#ch554

[opbackgrounds]

Whitebeard has got an underrated trash talk game. You know he got so much enrichment from insulting all the admirals while trying to save Ace

[opbackgrounds]

The design of Marco's devil fruit power is in general very cool, but he's also one of the few characters in the series who seems to have full control over his transformations. Here only his arms are transformed, but later on he'll be kicking people with his talons

It's a nice, subtle way to show his mastery over his power

[opbackgrounds]

this is like Superman-level candle blowing skills on Whitebeard's part

[opbackgrounds]

I appreciate that Oda continues to come back to the normies watching the livestream of the war, because yeah. I'm sure that's exactly what it feels like.

[opbackgrounds]

Mythical creature zoans being rarer than logias is interesting to me given Vegapunk's speculation about their origins. If devil fruits are indeed linked to the dreams of humanity then somehow you have more people wanting to turn into swamp people than werewolves, which I find difficult to believe.

Then there's the added quirk of zoans having animal spirits of their own, separate of that of the user. Where does that come from, and what does that mean for all the zoan users we've seen thus far?

So many questions.

[opbackgrounds]

One of Oda's great, underrated strengths was learning how to draw this specific punch really, really well, and then finding new ways for it to look cool and interesting over the course of a thousand chapters.

[opbackgrounds]

Ax-Hand Morgan is so jealous that this random giant got his arm replaced with a cannon

[opbackgrounds]

For as out of his way Oda goes sometimes to hide the eyes/face of major characters, he'll reveal what they look like at the goofiest times. In two chapters there will be a dramatic panel of Akainu removing his cap before vaporizing a deserter, but the moment's lost because he showed his face in the corner of a random splash page. Sure, he's showing off his power for the first time, but that's not event he focus of this page in particular. Just a strange choice.

But, if we're keeping track of all the ways Oda uses Aokiji's decision to freeze the bay, giving him an excuse to show off Akainu's power certainly counts.