Posts made by Zanze

God forbid we're shown the weaker Straw Hats (who were all otherwise completely irrelevant to the Egghead plot) overwhelm a semi-major villain with their smarts for once.
Wouldn't you prefer 10 pages of Nika's eyes popping out?

Wano tried a little too hard to live up to the hype in my opinion.
My dream Elbaf arc is a classic 60-80 chapters long One Piece arc, with a focus on the Straw Hats and a main villain that's not connected to either the Marines nor the Emperors. It's more or less the last chance to have a mostly stand-alone adventure before the grand finale.
I Imagine that after Elbaf they'll go straight to Raftel, with maybe a Lode Star pit stop.

@black-leg-jex said in Season 2 (and Beyond?) Speculation Thread (Spoilers):

I'm fine with them doing Alabasta as Season 3. Will they just stick to Alabasta or will they try to squeeze Jaya in there as well, I wonder?

They could end the 3rd season with the Merry getting blasted by the Knock Up Stream.

I just can't wait to see Skypiea...

WTF no Alabasta?

Skypiea-era Oda would have had a field day with the Egghead tech. Remember how much he got out of the Dials?

Even if the scene didn't have any major consequences, showing the non-powerhouse members of the crew fighting one of the Big Bads and having the situation under control, while reassuring the readers that the WG hasn't forgotten about Robin and also adding a little bit to Saturn's characterization (he acts all high and mighty but he's under a lot of stress) is a pretty decent use of 6 pages I'd say.

I have quite a few gripes with Egghead but that scene isn't one of them.

Not the best action sequence in the history of One Piece, but I found the full set of Elders very cool and entertaining. I actually kinda liked how scatterbrained they felt, like their priorities were constantly changing and they had to change approach on the fly, and they had to deal with so much shit: Vegapunk spilling the beans, Bonney hijacking the Pacifistas, Nika/Joy Boy's second coming, Robin being there...
In fact, the way Saturn's encounter with the Straw Hats developed didn't bother me. He climbed the island trying to reach Punk Records, then Robin suddenly appeared in front of him and he attacked her no questions asked. Then the crew stopped him, he realized the fight would have taken too long and he resumed his primary objective.
These scenes I think worked pretty well in characterizing the Elders. Making them feel nervous and under stress is justified under these circumstances and it even humanizes them a little. They were literally seeing red any angle they turned.

What didn't work very well for me was solo Saturn. He was so one-note and ineffective. It felt like the story was asking me to take Wapol fully seriously.
Maybe it's just me... He's actually one of the very few villains who (kinda) got to kill a character in the present. But yeah I didn't really feel anything when he finally (kinda) went down. He felt incredibly passive and just kinda lame. He worked a lot better as part of an ensemble.

I'll have to reread the arc to get a better judgement...

What if Vegapunk actually explained how the One Piece connects to the fate of the world during the part of the broadcast that got skipped over, when he was taking about the D?
In this case, the D would be the key to the One Piece.

@Lemony said in Chapter 1116: Inner Conflict:

I feel like this is kind of a argument that ends up boiling down to how much do you want to put Oda on the hook for that. Yeah, it isn't perfectly thought out. It's a 1100-chapter series being published for over 25 years, big deal. It happens. But at the same time, you can handwave it, as people have been doing, and it's not that much effort to do so. If you are already pissed off at the series for other reasons, it's just another thing piling up for you to complain. If you're not it's just something you can make up a good enough reason and it's fine. I doubt "why weren't the roger pirates hunted down" and the quality of the answer to this question is what's making or breaking the plot, honestly.

It's honestly this.
Even then, there might be a story reason involving the rat... I mean, Shanks.
Though it's weird that if Shanks is somehow protecting the Roger pirates, he let all the stuff that happened to Ace happen. But it's also true that the WG didn't really chase after Ace either (except for the whole newborn hunt thing...), they basically got him handed to them by Blackbeard.

But all in all, it is a story.
The newborn hunt thing served to justify Rouge's 20 months (!) pregnancy, making Ace's age compatible with Roger's lifespan. We know he wasn't originally planned to be Roger's son.
The infamous line a Marine uttered to Koby all the way back in chapter 6 was also mostly there to service Koby's character development too, forcing him to make a stand against Luffy.
And Robin's entire character is about having been on the run all her life and finally finding a family with the Straw Hats.

