@Captain-M said in Chapter 1090: Kizaru:

Curiously, he seems to confirm that Shaka and Pythagoras are for real dead. I'll believe it when the Stella says they can't just be restored for a Punk Records backup.

I found this bit in the chapter to actually be rather noteworthy.

The satellites are meant to be treated as Herman's Head-style facets of Vegapunk's personality, and as such whatever happens to them should be read as Vegapunk's internal conflicts being externalized. And I think Shaka and Pythagoras being dead (even temporarily) is a continuation of that idea. Shaka and Pythagoras were the two satellites who had their shit together, and Shaka in particular tended to keep the other's respective personality quirks from getting too out of hand.

I won't be surprised if, without Shaka and Pythagoras, none of the allied satellites will be able to stay on task. Lilith has been itching to pick ill-advised fights for the entire arc, and she's currently in charge of the giant mech that's supposed to be their escape route. Edison has been shown dropping everything (and depending on Pythagoras to pick up the slack) whenever he gets a "Eureka!" moment, while Vegapunk himself has mentioned he's constantly getting new ideas. And Atlas did pick an ill-advised fight that put her out of commission for a while, and she's been shown to express her anger by punching things. Like I said in another post, I think what I find interesting about York as an antagonist is both how her wants and actions reflect onto Vegapunk, and how she splits focus. Having only the satellites left be the ones that arguably represent all of Vegapunk's worst tendencies feels like a great way to continue that concept.

@theackwardstation Eh, I've personally never been able to buy into Yamato being a Jinbe situation just because of difference in framing. The first time Yamato ever brings up wanting to be on Luffy's ship, Luffy ignored the question altogether to instead focus on the part of her statement about Oden. Afterwards when Luffy's offering to break the cuff in exchange for joining them in defeating Kaido, he words so that an invitation on his ship isn't included despite knowing that it's what she wants. Even in 1059 this pattern is continued somewhat, with Luffy's back being turned to the viewer and having him him cast in shadow when Yamato once again brings up desire to be a crewmate; which is furthered by the dialogue, where the fan translations have Luffy once again ignoring the crewmate part of the statement to talk about Wano and Momo, while the in Viz translations Luffy's response doesn't necessarily ignore Yamato's statement, but he does sound... a little annoyed and almost dismissive? before then going back to the subject of Wano and Momo. Either way there's almost zero enthusiasm for Yamato exclusively, and the subject always circles back to Momo.

Compared to the panel's of Jinbe making a similar declarations, the tone is completely different. Luffy faces the viewer so they can see his determination, his words are loud and confident, and he leaves zero room for doubt on the subject.

@Captain-M said in Chapter 1078: Escape Limit:

And I think York mostly passes that bar. The Vegaclone designed for indulgence wants the lifestyle of the most decadent people in the world, I can buy that.

If you don't mind me adding to this, I feel like York's desire to be a Celestial Dragon is meant to say just as much - if not more - about Stella as it does about her.

The first time we ever see the original Vegapunk, one of the first things me learn about him was that, despite later showing that his true aspirations revolve around ending war, he ultimately chose the financial security of making weapons for the World Government. The second thing we learn about him is that he believes he could encourage a positive change from within despite this. Given that earlier chapters spent time setting up that Vegapunk works on a relatively tight budget, you can see why Vegapunk might've looked at the effectively limitless resources of Celestial Dragons - people who regularly throw around hundreds of millions on impulse purchases - and might've had the occasional stray thought of "Man, if I had the power and resources those assholes have..." And, under the current satellite system, you can also see how such laments might've slowly evolved into actions.

Which would make it rather fitting that Vegapunk's own greed has just killed his conscience.

@Captain-M said in Chapter 1078: Escape Limit:

But will her deal with the Elders really work out like she hopes?

You know, I don't actually think there is any deal between the Elders and York. To me, the scene where York calls the Elders came across more like York was speaking to them anonymously or, if she did reveal her identity, was either anticipating or banking on getting an aggressive response from the government. After all, if there was a deal, then she would've figured out it was off when CP0 showed up.

Plus, when you look at the other CP agents that have been imprisoned, in 1076 you can see that the capsules are hooked up to a rather ominous-looking piece of machinery. Whether York is planning a Great Brain Robbery or something else, the marines and Saturn coming to Egghead feels like something York wanted to happen.

