One Piece 1102-1103 Review: Bonney's Pain

One Piece, Chapter 1102-1103: Kuma's Life; I'm So Sorry, Daddy

I wasn't able to review either of these chapters in a timely manner, but there's the typical new year break for One Piece anyway, so... eh? I will very quickly breeze through chapter 1102, "Kuma's Life", mostly because... it's very emotional, but it's ultimately a long, recap montage. We get to see bits of Bonney's career as she makes a name for 'the pirate that beats up the elderly and children', and Kuma's been both avoiding Bonney for her sake.

There was a lot of discussion as to why Kuma doesn't just grab Bonney and go on the run together, but I guess it's to stop the World Government from coming down on Bonney hard with all the power of Buster Calls at their disposal, as opposed to what actually happened -- Akainu even apologizing to Bonney after arresting her. 

And I'm not going to go through every part of 1102 because we've got another chapter to go through, but it's cool to see scenes like Luffy getting a bounty for defeating Arlong, or the slow transformation of Kuma into Pacifista PX-0, and even a recreation of the 'Nothing Happened' moment, where nothing happened. Again, we get to see Kuma's thought process through everything in Thriller Bark and Sabaody, his two major appearances, and it's pretty nice! Again, it's a bit arguable whether all of the places that Kuma sends people to actually works for a training arc -- particularly Brook's -- but eh. 

Also really love Jinbe's confused reaction to Arlong being beaten up by some brat, and Ace being super-duper proud of Luffy. That's glorious. Another great moment is the acknowledgement of Bonney putting a piece of jewelry under her right eye... and the acknowledgement of Bonney's very questionable lipsticking, since it's what a little girl and a bunch of older men think lipstick should be applied. 

And right before Kuma starts popping Straw Hats, of course, we've got a nice little addition of the giant figure of Kuma sneaking around the restaurant where one of the Ten Supernovas, Jewelry Bonney, is eating and gorging herself, and Kuma just peeks from the window and wishes her well. We also get to see Kuma's train of thought as he witnesses the auction house incident, with him pointing out the significance of them doing all of this to rescue a Fishman... something that Kuma, from a persecuted race himself, would especially understand. 

1102 ends with Vegapunk arguing with Saturn on the phone, yelling and basically trying to negotiate ways to get the World Government to stop putting nonsense to fuck Kuma's life up even more. From how it's implied, Kuma's implanted with a self-destruct bomb. Vegapunk also mentions a 'dual personality' switch, but that gets immediately vetoed by Saturn. We also learn the previously somewhat-questionable detail that Saturn actually is a scientist himself, he's just too lazy to do his own legwork. 

And then we get Kuma as he sits in front of like, this MRI machine. This is right between Sabaody and Marineford, where we can presume that Sabaody was the last time that Kuma has any kind of free will whereas during Marineford he is completely soulless, shocking Ivankov and the others. We get some discussion, and Kuma noting that he believes in the 'Nika' that is Monkey D. Luffy. And... we get some great and heartbreaking panels of Vegapunk's face as he breaks down crying with his tongue lolling out as he essentially pulls the switch that fucking kills Bartholomew Kuma. 

And we get this absolutely glorious page just showing Kuma running in four different parts of his life. As a slave, as a rebel priest, as a Revolutionary, as a Warlord of the Sea... while the faces of people from his life like Ginny, Bonney, Vegapunk, Dragon, his parents all show up around him. 

And it really is just such a powerful scene. I was going to skip talking about 1102 in general, but this was the page that made me... really want to acknowledge just how powerful this scene is. Kuma's last words are even something along the lines of "man, I was kind of a nuisance in the end" when Vegapunk is just fucking crying and telling Kuma some great words of affirmation, where his death is the real nuisance to all the people who loved and cared for Kuma. 

And as in the past, PX-0, the being that has been Bartholomew Kuma, activates with glowing robotic soulless eyes, we cut to just slightly in the past, in the middle of the Egghead arc, when Jewelry Bonney has just finished witnessing all of these flashbacks and is now bawling her eyes out, as Kuma's last words -- "tell Bonney happy tenth birthday" plays in the background. 

Holy fuck, Kuma. 

