For me it was the concept of "devil fruits". That was what initially got me into the series. Of course if that was all their was to one piece, I would have stopped reading long ago but the concept of "devil fruits" is why I was interested in the first place. I was a teenager at the time and just wanted to see cool powers. 
Greg: Teacher of SUPER " OP " course !
-
-
@.access:
What I got from the message is that it's hard to get things done in times of isolation when you require a lot of people to work on the same thing. Since they need to avoid crowding their workplace, getting a chapter done is much slower now.
Which leads me to question: why is this only a thing with One Piece? Don't most mangaka work with multiple assistants? Are the others working overnight the compensate for this, or are they exposing themselves to make sure deadlines are met?
It seems weird for me, rather than One Piece having multiple breaks from now on it's the JUMP that should be doing it so every mangaka had a healthy work environment.Oda is still drawing his manga analogue style rather than digital. Other mangakas are most likely digital so less need to meet up and can do more things remotely.
-
I've spammed it a couple times, but here we go again.
I seen OP in passing around 05/06 and it was mostly after the stuff I cared about (Naruto, Zatch Bell, JLU, DB, TT) had finished. Didn't really care for it. I seen some of Alabasta and Drum Kingdom arc, but never full episodes. I thought it was about collecting all the Devil Fruits. I said to myself, this isn't for me.
In 08, my lil brother showed me this and I decided to give OP a try
Caught up to the manga a year after and it's been sweet ever since
If there was a "hook", it would be the 1st episode when Luffy freed Zoro.
-
Question to anyone who sees this, what was the thing that really hooked you on one piece? What moment, concept, character, or anything really. Just whatever it was that made you decide to continue for as long as you have.
I started with the 4kids weekly toonami airings. The initial hook was probably the march to Arlong, but I think the more important hook, the one that blasted my impatience to the point I couldn't wait the weeks anymore, were the Alabasta fights. After the first Ussop and Chopper fight, couldn't take it anymore and just watched everything else subbed and caught up… can't recall how far the anime was at that time anymore though.
-
Question to anyone who sees this, what was the thing that really hooked you on one piece? What moment, concept, character, or anything really. Just whatever it was that made you decide to continue for as long as you have.
I didnt read manga except dragonball. I was reading a dragon fanfic and the author mentionned nekomajin. I read it then I decided to try to find a manga to read. One piece silly humor got me and I would have continue but I think my big yes is Arlong park. That moment where Nami keeps yelling at Luffy before finally asking for help and Luffy the hat on her head is precious to me.
So either the silly humour. I have that gold moment in my head when Luffy is thinking how's gonna drown because devil fruit before having a eureka moment that actually he cant swim so it doesnt matter. Or Arlong Park.
-
Question to anyone who sees this, what was the thing that really hooked you on one piece? What moment, concept, character, or anything really. Just whatever it was that made you decide to continue for as long as you have.
I was familiar with it during the 4kids day and didn't think it was bad, but hadn't really watched it closely. One of my best friends brought it up to me in 2009, when I was in College, and mentioned how free-spirited Luffy was and how refreshing it was, and I was hooked with Alvida. Watched it all the way up to Impel Down that Winter Break and then started reading the manga. It was a great time to get into the series.
-
Question to anyone who sees this, what was the thing that really hooked you on one piece? What moment, concept, character, or anything really. Just whatever it was that made you decide to continue for as long as you have.
I literally never watched an anime or read another manga before I picked up one piece so I was pretty much hooked from the start because it was so different from the American comics I read and loved (I was a huge Avengers fan way before the movies came out and everyone knew who they were) but I’d say when Lucky Roo shot the bandit and the other bandits said something like “Hey that wasn’t fair” and Shanks said “Fair, were pirates and we don’t play by the rules” that’s when I was hooked
I still get goosebumps when I read that
-
Love hearing all these origin stories, so I'll share mine too!! Yes, my first experience was with the 4Kids dub, but I was actually part of the target audience. I was 4 years old at the time, soon to be 5 though
. Fell in love with it instantly, and not long after that I was put onto the Funi dub and the manga. I've been reading it week to week since I was 5 years old and while I may not have understood most of what was said, I still enjoyed the new One Piece content. Also, the art was cool so it kept my attention. -
I wish I was a fan of OP when I was that young.
