One Piece 1181-1186 Review: Brook's Tragedies

One Piece, Chapters 1181-1185

So due to my quasi-hiatus, I haven't had the time to really do the typical in-depth discussions I usually do for One Piece. But I am still keeping up to date, and I'll just do a rapid-fire discussion about the past couple of months of chapters. I know I'm missing a couple of the newest ones! Such is the case when you make some notes for a discussion while the chapters are being released, and whatnot. 

That'll be similar to how I handle the Bleach TYBW season as it comes out, by the way. Very excited about it, but due to real-life stuff I really am unable to do the reviews to the depth, detail and speed that I used to do. Anyway...

Chapter 1181: God and Devil

This one is mostly an action scene, and it's a nice setup for Loki versus Imu. I never really cared all that much for 'powerscaling' and I genuinely don't think Loki's going to be the one to take down Imu... but it's always fun, in Dragon Ball terms, to see Vegeta try and take on the big bad before Goku comes along. 

That's not to say this isn't entertaining, as Loki is really angry at Imu having the gall to act all inconvenienced at Harald's death when Harald's son and kingdom are the ones that actually suffered the most. We then have some clashes of big, over-the-top anime powers. Not a lot of them are explained; Loki has some lightning hammer attacks and does a dragon breath explosion attack at one point. Imu has some more black flames that he can mould and shapeshift. He summons a blade called Nemesis at one point. It's cool, it's neat, and just like the Rocks/Garp/Roger fight, it's nice to see a One Piece fight breathe and take the time to show off new powers.

Imu gives a nice Final Fantasy villain motivation rant, too, about the 'trinity of evil', which is neat. It doesn't really tell me anything new about him. He's anti-freedom and all about subjugation and domination. He freaks out about Joy Boy every now and then. But I can appreciate a villain speech as he's beating up the heroes. The title is 'god, devil, what's the difference', which is a bit of a background theme in One Piece. 

Not much to really discuss here and I thought I'd be happy if the bulk of the chapters of the hiatus were action scenes and I can take it easy... but it's not all just punchy punch!

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Chapter 1182: Zaza

We've got more fighting between Imu and Loki, and again, we get some more reinforcement that Imu's really having a lot of comparisons with the world of the past -- identifying Loki as Nidhoggr and being acquainted with Ragnir. We get some displays of how Ragnir and Loki combine their attacks into dragon breath explosions (which would undoubtedly be a source of the anime's fancy special effects) and Loki starts summoning more magical circles and fire bomb demons. It's very much a 'wizard duel'! I can't complain. It looks cool. 

And then we get a couple of scene-seetting scenes. We get a scene of Sanji heading off to hunt down Killingham after a bit of a flashback to establish Killingham taunting him. A bit shorter, but Zoro is also heading down to go God Knight hunting. Robin and Saul find out that the enigmatic Biblo the owl have moved the books of Ohara into a secret underground chamber. Chopper has stitched Gerd's fingers back. There's a comedy moment with Road and Gerd. Summers (or SUPER Summers) have gotten a boat to kidnap the kids...

And the final part of this chapter is an odd one, where it's the titular 'Zaza'. SUPER Summers berates Killingham for accidentally summoning the thing that he fears most... and after a buildup, we learn that this is... the Rain God Zaza. the Rain God Zaza is a four-armed woman with a kasa hat, a covered mouth, and utterly titanic as it moves around like a water elemental kaiju to grab the children. Zaza honestly did really just come out of nowhere and I kind of wished that there was a bit more of a buildup.

Or, well, buildup within the arc, in any case, since the idea of a "Rain God" has been around since Skypiea, which also mentioned the "Sun God" which would become super relevant. That leaves Earth and Forest as the two missing ones from the Skypiea pantheon. I like the idea of Killingham summoning another threat for our heroes to fight, and I like the concept of tying it into showing off the mythology of the gods that Oda is building up to... but not necessarily how abrupt it is done. 

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One Piece, Chapter 1183: Good Mor-Maid

We start off with more fighting, with Loki unleashing more named attacks, and Imu creating more giant flame blades. Very cool, one of the coolest swords in mythology, Gram, gets a name-drop. Imu also name drops someone called 'Douzan' as someone who he had eliminated before. Ominous!

We get more shots of Zaza kidnapping the kids and Ripley giving a badass motherly rallying cry... but then we cut to Brook talking with the rest of the Straw Hats there, who ask Brook what his connection to Gunko is. Finally it is being addressed! With how abrupt the Brook-vs-Gunko-Imu was handled, I was very very pleaased to see it actually be handled. In the previous chapters, that Brook/Gunko flashback the tension and mystery and confrontation rose up, it was so compelling, and even Usopp joins in... and the two are defeated offscreen. And that was a bit bad. 

But now? 

Now, we don't just get Brook sitting down (or lying down) and explaining the context about Gunko (or Shuri)... but Brook also points out that three are three personalities in her -- which we know as the original kind Shuri, the evil twisted Domi Reversi'd Gunko, and Imu possessing Gunko. Jinbe asks Brook to make the decision on whether Gunko lives or dies...

AND WE GET A BROOK FLASHBACK.

I am sorry, what?

That was so unexpected, but so welcome. Brook is in the running to be my favourite Straw Hat with really the only serious contender being Robin, but I've honestly fallen into accepting that Brook is in the secondary tier of the crew and I wasn't expecting a full flashback to flesh out the story before he joined the Rumbar Pirates. I was already over the moon that we're getting something with the Gunko connection. 

But Brook is revealed to have hailed from Esperia, a country that makes musical instruments. He's singing (which gives us the painful 'good mor-maid' title) in the city early in the morning, and Leader of the Raider Squad Brook is like the superstar of the kingdom. The knights idolize him, little tiny princess Shuri really looks up to him, and we're also introduced to the king and queen of the kingdom. The seemingly slovenly King Reuven initially looks like a typical evil king a la Wapol, but the comedy between them is basically just two brothers having a comedy routine. Brook also has an unashamed crush for the queen Candelle, even openly saying it in front of Reuven and Shuri... again, it's all a nice establishing of their wacky little family dynamic. The chapter ends with Brook doing a very long distance Arrow-Notch Slash to cut a bunch of mafia trying to kidnap Queen Candelle, which is hilariously and insanely over-the-top with how delayed it was. Man, present-day Brook need to be in more fights! 

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One Piece, Chapter 1184: We're All Bones When We Die

We jump a bit forwards in time from the previous flashback, with Shuri growing into a teenager at 14 and emulating Brook as a warrior (because Brook likes strong women). Brook and Shuri have a really nice relationship going on, bonding over music and stories. Also nicely established is that while Brook acts like his typical perverted self throughout the entire flashback, he constantly shoots down Shuri's child-like crush towards him. So the idea is that Brook does just see Shuri as a daughter-figure, which nicely avoids any creepy implications. 

We then get a flashback-in-a-flashback, which is... it's a very touching story, even if it's simple. 11-year-old Brook is a ratty little beggar who peeks into the nobles playing music, while he lives in a garbage dump and plays music with a "violin" made up of random bottles and wires. He sings songs to mock the king while singing about his dead family that starved to death. This is when he met the then-Prince Reuven, who is doing a "royal pretends to be a common folk" deal, and the two become fast friends. Brook calls Reuven 'big bro' (aniki), and gives his precious food -- random frogs and grasshoppers, but it's a cuisine because Brook found some curry powder and cooked it. Reuven is utterly appalled at the contrast between his own royal life. 

A couple of years later, Brook gets captured by some corrupt navy who thinks he's a drug runner (it's actually the Moron mafia family from the previous chapter). But then heedless of the potential implications of fighting the Marines, Prince Reuven charges in to rescue Brook... and Candelle, who is his royal bodyguard, shows up with him. This is when Brook essentially gets adopted into the castle as Reuven's charge, and this begins Brook's crush on the future queen Candelle. 

It's a very wholesome chapter, but we also know what happened to Brook and some tragedy's going to happen. This is a One Piece flashback, after all. 

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One Piece, Chapter 1185: Mindja Own Beeswax

We get more wholesome scenes of Brook bonding with Candelle, who trains Brook as her squire. There are some nice comedic moments that show Brook's a gigantic goober even as a child, and we see the genesis of his panties gag -- Candelle insists that Brook needs etiquette and has to speak politely, which is the origin of the 'would you mind doing me the favour of showing me your panties please' formal gag.

We cut to the teenage Shuri, and in a very blink-and-miss detail, as Brook handwaves the time when they grew up and Shuri was born, Brook notes a moment when a World Government ship landed on Esperia, where Candelle was 'stressed and bedridden for months', and shortly afterwards was the time of Reuven's coronation, marriage and Shuri's birth. I actually didn't realize the implications that was being told here until the next couple of chapters... which is surprisingly well-hidden by Oda and honestly one of the better ways to utilize the rape/sexual assault trope in a narrative and making it horrifying without being graphic.

The fact that it was hidden in-between Brook's stories as he explains his benefactors to Shuri, and there's also a cute moment where Shuri pouts that she also wants Brook to treat her as someone that he would 'sacrifice his life for', is cute. There's a great montage of Brook and Shuri as they grow up, set to the tone of 'Mind Your Own Beeswax', a little teenage-rebellion song that Brook teaches Shuri. Lots of cute moments here, the highlight being Shuri scaring the shit out of Brook with a halloween sheet skeleton. 

