Volume 108 will arrive on March 4 2024.
The generally reliable Shonen Jump News on Twitter has reported that volume 108 is on the March 2024 volume list. Probably arriving near the start of the month like usual.
Start your cover/chapters/title speculation!
Chapters 1089 – 1099, ending with Vegapunk and Kuma agreeing on the name "Pacifista", with either "Pacifist" or "Kumachi" as the volume title. On the cover we'll get the Egghead crew of the past, i.e. big headed Vegapunk, Kuma, Bonney, Sentomaru, Borsalino, and Saturn being ominous in the background. Maybe throw Ginny, Ivankov and Dragon somewhere in there as well.
I think 1089 - 1099 and Pacifist are also safe bets. I think "Better Off Dead In This World" would make a great title, but I always get burned when I lock in the dramatic-sounding ones as a guess. Oda just doesn't love them the way I do.
For the cover I think we'll have a little scene of a young Bonney a dad mode Kuma in the foreground at the bottom, with present day Luffy, Borsalino, Saturn and maybe Bonney or Vegapunk looming large overhead.
1089-1098, title "Kumachi"
Cover has Luffy, Vegapunk, Bonney center, Kizaru and Saturn looming on the sides, with a color-faded image of younger Kuma with kid Bonney in his arms in the background.
We had two extended volumes back to back (106 and 107) so I believe this one shall be on the shorter side (like Volume 104) - it also allows all Bonney-titled chapters to be in the same volume.
I'm betting on: 1089 - 1097, titled "Kumachi"
Cover: (Beast-Human form) Jaygarcia, (crying) Bonney, (Ligh emiting) Kizaru, (bloody) Sentomaru, (beaten up) Kuma and (obligatory) Luffy.
I'm thinking 1089 - 1098 with the title being Luffy vs. Kizaru.
The cover will have Gear 5 Luffy on the left and Kizaru on the right, both facing each other in fighting poses (either Kizaru summoning his sword or doing his Yatagami attack while Luffy is legs spinning arm up ready to punch Kizaru). Behind them in the background will be Saturn's face, either in regular of hybrid form. You'll only be able to see his face. Then at the bottom it could go either way. We could get it dedicated to Kuma because the flashback starts here but Oda could also save 109 to be a cover dedicated to Kuma and Bonney, as it will have 1099+ which is still all the Kuma flashback.
If this cover does reference Kuma, then he'll be in the bottom centre in his priest outfit. Ginny and Ivankov will definitely also be there, with Dragon and Gyogyo as other options if Oda needs to fill space. He'll save Kuma and Bonney being together until the next volume.
If the cover doesn't reference Kuma then it will be the Vegatank in the bottom instead, with Vegapunk, Atlas, Franky and Sanji all being in it or holding onto it.
One Piece Volume 108 will have 224 pages, so I think it will cover from chapter 1,089 to chapter 1,100!!
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Mugiwara_23
Math checks out, and yeah, I never would have guessed either.
I guess if you're forced to have a volume break mid-flashback anyway, finding a way to tease Luffy returning isn't a bad way to leave things off.
I’d say with the average One Piece chapter being shorter compared to earlier chapters, think of east blue to skypia, it kinda makes sense that Oda can push for volumes with more chapters in them.
I wonder if there ever be a volume with 13 or 14 chapters. Obviously the last volume shouldn’t count.
That will really split the flashback and non-flashback stuff in the volume then, so yeah I fully expect it to go the Kuma angle on the cover (even though 'Kuma's Life would be a great title for the next volume).
Interesting: with Vol 108 ending in chapter 1100, there’s a big chance Volume 109 is made of Chapters 1101-1110, making Chapter 1111 the first one of volume 110.
Lots of 11s.
Ginny, Kuma, VP, Dragon, Saturn. Might be Dragon's second cover.
Funny, I actually put 12 chapters in vol 108 in my excel sheet I use to track chapters & volumes, even thinking it was unlikely. It just seemed like the best volume ender; Oda could've ended at 10 chapters, but it didn't seem like enough pages. And ch 1099 didn't seem like as strong a place to end as 1098 or 1100. So, I leaned toward 1100.
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Mugiwara_23
Nice one. Simple, but good, clear story rep. You can see in the process vid Oda was pretty sure of the characters and scenes he wanted on this one, including the Vega Tank. You can also see him considering a Kuma paw bubble instead of the usual square for the background, which would have been great. I'd have stuck with that.
A little surprised not to see Kuma, but maybe next time for the back end of the flashback and his actual arrival. Glad Saturn's demonic form is being left a surprise for volume readers as well.
