By Eiichiro Oda. Released in Japan by Shueisha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Weekly Shonen Jump. Released in North America by Viz.

Every One Piece arc has a section where our heroes get the ever loving crap kicked out of them, in order to show how serious the new villains are before the Straw Hats then come back and wipe them out later. And, Water Seven being the longest arc to date, the ‘things suck’ section is particularly long, taking three whole volumes. Luckily this is the last, so after this one we should be getting back to the pirates kicking ass and having wacky fun doing it.

In the meantime, though… Iceberg’s been shot, apparently by Nico Robin, who is in cahoots with CP9, a secret government organization who turned out to have been moles at Water Seven. Luffy and company appeal to Robin, but she’s having none of it, insisting that she is leaving the crew, and that she has a wish that will never be fulfilled if she stays with them. (If they read their own manga, they’d know this was a giant hint that Robin is deceiving them. What kind of wish or dream CAN’T be fulfilled by being with Luffy?)

And what’s worse, Lucci and Blueno are Devil Fruit users, and put their powers to very good use. Luffy and Zoro get punched out of the building and across the entire city (shades of what Luffy did to Crocodile in Alabasta…), and Nami (merely thrown out the window, the curse of being one of the two ‘normal’ crew members) is now surrounded by people who still think she’s part of the ‘evil pirate crew’. Oh, and Chopper’s trapped in a blazing inferno along with Iceberg and Paulie.

Could things get any more desperate? Of course they could! CP9 has realized that if Iceberg doesn’t have the plans they’re looking for, then they must be with Franky, and they go charging off to capture him. Franky, meanwhile, is having a talk with Usopp, still frantically trying to fix the Going Merry. This is the nicest scene in the volume, and also the first time that we see Franky not being a jerk. This will prove to be important, of course. We also hear the legend of Klaubtermann, a legend that exists in particularly beloved ships, and realize that that’s how Going Merry got fixed in Skypeia. (Betcha forgot that, huh? Oda loves to do callbacks, and this is nowhere near the best. Wait till Thriller Bark…)

And then CP9 come in and start kicking the crap out of everyone again. This leads us to the second half of the volume, which is a giant flashback showing Franky’s childhood with Iceberg, along with their mentor, Mr. Tom. Tom is half-fishman and kind of written to be a vague ethnic stereotype, talking about doing things with a BOOM! He’s a fabulous character, but this is a flashback, so he also has ‘doomed’ written on his forehead in permanent marker. The flashback, like most One Piece flashbacks, is quite depressing. I was particularly struck by Kokoro, who appears younger here, and gives the impression that Tom’s death drove her to become an alcoholic.

And then there’s Spandam. I hate Spandam. I *really* hate Spandam. There are One Piece villains that are more badass (Crocodile), or very strong but complete monsters (Arlong), or even so cool they even avoid their karmic due (Eneru), but it’s hard to find one as smug, loathsome, and annoying as Spandam is. And unfortunately, get used to him, because we ain’t seen nothing yet.

Luckily, as I noted at the start, things begin to get better in the next volume, which has many of my all-time favorite One Piece moments. Stay tuned…