Every glimpse I have ever gotten into Oda's lifestyle has read like an excerpt from a horror story.

@Captain-M said in Chapter 1079: The Emperor's Crew, the Red-Haired Pirates:

Personally, I'd rather have seen how the Frontier Dome sabotage was pulled off, I thought the stuff we're seeing here fell into place pretty easily after the reveal, but I do have to remember that the manga's core readerbase isn't overanalysing this story the way I am.

Based on how the opening scene of this chapter follows after the final scene of the last chapter with the reveal of York, I feel the intent of this scene isn't to reveal how York pulled off her plan but rather set up where she and S-Snake are going from here. So the parts about the Frontier Dome and the cameras might be getting saved for a future villain monologue or later developments. Especially given it was also set up that Atlas, Robin, Chopper, and possibly Brook are likely about to either discover her and her plans in the basement or stumble upon something else related to her plans.

@Captain-M said in Chapter 1079: The Emperor's Crew, the Red-Haired Pirates:

Interesting that York has a counterplay already in mind for the government turning on her. And that it still involves killing everyone. Plenty of us talked about the obvious flaws in her plan and the high chance of this happening last week, so I'm curious about her contingencies.

I also found it interesting that the official translation didn't refer to the Cipher Pol agents in the basement as hostages. Which does make sense, since being a hostage implies that they were being held as collateral in exchange for becoming a Celestial Dragon; which by all accounts York should know wouldn't work. But it does suggest that York was keeping them all alive for different reasons, so we'll see how that plays out.

York's expression and dialogue in the first panel does also seem to indicate that she isn't terribly broken up by the CP0 agents being sent to kill her, which does help to make it feel like calling the Elders was more of a "eh, worth a shot" sort of move. But I still also stand by my thoughts that this might've been a smoother transition if we had a chapter or two to get a feel for what all the Vegapunks' arrangement and the status quo on Egghead was like beforehand.

@Captain-M said in Chapter 1079: The Emperor's Crew, the Red-Haired Pirates:

I loved seeing the dynamic of Shank's crew and fleet. It creates a great contrast with Kaido's military mindset and Big Mom's twisted family that he just picks up people he likes, regardless of strength, and uses his title to protect them. Not to mention the parallel it makes with Luffy's own philosophies.

I thought this part was also interesting in terms of how Shanks' fleet contrasts with Luffy's.

While neither Shanks or Luffy really put a person's physical strength as a strict prerequisite for friendship, and that's definitely apparent in their respective fleets there's a stark contrast between how that plays out between the two. While the Straw Hat Grand Fleet was founded on "we're Ride of Die for Luffy whether he likes it or not" and Luffy himself views his relationship with the SHGF as one of mutual aid, Shanks' fleet seems to be entirely reliant on the Red Hair Pirates for protection, and seem almost... complacent? For lack of a better word? Either way, it makes me wonder if the major difference between Luffy and Shanks' philosophies is that while they both inspire great loyalty and friendship, Luffy instills a much fiercer drive/determination in those who are drawn to him.

I think it's also interesting to think about how Kid's experience with Big Mom and Kaido might've played into the decisions he made with Shanks. When he was first introduced in Wano, he was very much of the mind that alliances and allies outside of his own inner circle were stupid given his own experience with Apoo and Hawkins. And by the time he leaves Wano, he clearly still thinks that given that he chastised his crew for mingling with the other crews. Which makes sense, given that he didn't really seem to grasp how the raid's success stemmed from both the mutual efforts of the alliance and Kaido's worldview being the direct cause for many of his subordinates either dying needlessly or straight-up defecting, or how that gathering all those allies was a big factor in Luffy being labeled the new Emperor. So when Shanks goes from 0 to 100, it makes sense that Kid's completely blindsided by it. Of course Kid thinks nothing about razing an Emperor's fleet and territory on top of his past reputation, since when do Emperors give a shit about their underlings? And such weak underlings to boot? His actions feel as true to his character a Shanks' actions in that regard.

If Kid does end up making a return, I won't be surprised if it also revolves around the idea of allies/friendship.

