#chapter 1129

[badly-drawn-doflamingo]

His name is taking me OUT.

[basedkikuenjoyer]

The quest to become a beguiling kunoichi! Not bad little Tama, not bad at all. Can we focus on this for a while please? I know we won't but it does feel like we just kinda...moved on from talking with Inu about the disappearances. Guess Yams had to go check on another Bork Bro in certified good boy Komachiyo.

Also, Shinobu is back to her more mature, voluptuous self again. Which is kinda weird because we just saw you in the broadcast and that happened while Yamato was setting off. How well the cover story lines up with the main one in terms of time has always been nebulous, but it implies the after effects of Ryo's power lasted like, longer than a week but not much longer. Either way, we understand the value of mature women here.

[basedkikuenjoyer]

Doll Parts

"Yeaaaaah he really wants one, he really wants one a Nami-swan." Hole does not get as much credit as they deserve. Hello hello my lovelies, we are back for 1129. And we'll have a fine time with it. Starting with the reveal of the mysterious Sun God figure. Big props to Tekking for guessing this one btw, I kinda got over the whole OP YouTube apparatus long ago but he was always fun. It's Road!

Who the fuck is Road? One of Hajrudin's men, we saw him in the cover serials. Fitting for someone with that name he's their navigator. And turns out it was worth noting the use of sessha as a personal pronoun (which Sanji acknowledges), because we'll go on to see him using a fair few linguistic trills that give off a major otaku vibe. Or is he a weeb for trying to act like he's from samurai-land? Is Road really just mad that Hajrudin got to meet real samurai? By the way...love that Luffy just thinks the giant Lego room is cool and doesn't want to wreck it too much.

That said...Road sure is one weird fuckin' dude. I can get the basic logic with the Straw Hats. Hajrudin pledged to follow them, that doesn't mean Road did. And it doesn't seem like the way funnier rationale of respecting Buggy more. There was never any real loyalty to Buggy's Pirate Dispatch, that was mercenary work. Hajrudin pledged a son's cup to Luffy. That pissed Road off because how dare a giant swear allegiance to a human. That's a great theme to play with as our time with Elbaf unfolds. And while there is some ambiguity as to what the gang saw when they burst out I'm pretty comfortable with this actually being Elbaf by now. Or at least maybe a Green Bit-style linked island.

What I think is the most interesting about Road though is this obsession with the story. His "living dolls" getting up to heroics. These are two very core themes I've been interested in, we've talked about how they've come up from Totland until now. What I see in Road here is a much darker, much more obsessive version of that immature side of Yamato. This glee at the Straw Hats running amok for the entertainment value, because of the story his "dolls" are telling all their own, has a lot of room to build some cool thematic ties to Wano. So we'll keep an eye on that going forward.

Meanwhile, Nami is not too happy about the second weird guy on this voyage to doll her up in a lil outfit. The sleeping gas belt and the crow picking them up are pretty interesting justifications for how this happened. I'm wondering what that'll mean for the rest of the crew still with the main giant ship. This does also mean part of our objective here will be to locate Sunny. Which is a great excuse to sorta keep things around here. Because like, Road is clearly not an actual threat here. Hajrudin wasn't one at all to Luffy back in Dressrosa. Not wanting to anger the giants and Luffy's appreciation for the craftsmanship of this diorama are good excuses to get around that.

But Nami is different. Nami is the type who will break your Lego castle and release your prized beetles out into the wild without a second thought. And that's why we love her. I also love her two faces here, not to mention her rationale leading up to...

Pull pervy crap, get zapped. Loser. Definitely wonder what we have in store next. Would be very Oda to pull back and update us on the elders in the crew. Or even see something completely different. But for now I'm still very into what we're introducing here. Especially since it has now become somewhat connected to the Grand Fleet. Starting with Cabbage end of WCI, we've now gotten a proper main story update on all of them in some form save for the XXX Martial Arts Alliance and the Yonta Maria Fleet. And Bellamy too I guess if you count him. But that's still proving to be a thing that feels like it's accelerating.

[migila]

Wait, so Oda decided to start the long waited Elbaf arc with a giant playing with a dollhouse? Ooookay...