Of course, it's a One Piece flashback, so bad things happen. A couple of years later, Esperia is beset by a fog that conveniently destroys the musical instruments that Esperia's economy depends on. Everyone tries to keep their spirits up, but Queen Candelle ends up succumbing and dying to the disease. This was done quite quickly, there's a lot of great panels of the mourning Brook, Shuri and Reuven... and shortly afterwards, the country is beset by another problem -- they can't pay the Heavenly Tribute. 

Reuven declares that there's going to be a war against the World Government, and we get a cool scene where Brook just immediately nods and accepts it with no question. Reuven did explain what's going on to the rest of his soldiers, noting that the World Government demanded 1000 slaves. We get then another montage of Brook singing the 'Mind Your Own Beeswax' song. He says this to raise the morale of the citizens, and then as he leads the army to fight the Marines that come. It's such a valiant fight, but while Brook himself is badass the artwork shows just how outnumbered the Esperian forces are. 

We get Brook running through every setting that has been shown in this flashback. The castle, the garden, even the dump are on fire. And as he rushes back into the castle, he sees... a demonized Shuri licking blood off her face over the dead body of a similarly demonized King Reuven. A giant demon bird (St. Marcus Mars's Itsumade form, but shadowed) looms over it, and a God's Knight is in the background. Brook's shocked face is... appropriate. 

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One Piece, Chapter 1186: One More Time

Brook is just shell-shocked at this point, unable to process what has happened. And the main thing that we learn later on? Brook at this point in his life is so secluded from the outside world that he doesn't even know what a 'Devil Fruit' is, that magical powers exist. He would also suffer from heavy brain damage and the implication from his discussion with his men is that he thought he's misremembering and exaggerating the events in his own mind... which explains why he ended up believing Shuri is evil.

But that confrontation was also horrifying. Faced with the death of his 'big bro' and benefactor. And while Brook initially thinks that Shuri is some kind of impostor, then Shuri starts talking horrible things about how she is a Celestial Dragon, how Reuven isn't her real father, and how Reuven hid the true reason of the start of the war -- the Celestial Dragons demanded her, and Reuven plunged the nation into devastation over nothing. 

St. Manmeyer Gurou also speaks up, noting that he remembers Brook as Candelle's squire -- he was the Celestial Dragon that showed up long ago, and  Shuri's biological father. There's discussion about the heterochromatic eye, and how Gurou couldn't 'awaken it' and perhaps Shuri can do so instead. Brook doesn't care about any of this heavy lore drops, more horrified about the strange betrayal of Shuri. And as Brook mentally compares the younger Shuri to an angel, and the current Shuri to a devil, he can't even raise his sword to defend himself as Shuri stabs him through the skull (giving him his distinctive skull scar) with Brook's own Gavotte: Bond en Avant technique.

(Imu also shows up, rising out of Mars's shadow-bird form, and seemingly glorps out because he doesn't care about the drama, which I thought was weird but funny. He also shows up only to interrupt Gurou for talking too much.)

As Brook seemingly 'dies', we later see him wake up, miraculously surviving having the sword hit his brain stem, and after realizing what's going on (and telling the audience the caveats above of why Brook doesn't know the real context of what happened) Brook freaks out and breaks the fuck down. 

End flashback. 

That was... that was a really, really powerful flashback. I am very biased, because I love Brook. But seeing this right after the Harald one? I like the Harald flashback, but I feel like this short flashback was also really very powerful as well! This also gives me hope that some of the other characters (particularly Usopp, mostly Usopp, okay it's just Usopp) is going to get some attention from a character development perspective.

We cut to the present, with Brook telling this to his crewmates... and noting that if the 'demonic visages' are real memories, then Shuri could be a victim and not a traitor, and Brook asks and resolves to have faith in Princess Shuri once more. Cutting back a bit to the scenes about his cute argument with Shuri about 'why would you protect me', Brook resolves himself, bows his head to ask the help of his crewmates, before running towards where Shuri was frozen in ice. 

We then cut back to the 'main' fight, and if we're being honest as much as there's the fun spectacle of Loki versus Imu, it feels almost disappointing to go back to that fight! Luffy is also here, finally having eaten his fill of food. Imu gives a rant about how he had defeated the giants 800 years ago with their children, and continues his ramble... until Luffy shows up and decks the shit out of Imu the way he did St. Charlos all the way back. Okay, that fight is happening, then... nice to see some progression there, but if we're being honest I'm not the most invested in Luffy at this point. 

Random Notes:

• Yes, there's a lot of comparisons to One Piece: Red. I don't want to make this review any longer, but I'll recognize it. 
• During the run of the chapters I remembered there being a lot of discussion about Queen Candelle actually being a God's Knight honey trap, trying to infiltrate a country or get some 'genes' like what Shamrock did with his own children's mother. Which I always thought was an insane leap even as the chapters were going on. But you should feel bad for thinking that Candele is evil! 
• St. Manmeyer Gurou was also mistaken as Admiral Kong by many people, and I would like to say that I also number among this one.
• With this arc (or the previous one) introducing the idea of bounty inflation for Dorry and Brogy, Brook having a 'reinstated' bounty from the past actually means that whether it's because of his raw 'cut some mafia members an hour into the future' sword skills or because the World Government suspects that he knows about Esperia means that Brook's real bounty might be quite higher than what it was introduced as! 
  
• Snuck in-between Brook training Shuri is Brook mentioning that Shuri seems like she could even see briefly into the future, with the wording clearly implying Future Sight. Brook doesn't seem to know what Haki is at the point in time (especially when he doesn't know what Devil Fruits are) so it might be Shuri awakening Future Sight Haki very early on because of her eyes.
• Brook's dream of piracy is actually noted by Shuri during one of their discussions, but Brook does the "I'll lay down my dream for another's" in deference to Reuven, because that's how much Brook respects him. Shuri also offhandedly makes a comment that she'll also be a pirate with Brook. Foreshadowing?
• By the way, a lot of the details in these flashbacks have been noted to be in Oda's mind since forever. Brook's favourite food being curry, Brook being stated to be the Straw Hat that wakes up the earliest, and the different artwork of Brook as a child has alternatively shown him as a beggar or in noble clothes, so it's most certainly something Oda has had in mind for this backstory!
• Knowing what we do later on about Shuri's parentage, it does add a huge layer of tragedy for poor Reuven as he keeps seeing Shuri get along better with Brook as a paternal figure. It's not even that Shuri and Reuven are estranged or fighting or anything, which honestly makes me feel even worse for poor Reuven. He really is quietly one of the best men in all of One Piece. 
• The 'Mind Your Own Beeswax' stuff is the English localization team's attempt to localize the Japanese accent that Brook borrows the slang from. I think it's the same real-world Hiroshima dialect that Akainu speaks, which Brook notes in-universe comes from 'Kamigata'. I am more surprised to learn that 'Mind Your Own Beeswax' is a real phrase that's an old slang from 18th to 19th century!
• The Itsumade is a being associated with the spread of disease, so putting two and two together, Mars might be the exact person responsible for the plague on Esperia. I mean, the World Government is definitely responsible in some way or form, but maybe Mars specifically.
• Speaking of the Itsumade, I did a quick scan through the Egghead arc, but Brook was never in a position where he would come face-to-face with Mars's Itsumade form, and even then it's glorping in a shadowy form instead of manifesting as a full bird like in Egghead. Luffy really did eliminate Mars from the battlefield quite early!
• Can I just say how wholesome -- and sad -- the cover art for chapter 1186 is? Little Loki surrounded by his animal friends drawing Ida as 'Mommy' with crayons? How fucking cute that is?  
• Jinbe of course is aligned with Brook the moment he hears the story, but I like how cold he was when Gunko was just a heartless enemy without the context, asking Brook basically for 'do we kill her or not'. 
• Franky, as always, is the most emotional of the Straw Hats, full with tears as Brook finishes his story.

One Piece 1180 Review: Wing Clipping

One Piece, Chapter 1180: Omen

A bit late to the party for this one; again, real life's going to eat up a lot of my time between now and May. 

We pick up right where we left off, with Nerona Imu having descended on Elbaph amidst a gigantic demonic circle, a horde of transformed demon houses heralding him with a theme song, and the collective hype of the entire fandom. We get a better shot of Imu's full form, and he does look quite cool.  Lots of discussion on aspects of his design -- is that an Elbaph belt? Are those dots Killmonger-esque piercings, or tattoos, or what? What are those circuitry like lines? Why does he have parachute pants like Enel? Is he a Lunarian? He has the weird skulls that Boa Hancock puts on her snake. What about those eyes on that ring on his back? 

Nothing much is explained, because Imu proceeds to ask 'who is the king of this land?' It has been quite a while for us readers, but this is something that Imu asked maybe an hour ago in-universe when he arrived possessing Gunko... so either Imu has some bad memory problems, or it is something tied to a power he has. 

Dorry and Brogy yell at Imu that Elbaph has no king, although interestingly Imu doesn't do the Domi Reversi 'you're close enough to be kings' thing again. Instead, he sees Gerd holding Summers... and in a rather cool (and Bleach-esque) sequence, he slices off the tips  of Gerd's thumbs and index fingers. This apparently happens so fast that Gerd is even more baffled than pained or shocked. 

Again, it is quite interesting that Imu makes it a point to rescue Summers, instead of punishing him for his failure the way he did to Saturn, but previous chapters did imply that it takes something out of Imu to take out someone that has carved one of his covenant marks on him. So maybe Summers is valuable because of that. Summers, at least, manages to recover his metal heart and get back to full power. 

Anyway, back to the action. Zoro zips next to Imu and gets ready to fight, but it's Hajrudin that throws the first punch, getting ready to throw a hit.... before Stansen comes in and dropkicks his own boss, yelling that they have no idea what Imu can do. As this happens, very subtly (until a second panel points it out), Imu slices off Stansen's leg. That's another one down for the count, although I really wished they made it a bit more clear that it would've killed Hajrudin. 

