Episode 867, "Holding Space for Shanks" (with Joel Ruiz and Evan Brando)

Summary

The One Piece Podcast – Episode 867: “Holding Space for Shanks”

Date: May 5, 2025
Host: Maji Media
Special Guests: Joel Ruiz, Evan Brando, Shannon Strucci
Main Hosts/Panel: Zach Delaney (aka Delaney), Vero, Steve Yurko

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Overview

In this lively, freewheeling episode, the One Piece Podcast crew embarks on a special, meme-filled sidetrack as the manga is on break and regular co-host Greg is on vacation. The panel, featuring recurring guests from the Atlanta-based “Do You Validate?” network, dives into a special “Boyfriend Bracket” for One Piece’s DILFs and daddies—who'd make the best partner, father, and, crucially, is the most “fuckable.” The cast also offers a lightning round on One Piece favorites, a no-holds-barred fanfiction statistics quiz (the Yaoi Thunderdome), and an in-depth anime recap.

Tone: Chaotic, explicit, queer, affectionate, and irreverent—a celebration of both One Piece and fandom culture.

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Introductions & Episode Context

[01:02]

• Zach Delaney introduces the episode, noting there’s no new manga; the panel will instead focus on "fucked up gay shit"—jokingly warning uninterested listeners to skip.

Notable Quote

Vero [03:29]: “If you don’t like when we’re weird and gay, just put the episode down right now.”

---

Lightning Round: One Piece Favorites

[05:25–11:04]

Straw Hat Preferences

Evan Brando:

• Favorite Straw Hat: Frankie – “He’s exuberant... maybe dating Robin, got cool hair—but I don't like the buzz cut.”
• Favorite Non-Straw Hat: Trafalgar D. Law – “I love a dumbass and a bad hat. No one is scuzzier.”
• Favorite Villain: Big Mom (runner-up: Buggy—“everyone’s favorite fail son”)
• Favorite Arc: Marineford or Whole Cake (“Toss up, depends on the day, both so good.”)

Joel Ruiz:

• Favorite Straw Hat: Nami – “She hates men, is a lesbian, and just wants money. I respect her. Life goals.”
• Favorite Non-Straw Hat: Bon Clay (Mr. 2)—immediately shifts into “Bon Clay is my boyfriend and Boa Hancock is my girlfriend. We do stuff all together.”
• Favorite Villain: Big Mom – “We love women.”
• Favorite Arc: Impel Down (“Luffy and Bon Clay underground, all the side stuff with the villains—everything in that hit for me.”)

See also:

• Multiple panelists: “This show is pro-women. These men respect them.”

Fandom & Fandom Culture

• Jokes about anime openings, skipping them, and early One Piece music sounding like DDR.

Notable Quotes

Joel Ruiz [06:42]: “Nami doesn’t take shit from anybody. She hates men, is a lesbian and just wants money. I respect her. Life goals.”
Vero [09:01]: “He’s larger than life. Buggy is everyone’s favorite fail son.”

---

The Boyfriend Bracket: DILFs & Daddy Debate

[15:00–93:06]

Segment Overview

• NCAA March Madness-style bracket, power-scaling famous One Piece fathers and older male figures on three axes:
  • Boyfriend/Quality of Life: Would they be a good partner?
  • Daddy Factor: Are they good actual/pseudo-dads?
  • My Dad Can Beat Your Dad in a Fight: Are they strong?
• Panel debates, votes, and roasts each other’s picks with wild fanfic-level speculations.

Match 1: RED-HAIRED SHANKS vs. KOZUKI ODEN

[19:33–43:06]

Vero for Shanks

• Sexy, open relationship energy: “He’s gonna be out there… emperor or whatever, I gotta go run this juice bar and take care of this five-year-old kid who can turn into rubber... I’m fine with that.”
• Lovable & good with kids: “He has his own kid, but he’s really good with all kids, has this paternal instinct.”
• Everyone loves him: “We would definitely get circling back—open relationship. I’d be like, hit up your clown friend, send him my way.”

Delaney for Oden

• Fun but responsible: “He’s a slacker, but he always brings it back—he’s more self-aware than impressions give.”
• Huge found family energy: “A plus dad. Not just to his own, but to a million smaller children. Even cat viper and dogfella.”
• Partner, not jailor: “His wife threatened to divorce him if he stayed home. Good boundaries—he trusts you.”

Debate highlights:

• Fantasizing about bathhouse orgies, supportive partners, running juice bars for pirates.
• Long riffs about the logistics of their bodies/hair/love lives.
• Running jokes about the audience sharing TMI: “Don’t tell me you jack off to Nami. I don’t need to know.”

Vote:

• SHANKS wins (for sex and energy, even though Oden is objectively the better actual dad)

Notable Quotes

Vero [37:57]: “I think Oden is a father, but Shanks is a daddy.”
Shannon [39:12]: “Oden tried to be a much better father, infinitely better. Shanks just left people behind.”

---

Match 2: CAPONE "GANG" BEGE vs. TOM (the Shipwright)

[43:42–61:22]

Evan for Bege

• Ride or die: “He got into a marriage for political gain, but whose side did he pick? His wife’s. Despite being powerful, his priorities are his family—not in a weird Tony Soprano way.”
• Unique sexual opportunities: “He turns into a castle—think of all the fun you could have… Is there a sex dungeon? Absolutely.”
• Good dad: “The only supernova who is co-parenting. He lets his kid smoke. Italian kids are different.”

Shannon for Tom

• Found family: “It’s easier to love your own flesh and blood kid than to take in some weird kid you find in a shipyard, raise him, and teach him.”
• Changed the world: “Built the Oro Jackson, died for his values… massive impact.”
• Big, huggable vibes: “Imagine cuddling with Tom, so comfortable and cozy. He’d treat you right and build you lovely things.”

Debate highlights:

• Accusations about sex appeal (“Are you kidding me?”).
• Jokes about sandwiches, sex, fish smell, and "fish-themed blowjobs"
• A running gag about the size of Bege’s castle and his kid’s cigar.

Vote:

• BEGE wins (for being sexy, unique, a good dad with staying power; Tom admired for huggability and being a great dad, but not enough for this bracket)

---

Semifinals / Final: SHANKS vs. GOL D. ROGER (Joel and Vero go head to head)

[62:01–83:06]

Joel for Roger

• Legacy: “Do you know how much sex I’m getting because my boyfriend was Gol D. Roger? Meal ticket for life.”
• Daddy of all pirates: “How many great pirates came because they were under him?”
• Wild sexual anecdotes: “All One Piece is about is how you realize you’re gay. The real One Piece… is gay sex. The chest is a flipbook of Gol D. Roger going to town on Whitebeard.”

Vero for Shanks

• No groveling: “Me and my man, I don’t gotta grovel to prove anything.”
• Sex appeal v. stability: “Shanks is the kind of daddy that isn’t gonna knock anybody up and ruin their life over it. He respects my bodily autonomy.”

Notable moment:
Panel explores the meaning of “daddy”—whether it’s parental, sexual, emotional, or all.

Joel [69:32]: “The real One Piece...is gay sex. The bussy. A big chest with a flipbook of Roger going to town on Whitebeard.”

Vote:

• SHANKS wins (Roger perhaps more enigmatic, but less emotionally available to the general audience.)

---

Final: SHANKS vs. BEGE

[84:33–93:00]

• BEGE is crowned winner:

  • “If we’re talking about the full picture, I think Bege would be a better sexual partner than Shanks would be a father by far. And Bege is like one of the best dads in One Piece.” –Shannon [92:11]
  • “I think that dependability is gonna be there… I'm picking a man that's going to choose me.” –Joel [91:44]

• Vero gracefully accepts defeat: “Shanks is a good little slut though, not a good father.”

---

“Yaoi Thunderdome” – AO3/Fanfic Ship Popularity Lightning Round

[147:21–156:06]

• Vero challenges the panel to guess which ships have more works on AO3.
• Sample matchups:
  • Luffy x Law (Lalu) has more fics than Luffy x Zoro (Luzo/Zolu)
  • Smoker x Hina > Jinbei x Robin
  • Brook x Sanji > Sanji x Katakuri
  • Whitebeard x Roger > Big Mom x Kaido
• Panel has keen knowledge of both meme and queer fandom cultures, calling fandom “horny.”

Notable Quote

Joel [155:46]: “How many fanfics are there of Bon Clay and Boa Hancock?” (Answer: None, but listeners are working on it!)

---

Double Anime Recap: Episodes 1127 & 1128 (Luffy vs. Kizaru, Saturn’s Arrival)

[97:35–137:38]
Hosts: Sam, Steve Yurko

Highlights:

• Episodes deliver strong action, animation, and direction.
  • Gigantic Gear 5 Luffy tossing Kizaru.
  • Bonnie gets a dynamic, standout battle scene.
  • The horror-infused debut of Saturn’s Zoan form, with “goop and weirdness.”
  • The anime’s fluid direction and rhythm earn praise: “nothing but good notes this week.”
  • The balance between slapstick and stakes is applauded.

Notable Quotes

Steve Yurko [129:55]: “Incredible achievements in action animation for sure… Gear 5 Luffy felt more like how I envisioned him—goofy, but cool.”
Sam [134:53]: “This is the kind of episode we were hoping the break was allowing them to make.”

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Shoutouts & Plugs

[139:28–146:57]

• Panelists plug their actual-play podcasts (Oddity Roadshow, Rift Tank, Do You Validate?), comedy shows (MST3K riffing, Cineprov in Atlanta), YouTube, and Patreon content.
• Vero invites fans to "be normal" when saying hi at cons and promises jello shots.

---

Final Thought: Why Bege Wins

• Long-term dependability, solid partner, “best dad in One Piece,” and a unique sexual edge as “the castle man.”
• Running theme is a celebration of queerness, found family, and One Piece’s layered characters.

Closing Sentiment

Joel [93:06]: “Shanks is a good little slut though—not a good father.”

---

Yaoi Thunderdome, British Boy, and Farewell

[147:21–157:02]

• The episode ends with playful faux-British orphan voices lamenting the end of Yaoi Thunderdome and celebrating “Fujo Friday.”
• Final sign-off and callback to next week’s episode.

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SUMMARY: Major Takeaways

• This offbeat episode foregrounds One Piece’s queer fandom culture, with affectionate deep-dives into characters’ relationships and “daddyship.”
• Capone Bege ultimately triumphs as the panel’s “top DILF,” narrowly outstripping Shanks and Oden on both emotional and practical grounds.
• The laughter, camp, and over-the-top sexual jokes foreground the community’s rule: found family, personal preference, and freedom to be weird—all are welcome on the Grand Line.

---

Recommended Listening:
For invested, fandom-savvy listeners (especially those who love the intersection of queerness, memes, and One Piece). Those looking for deep manga analysis or child-friendly content should check other episodes.

---

End of Summary

Transcript

[Sam]

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[Vero]

Sam.

[Zach Delaney]

This is the One Piece podcast episode 867 for the week of Monday, May 4th. I'm your Zach Delaney.

[Vero]

And I'm Steve. May the 4th be with you.

[Zach Delaney]

May the 4th be with YOU. Wow, Steve, what have you been up to this this weekend?

[Vero]

Disney.

[Zach Delaney]

Never talk about you. Steve. You never talk about that. No.

[Vero]

Me, Steve does not like Disney at all.

[Zach Delaney]

I gotta. I'm gonna pitch you down. I'm gonna focus so bad. And with us today is our fight together, co host, video essayist Marlon on Oddity Roadshow editor and whatnot, it's Shannon Strucci. Shannon, what's happening?

[Shannon Strucci]

I'm excited to be here. It's been a minute. I'm behind on the manga, so I haven't been coming on the show, but I was like, I don't have to be caught up to do this. So here I am with some of my Atlanta friends.

[Zach Delaney]

Well, I, Zach Logan, am not judging you for that. We also have, from the do you validate network GM of critical bits, oddity roadshow SSBadship host of rift Tank in person live, we have Joel Ru, Joel Riz. Am I saying that right?

[Joel Ruiz]

The first one was right. Hey, hey there, One Piece fans. You're gonna not like me. I'll go ahead and give y' all a heads up. I'm not gonna be your cup of tea. I've never. I've never. I've never. I've never listened to the show. I. I stopped during the Odin arc of the. Yeah, during the Odin flashback. I'll get back to it, but I just want y' all know, come at me.

[Zach Delaney]

Breaking cafe for a moment. I'm. I'm still thinking about the comment that we got on that Rift Tank video that was. That called you Gabor Kreischer.

[Joel Ruiz]

Oh, yeah. That was a good one. That was. I love that one. Gay Bird Kreischer was a good one.

[Shannon Strucci]

They were so upset too.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Shannon Strucci]

It's like, why did you watch?

[Zach Delaney]

They were annoyed. They were physically irritated.

[Shannon Strucci]

Like, how did you find that?

[Joel Ruiz]

Didn't they, like, say something too of, like, watch the whole thing? Wasn't for me. It was like, why? It's an hour.

[Evan Brando]

You have an off ramp, sir.

[Vero]

You know, listeners, if you don't like when we're weird and gay, just put the episode down right now.

[Joel Ruiz]

You're not gonna.

[Zach Delaney]

Yeah, you're done. You're done.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah. Anyways, thanks for having me.

[Zach Delaney]

And last. Yeah, of course, of course. And last but not least, we have comedian, podcast host, friend of the show, also on Oddity Roadshow, which makes me think this is just a coded message to Vero to go and guest. It's Evan Brando.

[Evan Brando]

What's up, one piece audience? I hope you like me. I'm very much on the other side of Joel. It's okay if you don't. You know, it's. It's fine. I get it. But I would like it if you liked me. So Joel and I are approaching it for very different.

[Vero]

Your shirt says welcome because you're a doormat.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, yeah.

[Evan Brando]

People pleaser.

[Joel Ruiz]

I was about to say Evan's got that.

[Evan Brando]

I'll say whatever you want.

[Joel Ruiz]

Evan's got that dog in him. That sad dog. Yeah. Evan got left on the side of the road.

[Shannon Strucci]

I did not know that where that was going.

[Vero]

When you pointed out.

[Evan Brando]

I thought you were gonna compliment my.

[Joel Ruiz]

If that was your audition to come on a Do you validate show? Come on. Yeah. Your books.

[Vero]

Thank you.

[Zach Delaney]

Sometimes I'm sexy. Now, just to explain why you're basically watching a Do you validate show wearing a one piece podcast skin like the substance we were. We're off. This week. There is no manga and Greg is doing this wonderful thing called being on vacation. So being that there will be no sgs, we have now kidnapped the show and we're doing all this fucked up gay shit. So like I said. Yeah, like Vero said, you might want to zone out if this is not your bag. But before we get into our program for today, Vero's got some lightning round questions for our new guests.

[Vero]

Circling back to making fun of Steve. I just received a picture of him at Disney World, so.

[Joel Ruiz]

Aw.

[Vero]

I'm gonna be nice.

[Zach Delaney]

I'm gonna be nice. Ice him on air.

[Vero]

I was mean to you, so you get to go first.

[Evan Brando]

Oh, great.

[Zach Delaney]

Yes.

[Vero]

This usually takes a five gazillion years, so we're gonna do this like we're speed dating. You guys have three minutes each. Who is your favorite straw hat?

[Evan Brando]

Oh, favorite straw hat.

[Vero]

And 100 words or less.

[Evan Brando]

100 words or less. I like Frankie. I think I like Frankie a lot. He's got. He's Exuberant. He's there for everybody when he's needed. He may be dating Robin, which I think is a pretty cool thing to do objectively. And he's got cool hair. I don't like that he has the buzz cut.

[Vero]

That's my least favorite buzz cut. Is. Yeah, yeah, I get it. I get it.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah. And he's super.

[Vero]

And he is super. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Okay.

[Joel Ruiz]

My favorite. I. I think. I think I gotta still go with my OG favorite of Nami. Right?

[Vero]

That's the correct answer.

[Joel Ruiz]

Because she doesn't take from anybody. She hates men, is a lesbian and just wants money. I respect her. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Vero]

Life goals.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And if anyone out there.

[Zach Delaney]

That was a test, Joel, and you passed.

[Joel Ruiz]

You're wrong.

[Vero]

Our listeners are gonna love you.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, I already know. I already know. They're like, oh, this guy gets it.

[Vero]

Okay. Favorite Non straw hat.

[Joel Ruiz]

Favorite non straw hat. Oh. Oh, God. Number three. Queer number.

[Shannon Strucci]

Mr. Two.

[Joel Ruiz]

Mr. Two. Mr. Clay. Bon Clay. Bon Clay.

[Evan Brando]

That's objectively the right.

[Joel Ruiz]

I will say. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I will say when I first started watching, I was like, I'm never going to ship anybody. But then eventually I was like, Bon Clay is my boyfriend and Boa Boa Hancock is my girlfriend.

[Vero]

Yeah.

[Joel Ruiz]

We do stuff all together.

[Vero]

Yeah, I think. Sorry. I'm contemplating putting Boa and.

[Shannon Strucci]

In a.

[Vero]

Room together and seeing what happens.

[Shannon Strucci]

Like, kind of fun no matter what.

[Joel Ruiz]

That's a good route.

[Evan Brando]

Queen out for sure.

[Vero]

On the way to Marineford. They would have been.

[Joel Ruiz]

No, no, that's a good. That's a good boat.

[Vero]

No, no, no, that didn't happen. Okay, who's your favorite nonstar hat?

[Evan Brando]

I love a dumbass and a bad hat. It's gotta be Trafalgar D Law, baby.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Evan Brando]

No one does it worse. No one is scuzzier. No one wears jeans.

[Joel Ruiz]

Rest of the show, as far as.

[Shannon Strucci]

I remember, for some reason.

[Evan Brando]

There might be others, but I mean, you know.