@Captain-M said in Chapter 1079: The Emperor's Crew, the Red-Haired Pirates:

I don't recall if he was specifically offered a copy of Big Mom's or not

I think Kid got the Big Mom poneglyph on his own when he made his own trip to Whole Cake. It's the Zou poneglyph that he would be missing.

@electricmastro said in Next Straw Hat Crewmates (Vol. 9 - Yamato vs. The World):

She’s pretty much an open book just waiting to get more interaction and greater purpose now that Act 3 is over.

She had over seventy chapters to get "more interaction" though. That's 1.3 Thriller Barks. In roughly the same number of chapters Nami went from Orange Town to Arlong Park. Even Jinbe, despite frequently going in a different direction, got a metric ton of groundwork laid out for his introduction pre-ts and everytime he's returned since.

Oda meanwhile seemed to bend over backwards to put as much narrative and visual distance between Yamato and 90% of the Straw Hats, and even when they do interact Oda continues to present the scenes in such a way that the Straw Hats acknowledge Yamato as little as possible. If Oda had any interest in giving her a greater purpose beyond what's already been presented, he probably would've done so by now.

@electricmastro said in Next Straw Hat Crewmates (Vol. 9 - Yamato vs. The World):

If it really wasn't a big deal whether Yamato interacted with the crew or not, then he wouldn't have bent over backwards, like you suggested, because bending over backwards does have intent to it. What that intent is, even I'm not fully sure, but once again, we'll have to see.

It being intention doesn't mean the only explanation is that it's in service of making Yamato somehow more important later down the line. Putting so much distance between her and the crew means that they have absolutely no emotional or thematic connection to her story whatsoever. And the fact that everything about her is connected to Wano, the main antagonist was her father, and her backstory has been presented without having ever been woven into the arcs of the other Straw Hats - that last one being a crucial element of every single Straw Hat's character arc - means there's no longer an organic avenue to do this. All the emotional resonance of her arc has been allotted to her bond with Momo instead.

If anything the distance put between Yamato and the main cast comes across more like a signal to readers to not get too attached, because she's essential to Wano's and Momo's stories but not intended to be a mainstay.

@Riddler Honestly I think the problem was less that it wasn't depicted in the story and more an issue of framing/paneling.

By having O-Tama's status as a Kurozumi be revealed through a panel of her parents' funeral, I'd argue creates an interesting amount of information density. It cements that Orochi is and always was 1000% full of shit whenever he tries to claim any sort of righteous fury or justified vengeance for the Kurozumi if he's simultaneously working his fellow clan members to death. And having O-Tama's parents' gravestone be included in the same graveyard as those who were killed in the factory, with their family names listed on the grave markers, speaks to a certain level of solidarity in the present Wano amongst the residents who were forced to toil. But the problem is that those grave markers are definitely a "squint or you'll miss it" detail that definitely would've been better served by being allotted a larger panel. As is the information doesn't have any room to breathe and gets lost in the deluge of all the other things that are happening in Wano.

Even so, Oda's response acknowledging other interpretations of Wano's final scenes definitely helps when re-reading the arc. Whether or not it's something Oda circles back to at a later date, knowing Oda has considered the same questions the readers were asking does give some of the open-ended questions left in Wano a sense of purpose even if it doesn't necessarily fix everything about Wano's ending.

@Dogmeat said in Chapter 1075: Labophase Death Game:

Go on, explain how Vegapunk's body that is separated from his brain and not connected to its WOODEN ANTENNA (sic...) moves his arms to connect his brain so that he can move...

I have absolutely no horse in this race, but what the hell. I'll bite.

Off the top of my head:

• Vegapunk has been shown in the past to have assistants to aid him. In one flashback with Kuma, there's panels with multiple surgeons working on him for the Pacifista project - some of whom are shown to be working on Kuma's brain specifically. Vegapunk could've put together the schematics and then appointed members from his own team of what would have to be top of the line surgeons and engineers to perform the actual procedure. He even could've overseen most of the process - awake craniotomy is absolutely possible after all.
• Vegapunk implemented the equipment that allowed his brain to send out the signals that put the satellites online first, and then the satellites took care of the final touches in the extraction and transfer of his brain to Punk Records and installing the antenna to get the Stella online. He said his brain was the size of a full grown giant before the procedure so there was a lot of surface to connect the equipment before the extracting the actual brain.
• The Ope Ope no Mi. It's already been established that organs extracted using its ability continue to function outside the body, it has a reputation of being used for surgical purposes, and there's a 9 year window between Vegapunk visiting Ohara and Law eating it. Vegapunk possibly knew and enlisted the help of a previous user for the procedure if he was dead set on doing the entire surgery himself.