Zoro then charges in with a King of Hell technique, unleashing an Enma-style version of the Purgatory Onigiri... but Imu just blocks the strike with his devil tail. Imu then says 'Omen', making a pose with his fingers, and a dark energy flame burst out of his palm and knocks Zoro down. Zoro is down. 

Hajrudin goes in again with his axe, and Imu launches another Omen -- this one taking the form of a giant fireball with a cute devil face like one of those Final Fantasy bomb monsters, and unleashes a massive explosion. I'm sure he's not dead, but the shading makes it look like Hajrudin is being vaporized. 

Imu then creates a halo of dark flames and tosses it towards Summers, who recognizes it in great excitement as an Omen... but gets chastised by Imu. "There is little time", Imu says, and it appears that this is a reason for why he's not rampaging around or saying much... all that coughing up of blood and whatnot seems to imply that he's got a time limiter to be in the mortal realm. Imu and Summers fly off, and as Imu leaves the location, the animated houses turn back to normal. Not sure what their plan is -- if it's still kidnapping children, they are not going where they should to do that.

We see Imu flying around with his massive Lunarian black angel wings, and Elbaph panics. Imu sees the block of ice that Gunko is stuck in, swings around his strange glaive, and the end with the clouds kind of acts like a rifle or something as it launches another one of the Omen fanged fireballs. That creates a massive explosion on the ice block that Gunko is in. Now whether this is Imu being efficient at freeing Gunko, or if Imu is actually punishing Gunko (since he doesn't make sure Gunko recovers like Summers and Killingham) is a bit unclear. 

We get a brief moment from Gaban, who is disturbed at the strange haki, noting that it's different from what he felt at God Valley. Yep, all he's ever seen is blob-mu, not devil-mu!

Meanwhile, Luffy, Ragnir and Loki are chomping down on food. Loki has grown annoyed at the frozen food and now burnt up the library (again!) to melt the food.

Nami returns to the rest of the Straw Hats to warn them about Imu... but Imu has arrived, restoring the sliced-up Killingham with an Omen ring. Sanji gets angry that someone has released Killingham, and zips in to attack Imu. We don't quite get a named attack, but Imu casually blocks Sanji's kick with his own leg, before swinging around with a black-flame-wreathed kick of his own and one-shots Sanji in a massive explosion. 

The chapter ends with Loki arriving on the battlefield, ominous and angry, while Imu notes that he's searching for the one that killed his 'faithful servant' Harald. Loki is even more outraged about this, because Harald was his dad and the king of Elbaph, not some servant. Loki is just not having any of Imu's shit, and it seems that we're going to have a 1v1 between the two!

It's an exciting chapter. Admittedly it's a rather common trick that shonen manga does when the new big bad villain comes in and one-shots all the strongest people around. Zoro, Sanji and Hajrudin get the brunt of this and I really do feel we could've shown more (some amputations for Stansen and Gerd hardly count) but I do like that Oda just immediately went for two of the most powerful characters among the Straw Hats. It's a nice way to segue in to showcasing how powerful Nerona Imu is as a combatant, and finally, after Elbaph felt really nonthreatening the moment Luffy and Loki's team entered the fray, I am starting to get a bit more tension here. Hope this can make up for the string of chapters pre-Imu's-arrival that disappointed me!

Random Notes:

• The kanji used for Omen can apparently also be read as 'Maki', as in 'demonic aura', a probable riff on Haki. This also ties into how Imu's "Akuma no Mi" is spelled in katakana instead of kanji ('The Devil's Fruit' versus 'Devil Fruit' in English translations).  
• I get that we don't want to belabour the point, but I do find it odd that Dorry and Brogy don't also rush in to attack (and subsequently get blown away). I kind of get excluding Chopper and Jarul, but the two giant warrior captains probably should've attempted something!
• I am also quite disappointed that Jinbe isn't also being included in 'Imu one-shotting the strongest warriors' thing. I don't care about powerscaling, but the way Jinbe was hyped up when he joined the crew made him an equivalent of Zoro and Sanji at least in terms of strength. I get that this 'badass when they first joined, but got reduced to a second tier' also happened a bit with Robin, Franky and Brook when they joined respectively, but Jinbe had a lot more buildup to him. 
• Seeing Summers and Killingham at least restored to 'full power' does help make their lame defeats (particularly Killingham's) a bit more palatable, since they might get a more proper takedown after being empowered by the Omen, but I also... don't really want to see round two of those dorks fighting, over focusing on the Imu confrontation. 
• So that was the same devil tail that battled Sabo and killed Cobra in that one Reverie chapter. 
• When Imu makes the Omen pose, I almost thought that he was going to flick the flame like Mr. 5's booger bombs, but the flames appear on the palm instead of where the fingers would flick it. 

One Piece 1179 Review: He's Here

One Piece, Chapter 1179: Imu Nerona Descends

Yeah, a bit late to the party with this chapter; real life stuff got in the way... but what a chapter it is, huh? 

The entire chapter is essentially, well... the descent of Imu on Elbaph. So he actually does finally make a move, he actually does decide to show his face. And I think I can reasonably say 'he' now, and while I've enjoyed the little game we've been playing with Imu being a featureless ghostblob, I am quite happy that it is both a silhouette, but also technically a form of Imu. Turns out Oda can have his cake and eat it in terms of disguising what Imu looks like while also making it make sense in-universe. 

The entire first half of the chapter has the Gorosei -- or at least the four pre-existing Gorosei -- try and talk Imu down from actually going down to the Lower Realms. Garling, meanwhile, is a lot more apathetic, shrugging it off as a wise move on Imu's part. Garling makes some note about how Shamrock's arrival has helped to quell the unrest, but the food situation is really hurting them. It's a rather interesting choice that the manga hasn't really shown us who is besieging the Holy Land. The easiest assumption would be Dragon's Revolutionaries, but the fact that we haven't shown who's doing it has made a lot of people speculate that Blackbeard is making his move, or perhaps even an oddball like the Marines having rebelled offscreen?

We get a brief sequence of York getting some karmic fate as she's starving while Garling just tells her to piss off and do her job and get the Mother Flame up and running. Ju Peter seems to be the most hesitant in letting Imu out, but Nusjuro notes that there's way too many situations going around to be sparing Marine Admirals. Warcury even wants to head onto the battlefield himself and do some giant boar action, but Imu then goes onto a whole rant about how they've been overconfident, how they've been slothful... goes on a flashback onto a bunch of scenes that he's seen in the past... and then creates the teleportation circle. 

We get a nice reaction shot from all five Gorosei as Imu teleports away, and I've gotten quite interested in seeing how the five Gorosei differ from each other. Garling, of course, is all happy to let Imu do whatever he wants, noting that they don't have the right to stop him. Marcus Mars is the most emotional out of the five, showing the most emotion out of any Gorosei that's still alive. He's actually panicking! Warcury also looks concerned, implying a couple of times in the chapter that something will happen if he leaves the castle. Nusjuro and Peter, meanwhile, are a bit more stoic.

We go back to Elbaph and do a bunch of post-battle stuff. In something I kind of glossed over in the last chapter, Summers' heart is actually robotic! Or at least, metallic. Gerd has found Summers and is holding him apart while his body tries desperately to rejoin back together. Zoro threatens to crush the metallic heart, and by Summers' lack of a poker face, we can immediately infer that that is the Legend of Zelda boss-fight style weakness of the God's Knights. As much as I like the rest of the chapter... kind of a bad action manga writing choice to have this be randomly inserted post-battle with no buildup, instead of it being found out by someone fighting Summers or Killingham during the last couple of frankly anticlimactic battles against the Knights of God. 

Killingham is still tied up like chunks of meat from a tree by Sanji, promising bloody revenge while Sanji is acting all cool and mocking him that he doesn't even remember his name. 

Loki, Luffy and Ragnir are trying to regain their food by eating the frozen food in the school. Luffy is having trouble eating, and there's a brief bit of power lore-dump as Loki notes that only Ragnir can melt his own 'flash-frozen' ice. 

And then Imu descends. A gigantic fire pillar appears next to the castle, and four more appear. And a gigantic pentagram magic circle appears in the clouds. Interestingly, music starts to play. Music being affiliated with Imu isn't something surprising, as the opposite number of Mr. "Drums of Liberation" Nika, but the houses and trees sprouting devilish cartoon faces and dancing around reminds me of Big Mom's Soul Soul Fruit. It's interesting! What are the connections that Imu's powers have towards other Devil Fruit powers, then? 

A giant circle of flame is carved around the branch where the castle is, and a final central fire pillar slams down right onto the castle. Zoro identifies the explosion of Conqueror's Haki, and indeed we see it knocking out a bunch of the giant children. 

Imu is teleported inside the castle, and immediately coughs up blood. Is what Warcury is worried about Imu's health? Is something harming or killing Imu if he steps out of Pangaea Castle? It's also interesting to see Imu coughing in his blob-form... before he transforms, of course. 

In his transformation, half the castle explodes. The giants that are rushing towards the castle are surprised, Summers and Killingham recognize (presumably) the Haki and are terrified that the Great One is there in person... 

