That's no ordinary rabbit! That's the most foul, cruel, and bad-tempered rodent you ever set eyes on! It's got a vicious streak a mile wide, it's a killer!
Title: ''To the Reverie - Rebecca and the Sakura Kingdom''
Chapters Covered: rest of 823 + recap
Episode Director: Yoshihiro Ueda (**1/2)
Animation Director: Shuuichi Ito (***1/2)
Time: 7:30PM EST
Watch It: www.crunchyroll.com/one-piece
Look at the bones!
One Piece Episode 779 Preview
Toei: "There, we animated another coverstory! Now shut up!"
I mean, the animations so far isn't looking too awful. But some of the shots with female characters was distractingly off-model. Like, I know Nami has an inhumanly slim waist, but in some of these shots she looked like a Q-tip. Carrot's voice actor's vocal inflection is completely unbearable when she speak for longer periods of time.
The Drum Island flashback however, was genuinely touching with some really immersive scene-to-scene transition. Probably the best work Toei has done with a continous work of animation for years.
And I do appreciate them finally using a coverstory for an episode, even if it was largely stillframes, it's honestly a lot more entertaining than alot of the stuff they've put out before.
Viola and Rebecca ( no matter how little I liked that character ) felt really endearing in their reappearance. Despite how incredibly poorly Rebecca was handled in Dressrosa, seeing her and Viola just having the freedom to be normal girls felt really good. Like it was actually sort of earned, despite all the fuckery.
Having Brook show Carrot around was a nice final touch, despite how difficult it is for me to listen to her voice for longer periods of time.
At first I was really skeptical of the team stretching out chapters, but as long as they actually put some backbone into making some expanded filler content, I won't hate it as much as I potentially could.
Wapol cover story finally animated! Gives me hope that Toei will do the others eventually!
Also the tour of the ship was really nice! I loved Carrot's "puffer-fish face" and "planting carrots" scenes; both were anime filler but very tasteful and fun!
This episode was a pleasant surprise on many fronts. First, the recap scenes were all classic enjoyable moments I haven't seen in a long time. They even reused that one piece of music specific to that arc. The Dressrosa content was limited to less than 30 seconds which was expected seeing as how recent those events were. On top of that they showed the Carrot funny scenes (she's so adorable!) and even added some filler with her that I enjoyed. But the unexpected treat was them animating the Wapol cover story (or a condensed version of it). I hope that continues if other characters like Eneru return in the future.
A cover story finally animated?
Don't get your hopes up. This was just a freebie.
The Drum recap was well-constructed, especially the flashback portion of it up to Hiriluk's death with it being paced very well and scored to a Movie 9 (appropriate) track. I still don't believe Oda when he says that Wapol's 27 years old. I'm twenty-seven and I sure as heck don't look that old!
Back in the present the full introduction of everyone's favorite energizer bunny and the ensuing shenanigans were fun (big laugh out of Pekoms scooting around on his back and retreating when the topic of food came up). Everyone traveling on the Sunny right now should thank their lucky stars that Luffy didn't seem to be interested in cooking any seafood, because if he had decided to use any of those pufferfish Blackbeard would become the Pirate King because he and the others on board the ship would be dead!
Just came here to say: Seconded wrt Carrot's voice. Hopefully that's the last uber cheery thing we see like that. Really made me question what I was watching, until of course the recaps, which were great. Basically everything was great except for the Sunny scenes solely because of Carrot's mannerisms/voice. It's like I'm watching an introduction to a never before seen character, in a bad way. Anyway, Strooger on point, now I can go away 
I don't wanna make anybody too jealous, but that was my favorite cover story - and now it's animated. I'm set for life.
Anyway, I honestly hope the Sunny runs into like 14 different islands on the way to Sanji. This show needs year of terrible filler. At minimum. I swear.
I would imagine that, someday, it will become necessary for Toei to animate at least the Eneru cover story.