-
I first spotted [K-F]'s episode 147 and had no idea what it was. On a whim, i downloaded and watch it.
It peeked my interest so i downloaded 4 more and watched those: by the time i saw that OHKO VS Belamy, i was already hooked.
Then i tried watching all episodes, from the beginning … but i caught up and only then i found out this was the anime version of the manga ...
Started reading the manga from the beginning but i caught up by chapter 384, IIRC: been a fan ever since.
-
When I was a teenager back in the middle 00's I used to download a lot of anime. It was my main hobby. That said, most of what I watched was seinen though, because I believed that I had grown out of shonen anime already, lol, even though I still loved shonen series from my childhood (Dragon Ball, Rurouni Kenshin, Saint Seiya, Inuyashi, Yugi Oh, etc). But one day I was watching on TV and got hooked despite avoiding the series for years. It was 2006.
For the next two years I was a big Naruto fan, although I was already noticing the overall decline in quality of the series.
So one day it crossed my mind the idea that I should check the other two anime from the famous "big 3". I chose One Piece first over Bleach. It was addictive. I watched OP from the beginning to Thriller Bark in less than two months, I think, and then I jumped into the manga to catch up to the original source, which was at the end of Amazon Lily.
I LOVED One Piece. It instantly became my favorite manga series of all time. So much so that it completely overshadowed Naruto and I never payed too much attention to it anymore, lol.
In case you're curious, a few months later it was finally time to give a chance to Bleach… and what a disappointment, lol. Considering I loved OP and had been a Naruto fan, I was expecting big things from Bleach, but it was just a bore. Had to drop it midway through.
-
Question to anyone who sees this, what was the thing that really hooked you on one piece? What moment, concept, character, or anything really. Just whatever it was that made you decide to continue for as long as you have.
When I was a kid I really liked Luffy. I even age ridiculous amounts of pineapple trying to get devil fruit powers like him, lol. Nowadays I stick around for Franky and Robin. I really like their characters because they remind me of myself depending on my mood.
-
I was in High School, so around 2008. Before One Piece i was only cared about Naruto and other manga. In my first year at HS, my friend brough over Volume 45, and i just read it.
Vol 45 is post-enies lobby and epilogue for water 7. At that time i dont really understand the story, who's who, etc
But the humor really hook me in, there's something special about the way they always wrong about Sunny figurehead, thinking it was sun flower.
After that, i watch the anime and read the manga from the beginning and here i am now.
-
I watched Arlong's arc and couldn't get enough, then loved chopper's arc a lot, drum island was amazing.
anyway, too bad chopper is just a garbage gag character for selling merch now -
Question to anyone who sees this, what was the thing that really hooked you on one piece? What moment, concept, character, or anything really. Just whatever it was that made you decide to continue for as long as you have.
The thing that got me to it was the art. The fact a shonen with such an aberrant art style could be so popular in Japan made me think it definitely had to have something special about it.
I was so confident in that idea that I actually gave OP a second, third and fourth try.
First time reading the manga I thought it was very boring (I instantly fell in love with Buggy, but disliked everything else) and gave up on Syrup Village. Second try after a few months, the same. Third try I decided to try the anime and I gave up even earlier. On my fourth attempt, went back to manga, managed to get to Baratie and that arc finally made me start to enjoy it, but Arlong Park was the arc that finally did the trick.
-
Alabasta arc and escpecially Vivi's fight with Luffy hooked me up really bad. It was so refreshing to see that it's not only about how the good guys fight the bad guys but also about friendship, trust and personal growth.
-
@.access:
The thing that got me to it was the art. The fact a shonen with such an aberrant art style could be so popular in Japan made me think it definitely had to have something special about it.
I was so confident in that idea that I actually gave OP a second, third and fourth try.
First time reading the manga I thought it was very boring (I instantly fell in love with Buggy, but disliked everything else) and gave up on Syrup Village. Second try after a few months, the same. Third try I decided to try the anime and I gave up even earlier. On my fourth attempt, went back to manga, managed to get to Baratie and that arc finally made me start to enjoy it, but Arlong Park was the arc that finally did the trick.That art must really have got you to give it so many second chances.
-
Some very neat stories, thank you all for sharing!!
