One Piece 972-973 Review: Born to Boil

One Piece, Chapter 972-978 Review:

Another huge One Piece catch-up thing for me. At some point I may or may not do one for My Hero Academia, but after the whole Villain Alliance arc, things have been... I don't want to say uninteresting, but the chapters just felt like they were sort of there, y'know? The Endeavour mini-arc is nice to see Endeavour slowly working his way towards some measure of redemption with his family, and there were a lot of great moments with Hawks and the whole double-agent thing, and the last chapter I read was the start of this huge war between the good guys and the bad guys. But ultimately I just don't really feel like reviewing or really talking about it? Oh well. When I jump back to Academia, I feel like I'm just going to be talking about whatever chapter is newest. 

This is going to be a bit of a faster-paced one, I feel. This one originally went all the way to chapter 978, but it's way more appropriate to split it up into one with the flashback chapters and one with the Onigashima present-day chapters. 

Chapter 672: I am Oden, and I was Born To Boil

These chapters are pretty interesting to read. As someone who literally didn't give a shit about the myth of Kozuki Oden prior to the start of this flashback, it's pretty great that the flashback really ended up endearing Oden to basically the entire One Piece fanbase. I'm always someone who doesn't really like the Shonen Manga trope of hyping up someone and really never showing us what they did, but the flashback really ends up making Oden feel like a character I really do want to root for. It's also interesting how the flashback is handled -- it could've been so easily just this huge information dump that doesn't have anything to do with the present day story (or, like the Dresrossa flashbacks, being too entrenched in the present-day story), but it manages to tell so much about Oden and the history of the One Piece world before tying back to the Wano stuff. 

Basically, after Shinobu tells the populace about the deeds of Oden and how he's been humiliating himself for the sake of the people for years, they start to cheer and beg for Orochi to release Oden, but, of course, Orochi is a tyrant that just ends up murdering random people with arrows. I really do like the fact that the writer actually sort of gave us a bit of a cop-out about the 'Hour of Legends' and delivering a not-too-spectacular battle between Oden and Kaidou... and then actually delivering the real Hour of Legends as this inspirational hour where Oden manages to old up the rest of his samurai on a board while boiling. 

And it's pretty dang badass, with Oden giving a speech about his ultimate dream to open Wano's borders and all, that he's waiting for someone that will come in the future. This is a pretty great sequence, too, as Oden manages to survive the entire period of being boiled... only for Orochi to change the sentence to death by shooting at literally the last minute, because Orochi's a cunt. Oden, of course, is already prepared for this and just yeets his scabbards into the air, allowing them to run away free and go off to complete Oden's dream of opening Wano. 

We get a pretty cool sequence of the Scabbards running away while each of them having flashbacks to the first time they met Oden. It's pretty touching as the Scabbards and Shinobu do a panicked escape, leaving their dying lord behind in tears. Kaidou and Oden have a face-off, and I do like that Kaidou actually comments how people are going to talk about Oden's death for a long, long time. And as someone who we know is obsessed about how he's going to die, is this the reason why Kaidou wants to die in such an epic way? We also get the brief revelation that Kaidou has killed off the Kurozumi hag that used the Mane Mane fruit to allow Kaidou the jump to take out Oden, so the dude has some honour and decency, I suppose. Not enough to stop him from executing Oden via gunshot to the head, though. 

It's an amazing end to Oden, and one that was done amazingly well. I didn't quite like the 'oden was born to boil' pun, but I do like Oden's final moments and that one panel that showed that he died with a smile. This chapter ends in an interesting way, with Toki reading and ripping up a letter Oden wrote to her about a war that is to come in 20 years, and it's just Toki's determination to do the huge time-jump thing. I'm also not sure how to really read this scene. Did Toki not know about Oden's determination to die that day and brushed it off since it's different from her time-vision? Is ripping up the letter her way of showing resolve, or is she doing something different from what Oden tells her to do? Toki is such an enigma, and while I feel like the scene probably should just be read as-is, it's interesting that it could so easily be interpreted in a different way. 

Since I'm only doing two chapters this time around, I do want to take stock of Oden's story. For someone who really wants to open up Wano to other countries and embrace the idea of multiple people working together, I feel like one of the critiques we could make towards Kozuki Oden as a character is that instead of opening up to his comrades, he ended up taking up all the burdens of Wano on his own back (at least during the period that he was dancing) on his own, unknowingly ending up being an isolationist with his methods. One could argue that as well-intentioned as he was, by the time he realized he was mistaken and did the assault on Kaidou and Orochi, that isolationist attitude might actually his own downfall? Maybe? There's something quasi-poetic in that, I think, without making Oden look like an idiot. And, of course, by the end of his life Oden's still basically carrying people on his back, trusting his retainers and his children to carry his dream into the future. 

