One Piece, Chapter 1023: Two Peas in a Pod
I wasn't going to do this review this early, but screw it. I'm awake, and there's a lot to talk about in this chapter, so...
Anyway, last chapter ended with Zoro and Sanji performing a combination attack to blow King and Queen back. We get a brief scene of Kawamatsu and Hyogoro dealing with some random goons who try to interfere in the battle, but they also note that no one from their side is allowed to interfere with the duel either because of Rule of Epic Fictional Combat they would get in the way. I actually, legitimately forgot Kawamatsu exists, and don't even remember if I know that he's in this hall specifically...
Marco, meanwhile, gets yet another information dump about King's race (who we later learn are called Lunarians). But, interestingly, he flashes back to a conversation he had with Whitebeard about how "God's Land" was above the Red Line. Now the obvious thought was, of course, that the Lunarians simply lived on top of the Red Line, just like how Marie-Geoise was located on top of the giant continent. But, on the other hand... the name 'Lunarian' implies some sort of connection to the moon. And King has wings, which already caused a lot of speculation with the Skypiean races... so perhaps the Lunarians are literally above the Red Line? And by "above", I mean that they come from the Moon? Because that super-old, super-weird Enel cover story establishes that the moon is close enough that some particularly strong balloons can take you there, and that there was an abandoned ruin which indicated that Skypieans, Birkans and Shandians all arrived from the Moon. What if there's a fourth race, or a progenitor race? Especially since Marco's response in the flashback involves him seemingly dismissing Whitebeard's claim that someone lived there? Interesting.
Anyway, Marco's daydreams are interrupted by Izo literally dragging him out of the line of fire, because he's so distracted. I guess Marco really is just out of the fight for now, although he's asking a lot of cryptic questions to Izo, asking if he believes in god. I'm really thinking that Marco will be one of the big information exposition guys at some point in this arc, and I'm all for it.
A good chunk of the chapter is just showing Zoro and Sanji clashing against King and Queen, but there's a lot of shit tucked into this fight. Sanji pointedly mentions that he's "feeling kind of weird", specifically noting that it's after the second time he uses his Raid Suit. While Sanji blocks Queen's cyborg ponytail-claw with his Diable Jambe, Queen actually points out that all of Judge's children are enhanced cyborgs, and he quickly notes that Sanji's burning leg is likely a cyborg augmentation. Sanji himself flatly denies it, saying it's his burning spirit and stuff... but this wouldn't be the first time a member of the Straw Hats denying that he has a specific power only to be revealed that he has it around a couple dozen chapters later.
It's honestly quite interesting, because I could see it going either way. We have seen people like Luffy just literally set themselves on fire with no explanation, and Sanji's pre-timeskip usages of Diable Jambe does utilize obvious friction. But then why bring it up if it's not going to be followed up upon? And Sanji did mention something about the Raid Suits. I've never been one for 'power-ups' or whatever, but with Nami, Chopper, Robin and especially Zoro steadily showing that they have a bunch of new tricks in this arc, I'm very happy that they managed to work in a believable one for Sanji beyond just the Raid Suit.
King, despite having a sword, actually fights dirty! His sword has little grooves that trap Zoro's two katana and drag them out of his grip, before he punches Zoro in the face with some blunt Wolverine knuckle-claws. King is kind of the antithesis of the enemy that Zoro usually fights, mocking the idea that someone would stick to 'traditional forms and techniques' in a real battle. Of course, Zoro just doesn't really give a shit, and gives a typical Zoro badass line.
Kawamatsu and Hyogoro, however, drop another huge lore bomb. It's something that has sort of been indirectly revealed through the SBS, but they point out how Zoro is similar to Shimotsuki Ushimaru, the former Daimyo of Ringo. Which... is honestly something we already guessed, since Zoro comes from the Shimotsuki Village, which has a very distinct traditional-Japan (i.e. Wano) culture. It's easy to piece together even without the SBS confirmation that the Shimotsuki village was founded by refugees from Wano. But what (I think) we don't know is that Shimotsuki Ushimaru is the descendant of the Sword God Ryuma... himself a member of the Shimotsuki clan as well!