-
Glad to see more 08'ers like me around. I also got into One Piece during the "Big 3 era" back in the late 2000s. It was sometime in 2007 when my group of friends from school got into the Naruto craze. The series had just entered shippuuden territoy, I think, so the hype was pretty big back then. It also neatly coincided with the time my parents first installed internet connection and when I stopped being in the swimming club and had a lot of free time to enjoy my new access to the web. I was already a big anime fan, since the days of Dragon Ball, Sailor Moon, Yu Gi Oh, Pokemon, Digimon, Sakura the Card Capturer (yeah, I watched every kind of series back when I was a kid!)
ALSO coincidentally around the same time, my favorite TV channel (SIC Radical, for any portuguese AP goers out there) started airing a dubbed version of One Piece. Although I couldn't watch every episode because of my school schedule, I watched around 3 out of 5 days a week, so I could still follow it closely. Some days I almost ran as fast as I could so I could catch the new episode before it started. I was almost immediately hooked. By the devil fruits, especially. By Zoro's sword skills. By Sanji's "kong fu". But mostly by Arlong Park. Barely anything can manage to beat that in the whole series. Also Mihawk's first appearance. That was great. I still think most people agree with me, especially those who started watching/reading when the series was much shorter, before Water 7, perhaps. I think that was my 2nd biggest moment of awe (rivalling Alabasta). Anyway, not long into East Blue, they changed into a subbed version of the japanese anime. And right before the Baroque Works agents met in Spiders Café, when I was hyped as hell… it stopped airing. Since I had gotten used to watching Naruto online, I dove straight into watching OP. I caught up to the anime right when the straw hats reached Thriller Bark. I remember very clearly that the first episode I had to wait for a week to see was the one where Hildon takes the weakling trio to Hogback's mansion. At that point I was so addicted I went and read the whole manga from the first chapter up to the point I was at in the anime (back then I thought of the anime as the main show and the manga as just support material... I know
). But by then, the anime was starting to become unbearable to watch, so I lost my patience, went ahead, and read the rest of Thriller Bark and Sabaody, right to the moment the Straw Hats were separated. The first chapter I read weekly was the very first or second chapter of Amazon Lilly. And what a time it was to become a new fan, right before the big boom of Marineford and Strong World. -
My brother got a Songoku toy as a gift. On the back were shown figures from some other anime. Pirate flag (pirates!), some straw hat kid, a bandanna dude with 3 katanas (3!) and a readhead. Thought it looked amazing!
Only a couple of months later did I stumble onto it on German TV station.
-
I guess I'm a day late on the "what got you hooked bit" but for me it was Vivi's farewell at the end of Alabasta. I'd been enjoying myself up to that point, sure, but it was such a perfect conclusion to what remains one of the strongest shonen manga arcs of all time. The way it all came together spoke to me so powerfully that I knew I was in it for the long haul. There's actually a ton of moments beyond that point that hit me far harder, to the point that that scene might struggle to make it into my top five, which really just goes to show how much great content One Piece has.
I couldn't say exactly what year it was I got hooked. I'd been on and off the series for years, starting with watching bits of the 4kids dub before school in the mornings. Even in that form, there was something about the series' world that stood out and made me want to see more, but I was a kid then and didn't end up looking for anything beyond what came up on tv. My mum thought it was a horrible show. Too bad for her. First year of high school I made friends with a girl who also enjoyed the series, but she'd already discovered the uncut Japanese version. She explained at length how much more bloody the original version was and told me I should look up the episodes on this new site I'd never heard of called "youtube" or something like that, where they were all uploaded in three parts. Again, I tried the series, but as much as there was something alluring about the world and the story, there was still something missing in what I saw.
It wasn't until a couple years after that when a friend's Fullmetal Alchemist recommendation got me properly into anime, and the download-limited internet my mum said was "all we needed" drove me to the manga instead. After FMA proved to be leagues better as a manga (this was pre-Brotherhood), I was looking for more to read. Naruto and Bleach were big at my school and everywhere else in those days, but part of me still wanted to give One Piece the chance it deserved after all this time. Scan and translation quality was garbage at the time, so it still took a while to get through, with several long breaks after major arcs just to let my brain decompress, but after that first time reaching the end of Alabasta I was committed. Finally caught up right around the time of Ace's death and started reading week to week, which quickly turned a strong interest into a passionate obsession.