Also, you realize the antenna isn't literally an apple, right? The post that connects the it to his skull is clearly made of metal, and nobody confuses it for a real apple. Not even Luffy, the one who's most likely to make that mistake. As for why it's an apple, the Doylist explanation is that Vegapunk's evidently inspired by Einstein and Newton, and apples carry a lot of symbolism that feel relevant to have literally hanging over Vegapunk's head. But if you need a Watsonian explanation, a lot of Vegapunk's inventions have purely decorative elements, so there's no reason for something that's going to be part of his body from now to be just utilitarian.

@electricmastro said in Next Straw Hat Crewmates (Vol. 9 - Yamato vs. The World):

@last-exit-to-laughtale said in Next Straw Hat Crewmates (Vol. 9 - Yamato vs. The World):

@electricmastro said in Next Straw Hat Crewmates (Vol. 9 - Yamato vs. The World):

If it really wasn't a big deal whether Yamato interacted with the crew or not, then he wouldn't have bent over backwards, like you suggested, because bending over backwards does have intent to it. What that intent is, even I'm not fully sure, but once again, we'll have to see.

It being intention doesn't mean the only explanation is that it's in service of making Yamato somehow more important later down the line. Putting so much distance between her and the crew means that they have absolutely no emotional or thematic connection to her story whatsoever.

Well, then again, Robin didn't interact with the Straw Hats much before Vivi left, including her not having interacted with Chopper at all beforehand. Haha.

I've always considered this an extremely disingenuous argument given that Robin's situation is only similar to Yamato's if you completely ignore the context and individual circumstances of their respective arcs.

Robin may have been mysterious figure who weaved in and out of the story in Alabasta, but her very first appearance had her introduced to the Straw Hats all at once, and her initial joining very clearly lays out the groundwork for the emotional through-lines that will follow her all the way to Enies Lobby. Then comes Skypeia, which is meant to showcase to both the readers and the crew the real Nico Robin, completely entrenched in her element when she doesn't need to worry about the World Government breathing down her neck. It's only then, after all of that, we get her full backstory, which is simultaneously paralleled in Usopp's own arc, the conflict regarding the Merry, is interwoven into Franky's own backstory and character development, and further reinforced by the reactions and smaller arcs of the rest of the crew. Water 7/Enies Lobby even manages to shine a whole new light on the Robin from Alabasta, given the number of scenes where Luffy makes her laugh.

Comparable scenes for Yamato on the other hand are, again, allotted to Momo. They are depicted as foils of each other, much of their character arcs share similar motifs (like names and fathers), her backstory as a result is this made far more relevant to Momo and is even interwoven/mirrored in several places, and the framing of their scenes often invite direct comparisons between the two. Even the flashback where Yamato learns of Luffy's true dream through Ace is used to explicitly strengthen her bond with Momo, and results in the decisions he makes later in the arc. Not any of the Straw Hats, not even Luffy. To act like Yamato and Momo aren't a package deal by this point, with Momo having the far stronger connection to the crew, I think is a rather narrow reading of her character overall.

@redon said in Volume 108 Predictions/Discussion:

This certainly tracks with what we knew about Mihawk.

After his former epithet was revealed, I've speculated that Mihawk's own path to becoming the WGS was driven by some sort of revenge quest. While it parallel's Zoro's own "Pirate Hunter" moniker, one of the few things Zoro shares about himself is that it stems from the public at large wildly misinterpreting his intentions. Such a misunderstanding can't easily happen with a title like "Marine Hunter" though, as it implies not only a whole lot of dead marines (or at least a handful dead high-profile marines) but dead marines that were methodically targeted. Yet, at the same time, he doesn't seem to begrudge the marines enough to turn down an opportunity to become a warlord, which Oda confirms here he agreed to because he wanted to be left alone. Which all certainly fits within the framework of a revenge quest against a specific person over an institution.