Kawamatsu notes that there's some weird fate stuff going here, because Zoro returned Ryuma's bladed Shisui to Wano, and Ryuma was a one-eyed samurai! We get to see Ryuma for the first time in Kawamatsu's flashback -- the only other times we've seen Ryuma is as a zombie, or in the canonically-ambiguous Monsters one-shot where he was much younger. But, yeah, young Shimotsuki Ryuma was definitely dead ringer for Zoro!
Normally this would be enough to be a chapter, but no! We set up even more fights! Jack is fighting against Inuarashi, and we get a bit of a neat recap of their conflict in Zou. Inuarashi does a pretty cool judo throw with Jack's mammoth trunk, tossing him into the same main hall, and gives a pretty badass speech about how things are different from when Oden died... and in the central hall, thanks to Zoro blowing a hole in the roof with Asura, the moon is shining down. So Inuarashi gets to become Sulong again, and he's pretty much convinced that he's going to avenge Zou and beat the shit out of Jack.
...honestly, I believe him. If not Inuarashi, then Inuarashi and Nekomamushi together. But Jack's honestly kind of been losing fight after fight, and had been injured on the rooftop, and it would make the most narrative sense for someone from Zou to defeat him.
Nekomamushi also stalk into the main hall and transforms into his Sulong form, talking about how Pedro's sacrifice indirectly made everything here possible. A lot of people don't really like Perospero because he's a creepy dork, but I honestly do think that while he's probably going to lose in the end, he's also not a pushover? We'll see. We also get two more panels of the Raizou/Fukurokuju fight.
And then we get the final two-page spread... and yes, Momonosuke has been aged up into a full-sized dragon. Basically the splitting image of Kaidou, except lighter-coloured. Or, well, knowing Momonosuke's colour palette in his eel-dragon form, he's all pink, isn't he? It's a very badass panel, and while I would've liked a bit more elaboration as to the specifics and the emotions as to how this is happening, we did get Shinobu crying because the 28-year-old Momonosuke looks just like Oden.
And... while I'm not the biggest fan of the Mono-becomes-a-dragon of the plot, but I'm also excited to see where it's going to go. If nothing else, it gives us a badass-looking dragon! I also wonder if the story is actually going to explore the terrifying ramifications of aging up someone who's mentally like, eight years old or some shit into an adult body. Poor Momonosuke's been through so much, and having rewatched parts of the earlier stages of Wano, there's a severe emphasis on how much he's actually not ready, and how people only see the 'shadow of Oden'. I really do wonder just how the manga will take the Momonosuke character in the future... but right now? Right now it's dragon-vs-dragon battle!
Random Notes:
- The cover page for this chapter is the first part of what I believe to be a four-part mega-picture of all the top finalists for that global One Piece character popularity poll that we had earlier this year. It's not in order, and it's pretty clear that Oda's mapping out this gigantic piece based on what looks good -- you can see Kaidou and Big Mom on the two edges of what would be the final picture, and I assume Shanks and Blackbeard will form the two other ending parts. Many of the Shichibukai (Law, Mihawk, Doflamingo, Moriah and Hancock) are also clustered on the right side of this week's image, too.
- I was mistaken last episode, it is the deus ex Mink serum that healed Zoro back up, at least according to Chopper's single panel in this chapter.
- Okay, Scabbard Roll Call? Inuarashi is fighting Jack, Nekomamushi is fighting Perospero, Raizou is fighting Fukurokuju. Kin'emon, Kiku and Ashura Doji are presumed dead or at least knocked out. Kawamatsu is fighting randoms with Hyogoro in the central hall. Izo's here too, dragging Marco around. Denjiro is still conspicuously not shown, and I'm going to assume he's going to be the one fighting Orochi, since that's practically the only real major villain left?
- I would like to argue, but honestly, other than Mihawk and zombie Ryuma, practically every other enemy that Zoro has had a long fight against has been against a Devil Fruit user, so it's not like Zoro's fights with any of his opponents is truly fair, I feel...
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