I started buying the English volumes a year or two after that when I started my first part time job and had some disposable income. I plotted out how many I could afford each pay cycle and started counting down the months until my collection was up to date. It was kind of a shame to have gotten there before the box sets were announced, I'd really like to have some of the extras from them, but what can you do?
-
The anime club I was in waaaay back in the day in 98 or so actually showed the first few episodes not long after they aired.. they had a hookup that got anime tapes right from Japan! Fansubs back when they were a difficult thing to get. Me and my friends just looked at it and went "That's looks weird, don't care. Is he doing the Mr. Fantastic thing? How dumb!"
And then I never looked at One Piece again in any format and never thought about it again. The end.
…..okay, obviously not the end.
Then a couple years later, American Shonen Jump hit. While the first street issue hit in January 2003, they had a preview copy at Comicon the previous year, so July 2002. ANd I read the dragonball and the yugioh. And eventually cause I had nothing else to do on the plane ride home, I read the other stuff in there as well. And to One Piece I went, "not bad." Still REALLY WEIRD looking but you can't argue with the strength of that first chapter.
Somewhere around that same point, our anime club (which was monthly) randomly played the two part finale to the Arlong fight, in raw japanese. I could tell there were emotions and character stuff going on, but it was raw and I had missed the arc up until then... but Arlong pulled out his sawtooth sword and used it to travel up the side of a building and I thought that was freaking cool. The whole fight was. (I might also be misremembering, and may have seen the arlong fight before the Jump preview, but I have to assume I had a reason to give it a chance)
At that point American Jump started coming out regularly, but was clearly far far behind. It took them like a year to get to Usopp. So.... I hunted down bootleg chinese sub dvds. I didn't know about manga scans at that point, so the bootlegs with Liar Bu and SUnkist and Clark Dell were what I had to go with. Binged it with a friend and we had several shared reactions along the way. Like thinking Kuro's hand gesture was the dubest thing ever, and then the reveal that he did that because he was used to claws, and that was a SO COOL! moment. And that kept happening over and over, the series would do something seemingly super dumb, then pay it off later and I began to appreciate it. We marathoned SYrup village in one sitting, not realizing how long it would be. A couple weeks later we binged the Arlong arc. WHich... I already knew the ending to, but... we had nooo idea how many hours that sitting was going to be when we started. (Marathoning that was an ordeal!)
I was officially hooked and got new sets regularly along with some other bootleg animes because that was just the only way to get it then, torrents weren't really a thing just yet and internet was slow. (Started torrents around the time of Full Metal Alchemist in 2003 but was still getting those box sets for reasons... computer memory space and ease of playing on a dvd player and such) But it got up to Skypeia and the anime started to slog. And it was at THAT point (must have been in 2005 or so, bootlegs were behind the official airing ) that I discovered scanlations!
I then proceed to download and binge... Naruto. Well, it was still good then. Got right up to the timeskip. Then turned my attention to OP. Binged through Skypeia (and to my shame I basically skipped the flashback) and then up through Water 7 where I was deeply hooked by Aokiji's whole "she will betray you thing" which at the time I likened to Berserk having Zodd prophesize Griffith's betrayal... because that was my comparison point then. (OH yeah, I'd binged and loved the Berserk anime and had all the raw manga volumes at that point.) Caught up at some point on the sea train, I no longer know when exactly. Just that I know for sure I was caught up before Robin's flashback.
I then found this website and lurked for a while, then officially joined in 2007.
And now I have been on this site far too long but it is what it is. Met my wife on here though so I guess I can't complain too much.
-
Question to anyone who sees this, what was the thing that really hooked you on one piece? What moment, concept, character, or anything really. Just whatever it was that made you decide to continue for as long as you have.
A friend introduced me to HK bootleg DVD rips of One Piece in 2002 and we worked together to hunt down as much of the series as possible on Kazaa.
I had been a fan of DBZ and Digimon before that, and I really liked how One Piece didn't have the typical Toriyama/Tezuka sharp and shiny look to it. Everything was a lot smoother and rounder and more western-looking.Not long after, I subscribed to Shonen Jump and found KF's much better fansubs (they were in Logue Town at the time IIRC). I joined AP shortly after (it had just launched and didn't have a forum at the time, so it was mainly a One Piece news blog with arc summaries and stuff) and have been following the manga consistently ever since.