And Imu perches on top of the spire. He's got a pretty cool design, the sort of played-straight-with-no-laughs-cool design that I don't think One Piece has really done before, except maybe for Crocodile and Akainu. With all other villains, Oda has made it a masterclass in making them goofy in some way -- Kaido's little legs, Enel and Doflamingo always giggling and laughing, Big Mom's entire design... but Imu, at least, just looks badass. He's got dark skin (either red or dark brown like a Lunarian, people can't decide), curled devil horns, pale hair, and a devil tail that spirals around the rooftop where he's perched on. The tail has a bunch of skulls on it. He's got a ring on his back, a ring of black flames filled with more of his 'Rinnegan' eyes, to borrow a Naruto term. And he's got tattoos resembling circuitry lines all over his arms? He's also got a spear, or a guan dao, with a zig-zag blade on the end. 

I like this design. I like this design a lot. This introduction is also pretty great, and I appreciate showing off the Gorosei's reaction to Imu. Now does that make me feel any better about the last couple of chapters? No. I still feel they're rushed, and while not to the degree of some of the worst parts of One Piece, I still find them a blemish otherwise on the arc's pacing and storytelling. But Imu is here, and I'm excited to see what we are going to get next!

Random Notes:

• Garling also makes a cryptic note about the 'former navy headquarters', which could really just mean anything. Has the Marines rebelled? Has the headquarters fallen? What has happened? 
• The Marines rebelling seems to be a no-no at least from dialogue in this chapter, where one of the Gorosei suggests sending Marine Admirals to Elbaph, but it's also interesting that we haven't seen the Marines in a while either. 
• We last saw the Mother Flame in Egghead, so I guess they just moved it to Marie Geoise off-screen? Like, the whole facility with the Mother Flame? 
• The teleportation circles that the Gods Knights use can't teleport food, I guess. We've seen it teleport clothes, weapons, and Summers's lounge chair... but maybe it's an 'organic matter' thing, otherwise they would've teleported the children from Elbaph away if they could. 
• Presumably, while dismembered, Summers can't use his Thorn Thorn Fruit, otherwise it would be easy to get himself out of Gerd's clutches. 
• I like the random joke of Franky questioning if he should turn Usopp and Brook into cyborgs. Terminator Brook would be awesome! 
• I think people have agreed that Zoro's group is the one closest to where the castle is. Thanks, people in the internet, because I have very terrible character spatial presence when reading a manga! 

One Piece 1178 Review: Popsicle Mu

One Piece, Chapter 1178: A Fading Nightmare

We kind of rush through a fight with Gunko-Imu, and while it's clear that it's not quite the climax yet, I'm not the most impressed with this chapter either. Maybe it's a residual from my underwhelmed reaction to 1177, but I just feel like this is rushing through the ending fights of Elbaf without giving me any really satisfying emotional closures for a lot of the characters, while spending time with scenes that aren't the most interesting. It's a growing problem I've been feeling since Sommers and Killingham were taken out, honestly. 

Luffy drops Brook and Usopp with Team Nami, before jumping back into action. Meanwhile, Loki launches lightning breaths while Imu gives a bit of an exposition about rumours of some large flying beast, referencing Loki's time as a pirate. As the battle continues, Imu glorps out of Gunko's body and emerges as a giant goopy shadow demon, which... feels a bit odd, considering how much she's been spending time going around possessing people and keeping her identity hidden? I guess she needs it to try and Domi Reversi Luffy and Loki, which is important to show... but it fails, of course. 

I am a bit surprised that it failed on Loki, but I never thought for a second that it would've succeeded on Luffy. Whatever the case, whether it's Conqueror's Haki or their specific devil fruits, Imu doesn't seem too surprised by this while the two are just confused and angry. Luffy unleashes a Dawn Gatling that pushes shadow Imu full of holes, and then Loki uses Ragnir and unleashes a blast of Niflheim to instantly create a block of ice that freezes Gunko and Imu within. 

Luffy reverts out of Gear Fifth, and Loki notes that he was a giant dragon for 'too long'. Okay. 

We then cut to a montage of the crisis being solved all over Elbaf, with Zeus, Jinbe and Lilith using their respective powers to put out flames. Zoro and the giants are about to finish off more Domi Reversi'd giants, but Chopper walks up and then whacks them, knocking the demons out and reverting them. Again, this mystery is still going on, and I just don't find it particularly interesting since it had zero buildup. Oh, there's also a bonus mystery that the books of Ohara and Bilbo the owl has disappeared, although it's not that hard to assume that Bilbo shrunk the books to protect them from the fire. 

Things are thankfully not over yet, and I really do hope that whatever climax next can salvage this arc. Summers's head-halves and heart seem to put themselves together, while the Imu frozen in ice disappears while we cut away to Mary Geoise, and the main body of Imu calls the Gorosei to tell them that 'The Holy Land will be without Mu for a short while'. I genuinely feel like I've checked out a little from the lack of resolution on a lot of the plot points while introducing random new quasi-mysteries, but hopeful, slightly, that there is a better climax on the horizon? 

Random Notes:

• He gets back in crazy mode quickly, but there's a nice panel of Luffy in Gear Fifth looking angry when Franky asks him if he needs backup, as he gets ready to launch himself into battle. 
• None of the giants 'slain' by Team Zoro were shown being reversed back to normal, so there was a theory that some heavy emotional component was needed to reverse the Reversi like what Dorry and Brogy had for each other; or maybe it ties to Chopper's protective nature as a doctor... but nothing anywhere as interesting happened. It's just punch them really hard, or be Chopper, I guess. 

One Piece 1177 Review: Did I Miss A Chapter

One Piece, Chapter 1177: Fury

Mmm, not the biggest fan of this one, I'm afraid. On paper, the events that happened here should be hype and cool and all, but I just wasn't feeling it -- it really felt like there was a chapter, or at least half a chapter, that was missing. And that does fairly ruin the moment, I would say, that would otherwise be an Elbaf arc showstopper. 

Yes, sure, 'the anime will fix it'... but I'm not reviewing the anime here, just the chapter. 

The first half of the chapter is a nice continuation of the previous chapter (and I still have the same opinions about the Dorry/Brogy Domi Reversi-reversal plot twist) but with Zoro and the four allied giants going on full-ham. There is something nicely cool at seeing a barrage of moves like Gungir, Ikoku and Zoro even gets a particularly nasty 'slice a head like a pie' attack called Red Ogre: Mega Rage. Some nice little moments like Colon and the other young giant children being excited at seeing the Giant Warriors fight and everything. 

On the opposite end, Kashi is being menaced by a couple more evil giants, and he's unable to bring himself to fight them. Gaban is apparently still weakened, so it is left to little Tony Tony Chopper to handle it...  and Chopper goes to Monster Point and slaps one of the giants. It isn't even a powerful slap -- neither the art nor the giant seems to be particularly indicating that it's super strong, and it's not even a named attack from Chopper. I don't think it's part of the Othello/Reversi game either, since Chopper is clumped together with Kashi and Gaban. But the slap seems to exorcise a little demon-imp spirit out of the giant, and he gets spun around the Domi Reversi thing. 

It's a bit weird, and I am a bit curious about this, but not as much as I would've sacrificed other scenes over it. 

Jinbe, Franky and Sanji have cut up Killingham into different bits -- reminding me of how they dealt with Buggy in the East Blue (and the live-action) -- and we get some boasting from the Straw Hats about how they are a Yonko crew now. Killingham, in his sorry state, keeps ranting about how they shouldn't underestimate the God's Knights while Franky doesn't seem to be terribly impressed by these fools. Which is a sentiment that I personally do have as well. 

Luffy and Loki show up, and Luffy gets all excited about his new big dragon pal... and Nami goes ballistic and angry at Luffy for causing so much devastation in his wake. We get a hilarious scene of Ragnir patting Luffy with a ._. facial expression in his Gear Fifth form, before Luffy and Loki start yelling at each other over this. It's a bit silly, although we do get Loki unleashing a lightning blast at Luffy which Luffy just tanks no problem. 

But then we cut away to Branch 8. This is where Brook was fighting Gunko. And I don't mind off-screening that fight, as much as I love Brook. We saw the connective tissue and buildup. We saw Brook clashing against Imu-Gunko, and there's enough hints here to build up a potential backstory reveal later on. It doesn't have to be in Elbaf. So the Brook stuff, I don't mind. 

The problem is that USOPP is there. He's somehow, between 1176 and 1177, teleported across branches, and fought Imu-Gunko enough to be wounded. What? Excuse me? I actually re-read the last five chapters just to see if I'm missing something, if I missed Usopp going "I'm worried, let me go and look where Brook is" or "I'm going off to do something" or whatever. No. Usopp is just there commenting and yelling with the rest of Nami's group. I really wouldn't have complained if we had one or two lines of Usopp realizing something was wrong. With or without Haki, with or without a huge 'Usopp mans up when fighting Chu in East Blue' moment. No. Just some connective tissue. 

And that's even something you could've done in this chapter, too. Take out one of the random panels of evil giants and replace it with Usopp arriving on the Imu/Brook fight. 

But no. Usopp is just on the ground. And he finally gives his speech about the warrior's pride of Elbaf, about the humiliation that Imu has done on it, about how she should've used proper warriors to fight warriors, about how Imu should have fought them head-on. Imu manhandles Brook with some Jedi powers, and then also causes Usopp's skull-bomb grass to explode point-blank front of him. The two of them are taken out. And I'm going to rush through this a bit, but Luffy and Loki arrive in the last two-page spread and Luffy gets angry at seeing his two teammates brutalized as such. 

And... I don't really like this. On paper, Usopp's speech is good. Usopp's speech is great. But there's just no buildup. He was fanboying without much substance before this, in every single one of his scenes. To have the leap of off-screen going through all the emotions to get to this point in time? We don't even need like a full chapter of angsty crying. Even a couple of panels showing Usopp arriving, realizing what it means for the giants to be conquered by someone like Imu, and running into combat would've been much more palatable than what we got here. Instead, we get yet another two-page spread with Loki when the sheer scale isn't really that necessary to display. 

