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

This is a landmark volume of One Piece, in many ways. It begins the epic Impel Down arc. It’s continuity-heavy, bringing back many old characters in newer, sometimes more sympathetic guises. And as for the other landmarks… well, you’ll have to wait a couple more volumes for those.

After briefly seeing Hancock smuggling Luffy on board a marine ship bound for Impel Down, the volume begins by showing us where the rest of the crew got off to after Bartholomew Kuma sent them away from Sabaody. Some seem quite appropriate (Nami on a weather island), some rather cruel (Robin just cannot catch a break), some laughably cruel (oh Sanji, I shouldn’t laugh as much as I did), and some are just laughable (Zoro and Perona, the perfect odd couple). Drink in these brief scenes of the cast, by the way. It’s gonna be a long time before we get back to them.

Meanwhile, we arrive at Impel Down and begin what amounts to a giant melee brawl that lasts the rest of the book. We’re introduced to a few new characters, of which the most memorable are Magellan the poison-loving freak of a warden, Hannyabal, his ambitious underling, and Sadie, the security chief whose personality is exactly as her name applies. (Her sensual moans whenever she delivers any line are the closest One Piece will get to sex in this volume – well, that and Hancock’s over-the-top one-sided love for Luffy).

The best part of the volume, though, is the reintroduction of two villains we had forgotten, and frankly thought of as too comedic for a serious rescue arc – Buggy the Clown and Mr. 3. They’re both imprisoned in Impel Down, but Luffy frees them in return for them leading him down to the lowest level, where his brother is imprisoned. Needless to say, neither of them has any intention of doing so, but events conspire against them, and things only get crazier with the addition of Mr. 2 a level down. Yes, to make up for the lack of Straw Hats, it’s old-home-week for villains in One Piece. There’s even a hint, in a few scenes showing the floor where Ace is kept, that we may be seeing an even bigger villain again soon.

There’s not much to review here – it’s a bunch of fights – but as always with One Piece, Oda makes the fights interesting, and inserts enough fun humor that it never feels like it drags. One wonders about Ace’s reluctance to be rescued, however, and why he wants Luffy to stay away. And now that we’ve finished the One Piece catchup (sort of – we’re still about a year behind Japan, but that’s better than the 8 we were at this point last year), we’ll have to wait for October to find out.

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

This review contains a few spoilers for the ongoing One Piece manga in Japan, though I try to avoid the big ones, obviously.

The speed-up is over! Welcome to the last of Viz’s 30-volume One Piece blitz, designed to get the series to be remotely close to Japan’s release. (As a reminder, when we began in January, One Piece in North America was seven and a half years behind Japan. When 54 comes out next month, we’ll be down to a mere year behind the volumes, and the Shonen Jump chapters are only about half a year behind now.)

In any case, this is the final volume of Sabaody, and marks a big tonal shift in the series as it moves into the Impel Down arc. I’m trying to spoil as little as possible, but the book begins with Kuma scattering the entire Straw Hat crew, separately, to various places all over the world. (We’ll find out where everyone bar Luffy is next volume). Indeed, as of the current chapters running in Japan, they’re still not together again. This is a big leap of faith for Oda, trusting that we’ll be OK with merely following Luffy and his allies for a year and counting.

It is Luffy that we follow, of course, as he ends up on a mysterious island, which turns out to be populated entirely by women! Women who have, of course, never seen a man before. As you can imagine there’s a lot of humor based around Luffy’s penis, as well as his clothing being ‘fixed’ by the women. I did like that the Amazon kingdom has women of all shapes and sizes. This is not meant to be a Sanji paradise (although there are certainly plenty of shapely women).

But of course, the main part of this volume is simply introducing us to Boa Hancock, another Warlord of the Sea and one of the more memorable characters of recent chapters. She certainly gets a fantastic entrance, stating right off the bat what sort of woman she is supposed to be. Of course, such petty cruelty cannot stand in the way of Luffy’s cheery cluelessness, and she quickly finds Luffy fascinating. And, naturally, she has a horrible past that has ‘forced’ her to become what she is.

