One Piece 1142 Review: Phobia

One Piece, Chapter 1142: The Things I Find Scary

So, conflict! We finally have conflict! A giant snake with a hideously bulbous head attacks the school, and the kids are running around in fear. We get to check in with the teachers who are yelling at each other -- we've seen Ange the librarian in previous chapters, but this is the first time we get to see the mathematics teacher Breid and the principal Kiba. Kiba has giant walrus tusks, and my assumption is that he's either eaten the walrus devil fruit or he's half-Mink. 

Kiba turns out to be a badass and we learn later that he's an ex-Giant-Pirates crew member, charging in with a giant hammer and bashing the snake in the head before he gets to swallow one of the students. I really like that Kiba's hammer is a carpenter's hammer instead of a war-hammer, since it's got those claws to pull out nails with... but the hammer claw is also a visual nod to the fact that Kiba is a walrus. Then Saul swoops in to finish off Jormungandr by jumping down from a tree branch, Haki-ing up his fist, and unleashing an attack called "Final Exorcism". As usual in One Piece, the attack is a pun, and this time it's a pun on 'final exam'. I like this -- Saul is established to be an ex-Vice-Captain, and while Vice Captains hasn't really had the best showcase in recent chapters, it's cool to show off that Saul can do more than just read books and laugh. 

Robin and Chopper pop up from Saul's beard, and Chopper goes straight to trying to deal with the highly wounded Mr. Wolf, the P.E. teacher who was mauled by the giant snake. Wolf asks Saul to help look for the other children, because there's a group of them that just walked off, as if hypnotized. While this is going on, a very notable, if short, scene is of a small giant child asking Robin if she is friends with Luffy... and then backing away with a deadpan smile on his face. It seems like Luffy's little interaction with Colon and his more violent methods of 'play time' has traumatized the kids a bit!

Saul and company see the kids sleepwalking away on the beach, a sight that reminds me of the tale of the Pied Piper of Hamelin. We get to see them being directed by a big cartoon arrow, which means that Gunko is most certainly involved in this particular sequence. And the kids that were just rescued are also starting to pass out one by one... just as giant, shadowy monsters explode from the jungle. Monsters that are giant to the already-large giants, which means they're truly titanic in size. 

We cut back briefly to see the Realm of the Dead, where Loki threatens the others around him to unleash his last shackle. He bashes the side of the World Tree with his hammer Ragnir, which summons a bolt of lightning from the high heavens that sets the tree on fire. Yep, last week's declaration that fire and lightning are the two weaknesses of the World Tree is quite true! Loki does seem to be doing the card-carrying villain thing, and while I am starting to be invested in this mystery of where on the morality axis Loki ends up being at. 

We cut back again to the Walrus school, where the librarian Ange tells the other teachers of how she recognizes the giant monsters... and turns out that in her class, she was talking to the kids and asking them what their greatest fears are. And the monsters are representations of their greatest fears! Monsters like Jormungandr, Nidhogg and Fenrir, even facsimiles of Loki and Nika, are drawn and doodled by the kids. And since it is the God's Knights' powers that are affecting the kids' sleep-walking, it is also somewhat obvious that the giant monsters are also created by their powers. 

Two interesting things are mentioned in this discussion. The first being that Sun God Nika is listed among the things that these kids fear, albeit in the context that Nika is going to destroy the world. Combined with the kid that is afraid of Luffy, I do find it a neat tie-in to the themes of Luffy's reputation among the giants. And in a much lighter tone, one of the kids list 'my mom' as the things he fears the most. 

And as we get a badass double-page spread of the giant demonic monsters marching towards Elbaf, we get to see these monsters. Giant beasts, evil gods, ghosts, skeletons, dragons... the kid's mom on the far left of the art... and a cute big bear with a helmet. Aw! 

We close the chapter with a check-in with the God's Knights. Killingham dozes off as he mumbles about having 'done it', which confirms that it's his power that's causing all the kids to fall asleep and the monsters to rise up. Summers laughs and asks Gunko what her greatest fear is. Gunko's answer? "Nika". Very interesting answer!

So yeah, whether it's on the giant rampaging monsters front or in the Loki front, we're getting a lot of action! I like this. It's a fun chapter, and while the giant monster stuff is fun, I am looking the most forward to the Loki stuff. 

Random Notes:

• Oni Inari Shrine Child Yamato Cover Story: Yamato swoops in to bash Who's Who with one shot of Raimei Hakkei. As everyone expected. Oh, Who's Who has Yasuie's sword! I did not notice that in the previous chapters. 
• Quick Norse mythology primer for all the names! Jormungandr is a gigantic serpent, second of Loki's monstrous children, that is large enough to wrap itself around the world. Fenrir is a giant wolf, and the third of Loki's mysterious children, and a powerful beast savage enough to fight the gods. Nidhogg is a dragon that gnaws on the roots of the World Tree Yggdrasil. Draugr are undead revenants.
• Aegir, the giant child about to be eaten by Jormungandr, is named after the Nordic god (or personification) of the sea. 
• The giant horn that they use to warn people is clearly based on the Gjallarhorn from Nordic myths, the horn that the watchman of the gods Heimdall would blow to herald the start of Ragnarok. 
• Did Kiba retire from piracy because he ate a devil fruit? That's assuming he actually did eat a devil fruit. 
• If Killingham's powers specifically don't draw from their greatest fear and is more along the lines of 'what did you think of last' or whatever, it is mighty convenient that Ange did a class all about fear a couple of hours before. 
  
• To my knowledge, Kirins don't actually have dream or hypnosis or fear related powers. 
• Shamrock is absent in the group shots of the God's Knights, so has he actually gone off back to Marie Geoise off-screen?
• I love that Summers is just making use of the chair he transported to lounge like a villain and do a mwahahaha pose.