One Piece 1079 Review: One Shot

One Piece, Chapter 1079: The Red Haired Pirates: An Emperor's Crew

...yeah, we get a bit of an explanation to the York stuff at the beginning of this chapter. It's... really not anything we couldn't have guessed before. There's a bit of a show of people running around, and a brief shot of a ship coming towards Egghead. Is it the Marines? No, it's a Blackbeard Pirates ship. That would be enough of a cliffhanger, that the Blackbeard Crew members are here to zehahaha their way through the conflict as a wild-card. 

But no. That, somehow, Blackbeard's potential arrival isn't the biggest cliffhanger in this chapter is a feat in and of itself. 

We cut away -- and stay -- with Kid facing off against the Red-Haired Pirate fleet, and we get to see the wacky losers in Shanks' crew .We've got such awe-inspiring names like the Puddle Pirates, the Social Club Pirates and the Bourgeoise Pirates, led by old men and children. Even Killer had to assure Kid that, yeah, despite their underwhelming appearance, these are New World Pirates under Shanks. And that's the big thing about Shanks, apparently... his 'grand fleet' is nowhere as impressive as Kaido, Big Mom, Whitebeard or even Luffy. No, it's just that as we see Shanks walking up his own ship, the other allied crews note that Shanks' fleet is just a bunch of weaklings that are Shanks fanboys, basically, gathering under his flag and being his buddies. 

Shanks is completely calm, too, even confirming with Yasopp that, yes, Kid is lively enough and isn't injured. Interestingly, Shanks even has time to go through a pile of intelligence papers gathered by Hongo, which I think is going to immediately mark mr. "burn and pillage" Kid as a person that Shanks doesn't like. 

Kid summons a rather impressive two-page spread giant cannon. His Damned Punk, the strongest weapon we know Kid to make, and Shanks... gets to see the future, seeing all of his weakling ship buddies getting rapid-fired to oblivion. So Shanks just... jumps all the way over the entire fleet, mutters to himself about how it's "just as expected"...

And before Kid gets the chance to fire off a single Damned Punk, Shanks slashes with "Divine Departure", the same technique Gol D. Roger used to knock Oden through a bunch of trees. Only Shanks just... Conqueror's Haki that shit so hard that Kid's crew gets knocked off, one-shots Kid, slices through his cannon, and as the later panels show, takes out Killer in the wake, too. 

It isn't even 'launch a bunch of attacks that our heroes struggle to take' like Kaido and Big Mom did. 

It isn't even 'unleash a badass esoteric power you can't defend from' like Crocodile or Enel did in their respective arcs. 

No, Shanks is just so damned fast that he takes out Eustass "Captain" Kid and "Massacre Soldier" Killer in one shot.

Yes. It's not even 'taking them down to one knee'. No, Killer and Kid are knocked out so badly that they are down. No defiant last look from Kid, no final desperate last attack, no recovery... they're down. This isn't even like Law against Blackbeard, or the Supernovas against Kaido and Big Mom. No. There's just no recourse from this. I mean, we all expected Shanks to beat Kid, there's no question, but... not this badly! This is just a single attack from Shanks! Benn Beckman and Yasopp and Lucky Roo didn't even do anything! The monkey didn't even do anything! The loser allied fleets didn't even have to lift a finger! 

And it's not like Kid is weak. Not at all. No. Shanks is just that powerful.

Heat and Wire tried to immediately surrender, giving up the Lode Poneglyphs... but Shanks just hops off, and we see Dorry and Brogy unleash a Hakoku combined attack, the same thing that they used to slice the giant island goldfish. Only it slices Kid's dinosaur-head-keel ship in half, and sinks it to the depths of the ocean. The narrator even says in no uncertain means that the Kid Pirates are completely and utterly eradicated with a badass shot of Shanks' face as Kid's crew sinks. 

Great line from Brogy and Dorry, too. "If you're going to point a gun at someone's home, be prepared for when they shoot back". Which is a sentiment I absolutely agree with!

But... yeah. Kid is already the least developed (and frankly least impressive) of the trio of Luffy, Law and Kid, but to see him lose and be so utterly defeated without even a fighting chance is just brutal. The fandom is totally abuzz about this chapter and I absolutely agree! It's not like how Luffy is basically dominating Egghead and never remotely feels in danger. It's not like Law, who, while the narrative demands he lose, he at least feels like he's going to make Blackbeard work for his money. Kid's resistance against Shanks just looks like an ant trying to fight a human, and being utterly wiped out in the process. And... yeah, Kid was definitely asking for it, but holy shit, the poor bastard. It is interesting, because I would've thought that Kid has a couple of stories left in him, but it also wouldn't be too terrible of an end if he just got taken out here for shock value. 

Absolutely fun chapter. A lot of great Kid and Shanks faces in this one, and what a great show of both Kamisari and Hakoku. RIP Kid. I don't actually think he's dead, but I wouldn't be surprised if he's just... out of the story at this point. 

Random Notes:

• The Germa/Caesar cover story is over. We get wacky artwork now!
• I brushed off the Blackbeard revelation above, but while I almost think that it's a certainty that it contained the Blackbeard crew members we haven't seen in Amazon Lily and wherever Blackbeard is fighting Law, it could just as well be Blackbeard himself, fresh off beating Law. It would be a much more fan-shaking moment if Blackbeard shows up and shows that he's stolen the Ope Ope no Mi for sure. 
• ...Okay, thinking about it, York realizing that "the World Government wants to eliminate me" when she unleashes the Seraphim is kinda... backwards with her statement in 1078 about how the World Government's going to make her a Celestial Dragon? Does she think the WG has betrayed her or not?
• I guess the World Government might've made the offer to Vegapunk, that's why York wants to be the Vegapunk?
• Hongo was apparently sure that Blackbeard was going to show up in Wano. You and the fandom, guy.