates seem be fighting each other most of the time. Are we supposed to assume that sailing independently is in itself a crime, thus being a pirate is synonymous with being able to sail freely at all? I don't remember it ever being stated though.

Captain M

@Alfiere In Noland's flashback we see the king having to wait for Marie Geoise's permission to enter the Grand Line for an expedition, which suggests that (at least at one point in history) voyages without a set destination or outside established trade were discouraged.

It's been made clear more recently that anyone not protected by a World Government member nation's flag has no human rights, so raising a pirate flag is a very deliberate choice to identify as independent - branding yourself as an 'outlaw,' in the word's most traditional sense of being literally outside the law.

So a jolly roger represents everything on the spectrum from an unlicenced and unaffiliated adventurer to someone who will rob and murder you and wants you to know it.

And it tracks for even the outwardly-harmless first variety to be criminalised (beyond the freedom to engage or take from them at will) because it's a very pointed rejection of World Government authoritarianism. The pirate flag says 'I will choose freedom even in the face of your highest-level threat to my security and safety.'

Alfiere

@Captain-M yeah i assumed that to be the case, seems a weird thing to leave implicit anyway.

FolhaS

I think that at earlier points in the story we see someone say raising a pirate flag is in itself a crime.
We've seen ships that, even if not using any flag, are not considered criminals for sailing. The Baratie for example, the Ohara scholars sailed the world, they were wanted people but not for piracy.

But we've actually seen a ton of crimes being done by pirates since day one, Luffy is the biggest exception to the rule and he tends to fight pirates who established themselves beyond more than simply attacking other ships.
Buggy was occupying a town he raided, Kuro was a known murderer when he was pirate, Krieg tried to steal the Baratie and we're told that is a common occurence and that's why the chefs are all really though, Arlong raided and occupied an intire island. Crocodile was doing the same in plain sight, but he was a bucaneer and was seen defending a town in Arabasta from pirate raiders. The StrawHats did steal the gold from Skypea because they were pirates (even though the inhabitants wanted to give them the gold anyway). Pirates tried to run away without paying Galley-La in Water 7, Ace actually ran away without paying in restaurants. Skipping a bit ahead, in Law's flashback we see the DoFlamingo Pirates raid a bunch of places before he managed to snag Dressrosa.

And we've seen several lesser name crews raid, or trying to raid islands, whenever Oda is showing us what's happening around the world, like before the time-skip when Whitebeard's territory went up for grabs.