[Vero]

I think that scene where we meet him for the first time in the anime and he's like sitting there and he's like, on the crate. He looks like he sells drugs to elementary school, that guy.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah. He's got this vibe.

[Evan Brando]

He's so cool. But he also looks like he shops at Spencer's Gifts and I gotta tell you, pretty cool thing to do.

[Vero]

Yeah.

[Shannon Strucci]

I say Evan has a long cosplay sword in his living room.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah, that's true.

[Vero]

I love that. All right, Evan. Favorite villain.

[Evan Brando]

Favorite villain. We were just talking about this. I think It's Big Mom.

[Shannon Strucci]

Nice.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Zach Delaney]

Hell, yeah.

[Evan Brando]

Maybe Buggy if we include him as a villain, but he's kind of a. He's. He kind of exceeds that. I think.

[Vero]

He's larger than life.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah, he's Buggy. He's everyone's favorite fail son.

[Joel Ruiz]

I do. I do also. I just go Big Mom. Like, it's. It's hard not to.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Joel Ruiz]

We love women. Yeah. I'm sure. I'm sure the listeners of the show love women, too, and respect them. Just like. Just like how you can look at. Look at the One Piece show itself and, you know.

[Vero]

Yeah, these men respect them.

[Joel Ruiz]

This show is a pro woman show.

[Vero]

You know, those guys, they would never talk to lady.

[Evan Brando]

No, they love me.

[Vero]

Of course not. What's your favorite arc? Now you're drinking a Yuko. Well.

[Joel Ruiz]

Oh, no, the. My favorite arc, once again, y' all gonna hate me because I'm terrible at remembering names or anything. When they. When Luffy is with Bon Clay and, like, they're underground trying to pull down. That's my favorite because once again, we got my. We got a lot of Bon Clay in it. I love the. All this side stuff with the villains, and that's one of my favorites. It's really, really.

[Vero]

Buggy balls.

[Joel Ruiz]

Buggy Balls Buggy.

[Shannon Strucci]

Where he's like, you remember my Buggy?

[Zach Delaney]

Remember?

[Joel Ruiz]

Oh, no. Some of the funniest stuff.

[Evan Brando]

That's very Joel.

[Joel Ruiz]

That whole arc. And I, I, I, I. That's my personal. I don't think it's the best arc. That's one of my personal favorites of just, like, a lot of. Like, I don't. I think everyone. Everything in that hit for me.

[Vero]

Absolutely. What about you?

[Zach Delaney]

It's the best in your heart, probably.

[Evan Brando]

Marineford, right?

[Joel Ruiz]

Did something happen in that one?

[Evan Brando]

Yes. Something or whole cake? Probably toss it between those two. It kind of depends on the day. But they're both so good, and they.

[Vero]

Have so much going on.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah, yeah.

[Vero]

Overloading.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah. Opulence.

[Vero]

Do either of you watch the anime?

[Evan Brando]

I have, but I'm not caught up.

[Vero]

All right, then I don't have to ask you what your favorite opening is, because you're all going to say, we are or something.

[Joel Ruiz]

Oh, I skipped the openings on the anime. I'm trying to go.

[Evan Brando]

I like the one.

[Joel Ruiz]

I've never.

[Shannon Strucci]

Trying to get swatted.

[Evan Brando]

I like a rap.

[Joel Ruiz]

Sorry.

[Evan Brando]

I like a rap that tells me what's going on.

[Joel Ruiz]

So funny.

[Vero]

I'm gonna queue up a song when we're done recording, and you're gonna hear the best One Piece opening, I bet.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Vero]

I bet they're from the plays during Water seven.

[Joel Ruiz]

I bet they're great. Our friend Sarashu tells me all the time, because I've told him. I was like, I skip all the opening. He's like, harold, I'm like, I gotta go. I gotta go. Do I like DDR?

[Vero]

No, fuck you. You like DDR?

[Joel Ruiz]

No, you're talking about the dance game. I just am bad at it.

[Evan Brando]

The dance game? Yeah.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I didn't know if we were talking about something else.

[Vero]

Okay. Most of the early One Piece openings, I think, sound like DDR music.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah, it wasn't a.

[Vero]

Which one?

[Shannon Strucci]

Believe in Wonderland.

[Vero]

That one sounds crazy. All right, Delaney.

[Zach Delaney]

Back to me. I don't know if you. I don't know if you've picked up yet. I must have said before, but the current recording setup. The current Joel's walking away. The current recording setup is all four of the Atlanta people in one room. The do you validate? Recording studio, which you should check out, by the way, if you're a podcaster and. Or entertainer in Atlanta and me in my fucking closet in England at one in the goddamn. So if I ever have a delayed reaction, I'm not just like, mentally. No, I am mentally checked out, but I'm also on a video call, so we are. We've got a double hitter of a fun, funky little gay activities today. Just a reminder, though, before we switch over to the next segment, we here at the One Piece Podcast love you as listeners and we appreciate whenever you guys share your support with us and the things you like. It's not an open invitation for you to tell me anything about your weird sexual preferences. Like, I don't. I have heard too many people now to me directly telling me that they jack off to Nami for me to be like, oh, I want to invite more of this, so just don't leave us alone. Yeah, we don't know you.

[Shannon Strucci]

I don't need to know.

[Evan Brando]

No, especially if it's like someone so basic, like Nami.

[Joel Ruiz]

Right. Also, there's tons of forums where people want to know that you do that. Go there.

[Zach Delaney]

Tell them, please.

[Joel Ruiz]

There's so many places.

[Zach Delaney]

But obviously, you know, just exercise restraint. And if you don't, then we don't do fun segments like this anymore. But that's that motherfuck. What's the word? Disclaimer. That disclaimer out of the way. Let's move on to the next segment. Don't laugh at me, Vero.

[Vero]

I'm laughing out of love.

[Evan Brando]

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[Steve Yurko]

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[Evan Brando]

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[Joel Ruiz]

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[Evan Brando]

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[Steve Yurko]

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[Joel Ruiz]

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[Evan Brando]

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[Sam]

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[Evan Brando]

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[Sam]

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[Joel Ruiz]

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[Joel Ruiz]

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[Zach Delaney]

Ladies and gentlemen, we are entering the den of debauchery, the battlefield of the bold, the the hall of horniness. It's time for the Boyfriend Bracket round two. This week we've got a really special edition for you. Obviously we gotta start narrowing down our sections. So we're doing DILFs, we're doing Daddies. We want to get daddied in this DILF episode of the Boyfriend Bracket. Joel's tapping his hand there. I'm gonna ignore that. Now, it's pretty straightforward. We just do it like, generally March Madness style. So we'll have a couple rounds.

[Joel Ruiz]

We're all familiar with March Madness.

[Vero]

Yeah, Anime listeners.

[Joel Ruiz]

We all know sports. The hoops game.

[Vero]

I thought it was football.

[Joel Ruiz]

No, no, no, no. Yeah. Sorry. Delaney.

[Vero]

Is it baseball?

[Joel Ruiz]

No.

[Evan Brando]

Well, you have to differentiate for Delaney. When you say football, you mean something very different, right?

[Zach Delaney]

Fuck off.

[Evan Brando]

I just don't want her to be confused.

[Vero]

Sorry. Continue your monologue, Delaney.

[Zach Delaney]

Yeah, no, thank you. Thank you, Firo. God damn the traditions. The traditions are traditioning. So it's just going to be regular tournament style. We'll just work our way up in groups of two until we reach the end and decide who is the best boyfriend. Because keep in mind, it's not about who's the best daddy. It's just about that being a fringe benefit. Now, here are our three criteria for today. We've got boyfriend. Quality of life, which is how is he gonna be as a boyfriend? How's he gonna be as a partner to you? Like, is it like what's the. What's the vibe for the two of you as a unit? Second criteria is the Daddy Factor. How good is this dad at daddying? How much dad power? We're power scaling, but for dads. And power scaling for dads. Thank you. Writing that down. And the third criteria is. And I'm saying the full name here. My dad can beat your dad in a fight, right? In a fight, right.

[Vero]

For sure. Yeah. Because the lady.

[Joel Ruiz]

And this is my dad for sure. Beat a couple of dads.

[Zach Delaney]

And this.

[Joel Ruiz]

The lady. Are you doing, like a trumpet laugh? Was that you or Vera?

[Vero]

No.

[Evan Brando]

Who?

[Joel Ruiz]

Cause I've heard this twice now and I'm so confused. Is it you?

[Vero]

What?

[Joel Ruiz]

Is it you go. Who's doing this?

[Vero]

I think not us.

[Evan Brando]

I think it's me.

[Vero]

They do grow.

[Zach Delaney]

I'm gonna.

[Vero]

I'm. Delaney goes.

[Zach Delaney]

I'm gonna pitch myself off the roof.

[Vero]

First.

[Zach Delaney]

No, it's the Ability Round. Devil Fruit. Devil Fruit and Hockey Plowers are at play in the Ability Round. Yeah, keep that in mind.

[Vero]

Also, listeners, I think we're going to avoid post wano spoilers for the most part. Except I don't give a fuck. So.

[Zach Delaney]

Yeah, there are. There are certain omissions where people are going to be like, what?

[Joel Ruiz]

Oh, I don't care. Okay, you can't. I mean, if you say something, I'm just like, all right.

[Evan Brando]

Where Joel doesn't know any of the characters.

[Vero]

I don't care. All right, So I also don't.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah. I don't know anyone's name, so it's on me. Yeah, what's. What's the stretchy boy with the hat?

[Vero]

Oh, that one's Sanji.

[Evan Brando]

Sanji.

[Vero]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Joel Ruiz]

I love that. Pedro Pascal's gonna play him. Yeah, the thing.

[Vero]

No, what's his name? Oh, my God. Helmeppo. No. He has firepowers. His daddy's Marine.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Zach Delaney]

All right, now. And once we've got those criteria under our belt, it's just gonna be a little bit of healthy debate. Fortunately, we don't need a tiebreaker. Cause it's an odd number of people. Speaking of which, we have. Our first round is just sort of an example round. It does count. But also, like, it's me and Vero because we've done this before and we like to keep the floor open for our guests.

[Shannon Strucci]

So.

[Vero]

Vero Delini.

[Zach Delaney]

Who's daddying?

[Vero]

Oh, my daddy.

[Zach Delaney]

Who's your daddy?

[Vero]

What's Shanks's full name? I just forgot.

[Shannon Strucci]

I haven't read El Buff.

[Vero]

I don't know no, Shanks has a name.

[Shannon Strucci]

Red Hair Shanks.

[Joel Ruiz]

Thank you.

[Zach Delaney]

Red Hair Shanks.

[Evan Brando]

I know there's stuff with.

[Vero]

What I got so flustered I forgot my future last year, you know.

[Evan Brando]

Hang on. His name is Figarland.

[Zach Delaney]

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

[Vero]

But my daddy. That's red haired Shanks, baby.

[Zach Delaney]

And I'm bringing to the table the man who was born to boil. It's Kazuki Oden. The dilfiest to ever do it.

[Vero]

He. I will give it to you. Like, he's pretty up there. If I wasn't going to bat for like.

[Zach Delaney]

For snakes.

[Vero]

Everything that I want to say is ext.

[Joel Ruiz]

Stop.

[Vero]

Stop for.

[Zach Delaney]

For red hair skanks.

[Vero]

No, I was gonna talk about his pubic hairs. So you know.

[Zach Delaney]

Yeah, of course. Okay.

[Vero]

I. You know, maybe. Probably.

[Joel Ruiz]

You know how scars work.

[Shannon Strucci]

It would be funny if Matt. A little one.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Zach Delaney]

So how's. How's the boyfriend? Quality of life. Vero.

[Vero]

So here's the thing. The thing about Shanks. Where do I start? One thing we all know about Shanks. That man's a. Yeah, yeah.

[Shannon Strucci]

Right?

[Vero]

Yeah.

[Evan Brando]

He wears his shirt so loose.

[Vero]

Yeah. I. I think we definitely would have to be rocking with like a semi open relationship in the way where like he's got a job, he's got to go be like an emperor or whatever. I gotta go run this juice bar and take care of this five year old kid that can turn into rubber or something. You know. And I'm fine with that, you know, because I'm my own woman or whatever in this situation. I guess I'm a woman.

[Shannon Strucci]

A specific woman.

[Vero]

And he's.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, that's the thing. A lot of people don't know about.

[Vero]

Making stuff up right now. Yeah. Because God, I'm trying so hard to use normal. Okay. Anyway. To think about. Yeah. So Shanks, he's gonna be out there. But also who's that celebrity that was like, I don't want a man in my house. Like I. He probably.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah.

[Vero]

Don't smell amazing. He'd wash up for me.

[Shannon Strucci]

No, but he smells like green alcohol when he.

[Vero]

When he comes home, he get a little snuggle on. He probably smells divine because you know, like sweat and the scene. The pheromones or whatever.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah, he stinks. In a good way.

[Vero]

Yeah. But he stinks.

[Evan Brando]

Complimentary.

[Vero]

Two weeks. I'm like, are those your toenails or like, is that the fish I have drawing outside? Right. Like get the out of your house. Right.

[Shannon Strucci]

You're not. You're trying to like sell him his for two weeks.

[Vero]

We're not leaving my bedroom.

[Shannon Strucci]

Right.

[Vero]

Until.

[Joel Ruiz]

Vero let him shower in between.

[Vero]

No, we don't have time because I'm probably not gonna see him again for like 10 years.

[Shannon Strucci]

Right.

[Evan Brando]

So your arguments are that you won't see him very much and that he smells.

[Vero]

I'm just making sure I'm setting the scene because I know that these are going to be arguments used against me.

[Evan Brando]

I see.

[Joel Ruiz]

Right.

[Vero]

Because Shanks likes to disappear. I like my piece. I like being able to do whatever I want. Also, I feel like we would definitely get circling back open relationship. I'd be like, hit up your clown friend, send him my way. I don't give a fuck what he was doing in Orange town. We're fine over here.

[Evan Brando]

They have an arrangement.

[Vero]

Yeah, for sure. But the thing about him is we have to be so open because just look at him. He's so lovable. Every goddamn person is like, holy shit, Shanks. Yeah, I love that guy. Holy shit. You know, red haired Shanks. Luffy, that's so cool. That's his hat. That's so neat. He's so good with kids. He is a well qualified DILF because first of all, he do have his own kid. He does. He does have an adorable little girl. Whatever. But even without. He just has this like, you know, paternal instinct. He's really. He's really great with kids. Again, I'm censoring myself.

[Evan Brando]

I've really felt you. You like Spider man style. Stopping the train of thought of whatever you were about to say.

[Zach Delaney]

Force field.

[Vero]

Who knows how to show me.

[Evan Brando]

It was. I could feel it in this room. The restraints.

[Vero]

Thank you. Thank you. And I just, you know, and if. Here's the thing. He's also a sweetie pie. So if I was like, honey, I would prefer it if you weren't fucking a different girl on every island on the Grand Line. He'd be like, you're so right, babe, I'll stop for you. And I'm like, I can't do that to him. I just. It's like, does Luffy believe in freedom.

[Zach Delaney]

For all or not? I thought you would have to share this date.

[Evan Brando]

So you have an open relationship because he has so much Riz that you're like, oh, I can't stop him.

[Vero]

It would be. No, no, no, no. I could stop him. It would.

[Evan Brando]

Do you choose not to. I see. You don't want to deprive other people.

[Vero]

It would just be so, so long. Now I know that he's out there on Elbaf or Whatever. Being like, cave diving. And he's like, back home with my woman.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah. Who's running a juice stand.

[Vero]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. He wants my juice.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Vero]

It's getting real sticky.

[Joel Ruiz]

I. I also. I think you're forgetting, though, the. The. The bisexual loophole, because you just said, I don't want you banging a woman on every island.

[Evan Brando]

You go, oh, he's banging Buggy.

[Joel Ruiz]

Because that's the thing. One island wanna island of man.

[Vero]

Any other. Listen, when he's going to town with, like, Mihawk or Buggy or whatever, I expect a transponder snail video call. He's gonna be like, hey, babe, I.

[Evan Brando]

Got something for you tonight. He's like the guy at the end.

[Shannon Strucci]

Of Back to the Future Vero.

[Zach Delaney]

All of this is made so much funnier by the multiple conversations we've had where it's like, Will and Elizabeth from out World's End. I was a girl pervert for that. I'm like, all right, so just switch shanks with Will. And this. This is the situation.

[Vero]

Who among us, at age 10, watching Pirates of the Caribbean was not like, I wish I could get fucking married on a pirate ship. And then every Dungeons and Dragons character I've ever played since has been chasing that goddamn high, and no one has ever let me do it.

[Joel Ruiz]

I do. I do have a question. Whatever. In this conversation, I wasn't there for, but it sounded like you said there was a specific time you were a girl pervert for something. What I know about you is, is there a time you haven't been a pervert? And I. This is coming from another pervert here.

[Vero]

You know what? I've always been a pervert, so correct.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, we. I could. I could see it in you, Thumbelina. Yeah. Jesus.

[Evan Brando]

Latency period.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah. Too fast to that. But I was like, yeah, because she's so tiny.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah.

[Vero]

She can crawl up on a voyage to rewatch movies that we call girl pervert movies, which were like, oh, this is why I'm that way. About a fictional boy in a book. Okay, Zuko. Oh, girl pervert, right?

[Joel Ruiz]

Oh, Zuko's a lot.

[Vero]

Peter Pan, the live action from 2001. As a little baby, I was like, wow, Peter Pan's so cool. Why does Captain Hook make me make me feel funny?

[Joel Ruiz]

Which. Which one was that?

[Zach Delaney]

Jason Isaac's.

[Vero]

Who are different.

[Evan Brando]

Jason.

[Vero]

Jason's eyes.

