One Piece

[*BananaKing]

Shanks siding with the marines?! Durendal, surely you jest, shanks is a good friend of whitebeard's and a pirate of the roger age. He's paving the way for the new age by cleaning up the scarred past of the old age.

I never thought, and still cannot see any reason why dragon would enter the battle at marinefold. I never expected him to bat an eye because its not his problem. Deep down he does care for Luffy, but he's accepted that Luffy has his own destiny to fulfill, just as he has his own respectivly. I see this great battle about to end within the next chapter or two. Shanks might be so bold as to go after Blackbeard himself. I mean Shanks does have very powerful Haki, and half of Blackbeard's powers mean nothing to Shanks. I bet you he's the only emperor w/o a devil fruit.

I had always had this little idea that it would be cool to see the other straw hat members all joined up/allied with the whitebeard pirates and/or allies and rejoining luffy at marinefold. You know, they all knew he'd go there

[durendal]

No, no, no. I'm not saying Shanks is siding with the Marines, but rather he would want to keep the status quo of the pirates and marines. I was just guessing that there is a reason why the Marines is the dominant government. Also, regarding Dragon, it's not about helping Luffy, but more on rather giving the finishing blow to the Marines. The situation is already an all out war of Pirates versus Marine, with the addition of revolutionist, the Marines will not stand a chance. All of the important heads of the Marines are gathered there, what would be the most easiest way to crush the marines but to eliminate all the governing bodies at once?

Anyway, I do hope that the straw hat crew will be able to catch up to luffy. With the experiences of Luffy, it will be difficult to catch up to him.

[*BananaKing]

Even though they take their orders from the WG, I think dragon's main enemy is the WG itself and the Tenryuubito. He most likely sees entering this war as a waste of his resources no matter how weaken his enemy may be. Plus, I have a feeling he's waiting for something relating to the Will of D before he does anything.

[Renegade]

I only keep up with the anime because I don't want to spoil anything. Unlike Bleach or Naruto, One Piece knows how to pull off filler!

[*BananaKing]

But just like every anime, its has too much

[durendal]

Well, what do you expect from Japan's top manga? That's more reason to milk the title. But at least not as blatant at how some american companies does them. Still, I'm avoiding the anime because I don't have the time to download and watch it. And I'm not really fond of fillers. And I've seen some movies of One Piece prior to me reading the manga, and I didn't quite enjoy it.

[*BananaKing]

The only time I watch the one piece anime is too see the fight sequences. As I mentioned before, many of the fights get extended and that'll be very entertaining when the "Impel Down Escape Crew" join the battle at Marinefold

[durendal]

I've seen episode 444 of one piece, and I'm not really quite satisfied with what I saw. Looks like they were trying to prolong the episode just to fill the airtime. Of course it isn't that noticeable since its mostly small additional comedic stuff. Episode involves impel down and Blackbeard.

[durendal]

Woohoo!!! Thursday! One Piece Chapter Night!!

[*BananaKing]

I already read it, its an interesting plot development now.

Well I think they add in comic stuff like that to give the manga time to develop. This way there'll always be a nice gap between manga and anime. So the anime people can take their time with the episodes and have that safety blanket that they won't come too close or reach the same point as the manga.

So did you like the Battle at the Summit?

[durendal]

Kick-ass of course. Too bad that the straw hat crew wasn't able to join in on the rumble. I'm also sure that they are aware of what's going on with marineford. With the death of a major power, I guess the world is now thrown into chaos seeng that there is a vacuum in the balance of the world. Perhaps this was what Shanks was trying to avoid.

[*BananaKing]

Indeed it was, however the Marines were too blind to see the reprocusions of the war. I do find it very intriguing that Doflamingo is trying to kill Moria. Who do you think he's working for? I say its the Gorousei (sp)

[durendal]

Well, if it's not Sengoku then it's definitely someone higher than him. Based on the way the marine runs things, I'm inclined to think that the marines are being controlled by a single entity instead of the gorousei.

Also, the repercussions of what the marines did only renewed the beliefs of the people thus ushering in the next generation of the pirate age. Since the balance was shaken, I'm not sure if the remaining of the four emperor would be vying for the empty space that Whitebeard left.

[*BananaKing]

Why wouldn't it be gorousei? They could be thinking in unison and decided that the Shichibukai are no longer needed. Cause their purporse is fufilled; I can't remember if it was mentioned, but I believe someone said that the warlords were created to counter whitebeard.

Well we know Shanks won't cause any trouble, but we don't know anything about Kaidou or Big Mama (why Oda-sensei would name him that I don't know )

[durendal]

Kaidou does seem to have an evil aura, so I'm guessing that he'll be causing a lot of trouble.

Read the latest chapter, and looks like Luffy has woken up. Backstory of Ace and Luffy seems to be looking quite good. Nice change of pace after all the hubub at marineford.

Also, I find it funny how Garp wanted Ace and Luffy to be marines yet let them be raised by former criminals. Well I am glad that Oda didn't use the cliche of making Luffy and Ace face each other on opposite sides, this keeps the story light hearted yet gives off intense emotion.

[*BananaKing]

Well I think it'll be interesting to see how Ace decides to accept Luffy as a brother. Ace looks so pissed and hateful, so it should be very interesting to see develop.

But why did Ivankov have to leave?!!

I'll miss you Iva-chan!

