sahugani's One Piece Review 455

sahugani · May 14, 2007

Sahugani’s One Piece Review 455

just kick back and relax. it's a good thing...most of the time

As painful as Golden Week was for us, we are back now with new chapters and that’s the important thing. I’m sorry that I’ve been getting my reviews out late every week. Circumstance has not exactly been kind on that matter. This week I’m using the scan by OPHQST for my pics and the title WP was provided by natoleza over at Deviantart.

4 Little Heroes

we still need to figure out exactly what race these space pirates are

We’re finally starting to wrap up the little backstory of Spacey as he and his 3 brothers stand up against one of the space pirates who caused the explosion on the moon. In a display of courage remarkably similar to that shown by the Strawhat crew, Spacey’s group stands up without fear against an enemy they know nothing about other than the pain they have caused. This guy also appears to be the leader of the space pirates for a number of reasons. In previous chapters we have seen others reporting to him, him addressing Enel (who was aboard a ship designed with his hat), and now we see him leading his crew against Spacey’s forces. I desperately want to see Enel kick this guy’s ass.

Spider’s Soul

i wonder if all souls slide out of our mouths when we die

Last week we saw Brooke whip out a sword from his cane and utterly destroy Talaran with the same move Ryuuma used. Being that he is a zombie, Franky points out that he isn’t dead yet (as he was dead before). Brooke says not to worry and as he does, a black blob glides out of the spider monkey’s mouth. According to Brooke, that is a soul and the reason it came out was because he had purified the zombie. How he did this is still a mystery. As the zombies have shown us before, finishing them is not a simple manner of killing them a second time as most bear wounds that would most certainly give that second death instantly. It is quite logical to infer, given that the shadow theory is confirmed later in the chapter, that the said black soul is in all actuality the stolen shadow that was attached to Talaran. I would like to assume that after being purified, the shadow would return to its former host, but there are a couple pieces of evidence that cause me to think otherwise. First of all, when Brooke purified Talaran, he said to return to the Master of the Depths. Since Moria is called King of the Depths later on, it is safe to assume that the shadow is returning to him. This is backed by information regarding the shadow theory I will discuss later as well as the statement given by the old shadowless man a while back that defeating Moria is the way to return their shadows, though back then that was simply taken as the old man’s groundless hope.

Shadow Theory Confirmed

what? its not normal to have dead bodies in your fridge?

With Brooke revealing such intimate knowledge of the workings of zombies and the spider mice’s recognition of him as Hanauta, the time for him to finally tell his secrets is upon us, but not after another skull joke or two to get Franky pissed. Unfortunately, this is only in regards to his knowledge of the island’s secrets and nothing to explain his swordsmanship. It looks like for the most part, the shadow theory we had come up with here panned out to be the truth. As the shadow follows the movements of its original host, the zombie born from it follows the movements as well to match the original’s techniques and personality. Moria’s power is indeed that of the shadow shadow fruit, which means he has been the one personally removing the shadows from individuals and inserting them into corpses. Along with this, Hogback has helped revive legendary warriors and stores them, which gives an explanation for the nature of the general zombies. If it was direct resurrection, Hogback wouldn’t need to store them as he could revive them on the spot. He recovers the corpses of these legendary warriors as he knows them to be already strong bodies. He uses his medicine to make their bodies fully functioning again and stores them so that when Moria produces the shadow of a present day warrior with enough skill, Hogback locates the body of a legendary warrior whose body would be most suited to the abilities. Moria looks for bounties so that he can get strong shadows to match with the bodies. While I hate to admit it, this means that the legendary samurai was in fact Ryuuma before his death and upon the insertion of Brooke’s shadow, he kept the name of his former life but gained the skill set of the Humming Swordsman. For the regular zombies and creature zombies, their bodies are simply rough stitched together parts from multiple corpses and inhabited by weak shadows.

The Humming Swordsman’s Plan

yes. trust the man who took a year to find his body, sailed for decades without a rudder, and got his shadow taken last time he tried this

In addition to his explanation of how Moria’s shadows and Hogback’s legendary corpses are fused, Brooke gives us a guess as to what is in store for Luffy now that he has been captured. According to him, Moria does not like to deal with the real bodies of warriors who might pose a threat to him and so after taking the shadow, he discards the unconscious body of the victim (apparently the initial shock is enough to knock them out). Brooke is convinced that there is still time to save Luffy and has already developed a plan for Robin and Franky to follow. This explanation ends his longest ever streak of being serious and he celebrates. While in general this idea of Moria’s course of action would be expected, I think that the fact that Luffy is number 900 may change things up a bit. Considering the direction that the zombie levels have affected the process in which they are created I’ve formed a couple new theories for the difference between 900 and other general zombies. Since the general zombies all seem to use direct skill sets without devil fruits, it is quite clear to me that the power increase of 900 is in regards to the application of devil fruit powers to the resultant zombie. The lesser of the two theories I have is that Hogback (through some reference to Begabank’s teachings) will try to extract or duplicate the devil fruit powers into the new zombie’s flesh. I like this theory mostly because it includes another reference to Begabanks (no one else would have enough knowledge of the nature of devil fruits) and would foreshadow the necessity of the Strawhats to have a DF researcher in the future, which is my theory for the next nakama. The second theory I have is that Hogback will try to create the first zombie that uses the shadow’s original body. The process would require Hogback’s medicine and Perona’s ability to suppress will (as well as some unknown need for Absalom’s presence), which would give reason for the mysterious three’s presence. It also gives Brooke’s team more time to act as Moria is forced to wait on reinserting and also means Luffy is not tossed into the ocean afterwards.