The mysteries and Oda's technique of dropping little breadcrumbs for us to find and interpret are what's kept me engaged the most, but I've always loved the flashbacks and other scenes that showcase strong emotions. Oda's really good at those.
-
Interesting to read about everyone's path. Short version : the art caught my interest, the anime got me in and Skypiea hooked me for good.
I first found out about the series around 2003. Back then I was only getting started with manga/anime ; I was into DBZ, Kenshin, Tenshi Muyo, Slayers, …and a bunch of other series that had me convinced all anime looked generic, because I knew nothing. I stumbled on a One Piece anime teaser in a retail shop and felt that silly-looking art that didn't take itself seriously to be a breath of fresh air.
A while later a friend introduced me to the show and over the next few months we watched the anime until early Alabasta. This and Drum made me want more of the same, the Chopper/Hirurk story especially hit me like a truck. I didn't go for the anime right away, however, but picked the manga instead.
Eventually I reached the Jaya/Skypiea arc and that hooked me forever. From the falling wreck to the skirmishes with Bellamy, first encounter with Blackbeard - his "men will never stop dreaming" panel remains my all-time favorite to this day - to the skywards current and early adventure in the sea of clouds, it packed everything that I read this manga for. I never cared much for the lengthy battles afterwards, but the conclusion with the golden bell and giant shadow was truly magnificient and at that point it became clear that I would be following One Piece for a very long time.
-
Did I answer? I feel like I Writen the date but not the reason.
Character profiles from Robin and Franky, her powers, his powers. The first chapter that I read weekly was the 3rd and the 7th.
-
When the manga came out in Germany, an Anime magazine I read (Yes we did that in 1999) showed the panel where Luffy asked Coby who that fat women was. The reaction of everyone and the fact that there are pirates, hooked me instantly. I remember this moment to this day.
-
Oh man, I remember checking out the first few volumes of the manga from a library five or six years ago, thinking I'd just read the first bit of the story because I'd heard that this series was part of the Big 3 with Naruto and Bleach, both of which declined in quality as they went on and thought I'd jump ship before that. What first piqued my interest in continuing was seeing Mihawk at Baratie, since he really, really gave off final boss vibes for Zoro. Not a midboss, not just the guy who gets defeated and then a stronger guy takes his place, but the true final opponent Zoro would have in the endgame. That…actually might not be true anymore lol, but at the time it made me think that the author of this series was honestly doing some long term planing and putting a lot of thought into where the story would go, and it could be a worthwhile investment.
Then I got hooked during this forum's namesake and absolutely fell in love during Alabasta. I regret nothing since
except my naive hope that Franky's pre-timeskip design would stick around longer -
Yeah i miss old Franky…
-
I understand why people miss the old Franky, but I'd say that he was only that extradinarily awesome character in the CP9 saga. Even in Thriller Bark he was not the same to me anymore.
My thesis is that Franky's got such a dominant personality that he should be the center of attention everywhere he is in order to do justice to his character. He is like a leader, a boss, a really noisy boss, but not a subordinate. But since the story doesn't really have enough room for that, he ends up being less than he should be.
It's a different case compared to other Strawhats that are more chill in general, so when they sit on the bench screentime-wise it doesn't feel as ackward.
But I'd say that Dressrosa did reasonably well for Franky in some scenes…
-
I keep hoping that he’ll crawl out of the giant hunk of metal that he has become, but he decided to become a caricature of himself.
-
For me i really only meant the non-cube monster Fuhranky.
-
I prefer Franky's post-timeskip design. It just looks better to me than his pre-timeskip one.
-
FYI, Greg said on Twitter he's about to do a livestream:
Like the Avatar? / Like the Miis?Dragalia Lost ID: 97617932505
-
I don't get the displeasure in Franky's design pts. Maybe it's because I don't see what is great or bad in general about it.
-
I didn't like Franky's TS design but I felt that Oda would do amazing, cool, creative, and goofy things with it over time.
To date he's delivered on the goofy end and..pretty much just that. Strong Right is sorta cool…
Looking at what Oda did with pre-skip Franky's body vs what he's done with Franky's new body, the difference is staggering. Franky was consistently putting new abilities on display whereas I'm struggling to think of anything he's performed outside Strong Right and hair gags.
For me? It's not how he looks so much as how Oda uses it and for almost ten years, he hasn't shown us anything half as interesting as what we saw before Franky even arrived a Enies Lobby.