Comparing this to some of Usopp's best moments -- when he realizes that he should stand up and not rely on lies when fighting Chu. His fight with Luffy in Water Seven. Him going through lots of excuses before apologizing at the end of Water Seven. When he mans up and tries to fight Sugar even without memories of his friends. Even Stampede, a usually-panned movie, has a much, much better buildup for Usopp being this dude with plant bullets fighting against Haki-monster Bullet, being manhandled by Bullet, but proving that he's useful after all. 

This doesn't have that buildup. Usopp did nothing in this arc before this but be the peanuts gallery, and it really rang hollow as a result. I really feel like we're missing just a couple of scenes. Maybe Usopp talking with one of the giant children. Maybe Usopp talking to Saul. To Dorry and Brogy. A discussion about warrior's pride. Even a repeat of him knowing he's helpless and weak against someone like Imu (or even the God's Knights) but still manning up and fighting alongside them would have been something. I wasn't the most invested in the 'Usopp becomes a True Warrior of the Sea in Elbaf' storyline, but I felt like it was sorely mishandled here. 

Yeah. I don't know... I really don't care about the Domi Reversi mystery at this point in time now. I guess we're going to a Luffy/Loki/Imu fight which is kind of cool, but it really does feel like we're just barreling to another not-so-satisfying conclusion again.

Random Notes:

• A bunch of the background Giant Warriors get given names like DDT, Rhodes and a bunch of other wrestling-move names. Neat. 
• While we've seen most of the other giant named attacks, Stansen shows off a new move called Drunken Hammer. His hammer is a barrel of ale!
• Dorry also gets stabbed through his arm in this chapter. I think Oda's just trying to give the two giants symmetrical wounds so they are on equal footing, but there's such a thing as too much symmetry. 

One Piece 1176 Review: SUPEEEEEEEER Cola

One Piece, Chapter 1176: With Pride

A late review for me due to work and travel, but there's a break week for One Piece so it's good for me. 

Finally, the manga remembers that good old Franky exists, and he reacts in confusion at all the explosions going on with the Mumas and giant Loki dragon causing explosions and shit. And rather randomly, Lillith opens up the massive sci-fi briefcase containing Vegapunk-prime's body... and reveals a bunch of upgrades for Franky. These 'Omni-Drain Converters' is an upgrade for Franky. Lilith uses the ODC to absorb the heat from the burning school, and converts them into 'Super Vega Cola', and she says that Franky's body is actually more advanced than the Pacifistas... and he's just gimping himself by only using cola to power himself. 'Fuel is passion', Lilith says, and the converters will help that. 

This is a rather low-key and random upgrade for Franky that, to be honest, feels like it should've been given to him in at the end of Egghead -- an arc where Franky, despite being the science guy in the science arc, did... next to nothing. Giving Franky this upgrade rather randomly at this point feels rather strange, but I suppose it is better late than never.

Team Nami, meanwhile, is going around trying to fix the burning school. Usopp disappointingly does nothing but panic throughout the chapter. Nami and Zeus summon a gigantic rain to put out the fire, which seems to work for a bit... until Killingham appears with a gigantic worm-like dragon called the Lindworm that chomps down on Zeus. Fortunately, it's at this point that Lilith/Franky's little ODC drones swoop in and just absorb so much heat that the entire school ends up being frozen. 

Killingham then just unleashes the Lindworm on the library, yelling about how history will be ended and ranting about how the new world will come around. Killingham also reacts at Jinbe's presence, taking the extra line to go 'oh my god, a fishman, I'm disgusted, thank god my mask keeps my air pure'. This ticks off Sanji, who decides to zero in on Killingham for the crime of being ignorant of a Shichibukai, and also insulting his crewmate. 

All of this leads to a three-way combo move as Jinbe unleashes a Vagabond Drill on the Lindworm's stomach; Franky flies up and unleashes a new move called Strong Dexter on the Lindwom's head, and Sanji slams down with an Ifrit Jambe: Concasser on Killingham. The combo move annihilates the Lindworm, and appears to have taken Killingham at least temporarily out of the battle. 

Which... it is cool to see Sanji and Jinbe do stuff. Nami and Lilith, too. It is even more cool to see Franky show off a power-up! But at this point beating up the sleep demons is really starting to lose its luster, and having Killingham just be taken out in one shot without even much of a back-to-back betwen him and any of the Straw Hats feels a bit anticlimactic.

The back half of this chapter deals with the Domi Reversi'd giants. The demonic Brogy and Dorry have finally reached where Jarul is, and their regneeration is giving the generic giants some trouble. And... and rather suddenly, Brogy and Dorry manage to struggle and get back a bit of their personality. It really would've been cool if this was more explicitly tied to the clash that Zoro caused them to do a couple chapters ago, or if the 'struggling from within' trope was actually highlighted a bit earlier in the arc... but this really does feel like it came out of nowhere.

And Brogy and Dorry decide to be in agreement, and then charge at each other and cut each other's heads off with the thought of how warriors of Elbaf must die with pride. It is cool to see decapitation in One Piece... but as the two bodies fall, the Domi Reversi swaps around and restores Brogy and Dorry to their normal state.

Which is a bit of a cop-out, I feel. 

Right, the chapter ends up with Zoro standing in front of Dorry, Brogy, Hajrudin and Stansen as they face of against the army of Domi Reversi'd giants, realizing that all they have to do is to cut off all their heads or run them through the heart, dealing fatal damage... and the giants all grin as they all say that it's totally a shame that they are so forced to go all-out against their comrades, being a joke about their war-happy mentality. 

But again, I still feel like this resolution is a cop-out, and not done especially well. There is a world where the exact same plot twist is done and I would've liked it, and that would either have this reverse-the-reversi plot twist be actually foreshadowed. That either the personas of Brogy and Dorry are fighting from within; or that there's even a way to spin them around. Or you could go the dramatic way, and have the clash with Zoro (or Hajrudin, or Jarul, or Luffy, or anyone else) actually shake them and be the catalyst to remind them of their true selves. As it is, we've got the confused clash a couple chapters back that you might squint and look at them remembering their history of being battle partners for years... but it really does come so sudden.

And it's not a particularly exciting plot twist since ever since Loki and Luffy arrived (alongside Zoro and Sanji), we kind of lost most of our tension against the bad guys -- the good guys are so overwhelmingly in the advantageous position that it's not really even funny anymore, and with the very first things they did is to instantly give us the solution for the two separate hostage groups (the kids and the mind-controlled giants) it's not the best. I really get the feeling like they're just rapidly trying to wrap up Elbaf after the God Valley arc went a bit long.

Random Notes:

• I will review the live-action Netflix second season... eventually. A lot on my plate at the moment, and I'm still trying to tidy up some of the outstanding articles that I haven't finished yet. But it will come at some point. Maybe mid-year or something. I think it's a bit too late for me to try and catch that 'wave' of attracting new readers, and that's exhausting anyway.
• It is interesting that Killingham is the only one of the God's Knights so far to actually wear the astronaut bubble suit. Gunko's weird, sure, but it is interesting that the Gorosei, Shamrock and even Shepherd doesn't care enough to be all disgusted by the lower folk and wear the masks.
• Oh, Brogy's left arm is still gone, so injuries sustained outside of Domi Reversi isn't restored. Kind of a Bleach-y handwave, though, using amputation as a substitute towards actual lasting death. I do like that Brogy later straps a shield to the stump of his hand. 

One Piece 1175 Review: Lightning Dragon

One Piece, Chapter 1175: Niddhoggr

A pretty simple chapter, this one, due to the two-page spreads, and how a lot of this is chapter is action scenes. For the most part, the chapter takes care of just getting rid of Summers, but the last couple of chapters have been excellent at making Summers really hateable!

We start off with a brief recap on the 'B-team', with Sanji freeing Robin from her thorn bindings. It is a bit annoying that the rest of the Straw Hats haven't tried to do anything productive just yet, even though the tension is slowly winding down with how we're very quickly running out of threats not named Imu. 

We get a brief showcase of the giant children and their wounded parents recovering from the fall, while giant dragon Loki is going around chomping up the dream-monsters. Luffy and Zoro hvae a brief catch-up and note that they basically have things under control... until Summers shows up with several thorn-vine-dragons with cannons in their mouths, firing thorns at the wounded Oimo and other parents.

Summers rants and demands they give back his 'emotions'... but then the kids line up in front of their parents, ready to take the blows in their stead, and Summers essentially hate-gasms one more time as he realizes the kids dying is going to be as sadistic as he wants to. But Zoro zips in and knocks away the thorns, while Luffy does a badass pose of jumping into the sky and grabbing a lightning bolt, and we get a 'Gomu Gomu Dawn Thor Rifle', unleashing a gigantic lightning punch. 

Being an immortal enemy, we get a particularly brutal shot of Summer's head being torn in half with his teeth falling out. It's comical and brutal, and a very much needed shot after all the nonsense Summers has been pulling. Summers falls down... and gets swatted and stomped on by Loki almost like an afterthought. Ripley and the other giants react at Luffy's Nika form, and the thorns around the children falls off. 

Gaban gets a brief flashback as we learn about the fruit, which is the mythical Ryu Ryu no Mi, Model: Nidhoggr. Jarl explains to Gaban and Shanks that the mythical dragon fruit has a different maximum size depending on who eats it, explaining why an ancient giant is noted to be able to use it to its maximum potential. There's a nice little graph comparing the dragon sizes for a human, giant and ancient giant, too, which is cute. 