[Zach Delaney]

Jason Isaacs is in Peter Pan, and his first scene is him without his hook on, shirtless, doing a steam bag.

[Vero]

They did it for the moms.

[Joel Ruiz]

I got a Google Jason Isaacs. Yeah, can I switch my pick?

[Vero]

We've gotten way too off topic, Delaney. Sorry I promised you a tight 90. It's very loose.

[Zach Delaney]

It's not gonna be a tight 90.

[Vero]

So those are my opening arguments. He's a cutie patootie. We know he's really good with kids. I'm trying to wrap it up. We know that he's really good with kids. We could be sucking and whoever I want. He knows whoever he wants, who his daddy is. That's me. I don't know. And oh, also, he's a trust fund baby. He's got all the money we could possibly want if we need it.

[Zach Delaney]

That is. Good point. Good point.

[Vero]

Also, he's alive.

[Zach Delaney]

I mean, well, technically. I mean, well, technically, Yamato carries on the. The Odin name, so go yourself. I don't know.

[Vero]

He's like 27.

[Joel Ruiz]

Which one is this?

[Vero]

Don't worry about it.

[Zach Delaney]

No, no, no, no, no. You innocent little man. Leave it. Leave it.

[Joel Ruiz]

Who's that little annoying child in Wano?

[Vero]

Do you mean comma.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, that's.

[Vero]

It's my son.

[Joel Ruiz]

Leave him alone. Your son sucks.

[Vero]

Yeah, he does.

[Joel Ruiz]

I wish your son would get eaten by anything that would kill him.

[Vero]

You know, you're gonna get to the end of one and you're gonna regret those words.

[Joel Ruiz]

No, I won't.

[Zach Delaney]

Yep, Delaney's.

[Vero]

Delaney's fine.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, Delaney's fine.

[Zach Delaney]

Talk about your daddy once again, Joel Ruiz. Talking over women. Someone had to pick up the fucking ball, didn't they? The spirit of the boys lives on. Okay, so let's get into. Let's get into Kozuki Oden. Let's get into the legendary Dilf of Wano.

[Evan Brando]

He's got two reasons you should pick him. Peck 1. Peck 2.

[Zach Delaney]

Here's the thing about Odin, is that he's got the slacker Persona. Like, he runs around town and fucks around and causes problems, but he always brings it back. He's a guy who can always bring it back to you in terms of evening it out and. And being on top of things, which indicates to me that he's, I. I guess more self aware than first impressions would lead people to believe. So, like, as a. As a partner, I feel like this is a guy who you get all the fun, but you don't have to deal with all the irresponsibility. Like, he's not gonna be. He's not gonna be coming home every single night. Absolutely annihilated on booze and drugs. Maybe like once a week, but, like, you know, it's not on a work day, so you're probably gonna be fine. In terms of the distance, every day.

[Vero]

Is a work day for him.

[Zach Delaney]

Well, yeah, he's got responsibility. Well, not when he's on Roger's ship. Some days it's just pirating. Speaking of pirating, I will say that I did also recap the ODIN flashback really quickly, just cause it's been a minute. Oh, I've completely lost my train of thought. His wife. His wife. He was gonna go home with his wife and do the responsible thing until his wife threatened to fucking divorce him if he left the crew and came home and stayed with her while she had the kids.

[Vero]

Delaney had a civil wrecker.

[Zach Delaney]

What?

[Vero]

He's got a wife?

[Zach Delaney]

I mean, well, Shanks has Ben Beckman or whatever the fuck, so. Yeah, Shanks is buggy.

[Vero]

No one here isn't in bed. I'm gonna bend. Beck him over.

[Evan Brando]

Sorry, one more time. What was that? One more time.

[Vero]

No.

[Zach Delaney]

Write that down.

[Vero]

No, I wrote it down.

[Zach Delaney]

So good boundaries. The point is good boundaries. I feel like that's like a lot of trust. And he's someone who you like, you know, you can be separated from and feel really comfortable in because he's gonna come back and he's gonna treat you right, but he's never gonna, like completely. He's not gonna go AWOL like Shanks, where we spent like, how many years at a time, like, man, where the fuck is Shanks? A plus dad, Stellar dad. Not just a dad to his own biological kids, but to a million smaller children and even his own vassals and shit. Like, what do you adopt? Cat Viper and dogfella, Kiku, the brother. Like, he's got a whole army of kids. He has a whole family on top of his additional biological family. And he's very supportive and encouraging to their interests. And on the topic of fuckability, I will say that as always, I remain a gray sexual person. And I would have gone with it.

[Evan Brando]

I've heard it, but I think it's Beijing.

[Zach Delaney]

I've heard of beige. I would have gone with that because he's the only supernova with rights to me. But I did look at Odin's massive cans and I was like, you know what? We can make this work. This is a good situation. And that's where I'm gonna leave that discussion point. So I think we've both gone over our. Our main arguments, if anyone has any questions.

[Evan Brando]

I think the. The important thing to note about Odin too, that was not mentioned is I think he.

[Vero]

You're not Supposed you have to defeat the lanyon.

[Evan Brando]

I will later. I will later. I just think it is important to note that I think without the aid of any sort of devil fruit powers, he probably does have the biggest dong because he does not wear pants. And I think there is a reason for that.

[Vero]

There's a whole island of giants.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, I'm aware.

[Evan Brando]

I am including them.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Evan Brando]

But that's why being burned alive sucks so bad.

[Joel Ruiz]

I don't want to start comparing giants dicks to non giant sticks because that's being like, oh, you're not the size of a horse. It's a different thing.

[Evan Brando]

Okay, let me ask. How supportive of your interests do you think these people would be? Because we're talking about partner that is. You know, they say like a relationship can be told if. Or you know, that can be tested the well being of based on how they respond to like bids for their.

[Vero]

I already told you he's letting me fujo out with that transponder snail.

[Shannon Strucci]

Like that's your main argument.

[Evan Brando]

Hypothetically, he would let you out on. He would let you listen to him and buggy having fun.

[Vero]

What else is there in this film that I told you about?

[Joel Ruiz]

Anyway, here's the hard part. I think both of your partners sue each of you because Delaney, as we did say, as you were talking about like being. Being on the grayscale. Like Delaney doesn't wouldn't vibe with Shanks.

[Vero]

But we're saying an objective overall. So you got to put yourself.

[Joel Ruiz]

Oh well then Shanks, slutty little boy man. Yeah.

[Vero]

My other argument is like I would absolutely be like, can you pick me up these art supplies? Or like oh my God, he sails all over. He's alive. He could take me wherever I wanted if I wanted to be.

[Zach Delaney]

We weren't gonna get into that rhetoric last session. Vero J. Christ.

[Vero]

I know I'm teasing you. I'd hop and skip over to like three islands over and then he'd drop me there for a little bit. I don't want to be on the boat full time. I will die. I don't want a devil fruit. I'm not trying to ever do that. I don't. I want to swim.

[Evan Brando]

Are you worried that his relationships with his buddies. Because he's about his friends. It was going to come in between you guys at all. Because if you sign up for Shanks, you're also getting his.

[Vero]

I've never had a significant other whose friends don't like me.

[Joel Ruiz]

Well, you're about.

[Zach Delaney]

See here's. Here's the thing. Wow.

[Shannon Strucci]

What's Lucky Roo like to hang out with? He's kind of menacing to me.

[Vero]

I'm gonna take his ass to hot pot and we're gonna have a.

[Shannon Strucci]

You do like hot pot.

[Vero]

I fucking love hot pot.

[Evan Brando]

I got lucky room with like, hot pot.

[Shannon Strucci]

Lucky Roo with like, hot pot.

[Vero]

And Ben Beckman and I would. Would.

[Evan Brando]

Are gonna what.

[Shannon Strucci]

Go to Hot Butt.

[Vero]

I take him to Top Golf.

[Zach Delaney]

Also go to Hot Butt. You also really hooked up.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah. This is my. This is my. The talk. The toxic person in me is going Shanks. Because I would love to see Delaney and Odin thrive. I would love to see how bad Vero and Shanks are for each other. Also, if I was dating Shanks, I would just casually mention anyone who just made me a little bit mad and get so turned on that they're dead in two days.

[Vero]

Exactly.

[Joel Ruiz]

Oh, my God.

[Zach Delaney]

Odin Also, Joel. Jonah's the same. It's the same shit with it. Like, the only.

[Joel Ruiz]

The only time was actually like, resorting to.

[Zach Delaney]

Resorted to violence.

[Evan Brando]

Have you seen that guy at topgolf? He fucking crushes.

[Vero]

A closing argument.

[Zach Delaney]

Okay, I haven't even answered Evan's question yet.

[Vero]

Okay, I'm sorry. I'll save my. I'll save my nuke for later.

[Zach Delaney]

My nuke for later. If it's. He's alive again, I'm going to come to Atlanta, kick your ass.

[Vero]

Can we just go to like a tea house instead?

[Shannon Strucci]

What's your Delaney speak?

[Zach Delaney]

So my, my counter argument to that is that I think that Shanks is a. I think Shanks is one of those, like, gift giving people. Like, that's his love language. Like, here's pain, here's this. Odin tries to understand, like, Hiori, like when she's playing, like, the guitar. Like, he asks questions and he gets really into it. Like, even if it's not his thing, like, there's always an attempt. Like, you see it with his family and with his retainers, where it's like whatever their thing is, he does try to. Like, he makes an effort. He makes an effort to reach out and see why it interests them. And I'm like, that's the kind of thing that I'm extremely attracted to where it's like, oh, you value me for having opinions about the things I do, not just for doing interesting shit. And to your point that the murder will happen, if anyone lays the hurt, then yeah, Odin's the same. But he's also got restraint. He's not just picking fights with people for no fucking reason. Like the whole Back half of wano. The only times he gets violent is when his wife gets shot and the mob wife gets killed. That's the only time he tries to pick a scrap. And to me, that's respecting women on top of just being based.

[Vero]

I think that Odin is a father, but Shanks is a daddy.

[Shannon Strucci]

Ooh.

[Zach Delaney]

I mean, Odin is a daddy. Have you seen his cans? Vero?

[Shannon Strucci]

I would like to.

[Evan Brando]

He doesn't wear pants again.

[Zach Delaney]

Knockers up and down the red. Like, the red line.

[Vero]

What are we doing? I don't like his hair situation.

[Evan Brando]

I was actually gonna ask Delaney about the hair. Would you try to change his hair?

[Vero]

You can't run your hands through that.

[Zach Delaney]

The hair situ. Here's the thing. I'm not even tall enough to get to the top of his head, so I feel like all the loose shit.

[Joel Ruiz]

The bottom.

[Zach Delaney]

That'd be fine. I can make that work.

[Evan Brando]

That carpet matches. In the interest of fairness.

[Joel Ruiz]

So is it the three of us vote?

[Vero]

Yeah, you guys vote.

[Joel Ruiz]

What do y'.

[Vero]

All.

[Joel Ruiz]

You guys have more questions?

[Shannon Strucci]

It's hard. They're very different characters.

[Evan Brando]

Good arguments for both.

[Vero]

How much you want? As your d jinx.

[Shannon Strucci]

Knocked over my luckily empty mug that doesn't have one in one.

[Vero]

Sorry.

[Shannon Strucci]

We got three att.

[Evan Brando]

This is. Yeah, you're kind of in the splash zone right now for hand gestures.

[Joel Ruiz]

All the pasta sauce up before y' all came over.

[Shannon Strucci]

Get that olive. Turn off the olive oil.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, the olive oil's gone.

[Vero]

All right, so you're voted Shanks.

[Shannon Strucci]

I mean, Delaney makes a very compelling argument. They're just. It's also like my own. It's all my own biases. There are aspects of Odin's character I found kind of off putting. I do think Odin is a much better. Or tried to be a better father.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Shannon Strucci]

Like, infinitely better. So there's a lot of points for that. Shanks has just sort of, like, left people behind and he's got a crewmate who also left someone and he's like.

[Evan Brando]

And I believe in them, though. They're. They'll catch up if they're mad.

[Zach Delaney]

That's the important thing. I really trust them.

[Shannon Strucci]

I do think Shanks, he's like. Or go ahead.

[Zach Delaney]

He's totally the douchebag boyfriend who's like, you know. Yeah. You know, I think it's just better for me that, like, we break up and I think we're gonna grow as, like, better people.

[Vero]

Oh, see? And I'm flaming you in the comments of AO3 right now.

[Shannon Strucci]

I was gonna say Shanks also gave really good advice to Luffy about picking your battles. Like, genuinely, it's. I read the beginning of one piece when I was 12 years old and I feel like that actually psychologically impacted me. So I got Go Shanks.

[Vero]

All the scenes of Shanks being a dick debunked. My man is innocent.

[Shannon Strucci]

All those scenes.

[Joel Ruiz]

Well, don't know.

[Zach Delaney]

Hang on, hang on.

[Vero]

Spoilers for you guys.

[Shannon Strucci]

So I. What's your.

[Joel Ruiz]

Are you talking about this?

[Evan Brando]

I have. I just have one. Oh. So Joe.

[Joel Ruiz]

No, I was just making fun of the show for retconning.

[Vero]

No, they're not retconning any. Anything else.

[Evan Brando]

Don't worry, they wouldn't do that. Oh, are you telling me? I have one question. In the last 20 years, have we seen Shank speak to a woman?

[Shannon Strucci]

Yeah.

[Vero]

What? Yeah. Oh, my God. In the beginning of Elbaf, he's like super cute.

[Evan Brando]

Oh, yeah. Yeah, you're right. You're right.

[Vero]

Yeah. He hangs out with Makino.

[Shannon Strucci]

I mean, Makino has a baby.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah.

[Vero]

He's probably polite to those weird sexy nurses on Whitebeard's crew.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah.

[Vero]

But like, listen, the man loves his bros.

[Shannon Strucci]

I was gonna say he loves your.

[Vero]

Hearsay so much he doesn't have any on his. His crew because he doesn't want them to have to deal with his.

[Evan Brando]

That's a pretty good argument.

[Joel Ruiz]

That's a good argument.

[Evan Brando]

I'm gonna go Odin. But I was curious your take on that.

[Shannon Strucci]

I don't hire women because I said.

[Evan Brando]

I respect him too much.

[Joel Ruiz]

Here's the thing. I don't work with any women because I can't control myself. That's not a good.

[Shannon Strucci]

I think Shanks is just such a likable character and he's Luffy's figure. We all. There's like.

[Zach Delaney]

Did Shanks finance his kids gender transition? I feel like that's a big one.

[Shannon Strucci]

To put on the table.

[Vero]

When did Odin do that?

[Zach Delaney]

I mean, he was supportive. He was Kiku like. And like he's got multiple transphobic.

[Shannon Strucci]

That we know.

[Evan Brando]

That would be crazy.

[Shannon Strucci]

As far as we know, we don't got a trans.

[Vero]

I mean, listen, you know what? Delaney, he probably paid for Luffy's top surgery. That was what marine cord was. That's how Luffy has a big scar.

[Joel Ruiz]

Delaney's just. Just Delaney's fighting right now.

[Evan Brando]

I'm going Odin. But it is a tight race. This may be the tightest race we have.

[Vero]

I got something else that's tight and it's Shanks.

[Joel Ruiz]

What? What? I. I've always said going For Shanks. What's hard about it though, is, is I do agree. I think Odin would probably be a better, more caring partner.

[Vero]

Yeah.

[Joel Ruiz]

And father and father also. Once again though. And I know we're putting ourselves in these. But like, isn't the ultimate question of.

[Evan Brando]

This who is the better partner?

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, no, but I do think it's just very funny because like the points of like where Delaney was like, Odin gets to know everybody, like. Well, of course that's why Vera wouldn't want that because then he would be looking at the real Vero and tell you who you are.

[Vero]

Wait, what?

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, I'm just saying we got a lot of similarities. We like the little sluts that leave us alone. Because I don't want to be. I don't want to be known or perceived.

[Evan Brando]

Don't engage me.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, no, yeah, but I am. I am going Shanks. Yeah, I know. I didn't say you don't know who you are. I'm saying I don't think, you know, you want. Yeah, I don't think you want to part.

[Vero]

Shanks would know me at my core and still come around.

[Joel Ruiz]

Okay. But yeah, I am going Shanks, though, just for this letting.

[Vero]

Thank you. Woohoo. Sorry, Delaney.

[Shannon Strucci]

I think it was just a matter of. Delaney, honestly, you gave a very compelling argument.

[Joel Ruiz]

You gave a good one.

[Zach Delaney]

Okay, so that is Vero moving up in the bracket it. Next up, we've got Evan and we've got Shannon.

[Shannon Strucci]

It's gonna be crazy.

[Joel Ruiz]

Oh, did I get a. Do I get a free win?

[Vero]

You.

[Zach Delaney]

You're. Oh, you've just sort of. That's how grandfathered up to. No, you don't.

[Evan Brando]

You got a first round buy bracket on.

[Joel Ruiz]

No, I meant round one. I meant I get a free win in round one. I don't gotta buy anybody. Okay. I'm. Yeah, I am. All right.

[Zach Delaney]

Okay, opening arguments. Who you guys got?

[Evan Brando]

I think it takes. Any man can be a father, but it takes a certain special kind of man to be a godfather. Yeah, baby. We're bringing the Italian representation to the DILF Arena. Capon Beje is my choice, listeners.

[Vero]

He did the hand I was hoping.

[Evan Brando]

I was speaking in such a way that it was like you can hear.

[Joel Ruiz]

It in your voice.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah.

[Zach Delaney]

It'S me, Bej.

[Vero]

So tell me how this is happening and you're not getting jumped by his wife.