Gecko Moria

...where are his legs?

I’m certain no one quite expected Gecko Moria to look like this. From the butt shot we saw before, we all assumes he was a giant due to his comparative size and that his lower half resembled the body type of Oimo and Brogy. It seems more like he is simply an enormous man like Whitebeard, though much uglier. Many questions are raised as to his actual fighting ability. First of all, as he is more likely to rely on his subordinates than act himself, it is a bit of a wonder that he was ranked into the Shichibukai, who are assumed to give up their crews. Also, unlike Luffy’s previous opponents, Moria’s devil fruit ability doesn’t seem to be the type that would help him out much in direct combat. In fact, his ability only seems to be truly effective when paired with Hogback’s legendary corpse collection. Finally, he simply doesn’t look quite as intimidating as Luffy’s former opponents, which together with the already mentioned points, seems to lessen my excitement about the final fight between the two. While I completely trust that Oda will pull off a final fight that is worthy of Luffy’s record, it is seeming lame at the moment. My best guess is that the final fight will involve Luffy fighting his zombie other, but as that makes Moria seem kind of pathetic, I doubt that it is the case. I’m really looking forward to seeing how Oda will pull this off.

The Hidden and the Sought

what a prize winning smile

When Luffy is brought before Moria, he demands to know the fates of Zoro, Sanji, Chopper, Usopp, and Nami, unaware that the latter three are hidden in Bearsy’s stuffing a few yards away. Moria replies that the only ones he wanted were Luffy, Zoro, and Sanji. We know that Zoro was already captured and put inside a general zombie, but this raises the question of why Sanji’s shadow was put inside a creature zombie instead of a general zombie like Zoro. With the combined aspects of all the slight ambiguities surrounding Sanji, it’s kind of expected for an error to occur with him. The first ambiguity lies in the bounty picture joke, which was only officially recognized by those who knew him beforehand (who then mocked the picture as well). Also, in the way Moria talked about Sanji, it seemed like thought that he hadn’t caught him yet (he didn’t recall the name and said he had sent the order instead of definitively saying he caught him). While I don’t care to venture as to what happened exactly, I would not be the least bit surprised if the whole mistake stemmed from Moria or someone else not recognizing him from the bounty picture.

The Three Clash

i just can't help but think of heartless in Kingdom Hearts

When the subject returns to the other three mentioned, Bearsy once again tries to say that they are inside him and is once again cut off by Perona, thus starting another argument between the mysterious three. Absalom tells Perona that she’s too mean to Bearsy and is reminded again of his Bride, who has apparently caused all kinds of chaos in Perona’s garden by tricking Lola. He then turns to Hogback and insinuates that the doctor has taken her for himself. Well this seems to shatter my theory of trust between the two of them that I clung to a while back. Because I doubt Absalom would come to help the doctor should Chopper start to attack him, it is looking like Chopper might not fight Absalom and we may actually see some fighting ability from Hogback himself. Anyways, Luffy takes advantage of their argument and eats through his cage to escape (which I think needs a bit of explaining). Both Absalom and Perona go after him, but Absalom is reminded that his ability is a bit too destructive for indoor use, so Perona breaks Luffy’s spirit with her ghosts and he is recaptured. I’m still trying to figure out how their techniques might be able to be countered by any member of the Strawhats and am not making much progress outside of Chopper’s nose nullifying Absalom’s invisibility. Anyways, with Luffy once again captured, he is hit with a searchlight and Moria lifts his shadow off of the ground as if it had a material substance. Then he simply uses an oversized pair of scissors to amputate the shadow and leave Luffy unconscious. Whether he will be saved before his shadow can be reinserted or whether his alternate self will indeed be born is left ambiguous as the chapter ends.

Overall

i need to get back into general forum posting eventually

This chapter yields both a big positive and a bit of a negative in my opinion. While I am a bit surprised (and not the good surprised) by Moria’s appearance, I am extremely happy to finally receive some confirmation on the shadow theory. While many aspects of the story have been somewhat predictable so far, Oda still has many mysteries he has yet to address and is still introducing more. My only legitimate complaint is that Oda has not yet started to take advantage of the HUGE opportunity he created for Chopper’s development in regards to his interaction with Hogback. I will be somewhat disappointed in Oda if he ignores this.

Raijatsu · May 14, 2007