Luffy also finally finds out what’s going on with Ace, and makes the decision to go and rescue his brother, figuring the others will be okay without him for a bit. Of course, he has absolutely no way to get there… but that’s OK, as Hancock has totally fallen in love with him, and will give him a ship! I’ll be talking more about Hancock’s feelings for Luffy in my review of the next volume, but suffice to say I think that this is Oda’s answer to everyone who wants the series to have more romance and shipping. And it’s typically hilarious.

This is another transition volume, mostly dedicated to introducing Hancock and getting Luffy fired up about saving Ace. As such, it’s not quite as utterly awesome as the previous two. However, that’ll change soon, as we head for Impel Down!

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

It’s sad that a cover featuring the entire crew grinning happily and toasting the reader can make me feel so melancholy…

Like Volume 51, there’s so much going on in here that you run the risk of getting a bit confused. We find out about Haki, which becomes important later on. (Note how it brings down most everyone in the auction hall, with the exception of our heroes! Yes, even Usopp! Take that, Usopp haters!) We see a lot more of the 11 Supernovas, and get to see some of their truly ludicrous abilities. My favorite of these of probably Capone, simply because my mind reels at the imagination Oda has to have thought of that. And we get another of the three Admirals introduced.

You may have noticed when Aokiji was introduced that he seemed a little familiar. In fact, each of the three admirals are based on famous Japanese character actors. Aokiji’s appearance was based off of Yūsaku Matsuda, who became famous as a private detective in Tantei Monogatari, but may be best known here as the villain in the Michael Douglas film Black Rain. (It was his last film, he hid his cancer while filming it.) We now meet the goofiest of the 3 Admirals (though no less dangerous), Kizaru. Kizaru’s actor basis is Kunie Tanaka, who is still alive, and may be best known over here for the Kurosawa film Sanjuro. (The last admiral, who you will learn to despise, Akainu, is based on Bunta Sugawara, best known for the yakuza series Battles Without Honor and Humanity.)

And then there’s Kid and Law. Really, if you forget all the other Pirate Captains introduced here, remember these two, who clearly seem to be the most important. Seeing the three of them take on the hapless marines attacking them is a thing of beauty, especially as they snark at each other all the while. (Well, as much as Luffy can ever snark.) You also get reminded that most of the pirate crews around are, in fact, killers and looters – Kid’s bounty is higher as he’s a murderer. For all that the World Government looks scummier with every chapter (and boy, they’re still scummy), the hatred of pirates seems to have a rational basis.

And that leads to my favorite scene in the volume, when the crew are back at Shakky’s bar talking with Rayleigh. Now that they know he was Gold Roger’s first mate, they’re all intensely curious. Robin even goes so far as to ask if they found out about the lost century. He says they did – but enourages her to go through the journey on her own, and see if she comes up with a different answer than they did. And then… Usopp asks about One Piece. And Luffy just blows up, saying that he doesn’t want to hear about it, as knowing the end would just make it too dull. (Luffy hates spoilers, therefore. He’d clearly despise my blog.) And then when Rayleigh points out that conquering the world to be the Pirate King will be difficult, Luffy says he doesn’t want to conquer anything. “The one who is the most free… is the Pirate King.”

I’ve said before that the goal of One Piece is Luffy and Company changing the very definitions of the world, and this is perhaps the best example of this. All of the good points of piracy, and none of the bad. Heck, they’ve never even stolen from good guys!

Sadly, all the fun times can’t last forever, especially when there seem to be multiple Kumas running around Sadaoby. So the Straw Kats are finally cornered, facing off against a Kuma, an Admiral, and the bodyguard of Dr. Vegapunk, Sentomaru, who seems to have a way to hurt Luffy (Fist of Love? Nah, probably not…). These three, all together, are enough to have Luffy tell the crew to run away. But then the real Kuma shows up…

If the last volume were a breathless roller coaster ride, this one is just one big downhill slope on that ride. If doesn’t let up for over 200 pages. Even the exposition is charged with energy. And what a cliffhanger! ZORO!