Friday 25 November 2016

One Piece 847 Review: Big Mom Be Crazy

One Piece, Chapter 847: Luffy and Big Mom


It's a bit weird now that on the Wednesday-Thursday schedule I only have two mangas left to review -- One Piece and My Hero Academia. Usually there's a lot more, but with Toriko finally ending, the middle-week manga releases have became a lot less in quantity compared to Sundays. Maybe I'll pick Magi back up. I dunno. Any suggestions for any new mangas for me to review?

Back to One Piece. It's a very... eventful chapter, despite not much actually happening. If that makes sense.

We get a brief check-in with Chopper and Carrot. Brulee is a weird psychotic witch, so she ties Carrot up and is about to cook her in a soup, while having Heavy Point Chopper chained up and ready to be given to Big Mom's exotic animals collection -- which has been mentioned before but I didn't think it would be... well, what we will see later on. Chopper notes to himself that Brulee has no idea of Chopper's ability to transform to his normal, small form to get free of the chains and later turn back into Monster Form... but that's all we get to see of this particular bit.

In the same vein, we also see at the end of the chapter a couple of brief panels of Pedro attacking Big Mom's forces guarding the poneglyph, and Brook getting his cane-sword ready to unleash the powers of a live concert. Anything where Brook gets to do something is definitely a plus -- Brook's just been so underused.

But the focus on this chapter is honestly Big Mom. After several chapters of building her up to be quasi-sympathetic, just with different values and priorities, we return to a far more disturbing take on her character. We get confirmation of Mont D'or's powers and that it traps things in book, keeping them alive indefinitely, but fully conscious, as part of Big Mom's animal collection... which is a very morbid thing. We get a brief shot of a Manticore (which we saw in Impel Down), a unicorn, a panda (not Pandaman) and a 'Donkobito', as well as a couple of callbacks to previous arcs like a centaur from Punk Hazard and the longleg/longarm tribes. Big Mom is showing off this collection to the Germa 66 royal family, and Judge asks Big Mom something: Tottland is so full of diversity -- which Big Mom is super proud of -- but why are there no giants?

And Big Mom goes from her jovial self into a brief panel of pure, unadultered anger, before brushing it off as Judge just having missed some. It's interesting, because Judge notes that Big Mom seems to be just an oversized human. So is Big Mom jealous of the giants? Or is she descended from them or something? I dunno. Big Mom bids them goodbye because she has to see to some other important stuff, but she tells one of her aides to stop swooning over Germa 66 because 'fiction isn't always real'.

Yeah, the Germa 66 is like a comic book or something in-universe, right?

Meanwhile, the army of superpowered Big Mom children have captured Luffy and Nami in a cell in a book, and we get a brief shot of Perospero, the first son of Big Mom. Big Mom shows up not exactly face-to-face, but rather face-to-dendenmushi. Big Mom mocks Luffy for a bit, who's all like "I WILL BEAT YOUR FACE UP!" and shows absolutely no fear against Big Mom whatsoever. Big Mom does the speech about how Luffy is just a grain in the desert of the New World, while Luffy is just adamant that he will get Sanji back god damn it. Big Mom rattles off a list of Luffy's crimes before noting that she's willing to let it all slide because she got the magical box from Fishman Island. Which is a natural treasure, containing the fishmen steroids, but we all know there's a bomb in there.

Luffy then straight-up picks a fight with Big Mom again, and then Lola is brought up. And apparently Big Mom hates Lola! And Lola was supposed to be married off to some super-awesome man (who? One of the marines? The Gorosei?) that would've made Big Mom pirate king since she would have enough power to crush Kaidou, Shanks and Whitebeard, but Lola reneging on the deal (and then proceeding to propose to every other man she meets) causes Big Mom to lose everything. Luffy notes how Big Mom is blaming her daughter for her own mistakes, and seems to strike a nerve. That's all we've got, though.

So yeah, overall, a very fun chapter. If nothing else, the shouting match between Luffy and Big Mom is absolutely fun. Sorry not very analytical this review is. Very sleepy

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