Chapter 673: The Kozuki Clan

This chapter sort of starts off with an interesting flashback to Oden's time as a pirate with Gold Roger's crew, showing off the world to a very happy young Momonosuke and talking about Zou to his retainers. And then we cut back to Orochi's armies chasing down the Scabbards and retainers and I feel like this is basically telling us the events of what we knew actually happened via flashbacks and exposition in previous chapters, why some people managed to time-jump and some people didn't. We get to see Inuarashi and Nekomamushi get left behind to fight one of the giant silhouetted giant-oni-esque creatures, as well as Ashura Doji and Denjiro staying behind to hold off the enemies. 

Kaidou, though, zips all the way to Kuri and is on the verge of burning the castle down, and there's this actually very scary scene where Kaidou's choking Momonosuke on the edge of a roof, talking shit about Oden, while Momonosuke just keeps talking about how his father was a great man and how one day he'll carry his will and stuff. And then Kaidou just... disgustedly tosses Momonosuke aside, saying that he's a moron for being a young kid who doesn't even have his own dreams and just parrots what he hears from people. 

And while this does inadvertently save Momonosuke's life, this is pre-character-development Momonosuke, pre-Punk-Hazard Momonosuke, and what Kaidou said is basically echoed by Luffy. Luffy doesn't give a shit about Momonosuke's status as a prince and a future shogun, he gives Momonosuke shit for basically not standing up and 'be your own man' and stuff like that. And I do like that as admirable that a little kid like Momonosuke can be defiant against the strongest man in the world, the prose makes it clear how shit-scared Momonosuke is and how he's just thinking about how he's going to die. 

And... and I'm not sure what happens next. Kaidou leaves, and we see Kin'emon's group arrive and Toki talks about sending people to the future, but I'm not sure why Hiyori ends up going from being in Toki's lap to being brought by Kawamatsu as he jumps into the moat around the castle. I feel like there might be something more to Toki's machinations? We sort of see Toki galloping on a horse out of the burning castle of Kuri, and Toki has a brief flashback to one of her conversations with Oden... before talking to the entire people of Kuri about the moon and the dawn and getting seemingly gunned down to death by Kaidou's goons. She's an enigma, that Toki. 

And then what continues on is basically an epilogue. Oden and Toki are dead, Momonosuke's group has time-traveled, and we get a couple of interesting scenes. Orochi being in a bath and being shivering because he's cold and scared of the vengeance of Oden's samurai is a pretty great scene, we get to see the Kawamatsu/Hiyori scenes play out, and we get the big revelation that Denjiro rampaged in a hut in anger and somehow this ended up with his hair being bleached. That's... that's honestly kind of the most boring way to do this, but truth be told I've never been super-invested in the "where is Denjiro???" question, and Denjiro being Kyoshiro is sort of the more obvious route, particularly thanks to some questionable decisions in anime openings. We get to see Kyoshiro/Denjiro adopting Hiyori, revealing his identity, and making up the whole Komurasaki identity as they play the long game while they wait for the final day of Wano's liberation.

And... and that's the end of the flashback. 971 and 972 are easily the highlights of Oden's story and, as Kaidou himself has mentioned in-universe, it sure is a pretty damn awesome way for Oden to go out. I'm still not particularly sure what I feel about Toki as a character, though, but this flashback arc as a whole has been really, really great, really making me care about Oden, really filling in the blanks about the backstory of Wano, and tying into the greater One Piece world with the Poneglyphs, Roger, Whitebeard, Zou and all that stuff. It could've been very easily just be self-contained to the Wano stuff and it'd feel like a side-story, but overall, it's a very great story. Good stuff. 

Random Notes:

• There were some interesting red herring moments in 672 and 673 for Inuarashi, Nekomamushi and Raizou being traitors, but back when I was reading the flashback chapters I was definitely super-convinced that none of the Scabbards are actually traitors because they went in to boil with Oden, man. 
• It's a small moment in 673, but I do like Shinobu's way of being basically counted among Lord Oden's vassals.
• It's interesting that Kaidou completely ignores Toki and Hiyori during the assault on the Kuri castle. The gender discrimination in Wano has been sort of an on-and-off theme that has been brought up every now and then but never really explored in depth, but I feel like the constant underestimation of women by traditional Wano values is going to play a role in Hiyori's eventual role in the future of the series.
• I have seen a lot of people speculating that Momonosuke, despite what he claims, just isn't fit to be a leader and seems to be happier being an explorer and pirate or whatever, so maybe at the end of Wano, Hiyori is going to be a lady shogun or whatever? That's actually awesome. 
• The cover story basically Gotti going off to save Chiffon but accidentally saving Lola instead. It's kind of there. 
• Orochi has the most goofy-looking Burger King paper crown on his head when he's taking a bath.
• Also, Denjiro/Kyoshiro is the Witching Hour Boy, a revelation that doesn't really mean much. It's nice that the question is answered, but unlike "where is Denjiro" and "what is Kyoshiro's allegiance", it's something that really doesn't have much bearing to the plot. 
• At some point when he embraced his Kyoshiro identity, Denjiro ends up getting a big-ass blue pompadour to go with it. 
• There's a reason to it, but it sure is a dick move for Denjiro and Hiyori to not tell Kawamatsu anything, huh?