One Piece Diaries #67 – Post-Marinford Arc #1

One Piece is one of the most beloved anime in history, but at over 1,000 episodes, it’s tough for those who haven’t been watching from the start to jump on board. One Piece Diaries tracks one writer’s experience with this daunting rite of passage. With hype for the highs and critique for the lows, this column will help you decide whether to take your own One Piece journey – or let you relive the one you’re already on. It will be updated biweekly every other Thursday.

Episodes Watched: 493 – 504

Before we get into the actual review, I want to apologize for not updating in a while. I took a break from watching One Piece to watch the entirety of Rick & Morty, followed by several true crime documentaries. But I’m back on the boat and I’m ready to talk about the Post-Marineford arc.

The first part of the arc focuses on Luffy and Ace’s childhood. As if Ace’s death wasn’t painful enough, they chose this time to hammer home how important Ace was to Luffy’s childhood. Exactly how many times is this series trying to make me cry?

These 11 episodes were incredibly complex, and there’s no way I can possibly talk about everything, so I’m going to divide my commentary into two sections: Luffy and Ace’s developing brotherly bond, and the horrifying things this arc revealed about the world nobles. Also, I have a couple of random notes about Makino.

We’ll start with the first one. Luffy’s childhood relationship with Ace made it quite clear how integral Ace was to his life. They weren’t just brothers because of circumstances, they actively chose to take on those roles. I’ll admit, I had a hard time with their relationship at first. As much as I understand why Ace wouldn’t feel inclined to trust anybody, the slapstick violence that accompanied his initial rejection of Luffy didn’t really help make that point so much as be just pointlessly mean. I guess as an Oldest Daughter™ I found it a little difficult to relate to such an aggressive approach to a younger kid.

But as their relationship developed, it became a lot clearer that they genuinely cared about each other. I love how they encouraged each other to improve their skills and strive for their dream of eventually becoming pirates. Ace’s ideas about what it meant to be a pirate – that it gave you more freedom than anything else in the world – are what’s been motivating Luffy for the whole series.

The whole situation with Grey Terminal was horrific, but it was an unfortunately accurate stand-in for the real world. People who have nothing and are rejected by society congregate in one place because it’s the only place that will have them. Some resort to harming others in order to gain a foothold, while others try to hold onto their morals and get taken advantage of. Ace steals from other people not because he’s a bad person but because it’s quite literally the only chance he has to make any changes in his life.

I thought that Sabo was an excellent lens to reveal the World Nobles’ more depraved nature. For an outsider, it would all seem instantly horrific and might be too much for viewers to digest all at once. But Sabo had to come to an understanding of what being a Noble really meant. He already disagreed with the way non-Nobles were treated and didn’t want to live in such a stifling environment, which is why he kept running away. But he could have tolerated that if he didn’t learn that the Nobles were planning to burn down Gray Terminal and murder everyone they found “undesirable” – and if he didn’t learn that everyone knew about it and supported it. He was, rightly, horrified.

Most people aren’t willing to give up extraordinary privilege to do the right thing. Sabo’s willingness to risk not just his position but his life to protect the people of Grey Terminal was truly impressive.

Two things about Makino before I sign off. The first is that I’ve seen several people theorize that Makino’s baby is Ace’s. Before I watched these episodes, I didn’t realize how messed up that was – Ace was still a little boy when Makino was 19. I’m praying that the people who believe this simply didn’t understand the timeline – it’s possible since I didn’t get it either. To anyone who still believes that Ace is the father after knowing the age difference, I hope your pens run out of ink as soon as you buy them and that you’ll perpetually lose your phone charger.

The second is that when Ace is leaving on his pirating journey, Makino tells him not to catch a cold. I know that that’s just a thing that people say, and that it’s more general well-wishing than anything meant to be taken literally. But it amused me because I can guarantee with 98% certainty that at some point during his pirating journey, he will catch a cold. Probably multiple times. This made me laugh because I’m an idiot and also because I had a cold last week.

Anyway, I’ll be back next time with my report on the next phase of the arc.

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