One Piece Anime, Wano Arc: Episodes 1066-1068

Okay, this got super-delayed because I did the Netflix One Piece show, and... and I was honestly a bit One Piece'd out at the point. But hey, I do want to at least finish up the Wano arc of One Piece.

I'm going to be very busy for the first half of this year. I do think a lot of my present projects (Pokemon playthrough, What If S2) will be delayed more or less into a timeline of "if I have the time to play/watch", but I will still do a bunch of these reviews of things I've watched before. 

Episode 1066

• 
  Interestingly, this episode starts off in medias res, with Kid just breathing hard as he slowly creates his Damned Punk railgun in the background, out of context, while Big Mom and Law are fighting in the background. This alone isn't particularly special, but what's special is flashbacks -- done in pretty cool sketch-art format -- of Kid's entire journey. Including certain stuff about his past of conquering the trash islands with Killer, Heat and Wire that is only mentioned by Oda in the SBS segments!
• This includes Kid and Killer watching the Smiley demonstration during the Punk Hazard arc, something I always forget happened. 
  
• The shot of him in front of the crucified enemies is actually really cool. 
• The animation admittedly does feel a bit more high-quality, but we do get more repetitive stuff of Yamato fighting the Kazenbo and Momonosuke pulling the island. I do understand why we are shown these scenes since we see them reacting to the gigantic Law sword that pierces all the way to the depths of the Earth, but having that and a random flashback to the Scabbards? Yeah, it did kind of make me roll my eyes a bit. 
• 
  In a cute little easter egg, Momonosuke briefly has flashbacks of his family playing, but all the poses are done similarly to the eyecatches of the Dragon Ball anime.
• ...the jokes are a bit twofold because Momonosuke is, y'know, a dragon.
• We get a slightly remixed version of the Punk Corna Dio attack, with a couple extra shots of Kid with glowing eyes and a lot more reactions from the surrounding nobodies. 
• And then we get Law being absolutely pissed off at being reduced to Kid's 'opening act'. I do love this bit about Law, which nicely fits into how he was similarly pissed off at Luffy during Roof Piece for seemingly ordering him around. Oh, Law. 
• Law did also tell Kid to try and attack first, though noticeably Kid didn't rise to that taunt. 
• "What comes next after the bull? A hippo? An elephant?" God, the delivery of this line. 
• Just like what the fandom did during this chapter, Law himself gets an extra line going "see, she likes my technique" with the smuggest look on his face because Big Mom actually did identify Law's technique as hurting him. 
• We see the fragments of Big Mom's bones actually come to life and then proceed to stab each other to rejoin. 
• MASER SABER! I do always find it hilarious how proud Kid sounds as he talks about how cutting up his giant metal bull is pointless because it's all just scrap. 
  
• 
  Kid bouncing around, leaping seemingly to clash with Big Mom's Maser Saber, but actually doing Assign on her and a building behind her is pretty smoothly animated! Kid's constructs has always looked cool, but him jumping around like this is an unexpected action scene!
• And, of course, we've got Big Mom spinning around with the whole damn building attached to her back to counteract the Corna Dio. 
• We then get a much-extended sequence as Law flicks a bunch of rocks around Big Mom, and quickly teleports and changes places with these rocks and does a lot of painful-sounding slashes onto Big Mom's head and body. 
• Kid joins in and there's a hilarious bit where his giant metal arm just jackhammers Big Mom's face. In the Iron-Man-in-the-Hulkbuster way, not that other way. 
• And then big Mom just punches the two of them, unleashing a pretty cool shockwave as she knocks the two smaller Supernovas across the room. 
• MISERY!
  
• 
  God, Misery looks so much cooler in the cartoon. they take the advantage that she can writhe around and we get a lot of disturbing-looking shots that look like they come from a horror show. The ultimate look for Misery is still somewhat comical, but it really does give a much bigger impact than 'Big Mom summons a Stand'. 
  
• The shots of ghoulish faces rising up from the ground, and the cutbacks to Big Mom with her eyes whited out while grinning, really does sell this scene and the character as being a literal monster.
• And Misery just swoops in and pounds the shit out of Kid. Punching and punching with lightning bolts flashing everywhere, and we get to see Kid being tossed around like a ragdoll while his colouration gets played around with like an early-season JoJo episode. 
• Misery casually flailing her hands also casually wipes out a bunch of random nobodies, too, which is a nice little addition that sells the sheer destructive capabilities of this ability. 
• This ties into the earlier prologue scene as Misery is about to unleash a finishing blow. And then... surprise falling building, as Law does a 'Tact'.
• And then we get K-Room: Anesthesia as Law stabs Big Mom through the throat, deep through Onigashima, and we get Yamato and Momonosuke reacting to the gigantic glowing blade stabbing through the entire island all the way down to the mainland. 
• Big Mom then proceeds to beat up Law in a pretty brutal manner, and we just keep cutting back to a black-and-white image of law with only the red blood being coloured in. 
• PUNCTURE WILLE!
• 
  Okay, while a lot of the over-the-top Dragon Ball stuff in the Zoro/King fight is mostly anime addition, this is entirely canon. And seeing the blade create such shockwaves that it shatters away the cloud and even the ground...
• Seeing the faraway shots as Momonosuke reacts, or the people in the Flower Capital didn't react, really does sell just how utterly insane Puncture Wille is. 
• And then we get the big finishing shot as Kid arms up Damned Punk, which glows purple as he rises up, bathing Big Mom's fiery hair with a pretty ominous purple shade. 
• We also get a shot of Big Mom talking and telling Kid to bring it on. "I'm Big Mom!" And people pointed out just how well animated Big Mom's speaking in this scene is. 
• There's a shot of the skull (there are a lot of random metal skulls that Kid can just draw on, apparently) glowing with purple energy, the sci-fi anime sound effects happening, and Law and Kid delivering their respective badass boasts about taking down the era that the old Yonko reigned over.
• Damned Punk fires, slamming onto Big Mom as she desperately holds on to not fall into the hole... and as we zoom into Kid's screaming face, we get a 'to be continued' with the purple magnetic lightning flashing across it. 
  