It's hard to make every little detail like these collime in the span of 30 years of story.
As for me personally, the one time I really rolled my eyes was the Elders going "in over 800 years we never associated the rubber fruit with the rubber god lol!"

So apparently

I'm not a fan of how segmented Egghead has been either, but I'd wait until the arc is over to judge.
A bunch of stuff that got glossed over when the events on the island got skipped has been reintroduced in recent chapters (namely Stussy, York and the Seraphims), those threads can still get a conclusion, as can Kuma and Saturn.
I mean the Elders would still have to do something after the broadcast is over/gets interrupted, no?

Anyways, every chapter feels like it's the second to last or something chapter of the arc but then it just keeps going lol

Egghead has been fun and unpredictable, while Wano sometimes felt like the story was going through the motions in my opinion.
However it is weirdly structured, it's incredibly long to be Just a set-up arc like Zou, but it's also too all over the place and unfocused to work well as a classic Thriller Bark-sized arc.
But also, it's still not over. I feel like Oda can still somehow stick the landing.

My biggest regret, aside from the crew not doing much, is the futuristic setting not amounting to much. It's a shame, I really wanted to see Oda play with sci-fi tropes.

Thinking about it, it could work like this:

Ep. 1 - Logue Town
Ep. 2 - Calm Belt / Laboon / Whiskey Peak (maybe they don't actually go to Whiskey Peak and everything happens at the capes?)
Ep. 3 - Little Garden (a bit cramped but it could work in a single episode, it's already a short arc and most of it is fights)
Ep. 4/5 - Drum
Ep. 6/7/8 - Alabasta

Hopping through 6 islands in 8 episodes seems a little crazy to me, an adventure needs time to breathe and Alabasta in particular would feel crippled if you just reduce It to two episodes, even without the long fights.
I can't see Drum lasting less than two episodes, either. Chopper's flashback alone is still very iconic to the series and deserves to be told in its entirety.

Eh, we'll see.

8 episodes for Rogue Town through Alabasta seems like they'd need to go way too fast.
Unless season 2 ends mid-Alabasta? And then season 3 Is the rest of Alabasta, Jaya and Skypiea. Not sure how feasible that would be though.

Egghead as of now also feels to me like it's going to end in 3 chapters at most, but on the other hand Saturn has really been built up as the despiceable villain that gets taken down in a big climax. Saving him for later would remove most of the catharsis for all the Kuma/Bonney related stuff... Who knows.
There's some things that I haven't liked that much about Egghead, but at the very least it's been an unpredictable ride.

@Zin-Magala I see. To be fair I don't think Vivi is joining either, I just think she's going to play the most important role and to get the most emotional reunion with the crew out of all the pseudo-crewmembers in the grand finale.

Actually, I'm a next crewmate atheist.
It's just been Luffy to Brook for such a long time, Jinbe works because he's also been around since forever and he already went through quite a few big story arcs as basically a crewmate anyways. I can't see any entirely new character join this late in the game and be convincing as a part of the group. In fact, I probably shouldn't even be posting in this thread. Crew's full!

@black-leg-jex said in Next Straw Hat Crewmates (Vol. 10 - Egghead):

Well yeah, my point wasn't to compare both of Brook and Yamato's situation, I was just pointing out the hypocrisy of the red herring argument. Yamato suffers from Wano's bloat which is an issue Brook didn't have with Thriller Bark and while both do have an existing connection with a friend of the Straw Hats (Laboon for Brook, Ace for Yamato) the former is far more impactful because of how little focus Laboon actually had and how long it was between his introduction and Thriller Bark.

Eh, you can only tell what was a red herring and what wasn't with hindsight. I didn't think Yamato had "the sauce" to become a main character, but only because his role in Onigashima wasn't really building up to that. From his introduction alone it could have gone either way.
But I'm sure Oda could have developed him more if he was a priority. Law got a ton of focus during Dressrosa, which was also a very crowded arc, and Yamato had plenty of screen time anyways, it's just that Oda didn't do much with it... Which I also didn't like, because future crewmember or not, Yamato's past with Kaido was very interesting and it feels like it all kinda got glossed over. Like a lot things Kaido, in fact. Ah well.

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

As far as Yamato not having a character arc, both Nami and Robin joined without getting a character arc until later. Robin joined without anything checked off. Certain events needed to happen before Oda could tell that story and who's to say that's not the case for Yamato. Sorry, Oda doesn't work on your timetable and he's not sitting at home thinking, "Welp, I didn't do a thing in Wano so I have to scrap Yamato and come up with a new character to be the last SH."