It also fits with his general listlessness in the present. When you think about it, Mihawk's life - especially pre-ts - is actually kinda depressing. Despite all his accomplishments, in a story where a major overarching theme (especially for the swordsman characters) is that what they protect matters more than their strength, it feels significant that Mihawk was suspiciously peerless for most of the series; leaving the only thing he has to protect being his title. He even sails around in a coffin because he's done everything he set out to do so the only thing that was left was waiting to die. Which also feels fitting if his initial motivation for becoming the WGS was out of revenge, succeeded, and then realized he didn't know what to do with himself after.

Finally, I won't be surprised if it turns out Mihawk was one of the many orphans the World Government has trafficked over the years to mold into recruits and that ends up being the source of the betrayal. This is pure speculation on my part, and probably a bit of stretch, but something about the drawing Oda made of Mihawk as a kid feels very reminiscent of the glimpses we've seen into childhoods of other young government recruits like Rob Lucci.

@omy785 said in Next Straw Hat Crewmates (Vol. 10 - Egghead):

logbook keeper (like Oden)

I feel like this is a misconception about Oden, as logbook keeper was never his role. He started recording his logbook long before he met either of the crews that he sailed on, because his logbook for his own benefit and not because he expected anyone to eventually read it. Then when he became a member of Whitebeard's crew, he's described as Whitebeard's brother an then later the 2nd Division Commander. Then with Roger, Oden's role is way closer to that of Robin's since he joined in order to read the poneglyphs, for pretty much the same reasons that Robin wants to. Keeping a logbook was Oden's hobby, not his role on any ship.

Futher, I'd argue the idea of a logbook keeper on the Straw Hat crew doesn't really gel because Luffy has made it clear, on several occasions, that he is not interested in having his story told. He even flat out tells Kaido that he does not want or need anyone telling the tale of his fight - even paraphrasing the "someday we'll just be bones" lyric from Binks - that interestingly enough also parallels Oden. So getting a crew mate to be a full time logbook keeper would mean having someone on the crew whose purpose Luffy is at best ambivalent towards and at worst diametrically opposed to.

If there is a turning point coming up in Egghead, I wouldn't be surprised if it's the Strawhats and Vegapunk electing to stay in fight instead of trying to escape as soon as possible. There's been groundwork since arguably the pre-timeskip that Vegapunk's primary character flaw is how easily he drops projects and people to move on to greener pastures, and him voluntarily leaving the safety of the Labophase to help Bonney is the first time I think we've seen him depart from that attitude, when previously he was much more willing to let Sentomaru and his other employees to fend for themselves. So it stands to reason his growth will likely continue in that direction.

Egghead also has something of a unique dilemma in that, since the things the primary wants the World Government aren't totally in conflict with the wants of the Straw Hats. Sure, the World Government wants to kill Vegapunk and Luffy, but what they want more than that is the WMD machine and the person who is willing and able to keep producing those weapons. If the Straw Hats leave now, or rather keep all their energy focused only on leaving, it means giving the World Government pretty much everything that it wanted out of Egghead. Which could have major ramifications for a lot other characters. So to me it seems like the question isn't what problems will arise that will keep the Straw Hats stuck on Egghead, it's what will happen that will compel the Straw Hats to voluntarily stay.

@Deicide said in Chapter 1091: Sentomaru:

I'm not sure if Caribou will be a factor in this arc or if he's meant to disappear for a while and reappear later in some unexpected place.

I have a feeling he'll have some relevance during this arc, mostly on the grounds that Caribou ate an entire Wapol Metal factory with his swamp powers during his cover story, and it's never been shown what became of it afterwards. Between that and Wapol himself reappearing in this arc, I can see that becoming a plot point. Especially if the Vega-Force 01 gets damaged.

@King-Cannon said in Chapter 1090: Kizaru:

And it also might be the reason he didn't focus on Zoro's family as much. in the end, they're just a family of swordies swording their way around, so there's little interesting territory to explore. The Shimotsuki connection is the only plot thread of any relevance to Zoro's background, but that alone was already highly predicatble.