-
Hey, thanks for answering my question, Greg! I'd meant to ask you about Jinbe sometime after he officially joined.
I can't say I agree about there being no more crew members: Luffy said he wanted ten, Zoro was called the first and Brook was the eighth. That'd make Jinbe the ninth, leaving the tenth spot open. But I guess we'll only know for sure when it happens.
Like the Avatar? / Like the Miis?Dragalia Lost ID: 97617932505
-
I agree.
It's baffling that Oda decided to make a fist fight between Franky and Sr. Pink instead of exploring his arsenal of weapons post-timeskip. But from what I remeber Franky's fight against Fukurou was not that different either. Maybe that's Oda's quirk for Franky's fights… which is kinda dumb, lol.
Franky Shogun is cool though...
-
Well, now's a good place as any to bring back the Heavy Nunchuck.
-
I’ll be super upset if there’s not one more crewmate, that’s one of the things I’ve been looking forward to the most in this series, since I’ve loved each and every straw hat
It would be one thing if he never had Luffy say how many members he wanted (in the very first chapter) or Black Beard having ten titans or his remark about how he wanted the straw hats to be like a soccer team (eleven players) but he did do all those so I’ve been anticipating for years, so it would really suck if that didn’t end up happening
-
Greg with the One Piece netflix show picking up steam have you read the first episode script?
-
I thought it was just about how he looks, but if it's about utility and function, that's understandable. I don't think there's been time to reveal everything for the crew yet. Oda has been shown to unveil the capabilities, while tacking on small upgrades here and there.
Example would be Nami's new clima-tact not being all fleshed out, but she gets an upgrade of convenience/ease with use from Usopp and Franky. What did she learn and implicate hasn't been shown because it isn't time yet.
I doubt Luffy has shown everything either. I would point out that we got an indication of "18 months with Rayleigh and 6 months alone". I doubt this has no purpose. We get Tank, Bound and Snake Man. Is it possible that Luffy has something unrelated to G4 up his sleeve? Then it's also possible that he might have another G4 form. Many see this as an "asspull" for Oda to pull things out, but I believe that it is justified by the separation with time with Rayleigh and without him. The flashback might come in where Luffy is by himself and without Rayleigh to show the difference. When Oda shows Tank and Snake Man, it's when Luffy is getting something that can compliment it. As comedic as it was, the food complimented Tank Man. Luffy's growth in CoO helped Snake Man. There's a time and place for everything. Luffy is using Bound Man against fodder now. Is there another form or unrelated technique from his training that can compliment his CoA growth?
Usopp dealt with plants and bugs that weren't normal. He also dealt with his body changing due to the food. His awakening of Haki complimented some of his new tools and growth. I doubt that he has shown all of the utilities of the pop green. As Heracles said there are many uses. He even keeps it in a utility belt like a comic hero.
!
Just saying that Oda has changed the way he unloads the capabilities of each SH character. I understand that we are 6+ arcs in, but we have also seen that the crew haven't unveiled everything. The formula of when Franky was first iintroduced and showing off his centaur and nail spitting won't be the same in pts where crew members aren't the focus for longer periods of time -
I thought it was just about how he looks, but if it's about utility and function, that's understandable. I don't think there's been time to reveal everything for the crew yet. Oda has been shown to unveil the capabilities, while tacking on small upgrades here and there.
Example would be Nami's new clima-tact not being all fleshed out, but she gets an upgrade of convenience/ease with use from Usopp and Franky. What did she learn and implicate hasn't been shown because it isn't time yet.
I doubt Luffy has shown everything either. I would point out that we got an indication of "18 months with Rayleigh and 6 months alone". I doubt this has no purpose. We get Tank, Bound and Snake Man. Is it possible that Luffy has something unrelated to G4 up his sleeve? Then it's also possible that he might have another G4 form. Many see this as an "asspull" for Oda to pull things out, but I believe that it is justified by the separation with time with Rayleigh and without him. The flashback might come in where Luffy is by himself and without Rayleigh to show the difference. When Oda shows Tank and Snake Man, it's when Luffy is getting something that can compliment it. As comedic as it was, the food complimented Tank Man. Luffy's growth in CoO helped Snake Man. There's a time and place for everything. Luffy is using Bound Man against fodder now. Is there another form or unrelated technique from his training that can compliment his CoA growth?