In principle, sure, but I couldn't see this working in Yamato's case. He never left Onigashima in his whole life iirc, and the man responsible for all his pain and suffering was Kaido, the arc villain and his very own father. You'd think that would be the arc where Yamato gets the most amount of focus. Like, he could find his Hogback later, but his Wapol was Kaido.
Instead of being front and center of the struggle against Kaido, Yamato got more or less relegated to playing second fiddle to Momo. He wasn't even mentioned by Luffy when he was gathering his forces before the final Gear 5, and he even named Pedro there.

I'm not saying that the character is worthless or is never going to get any other important role in the future (in fact it's pretty clear that he will), just that he never got the amount of development that's usually reserved to crewmembers, and the ship has sailed without him.
I'm pretty sure that whatever happens with Pluton will involve both him and Momo (and hopefully my boy Kin) because that's more or less what the story has been setting up, then of course I could be wrong.

And also, Vivi has already abandoned Alabasta. Not willingly, of course... but if I had to bet on a pseudo-crewmember becoming very, very important it would be her.

I started reading when Brook was already in, but what really sells him in Thriller Bark, more than Luffy asking him to join, is everything that comes after.
One full chapter of bonding with the crew while some mysteries about his past and motivations still linger. Him saving Franky and Robin and impressing them with his backstory, which at that point is still under wraps. Then the Laboon twist, and the recovery of Brook's shadow becoming one of the main reasons Luffy fought Moria for, with Zoro even commenting that now they have to recover one more shadow. The afro scene! The fact that in the fight against Oars he was already doing team moves with the crew. Then, his flashback which is not only moving but also very unique still 55 volumes later, culminating in a crying scene (THAT is what every single crewmate has actually gotten).
And last but not least, Brook of course has that striking design (not that Yamato's is bad but it's not a gentleman skeleton with an afro and a yohoho). All this from Vol. 45 to 50.
Meanwhile in the same amount of chapters Yamato speaks to Luffy like twice and to Franky for one panel. There's no twists or mysteries to his story, and I wouldn't rank his half-a-chapter long flashback among the best of the series. The emotional center of the arc still lies very clearly in Momo with a side of Kin'emon.

...and then of course, Brook joined while Yamato didn't.

So long after the fact, I can say that pulling the "I'm going to join your crew!" card with Yamato wasn't really that great of an idea. It created unreasonable expectations for the character - he'd have to get a striking flashback, a unique fighting style, some funny or endearing interactions with the crew, a greater struggle with Kaido and a bigger sense of catharsis when he finally went down.
Then of course none of that happened, because Yamato was a Wano side character, which is fine. But if he was to become a crewmember, I was expecting much more from week to week and in the end it became frustrating and a lot of the Yamato stuff ended up feeling like a waste of pages. In hindsight, though, there was nothing wrong with Yamato as a side character, in particular as Momo's mentor and "other half". That's the role he actually played in the story, and he worked well enough for that - aside from, again, all those pages wasted for the fire subplot that didn't really accomplish anything.

Can't understand how people still expect him to join the crew, after the ship has already sailed and after the character didn't get any of the typical developments a crewmate gets. Even Jinbe's delayed joining made sense, since he had a higher standing than Luffy back in Fishman Island, but that's not the case for Yamato. And Jinbe got more of the typical treatment anyways, some of his scenes with Luffy in Marineford and Fishman Island were very heavy, he had a flashback and he interacted a lot with the other crewmates, particularly with Nami.
So Yamato should come back randomly one day, join the crew for no reason, being uber stronker than anyone else, already knowing Luffy's endgame without having sailed with him, and being instantly beloved by everyone without the audience getting to see how that bond formed? That's 100% Poochie territory.
Isn't it better if he just remains a side character that will probably play some important role (alongside Momo) in the grand finale? Oda knows better than to make the last crewmate a Poochie. He can still do amazing backstories, Kuma and Bonney just got one, why couldn't the last crewmember get it?

Yamato has a strong case for joining the crew, but before that happens he should get access to a time machine. In the meantime, whenever Yamato is not on screen, the other characters should be wondering: "Where's Yamato??"