[odin]

I cant believe i have not seen this thread yet, well to start off im a huge one piece fan, i keep reading the manga and watch the anime each time a new episode gets subbed the last arc is by far one of the greatest but i still have not seen an arc as touching as the aarlong saga where we get to know about nami's past, but still one piece is getting better and better and hopefully people will take notice and make one piece #1 in america cause frankly naruto has gotten way too stupid in the manga and the anime....well they should call it "Filler : The Series" , bleach was my number 1 pick a long time ago but it just got transformed into a total chaos, meaning that we get very little character development, the only ones that have been getting some at all are Ichigo and the rest are just canon fodder for aizen ( who is by far the most annoying villain in history who has no personality) and that's why i love one piece, the may have a huge cast of characters but the get developed evenly and are all likable (except spandam, he can just die for all i care) and the series really feels like an adventure. i just got to read the latest chapter in the manga and im glad we can finally get to see some of Ace's backstory, its about time.

[*BananaKing]

Well its going to be really cool to see how those two brothers became so close. Luffy's really been through a tremendous ordeal these past 100 chapters. Surviving Impel Down and escaping the Battle at the Summit alive; Luffy's defied fate itself.

But why did Ivankov have to leave?!!! I still miss you Ivankov!!!

[odin]

Well its going to be really cool to see how those two brothers became so close. Luffy's really been through a tremendous ordeal these past 100 chapters. Surviving Impel Down and escaping the Battle at the Summit alive; Luffy's defied fate itself.

But why did Ivankov have to leave?!!! I still miss you Ivankov!!!

eventually he/she/it will return, probably at the same time that dragon will enter the scene. right now i want to know what happened to the rest of the crew, we get some details on the anime and manga but they just cut back to luffy after revealing a bit of their whereabouts.

[durendal]

Yeah, but at least we're all assured that the rest of the Straw Hat crew are busy in their own little adventures. It'll be cool when they finally get together and reveal how much stronger each of them have become. I bet they'll even be on par with an Admiral. Hopefully Luffy will be able to control his Hakki by then, and hopefully Sanji and Zorro would learn Hakki.

[durendal]

Okay, this is going to be a major spoiler but I need to ask this.

What the heck did Luffy say to all his crew? All of them understood what he did when he returned to Marineford to ring the bell. Does this mean that he is going to declare war on the marines? I'm sure that it was agreed that all of them would meet on that bubble archipelago (forgot it's name, too hard to remember). But then what's next? All of them seemed to relax a bit when they recieved the message. It makes me want to think that it say "say there and I'll get you eventually". Rayleigh seems to have a plan of his own. And what part did Kuma play along all of this? Did he send all the strawhats to different location with the intention to train them? I would think so when it was revealed that he was part of the revolution.

What are your thoughts on this?

[*BananaKing]

Well the way I see it...

The ringing of the Ox bell has 2 meanings, either it can mean a respectful farewell or a declaration of war. Remember, Luffy already declared war on the World Government when he shot the flag at Enies Lobby. By declaring war on the WG, he's declared war on both the marines and the world. I think Luffy rang the bell 8 times as a respectful farewell to those who died at the war and his brother. He then rang it another 8 times to give a respectful farewell to the Age of Whitebeard. Remember Ace declared that the previous age was Whitebeard's and Luffy no doubt understood and respected Ace's choice of words. Now I doubt Killer was right in saying Luffy is declaring the new age to be his own, I don't see Luffy being that arrogant; Blackbeard yes, Luffy no. I am getting very annoyed that the Strawhats still have no plans to regroup...its getting a little boring because now that the War at the Summit os over, what's Luffy got left to do on his own? Thiis whole war was to make a new shift in the manga and a new change in Luffy's character. Oda needs to build on it by having Luffy's new experience reflect onto his crew. Let the captain help shape the crew through more adventures together, not alone...*sigh* Oh well, we'll just have to wait until next week and see where things go

As for Kuma, my belief was that as a testament to Dragon, he saved Luffy from death at the hands of Kizaru. I think by separating the crew, he intended on thinking Luffy would try and regroup the crew and miss the war. Even though Kuma "died", he still had a duty to Dragon to keep his son alive; much like Ivankov did. I still wish Ivankov didn't have to leave Luffy...I miss their chemistry

[*BananaKing]

So the latest chapter...I don't know how to feel about it...

So the Strawhat pirates have elected to reunite after 2 whole years of training! The series itself is going on a month-long break. After this month break, these two years of training better be over, I want more adventures!

[durendal]

Ouch, four weeks without One Piece. That's gonna be hard to endure. So are we going to some something different after the 4 weeks? Let's certainly hope so.

[*BananaKing]

Well the way I see it, the death of Luffy's brother has called a serious change in his personality much like Robin's situation at Enies Lobby did. His Gear system isn't cutting it anymore, he isn't strong enough to defeat the people that stand in the way of him protecting his friends and family. Remember how powerless Luffy was when Kizaru and Sentamaro nearly destroyed his crew? For the first time in their history Luffy told them to just run away; you know how much it must have hurt luffy to do that? Its not a matter of pride, but a matter of his own weakness. He couldn't protect his friends when they're were facing enemies that were trying to kill them; it must have torn him up something bad.

Luffy knows that he needs to be able to get stronger, his gear system got him through one milestone, now he needs to exceed another. With Rayleigh's help he'll be able to...what I don't like is this 2 year gap in story...a lot of things can happen in two years, and if not done right, this gap will just feel stupid, pointless, and may create a very awkward transition back to main story.