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One piece chapter 782 review-Evil’s champion
Welcome to this new review of One Piece. As usual all credits to Mangastream for their translation
Jinbei’s cover story.
I’m not gonna lie at this point I lost all interest in Jinbei’s story. For the exception of the Poneglyph I don’t see how it is relevant to the main story(it most likely isn’t), and I feel like we’ve wasted two pages just to show the sea monsters and Wadatsumi getting reconciled with the people from the port town. I hope Oda finds a way to make it more interesting, maybe by having Jinbei be in danger, that way the SHs will have to eventually help him out.That would be an interesting development imo.
Review
Luffy and DD's hakis clashing
After last week’s excellent chapter I felt that this one really needed to deliver on Luffy and DD’s fight, and I wasn’t disappointed. If you remember last chapter ended with Luffy stopping DD from finishing Law with his bare foot. After what can be considered as one of the most expressive stares in the history of OP, both fighters use their Haki in order to get the upper hand, or the upper foot in this instance. But they don’t just use Armament Haki , they also clash using Conqueror’s Haki which imo is much more impressive. I’ve been waiting for this since the beginning of the arc, to see two conqueror’s haki clash, especially with someone from DD's caliber. Trebol is surprised that Luffy can use Haki which could have been a plot hole or not, so I’m not gonna dwell on that too much. But what is more interesting is what he reminisces about, his first meeting with DD. We already knew beforehand that Trebol and Vergo acknowledged DD as a king because of his ability to use CoC, but also because he’s a Tenryuubito.Trebol remember this scene and it seems Diamante and Pica were there as well. To someone who prolly knows a great deal about the Tenryuubitos, haki and even DFs this must have been very rare indeed. The tenryuubitos aren’t exactly known for their strength, but more than just being born one, what qualifies DD as a king in the executives eyes is that he can use CoC and at such a young age too.
Trebol gives DD the means of his revenge
Trebol decided to give power to DD in order to exact his revenge, and for that he seemingly gives him two things, a gun and as some expected a while ago, a DF. The pear shaped DF on the table could be the Ito Ito no mi.
Once again Trebol reaffirms his complete trust in DD’s abilities, whom he sees as a man who has been shaped up by the madness of his past, driven by his rage and wish to exact his revenge on the world, a true demon or as he calls him a Yaksha( a demon in Buddhism).
Luffy gets temporarily the upper hand in his fight against DD
All that time Luffy and DD were in a lock with their hakis clashing. This imo could be the proof that their hakis aren’t that far apart, with DD’s being slightly stronger (again imo) .The following exchange was one of the more satisfying ones in this arc. Luffy breaks free from the lock first and targets DD’s head but the latter blocks the attack with his arm.Luffy flips again and hits DD on the same spot but it looks like this time it is more effective. He then hits DD in the stomach with his haki imbued foot , before punshing his face. In DD’s defense he did use Haki to protect himself.But still Luffy is relentless and keeps landing a hit, before using a “new technique”, the Gomu Gomu no Eagle bazooka, which seems to be an upgrade of the regular bazooka, coated in haki.DD successfully evades the attack .
DD counter attacks
Just when Luffy was clearly getting the upper hand in this fight , DD finally counter attacks using one of his techniques, Athlete thread, which seems to have strings attached to his foot. Luffy protects himself in Haki, but it’s still not enough to stop the attack who sends Luffy flying.
I quite enjoyed this exchange, but I feel there is a need to explain what happened.There was some complaints that it didn’t make sense how Luffy was able to beat DD like this when he wasn’t able to even land a hit before. Since last chapter we saw that DD has sustained quite some damage to his organs because of Law’s gamma knife. While he did use his strings to stitch himself up, there is clearly the risk of the stitches not holding up. So even if DD wasn’t weakened, it’s possible he was weary of that fact, so that’s why we’ve seen him protect himself . Each time Luffy landed a hit DD used Haki to protect himself. There are other factors who could explain why Luffy seemed to be able to get the upper hand. He was clearly pissed, and wanted to protect his friend. That’s enough reason imo for Luffy to try to take out DD, especially if he was about to crush Law’s head. To me there is little doubt that at that point Luffy was completely serious, and focused on his goal, plus he could have gotten a “power boost” from being “fired up”. So logically Luffy could only land a hit now, but I wouldn’t say that DD is done for . He prolly waited for the right moment to use Ahtlete thread, which is an interesting technique to say the least.Honestly at this point DD’s use of his DF is superb, and each of his technique seems to be designed to deal maximum damage.
Trebol catches Luffy in his snot...is he really a logia?
Luffy is sent flying to the floor below and lands down on Trebol who catches him in his goo.Once again Luffy and DD’s fight gets interrupted, and Trebol urges him to finish up law while he still has Luffy caught in his snot. The latter tries to break free but his haki punch doesn’t work. Luffy wonders why a haki punch doesn’t work on what looks like a logia user, and Trebol throws the idea that maybe he’s not a logia user after all. I think that is a possibility and would explain why Luffy wasn’t able to hurt him using haki, and as we’ve previously seen a character with logia type powers but who turned out to be a paramecia, namely Magellan, I think it could be just that. Or he’s a mythical Zoan like Marco but then I fail to see what he is supposed to be, a heavingly slug?