Fullalead would be amazing, when was the last time One Piece had a strictly pirate-themed setting? Sabaody? Jaya?
Between Rocky Port, the Wang Zhi dude, the treasure of the island, the Davy Back Fight origins, and the place having been the base of operations of the Rocks pirates there's already plenty of stuff to explore. Not to mention Garp and the Blackbeards being there...
The "that treasure" thing in particolar really sounds like a teaser for future events imo.

That said, I think Oda is just referring to Elbaf here

I've just now realized that Luffy and Kuma might very well have interacted with each other back in Goa. Kuma just needed to erase Luffy's memory of their meeting. Maybe this is how we get to know Luffy's ultimate dream?

I've also come up with another crackpot theory. What if Kuma's mind was never erased? He's just been faking it? Nobody but Vegapunk could know. It destroys the tragedy but I dunno, it's the kind of twist that Oda sometimes likes to do.

F-Zero 99 is a blast. I was initially disappointed in getting a battle royale based on the SNES game after 20 years of waiting for a GX sequel, but they really captured everything I like about F-Zero in this game and they even added a new spin on it.
This is the most fun I've had with a videogame since like Smash Ultimate or Metroid Dread, I just can't stop playing

I don't think they'd make Brook join in a movie.
Maybe they could adapt Strong World

If they're actually aiming to adapt the first half of the story in 6 seasons, there's no way Skypiea doesn't get a full season in my opinion.

S1 is East Blue, S2 has to be Baroque Works, S3 goes to Jaya/Skypiea and S4 is Water 7/Enies Lobby. All these story arcs last more or less the same amount of chapters in the manga, and could serve as natural end points for a TV season.
Sabaody to post-Marineford could also be a season, though I'm not sure where Thriller Bark fits. But that's an arc they can't skip.

That's all very far into the future though, for now I'm just pumped about Alabasta

It's a mystery command chain.

Finished the series. Overall I've really enjoyed it. The characters are on point, both visually and in terms of characterization, the sets are amazing, the story works and most of the changes are very inspired. Also loooved the soundtrack, I don't watch much of the anime but I wouldn't replace the sea shanties for anything else. Also liked how most characters had their own music style, jazzy Baratie, hip hop Arlong, and my favorite one is that distorted MEEEEOOOOOW that accompanies Kuro's scenes, ahah.
I liked Garp having a more expanded role. He's more down to earth than his manga version but I think he works. Him sending Mihawk after Luffy makes sense, he wanted to teach his grandson a lesson (or at the very least, test his will as is revealed in the last episode). Same for Koby, seeing him gradually grow into the heroic Marine he becomes later in the story is cool. I said that Arlong looked too scrawny in the trailers, but in the actual series he worked really well. He feels very intimidating, and I also liked how he's more in line with his characterization during the Fishman Island flashback than with his money-obsessed East Blue version. It just makes his character more grounded. Buggy is also very different from the manga, he's still a fun character but I'm not fully on board yet. But, he works.
Also, the action scenes just worked. I'm not fully convinced by Luffy's fights yet, but daaamn Zoro and Sanji's fights are spectacular. Really well-coreographed, and very readable. Buggy's powers also worked way better than I thought it would.

My biggest criticism would be that they changed or streamlined some of the character beats too much. As a seasoned OP fan I didn't mind it that much, but my girlfriend, in her first exposure to the series, failed to connect with most of the crew with the exception of Nami. In particular:
-Luffy finding Zoro on the cross after, like, one hour he's been there reeeeally doesn't have the same impact as Luffy finding Zoro on the cross after he's been there for a week and is literally dying of starvation like in the manga. The rice ball scene with the little girl was also way stronger in the manga. It just feels kinda devoid of context in this version. Also, Morgan doesn't really come off as a villain at all here. It's not too much of a big deal, that section of the story still works as a quick introduction to the main characters, but the emotional beats kinda aren't there.
-They skipped way too much stuff about Usopp. You don't really get why he wants to become a brave warrior of the seas here, since he's never shown to be much of a coward. Without the Usopp Crew, his fascination with pirates is also barely conveyed. And without Django, he pretty much loses the moment where he's most useful to the crew. Also, with Merry dead, you don't even much get why he up and decides to leave Kaya all alone. Don't get me wrong, I think the actor did a very good job and Usopp very much feels like Usopp, I just feel like he lost most of what made him memorable in the early days of the series.
They also simplified Sanji's introduction arc but I think it worked a little better there.
Aside fom that, Episode 4 felt a little like it was dragging on sometimes, the Luffy fight scenes are for sure going to be better in future seasons, and some camera angles were weird.
That's pretty much it as far as my criticism goes. It's easier to talk about what you don't like as opposed to what you like, I want to stress that I've really enjoyed the series a lot.

