The Straw Hat crew finally land in the ocean, and figure they need to make repairs to the Going Merry. Since Usopp is not skilled enough, a shipwright is needed. They land of one of a ring of islands. Luffy goes exploring, and he is joined by Usopp and Chopper. They come across a lot of animals that are elongated and look strange. They discover a house with a very tall horse. Luffy attacks some bamboo and is surprised when a man falls down. The man thanks them and says he was stuck up there for a decade. He explains that the animals look so strange because they can be super relaxed on the island. They go into his house after the man is surprised that his horse remained on the island. When they inside his house to eat (food that has gotten rotten/moldy over ten years), his horse is shot. They go outside to find that a pirate, Foxy the Silver Fox has shot the horse and says that it belongs to him now and the only way to get it back is through the pirate game known as the Davy Back Fight. Luffy agrees to play three games, the winner of each game gets a crew member or the other group’s flag, which they can never sail under again. Before the games can begin the players for each game must be declared, and no substitutions can be made. The first game is racing around the island, which after major interference from the sidelines from the Foxy pirates, narrowly goes to the Foxy pirates since before the Straw Hat team (Usopp, Nami, and Robin) can cross the finish line, they slow down because of Foxy’s devil fruit ability, the Slow-Slow fruit. It allows him to fire beams that slow things down for thirty seconds. Since they lost, Chopper is forced to join the Foxy Pirates and the second game begins. Since Chopper was to play in the second game, a ball game where one of the players on each side is the ball, the Straw Hats only have Zoro and Sanji playing for them. After some difficulty and some more cheating from the Foxy pirates, Zoro and Sanji win by working together. Nami points out that if Luffy picks Foxy, they will automatically win the final game, Combat. The Foxy pirates are upset by this idea, but then Robin points out that Foxy would be on the Straw Hat crew, which means Nami’s proposal is rejected. The final game occurs on the Foxy pirate’s ship and is a boxing match where the first person out the match loses. Before the final game, Usopp helps Luffy and finds a wig with a special hairstyle, the Afro. Usopp convinces Luffy to wear the Afro saying it will make him more powerful. And so, the final game is an anything goes boxing game featuring Foxy the Silver Fox versus Afro Luffy. Luffy wins by using Foxy’s Devil Fruit abilities against him. As the final victor, Luffy takes their jolly roger and poorly draws them a new one. The crew go on (some more filler in the anime), and Robin is visibly shaken by a new face that belongs to a big shot at Marine Headquarters, Admiral Aokiji. He claims to only be going on a walk and the Marines were uncertain where Robin went, and he figured she went with the Straw-Hats and can confirm that now. Aokiji shows off his Devil Fruit powers of the Chilly-Chilly Fruit, which allows him to turn into ice and freeze anything. Zoro, Sanji, Robin, and Luffy face off against him and are frozen in some form or another, Luffy and Robin completely frozen.
Thoughts: While the initial set up is tough to get through, it is relaxing to see the crew interact before facing against CP9. The way Luffy wins against Foxy suggests that Luffy is not as dumb as he acts. Luffy’s loss against Aokiji motivates him to come up with more powerful moves, though those moves have severe drawbacks. The first appearance of a Marine Admiral, though a very lazy Admiral, shows that Luffy and crew need to become much stronger if they want to succeed on the Grand Line.