[Evan Brando]

Well, I think that we were talking about the person as an archetype, not am I going to steal this person away from their partner? Because one of the best things about him is he is a ride or die. So I'm just going to go down the. The. The rubric here that we have established for Mr. Beja boyfriend, quality of life. I think it speaks for himself. His track record is that he got into a marriage for political gain. And when it was time to sever those ties because his wife didn't want to, whose side did he pick? I'll tell you. It was his wife, because the man is a ride or die for his fucking wife.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Evan Brando]

So guy, he's going to stick by you no matter what. Despite the fact that he is a very powerful and influential man. His priorities are to his family and not in, like, a weird Tony Soprano way. He seems way cooler and like therapy. I think he does, but I don't think there's any sort of, like, psychosexual tension or anything between him and his therapist. He clearly worked on himself in the time skip because he was a very different man, I think, pre and post.

[Vero]

What was he doing post time skip? Pre time skip.

[Evan Brando]

Pre timeskip.

[Joel Ruiz]

He was just a background character.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah, exactly. Right. He got a personality.

[Shannon Strucci]

His editor was like, you need 12 cool guys.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah, well, like, he. You know what? Like, a lot of men before they work on themselves, they're just like, who gives a shit, guys, you know, this guy, though, now, I mean, he's got a wife. He's got some cool powers. He's got some social standing. He allied with some of the most powerful people in the world. He's got friends in high places. I mean, he's hard to argue with. And he's.

[Zach Delaney]

He's got a baby. And that baby puffs on a stogie.

[Evan Brando]

Well, I'm gonna get.

[Shannon Strucci]

It on my phone.

[Joel Ruiz]

What a good.

[Vero]

Gonna let his child have lung cancer.

[Joel Ruiz]

Well. Oh, I'm sorry. Do you mean he's gonna let his child be rad?

[Evan Brando]

As also, Italian kids are different. They're not affected by carcinogens.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, you can't. You can't, as an Italian, get cancer from the sun or cigarettes.

[Evan Brando]

It's actually more likely you'll get cancer if you're not smoking at a young age.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, he's building his son's lungs up.

[Evan Brando]

Exactly, exactly.

[Joel Ruiz]

I know. I'm not. I was also gonna pick him, so.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah. Also, great fashion sense the man wears. And everybody else dresses like a bum. Are you telling me the most powerful man in the world wears jean shorts? Come on. Where is like, look, let's be a little classier here. The daddy factor. He is the only supernova who is co Parenting currently, as far as I am aware, nobody in the worst generation is making any. Strives to make another worser generation.

[Vero]

They're 23 years old. They're all like fucking babies.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah. And who cares? Not stopping one of them.

[Vero]

This is a man who didn't do anything until he was, like, 40.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah. So everybody's on a different journey.

[Joel Ruiz]

You know how long it takes to spin pasta on your fork? He was busy.

[Zach Delaney]

To do Vero.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Evan Brando]

Also, everyone's timeline is different. In fact, I would say the fact it took him a little longer shows that he is persistent and committed to the things he's passionate about. And look at that. It's paying off for him. So how about that? All right. All right. And as far as dad could beat your dad and is he fuckable? Yeah. The man turns into a castle, obviously.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Evan Brando]

Think of how much fun you could have.

[Zach Delaney]

Is there a sex dungeon? Is there a sex dungeon?

[Evan Brando]

I think without a doubt there's a sex dungeon. That seems like a very healthy and happy marriage. And I feel like having a strong sexual relationship is hugely important in any cornerstone of a. A relationship like that.

[Joel Ruiz]

Now, do. Do remind me.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah.

[Joel Ruiz]

Is he. Does he turn into, like a full size castle? Is that that people can go in and he just, like, fortifies himself as a castle so you're shrunk down inside of him?

[Evan Brando]

No, no, he's like a full castle.

[Joel Ruiz]

He's like a full castle. Can now can he go so you.

[Zach Delaney]

Can explore his body?

[Evan Brando]

Yes.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah. Can you go? Can he go castle, comparative size. Can he be like a little castle? A little cast?

[Evan Brando]

I am not. I think he can't be like a full castle, but he can, like, armor up as, like, a regular size.

[Zach Delaney]

I think full castle is a terrible fucking phrase. I just want to make that this.

[Evan Brando]

Man goes, full castle, baby.

[Joel Ruiz]

I just. I was trying around the specifics. I do. Yeah. Okay.

[Evan Brando]

I think he does call that, like, big daddy mode, though, which is pretty cool. Big daddy mode. Yeah. If I'm remembering correctly. So those are my arguments, and I think they're very strong.

[Joel Ruiz]

All right.

[Vero]

Hell yeah, Shyamalan and ding dong.

[Shannon Strucci]

It's easy to love your own flesh and blood, child.

[Joel Ruiz]

Not really.

[Evan Brando]

I don't think so.

[Joel Ruiz]

It's not.

[Evan Brando]

If you're my mom.

[Shannon Strucci]

It's easier to love your own flesh and blood child that you made that looks exactly like you with a little cigar and five o' clock shadow.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah. I would love a little me that was smarter.

[Joel Ruiz]

Oh, my God.

[Shannon Strucci]

It's a lot harder to take in some Weird kid that you find in a shipyard and, like, raise him as your own and, like, love him and, like, nurture him and, like, teach. What are Capone's values apart from, like, being a dad?

[Vero]

Tom.

[Evan Brando]

I think being a dad is a value. There's a lot to fatherhood. Shannon.

[Shannon Strucci]

I guess Tom, the fish man. Like, it is just, like.

[Vero]

Just the.

[Evan Brando]

Way he said the fish man.

[Shannon Strucci]

The fish man. Fishman Tom. We all know him. I. I was wearing a gala hat once at the Atlanta Mushroom Festival, and a guy got really excited. He had a Tom tattoo.

[Evan Brando]

That's awesome.

[Shannon Strucci]

It was awesome.

[Zach Delaney]

Hell, yeah.

[Shannon Strucci]

One of many one piece characters who, like, died for what he believed in. Died for someone that he cared a lot about. Frankie and I just, like, you know, a lot of one piece also is, like, found family. Some level of ambiguity about Tom's relationship with Kokoro, although I do think they were, like, common law married at that point. Probably. I was talking to someone earlier is because, like, Chimney is Kokoro's granddaughter. Did Tom have any actual kids that weren't Frank? We were, like, trying to figure out. I don't think he did. Anyway, I think Tom. I genuinely think Tom is awesome. Coco loved Tom so much. They had such a deep connection that when he died, she became an alcoholic. It's a big part of the water seminar.

[Vero]

It's very sad.

[Shannon Strucci]

They. It's just like, a beautiful, loving relationship. I think Tom would 100 treat someone right. He, like, respects different people regardless of where you come from. Encourages people to, like, live by their values. Again, died for what he believed in, I think. I just imagine, you know, how, like, in Totoro, they, like, sleep on his belly. I just imagine, like, cuddling with Tom. Like, his limbs are kind of small, but you could, like, he would be so comfortable. Comfortable and so, like, cozy. And I feel like, you know, he's got, like, really, like, also just trying to stop myself from saying anything, like, too risque.

[Vero]

I was just saying I was gonna suck and shanks for 37 hours.

[Shannon Strucci]

He's a very skilled craftsman. Like, go with his hands strong. Like, you think he can make it? Yeah, yeah, that. I mean, yeah.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Shannon Strucci]

But not that he would have, like, a. A castle dungeon, per se, but anything that you wanted, he could. Yeah, I mean, he, like, taught Frankie and FR do all sorts of crazy stuff. Right. There's some. Some stuff going on with Tom that we didn't see also, so I originally thought. I mistakenly thought that Tom was a pufferfish fish man. So I was so excited to talk about how, like, pufferfish create these, like, weird geometric shapes to attract mates.

[Vero]

And the.

[Shannon Strucci]

The female puffer fish judge based on that. That's not real. He's a longhorn cowfish. And the thing I thought was very interesting about longhorn cowfishes is the males typically have a harem of, like, five females. But it seems like Tom was loyal to one woman. But I think if you're open, he.

[Evan Brando]

Said there's a lot of stuff we didn't get to see.

[Joel Ruiz]

That's true.

[Vero]

But he.

[Shannon Strucci]

Well, I mean, cocoros seem happy that maybe they were open. I'm just saying that's an option if that's what you, like, bring some other, like, women around. If Tom is straight also, there's some ambiguity, like, I don't know. But yeah, I think he was, like, a very cool, like, cozy person. I think he had more going on than veggie. Like, he changed the world. He built the Oro Jackson. Like, he did so much for so many people, and it was only because of, like, discrimination that he didn't get further in life and couldn't keep being like, a father figure to Frankie and Iceberg. And, like, Iceberg is also one of my favorite characters, like, because of Tom. Water 7 has one of the few, like, not corrupt leaders in the world of one piece because of his influence.

[Vero]

What do we do about the fact that neither one of your guys has sex appeal?

[Evan Brando]

Are you kidding me?

[Zach Delaney]

Hang the.

[Shannon Strucci]

On bringing their personal bias.

[Vero]

I'm just saying.

[Evan Brando]

Beijing short king. But some people like a short king.

[Shannon Strucci]

Some people like Italians.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Evan Brando]

Very similar people.

[Joel Ruiz]

First of all, basically bringing you a sandwich during. He's George Costanza, that man.

[Evan Brando]

He's going to town on a hoagie. Absolutely.

[Joel Ruiz]

That man is. That man is. Is going downtown with. With. With one hand in a head, and the other hand is hand feeding you a fresh cut Italian hoagie.

[Vero]

You're not supposed to be arguing for them. You have to fight them in battle.

[Joel Ruiz]

I can argue everybody.

[Evan Brando]

I do. I appreciate that about you. I do want to say I don't think it's accurate to say that he had a bigger impact on the world than Beijing, though, because that's just.

[Vero]

Whatever you're going to say is a.

[Shannon Strucci]

I don't know about this one.

[Evan Brando]

All I'm saying is the man has undeniably unfolded some crazy, fun stuff in the world. He helped uproot one of the most powerful women in the history of the world.

[Shannon Strucci]

Oh, feminist. Taking down a powerful woman, supporting his wife.

[Joel Ruiz]

Huh? Yeah.

[Vero]

In laws, you know, yeah, his mother in law.

[Shannon Strucci]

I'm just saying he didn't make the.

[Zach Delaney]

Technically an abusive mother also. Yeah, exactly.

[Evan Brando]

Do you guys like abusive moms? No. Neither does Beijing.

[Shannon Strucci]

Tom's confident enough to leave his shirt open. He's got gills. That's cool. He can, you could like piggyback, ride him in the ocean. Go wherever you want.

[Evan Brando]

Damn, that's airtight.

[Shannon Strucci]

Okay, no Fishman karate.

[Joel Ruiz]

If he wanted you to, would you do stuff with the gills? If he want. If he was into it, yeah. Nice, nice, nice, nice. What's that noise?

[Zach Delaney]

Doing stuff with the gill.

[Evan Brando]

Obviously it was the Foley for doing stuff with the gills.

[Vero]

Cute.

[Shannon Strucci]

Tom's shoes are that man skips leg day.

[Vero]

Do you like sushi? Because you're going to be tasting that. Do that eight nights a week.

[Joel Ruiz]

Don't be getting on this high horse over here, Vero. Miss. I'm going to ride him and never let you them shower until I gotta kick him out of the house. Yeah, yeah. Let your man touch a bar of soap.

[Vero]

Below jobs are gonna taste like two.

[Joel Ruiz]

Day old tuna and it's gonna be consistent themed.

[Evan Brando]

Doing fish themed blow jobs.

[Vero]

Yeah, she's a fish.

[Evan Brando]

Oh, sure. I guess I was picturing like ambiance.

[Vero]

You're either getting sushi or you're getting lung cancer.

[Evan Brando]

Or garlic bread.

[Joel Ruiz]

Also garlic bread. You're not.

[Vero]

I, I, I know what my dad smelled like.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah. You think an old fish is better? Like very old.

[Shannon Strucci]

I don't know how long fish.

[Joel Ruiz]

You got enough saliva and sex juices going. Everything's tasting the same after like, after like five minutes.

[Vero]

Guys, I have a. Do you want.

[Zach Delaney]

I have a question for Evan. I have a question for Evan because Tom's obviously a bit more cuddly, so this one's more for you. Do you think that Peje is the kind of guy who's like only good for one like that sort of thing was like, man, if I didn't have my gorgeous wife then I would be such an asshole right now. Or do you think that he's kind of a chill guy outside of that?

[Evan Brando]

No, I think he's a cool guy outside of it. I think you have to be a cool guy to be a cool captain. Right?

[Zach Delaney]

That's fair.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah. To be allied with straw hat Luffy, you have to have some sort of like coolness. Generally speaking. I think, I think he probably hosts some poker nights for the boy. He's, you know, I think he's a good hang. I do think that he probably is one of those guys who's like, my wife is the best thing about me. But I think he's. He stands on his own. Right?

[Shannon Strucci]

Tom definitely does.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah.

[Zach Delaney]

And actually that's a good. That's a good follow up question, Shannon. Is Tom a good hang. What are you doing with Tom and the boys?

[Evan Brando]

Watching golf. Tom dresses like he watches golf.

[Zach Delaney]

Tom does. The dad stands in front of the television. Like.

[Joel Ruiz]

Does. He does look like he. He has Hank Hill lower half.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah. That man has no butt.

[Zach Delaney]

His ass is concave.

[Joel Ruiz]

If you're pegging that man, you got to put some pads on your thighs. Otherwise you're getting stabbed by some.

[Evan Brando]

He needs his. Oh, God. What's. What. I just watched this episode.

[Shannon Strucci]

Cute little horns on his head. I think hanging out with Tom would be fun. You. If you. I feel like he wouldn't just talk about ship building and crafts, but I would love to ask him about, like, woodworking and ship building. And I think he's like always laughing. He's always smiling. I think he has a really. People like him a lot. Even with how much discrimination is in the one piece universe, people kind of overcame it. Not just because of what he was good at, because of his person. He has a good personality. That can't be. No one can argue that Tom had like a bad personality in my opinion. He seems like a very strong guy. I think he has the best vibes. I think it'd be fun to have a beer with him.

[Evan Brando]

I think He's a G. D.I.L.F. wait. Yeah. Granddad.

[Vero]

Oh, yeah.

[Evan Brando]

A good deal.

[Shannon Strucci]

I don't know how long Fishman lives, so I don't know where he is.

[Evan Brando]

On the grandpa. He's got white hair.

[Joel Ruiz]

Did any of his kids have kids? That's what. Not how old you are. If your kids had kids. That's what.

[Shannon Strucci]

We don't know who chimney is.

[Joel Ruiz]

That is. Yeah. Why are you guys confused about this? You can't be a good deal if you don't have a grandkid. You guys are like, oh, he's old. He can still just be a gulf at that point.

[Evan Brando]

Sure.

[Joel Ruiz]

If his kids aren't getting. Getting it on.

[Shannon Strucci]

Oh, he's got crazy.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Zach Delaney]

That term for this. That exists.

[Vero]

Pissed. Idiot.

[Shannon Strucci]

Super strong is cool.

[Vero]

I know my answer. Delaney, do you know your answer?

[Zach Delaney]

I'm going to wait to see how the rest of this unfolds, but I think I know I'm not.

[Vero]

You have to have your answer because we all have to. That's. Do you have your answer?

[Joel Ruiz]

I'm. Yes. I'm conflicted, but yes.

[Shannon Strucci]

They're both good characters. I will say they're both likable, fun characters.

[Joel Ruiz]

I'm going to have to stay with my rider. I'm going bad because I was going to pick him. I. I love it. Also, listen, that's a cool dad because he lets his kick smoke. Okay, listen, the One Piece world. Terrible. You gotta get it in where you can.

[Zach Delaney]

What we heard the One Piece podcast say, let your children smoke.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah. No, here's the thing.

[Zach Delaney]

It's rad.

[Joel Ruiz]

This world is all about being as rad and as cool as possible. And if you're on a pirate ship. Ship at 14, going three packs a day and everyone's like, damn. And you're like, oh, you want to see a picture of me as a baby? You want to see this little baby smoking here? And then you're going to get respect on that ship.

[Vero]

Sure.

[Zach Delaney]

Cuz also, it's the One Piece equivalent of like a Yale legacy scholarship.

[Shannon Strucci]

Jesus.

[Joel Ruiz]

So that's. That's a good dad right there. That's cool. I love that he loves his wife. I like that.

[Evan Brando]

Good quality.

[Joel Ruiz]

Also, I would bang him as a building.

[Vero]

Hell yeah. I'm going fish daddy.

[Evan Brando]

Fish daddy.

[Joel Ruiz]

You want Tom?

[Vero]

I think he's sweet and sensitive and he'd build me lovely things.

[Evan Brando]

Beijing doesn't need to build you things. He is the thing.

[Vero]

He's probably the most unattractive man I've seen in a while. As far as the One Piece World.

[Evan Brando]

More than the fish guy.

[Vero]

Well, we have a non sexual relationship. We're doing like.

[Evan Brando]

You have a non sexual relationship.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Shannon Strucci]

They each take care of themselves.

[Vero]

Sexual relationship with Tom than anything with Mr. Capone. Now you made a great point. Both you, both. I. I was just coming for blood because that's how I play this game.

[Zach Delaney]

That. Oh, God. Everyone's staring at me.

[Vero]

All right, I'll look away.

[Joel Ruiz]

I'm not looking.

[Zach Delaney]

Shannon made such compelling arguments for Tom and I did like, go back back and like, oh, this man is absurdly huggable. But unfortunately, if there was one person that multiple people considered to be their fighter in this bracket, it was. It was veggie. So I. I'm unfortunately.

[Vero]

You want him?

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Shannon Strucci]

Smell like cigars.

[Vero]

Jesus.

[Evan Brando]

Italian marinara. All right, this morning.