Jarl also gives some backstory about how this fruit was wielded by their Warrior God (which might just be the titular Elbaf himself) who wielded Ragnir and was accompanied by his ice squirrel Ratatoskr. Ratatoskr is from the real-world Norse mythology! Jarl notes that Ratatoskr chose to inhabit the Warrior God's weapon Ragnir, waiting for his return, and I'm not 100% sure if this is just the process that Vegapunk artificially embeds Devil Fruits, or if this is something completely different. 

We then continue on for a couple of large panels as Loki unleashes 'Thorheim', a gigantic lightning nuke that vaporizes all of the Mumas. Luffy and Ragnir celebrate... while Imu reacts, floating in Gunko's form but also 'seeing' the events from her room in Marie Geoise, recognizing Nidhoggr and narrowing her eyes. Yeah, I do think Imu might want to make Loki/Nidhoggr a deal he can't refuse, otherwise this arc really does feel like it's otherwise so overwhelmingly in the good guys' favour. 

Pretty nice action chapter with some context and explanations. Simple and sweet.

Random Notes:

• Will be traveling for the next couple of weeks, so no live One Piece updates. I have a bit of a backlog of D&D and Marvel-TV stuff to talk about, though. 
• Gear 5th Luffy is in his 'giant' form throughout all these scenes, something that I don't think really registered with me until this chapter. Loki is just so big that I keep forgetting the scale until we see Luffy looming above Zoro. 
• 'Thorheim' isn't a real realm from Norse mythology, so I guess Loki's realm attacks don't have to correspond to the Nine Realms of Nordic myth. 
• 'Nidhoggr' is written with the kanji for 'thunder dragon'. 
• The official translation parses it Niddhoggr, but I've been calling the mythical dragon 'Nidhogg' or 'Nidhoggr' for years now, so.
• This chapter also confirms that Imu's main body is still in Marie Geoise, and she/he didn't actually physically arrive in Elbaf. 

One Piece 1174 Review: Níðhǫggr

One Piece, Chapter 1174: The Strongest Thing in the World

Unfortunately, we do not get any more Brook. I am slightly, ever so slightly, upset.

This is a really good chapter, though, all jokes aside. And a good chunk of it has to do with the giant children, which is not something I expected to write in this story. But the matter of the fact is, even though Colon is the only character to really have any significant amount of time, the random little quirks that Oda has given to the little cluster of kidnapped children every time we cut to them did do enough to make each of them somewhat distinct that when Oda ends up pulling on the foreshadowing triggers, it works.

We start off where we left off with Summers briefly panicking that he destroyed the ship... but then we get Summers going absolutely ballistic with being delighted at realizing that he's about to witness a lot of misery and suffering as the children walk off to their deaths right in front of their parents. I'm not going to belabor the point, but god damn, Oda did a great job at making Summers' face really, really despicable as he laughs in what's essentially an orgasmic face as he sees the desperation among the giants. 

Summers starts speaking and taunting everyone over a megaphone, and we get to see some of the interactions between the parents and the children. Oimo, good old Oimo, tries his best to rescue his granddaughter the way that Saul and Robin did, but gets his hand impaled for his trouble, and dragged on the ground. The kids continue to cry and think that they're being punished, or that this is karma for disobeying their parents, while the parents are panicking and trying their best to save the kids. 

We've got some typical misbehaviour, but Colon gets a neat moment where Ripley scolds him for bullying another child; and Oimo's grandson is angry at Oimo for being part of the 'barbaric pirates'. Nice little moments. Colon tries his best to hold his composure... but he is still just a kid and breaks down crying at the end of the pier. Ripley kneels down in front of him and hugs him, and we get a scene of all the thorns piercing through Ripley's body but without a shred of showcase of pain in her face. 

And Ripley is just there with a smile, knowing that there's not a thing she could do to save her son... but she is going to be there, to be calm with her son, to make sure that he doesn't die alone. ALL the parents (or grandparents) do this. We get a nice short moment from Ronja (the Pollyanna kid) whose father praises her for being so brave, and Bent (the kid whose greatest fear is his mom) apologizes to his mother... who is happy to be treated as 'scary' if she can keep her son safe. The orphan Johanna is jealous for a bit... before Ange, the teacher, rushes in to hug her.

Oh, and Bjorn, Rodo's younger brother, regrets being ashamed of his nerdy brother, right as Rodo jumps in to grab him and fall alongside the rest of the children. 

Again, all of these built up on nice little lines here and there of foreshadowing for minor characters, and the juxtaposition with Summers' nasty laughing face is genuinely well done. 

...of course, Oda's not going to kill a bunch of children like that. But the buildup is great. They fall on a white layer on a black landscape, which seems to be intentionally drawn to look disorienting and confusing. The white layer is evidently Luffy, who boasts about this being his 'Gum Gum Tummy Cracker' or whatever, and we get a conversation between Luffy in his Nika form with an angry eyeball that is clearly Loki. Loki insists that he is The Destroyer, who wants everyone off his back to not hinder his fighting. 

And we build up, of course, to the reveal of Loki's true devil fruit form. It starts snowing. Lightning and thunder rock the land. Far away, Elder Jarl and his bodyguards hear the Nika drumbeat, and Jarl starts talking about a prophecy about the arrival of Sun God Nika... and we get a glorious two-page spread of a jet-black dragon with glowing eyes, bursting through the canopy and knocking away the giant Mumas. Luffy and Ragnir are standing on his head, dwarfed by the sheer size of Loki in his beast mode, and... and Mumas are just being thrown around like dolls. The sheer scope of Loki is just insane, since we've seen that the Mumas are already giants to the giants. 

So yeah, after a bit of teasing, we finally get to see Loki's beast form. It's not Fenrir! It's not a serpent, a squirrel or an eagle either, and I am quite happy that we're playing Loki's monster form completely straight. Just a cool, badass, monster dragon... and the size, too! Very excited to see what's going to come out of this. 

Random Notes:

• In his flashback, Colon has... an Emet toy? I... what? 
• This, by the way, isn't the first Emet toy to have appeared in the story, as Wapol, of all people, made an Emet toy in his cover story during his rise to prominence as a materials producer mogul. What!
• As per how I understand it, Gunko's arrow arrow fruit terminates at the docks, and since the children have walked all the way to the end and fell, they should be free from the Arrow Arrow Fruit, if not the Thorn fruit. 
• One of the mothers tries to bite off the thorny vines, bless her. 
• Killingham gets a brief cameo reacting to Summers's nonsense, but he doesn't really do anything. 
• Summers' reaction about how 'oh, I can pawn off the mistake on the Great One!' is an interesting one. Is it just Summers that's a bit of a moron, or are the God's Knights actually chafing under Imu somewhat? 
• Loki's draconic devil fruit name isn't told to us yet, but with Nidhogg being identified as the name of one of the Muma dragons, chances are that's the one, isn't it? 
• Rodo/Road, Colon/Collun... yeah, I'm pretty sure I mix up which romanization a lot of times. 

One Piece 1172 - 1173 Review: Imu vs. A Straw Hat

One Piece, Chapter 1172: The Elbaf I Admire; Chapter 1173: A Generation of Warriors

I didn't really do a review for chapter 1172 because a huge chunk of it is just a recap chapter, which is understandable considering that we've spent the last couple of months in a very intense flashback. We get a recap on the positions of everyone as far as the Straw Hats, Hajrudin's crew and Gaban are aware, as well as the powers that we are aware of. 

Hajrudin's group arrive on the upper layers, seeing the chaos that's happening with all the dream creatures, as well as the Great Erik, Dorry and Brogy's ship, on fire. Kashi, wounded but alive, catches our heroes up about Domi Reversi. Rodo rushes to save the children, because apparently the cowardly child Bjorn is his little brother. Goldberg and Gerd go with him.  

The second half of 1172 has Jarul pick up a broadcasting snail and give a whole speech exonerating Loki and condemning the World Government as the ultimate villains of everything bad going on in Elbaph's history. As Jarul goes on his speech and explains why he kept it all a secret for Harald's sake, we get a badass shot of Killingham, Gunko-Imu, and... well, Summers is taking a nap, so a badass shot of two of the three villains, at least. Jarul tells the World Government that they are not going to be anywhere as patient as Harald was, and that Elbaph is now an enemy of the World Government. 

Most of the random generic giants fighting against the dream monsters cheer in agreement, and Usopp goes super-wild as he gets excited that the Elbaph he loves is back. Yes, Usopp, maybe, hopefully, you'll do something this arc, then? The chapter ends with the demonized Dorry and Brogy almost reaching Jarul; while Zoro, Hajrudin and Stansen arrive at the scene. Zoro has a plan, and that's the cliffhanger. 

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(That cliffhanger didn't amount to much, by the way, Zoro's plan seems to just be slashing the giants, which is basically business as usual for ol' moss-head)

There is a brief discussion as Hajrudin and Stansen tell Zoro that while they understand that some fighting is inevitable, a bunch of random Domi Reversi'd Giant Warrior Pirate crew members take notice of them and start mocking their dreams of uniting the other giant tribes in the world. Mocking dreams? Them's fighting words! Something snaps in Hajrudin and Stansen and they just yell at Zoro to do it. 