I told you they can't do a cover story unless in can fit in with a current plot, they can't randomly throw it in! That was awesome!
hmm carrot… Toei is there something you want to tell us.. carrot with her own mini carrot field:ninja:
decent-ish ep for the most part!
Anyway, I honestly hope the Sunny runs into like 14 different islands on the way to Sanji. This show needs year of terrible filler. At minimum. I swear.
I'm bemused that people are so averse to the formula of stretching out manga chapters for episode content and want filler arcs so badly. The former method has actually produced good episodes, and Zou in particular has had an upward swing in terms of quality of episodes that cover less than a chapter. Meanwhile, if the Silver Mine arc is anything to go by, the quality of filler arcs ain't going up anytime soon; the best we can get is probably something that's an inoffensively bland time waster like Silver Mine was. Would you rather have a fun episode that stretches out a tiny bit of canon content, or an awful filler episode? It's not like people are happy once we're discussing filler arc episodes, they just complain about them.
Ultimately, people need to stop being prejudiced against an episode just because of how much manga content it covers; what matters is how enjoyable the episode itself was and whether or not it was a worthwhile 22 minutes of your time. Do I wish the episodes covered more of the manga? Absolutely! Are there episodes that cover less than a chapter that are horrible? Definitely! But comparing Toei's track record of stretched episodes vs. filler episodes, I'll take the stretched episodes any day.
Spoiler:
I'm bemused that people are so averse to the formula of stretching out manga chapters for episode content and want filler arcs so badly. The former method has actually produced good episodes, and Zou in particular has had an upward swing in terms of quality of episodes that cover less than a chapter. Meanwhile, if the Silver Mine arc is anything to go by, the quality of filler arcs ain't going up anytime soon; the best we can get is probably something that's an inoffensively bland time waster like Silver Mine was. Would you rather have a fun episode that stretches out a tiny bit of canon content, or an awful filler episode? It's not like people are happy once we're discussing filler arc episodes, they just complain about them.
Ultimately, people need to stop being prejudiced against an episode just because of how much manga content it covers; what matters is how enjoyable the episode itself was and whether or not it was a worthwhile 22 minutes of your time. Do I wish the episodes covered more of the manga? Absolutely! Are there episodes that cover less than a chapter that are horrible? Definitely! But comparing Toei's track record of stretched episodes vs. filler episodes, I'll take the stretched episodes any day.
I think you're standard of a "good" episode has really gone down after watching OP week to week. I think the best comparison would be to watch something like One Pace, which removes all the filler from the episodes and follows the manga more closely. It's like night and day compared to the real episodes. It makes it even easier to recommend the anime to new people because they won't have to sit through 750+ episodes, they can enjoy better content over a shorter period of time
I think you're standard of a "good" episode has really gone down after watching OP week to week. I think the best comparison would be to watch something like One Pace, which removes all the filler from the episodes and follows the manga more closely. It's like night and day compared to the real episodes. It makes it even easier to recommend the anime to new people because they won't have to sit through 750+ episodes, they can enjoy better content over a shorter period of time
You must've missed the part where I said "Do I wish the episodes covered more of the manga? Absolutely!"
We would still have 778 anime episodes today no matter what the anime team did. Their options are either make filler episodes, or stretch out the manga material. And stretched out manga episodes have proven that they can be of high quality, whereas pretty much all filler episodes have ranged from average to bad. So, to me, stretching out the manga is the better choice.
In a perfect world, episodes could cover multiple chapters without ever catching up to the manga. But we don't live in that world and shouldn't treat episodes like we're in that world.
I'm bemused that people are so averse to the formula of stretching out manga chapters for episode content and want filler arcs so badly.
I can only tell ya my opinions. ‘Can’t promise they’ll be interesting, so I’ve enclosed them within a tag. lol
! COUNTERDOSE’S TOP FIVE REASONS WHY HE WANTS FILLER!!
! NUMBER 1! It’s time for a change. We’ve been in this ‘stretch method’ for a long, long, long time. The last filler arc to go beyond just a few episodes was Ice Hunter. Close to ten years ago. It’s totally great that some people have enjoyed the ride, but… Bro, have mercy. We. Did. It. Your. Way.