Nami I think is the real heart of the show here. She's the only character who gets development throughout the entire series, and is often the catalyst to bring out more character out of the rest of the cast (Luffy just like in the manga, but here Zoro and Kaya as well). Also, Arlong Park was the least streamlined arc and I think it really payed off here. For example, Arlong sending Nezumi to retrieve Nami's money is one of those things that could have easily been skipped (much like Kuro's crew assaulting the village and stuff like that), but it's the main catalyst to the "Help me" scene and keeping it really worked in making it as effective as it should be. Not every detail from the mangs is there, but I don't think it matters because you still really feel for Nami there.
Sanji's flashback was also very good.

The final scenes were also great, I loved Shanks in this. "I could beat you with one arm tied behind my b-wahahahahahahahah", and the barrel scene was perfect. The Smoker tease too!
Oh and I couldn't help but smile at the references to later stuff like Sypiea, Foxy and Punk Hazard. They were very smooth with the easter eggs!
Overall I've had a ton of fun. My girlfriend not as much, though. She only started to get more into the series from Sanji's flashback, which... makes sense. That's how it goes for most people. She even cheered on Nami during the Nezumi scene! She's still not fully convinced though. But Drum and Alabasta might do the trick a couple years from now.
Also glad that the series is finding success. It's fun, fresh and well made, I'd certainly want to see more.
That's pretty much it as far as my impressions go...

I'm only 4 episodes in, but this is pretty good?
The characters work, Zoro in particular cracks me up and Luffy is every bit as dumb as he is in the manga but in a more grounded way. Koby is perfect, Kuro and his henchmen worked very well.
I also like how they kept the story but changed the plot's structure, it keeps things fresh and different enough, the fight with Kuro happening inside Kaya's mansion in particular is a very inspired choice. Having Koby and Garp take a more active role in the plot also works, it's more fitting for the TV format.
The locations are great, the acting is good, the action works...
There's a couple of changes I haven't loved (mostly the way a lot of things about Usopp felt rushed), and it's not really anything mindblowing, but it's just minor complaints from me. They did a great job. Can't wait to see Mihawk.
It has also mostly passed the Girlfriend Test which is not something I was expecting

My top 5 for villains:

1. Crocodile
   THE One Piece villain imo. He had charisma, strenght and an awesome power set. Plus he was actually ruthless, and the scene where he bullies Vivi is still probably the most hateful villain speech in the series.
   His schemes were clearly in James Bond villain territory, but somehow they felt more grounded than other stuff the series would do later. Overall Crocodile just felt dangerous and was super entertaining.

2. Akainu (pre-TS)
   Old school Akainu was terrifying. The ultimate embodiment of fascism in an invincible magma-shitting Terminator who's also a surprisingly good trash talker. Killed civilians without a second thought, killed Ace and is still the one and only character to have broken Luffy. He could have absolutely worked as the final villain.
   Post-skip Akainu is just sad, though. He went from Terminator to lazy postal office employee.

3. Big Mom
   The best post-skip villain and one of Oda's best characters in general in my opinion. There's just so much going on with Big Mom: Carmel's misguided upbringing that failed to teach her any sense of responsibility, her intentions being actually good but her methods being absolutely ruthless, her obsession with family, the hunger pangs, overall that feeling that she can only engage with the world around her at a very superficial level.
   Then of course there's that flashback.
   Add to that fun powers and a comedic edge that never detracted from her scariness, overall Big Mom was just super entertaining and absolutely unique.

4. Ener
   He's not very developed and he kinda felt like Crocodile 2.0 but dumber. That said, man anything Ener did always felt spectacular.

5. Moria
   I just like Moria. The bonkers design, the kishishishi, the laziness, the hinted-at tragic past, all the fun stuff he did with his powers, Thriller Bark as a whole. He's not super memorable as a villain but he's just tons of fun.

Honorable mentions to:
Arlong - super iconic character but yeah he just missed the top 5
Blackbeard - he's already awesome but his time hasn't fully come yet
Buggy - I feel like he's more memorable as a sidekick than as a villain

This looked amazing, ahah.
The trailer just suddenly dropped on YouTube while I was at a pub with a friend and we spent the entirety of it going "WOOOOOAH, THAT'S THE THING FROM THE SERIES!"