Paw bubble would have made this too noisy...
Sentomaru and Bonney looking their cleanest yet and they were the ones we needed to see most on this cover. G5 and Kizaru look good as well and we see, inside the Vegatank, the few protagonists caught between their long struggle.
No Ginny or any flashback-related item then, aight then.
10/10 cover
I'm surprised there's no Kuma in the cover.
Wano predictions: There will be 5 acts; All Straw Hats will get fights, some in Act 4; Big Mom Pirates will arrive; Carrot will have her moment, but won't join; Yamato will be a Kouzuki samurai and Wano's Guardian; Shanks will visit Luffy in Act 5; Next arc is Mary Geoise.
@Deicide said in Volume 108 Predictions/Discussion:
I'm surprised there's no Kuma in the cover.
Within the events depicted in the cover, he's not really important yet.
@King-Cannon Yes, but his flashback takes over 50% of the volume, so I expected it to be referenced in the cover.
I don't want to be harsh because I have the highest respect and I'm just glad to see Oda still has it. I mean, If only the current manga looked like that... I wish he would (or could) put all that care. Imagine how the Vega Tank characters would look in a regular page in that scale. We don't even have the final product, the video doesn't have the best quality either and they already look good, detailed enough and not rough at all. Everything feels so rushed in the manga that it's always refreshing to see this stuff.
Looking back at the rescue Bonney squad in the Vega Tank, little did they know. Little did they know man.
Seems like Oda really enjoys having fun with g5 on the covers. It's appeared more than regular Luffy since its introduction. For comparsion, there are two covers with Gear 4, one four Boundman's introduction and the other for snakeman's introduction. But I guess Luffy does use G5 more than he previously used his other best gears at the time.
Weird choice. Hopefully the next cover is full Kuma flashback, even though most of it was in this volume (and most of this volume was it).
I like this cover a lot! I think it makes sense to hold Kuma for vol. 109. The flashback concludes next volume, so it won't be out of place. Kuma and Saturn on the cover of 108 would make sense, but would also spoil volume only readers. Both still work on the cover of 109. Though, Oda could chose to again glorify Nika on 109 with Bonney looking at him in total awe and Egghead bouncing all around. Hopefully it's a different concept, though I do expect Luffy will be Gear 5 on the next cover either way.
Nice to see the focus on Kizaru. I still think he might be the biggest opponent for Luffy this arc.
@Chams-0 I hope so!
My eyes finally caught Saturn in that clip wow.
Final cover! Announcement tweet confirms 12 chapters (1089 to 1100) and a title of "Better Off Dead in this World"
I've never seen colors boost a cover for me so much. I already liked it, but looks beautiful. It has a similar effect as the opening. G5 Luffy in sunlight is way better than at night.
The lighting/shading for this vol over really makes it pop in comparison to a lot of the previous covers imo. It's also not as busy! I really like it! Probably my fav depiction of gear 5 on a cover so far.
Beautiful though the colours are, it's interesting that Borsalino's suit looks black with yellow pinstripes like in the monochrome art instead of orange and yellow like his appearance on that recent Jump cover. Oda also seems to have forgotten that the key on Franky's head was originally part of his Egghead outfit's headpiece, and has made it one of his hair sculptures here instead.
I didn't remember Bonney with blue eyes so I went and checked other covers with her. Turns out they were gray in Sabaody and brown at the Levely.
@Sengokusgoat I'd be willing to accept the Sabaody version as close enough to brown to say it was consistently her colour previously. At a glance, it looks like the anime changed her eyes to blue, so maybe Oda referenced some of their work, forgetting they'd made a change.
Rather surprising Oda didn't have Kuma on the cover even though he had Bonney and Sentomaru on the cover.
Covers compilation!
(I know i.ibb hosting doesn't work for some people when it's used for the spoiler summaries, but imgur has compressed the shit out of this one on upload, and reddit's garbage fire of a new image viewer doesn't cooperate with embedding, so I work with what I've got.)
Is this the first time Oda changes the eye color of an etablished character?
@Kfunk I doubt it's the first time he's made a mistake/copied the wrong reference, but I'm not going through every single colour illustration to cross reference.
There's a few well-documented hair and outfit changes though. Law is usually blue-haired, gets a very dark black for volume 69. Jinbe's outfit goes from white to green between volumes 64 and 66. Franky's Wano outfit also changes between volumes 91 and 92.
I'd say it's almost definitely happened before, and also that there's good odds of her eyes going back to brown the next time she shows up in colour.