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And 1103 starts off where the Bonney-crying scene leaves off. This whole sequence happens earlier in the Egghead arc, basically right before the 'missing time' as everyone's figuring out the York traitor stuff. We get a very powerful scene of Bonney reverting to her true, 12-year-old age, and hugging uncle Vegapunk and the two of them reconciling. Vegapunk gives Bonney a tenth-year-old birthday gift from Kuma, which is... a sapphire necklace that seems rather obvious as some kind of plot device down the line. 

And we cut to the present day. Finally. After several months. Jaygarcia Saturn, Godhead of Science, Gorosei and Celestial Dragon, and giant spider-centaur-demon of doom, is holding a crying, struggling Bonney in his grasp. Rather interestingly, Saturn's weird ability to freeze characters like Sanji, Franky, Vegapunk and Atlas is still active, and I really wonder what that is. Just some kind of weird Haki? Rather interestingly, we get several shots of Kizaru thinking about his younger friends in this episode, and I do think it'll lead to a little figurative middle finger from him later on. 

Interestingly, we get to see a brief shot of people reacting to the news that Egghead Island is under siege by a Yonko fleet, including Dragon and Ivankov, who are just discussing things in Kamabakka. I'm not sure if he's going to make a move, but if Dragon's ever going to be relevant, I really do hope he does something in this arc. 

Bonney tries to attack with a "Nika-ish Future", but her arm just bounces off of Saturn. She ends up feeling weak, and Saturn begins a bit of a villain monologue. This is rather bizarrely intercut with a scene of Luffy stuffing his fat ass up with a bunch of food that seems to have come out of nowhere. Saturn yells at his minions to slap seastone cuffs on Luffy, and while we don't see the Marines succeeding in doing so, the panel right after that is Kizaru, in a slightly different pose from before going "...", implying that he might've had a hand in helping out? It doesn't gel perfectly well because Kizaru's lightspeed is usually extremely flashy, but I wouldn't mind it at all if this is the moment that Kizaru finally makes a decision. 

Saturn then explains a lot of things about Bonney, and confirms something that was implied by the flashback but was something I missed entirely -- Jewelry Bonney was never shown to eat a Devil Fruit, and the Sorbet Kingdom people were even confused when she manifested those powers. Bonney does have the power of the Toshi Toshi no Mi, it's just that Saturn was experimenting on extracting and infusing the power of that fruit into a baby without having them eat the fruit. Bonney did eventually inherit the ability, but it seems that the ability has left the original fruit when Bonney manifested the ability... which I guess means that the 'only one person can have this fruit' rule still holds strong, with, of course, the exception being Vegapunk's creations. 

Saturn also explains a major drawback of the Toshi Toshi no Mi. The ability has the insane power to transform into any state that matches "futures perceived to be possible", but as someone ages and grows, and their futures become more certain, possibilities become naturally limited. It's a neat way to basically create a power that's only really effective for a kid. I guess it's like how when you were young you'll look at Superman or Batman or Spider-Man and go "wow gee, I'd sure like to grow up to be like that!" but when you grow up the logistics of physics and, in Batman's case, practical money, starts to bog you down?

And in Bonney's case, she's starting to doubt Nika as anything beyond an 'impossible myth' -- something that from Saturn's dialogue is a fact that he needs to hammer home to Bonney, lest she actually realize that Nika is a couple feet away. Just to rub the salt in even further, Saturn confirms that he is the Celestial Dragon that tormented Ginny, calling her a 'failure' and 'Wife Number Eight', and talking about how the Sapphire-Scale passed on to Bonney as well. 

And as Bonney is crying, Kuma lands like a goddamn superhero in the distance. 

Vegapunk yells at Saturn in rage, a very stark contrast to how he's bargaining and trying to explain and negotiate and treat Saturn as an equal even in a chapter as recent as 1102. But Saturn's reply? "Do you comprehend the feelings of the insects you step on? Of course not." Yeah, Vegapunk, rather pointless to negotiate with psychopaths when they are unwilling to even entertain the notion of compromise. 

And Bartholomew Kuma has arrived, terrifying the Marines as they realize that this is the real Kuma.

The Marines report this to Saturn, and they are bamboozled that the authority chips are not working. Bonney's mind has snapped, and she's just thinking to herself a thought that poor Nami and Robin and Momo and Ace have all thought of before. "At this point, I think I'd be better off dead."

