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

This is another volume, like 40, where the majority of the plot is getting from one side of a building to another and fighting people who are in the way. I’ll do another bullet-point observations review.

— I haven’t really discussed them in my reviews, but I have been following Oda’s ‘cover page’ story arcs, most of which take a minor villain from a prior arc and redeem them in some way. This one during Enies Lobby is one of the best ones. It’s focused on Miss Golden Week and the rest of Baroque Works, as they set out to rescue the others from Impel Down. (In light of recent story arcs, this becomes a lot more far-fetched, but OK.) Most of them escape, but Crocodile and Mrs. 1, 2, and 3 are still imprisoned. Also, love to see the return of “Paula from the Pub.”
— The odd thing about the battles in this volume is that they start off looking very unbalanced or ‘wait, that’s the wrong opponent’. One Piece may push the boundaries of shonen a bit, but it still works within its cliches. Seeing Usopp going after Jabra (one of their stronger brawlers), Nami fighting Kumadori (who pretty much starts stomping her almost immediately), and especially Sanji vs. Kalifa (Yes, they both kick, but you know any woman will make Sanji their monkey boy) is just weird. There’s a feeling of wrongness that permeates the early battles, with the exception of Zoro and Kaku.
— And then right away that one’s taken care of as well, as Kaku activates his fruit powers. They’re truly hysterical, and it makes a fun ‘light-hearted villain’ character into a complete stitch, as he shows you the awesome giraffe powers he mow possesses. He is helped along by Sniper King being an idiot and handcuffing himself to Zoro. Whoops. And best of all, neither Kaku nor Jabra have the key for those cuffs. (Honestly, Sniper King does little here. Wait till 43…)
— Seeing everyone shift to their ‘proper’ opponent is fascinating, as you can see Oda manipulating everything to put the gears that he mixed up into the proper place. Chopper arrives to help Nami, and his huge sized form is much better at taking on Kumadori. Now she can go take over in Sanji’s fight as he, well…
— I am pleased that Oda, while still admiring Sanji’s chivalry a bit, had Nami pointing out how utterly stupid it is. And she even kicked him a bit too. I’m going to assume that a later volume in the future is going to have Sanji fight a woman again, because it’s such an obvious weakness it will have to be used against him. And he’s so clever otherwise!
— I like the way that we only see the aftereffects of Gear Three, with Chibi-Luffy, rather than the actual power. Clearly Oda is saving it for the Lucci fight.
— Lucci’s amused sneer as he tells Spandam that he let the kids follow them is amusing (in that it shows how little everyone thinks of Spandam) and disconcerting (as it shows Lucci wants to fight Luffy a bit *too* much…)
— Franky’s various personality changes when he doesn’t get cola is another one of the hysterical jokes Oda throws right into the middle of serious beatdown fights.
— And, at the opposite end of the spectrum, we have Chopper’s monster transformation. This has some great art, as Oda makes it utterly clear how WRONG this is in every possible way. Yes, he one-shot KO’s Kumadori, but this is not the Chopper we want to see, I don’t care if he’s powerful now.
— And then there’s Nami and Kalifa’s fight. There are some amusing bits where Kalifa is a flake, but it’s one of those things where, if you started trying to get someone into the series by pointing out the strong powerful women, you know (because Murphy works that way) they’d pick up this volume, turn to this fight, and then slap you. It’s pure, utter fanservice. With added balloon fetish.
— And just for a change, how about Spandam doing something moronic? Yes, after all the threats and boasts, the Buster Call is triggered by accident. Kudos to Robin for broadcasting that everyone should get the hell out of there, though she earns another punch in the face by Everyone’s Favorite Villain (TM) for her troubles.
— And finally, Luffy and Lucci meet and start to fight. Knowing Luffy’s fights in previous volumes, it won’t end soon.

Despite some soapy fanservice, this was a very good volume. Oda knows how to keep people reading even when the basic plot is “people hit other people” for 200 pages. Recommended.

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

Things pick up exactly where they left off, with Luffy having polished off Blueno and standing just a building away from Robin and Franky. Franky, of course, has noticed Robin’s reticence to do anything, and decides to take matters into his own hands, in one of the volume’s funniest scenes. Unfortunately, having briefly escaped, Robin shows she is still unwilling to be rescued, and in fact merely wishes for death.

This coincides with the rest of CP9 showing up, in a huge 2-page spread that looks great. Luckily, the rest of the Straw Hats arrive at pretty much the same time, albeit in a much messier fashion, and the next chapter has their own 2-page spread. (I was a bit confused about Sniper King’s entrance, till I recalled one of the giants had told him before, “Leave it to me!” Poor Sniper King, a human fastball.) Robin is growing increasingly frustrated with all of this, and her anger is giving way to tears.

And then Spandam once again threatens the Buster Call, which leads to Robin pointing out the true horror of the thing, and leads into a flashback covering her backstory. (Of note, the only two Straw Hats who don’t get flashbacks during their initial arc are Nami and Robin… both of whom briefly “betray” the crew. Oda knows how to build up drama.) Robin’s childhood is shown to be a huge ball of sadness and loneliness, punctuated with occasional bursts of hope. She’s clearly brilliant, as shown by her passing the archeologist’s exam at age *eight*, but her joy is immediately taken from her when she realizes that her scholar friends still won’t let her work with them.

Then we meet Saul, who is a truly wonderful character, and the best Giant we’ve met to date. His influence on Robin is seen from the get-go, as we see him teaching her to smile and laugh through her despair. Sadly, the past is *their* country this time, as the Marines arrive chasing after Robin’s mother, Nico Olvia, who is the spitting image of adult Robin only with white hair (still young and beautiful, the white isn’t meant to be age here). Robin’s desperation for human warmth, love and affection wars with everyone trying to distance themselves from her so that she won’t be killed.