At the very least, it's going to be a very fun watch with fellow fans

But Luffy is very much still a meatheaded simpleton even now that he can straight up see the future, I'm not sure how interpreting the Mr. 3 scene as an early instance of CoO changes its meaning.

And what Luffy did boils down to "sensing" which of the statues was the real Mr. 3, which is pretty much exactly what CoO does anyways.
Of the very early proto-haki instances it's always been the one that I felt fit with the final version of the power system in the most elegant way.

Luffy hitting the real Mr. 3 in the maze of Mr. 3 statues first try in Little Garden is also an early haki thing.
Add Zoro VS Mr. 1, Zeff's "spear", Shanks scaring away the lord of the coast, Dragon hitting Smoker, to me it's safe to say haki was always there in some way.

It probably didn't use to work exactly the way it does now, though, but the biggest change IMO is that it was probably not supposed to be as widespread as it is now.
And while I think CoO and CoC are very cool, count me among those that feel like CoA is kinda lame and boring

@Bugs I mean, I don't mind characters dying, but those two (and Apoo) have played some kind of active role in the story for like 50 volumes, then when the arc that was supposed to put them in the spotlight finally came they could have been removed from the story and nothing much would have changed, + in the end they randomly die LOL.
I guess Drake served to introduce Sword and Hawkins was a neat villain, but you would have expected something more...

I'll stop here, though. This doesn't have much to do with Vol. 106 and for some reason I always get bitter when the Supernovas enter the conversation. Law and Capone were great, but afterwards they've been such a disappointment :'(

Apoo being there while Drake and Hawkins are not kinda makes me assume that they really died? But Drake didn't look THAT beat up in their final scene...
If they're both really dead they've got to be the most wasted characters in the history of this series

Finally returning to Egghead only to see the crew defeated would be very dramatic and would also kinda explain the 6 months break from the crew.

On the other hand, the crew + Lucci, Kaku and Stussy jobbing to four overgrown children and freaking Kizaru? After Luffy took down Kaido? Eeeeeh...

So they'll probably do two episodes for each arc.
Morgan/Buggy
Kuro
Baratie
Arlong

Logue Town I think would fit better as the opener of Season 2, yeah. Aside from the barrel scene it serves more as a set-up for future story beats than as a conclusion to the East Blue stuff. Plus they apparently haven't cast Smoker so...

I didn't expect the egg to be [ a e s t h e t i c ], but it's a nice choice!
Cool cover. Just like the first Egghead chapters, it perfectly captures that exciting "And now, for something completely different..." feeling after so much time spent in Wano.

Too bad we'll probably never get all the Vegapunks in a single cover though

The trailer looked... fine?
The sets are very good, the characters are mostly on point, Lord of the Coast looked great, and I really don't mind them changing Luffy or Zoro's characterization a little bit to make them more grounded, or changing the humor to be a bit more mainstream. But this mostly felt like One Piece to me.
The two things I didn't like are:
-the lighting, it's way too yellow/brown, the One Piece world should be colorful and vibrant, and it's even more of a weird decision because the characters fully embrace the goofy vibes instead,
-and the Gum Gum Pistol, the effect looks fine but the composition of the shot is weird. Alvida (?) looks like she's just standing there waiting to get punched in the face.
But overall this looked pretty good, even fresh actually, I'm definitely going to watch it.
I'd also be more interested in the reactions of people who weren't already familiar with One Piece.

It's Hamburg from Foxy's crew

I can't wait to finally see a trailer for this after all these years.
I've been wanting to introduce my girlfriend to One Piece for a while, but she understandably doesn't want to watch 1000+ episodes of anime. Netflix series sounds like a perfect way to share some One Piece mania with her.

All I ask is that this is a fun 8 hours.
It's obviously going to look at least decent and to be faithful enough to the manga. Wouldn't really care if they cut stuff like Pearl, and I also wouldn't mind some small deviations really. I've already read the original story!

If it's not Blackbeard, it's Imu. But I hope it's Blackbeard.
Akainu could have worked some 10 years ago, but he's been a clown for so long now I don't think he's fit to be THE final villain

I'll try a prediction and come back here 10 years from now to see how much stuff I've gotten wrong.