I think one thing that would've been a nice touch for Wano's conclusion is if O-Toko and Zoro had gotten one last interaction. Given that O-Toko lost her adopted father, Shimotsuki Yasuie, I think directly making the connection between her and Zoro's teacher - a likely relative to Yasuie who also lost a daughter - could've been a nice little bit of closure. Plus I think the revelations about Kozaburo were a little more compelling (particularly that the chapter he appears in heavily implies he was a pirate who was wanted by the navy) development for Zoro compared to filling in a family tree.

But c'est la vie.

@Gear-4-Sauce This is my take on the matter as well. The current situation feels more like a false positive: it looks like victory has been achieved, but due to previously established factors that the Straw Hats haven't addressed or didn't overcome they're about to hit some sort of a wall.

We can already see parts of that in play. The Seraphim are contained, but the orders York gave them evidently haven't been overridden. The other CP agents have been fed but not freed, and Oda took a moment to remind us that York wanted them to remain unharmed for reasons currently unknown. The other satellites have been given important tasks to enable their escape, but the previous history calls into question on whether or not they'll be able to follow through on those tasks. The Frontier Dome is keeping them all stuck, but also feels like the only thing preventing the crew from getting immediately swarmed so the room for error is small... and the percentage counter for the Frontier Dome would make for a mighty fine ticking clock. We know Blackbeard wants his island to be made an official kingdom, that a Blackbeard ship is somewhere on Egghead, and that one of the BB Pirates we have yet to see this arc - Laffitte - is the one who talked the WG into making BB a warlord the first time around; even if it isn't the missing BB pirates on Egghead, the rest are connected to the subplots involving Law and Garp. We haven't even seen Caribou since he got kicked off the Sunny and swore he'd get back at them.

There's a lot of failure points in the escape plan despite York's capture, and I personally didn't feel like it deflated what she brought to the table. By 1079 I felt it was clear that she was going to be a secondary antagonist given that she admitted that she wouldn't win in a straight fight, and the additional information in 1089 further characterized (or rather I should say confirmed) her as the kind of secondary antagonist similar to Spandam or Helmeppo - particularly that her biggest character flaw is that she's short-sighted and overestimates her superiors' ability to be reasonable. So just because she's caught now doesn't mean she can't cause problems later.

@King-Cannon said in Official Egghead Thread:

A lot of the cutaways were significant because some elements needed to be introduced in other subplots before Oda could proceed with Egghead's plot, the Mother Flame being the first that comes to mind.

I think the big thing I'm not 100% clear on when it comes to the cutaways is the arrangement.

Typically when cutting between subplots, the beginning of one scene will in some way answer a question raised at the end of the previous scene - the most obvious example I can think of this is a show like Archer where the scene transitions are tied together by having dialogue at the start of a new scene picking up where the scene before it left off. With the Egghead arc some of these types of transitions/connections are obvious - the match-cut of sorts that happens between a Pacifista causing an explosion on Egghead and an explosion in the fight between Law and Blackbeard, York saying that the world only needs one Vegapunk being immediately followed up with a panel of York complaining that the WG wants to kill all the Vegapunks, the Blackbeard ship reaching Egghead being followed up with Shanks and Kidd clashing having the connection of the last remaining Emperors of the previous generation crossing paths with the new/worst generation, etc. - but the reason for the placement of other scenes still remain unclear to me. For instance, I'm still not quite sure what the connection is between Law's defeat being succeeded by a sequence of Sengoku and Tsuru talking about the death of T-Bone and the Cross Guild, nor what Myosgard's execution has to do with Garp punching battleships and mentoring Kuzan.

While the reason for the sequence of events could certainly become evident later down the line, I think that's the biggest reason the cutaways might've felt jarring to some.

@Captain-M said in Chapter 1090: Kizaru:

Curiously, he seems to confirm that Shaka and Pythagoras are for real dead. I'll believe it when the Stella says they can't just be restored for a Punk Records backup.

I found this bit in the chapter to actually be rather noteworthy.

The satellites are meant to be treated as Herman's Head-style facets of Vegapunk's personality, and as such whatever happens to them should be read as Vegapunk's internal conflicts being externalized. And I think Shaka and Pythagoras being dead (even temporarily) is a continuation of that idea. Shaka and Pythagoras were the two satellites who had their shit together, and Shaka in particular tended to keep the other's respective personality quirks from getting too out of hand.

