True to form, just as the One Piece anime is finally, finally about to depart Dressrosa and bid it farewell, it needs to slow things down. It's almost as if Toei isn't ready to leave and is digging its nails into the ground, desperately hoping to stay just a little bit longer.
Joking aside, I know One Piece is in a tricky situation as far as pacing goes, since its story is dangerously close to the manga's content right now. Just for our sanity's sake, they should probably detour into a filler arc before reaching Zou. Though I realize that would mean keeping the crew separated for even longer than they already have been, but hey, the series' hesitation towards substantial filler arcs is what got us in this situation to begin with.
It's the Fujitora show this week as the blind, Zatoichi-style admiral goes on the offensive to fulfill his duties as a protector of the innocent. Clearly he doesn't have anything personal against the Straw Hats, he more than likely even respects them, but a marine's got to do what a marine's got to do and he begins to dish out his gravity powers to possibly their most absurd extant yet. All the rubble left over from the fight with the Doflamingo family rises up high in the sky, and soon a huge, island-sized CGI ball of debris is hovering over everybody's heads. Fujitora may seem like a wise old man type, but in practice he ends up being one of the most brash and reckless characters we've ever seen in the show. Even the citizens, who he's supposed to be protecting, are fearing for their lives thanks to this terrifying monstrosity above them.
The episode hinges on Luffy's arrival on the scene, fresh from dropping Rebecca off. It quickly becomes a fight and then even quicker halts in its tracks. Most of the battle is stretched out beyond belief and features Luffy calling out his attacks like "I'm about to punch you!" or "Here comes a kick!" out of guilt for beating on a blind man, and it gets very repetitive. The fight doesn't even conclude by the end of the episode and if memory serves correctly it was only a few pages in the manga.
Otherwise, there's a fairly nice scene at the beginning of the episode between Law and Sengoku where they share their memories of Corazón. Despite being a pirate and a marine respectively, they share this relationship in common and agree that what Cora would have wanted is for them to simply carry on his memory and live life however they please. Again, it's a nice scene continued from last week, but it's a real bummer that we're stretching things out so much that otherwise short sequences are getting split between episodes. The promise of a new arc, whether we sail straight to Zou or indulge in a filler side story, keeps being dangled in front of our faces and I'm as ready for something fresh as anybody.
Crunchyroll to stream upcoming anime― Aniplex and Crunchyroll announced on Wednesday that the late manga creator Hisaya Nakajo's Hana-Kimi manga is inspiring an anime. In addition, Crunchyroll announced that it will stream the anime when it premieres in North America, Central America, South America, Europe, Africa, Oceania, the Middle East, the CIS, and India. The announcement did not reveal the deb...
James and Lynzee look into Hideaki Anno's latest hint that there might be more Evangelion after the last movie and news on the Lord of the Rings anime film!― Could There Be More Evangelion on the Horizon? James and Lynzee look into Hideaki Anno's latest hint that there might be more Evangelion after the last movie and news on the Lord of the Rings anime film! Plus, we catch up with Kafka and the Ka...
Grant Jones dives into the wild world of giant monsters and how Kaiju No. 8 builds on their legacy.― Kaiju No. 8 is a series that wears its influences on its sleeves. As the first word in its title suggests, it comes from a long line of works in the kaiju genre, using giant monsters and burning skylines as a backdrop to tell stories. While many likely know kaiju in a passing sense, it may help to h...
This steamy manga's appeal is going to depend on how much you can stomach a female protagonist who kicks off the romance by assaulting her former fiance.― This is a tricky one. Before You Discard Me, I Shall Have My Way with You is, to all appearances, a story that opens with a sexual assault. Agnès has been betrothed to Crown Prince Lucilleur since childhood, and she's been in love with him just as...
Japanese studio to handle production slated for broadcast, streaming globally― Kadokawa and Singaporean game developer and publisher Garena announced on Monday that they are co-producing an anime adaptation of Garena's Garena Free Fire battle royale shooting game, with a Japanese studio handling the animation. Kadokawa's Kadokawa Qingyu subsidiary is the production manager. The anime is planned to b...
Healer Nanna's powers have one very unique caveat: she has to have sex with the person to heal them. See why Rebecca Silverman calls it "a cute story, decently racy, and generally good, fluffy fun."― One of the fun things about Seven Seas' Steamship line of racy manga aimed at a female audience is finding which romance tropes are prevalent in any given release. While every genre has its tropes and s...
What's the perfect recipe for waifu supremacy? Lucas and Nick look at fan-favorites from Yu Yu Hakusho to Spice & Wolf.― What's the perfect recipe for waifu supremacy? Lucas and Nick look at fan-favorites from Yu Yu Hakusho to Spice & Wolf. Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by the participants in this chatlog are not the views of Anime News Network.Spoiler Warning for discussion of the s...
Train to the End of the World and Voice Actor Radio are getting a lot of love these last few weeks! Discover which other series stand out in our weekly user rankings!― Let's have a look at what ANN readers consider the best (and worst) of the season,
based on the polls you can find in our Daily Streaming Reviews
and on the Your Score page with the latest simulcasts. Keep in mind that these rankings...
Crystal Kay previously sang themes for 2004's Fullmetal Alchemist and Nodame Cantabile― Recently, Anime News Network was able to sit down with singer-songwriter Crystal Kay and talk about not only her involvement with anime over the years but also what it was like to grow up in Japan as the child of a Korean-Japanese mother and an African-American father. Anime fans likely know of Crystal Kay throug...
The plot is excellent in the romance camp. Everything that happens is to get Eui-joon and Gunwoo together, and it works pretty well.― You can read The Dangerous Convenience Store in English two ways. The first is to read it on the manhwa site/app Manta, which has all seventy-five chapters and four bonus stories available. The second is to read Seven Seas' print (or ebook) edition, which, as of this ...
Some older mysteries inch closer to resolution as the true nature of the Abyss slowly comes into view, and long-posed questions start to be answered.― Sometimes, being a fan of Akihito Tsukushi's acclaimed Made in Abyss series means acclimating to suffering. Like many Western devotees, I was introduced to this bizarre, squishy, disturbing world via the 2017 first season of Kinema Citrus' fantastic a...