Usopp dealt with plants and bugs that weren't normal. He also dealt with his body changing due to the food. His awakening of Haki complimented some of his new tools and growth. I doubt that he has shown all of the utilities of the pop green. As Heracles said there are many uses. He even keeps it in a utility belt like a comic hero.
! https://i.imgur.com/CCplJf4.jpg
Just saying that Oda has changed the way he unloads the capabilities of each SH character. I understand that we are 6+ arcs in, but we have also seen that the crew haven't unveiled everything. The formula of when Franky was first iintroduced and showing off his centaur and nail spitting won't be the same in pts where crew members aren't the focus for longer periods of timeI agree with the analysis in general, but I disagree that's a good thing.
Oda mismanaged the timing to showcase what the (non-Luffy) Strawhats are capable of… and now it feels a little late.
I know that only a few arcs were written since the timeskip despite 10 years of serialization, but the story has escalated a lot in those few arcs to the point that we're going to take down one or even two Yonkou this arc. Oda should have found some room to show better what the Strawhats can do to establish their abilities and also to make us have a feel for the overall level of the crew. It would have been fun to see more of them too.
It's just weird that the first challenge of most Strawhats since the timeskip is going to be to defeat top tier fighters from a Yonkou crew without having ever shown anything substantial before. Meanwhile we have followed very closely Luffy's development through his haki training arcs (something that was never done before onscreen) and defeating stronger opponents.
-
I agree with the analysis in general, but I disagree that's a good thing.
Oda mismanaged the timing to showcase what the (non-Luffy) Strawhats are capable of… and now it feels a little late.
I know that only a few arcs were written since the timeskip despite 10 years of serialization, but the story has escalated a lot in those few arcs to the point that we're going to take down one or even two Yonkou this arc. Oda should have found some room to show better what the Strawhats can do to establish their abilities and also to make us have a feel for the overall level of the crew. It would have been fun to see more of them too.
It's just weird that the first challenge of most Strawhats since the timeskip is going to be to defeat top tier fighters from a Yonkou crew without having ever shown anything substantial before. Meanwhile we have followed very closely Luffy's development through his haki training arcs (something that was never done before onscreen) and defeating stronger opponents.
I think there were at least 6 arcs between Drum Kingdom and Ennies Lobby. EL arc is where Chopper's Monster Point came into play. Something that he had before the story began.
I see it like this, should G4 have been used on Caesar or Hody? Those enemies and their support weren't worthy of that. The crew need an opponent that makes sense to unload that. The progression would seem off if we knew all of the capabilities of the crew by now and this current battle is where everyone went beyond their limits (like Ennies Lobby/CP9) or just totally drained themselves (like TB/Moria). It's a Yonko, but the whole point to this is to liberate Wano. The clear difference is that I see post Wano as as a new beginning and most believe that the story is near the end.
Another factor is that Law illustrated that Yonko crew are vast. Larger and stronger than former opposition. It requires allies/numbers. So the focus has been on Law, the Fleet, Scabbards, etc. It builds the SH crew to be almost similar to the WB Pirates that had a ton of allies. Law has a bunch of crew members, but the focus is on Bepo, Jean, Penguin and Hachi. We don't even know the last 2's capabilities. It is different for the SH crew. Everyone gets focus. I believe that is the same philosophy behind the allies. When you see WB allies, Squard even got to play a large role. So, fleshing out Kawamatsu or Barto is for the purpose of us being familiar with an ally, which goes in line with how we knew the WB allies that were even main crew in the Oden flashback.
Not gonna dig into if this is great or bad. Just that I can see where he is going with it, so when the incident that takes place, I will be able to critique if it was worth it or Oda wasted my time by not keeping the crew as the focus they were for pre-timeskip.
-
I can say with considerable confidence that the crew as it currently exists is what Oda set out to accomplish.
Luffy's, "I want about 10 people." is fiercely debated in Japan as it is abroad.
10 crew in addition to himself?
10 crew total?
Since Oda said a crew member would die and that was Merry, is the spirit of their ship the 10th?
I would temper your expectations if you're hoping for more than the crew as it currently exists.
That said, Oda is entirely subject to whims that he feels will improve his story and surprise the audience. I would most certainly be surprised if another crew member joined.