@Captain-M
I actually found one case
Rebecca had brown eyes on Vol.71 and Vol.72 and green eyes on Vol.80 to go back to brown for Vol.90
In B&W it doesn't really matter but I wonder how the colored manga will handle it once they catch up to Egghead? I'd prefer if they keep the colors they already picked for Bonney, maybe it's just my problem but sudden change are jarring to me.
Colours change like this a few times in One Piece. Usually it's because Oda will colour it in one way and the anime will colour it in another and then Oda will sometimes use the anime colouring rather than his own as reference.
For Bonney, she actually has violet eyes in the anime but it's the kind of shade of violet where it could easily be seen as blue.
@black-leg-jex said in Volume 108 Predictions/Discussion:
I'm thinking 1089 - 1098 with the title being Luffy vs. Kizaru.
The cover will have Gear 5 Luffy on the left and Kizaru on the right, both facing each other in fighting poses (either Kizaru summoning his sword or doing his Yatagami attack while Luffy is legs spinning arm up ready to punch Kizaru). Behind them in the background will be Saturn's face, either in regular of hybrid form. You'll only be able to see his face.
If the cover doesn't reference Kuma then it will be the Vegatank in the bottom instead, with Vegapunk, Atlas, Franky and Sanji all being in it or holding onto it.
Looks like I was pretty close. Oda used Kizaru in the back instead of Saturn, but the cover being a reference to Luffy vs Kizaru and the Vegatank being the focus on the bottom was completely right. I expect volume 109 to be the Kuma flashback cover.
@Kfunk Good catch! I imagine the colour manga is just going to stick with what they have, but you never know. I'm very interested to see how they handle Prince Gruz and Kujaku, given that they established their own version before either Oda or the anime showed them.
@black-leg-jex said in Volume 108 Predictions/Discussion:
Colours change like this a few times in One Piece. Usually it's because Oda will colour it in one way and the anime will colour it in another and then Oda will sometimes use the anime colouring rather than his own as reference.
While that's almost definitely what happened here, I'm struggling to think of other examples where Oda got it wrong specifically in the way the anime the anime differed, as opposed to just contradicting himself.
People like to bring up Kuma's orange top as an example of a manga colour scheme being retconned to follow the anime, but I've always felt doubtful of that one because you can still see an orange Kuma on volume 49's cover, years after his anime debut. And even after the change it's navy blue vs black, so maybe in-universe the guy just put a different shirt on.
I hope we get Ginny for vol. 109, with a focus on Kuma, maybe Saturn looming in the back, hopefully Conney.
Maybe Oda didn’t want to “spoil” Ginny in this volume’s cover. But curious that the chapters that focus on her of the flashback were in this volume.
If Oda doesn't mind spoiling Gear 5 on volume 103's cover I don't see him caring about spoiling Ginny. Given that, I doubt we'll see her on any volume cover if she didn't make it on this one
Sometimes important characters just don't have their moments align with the covers. If Cora can get skipped, anyone can.
There's a chance we can get Ginny on 109 if Oda decides to base the cover on chapter 1102, Kuma's Life. We could either get Kuma laying on the operating table or Kuma running and around him are thought bubbles showing scenes from across his entire life.
If I had to design the cover from vol. 109 I would put Kuma in the center, Ginny on his shoulders, and 5 different Bonneys, with various ages, from kid to copying Conney, strolling in the front
@Chams-0 said in Volume 108 Predictions/Discussion:
If I had to design the cover from vol. 109 I would put Kuma in the center, Ginny on his shoulders, and 5 different Bonneys, with various ages, from kid to copying Conney, strolling in the front
Sounds nice, but prob not too “shounen-esque”. It seems that every cover has to have some sort of fierce demeanor/attack stance in it somehow.
That's not true. The Drum Island flashback volume is just Luffy and Chopper sitting there smiling, while Hiriluk holds his pirate flag behind them.
Oda can do whatever for the volume covers, the only rule is that Luffy has to be on it unless Oda is setting up a multi-volume theme (so villains vs. heroes or the trio that made up 99-101).
Luffy can show up on a Kuma flashback cover because he saw Luffy. We could either get Luffy training as a 16 year old or the scene where Luffy is sent away by Kuma in Sabaody.
@black-leg-jex said in Volume 108 Predictions/Discussion:
The Drum Island flashback volume is just Luffy and Chopper sitting there smiling, while Hiriluk holds his pirate flag behind them.
With Hiriluk looking confidently fierce in the background while proudly holding a flag. Yep.