[Vero]

Can we make the Italians fight each other now these two.

[Joel Ruiz]

I don't. I'm not Italian.

[Zach Delaney]

Well, it's actually.

[Joel Ruiz]

I don't get.

[Zach Delaney]

It's actually. It's actually you versus Joel. And my revenge begins a new. Because now I get to watch you guys kill each other on call Cool.

[Vero]

You go first. I already made my point.

[Joel Ruiz]

Well, first of all, I definitely know how to say his name. That's a huge plus for this guy.

[Vero]

I know how to pronounce things.

[Joel Ruiz]

It's. Is it gold or is it gold? Because, like, gold. Gold.

[Shannon Strucci]

It's gold. D or gold.

[Joel Ruiz]

Gold D. Or. Or. Or. Or. And it's Roger, Just one S. This is all for all the listeners out there.

[Shannon Strucci]

Yeah.

[Joel Ruiz]

There's no S. Here's. I do have a question. This can get cut if. But can I say the word?

[Zach Delaney]

You're fine.

[Joel Ruiz]

I feel like even though I'm in the second round, I feel like I'm at a disadvantage because Vero's already gotten to lay down a lot of stuff about shanks.

[Vero]

I'm laying him down for sure.

[Joel Ruiz]

So what I'm gonna put out here is, yes, I know that people are gonna come for me. The opening is him getting decapitated. Do you know how much sex I'm getting? Because my boyfriend was. Was gold, Roger.

[Evan Brando]

Okay, you understand.

[Joel Ruiz]

You understand the morning.

[Vero]

Your benefit is that he's dead. No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

[Joel Ruiz]

I'm getting ahead of this. I'm getting ahead of this because you all. You all. You.

[Vero]

Oh, I wasn't gonna bring that one up.

[Joel Ruiz]

All you said to the lady was like. He said, he's dead. He's dead. Yeah, he's dead. He's dead. Okay, so I want to bring something up real quick.

[Evan Brando]

We were at dinner right before this, and we were like, who do we think Joel's gonna pick? And I want to say on record, I said, joel's gonna pick a normal choice, but he's gonna have some fucking reasoning that nobody could predict.

[Zach Delaney]

And the reasoning.

[Evan Brando]

Now I'm gonna get banged a lot because my boyfriend died.

[Joel Ruiz]

No, no, no, no. It's not that. I'm not. That's not the only thing I'm trying to. I'm trying to get ahead. I'm trying to get ahead before people come at me, be like, oh, he. That's the opening scene is him dying. Good job. You picked the deadest one. No, sir. No. We had a good life together. That man treated me right. But I will say, what am I gonna do after he dies? Meal ticket. Yep. Once again referencing George Costanza. Do you remember the episode? No.

[Evan Brando]

He hides all his gold from you.

[Joel Ruiz]

No. No. You don't know where it is. George. George Costanza. Science Felt. Do you remember the episode where he left it all? He felt. He's got the picture. He's got. He's got the picture of. Of. Of Susan, his dead ex wife, and she looks so good. And then people are like, banging George Lifton, right? Because of that, I'm just. I'm not. I'm not just getting banged. People are buying me food. People buy me. I don't need the. I don't need the one piece, all right? My meal ticket is paid for on stories alone. Okay? That's just. Just for the current time, because you.

[Evan Brando]

Could hold an 8 by 10 glossy of him looking sad at it. At your fucking Jason's dad.

[Joel Ruiz]

I'm just trying to. Once again, because there was a bunch of. A bunch of guff about Odin being dead, and I want to get in front of him, okay? So listen. Why is he a good daddy? Look. Look at all this little. Look at those little boys and the crew that he's got.

[Vero]

His little son that had such a bad daddy complex and got himself killed.

[Joel Ruiz]

Which one was the son?

[Vero]

Ace.

[Joel Ruiz]

That. Oh, wait, Ace is his name. Oh, well, that was so funny. That was so. I forgot about that. I texted Shannon. I was like, watching that arc and I was like, yo, that's a giant hole in Ace. It made so much sense using the die. It made perfect sense. Anyways. Okay, yeah, sure, he was bad to Ace. Who give. Ace sucked. He was a little whiny boy. He was whiny. He was. He was made too cool. He wasn't as cool as everyone thinks he was. That's why he was on screen long enough, because it's like one of those hot dudes that if you hang out with him long enough, you're like, man, you got nothing going on but that body. So I'm gonna suck it one or two more times, and then I'm out. I'm gonna get that taste on my lips, and then I'm walking. Anyways, we're not here to talk about. We're not here to talk about his son. I'm saying, listen, he. He's a good father to all those. How many. How many great pirates came because they were under his two daughters, huh? How many? How many? How many? How many? How many?

[Shannon Strucci]

You know, who was understood.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, Shakes.

[Vero]

No, I wasn't.

[Joel Ruiz]

That's what I'm saying. Yeah. So you're. Why is your daddy so good? Cause I'm my man. My man taught. You know that thing that your guy does with his tongue? Who told him that he's just like sinners. I'm just letting you dress like sinners. I'm just letting you know. I'm just letting you know that because.

[Shannon Strucci]

Of him, that scene in Sinners have.

[Joel Ruiz]

I haven't seen Sinners yet, so I can't wait to figure this out. So I. I'm just saying he's a good.

[Zach Delaney]

He's.

[Joel Ruiz]

He's a good father figure because he ushered in such a great heir of pirates without him. Also. We don't have a show without him, so that's a pretty good dad. That's a pretty good dad. And then also, him and Whitebeard for sure took turns on each other.

[Vero]

How are you a good significant other? Oh. Oh.

[Joel Ruiz]

Because the adventure, the fun. He's taking the. He's showing you he's the greatest pirate. Are you telling me. Are you telling me. Are y' all telling me? Cause I know, folks.

[Zach Delaney]

Can you clip that?

[Joel Ruiz]

I know y' all are focused a lot on that.

[Evan Brando]

I need you to, like, on me.

[Joel Ruiz]

Saying that after his death, how great it is, the amount of stuff we get to do together as. I'm just going around. And here's the thing. I'm jerking him at the wheel. He's up there. He's up there going starboard or whatever, and I'm just down there. I'm enjoying that body. I'm making sure he's got no needs. And you know what? Very similar to Vero. I'm letting him do what he wants. That's the king of the pirates. Are you gonna tell me that I'm gonna hold that man down? No, sir. No, sir. After we. After he gets done, I'm gonna run him a bath, rub those probably huge feet, and then I'm gonna take care of him. All right? I'm gonna be a little service boy for that guy, and I'm gonna love my Hell no. Yeah. Yeah.

[Shannon Strucci]

No, you're doing it because you want to.

[Joel Ruiz]

Because I feel like. I feel like he would be.

[Evan Brando]

Do I know you have to earn his love?

[Joel Ruiz]

I'm not doing this because he's making me. I'm doing it because I think he deserves it. He takes care of me. I'm not good at living. I'm not good at going out there and fighting stuff. If I eat a devil fruit, it's a bad one. All right? My devil. It's a bad devil fruit. My devil fruit gave me this voice. My devil fruit was. My devil fruit was like, hey, you don't know a lot of words, and it can't control the volume.

[Zach Delaney]

The kreischer. Kreischer fruit.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, the kreischer Kreischer fruit. So I don't. I don't have a lot of skills. And even without the devil fruit, I'm not swimming. The ocean is terrifying.

[Shannon Strucci]

Yeah, they're sea kings.

[Joel Ruiz]

So he's taking care of me and I'm enjoying my life. Because here's the thing. I like what we got to do. I'm enjoying it. He's not forcing me to do anything. Also, once again, this is to go back to the original question. All One piece is about is about how you read and you realize that you're just gay. And so the real One piece, as I said, is gay sex.

[Evan Brando]

No sucking and fucking along the way.

[Joel Ruiz]

It's the bussy. You're gonna go find the One piece and then you're gonna open it up. Huge chest. And Dennis Reynolds hand drawn style is gonna be a picture of Goldie Roger going to town on.

[Evan Brando]

That's why the main character's name is Monkey D Busy.

[Joel Ruiz]

I drew the that picture and that's. I don't need the One piece.

[Vero]

Why? Shanks and Buggy were too sick to be there. Because they were babies and they came to us.

[Joel Ruiz]

Exactly. So I, I, I made the One Piece. And it's. And it's manga of Coldy Roger Rarely white.

[Vero]

It's a NC17.

[Joel Ruiz]

I'm the first person to do Flipbook. I do so many. I drew so many pictures of them back and you're you. That's a moving picture right there. So the real One Piece is that. So that's why he's a great dad.

[Evan Brando]

That's why they call him White.

[Joel Ruiz]

Be telling everybody, hey, don't be gay, don't listen to any laws, do whatever you want. I rest my case.

[Evan Brando]

Wow.

[Joel Ruiz]

Wow.

[Vero]

This sounds like a lot of coping for somebody who knows that they are just not offering what Roger desires.

[Evan Brando]

An argument for a man who is not sure the man's last name is Roger Rogers.

[Joel Ruiz]

The least important thing about your partner is knowing what any of their names are. It's about living. It's about having fun.

[Vero]

You just gotta call him Daddy.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Zach Delaney]

And also, once again, he's not just a daddy, He's a sugar daddy. There's tears.

[Joel Ruiz]

I'm not doing this because he wants me to. I'm doing it because I like taking care of people. All right. I think it's nice what I'm doing for. I'm taking care of other guys on the ship. Am I jerking them when they steer? Not necessarily. Maybe. But I am making sure everyone's taken care of because it feels good to be part of a crew.

[Vero]

So on Roger's Crew.

[Zach Delaney]

Is any of this usable on Roger's crew?

[Joel Ruiz]

I don't think I cut that.

[Vero]

You have to be the cabin boy with the tightest little ass ever. Whoa. Survive, I suppose.

[Joel Ruiz]

These are words that you're putting in my mouth. These are words of what you're putting in my mouth here.

[Vero]

Having time with the boys, Roger allows.

[Joel Ruiz]

People to be who they want to be.

[Zach Delaney]

Saying you were going to be Roger's butt boy, that's not saying that you.

[Joel Ruiz]

Have to be Roger's butt boy. Some people want to be a butt boy.

[Zach Delaney]

I'm saying some people want to be a.

[Joel Ruiz]

But I will not take this butt boy you're making. No, I'm saying what I'm saying that Rogers, Roger lets me do what I want and that's take care of him. Him. That's have a good time.

[Zach Delaney]

And you guys are trying to think.

[Joel Ruiz]

What I. I enjoy. I like, I like being a caretaker. It's fun. I don't have a boy.

[Evan Brando]

You like being a boy?

[Joel Ruiz]

I like being a.

[Vero]

Wouldn't do that for you. A boy Shanks wouldn't do that for you.

[Joel Ruiz]

I'm not saying that Shanks wouldn't do that for me. But you know what?

[Vero]

How is Roger better?

[Joel Ruiz]

How is Roger because he taught Shanks. Shanks is only half as good as he is because of Roger.

[Vero]

And how do you think human history progressed so far? We built on what we learned that came before and mastered it.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, how many flip books of shanks slamming that bussy is there out there? I know there's one flip book out there and that's called the one piece. I'm actually friends with Oda. He showed it to me. He said, hey, hey, hey, kid, you wanna come see this? I was like, I'm 37. And he was like, come here.

[Evan Brando]

I do remember the day that happened. Joe called me and told me, you'll never get guess what I told 37 year old by my good friend Oda.

[Zach Delaney]

He, he put, he put the hat on you as he left and was like, oh, you know, follow your dreams.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, yeah. That picture where he's laughing.

[Evan Brando]

He wasn't laughing. Joel was under him.

[Joel Ruiz]

And yeah, you do not have to do those things to be on his crew. I'm just getting to live my life. I'm getting to enjoy going on adventures. I'm going out. I'm having fun. That's why I think it's good, Daddy. And once again, the whole era of pirates the show one piece itself would not exist. This without gold D Roger, the man whose name I know.

[Vero]

Not talking about him being a great dad and being.

[Evan Brando]

It actually, it sounds more like you're talking about how good of a lover and a But boy you are.

[Joel Ruiz]

That he's a good dad. Once again. All the pirates. He was good too. Also, Ace was a lost cause. That boy was never.

[Vero]

You know who would never say that? A good step parent.

[Zach Delaney]

Joel just turned into that bitch from the parent Trap. Like with the hat. It's like, oh, hello. Childing you off to border.

[Joel Ruiz]

I didn't come here to say. Say that Ace is a boring, overblown character, but I am saying it.

[Evan Brando]

You said you were going to turn the audience against you, and I was curious how you were going to do that.

[Joel Ruiz]

It's crazy. They were against me being right.

[Zach Delaney]

How's that running for you, man? You. You win him over yet?

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, that's my. That's my target.

[Evan Brando]

Saying one of the most beloved characters in the franchise just kind of sucks.

[Joel Ruiz]

It's beloved because he didn't get enough screen time for us to not like them.

[Vero]

Guys, you want to vote? Any questions?

[Shannon Strucci]

This is tough.

[Evan Brando]

I mean, do you have anything you'd like to add on Shank's end?

[Vero]

Here's the thing. Me and my man. I don't got a grovel to prove. Who's gravel? Listen, Roger knocked that lady up so bad, she had to be pregnant for two goddamn years.

[Evan Brando]

Oh, yeah?

[Vero]

What kind of man does that?

[Joel Ruiz]

Well.

[Evan Brando]

She used her. Her force of will.

[Joel Ruiz]

That woman used her. Her strength of being a mother.

[Vero]

He put that evil on her and made her endure.

[Evan Brando]

That doesn't bid a woman do anything.

[Vero]

She shouldn't have to carry a baby for. I don't want to hear it. You two aren't gonna know.

[Joel Ruiz]

She chose. She could have.

[Evan Brando]

She.

[Joel Ruiz]

She could have had wait Ace whenever he was supposed to be born, and.

[Vero]

Then she would have died.

[Joel Ruiz]

It would have saved us that whole arc.

[Zach Delaney]

No, it would have killed her ass.

[Vero]

I'm just saying Shanks is the kind of daddy that isn't going to knock anybody up and ruin their life over it. He respects my bodily autonomy.

[Joel Ruiz]

This is weird.

[Evan Brando]

You can knock someone up and respect your bodily autonomy. Yeah, I learned that in health class.

[Shannon Strucci]

Right, right.

[Zach Delaney]

I've got my vote.

[Vero]

Where'd you land that one?

[Joel Ruiz]

Florida delay's got you guys got your votes locked in.

[Vero]

I think. I think Shanks would be a little sweeter. I think he would take care of you. I think he's not gonna make me be a butt boy or whatever.

[Joel Ruiz]

He's making Me do any of these things? You guys are. You guys are trying to make it sound like Roger is trying to make.

[Vero]

We're fighting to the death here, huh?

[Joel Ruiz]

I know, but I'm just saying the only thing you can do against my argument is put words in my mouth. Roger's allowing me to just do my.

[Vero]

We're on a podcast right now. That's the whole point.

[Zach Delaney]

Joel, I just sat here for 10, 15 solid minutes talking about how much sucking and fucking. Joel, that Roger was going to permit you to engage in.

[Joel Ruiz]

Not permit. You guys are making this sound all wrong. Like, I'm like, oh, please. No. If I want to suck him off, I'm sucking them off.

[Vero]

Lady gentlemen. Gentle. They.

[Shannon Strucci]

I think they're both bad dads, so.

[Vero]

It'S hard to Shakes a bad dad. He showed up and saved uta. He cared about her. He told he was doing what was best for her.

[Evan Brando]

Hand. Was doing what was best for you. Then bailing is.

[Shannon Strucci]

She turned out great.

[Vero]

Yeah, that was fine. She became a vtuber. That's so cool.

[Evan Brando]

Red flag.

[Shannon Strucci]

I gotta think about it.

[Evan Brando]

That's a tough one, Delaney.

[Zach Delaney]

Well, now, that's. That's kind of it a little bit.

[Joel Ruiz]

Because I know it was just the movie.

[Shannon Strucci]

She's like in a manga panel.

[Vero]

Yes.

[Evan Brando]

She's around.

[Shannon Strucci]

I think they're both really terrible dads.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, for sure.

[Shannon Strucci]

Horseshit. Dad. That's. Poor Makino. Poor Utah. Poor Ace. Poor Port Gusti.

[Vero]

Poor Luffy.

[Shannon Strucci]

What. What was Ace's mom's name? Port G. Roou. Rouge. I feel bad for all these people, and Luffy's fine. Trauma. It's from, like, Garp and all that stuff.

[Zach Delaney]

Yeah. Dragon.

[Shannon Strucci]

Dragon.

[Vero]

Not.

[Shannon Strucci]

Not from Shanks. I think I was thinking about a lot. What it comes down to is that Joel is at a disadvantage because we've. Roger is more enigmatic. We know less about him. What he actually is like. Like, there. There are. I feel like I understand Shanks better. So that's probably why I gravitate towards Shanks. Because you do see the moments of kindness from him or the things that he does that are not just, like Grand Pirate adventures. Like, what you would actually want, like, in a partner or even, like, a friend or just someone that, like. Like with all my selling, Tom was about his personality. So I gotta go with Shit Banks. Both of y' all made very compelling arguments, and they are both terrible dads.

[Vero]

Think of the scene in the bar where those bandits jump them and he's just like, I'm a Laugh it off. Emotional maturity. Composure Wait, hang on.

[Evan Brando]

And you're saying he's gonna laugh it off, and you're saying laughing o faces.

[Vero]

He's gonna laugh off some that he doesn't have to deal with. We'll have a little fight, and it'll be whatever. He's not gonna rage in my face or something.

[Shannon Strucci]

That's not saying Roger. We don't really know enough about it.

[Joel Ruiz]

Didn't Roger turn himself in too?