Greg with the One Piece netflix show picking up steam have you read the first episode script?
If you're referring to the leaked script, no I have not read the leaked script.
-
There is always Vivi. Now that she is most likely on the run, she can reunites with the crew for the final journey( not that there is a known purpose of it).
“When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they can seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall. Think of it–always.”
-
I neglected to bring her up but yes, Vivi most definitely has a placeholder set for herself.
-
I neglected to bring her up but yes, Vivi most definitely has a placeholder set for herself.
Remember Greg
I just noticed Jinbe and Vivi are looking at each other or at Luffy next crewmates here we come.
-
Question to anyone who sees this, what was the thing that really hooked you on one piece? What moment, concept, character, or anything really. Just whatever it was that made you decide to continue for as long as you have.
I'm an example of somebody who started reading this series really, really late. In fact, I used to read Naruto, and, like just many many people, was dissatisfied with many aspects of the ending and the events leading up to it. After the series ended, I took a break from manga for a while. But about a year after it finished, I found myself missing having a weekly fix and decided to start another series, and did some research about a few that I'd already heard of. Due to said research, I passed over Bleach and Fairy Tail (haha), but found that One Piece had very good reviews–which surprised me, because I used to remember a ton of jokes being cracked at its expense (which, in hindsight, I realized were about the 4Kids dub, not the series proper).
Furthermore, another thing I learned about through my reading was the strong sibling bond between Luffy and Ace. Strong sibling bonds between main/major characters in stories tend to have a pretty solid appeal for me, as I've found before and since (other examples including The Hardy Boys and Gravity Falls), perhaps because I tend to have strong protective-big-sister feelings myself. The few chapters of Marineford covering Ace's death were actually the very first ones I read; I obviously had no context and no idea who anyone was besides Luffy and Ace, but I did find the scene to be really moving, and then was basically like "Well, I'll read from the beginning, get there at some point, and actually have the proper context!" (Ironically, when I did, though I still found that scene to be very sad, it was also more frustrating on a reread understanding exactly how much Ace's death was his own fault, lulz. I was more sad for Luffy, really).
So then I started at the beginning (in October 2015, I believe), and was hooked pretty much from minute one, since I loved the East Blue saga and it remains one of my very favorites to this day. For the next few months, I switched between reading several sagas in the manga, watching some of those sagas in the anime in Japanese, and then watching some of the Funimation English dub, so between all of that and grad school studies, it took me about three months to get caught up on the manga. The first chapter I read as a fresh release when it came out, at the same time as the rest of the fandom, was Zou chapter 812, where it's revealed Sanji's a Vinsmoke and getting married. (Interesting place to catch up, haha.)
–- Update From New Post Merge ---
And yeah, honestly, out of all the characters we've already met, the only person that I'm interested in having officially join the SHs in full capacity, besides the 10 we already have, is Vivi. Is it feasible? With the way things stand right now, dunno. But in terms of chemistry with the crew and relationships already forged with them, she beats out everyone else by miles, and I'd love to have her back.
-
There is a big issue tough. If Vivi joins, Carue is too and that would make 11 !
For Franky design and lack of ability, I would agree. But almost all Strawhat have the same weakness.
Usopp is only launching random pop green here and there when his attacks were much more diverse. Who else miss his Wagomus or Spells ? Or Chopper who seems he can only do Monster Point rampage. So far Brook is the one who had the most interesting display in his new abilities -
Looking at what Oda did with pre-skip Franky's body vs what he's done with Franky's new body, the difference is staggering. Franky was consistently putting new abilities on display whereas I'm struggling to think of anything he's performed outside Strong Right and hair gags.
For me? It's not how he looks so much as how Oda uses it and for almost ten years, he hasn't shown us anything half as interesting as what we saw before Franky even arrived a Enies Lobby.
I would argue that he has a few redeeming qualities like Kizaru's laser (and nipple lights
), but truly aside from that it's mostly been fist fights, rockets and guns. I miss the days of the shield arm and centaur-Franky…
Like other downsides of the post-TS era, I'm tempted to say it boils down to secondary characters competing with the main cast for both panel space and Oda's creativity. 20 years is a long time to travel with anyone, maybe it's difficult for him to keep his focus on the Straw Hats alone and this is why we're not seeing that much novelty for some of the crew.
