One Piece 1124 Review: Borsadlino

One Piece, Chapter 1124: Best Friend

A much calmer chapter, and one that's basically trying to wrap up a bunch of the character-related plot threads. Which I definitely do appreciate -- I did note that I'm not the most pleased with the rapid pacing in the past couple of chapters, so slowing down here does definitely work to the story's benefit. 

We start off with the World Economic News blimp, where Big News Morgans is just super excited at screwing over the world and do the whole sensationalist fearmonger thing to sell the most papers possible. Vivi, of course, is absolutely angry at Morgans' lack of ethics and disregard for the importance of optimism... which honestly isn't too far off with a lot of news media in real life. That's all I'm really going to say about that topic because I would probably rant for too long otherwise. 

I do like the little touches in this scene. Wapol being so pants-shittingly scared of Imu and the World Government that he's trying to calm Vivi down and stop her from pissing Morgans off, and the quiet threat Morgans gives to Vivi, and Vivi's moment of what's essentially 'fuck you' towards Morgans because she's not going to grovel just to save her own neck. Vivi, of course, is also super angry at the narrative that Morgans seemingly wants to push about Luffy killing Vegapunk. 

We get a short scene of Sentomaru rowing off on a boat. I don't remember what happened to him last? Did Kizaru zap him? Was it the Seraphim? He survived and he's just rowing off. I don't think he knows where to go, since he doesn't really like pirates, and his loyalty is to Vegapunk instead of the Marines. He doesn't know Lilith survives, I guess, and if he does I assume he would join the Straw Hats... but right now he's off rowing his little boat. 

And then we get the strongest scene in this chapter, which is Kizaru stalking through the boat of fallen Marines, picking up the phone to answer Akainu. Akainu is in full 'status report' mode, and Kizaru... is just so overwhelmed by everything that's going on that he just nonchalantly tells Akainu that one of the youngsters will make a report once they wake up. Akainu then says something along the lines of "you better not be slacking off, Borsalino!"

Which... triggers Kizaru. As much as someone as calm as Kizaru can be triggered, anyway. He asks Akainu about whether he's ever had to "kill [his] best friend", and we get a flashback to Kizaru's moments with Vegapunk. From their meeting where Vegapunk only cares about the World Government funding, to them slowly sharing each other's drinks... to the shot from Kizaru's POV of him laser-swording Vegapunk from the back, and the image of Vegapunk's corpse falling to the ground reflected on Kizaru's sunglasses. 

And then we get a wonderfully drawn panel of Kizaru, vulnerable, angry and emotional. Veins bulging, lips trembling, tears flowing, snot dripping... gone are the wisecracks, the cog-in-the-machine mentality, the devil-may-care attitude... Kizaru is an emotional man right now, and it's such a nicely-written sequence throughout the story. 

With so much going on in Egghead, I do really like Kizaru's subtle arc in the background, where I really do think that all of his talk about being a cog in the machine is either him trying his best to lie to himself; or if he truly never thought about it until this point. 

In a way, the heavy parallels here are to how Aokiji must have felt when he, too, was forced to 'kill' his best friend Jaguar D. Saul, particularly when both Aokiji and Kizaru have opportunities to see the darker side of the Marines which makes them question what's going on. I absolutely love this, I absolutely love the themes of 'you can't just pretend you don't know what's going on' that's being shown here, and... honestly, I've had such a huge soft spot for Kizaru ever since I first saw him in the Sabaody arc. 

I really do wonder where Kizaru would end up after this arc. I don't think he's going to leave the Marines yet, but he is quite pissed at everything that's going on. "If you've got time to waste doubting me, come and see for yourself!" Akainu's even stunned to silence and apologizes to Kizaru, which I do like. I really like it when characters and especially antagonists are shown to have some more complexity than just 'rah rah I only work for my goal'. 

Speaking of goals, the rest of the chapter ends with the Straw Hats. We get a nice, quiet scene of Franky, Zoro and Jinbe on the Thousand Sunny, discussing how Luffy apparently went super-depressed last chapter after their failure. Franky points out the sheer amount of impossible odds that they had to fight through, and that it's a miracle they even got out... while Zoro rather callously notes that Luffy, being an Emperor, shouldn't cry so much over the death of one old man. 

...which, I really do wonder, if One Piece is ever going to tackle this. I thought Wano and the whole 'Sanji abandons the crew' would be where we discuss Zoro's practicality in life versus Luffy's never-changing "I don't care what the world thinks of me, I'm still going to just be me" mentality. We'll see if this goes anywhere. 

Lilith wakes up, and a group of other Straw Hats catch her up to what's going on. Lilith apparently 'heard' about what happened, presumably from whatever chip is left within her... then she bawls her eyes out, and immediately goes back to instant happiness. It's kind of funny, actually. Lilith goes to talk to Luffy, who's all depressed because they failed to save Vegapunk. It's less the principle of the matter of Vegapunk dying and more because Luffy promised that he's going to do it. Lilith then explains something... but we don't hear the explanation but "to put it simply, everyone's alive". Which I'm going to assume is some Punk Records related stuff. I think we can guess that, though I really do hope there are some permanent stakes to prevent a Dragon Ball scenario. I really do want us to have the rest of the series with just Lilith and York as the only two Vegapunks left. 

This does mean that Luffy did keep his promise to Vegapunk, and the last two-page spread is Luffy jumping to the giants, and declaring that he's okay now and he's going to have that end-of-arc feast, please and thank you. Another reaffirmation about Luffy wanting to become the King of Pirates, which is nice. And maybe one of the most adorable scenes ever is Robin realizing that they might meet Saul and hugging Chopper very hard. That's adorable.

We end with a shot of "Warland Elbaf", and some guy in silhouette saying "come on, then". This could be anyone, really, but anyone that's in silhouette is apparently always going to be Scopper Gaban. So It's probably Scopper Gaban, he's totally going to be relevant, totally. I really don't care to speculate, not when we have the Man Marked By Flames, the mysterious silhouette in the 'people hunting for One Piece' mosaic, and that one guy Crocus drank beer with in a cover story... this guy could be Scopper Gaban, could be Shiki, Rocks, Loki, Thor... whatever. We'll find out when we find out. 

Anyway, a nice little slower, wholesome chapter to end off Egghead. I think we'll probably start off Elbaf next chapter, or if we don't, we might get a brief 'decks of the world' sequence. Neat!

Random Notes:

• Other blog posts are really slowing down for the next couple of months due to my recovery. One Piece and Pokemon (which are mostly pre-written) will probably be regular, but that's all the energy I have right now. 
• Oni Child Yamato Cover Story: She's on the way to Kuri, and beat back someone trying to kidnap a lady? The guy is in silhouette, so clearly judging by fandom guesses, it's definitely Scopper Gaban. 
• What other plot threads are outstanding? Stussy, Kuma and Saturn/Iron Giant seem to be the two more 'urgent' ones in my head, but we also probably need to see Lucci/Kaku and, of course, Imu. 
• Love the running gag of the random background W.E. Journal lady reporter fangirling over Vivi. 
• I do really like the sheer difference in scale, with Luffy next to the gigantic grapes, while the other Straw Hats are so tiny on just one of the giants' chairs. 
• Usopp, like the rest of us, wonders why the hell Lilith is the 'evil' one.
• There's a nice little detail that without being connected to York, Lilith now feels hunger a bit more prominently. 
• Yes, I know it's technically 'Elbaph', but I don't think I'll get used to it as quickly as 'Laugh Tale'