[Shannon Strucci]

Well, he was dying.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, I was saying, but he. But, like, he was just.

[Shannon Strucci]

That was kind of him making peace with things.

[Joel Ruiz]

So I. Do I. Yeah.

[Shannon Strucci]

Like, maybe by the end of the series, there'll be more to Roger that.

[Joel Ruiz]

We can kind of switch to my side.

[Shannon Strucci]

I already made my vote.

[Evan Brando]

I really appreciate you coming from the most, like, logical, well thought out.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah. Me screaming bussy really, really, really screams logical.

[Vero]

Delaney.

[Zach Delaney]

It's hard because on the one hand, Shanks has been shady for years, and I don't trust his ass.

[Vero]

But it wasn't.

[Zach Delaney]

But Shanks. But he. But he does. But he does have moments. He has moments, but he's. He's always been kind of shady on his own merits. When we see him, we've seen him being a bit shady with it, even those other time. With those other times. Accepted. I'm not forgetting. I'm just saying. But, like, on the other hand, as much as I appreciate how thorough Joel is in interrogating the meaning of daddy to encompass sugar daddy as a crux of your argument.

[Joel Ruiz]

Oh, here's the thing. I don't know what a good father is. I can't make that argument. You guys. You guys expect me to come on here and be like, oh, this is what a good dad does. I don't know what that is.

[Zach Delaney]

You voted for Dils.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah, Dils.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, that. Because I thought we were just talking. Gonna be talking about hot dudes that we would, you know, do stuff with. Now there has to be. Oh, he's a good father. Oh, that's not what I signed on for, unfortunately.

[Vero]

I think the thing that's hinging for these people is that they want to feel like they're voting for the good dad. That's why.

[Joel Ruiz]

Oh, well, parents aren't good people.

[Zach Delaney]

That was one of the criteria.

[Vero]

That was one of the three criteria.

[Evan Brando]

That there's a rubric.

[Joel Ruiz]

You can go ahead. Be brave, Delaney, and vote for me.

[Vero]

Okay, Donald Trump.

[Shannon Strucci]

Let the lady. Let the lady speak.

[Zach Delaney]

Both of you are insane. I'm going with Joel just because he's thought about this long term. That being said, I need To I need to impress upon the listening audience that the picture Joel painted is terrifying.

[Vero]

Delaney, you voted against me because I beat you last round.

[Zach Delaney]

I think I. You almost got me. You almost got me back. But no. Sorry.

[Joel Ruiz]

All right.

[Evan Brando]

Evan, do you feel that there is any worry that Shanks has to be the only red haired character in the series because the only other red haired character he meets, he pretty much like kills immediately. Is that a worry?

[Vero]

There's a spoil. Oh, sorry. I'm bringing out the nuke. Not only do I get to have passionate sex with Shanks, I get to be fucking his twin brother too.

[Zach Delaney]

No, no, that was not. That was not on the train. He's not a father.

[Vero]

He doesn't have to be a father. I was talking about. He was talking about sucking Roger's crew earlier.

[Joel Ruiz]

Oh no.

[Vero]

Shanks is not the only redhead on the grand line.

[Joel Ruiz]

Apparently there's a twin now, right?

[Shannon Strucci]

Yeah.

[Joel Ruiz]

Because that's a good storyline to bring up.

[Vero]

Don't.

[Zach Delaney]

I don't let that influence your decision, Evan. That comes with a Barbie. No, no, I'm.

[Joel Ruiz]

I'm. I'm just calling out.

[Evan Brando]

There was another element 20 years later of. Of Shanks that was not going to bring up.

[Vero]

So hot. When a guy has an evil twin brother and you're like, hold on.

[Shannon Strucci]

I think it's scary. I'm not interested.

[Vero]

You're not reading enough books.

[Shannon Strucci]

I get confused.

[Evan Brando]

I wouldn't read a book and I resent the implication. God, these are both really bad fathers.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Vero]

All the time. Shanks was shady.

[Evan Brando]

I guess I'm going to go with Shanks.

[Joel Ruiz]

Cuz here's the thing.

[Evan Brando]

We don't know that much about Gold D. Roger. I don't know anything about this person.

[Joel Ruiz]

So much more.

[Evan Brando]

Joel, I want. I want to be really clear. I appreciated all the bussy talk.

[Joel Ruiz]

Here's the thing. I didn't pick anyone until like right before this started. And so same.

[Evan Brando]

I just.

[Joel Ruiz]

I'm good with this.

[Evan Brando]

What you're saying about Roger not being someone you can really engage with reminded me of my own dad. And I thought that perhaps.

[Vero]

Does anyone here have a dad they like, raise their hand?

[Shannon Strucci]

Oh, I had one.

[Vero]

Oh.

[Joel Ruiz]

Got my ghouls.

[Vero]

Jesus Christ.

[Evan Brando]

My dad's.

[Vero]

Guys, I'm just gonna go.

[Shannon Strucci]

Yeah, I had one.

[Joel Ruiz]

I'm so happy you said that because I was like, I'm not bringing that. So I think that means I win.

[Evan Brando]

My dad's a bad guy. I just can't.

[Joel Ruiz]

I don't know anything about means I win. Vero left.

[Shannon Strucci]

No I did have a really good dad one time.

[Joel Ruiz]

One time.

[Zach Delaney]

One time.

[Shannon Strucci]

I have a one piece character backstory.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah.

[Joel Ruiz]

But I will say, I will say if, if Jesus in, in 38 years, one, one piece ends.

[Vero]

Yeah.

[Joel Ruiz]

If they pop open that box and it is a flip book of pussy, then I retroactively win.

[Vero]

I think it is.

[Joel Ruiz]

I hope that's so graphic drawings. So true. And all the fans are.

[Vero]

So I just gotta take you to Mandarake sometime and show you all zozen walls.

[Evan Brando]

That's what the one piece is.

[Vero]

All right. So you and me. And the thing is, one of them.

[Evan Brando]

Is a good dad. End of discussion.

[Vero]

We don't even have to do the argument. Is anyone going to let me get in a point or. Oh, do I just lose automatically?

[Joel Ruiz]

Do you? Well, let's, let's, let's see. Because. So here it out.

[Shannon Strucci]

Because an element of it is sex appeal and an element of it is good.

[Vero]

Okay. So go.

[Evan Brando]

We have a. I just think that it's pretty. If we're talking about who the best dad is, it's kind of like a no brainer because the last matchup was God, these are both such horrible dads. And the matchup before that was, God, these are both such great dads. I feel like Beijing's in the camp of great dad. We see him dad on screen. Don't really do that for shanks. Or the one time we do, he then fucks off for 20 more years. Yeah, Beijing, he sticks around.

[Joel Ruiz]

He holds that baby.

[Evan Brando]

He's committed. He holds that baby. He's getting his baby involved in his life.

[Shannon Strucci]

He loves his baby so much.

[Evan Brando]

He loves his baby.

[Shannon Strucci]

So I don't want to have sex with him.

[Vero]

Here's the thing. Here's the thing about Beijing Daddy. I'd like to. Let's sit and think on that word for a minute.

[Zach Delaney]

Welcome to TED Talks.

[Evan Brando]

Could you say that more like an NPR host?

[Joel Ruiz]

No, no.

[Vero]

You know those mouth sounds that they do?

[Evan Brando]

They're like, you're listening to npr. Subject is Daddy, I'd like to Fuck.

[Vero]

I'd like to.

[Zach Delaney]

Scholars have debated the fuckability.

[Vero]

And the thing is this, this is Terry Gross, Italian.

[Zach Delaney]

He's.

[Vero]

It doesn't. It doesn't matter how much you bathe him. The walls of your house are gonna smell like it. Your fucking babies bassinet. Net is going to smell like it. You're going to be in the kitchen.

[Zach Delaney]

Oh, so all of a sudden it's not a perk anymore.

[Vero]

And there's going to be cigar smoke everywhere.

[Joel Ruiz]

You're telling me my house reeking of garlic is a bad thing?

[Vero]

I said cigar.

[Zach Delaney]

Yeah.

[Evan Brando]

The dude.

[Joel Ruiz]

Italian.

[Vero]

I'm circling. I'm arguing with him.

[Joel Ruiz]

First of all, I'm arguing with everybody.

[Vero]

He's mad he didn't win you. You're gonna lose your fucking security deposit because of the smoke stains. He is not exuding sex appeal.

[Evan Brando]

You don't need a security deposit. He is the house.

[Shannon Strucci]

I was gonna say that, but where's.

[Evan Brando]

You don't need a lease.

[Vero]

Resale value for your children. Here's the thing. His body is the house. What happens when you guys die? There's no home to pass on to your kids.

[Evan Brando]

He's extremely powerful and rich, and also, I would argue, one of the most well groomed. Certainly the most well groomed of the supernovas.

[Shannon Strucci]

What? Delaney Vero.

[Zach Delaney]

If you can look me in my eyes and tell me dead ass that Shanks has good credit without laughing. Shanks has a smile.

[Vero]

Delaney, there are thousands of islands along the Grand Line.

[Zach Delaney]

That's not the words. I need to hear the words. He has great credit.

[Vero]

They fly his flag everywhere.

[Zach Delaney]

That's credit to him also.

[Evan Brando]

He's like a credit score.

[Joel Ruiz]

Here's the thing.

[Vero]

They don't have credit scores in one piece.

[Joel Ruiz]

You know that. None of these. None of these people have houses. They live on the sea. Being a pirate's free. They're roaming around.

[Shannon Strucci]

They got ships.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, that's what I'm saying. So Shanks can't turn into that.

[Vero]

Shanks has a thousand islands. Islands. As many islands being like, bam. We love Shanks. If you're a friend of his, come stay here. He protects.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, we can definitely trust someone that owns their own island. Yeah, that's always been a real. A real good trait for someone to have. Also that I got a private island.

[Evan Brando]

Are you gonna tell me the Italian guy is bad when you're arguing for an Irish man? I don't fucking think so.

[Vero]

Oh, so now we've all seen sinners.

[Evan Brando]

No one's even straight up sinners. They're just a bunch of drunk.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Zach Delaney]

Jesus Christ.

[Vero]

Well, what does that have to do.

[Evan Brando]

With bringing up the Italian thing? I can get a little awesome.

[Vero]

I'm just saying.

[Joel Ruiz]

Also, I'm Irish as well.

[Evan Brando]

I want to be very clear. Not that it matters. You could be mean to the Irish. Yeah.

[Joel Ruiz]

I feel like not so different. And I do get. I do get, because this is all supposed to be all about personal bias and where you're putting yourself in there, but I feel like you're really this kind of. What sexy pill is that? Right, everybody.

[Vero]

Shanks, he's got a little scar.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, yeah. No, no, no.

[Vero]

Don't get me wrong.

[Joel Ruiz]

He's hot. He's. Don't. Yes, show me every picture you want. But also, Shanks is. You're only with him for two weeks and you booed him out. You know what's sexy to me? I don't have stability.

[Vero]

He can bring me along.

[Joel Ruiz]

Like your reliability Shanks. Great, great. You come, you slam it. We. We go have some fun orgies. You bring me to one of your private islands. No, no, no.

[Vero]

There's a landing strip for you right there.

[Joel Ruiz]

That's great. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But here's the thing. I bet most of the time Shanks is gonna be looking at a mirror of himself.

[Vero]

What?

[Joel Ruiz]

Shanks is gonna be looking into a mirror while he's banging you just so.

[Zach Delaney]

He can look American Psycho style.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah, absolutely.

[Joel Ruiz]

Shanks ain't ever you ever. You ever.

[Vero]

I'm not.

[Joel Ruiz]

You ever. Nut. At the same time when you're just staring at someone's eyes. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Vero]

You think I'm not.

[Joel Ruiz]

No, I get what you're saying.

[Vero]

Why are you arguing against me?

[Evan Brando]

His and hers mirrors.

[Joel Ruiz]

I try to say. Well, because we. Because I think so.

[Vero]

I know where the biases are.

[Joel Ruiz]

I think you're pigeonholing what sexiness is. Because yes, there is an appeal, but it's not just physical attraction. It's being. You know, it's being taken care.

[Vero]

I don't want somebody who's gonna pop out a baby that has a pre made nicotine addiction.

[Evan Brando]

He does it. You teach him. Yeah, he learns. Because you're a good dad.

[Zach Delaney]

That's what smoke is smoking. Responsible parents all about.

[Evan Brando]

Thank you, Delaney.

[Joel Ruiz]

Daughter's a YouTuber. We all know how that's gonna turn out. Okay. She's gonna be playing a ukulele, doing an apology video.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah. Look at that guy.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Shannon Strucci]

His dress is cool.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Shannon Strucci]

So, Delaney, I have. You're not. Since you're not in this round, I feel like you're not biased and whatever with the rules. Are we weighing equally? Sex appeal and like being a good father? Because that like I'm split on the two characters. How am I supposed to judge this?

[Evan Brando]

Also, Beijing eats out way more and probably better than Shanks. It feels like it needs to be said.

[Shannon Strucci]

I think that's true too. But I'm talking to you at this point.

[Zach Delaney]

It's whatever you weigh more heavily. Like they. I don't think one has more bearing than the other.

[Vero]

Other.

[Evan Brando]

If the D or the F is.

[Shannon Strucci]

A bigger okay then I mean everyone had such good arguments tonight. I have my vote.

[Joel Ruiz]

I got my vote.

[Zach Delaney]

I'm voting.

[Vero]

Lay it on me. We gotta do the other segment still.

[Joel Ruiz]

What?

[Vero]

It's a quick one. It's fun.

[Joel Ruiz]

Okay, I will say, we'll say. Because I do think if we're going like dad, like not just daddy, but like daddy.

[Vero]

It's daddy. I'd like to.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, I know but that any long term I think Shanks would be great. Great for a while. I don't think there's long term stay in power there. I think eventually he is gonna not show up for one of those two weeks things. He's gonna stop showing up. I am gonna go Beijing. Because I do think, because also once again I, I think that dependability that's gonna be there also as we talked about. You see.

[Vero]

So he's settling.

[Joel Ruiz]

Have you seen. I'm not settling. No, I'm not settling. I, I, I'm, I'm, I'm picking a man that's gonna choose me.

[Vero]

Me also once again, he's gonna choose his wife. Because you're the home wrecker in this situation.

[Joel Ruiz]

I'm the wife in this situation.

[Evan Brando]

Get to be the wife.

[Joel Ruiz]

I'm the wife.

[Zach Delaney]

Joe's the wife.

[Joel Ruiz]

But yeah, that's, that's my pick.

[Vero]

That's fine.

[Joel Ruiz]

Shanks is a good little slut though. Not a good father.

[Vero]

Sure. Yeah, he is. Right? Shannon.

[Zach Delaney]

Shannon.

[Shannon Strucci]

I don't think BEI is like sexy Shanks immediately. But if we're like looking at full picture, I think Beji would be a better sexual partner than Shanks would be a father by far. And Beggy is like the one of the best sets in one piece. So that's my vote.

[Joel Ruiz]

100.

[Shannon Strucci]

I think that's why just weighing it. I totally understand what you were saying, Vero.

[Evan Brando]

That's a good argument.

[Shannon Strucci]

You had a really good argument. But I guess Titans, right?

[Evan Brando]

There's a reason this is the finals, baby.

[Joel Ruiz]

I've had sex with really hot people and it doesn't last that long. Like you're just like, okay, cool. Like what's past this?

[Evan Brando]

Had sex with really hot people.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, I pulled.

[Vero]

Except defeat.

[Zach Delaney]

It matters. Not that it matters anymore. Yeah. I'm going veggie. I, I take long term games.

[Evan Brando]

I'd like to offer a respectful handshake for a game well played.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah. They, their hands slip because there's so much olive oil.

[Zach Delaney]

We're Delaney A gentle Ariana Grande finger grab in Mutual respect.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah. We're holding space for shanks.

[Shannon Strucci]

No, I think genuinely, I think everybody had really interesting choices and it just comes down to not just preferences but like, I don't know, the characters are complicated.

[Evan Brando]

A lot of respect for Tom. I got.

[Vero]

Yeah, he's puffing on that.

[Shannon Strucci]

I have no interest in having sex with Tom, but I love Tom.

[Joel Ruiz]

Was. Tom was a really good. Tom's a. I feel like Tom's a good dad.

[Evan Brando]

I know we're pressed for time, but who was your like runner up for your choices?

[Shannon Strucci]

I was looking ze.

[Evan Brando]

Good pick. Good pick.

[Shannon Strucci]

Mont Blanc Nolan. What were a couple of other others? Because I just thought he was an interesting character. He was so honest that he got killed and abandoned his family by dying.

[Joel Ruiz]

Y' all go.

[Shannon Strucci]

I'm gonna look at what I was gonna do.

[Joel Ruiz]

That frog guy. Just because I thought it was just all about sex.

[Evan Brando]

Like the frog guy.

[Joel Ruiz]

I thought it was gonna be all about sex stuff. So I was gonna talk about that tune.

[Evan Brando]

I, I consulted with some pals and my, my other one was gonna be Whitebeard, but my friend Drew was like, you should do Dragon because he's hot.

[Steve Yurko]

Which.

[Evan Brando]

True. But yeah. And then my friend Will was like Kairos, who's the, the one legged gentleman from Dressrosa.

[Joel Ruiz]

Also, also, I wanna, I wanna, I wanna point this out. Oda makes everybody too buff and too hot. So Beijing actually has some. A look to him, which adds some hotness to him because he's not just a walking stack of muscles. I'm just trying to say in the world, cuz this is like the problem with CW shows. Everyone is the same level of. Everyone's like 8 and nines minimum. So no one's really hot on that show because everyone's so high. So like B, I'm just like, hey, good for you. Yeah, you got that weird little guy energy.