  

Episode 1067

• Not too much to say about this, honestly. The actual shot of Kid and Law unleashing their respective final blows are pretty cool! The second Damned Punk, as well as Law slicing Misery in half lengthways, are very awesome to see. I do like the deliveries of the lines by Law, Kid and Big Mom as well, but... it really did feel like they extended what should be maybe 5 minutes tacked on to the previous episode to a full episode on its own. 
• There's a lot of scenes of random generic pirates screaming as Big Mom draws their souls into her body, which honestly did really run for a bit too long. It is admittedly a cool moment to see Law and Kid not show any fear, though.
• And then we get the sequence of Big Mom falling, taking out the Kazenbo, and then being engulfed in the Silence R-Room. But she actually falls out of Onigashima at around the halfway mark of the episode. 
• And I do appreciate the addition of Big Mom looking at the Flower Capital and thinking of the time she had in Wano. It does give her a little bit more of a characterization before being taken out of the story. 
• We, however, get a flashback of a montage of Big Mom's scenes in Wano. A bit more excusable, but way too long. 
• Unfortunately we also get a full-on flashback to Roger's speech, which we've heard a dozen times before. 
• And then we get a flashback to Kid and Law beating Big Mom earlier this episode.
• Which really leads the effect to ruin any kind of poignancy as Big Mom falls out into the lava pool at the bottom of the hole. It's kind of a shame, because I really do think there's some neat material in Big Mom's speech to Roger ranting about how it was his fault that the new pirate generation is so prevalent everywhere, but the way the episode extends it really does minimize the impact that it should have had. 
• There's also the scene of Fukurokuju finally succumbing to flame, as well as Momonosuke identifying Zunesha as Joy Boy's companion, which at least does add a fair bit more meat to this episode. 
• Nice touch that Fukurokuju's ninja symbol was the last thing to burn as his convictions faltered.

Episode 1068

• We do get an interesting sequence with Momonosuke's conversation with Yamato. It's oblique about what's contained inside Oden's journal, as usual, but I do really wished that some of this internal turmoil was shown to us during the many, many scenes of Momonosuke pulling the island. We still don't quite get an answer as to what opening the borders of Wano entails, even now, though. 
  
• Franky grabs on to Zoro! There was a shot of the reaper slamming his scythe on the ground when Zoro falls off Onigashima, but that's about it for the enigmatic appearance of the reaper for now. 
• The main focus of this episode's first half, however, is Izo vs. CP-0. It's not extended to a full episode, and a good chunk of it has Izo flashbacking all over his scenes as he joins Kin'emon and the others in the fight, but it sure as hell is a much better showing than what he got in the manga. 
• There's nothing exactly new that we see, but we do see Guernica and Maha both using Soru and Shigan a lot while they attack Izo.
• It really doesn't do much to dispel that these CP-0 guys are supposedly much stronger than pre-timeskip CP-9, sine they're just zipping around and stabbing Izo with Shigan, but ultimately I do think that showing Izo have an actual fight before falling is pretty needed. 
  
• There is a fair amount of blood being splurted out when Maha stabs Izo, and we get the epic slow-motion raising of the gun before Izo straight-up executes Maha by shooting him in the chest.
• And the end result is a vastly-improved takedown. It's still short in the grand scheme of things, but it's definitely much improved!
• And then we get the conversation between Guernica and the flower CP-0 guy, who I find funny is just called 'Joseph'.
• The rest of the episode is Komurasaki/Hiyori creeping the shit out of Orochi. Man, that scene where Hiyori pulls out the seastone nail and stabs Orochi after the rubble falls on top of him is stone-cold! Shame it's not the end of Orochi. 
• The additional shot of Oden's spirit or ghost or whatever appearing behind Hiyori as he gives his speech about the Moon Princess song is pretty cool!
• And we also get more scenes of Luffy fighting Kaido. "This is my last Gear Fourth!" You don't know how true that is, Luffy. 
• This is the debut of Gomu Gomu no Hydra, isn't it? 
• A bunch of scenes are also shown here of people just regrouping. The Minks returning into the island, Marco arriving where Nami and Tama are, Zeus briefly mourning Big Mom before Nami yells at him, Kid and Law reacting to Kaido's fall.