Of note, the Marines in One Piece have never really been a source of fun times, but we have till now met noble Marines (Smoker, Tashigi), or at least ambiguous Marines (Hina, Aokiji). This is the volume where we realize we have to assume that 90% of the government and Marines are corrupt and evil, and that it’s the people like Smoker who are the exceptions. We also get a brief hint of an Atlantis-like country that the World Government is desperately trying to hide, which apparently is the subject of the hundred missing years/true history Robin’s been researching all this time. Also, gosh, Spandine looks and acts familiar…

Thank God, Robin at least gets her mother to acknowledge and hug her one last time, because otherwise I think this volume might go beyond the despair event horizon. Everyone is massacred, with Robin being the one exception. And we see what the Buster Call entails, as the innocents who had nothing to do with the research are also killed, just in case. (The future Admiral Aikanu does this, and let me tell you, it’s pretty awesome foreshadowing. Expect much worse from him later.) The Buster Call also doesn’t seem to mind killing a few Marines too, in the process of wiping out everything. It’s One Piece’s equivalent of a nuke, only delivered by cannon. The only person on the island who has any doubts is Kuzan, which is why he lets Robin escape. (Clearly, as Aokiji 20 years later, he’s changed his mind.)

And so, after a brief montage of “Robin’s life sucks” through her teenage years, we’re back to the present. Robin admits that most of her fear is that the friends that she’s finally found will grow to hate her because of her past and the Marines constantly chasing her, and again affirms her wish for death. (Can you imagine how 4Kids would have dubbed this, by the way? The mind reels…) Spandam is loving this, of course, and points out that Robin’s enemy is the World Government itself, and too big for Luffy to try to take down.

He doesn’t know Luffy very well. What follows is the climax of Enies Lobby. Oh, sure, there’s about 4 more volumes to go after this, but that’s just the dessert. The true story ends here. Luffy calmly tells Sniper King to shoot down the World Government’s flag (which, give all credit to Usopp, he does immediately with no terror at all). He then declares war on the world government, and once more asks Robin: does she want to live? And finally, his words get through to her despair and fear and stubbornness and she screams out that she does. This is one of the best scenes in the whole manga, and the emotional climax of Water Seven/Enies Lobby. The goal of the arc is rescuing Robin, yes, but the REAL goal was getting Robin to trust her friends. Mission accomplished.

And then everyone dives in and we’re headed for another big string of fights. Whee! Fantastic, marvelous, stupendous, colossal volume of One Piece.

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

It’s hard to review volumes like this. The plot is essentially ‘Luffy & co. go from one point to another’, but it’s done with lots of cool fights, wacky schtick, and surprises. This is Oda, after all. He does in 11 chapters what would take Tite Kubo 11 years.

Therefore, I will simply note random thoughts as I read it:

—I really have to wonder if the whole ‘power level’ joke was Oda’s riffing on Dragon Ball Z. Yes, I know that ‘It’s OVER 9000!!!’ is a North American meme, but I’m sure it’s been heard in Japan by now.
—Baskerville is one of Oda’s best truly silly characters – he’s never afraid to include villains who are there simply for laughs.
—Regarding the sea train flying over the gate, my thought was: for all his stoicness, Zoro is easily just as insane as Luffy is.
—Ooooh. Poor Pirate A, he never gets any love. Or is it B?
—Nice cameo by Usopp, when Sniper King’s mask gets knocked off.
—As helpfully notes by an Exposition-class marine, Nami has leveled up, and is now a powerful fighter. She really should not be surprised by her thunderbolts taking out the good guys too – that’s what weather does, after all.
—Love the exchange between Paulie and Zoro. “Tell them… they’re fired.” Just beautiful.
—In case you didn’t hate Spandam quite enough yet, he’s now belting Robin across the jaw, and kicking her while she’s down repeatedly. Oh, and twisting the “agreement” he had with Robin so that he can kill the Straw Hats. Robin was really being incredibly naive here, thinking that they’d keep their word, but then, that does help to establish that she’s not perfect.
—We also see not only that CP9 have little to no regard for Spandam, but also that Lucci is very much a mad dog. His face when stating they want “BLOOD.” is chilling.
—Great exchange between Blueno and Luffy. “How long do you plan to keep fighting?” “Until I die.”
—And poor Sniper King, getting left behind. Nami notes that he’s not Luffy, which is true enough. But Zoro notes he’s gotten that far and hasn’t died, which is significant.
—And Sniper King (who takes off his mask here, so OK, Usopp) gets a fantastic moment when he manages to turn the giants to their side. Featuring a callback to events that happened a good 27 volumes ago, and it’s highly important that of all the Straw Hats, only Usopp, with his ability to spin a tale and love of warrior giants, could pull this off. It’s not just about hitting hard. More on that in Volume 43.
—Nice little breakdown of the Devil Fruit powers, for once given in the story rather than in Oda’s Question Corner comments. Kaku and Kalifa’s faces as they chow down indicate it’s not exactly a pleasant experience.
—When Sanji isn’t trying to be impressive in front of a woman, he’s really fantastic.
—And Luffy levels up as well, finally showing us Gear Two, which apparently involves pumping blood through his muscles. He’s also managed to learn one of CP9’s 6 superhuman techniques just by watching it a bit. Exit Blueno.

And so, by the end of the volume, Luffy at least has almost caught up to Robin and Franky. What will happen next? (Note if Viz hadn’t sped up One Piece releases, I would have been reading this volume in 2014. I really appreciate them taking the risk of mediocre sales and putting this out.)