[Shannon Strucci]

My other one was going to be Ginzo, but he couldn't beat me. Anybody in a fight. Father figure.

[Evan Brando]

That's a good one.

[Shannon Strucci]

I like him. I like that character a lot. I can argue with personality all day and. But the.

[Evan Brando]

If the ability to pull off a dipshit hat was on there, I think that's something. That's something I would like to consider as a law fan.

[Zach Delaney]

Top tier ability.

[Evan Brando]

Absolutely. One of the best to ever do it anyway.

[Joel Ruiz]

Great.

[Evan Brando]

I was just curious. What, what.

[Zach Delaney]

Okay, well, congratulations on Evan and Beggie for walking away with the kids competition again. Reiterating my, my, my strong belief that Veggie is the only supernova with rights I don't give a about kid. I don't give a about law. Who the was the straw doll guy? I don't really care Veggie only stocks are high and that's the final word on that's the objectively the final word. Nobody else gets to follow up on that thought. We're gonna take a break, we're gonna come back and we're gonna do a brisk yowie Thunderdome. So see you on the other side.

[Vero]

When did making plans get this complicated? It's time to streamline with WhatsApp, the.

[Joel Ruiz]

Secure messaging app that brings the whole group together.

[Vero]

Use polls to settle dinner plans.

[Joel Ruiz]

Send event invites and pin messages so.

[Vero]

No one forgets mom's 60th and never miss a meme or milestone. All protected with end to end encryption. It's time for WhatsApp message privately with everyone. Learn [e-mail] this episode is brought to you by State Farm.

[Joel Ruiz]

Checking off the boxes on your to.

[Vero]

Do list is a great feeling. And when it comes to checking off coverage, a State Farm agent can help you choose an option that's right for you. Whether you prefer talking in person on.

[Joel Ruiz]

The the phone or using the award.

[Vero]

Winning app, it's nice knowing you have help finding coverage that best fits your needs. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.

[Evan Brando]

Hey, it's Ryan Reynolds here for Mint Mobile. Now I was looking for fun ways to tell you that Mint's offer of unlimited Premium Wireless for $15 a month is back.

[Sam]

So I thought it would be fun if we made $15 bills, but it.

[Evan Brando]

Turns out that that's very illegal.

[Sam]

So there goes my big idea for the commercial.

[Evan Brando]

Give it a [e-mail] Switch upfront payment.

[Vero]

Of $45 for three month plan equivalent to $15 per month required. New customer offer for first three months only. Speed slow after 35 GB of networks busy. Taxes and fees extra. See mintmobile.com.

[Sam]

This is the double anime recap for episodes 1127 and 1128. I'm your host, Sam. And today with me we have Armin Hammer's very own Steve Yurko.

[Steve Yurko]

Please don't eat me. Oh, you're talking about Armin Hammer, the baking soda.

[Sam]

I see where you went with that.

[Steve Yurko]

That was the most clever one I think I'll ever do.

[Sam]

You were on your feet with that one.

[Steve Yurko]

Yeah, yeah, I think you got me at a good time.

[Sam]

I think we're both probably having a good time here watching a little anime.

[Steve Yurko]

Spoilers. Two really good episodes.

[Sam]

Yeah, I'm really excited to talk about these two.

[Steve Yurko]

Let's get into it.

[Sam]

First up, we have 1127, titled Luffy versus a fierce kaleidoscopic Battle. I love the use of the word kaleidoscopic.

[Steve Yurko]

Intentional.

[Sam]

And Usopp is remarking, Luffy, you almost stepped on us. Because if you remember from the cliffhanger of last week, Luffy in Gear five turned into a big giant Luffy. And he grabbed Kizaru. And he's holding him like a Barbie doll.

[Steve Yurko]

I. I can't get over the. Well, I think we'll hear plenty of it. Just the sounds Kizaru makes while being held.

[Sam]

And, like, Luffy's, like, rocking his head back and forth as he's like. I don't know. Like, I don't know what he's doing. He's just, like, intimidating, but, like, sort of.

[Steve Yurko]

He's our goofball.

[Sam]

It's like goofily hunting his prey.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Steve Yurko]

It's like, honey, I blew up the kid. It's like, scary because it's like. It's like a giant child.

[Sam]

And Kizaru's like, I'd appreciate it if you just let me do my job. And then he gets, like, not a cartoon sweat mark. Sweat mark. Like a really realistic, like, sweat drop, like, going down his neck like a nice dark streak. He is perspirating for real, not just for effect. He is. We are in his shoes a little bit here. So Luffy pulls him out of the lab and just winds him up and twirls him around in the sky and throws him so hard that the clouds part. Like a sonic boom.

[Steve Yurko]

Yeah. Should have done this first pitch at the Red Sox game.

[Sam]

And Brook is. He's getting his jokes in. He's like, oh, I finally got to see Luffy's new form with my own eyes. Oh, but I don't have any eyes.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yo ho ho.

[Steve Yurko]

The second one wasn't as good. Yeah, it shook me more.

[Sam]

Yeah, that's a reach.

[Steve Yurko]

Yeah. I think. I wouldn't be surprised when the dub comes around. They. They switched that one up a little bit. That one felt. That felt a little too close to the. Like, the.

[Evan Brando]

I don't know.

[Steve Yurko]

I. I don't know what the Japanese is specifically, but that felt. I'm like, nah, it needs more like, you gotta. You gotta focus on, like, the. The organs and stuff.

[Sam]

Yeah. Like an actual body part.

[Steve Yurko]

Not just like, Brook still has a core. You know, his core can be shaken.

[Sam]

It just felt like he's, you know, he was in his mind, like, oh, what's a cliche. I could use that. I can turn into a joke core. Wait, no.

[Steve Yurko]

He's trying out new material.

[Sam]

Yeah. Yes. This is open mic night. Vegapunk is. He has a moment of freaking out once he sees that Bonnie is up and about and sneaking around on the island via the security cameras. She's got her, like, hood up, so she's in stealth mode. Franky is telling Vegapunk over the phone what happened. He's saying that Kizaru had kicked Bonnie away. And Sanji overhears this and he, he has to get his word in. He gets super mad at the idea that somebody would kick a lady. And, you know, Lilith is basically saying, like, oh, you know, go, go, go be with your friends. I can see this is weighing on you. Like, I, I, I got it from here. And there are two wolves inside of me, one of whom thinks it's a little gauche to mention every single time that they draw Lilith's posterior with a little definition. But that wolf is not getting fed.

[Steve Yurko]

Tonight, so I don't know, I'll come out and write and say it like, Lilith. That's one of the top 10 butts in one piece. Do you need me to just do Al Pacino right here, right now, or should we just move on?

[Sam]

Follow your heart, Steve.

[Zach Delaney]

Steve.

[Steve Yurko]

He's got a great ass.

[Sam]

We got this great action scene with Bonnie.

[Steve Yurko]

Great ass.

[Sam]

Great action scene.

[Steve Yurko]

Great action scene.

[Sam]

A lot of switching, like, PO point of view shots. Like she's like in the bushes looking through a gap. And then like, we're see our point of point of view as she's like, running between the marines and kind of zigzagging around them and like, using her powers to, to change their ages. But then there's also shots of the marines point of view as, like this strange woman is just attacking them and then turning them into, into children.

[Steve Yurko]

Sorry. What's handy is like, since, you know, the anime was delayed, like the latest English volume 108 covers a lot of this stuff. And what I loved was because in the manga, this is like a panel.

[Sam]

Yeah.

[Steve Yurko]

And it's just the after effects.

[Sam]

Yeah, I had that thought watching this. I'm like, this feels like in the manga they would have done something where it's just, we just see them that they're kids and we infer exactly something happened.

[Steve Yurko]

And this is what the anime should specialize in, is really taking these moments like, oh, that's a cool scene. That would have been nice to see. And we get to see it and it's fantastic. Yeah. I know what the big takeaway was from this episode, and we'll get to it soon. But I really was impressed with this Bonnie sequence. Kind of. Really kind of, you know, for people on a. Like, unaware people need a reminder that she is a supernova. She was a supernova. I don't. The supernova feels like a outdated term at this point, but there was a reason why she was amongst that crop, and this is why.

[Sam]

Yeah, she has a very distinct, like, the animation is definitely favoring, like, zipping around, tagging guys with their powers bouncing off of walls. She. She feels very, like, bendy and. And, like, you know, she's. She's not gear five, but she's got, like, some, like, squash and stretch going on, but still very, like. Like, there. There's, like a. There's like, an athleticism to it. Yeah. And then there's like, a. Just a lot of really cool individual details within this. This action. Like. Like the one guy, like, grabbing her hood and pulling it off and her having this moment of, like, oh, no. But then she, like, you know, shrinks down and causing the Marines to, like, end up hitting each other and whatnot. There's one.

[Steve Yurko]

It's really well thought out and just well paced.

[Sam]

Yeah, the. I, like, the last Marine, she gets where she, like, tags him, and then she's, like, running off into the horizon in the frame. And then, like, the back of the Marine who she just touched is now, like, shrinking down. And, like, you see the. The him turning into a child and his. His, like, shirt, like, kind of fallen off his shoulders. Just great.

[Steve Yurko]

Yeah.

[Sam]

Great direction. Great framing and whatnot. She lands behind, like, a big piece of rubble that she's using, like a wall because there's. There's some Marines surrounding Centamaru's body after the fight with Kizaru. And we get, like, a brief flashback to what I presume was, like, two minutes ago when Sentomaru caught her from the sky when Kazaru kicked her.

[Steve Yurko]

I forgot what happened here because I thought, like, oh, did, like. Did Sentomaru, like, leap and kind of, like, catch her before she hit the wall? So. Because she got kicked into that, you know, that barrier and it exploded. And I'm like, damn. I'm like, I kind of forgot Bonnie could take a hit like that. And so I thought, I'm like, oh, is this supposed to show this is my memory? Because I hadn't refreshed myself with the chapter and, like, no, he just caught her after she fell.

[Sam]

Yeah.

[Steve Yurko]

Bonnie's Tough as hell.

[Sam]

That brings us to the eye catch of the episode. We come back to Zoro versus Lucci and this looks awesome.

[Joel Ruiz]

God.

[Sam]

I did take a few. I did look. Look for, you know, names of animators to attribute to. So the. The Bonnie sequence is an animator named Zhugang Lu. I believe is the Princeton pronunciation. And Zoro versus Lucci is too young, say. And which I'm completely spitballing on that pronunciation.

[Steve Yurko]

True. Are they from.

[Evan Brando]

But that. That's a.

[Sam]

That's a familiar name.

[Steve Yurko]

Yeah.

[Sam]

He's definitely.

[Steve Yurko]

Do you know their nationality at all? Because it seems like they're definitely freelance.

[Sam]

Yeah. I mean the first name was. Is definitely Chinese.

[Steve Yurko]

Yeah.

[Sam]

Tuyon Care.

[Steve Yurko]

Not that it matters.

[Sam]

Yeah. I don't know. With a lot of confidence. Not Japanese.

[Steve Yurko]

No. For sure.

[Sam]

The name's not Japanese at least.

[Steve Yurko]

But some. But some familiar names that have definitely, you know, have touched one piece before.

[Sam]

Yeah. This looks great. Like just the way Lucci's like the. The flames from his awakening. Like. Like the. There's something very like striking even in like the still shots where it's just the. The veil like moving around is. Is very graphic and very cool looking.

[Steve Yurko]

Yeah. I saw somebody watching this the Monday after it came out at the airport when I was like flying home.

[Sam]

Oh yeah.

[Steve Yurko]

The old me would have just tapped him on the shoulder and be like, hey, how about that one piece? But this is everywhere.

[Sam]

Show them your tattoo.

[Steve Yurko]

I'm afraid I've done that once before and they didn't know what the hell it was. And I'm like, I will. The real ones know, so.

[Sam]

Oh. Cause it's so perfectly fit for that, like silent acknowledgement.

[Steve Yurko]

Yeah.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Steve Yurko]

It's. I don't know, the one piece. Walk around characters at Universal Studios knew what it was and that's all that matters. That was a test.

[Sam]

And then we have this wonderful sequence of Kizaru. He's flying. He's still in the process of getting sent through the air from Luffy's throw. And he's. But his arms are crossed. He doesn't seem too bothered. He's like, I think I'm gonna fall into this sea. Because he's like his back is like right up against the water, like flying parallel. And then he like he does this motion where he like kind of like, like kind of scoops up the air. Like he's like. He's sort of guiding his. The momentum that he's gonna change to. And then he has his Yasakani Sacred Jewel and like turns into a burst of light. Beams and they recollect and fly back to Egghead. Just beautiful, rainbowy. Just. Just this. This cool visual scenario of him, like very chill, but like flying and just redirecting his. His motion just all. All great.

[Steve Yurko]

Yeah. And yes, that was just incredible with how much is happening on the screen. But I didn't find it at all. Like there's too much going on where I can't tell what's going on. It's like I. No, I felt like this was like pretty easy to read and definitely not easy to animate, that's for sure.

[Sam]

Yeah. Kizaru reappears into the battle with lots of Kizaru in tow. And Luffy's eyes bug out. And I wrote down Akihiro Ota, as you know, one of those animators who really specializes in that, like kind of sketchy, liquidy cool stuff.

[Steve Yurko]

Have we gotten to the. The chance art stuff yet or did we pass that already?

[Sam]

I did not write him down, so I don't know which part's his.

[Steve Yurko]

I think he was very much involved with that Kizaru sequence with the multiple Kizarus and like the rainbows and all that. He has an excellent thread on Twitter recently where he talks all about it.

[Joel Ruiz]

Cool.

[Steve Yurko]

Yeah, check that out. It's incredible how much thought went into the process of that.

[Sam]

Yeah. And again, like a lot of, you know, like camera spinning around. Action. We see Luffy's point of view a few times. Lots of like rainbowy effects. I love this one shot where you see like it's Luffy's point of view and you see his own hand up close and like the light from Kizaru is like. Like you. You can. Is you can see it through like the skin of his hand. So you can see like the bones through like the. The subs. Subsurface scattering.

[Steve Yurko]

Luffy or Kizaru.

[Sam]

Luffy. Like, you see, you see, you see. Kizaru's light is causing like. Like almost an X ray effect on Luffy. But it's like kind of realistic. So it's like his hand is like orange. And you see like the dark bones through his hand. Like it's crazy like in gear five to think he even has bones.

[Vero]

But.

[Sam]

Just like, just a good, good like blink and you miss it.

[Steve Yurko]

Right? Oh, there's a lot of that here. Those impact frames.

[Sam]

Luffy goes giant again and Kizaru is like running up his arm. Like he's like. Like an attack on Titan. Titan. Like Luffy, you know, tries to grab him and then Kizaru dodges. But like all the. The multiple Kizaru's are. Are making like this. This monkey chain grabbing each other's ankles and stuff and like whipping around.

[Steve Yurko]

Yeah, that was. That was another amazing scene. It was. Yeah. Sorry, I'll. I'll.

[Sam]

No, I mean, I. I agree.

[Steve Yurko]

I. I was just like. I was watching this and I was just in awe like from. You know. I know like one Piece has some really great action sequences and all that, but for me to kind of just like watch it, like, and not just like this is awesome, but just more like kind of just like laughing with it, you know, it's almost like watching like a. Like a. Like a performance of like trapeze artists or something like that.

[Sam]

Yeah.

[Steve Yurko]

I. I was so charmed by all this.

[Sam]

And Luffy puts a. Puts an end to the. To the Kizaru's by finishing with a Gum Gum dawn stamp and. And just like punching like right, or I guess kicking. Kicking right through all the. All the clones. But Kizaru, he just like zips away and he's back at the the lab and he's grabbing Usopp by the lips. He's like this. Don't you know this is an insensitive stereotype.

[Steve Yurko]

And that's. It's in the manga too. It's like you don't see a close up of Usopp, but like you could tell he's grabbing him.

[Sam]

And Kizaru shoots a beam at Vegapunk's car. Like Vegapunk, Franky and Atlas and Sanji are all driving away in this like. In this like gotcha Pond ball on wheels. And Kizaru shoots a laser at it. But then Luffy dives in and eats the laser. And then he like absorbs the light and goes. And like a big Super Saiyan sound effect happens.

[Steve Yurko]

This is like the one sequence I thought kind of didn't. I think fully captured Oda's gag here. I don't know if you feel the same way, because I think I'm trying to remember what.

[Sam]

What the difference was.

[Steve Yurko]

I think just it lacked like that, you know, like a kind of like medium shot of Luffy with the light beaming from out of him. I think it's just. I think it was zipping around a little too fast. We still got like that wide shot, but I thought like, oh, the whole gag as he absorbed the light. And then it's like, you know, he's being like lit up like a Christmas tree.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah.

[Steve Yurko]

Like, didn't quite nail the gag of it to me.

[Joel Ruiz]

Me.

[Sam]

Yeah, like. Like I Thought like, I think it, I think it's super funny when he, when he eats the light. But then like the. I thought, I thought he was like, like charging up for like a big super attack or something.

[Steve Yurko]

Yeah, I think that's, I think the tone was a bit off and, and.

[Sam]

Then, yeah, that just kind of like we cut, we cut away before that like really goes anywhere and we're. Atlas is giving the order to the, the Pacifistas to turn on the Marines and attack the Marines instead. Because the Marines and all the Pacifistas were readying to, to kill Vegapunk because they're all in his. They're all.

[Evan Brando]

They're.

[Sam]

He's in their line of sight. But now the, the Pacifistas are about to change direction and one of them is like readying up a laser beam. And then before we can see what happens, it cuts away to St. J. Garcia. Saturn in his, his like naval office room with this like kind of glitchy security camera effect punching in on him. And we get the to be Continued card over his. Over, over the very faint image of his eyes in the darkness. And then we move on to 1128. The nightmare strikes. Godhead of science and defense, Saint Saturn. And yeah, we've got. We're back to Saturn in his office as we're cross cutting between him and the Pacifistas. I love this representation of the Pacifistas, like hierarchy. These cool illustrations. I don't know who, who drew these.