Zoro hops on top of the heads of the Reversi'd giants, avoiding the, well, reversi game piece thing. Hajrudin and Stansen, meanwhile, go around the crowd. Zoro unleashes Three Sword Style Secret Technique: Crossing of the Six Paths, taking out a bunch of the weaker giants. Cool! We haven't seen rokudo no tsuji since Fishman Island! Zoro finds himself in the middle of Dorry and Brogy's attacks, both of whom swing down at him... and the art is a bit unclear here. Zoro seems to propel himself down by slamming the air (something he did in Wano and Thriller Bark), and this causes Dorry and Brogy to attack each other, slicing off each other's shields. 

Now if Zoro's plan is to get the two of them to fight each other, it would make sense, especially for Zoro, who has witnessed Little Garden. But the close-up to Zoro's face after he witnessed the two giants clash is one of confusion, which... confuses me. Was that not intended by Zoro? That doesn't really make sense.

But I don't really care, because the coolest part of this chapter is Brook. Brook, who has been squirming away like a caterpillar to reach Gunko... and he starts calling at Gunko by her real name. "Princess Shuri". Brook then goes on a bit of a rant saying things we already know -- Gunko looks familiar to someone from Brook's past, sharing features like the eyes and the love for his music... and even if Gunko wasn't Shuri, she would share blood. 

But then instead of missing a daughter-figure or someone he is fond of... we get a zoom-in to Brook's angry face, something we don't really see a lot from this skeleton man. "I had hoped to go the rest of my life without having to think of you again!" Brook actually hates Shuri/Gunko, and there was a huge schism caused by Brook thinking that Shuri killed her father, who Brook identifies as a man that he had 'owed everything to'. So that does fit a lot of the questionable decisions that Brook never brought a daughter-figure up and never looked for her. He actually hates Shuri. 

Of course, what seems to be the simple answer was is that Shuri probably got Domi Reversi'd or entered into an Abyssal Covenant, causing her to be taken over and used to kill her father the king. With one of Gunko's few flashback panels having her cry while yelling father, it's a safe enough assumption. 

Brook continues to yell at the 'patricidal princess', while Gunko/Shuri has her own inner confused fight with Imu, who is attempting to re-establish control. 'Shuri' regains control of her body for a short enough period of time to yell at Brook to run, and does something with her arrow powers to let go of the arrow powers. This isn't enough to affect the children, but Brook manages to get most of his body out, and more importantly so does Usopp and Nami's group (except for Robin, who is trapped by Summers instead). 

Brook doesn't get all of this mind-control stuff and is still  riding the high on finding a person that he hates with all of his nonexistent guts. He yells and demands to know who the figure before him is... and IMU charges and slams her trident onto Brook, who blocks it with the random Elbaph shield he has. Imu is just yelling and demanding to know who Brook is to Gunko, but Brook, Soul King Brook, Humming Brook, Straw Hat Brook... stands firm. Blocking, not for the first time in the series, a god-like being way more powerful than what he should be facing. 

I am sorry, I did not expect coming into this arc to have motherfucking Brook, my favourite Straw Hat, get both a second backstory and the honour of actually facing off against potentially the final villain of the series. You fucking go, Brook. 

Anyway, Summers is sitting on top of the giant kids and is mocking them, while Colon is just being defiant as usual. The other kids panic, while Summers is about to lead them into their ship, mocking that this is the last time they'll see their homeland. The group of mothers (and Oimo) finally catch up, but they are interrupted by one of the Mumas, specifically the God of Destruction Nika. However, despite some fear from the kids, the mothers just pull out their weapons and start hacking the Nika apart. They still have warrior's blood within them, after all, and they are also going to get their damn children back. 

As the Muma Nika starts stabbing the ground, Rodo, Gerd and Goldberg arrive. The three of them do a combo attack, their own version of Ikoku and Hakoku called Three Generals: Gokoku Sovereignty. I guess it's just an Elbaph thing that when you swing multiple weapons together, you just create a destructive beam of force. The fake Nika gets blown off towards Summers, who instinctively creates a giant thorn-club to bash the fake Nika away... and the fake Nika smashes and destroys the getaway ship. This gives us a hilarious Summers expression, and I am completely okay, by the way, of the direction that Summers is basically this arc's punching bag. 

Anyway, really like the Brook stuff. The Zoro stuff is fun, too, but I really wished I was a bit more clear on what is going on. 

Random Notes:

• I don't think I quite realized that the little lifts that carry people up and down the different Elbaph realms are shaped like two boats arranged like hamburger buns. 
• Goldberg briefly floats the idea of eating the God's Knights to stop their immortality. Goldberg's shield being mysteriously tied to Big Mom, this is... a rather scarily morbid little suggestion from him. Mind you, I don't believe that this would work; I've seen characters like Wolverine just tear their way out of being eaten by large monsters or whatever. 
• No sign of Franky (or Bonney, or Lilith), even though Ripley is there with the mothers group. 
• Sadly, Brook as a father is most definitely not a thing now. If the twist that Brook actually hates Shuri wasn't so good, though, I would probably be a bit more upset. 
• We have known for near a decade now that Brook's backstory involves him as the leader of a 'battle convoy' of a 'certain kingdom'. If that kingdom has been wiped out or assimilated by Imu in some way or form, it kind of makes sense that it was never name-dropped, I guess. 
• One question is how Gunko got the surname of Manmeyer. Did Imu just get that particular Celestial Dragon family to adopt Gunko? 

One Piece 1171 Review: Back to the Present

One Piece, Chapter 1171: Ragnir

A bit of a delay on my part due to some IRL issues, but we got a break week anyway so that turned out all well and good. We finally return to the present day storyline, with the flashback story being wrapped up in this chapter.

With Harald dead from the events of last chapter, we get a denouement as the chapter pans across the destruction and death throughout the castle, and Gaban notes just how hopeless the fight would've been if Loki and the 'treasure of Elbaph' wasn't there. Shanks gets to thinking about Harald's optimism, and gets a bit frustrated. Gaban stops Shanks from... hurting himself or whatever he was going to do, and tells him to quit his bad habit: 'don't you dare regret your birth'. Gaban tells Shanks to keep a level head, while Shanks is quite rightfully outraged about Harald's death and what he could have done to prevent it. 

We get a great half-page spread of Loki crouching over Harald's body, with the flames obscuring Harald's upper half, which I thought was a really strong panel. Loki is quite upset at his father's death, muttering about how it's "a joke" that this is what he gets for loving his country. Loki then tells Jarul,  Gaban and Shanks that he's going to take all of the surviving soldiers (so there are survivors) and that he is going out to sea. As everyone reading the Harald/Loki fight surmised, despite Harald's wishes, practicality reigns here and no one would believe that Loki would be the one to succeed Harald's wishes. Loki swears the room to silence as he goes off to sea, intending to avenge his dad. 

While this is going on, we get a last cutaway to Imu's mansion in Marie Geoise. Imu is shocked that an ancient giant of Harald's strength, empowered by the Abyss, was killed in Elbaph. Imu then prevents the Gorosei from sending more God's Knights to Elbaph to investigate, which explains why they've only investigated in the present day due to... whatever is going on in Mary Geoise thanks to the Revolutionaries. Interestingly, Imu notes that performing the covenants exerts a toll upon Imu, an interesting caveat to the otherwise game-breaking powers. 

Imu then gives a recap of basically what Loki has described, noting that Harald's views, as an eccentric and heretic, would lead to destabilization if he actually joined the World Government. And it was such a shame that Harald was lost, since he was such a unique pawn... but Imu doesn't seem to be too surprised by it, finishing his little speech that "Elbaph is of the D." and that they are incompatible in the first place anyway. 

And this is where we cut back to the present day. 

Loki was yelling at Hajrudin, asking what he should've done, whether he should've undid everything that Harald has done just to 'tell the truth'. It is a typical bit of getting everyone on the same page, and it was something that was going to be done either way, but I really love Hajrudin and Luffy's expressions as Loki and Gaban are talking about them. 

Hajrudin unlocks Loki's chains, and the two brothers have a little warrior's reconciliation, even if Loki isn't exactly smiling at it. It's a nice little moment in the midst of conflict. The rest of the chapter has one of the Mumas, the Draugr, fall down from the upper realm and start rampaging. Loki yells at everyone to go up -- and everyone does, basically, including the wounded Gaban. Luffy stays behind to see how Loki fights, and he lifts out the squeaking Ragnir... and bashes the Draugr with an attack called 'Nifflheim', freezing the giant solid. Okay! So presumably Loki/Ragnir is going to have an attack for each of the seven realms of Norse mythology!

Random Notes:

• This whole discussion about Shanks regretting his birth and that being his bad habit is quite interesting because that line of character thinking is something I associate with a different mentor figure to Luffy, which is Ace. Now Ace and Shanks's parentage, as far as the audience is concerned, is wildly different. Ace was born from Roger, while Shanks was born of the Celestial Dragons. It is quite different, and it is something that I do hope the story will draw parallels between. 
• I absolutely agree with Loki and co's decision, because no one is going to trust Loki and he's not the right temperament to be a king anyway. I don't agree with their decision not to inform Hajrudin at all. 
• Loki notes that he can 'fly up', which... may be a hint about his devil fruit powers? 
• The pre-flashback stuff has Gaban note that he's going to stay down in the lower realms with Chopper looking after him, but I guess the choreography got changed around a bit with how we had a oddly extended sequence of Gaban requesting Chopper and Sanji bringing him up with the rest of the fighters. 
• It would appear that the thunderbolt was probably one of Ragnir's powers, presumably 'Asgard' or 'Vanaheim' or one of the upper realms. 