NUMBER 2! There’s nothing to look forward to. I felt like I deserved a paycheck after sitting through all of Dressrosa. No, wait, I felt like I deserved a purple heart after surviving all of Dressrosa. I’m serious. I can’t take the slow pacing. And there will never be hope that the next arc will be any better.
But with filler, no matter how long, no matter how terrible, there’s always a prize at the end. Something wonderful waiting for me: a watchable adaptation of my favorite story. It’s like chasing a dream.
I do NOT think that a filler arc is better than a poorly-paced canon arc. But a filler arc + a properly-paced canon arc? Better than anything!
! NUMBER 3! Besides, if filler gets REAL bad, I don’t gotta watch it. Not like it’s important.
NUMBER 4! But what if it IS good? I mean, it’s not gonna be, but what if?! There’s just that naive excitement over something new. In a TOEI original tale, anything could happen! At the very least some of the more neglected characters might see some action.
I just like the One Piece world, and it’s fun to not know what’s coming up next.
! NUMBER 5! One Pace exists. This show was so sick it needed a doctor. And that project looks to me like a tall order; there is some tough work involved, for sure. 'Know what the filler arc version of One Pace would be? A list of episodes you can skip.
It’s real hard to recommend the anime if I gotta be like, “Yeah, it’s good but you gotta watch the fan edits that fix everything.”
@Kaido:
The former method has actually produced good episodes and Zou in particular has had an upward swing in terms of quality of episodes that cover less than a chapter.
Yes, I agree; there are good episodes. Probably close to 3 a year. Nah, I’m just messing around; there’s no way there’ve been that many. No, I'm sorry. I'm playing.
However, I’m don’t know if I want to count the Zou arc. You know? ‘Not super sure how much it counts as a good example of stretched material.
Because we, in fact, HAD filler right before it! Only 4 episodes, but what if they'd tried to bleed all those extra minutes out of Zou? That’s like half an episode of Luffy jumping on the rope bridge!
Plus, one of the last episodes of the arc was almost completely filler. You’re saying instead of writing that new material, you’d rather they made the handful of canon panels take an impossibly long time? You looking to change your name from Kaido to Foxy? 
I told you they can't do a cover story unless in can fit in with a current plot, they can't randomly throw it in! That was awesome!
They could have easily done this with Crocodile in Impel Down and Hatchi you know. Thrown in flashbacks to explain how they got where they were. It's too bad really.
Since Jimbei's cover story actually becomes slightly relevant, it might be likely to see that also get adapted.
They could have easily done this with Crocodile in Impel Down and Hatchi you know. Thrown in flashbacks to explain how they got where they were. It's too bad really.
Yeah they really should have, it's a shame 
Would have preferred that content over some of the bad filler we got in Impel Down lol.
Anyway, at least there's a sign they might do this more often in the future.
I really liked that episode a lot
Would have preferred that content over some of the bad filler we got in Impel Down lol.
What're you talking about? Don't you see the comedic genius of Buggy and the prisoners taking a bathroom break instead of escaping?
Anyway, being serious now, we are going to have a filler arc starting on 780, but I suspect it'll only be three episodes long, four at the outside, so that the next arc will premiere at the start of the Spring season. There's no title yet, but the magazine preview mentions the Sunny happening upon a Navy base. So we should start a prayer circle and pray for it to be G8 2.0 quality-wise.
Also, random observation: I didn't notice until this episode that Carrot has claws on her hands. Actual claws, as opposed to the ones on those gloves she wears when fighting.
~Stargazer~, ~Distance~ original stories.
3DS Friend Code: 2234-8294-8917
So we should start a prayer circle and pray for it to be G8 2.0 quality-wise.
Man, I've just finished rewatching G-8 a week ago, and it's still pretty good. I don't know if we can expect another great filler arc like that here, but I hope.
I shall join the circle for now~
OP 