I won't be surprised if, without Shaka and Pythagoras, none of the allied satellites will be able to stay on task. Lilith has been itching to pick ill-advised fights for the entire arc, and she's currently in charge of the giant mech that's supposed to be their escape route. Edison has been shown dropping everything (and depending on Pythagoras to pick up the slack) whenever he gets a "Eureka!" moment, while Vegapunk himself has mentioned he's constantly getting new ideas. And Atlas did pick an ill-advised fight that put her out of commission for a while, and she's been shown to express her anger by punching things. Like I said in another post, I think what I find interesting about York as an antagonist is both how her wants and actions reflect onto Vegapunk, and how she splits focus. Having only the satellites left be the ones that arguably represent all of Vegapunk's worst tendencies feels like a great way to continue that concept.

I wonder if S-Snake inheriting Hancock's soft spot for Luffy indicates that it matters somewhat when an individual's lineage factor was collected and not just who. Pythagoras said that the Seraphim evolve as they grow and theorized that it's because information gets recorded in the bloodline, so does S-Snakes behavior now mean that Hancock's genetic material was only collected after Marineford?

If so, I wonder when that collection progress would've occurred for the other Warlords. It might also explain why S-Shark seemed so cold and keeps targeting Nami if Jinbe's sample was taken before he met Luffy.

@Captain-M As someone who took a break for a while and then binged up to 1074 the first time around, and then did another re-read during the month long break, my takeaway was that Egghead, while breezy when taken in all at once, doesn't have as much of the typical Straw Hat faffing about seen in previous arcs; and I think its relative absence proves that the faffing about is truly an essential element.

For instance, we didn't really get to know anyone who lives in the Fabiriophase outside of Atlas - I noticed some even assumed the workers were all robots or holograms - so now that Saturn's ordered the evacuation ship to be destroy we don't have any characters to put a face to that conflict. Or with the traitor plot, while I'm certainly more interested now that York's motives have been established, I wasn't terribly invested in the traitor plot when it was happening (and sometimes doubted it was even a thing) because of how little we'd gotten to know the satellites. Not only because it left little to discern in terms of potential motives or how such a betrayal might effect the characters. For comparison: the CP9 reveal happens in about 23 chapters into Water 7 while York's reveal happens in 20 chapters. With Water 7 having an average of 19 pages per chapter, that's nearly 60 pages of extra development that the undercover CP9 agents and other Water 7 residents had over the Vegapunks, and I think it's definitely been felt in my binge reads at least. Those first 20 chapters don't really give me the same "ah-ha" moments on re-reads the same way comparing undercover CP9 moments with later developments.

That said, while I'm still not a fan of the whole "the culprit was the person who was off-screen the most" as mystery trope, I do think it's softened a little by it feeling like a first act reveal, and that the picture is only now starting to come together a little more. So I suppose we'll see how it will shake out in hindsight.

@Captain-M said in Official Egghead Thread:

Could be that this is just like all the little skirmishes we ducked in and out of in the first two acts of Wano because Oda didn't want to give away abilities or undermine foes by showing them losing early on before the big battle.

@Captain-M said in Official Egghead Thread:

Could be something like Zou where the arc as you'd usually expect to see it has already played out and we get it in a series of flashbacks that add context to the present day storyline as it plays out in parallel.

Little column A, little column B maybe?

So far I'm been under the impression that the build up so far has been about establishing all the complications that will arise later in the arc. After it was revealed that Kizaru and Saturn were heading to Egghead, it felt apparent that the point of the Straw Hats getting stuck in the dome was to distract them long enough for them to run out of time to avoid confrontation. Similarly with York's reveal, I thought what was most interesting about it wasn't so much what she might do to the Straw Hats but what her actions and motives revealed about Vegapunk and his character, and how a lot of the conflicts she caused stemmed from how she splits focus as a result of that. Which I think can continue to be a problem going forward, since despite being captured she can still be an unwelcome distraction or nuisance in the wake of a threat that really needs the Straw Hat's full attention.

So we might get fed the flashbacks that either elaborate on complications that arose in the missing night as they become relevant, or touch on moments that seem innocuous at first but will spiral into much bigger problems later down the line.