The Straw Hats decode Luffy’s message and get their rears in gear.
What They Say:
With Robin on her way to meet Dragon, Brook putting together a new song, Usopp training himself as best he can, and Zoro humbling himself before Mihawk to learn his sword style, the Straw Hats are making great strides. Meanwhile, the meaning of Luffy’s mysterious message is revealed!
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
The coming together of the Straw Hats has been a mixed bag for me, mostly because it comes across as a drawing out of events rather than getting things really going with the next storyline. It does have an advantage in that it’s letting us get reacquainted with the cast after they’ve largely been thrown to the four winds for so long now, well over a hundred episodes in fact, that it’s good to remind everyone who they all are. They’re just not doing a good job of it for the most part as characters I’m not familiar with aren’t really being worked well to serves as advancement of story and introductions. And before you start, a series can’t always survive on just who has been watching it since episode one. It has to bring in new viewers too. And with these guys being off screen for nearly two years broadcast time for the most part, it’s not a bad thing to do.
While some of the episodes haven’t done well, I definitely appreciated this one with how it worked Brook as he’s realizing he has to do something to get back on track with Luffy since Luffy is making his moves. We get some useful flashback material that shows us how he came to meet everyone but doesn’t dwell heavily on it, giving us a taste to know who he is. It works as a fun element too since events in the present have him, well, planking. While he’s being used as a sideshow now and hasn’t cared, he’s now starting to get himself moving and that means music and dancing, which is great to see. It gives it a brief burst of useful energy.
With the rest of the cast, they’re ones I’m familiar enough with but offer up enough little nudges and flashbacks to make it worthwhile. Robin’s story extended past my DVD viewing here so it was welcome to see more of her past and how Luffy bonded even closer with her. The same can be said with both Usopp and Zoro as they’re focused more on just improving themselves. They’ve been with Luffy the longest and have grown a lot, but their need to continually grow and challenge themselves is made stronger by being with Luffy because of the situations that they get put into with him. So it’s good to see that they’re finally making good use of their time on the various islands and getting where they need to be.
In Summary:
One Piece doesn’t do anything radical here but it does spend its time shoring up where it wants to go moving forward with its storyline. The Straw Hats are all getting on the same page again and really coming to understand that Luffy has made a decision and that has them getting themselves in era. Some of it is lighter and more fun in general, such as Robin and Nami’s problems, but others are getting serious such as Usopp and Zoro. Zoro in particular has the strongest of the arcs so far as he tries to learn from Mihawk in order to get better, an amusing twist in their relationship to be sure but the kind of thing that is definitely what both men are like. It’s a good episode, though somewhat worrying with the long term game plan to get everyone back together.
Grade: B
Streamed By: FUNimation
Review Equipment:
Sony KDS-R70XBR2 70″ LCoS 1080P HDTV, Dell 10.1 Netbook via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.