One Piece 1169-1170 Review: Ratatoskr

One Piece, Chapter 1169: My Death Cannot Come Soon Enough; 1170: Contradictions

I couldn't get the review to 1169 in time, but to be honest it's just a bit of a remix of chapter 1152 (where we saw the event from Loki and Jarul's POV). 1169 tells it more from Shanks/Gyaban and Harald's perspectives respectively. 

It starts off with Shanks and Gyaban discussing the existence of Portgas D. Ace, so they at least knew that Roger's son exists... but Gyaban also notes that Ace and Buggy were 'more' of the Roger Pirates' children than the bloodline son. And it's a nice nod to the themes explored with Ace, with Gyaban telling Shanks that the King of Pirates isn't a position tied to bloodline. It's a nice little nod, even if Gyaban's line about those who have greatness expected of them fail to achieve that expectation. 

Harald spends a couple of pages reflecting on the Deep Sea Covenant, even as he slowly loses his mind to it... and also falls into despair as he realizes that a huge chunk of his life is now essentially all for nothing as every sacrifice he has made is doomed to go down the drain as he is soon to be nothing but Imu's mindless puppet. He keeps yelling and asking the guards to kill him, and for their credit the guards actually do -- it's the scene we see in 1152 with like twenty guards impaling Harald... but Harald just regenerates, and bashes all the guards aside with his swords, alternating between yelling for help and fully being transformed into Imu's minion. It's less mind-control and more 'mind-warping', since Harald ends up being turned into an evil version of himself instead of merely being a mindless zombie or an extension of Imu. 

While all of this is going on, Shanks explains to Gyaban about the contracts. Apparently at some point Shanks did talk to Harald away from Marie Geoise, because the Shallow-Sea Covenant is something that only has real effect when one is close to Imu... while each succeeding covenant giving powers. Shanks confirms that the second level, Deep-Sea, gives the superhuman strength, the undying body and the ability to use the Abyss teleportation... at the exchange of being able to hear Imu's voice over distances. 

Ultimately, this is when Shanks and Gyaban feels the giant Conqueror's Haki clashes from the castle as Loki and Harald clash. Loki and Jarul are completely confused, while guards are being slain (and we do know they die) left and right. Harald, in the throes of lucidity, tells Loki and Jarul to inform everyone in Elbaph about what has happened in the royal throne room, essentially happy to take the blame for everything and go down as the worst king in Elbaph history, one who nearly sold the giants to the World Government as slaves. Of course, we know how the story goes in the present day and this particular official stance of history was never written down, so it's curious whether Jarul and especially Loki decided to keep 'Harald as the wise old king' story willingly or unwillingly. 

Harald asks Loki to eat the sacred devil fruit of Elbaph, and to kill him and take the throne. The only thing that matters to Harald is Elbaph's future, not his own reputation. Some really great artwork of Loki's expressions as he considers the lengths that his father would go for Elbaph... and a particularly great panel as Harald breaks free and starts tossing guards around. Harald starts killing guards and regenerating and we get some really nice action panels. In the midst of this, Jarul fights Harald but gets overpowered and has his own sword stuck into his head (as we know was going to happen) while Loki runs off, confused at everything that's going on -- particularly Harald's sudden change in personality. 

As Harald goes to pursue Loki... Shanks and Gyaban swoop in and start slashing Harald, drawing blood and delaying Harald for a bit. Shanks and Gyaban quickly figure out what's going on and connect the dots. 1169 ends with Loki reaching the treasure room, seeing the treasure chest with the legendary devil fruit... and get attacked by a flying hammer!
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1170 has Loki confront the hammer... which, of course, is sentient and is the true form of Ragnir; Loki's present-day hammer that Harald was yelling at Loki to 'wield'. Ragnir, like the hammer Mjolnir from real-world mythology-Thor, is a flying hammer and one that can move around independently. In the One Piece world, of course, this means that Ragnir... is an object that has consumed a devil fruit. In this case, it turns into a squirrel!

This squirrel, by the way, is a homage to one of my favourite aspects of Nordic mythology, Ratatoskr, the squirrel that runs up and down the World Tree Yggdrasil in Nordic mythology, ferrying gossip between the eagles on top of the tree and the dragon-serpent in the roots. Now whether the actual devil fruit consumed by Ragnir is a legendary fruit or just a 'regular' squirrel-squirrel fruit... or if Ragnir is a squirrel that consumed a legendary hammer fruit, I don't exactly know... but he sure is a cute squirrel!

Ragnir in hammer mode also has some powers of its own, and dialogue from Harald in 1169 implies that Ragnir itself is a different kind of treasure, and as Loki tries to figure out what's going on, Ragnir as a hammer embedded on the floor is able to cause the floor around it to crack. Harald claims that Ragnir is a being that 'deems people worthy' on whether they could eat the fruit or not, which by implication also includes him. 

Gyaban and Shanks continue to attack Harald, dismembering his leg mid-monologue, and Gyaban notes that people with regenerative powers are weak to Conqueror's Haki Coating. It is kind of a random bit of revelation from Gyaban, but apparently the Knights of God did fight and harass the Roger Pirates, specifically to hunt down Shanks. Gyaban notes that they would just simply 'cut them up' and send them packing. It's... it's a bit of an interesting revelation, but I suppose having a bunch of off-screen fights would explain why the Celestial Dragons apparently just never made a move to get Child Shanks back, particularly with the amount of information network that they have. It's not the cleanest retcon, but it does make sense. Shanks and Gyaban talk a bit about 'fate' as they dodge around Harald's attacks. Apparently, Gyaban finds it particularly difficult to fight a Knight of God that has Conqueror's Haki, which is an interesting wrinkle. 

Loki, meanwhile, gets chased around by Ragnir before standing up to face off against Ragnir, slamming his previous hammer onto the sentient Ragnir and shattering it. The clash wounds Ragnir enough to force it to turn into its squirrel mode, where he cries... and nods and acknowledges Loki. 

Loki eats the fruit... and it seems to be some kind of Zoan? His fingers turn into claws, and we see spikes grow out of his hair or something... but we don't see the full form... but it's implied to be something vaguely wolf-like, making it probably the Fenrir fruit, if we're going by Nordic mythology again? We see the giant glowing eyes of Loki's beast mode, before he charges in and starts fighting Harald, although we never see the full transformed form of Loki with his new devil fruit, as he just goes into blur-lines and clashes with Harald and keeps rending chunks off of his father as Harald continues to regenerate. There's a panel where he seems to be a wolf-man... but then Loki reverts to his giant form. 

When the part of his arm with the Deep-Sea Mark is blown off, Harald comes back to his senses long enough to acknowledge Loki's Conqueror's Haki. Loki begs at Harald to reconsider, but Harald says that he's not being controlled, but that the mark is starting to influence his thoughts as he considered himself a god. As the flesh around his left arm starts reforming, Harald starts telling Loki to get along better with his brother, that he has the ability to lead Elbaph... and Loki starts yelling at Harald for being 'the worst', forcing a son to take his father's life, about being 'forced to do the dirty work. Raging and crying in grief, Loki swings the hammer and a thunderbolt slams down onto the castle and also strikes Harald. 

And as Loki swings it, Harald thanks Loki for being a good son to Ida... and to him. We get a gloriously-drawn scene of Loki slamming the hammer and shattering Harald like a ripped-apart glass painting, and Loki cries through his bandages and screams in rage. And so ends the reign of King Harald, the 'worst king of Elbaph', the 'best king of Elbaph'. One of the more fascinating characters in One Piece and one that ties very well to Loki's story while also being a commentary about so many things. Good intentions. Preserving tradition versus boldly changing the direction of culture. Being roped into a religion, a cause, a cult without realizing the full extent of it. Lots of things to talk about Harald... but also interesting in how it relates to poor, poor Loki. His relationship with his father might not be the best, and 'estranged' is probably a nice word to describe it... but he doesn't hate his father. And he most certainly did respect him. And being forced to end his father and to see everything Harald worked to far get perverted by his enemies... yeah, I'm looking forward to see what Loki does in the present day. 

Random Notes:

• 1169 came with a two-page colour spread of the entire Rocks Pirates as we know them, with all their official colour schemes. My favourite detail is Wang Zhi flipping off Barbell. 
• When Shanks actually did meet Ace for the first time in the Ace novel, Shanks treats Ace fully as his own person -- the position that he introduced himself as: 'Luffy's brother'; not 'Roger's son'. 
• There has been discussion about how Shanks had met Harald away from the Knights of God prior to this, but never warned Harald about the demonic contract... but with how gullible and desperate Harald is, I don't really think that it's something that he would've listened to anyway, since he didn't listen to Rocks either. 
• Also people are angry at Shanks for taking time lazing about and taking a bath at Gyaban's house, but to be fair to Shanks... while he was urgent, he didn't know it was 'drop everything right now' urgent until he sensed the Haki explosions from the castle. 
• Jarul isn't unconscious, neither did he get amnesia from the sword in his head. He's conscious enough to talk to Shanks and Gyaban and remember that they need to stop Harald from reaching Loki... so in the present day, there is a high likelihood that Jarul, in fact, is in cahoots with Loki. In 1170, we even get a couple of panels where Jarul explicitly summons more soldiers to attack Harald and slow him down to buy time for Loki.  
• I know Ratatoskr from Nordic myths, but also from Magic: The Gathering and Marvel comics where Ratatoskr hails from the 'Thor' corner of that universe... but menaces the superheroine Squirrel Girl. Which is genius and kind of hilarious. 
• It's in these clashes that Gyaban and Summers presumably clashed with each other, and Gyaban notes that the Knights of God are surprisingly good fighters despite being Celestial Dragons... the same sentiment that most of the fandom made when we first found out about the Knights of Gods' existence.