Luffy - Teach, Burgess
Teach is duh, while Burgess just gives me the Blueno punching bag vibes
Zoro - Shiryuu
Clearly the 2nd strongest
Nami - Devon
Main females (sorry Robin), similar skillset considering Nami had Fata Morgana before she devolved into spamming thunders
Usopp - Van Auger
Just makes sense
Sanji - Lafitte
Lafitte is clearly one of Teach's "wings"
Chopper - Q & Stronger
Animal doctor VS doctor and animal
Robin - ???
Dunno
Franky - Wolf
Giant Mecha Sunny VS Wolf writes itself
Brook - Vasco Shot
Mostly by exclusion but it could work. Music and alcohol both alter the mind, and also, singing and drinking are trademark pirate stuff. Vasco is also dressed like a jester which suggests he's the "entertainer" of the crew. I dunno this one makes more sense the more I think about it
Jinbe - Pizarro
Water VS Land, and Pizarro clearly must be fought by a powerhouse

Or, if Kuzan actually fights with the Blackbeards, he gets Jinbe (ex world power VS ex world power, water VS ice) and Robin fights Pizarro (Robin can sprout giant limbs and her clutching an island is easy double spread material imo)

I kinda hate them, to be honest.
The events themselves feel mostly disconnected from the main story and they also feel somewhat abridged (Kidd getting one-shotted is the biggest offender, but also: the Blackbeards' powers get introduced a bit too quickly -some are not even shown in action-, Marco becomes friendly with Bakkin very suddenly...).
Then I can't help but feel like Elbaf and Fullalead are places we should have explored for the first time alongside the Straw Hats.

Last but not least, I mostly enjoy One Piece for its moment-to-moment storytelling: the gags, the twists, the weird things the crew meets in a new island, the character interactions... The main plot in One Piece has mostly served to hold all that stuff together in my opinion, so these quick barrages of hype moments don't actually do a lot for me.
Plus I'm loving the Egghead arc and I'd like for the story to stay there.

I might very well change my opinion if all this stuff gets to come together, and also, trying new things after 1000 chapters is of course okay... It's just that as of now I'm not really a fan.

There's actually two parallels to Luffy in this chapter.
Kidd's crew getting annihilated has a very similar narration box to the one when the Straw Hats got annihilated, and the scene with Shanks staring down at an unconscious Kidd that he just one-shotted looks very similar to when Kaido did it to Luffy. Maybe Kidd's glaring too.

I don't think Kidd is supposed to be a particularly despiceable character. All the Supernovas are edgelords and characters like Bartolomeo aren't really any better than him. What matters more to me is that he's never had a villainous role. In fact, in one way or another he's always been an ally, and in Wano we were clearly supposed to care/cheer for him and Killer.

There are some hints that this might lead to something, but as of now I still think it's more likely that Kidd's out of the running and that's it.

Kidd is cool. He hates everybody and everybody hates him. Except maybe Luffy.

I hope he gets to stay in the story, but I can't see how his "rival" role hasn't been exhausted

After having been hyped for more than half of the story, I think it's only right that Vegapunk gets to be a well-developed, memorable character instead of just a glorified in-story SBS lore drop.
I also appreciate that Oda is trying to write a well-intentioned character who also has a ton of flaws. It's somewhat rare in shonen and even in One Piece itself, really, at least to this extent.

Plus the art was on fire this week, York towering over Stella with her absent-minded smile that now feels intimitading and that panel with Bonney crying are just really great.

There was also that time when Zoro hit King's belly and he just randomly exploded. The Seraphims haven't done that yet though.

It's very likely that there's at least a couple of panels that can disprove this, but during the King fight I headcanon'd that the flame goes off while he's attacking, kinda like a videogame boss fight.
Otherwise there wouldn't be any point to turning the flame off, a speed boost sure is not a worthy trade-off for literal invulnerability, no?

I have mild astigmatism (-3 degrees, though in only one eye) as well, in my case I'd say glasses mostly fix it but if I'm particularly tired or if I'm doing some activity that requires me to squint my eyes a lot, at one point my sight goes all blurry anyways. Like, lines and even colors blend with each other and "dance" a little and all that kind of stuff, even with glasses on. Then it's break time.
With Oda's schedule and his work requiring his eyes to always be focused on something I can see how that would be a problem for him. Plus every astigmatism is probably not the same.
In fact I'd say his astigmatism has gotten bad way later than it could have, given his lifestyle.

Although to be honest, I hadn't even noticed the art becoming more scribbly...