Law tells Luffy to pay Trebol no mind, and taunts the latter, which angers him quite a bit. Law makes fun of the executives whom he thinks are nothing more than buffoons, and wouldn’t have wanted to be lumped with them. I see that as being done on purpose by Law, as we would discover soon why.
The executives kneeling before the man they groomed to be the next pirate king.
Trebol tries to finish Law, and we get yet another flashback from Trebol. He explains how despite DD having the potential, he was truly shaped up into the man he is now by the executives.As such they see themselves as DD’s family, more than just subordinates. They shaped him up to be “Evil’s champion” ,a man motivated by wrath and his thirst for revenge , that one day would become the supreme king who rules on the sea, in other words the Pirate King.The executives are completely delusional at this point. Who in their right mind would decide to follow a kid just because he has Haki? Ace also had Haki as a kid and yet we haven’t seen anyone decide to follow him based on that.Another thing that boggles my mind is the account made by DD to the executives when he came back from Mariejois. According to them DD was almost killed, and Saint Homming was killed by the Tenryuubitos themselves. And yet we have Rocinante’s flashback show DD shooting his own father. He even boasts about killing his own father later in Dressrosa. So either DD lied or it is the Tenryuubitos who finished up Homming, after DD put a bullet in him. I think it’s the former. There’s no reason to doubt Rocinante’s account, and as seen in Trebol’s flashback, DD was manipulating the 4 executives to do his biding, by having them take out thugs for him for example. So even at such a young age DD was manipulating the executives and basically everyone of his entourage.
But there is something that I find interesting in all this. I remember discussing the reasons why DD was so evil, that even though him and Rocinante went through the same traumatic events, one brother turned evil while the other turned out just fine. And we know that Rocinante’s meeting with Sengoku shaped up the person he would become, if it weren’t for that Roci could have ended up almost as bad as DD, although I still think he “inherited” his parents good traits. And now we do get the confirmation that Trebol and the others enabled DD, by giving him the means to get revenge and basically made him become the embodiement of evil. And all that for what? Apparently in order to make him pirate king. It is clear now that DD’s goal should be that of becoming the Pirate king. I’ve had that feeling ever since Monet mentioned it in Punk Hazard. And then there was DD’s presence in Logue town at Roger’s execution, which to me only proved that DD just like the rest of the pirates present were there because they were inspired one way or another by Roger. Whether this dream truly stems for DD’s wish to rule the sea, or it was inspired to him by his “family”, I really think there’s a high chance DD aims for becoming Pirate King, just like Crocodile before him.
I find the character of DD very fascinating, and the whole situation with the executives is so surreal, it is kinda reminiscent of Cervantes Don Quixote, but rather than having someone who helps him see beyond the illusions, DD is further pushed into madness.
Law's plan to take out Trebol...so badass
Law continues to provoke Trebol by claiming that he’s just manipulated by DD like the rest. DD tries to warn Trebol not to get caught in Law’s game, but it’s too late. All this time Law has been provoking Trebol so that he could get him in his range, since he’s immobilized. Law puts his room on, and in one of the most badass sequences in this arc, he uses tact to bring his cut out arm and slashes Trebol up and down repeatedly
. The attack works this time since we see a skinny Trebol emerging from his snot mantle, with a vertical slash up his belly. It seems that the reason Luffy couldn’t hit him was that he didn’t hit his real body, and was only hitting the mantle that was making him look much bigger.
Trebol's desperate act, what will be the fate of those two?
Law’s plan worked and Trebol seems to be in a pretty bad shape, but the latter is so desperate he decides to go all kamikaze. He decides to light himself up along with Law who is still immobilized. The last panel shows a big fiery explosion a top the palace.
Conclusion
I really enjoyed this chapter, with Luffy and DD’s fight being the highlight obviously. At this point I think DD and Luffy are evenly matched. DD doesn’t look like he’s too hurt, even after getting punched a few times by Luffy. He could still use a powerful technique which makes me think that he’s not too impaired by Law’s gamma knife. I hope that next chapter we will see Trebol and Law out of the picture so we can finally focus on the main fight. While it did show some interesting stuff I think that'senough interruption. About Law’s fate, I don’t think he’s dead (the guy just doesn’t die lol) so he could have switched places with the body double, or as some pointed out maybe Sabo could come help, and the flames at the end are his. I hope Trebol is out for good, not only he hasn’t shown much in terms of fighting abilities, but he has to be one of the dumbest members of DD’s crew. He fell head first in Law’s trap, so I really hope that slash took care of him, along with the explosion.
Based on my level of enjoyment I’m giving this chapter an 8.5 out of 10, because while Luffy vs DD’s fight was great, it got interrupted yet again by Trebol and Law, and I just want to see those two duke it out without any interference.