And it's a couple of short panels before the end, but all shots of Kuma's face has him with blank eyes... but gritted teeth. 

A very, very sharp contrast to the soulless expression that the robotic Kuma has in Marineford, or in Sabaody, or in Marie Geoise.

The Marines fire at Kuma. Cannons fire. Explosions fire. Kuma runs, because that's what Bartholomew Kuma does. But he's not running away for once. He's running towards his daughter, who's crying, whose heart is breaking. 

And Kuma's expression is angry as hell. 

This is a man out for blood. 

The Marines take aim at the head of the 12-year-old Bonney. Kuma's eyes glow, and by my count at least five Rear-Admiral-or-higher child-shooting Marines get blown the fuck off by two Ursus Shocks in a very cinematic shot. 

Saturn chucks Bonney to the ground, and is about to impale her with his big-ass spider claw. 

And Kuma is here. 

Holy shit what a badass panel. What a great payoff to all the buildup of Kuma as someone who's beaten down by life, who's hurt and tormented and forced to see everything good in his life fucked up by this Gorosei jackass. And he just zips in, smoke wafting off his body, as he cradles Bonney and takes Saturn's claw to the back. 

And with the most glorious angry expression on a robotic face that you've ever seen, Kuma grapples Saturn's claw, and prepares to punch the shit out of Saturn. That's one of the best panels I've seen in One Piece. Keep in mind that Kuma's supposed to be soulless for two years now. He's angry. He's probably going to die at the end of this fight. But those eyes. That gritted teeth. And I just realized as I type out this paragraph that his fist is glowing with Haki. With ambition, with willpower. This is a man that's been fucked up beyond repair by Saturn, and... and I honestly don't even care for Luffy or whoever to beat up Saturn. Luffy can become Nika and inspire Kuma, sure. But it has to be Bonney or Kuma that lays the smackdown on Saturn, and even if Kuma dies next chapter, I really, really felt like this is such a badass moment that it has to amount to at least something. 

Anyway, what a chapter to end/start off the year. 

Random Notes:

• In a glorious little attention to detail, the two restaurant guests that get terrified of Kuma's giant face in the window can actually also be seen in the original chapter that Bonney appeared eating a pizza in. 
• Also a nice attention to detail is that Usopp and the obscured-by-speech-bubbles Nami and Sanji are actually in the correct poses that theyw ere at when Luffy reacted to his Arlong Park bounty. 
• Smoker's random cameo in 1102 is so random and has so little to do with any of the major characters in that story that I wonder if Oda's just really excited about that Netflix final episode post-credits scene. 
• Apparently Luffy punching a Tenryubito and Usopp falling on another is an "act of high treason that has never been accomplished in centuries". 
• If Hunter x Hunter has taught us anything, random super-nuclear bombs implanted within badasses are at the height of power-scaling ladders.
• Seemingly to quash all the 'Kuma will return with the memory bubble' theories, 1102 establishes that Kuma's memory bubble literally is just a one-time use thing, vanishing after being touched without equipment. And Bonney basically has just 'consumed' all of it.
• I was wondering why Kizaru was so willing to laser-beam Sentomaru or lob Bonney into the laser grid earlier... but I guess that was before he saw his boss transform into a giant spider demon and rant all this nonsense about how he views all humans as ants. It's just my guess, but I think Kizaru's okay in killing his friends if it's really for justice and a good cause. But tormenting them because Saturn feels insulted by them is one step too far for him. 
• Another theory as to who gave Luffy the food is Caribou, which... fair enough. I guess if Saturn's powers require him to focus on whoever he is 'locking' down, he would've missed an icky swamp man gooping around in the background. 
• At the time of writing the review, all the reviews are ambiguous on whose 'Wife Number Eight' Ginny is. I think the implication is either Saturn or Imu, otherwise I don't think Saturn would care or keep track of, oh, St. Charloss's sex slaves or whatnot. 
• It adds an extra layer of nastiness when you realize that as Saturn yaks on about humans being insects, he's potentially including his own bio-child in that assessment. 
• Kuma is notably missing all the damage that he had from his fight with Akainu. His face isn't half-melted, and he's got both feet. But we'll chalk that up to his determination as a dad.