[Evan Brando]

These.

[Steve Yurko]

These are reused. I'm pretty sure these were in.

[Sam]

I think you're right. Yeah, I think you're right. They still look great. And I, I like the, like we're demonstrating because the pre. They were previously under the orders of Kizaru who's using the Authority chip. Right. So we got the image of the chip and it like rolls up to Sentomaru and then rolls up to Vegapunk because, because that's who's. Because it's Atlas Vegapunk who now in control. So it's like a, it's a cool demonstration of like kind of the order of, of Authority. And then they're, they're all, you know, turning on the Marines now Atlas and Sanji are calling out for, for Bonnie and they're trying to find her. And Sanji's like, wait, hold on. I know exactly how to do this. I'm. I'm a professional. And he closes his eyes and he turns into like a submarine sonar which he calls his Lady Dar. And like he's seeing like the different women around the island. Like, he's seeing the Vice Admirals. He's seeing, like, dahl and bluegrass. And then we land on.

[Steve Yurko]

I didn't pick up on that. That's great.

[Sam]

I'm sure there's a few other characters in there as well, like Stussy and Nami and whatnot. He's like, founder. And Frankie's, like, kind of amazed. Like. Like, oh, like, are. Are you sure? And then Sanji says, has my radar ever been wrong? I love this line from Vega Punk. He's like, it's unscientific, but I'll trust it. And Bonnie has to jump out of the way from an. From an attack from Vice Admiral Pomsky, who's, like, got the. The Hulk Hogan thing going on. And he's.

[Steve Yurko]

Okay, cool. Yeah, he totally looks like. Like Hogan.

[Sam]

Yes. He's swinging a big clamshell on a stick. And again, the great Bonnie animation of her, like, kind of deathly dodging the pistol, reaching for the pistol. Like the. The kind of backslide she does when she. When she lands from. From dodging.

[Steve Yurko]

I. I, like, guffawed at just her, you know, stumbling to reach the pistol. I thought that was such a fucking brilliant little piece of acting there. Like, God, stuff like that. Like when. When you do stuff like that, that's. That's when I. Oh, I hit my microphone. See, I hit my microphone when stuff like that happens. The simple things. But I thought that was really cool. And, yeah, just them really getting mileage out of. Doing these Bonnie action sequences is great because she's not. She, like. She's still, like, on the attack, but she's playing defensively, which we don't really get to see all that often with our characters, so it's really fun.

[Sam]

She's dodging gunshots and bouncing off of, like, walls and, like, chunks of rubble. And she's got her gun and she's shooting something called an nde. And, like, the Marines that are hit by it start to, like, hallucinate, like, another point of view. Shot Marine looking down at his hands. His hands, like, deteriorate. Deteriorate into, like, a skeleton. He's like, oh, no. But then, like, we cut back to reality and he just. Just faints.

[Steve Yurko]

Mm.

[Sam]

At first I thought, like, it was like, something with her powers, like he was being aged into a skeleton. Um, but then it's a weird thing.

[Steve Yurko]

Because obviously it's near death experience, but.

[Sam]

Yeah, I forgot there's a lot. There's a lot from this section of the arc that I'm like fuzzy on mongo eyes.

[Steve Yurko]

No, I, I. It was so funny. I was seeing this. I'm like, nde. What does that stand for? And then like, I'm like, oh, it's the skeleton bit. So I'm guessing she just imbues this power into the bullets. So they're not fatal, they're just near death, which is very kind of her to do.

[Sam]

And suddenly a pacifista is attacking her, even though they're not supposed to. And it turns out that this is possible because this one's been hijacked by Vice Admiral Bluegrass, who has the ride. Ride fruit. She can just attach a. She just grabs hold of a little horse pulley thing and now she can control people. And she's. She's trying to order Bonnie to like undo the spell of her. Her age changing and. But Bonnie is kind of like frozen in fright at. You know, she's being awashed with memories of her dad and the memories she saw from her dad from the paw bubble. And then Sanji jumps in and scoops her up and gets her out of the way like a gentleman.

[Steve Yurko]

Glorious.

[Sam]

Back in the lab, the crew are caring for Robin's wounds. They've laid her down in this cushioned. It looks like a coffin that they're putting her in, but it's just like a weird makeshift bed thing in a box.

[Steve Yurko]

Yeah, I thought. I'm like, did she get hurt again? I knew she was already hurt, but.

[Sam]

And you know, Stussy also hurt, but she's. She's fine to just sort of grab her side and limp. And she and Edison have like this moment. Like there's kind of like a silent understanding. Like, Edison recognizes that she's. She's. She's got. She's got business to do. She's got to. She's got a plan. She's got something she might be sacrificing herself for or something cool. More Zoro Lucci action is like. Lucci is kind of hiding in like the. This, this cloudy fog around the. The battlefield and he's like pouncing on Zorro and kind of gloating him. And I love how the. The, you know, like when the. The camera's on Zorro and kind of like circling around him as he's kind of looking back and forth. And then that matches beautifully with the fight with Luffy and Kizaru. Like the. The sort of the line of motion and the. The direction of the cameras is. Is just so seamless. And yeah, so Kizaru and Luffy are still fighting Luffy's like playing on the. The like corners of the. The egg crack of Egghead kind of like bouncing off or like hanging off of him like monkey bars almost. And I like Kizaru's like laser kick that Luffy just sort of handstands himself off of. And this action as well as the Lucci fight is also like cross cutting with Saturn in his office. Like the camera is also so very dynamically kind of spinning around him. The light from the window, the light beams from the windows is very intense in the dark room. But with the strong light coming through the windows and the motif of the. The wine glass sort of teetering on the edge of the. Of the coffee table. Kizaru evades Luffy in turning into like a very beautiful looking light swirl. And Luffy's like, oh no you don't. He starts to chase after him. But then like everybody on the island has a moment of like stopping and turning and being like, oh, oh, what's that? Because they all, they all, they're all having that oh fuck moment. They all feel that something's happening. And we get the. The big booming elderly man's voice saying, stand down Pacifistas. Which brings us to the eye catch of the episode. And then when we come back, the eye catch is coming in with the ominous music playing right through it. So the Pacifistas have received their order. They're not listening to Atlas's orders. Atlas realizes what this must mean. And we get the same. We get the Pacifista hierarchy images now rotating from Vegapunk up to the five elders. And then as like this cool kind of representation of the. The teleporting Saturn in his like big scary spider form. It's like rushing at the camera inside like this dark void. Like that's him traveling through the. Whatever liminal space he's moving through. As the pentagram appears on the ground and the Marines are all reacting to.

[Evan Brando]

That.

[Sam]

And event and big bursts of green dust clouds and. And the storm clouds are coming in and covering over Egghead and Saturn from the green dust. And he's forming into this purple black goo and then solidifying into his hybrid zone form. And he's like, solid ground. It's been a while. And the title card gives us Saint J. Garcia, Saturn, Godhead of science and defense. Five elders, the highest authorities of the world government. And cool sequence of Vegapunk, like just barely steering his. His car out of the way of another laser beam. But that the, the, the. The turn, the harsh turn, like has them like Tipped over. And they're like falling down into the city.

[Vero]

City.

[Sam]

Great camera shot of you know, like Frankie's like yelling out to Luffy. And then the camera's like pulling out to the. We see the car like falling the super far distance. And now Kizaru is like kind of in the middle ground. And then we pull back further and now like Luffy's in the foreground looking just like looking down bird's eye on the city. As the. As the car is falling, Luffy pumps up his arm. He's throws a punch at Kizaru. But Kizaru shoots a laser which causes Luffy to like kind of spin out of control. And he turns into a little cartoon tornado with the eyes. The Tasmanian. Tasmanian devil eyes in front of the tornado. As he's like having an idea like, oh, I can use this momentum to my advantage. And so he turns himself into a big twisty Luffy who redirects the the kinetic energy to send another punch at Kizaru. But Kizaru kind of like barely kind of air steps aside from it. But Luffy is in goofy mode. So his. His super powerful fist attack kind of just wraps around and conks Kizaru right in the temple and sends him flying. And then that's. Luffy is now out of energy. He turns gray and he deflates and he falls. And now Saturn is appearing before Sanji and Bonney. And Bonney is frightened by the sight of him. She's remembering stuff from Kuma's memories. And she's quickly out of Sanji's arms and she's running at Saturn. She's like scooping up a sword again. The same kind of style of animation that we've been seeing for Bonnie as she's just covering long distances on foot. She's like scoops up a sword that was taken out of the ground and she lunges it right into St. Saturn's beard, which is apparently where he keeps all his blood because. To be continued. General thoughts on these two episodes Steve.

[Steve Yurko]

Incredible achievements in action animation for sure. One of the first things I want to say is, I mean, Luffy versus Kizaru felt like a bigger deal to me in this. It's kind of weird how I'm thinking like, oh yeah, I guess Luffy did fight Kizaru. I kind of. Maybe I just took that for granted during the manga because I thought like, Kizaru's the guy who. Who basically was the wall at Chabondy Archipelago two years ago that split them all up. So he is fearsome he's incredibly intimidating. And maybe I just forgot that I took that for granted. So I really felt that this was like, okay, this is the difference two years makes where Luffy is fighting Kizaru alone and kind of just on his level, probably above his level. What I liked about Luffy in this too, is gear 5. Luffy felt more in tune, pun intended, with how I envisioned Gear fifth Gear five. I think it was less like the stuff with Lucci, which I still enjoyed. But I'm less about the angry grin, red. You know, glowing red eyes, gear 5 Luffy. And I'm more all about this goofier gear 5.

[Sam]

It's a very comfortable balance. The coolness and the silliness.

[Steve Yurko]

Yeah, because it still felt cool. But I. I felt like it just wasn't getting too hardcore for one Piece. But it's some really great action sequences. And we talked about the Bonnie stuff, and I love that too. And for this episode, Sanji rescuing Bonney looked great. It felt triumphant. I really enjoyed the Gachapon vehicle hijinks. I think those scenes were pulled off really well. But this arrival of Saturn on Egghead, the transformation was not anything like we've seen prior. It just was goopy and weird and him kind of fully forming and just his intention, his legs just piercing the ground.

[Evan Brando]

It felt like.

[Steve Yurko]

It felt fearsome. It felt like a big deal. I thought the direction of putting this guy over as a terrifying enemy was just. I thought it was. Was pulled off tremendously in this episode. I thought both of these were just really fun to watch. I don't think. I don't think there was really any lulls in them for me. I mean, they're very action focused, but I just think they were great. I had a lot of fun watching these, and I realized. Sorry, I was kind of skimming through my volume too. I think that sequence with the. The Stussy and with Edison kind of like having that acknowledgment. I think that's not in the manga. I couldn't find that anywhere. So that might have just been an anime exclusive.

[Sam]

Yep. Phenomenal episodes. Like, the first episode is, you know, there's a good succession of, like, really strong, standout action scenes. The second episode felt more like. Like a cohesive, you know, like it's not Megumi Ishitani, but it's like, you know, you. You can see where all the other directors are, like, trying to up their game.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah.

[Sam]

Like. Like, and for, like, how. How good it does the goofiness. Like, these are episodes that are firmly in the, in. In the cool category. Right. Like they're, they're.

[Steve Yurko]

It's.

[Sam]

It's the sketchiness, it's the graphicness, it's the horror. It's the, it's the ambience. It's the like everything's got this kind of like delicate thin line work and just really, really earning that. That the seriousness and the stakes and. And without it feeling like it's at the expense of the goofy heart of One Piece.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah.

[Sam]

This is the kind of episode that we were hoping the break was allowing them to make. Right?

[Steve Yurko]

Yes. I think it's. You gotta be patient. You gotta space out this stuff. So that's. That not every episode's gonna look like this, but in moments like these, you want these episodes to have that little extra time in the oven to cook.

[Sam]

Yeah. And it makes me think about like I'm imagining like if I was an anime only person and I was like marathoning through Egghead and I got to this part, like I probably would have been really taken aback by how cool it is. Like I had. It's like, oh, two episodes ago. This is not what I thought I was gonna be seeing. Like, it's just. It's fun how. How easy it is to imagine getting like kind of swept off my feet by. By the action and by the surprisingly high stakes and good. And good compelling drama and. Yeah, I agree. Like, I think. I think it's doing a lot of work to make this. The. The Kizaru factor of the arc feel really significant.

[Steve Yurko]

And I already feel that way about Saturn as well. The brown horns were interesting. I wasn't expecting the brown horns. I feel like they hurt more than they help.

[Sam]

Yeah.

[Steve Yurko]

Yeah. I was expecting black, you know.

[Sam]

Yeah. These are the kind of episodes that I want to see in One Piece. Nothing. Nothing but, but good notes for me this week.

[Steve Yurko]

Nothing but net.

[Sam]

One Piece stocks are going up.

[Steve Yurko]

At least someone's are.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah.

[Sam]

I'm really, really satisfied with where the. This arc is going.

[Steve Yurko]

Where the anime is going. This has been returned to form.

[Sam]

And then I would say yeah.

[Steve Yurko]

But I think it was a good time to do these recaps because we got a recap in the anime coming up next week. Gee, Bonnie and Kuma Focus. I can't imagine why.

[Sam]

Yeah. Anything else you'd like to say before we move on to the next segment, Steve?

[Steve Yurko]

No. All good here. Glad to have one piece back.

[Sam]

Me too though.

[Steve Yurko]

Now it's like messing me up because now. Well, I don't normally watch. I don't think I normally watch on Saturday nights, but now it's like, well, geez, I gotta.

[Joel Ruiz]

I gotta.

[Sam]

Well, it's not airing on Saturday nights anymore.

[Steve Yurko]

I know.

[Sam]

Yeah, for us it's like Sunday morning.

[Joel Ruiz]

Mm.

[Steve Yurko]

Yeah. So early enough for me, but I gotta make sure I see it, you know?

[Sam]

Yeah, you gotta read the chapter and watch the episode.

[Steve Yurko]

Yeah. Busy mornings now. It's one piece Sundays.

[Sam]

Well, thank you very much, Steve.

[Steve Yurko]

Wait, that doesn't make sense. It's just Sunday. Thank you, Sam.

[Sam]

Yes. Good talking to you. Let's move on to the next segment.

[Steve Yurko]

Let's do it.

[Vero]

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[Zach Delaney]

This has been the One piece podcast episode 867 for the week of Monday, May 5th. It's not actually the fourth is the fifth. That was the day. Think I off. Thank you everyone for joining us live from Atlanta. Before we get into our final segment, we're going to just do a quick plug around, let everyone know where you're at. So we'll start with Shannon. What you doing?

[Shannon Strucci]

If you want to see my old YouTube videos, go on YouTube type street movies. S D R U C C I Please check out Fight Together on the one piece podcast. It's a miniseries we did on like actual like serious real world topics. We would try to bring in experts. It's like really serious and sincere here. And we don't say the word bussy. I don't think on that. You could, we could check out OD Roadshow. It's a southern gothic, you know, body horror, actual play where I play a gay con man, uh, that Joel runs and Evan has been on, uh, just wherever you get your podcasts, but for people here. Yeah, sorry, yeah. That Delaney has been on multiple times.

[Zach Delaney]

Joel killed me.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah. Just like Gold D. Roger killed that.

[Vero]

Oh, yeah.

[Shannon Strucci]

And Delaney and I were on Rift Tank together as well.

[Zach Delaney]

Yeah, we were. It's a good episode.

[Evan Brando]

I'm Evan. You can find me if you're in Atlanta the second Saturday of every month at the Terra theater doing an MST3K style riff show. We did Total Recall last month. This month we're doing Start Trek 4, and we do that every month. And we have a huge slate because it is technically our 20th anniversary year. We've been doing CinePro. I've not been a part of it for 20 years, but the troupe has been going on.

[Shannon Strucci]

What's the next date?

[Evan Brando]

The next date is. Oh, gosh. May 12th. I think that is Star Trek 4. And then after that is Starship Troopers, which is the official 20th anniversary.

[Shannon Strucci]

May 12th is a Monday. Is that.

[Evan Brando]

Then it's the one before the.

[Vero]

That.

[Evan Brando]

Okay. May 9th.

[Zach Delaney]

Hell, yeah.

[Evan Brando]

May 10th. Right. Yes. So there's that.

[Zach Delaney]

Oh, so this week.

[Evan Brando]

Yes. No, next week. Yes, this week.

[Zach Delaney]

If you're in Atlanta when they're hearing this.

[Evan Brando]

Yes, this week. If you're in Atlanta.

[Joel Ruiz]

Just come to it. Yeah, Google it.

[Evan Brando]

Look it up. And you can find me on the socials at Evan Brando show. I do cartoons. I have a forthcoming podcast called Question Quest, which I believe will have premiered by then, but we'll see.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, I am. I'm Joel. I got some shows. You can check them out.

[Evan Brando]

I was on a couple of them.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, you're on them. A bunch of people have been on them.

[Evan Brando]

So if you like me, Delaney's been on.

[Joel Ruiz]

Delaney's been on them. Shannon's been on them.

[Evan Brando]

So if you like Delaney and Shannon.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, that's it. Do you validate actual play podcast? Bunch of stuff. You can find it all on their website. You know, audio roadshow, critical bits. I got a bunch of things. Rift Tank. Go watch that. Oh, yeah. You guys. Do you guys do what you. I. Listen, I know none of you like me. No, no, no, no.

[Vero]

You matched me.

[Joel Ruiz]

No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Listen, I. I'm not talking to the people. Shook hands. I'm not talking to people. I'm not talking to people in this room. I'm talking to the fans. I know all of you go. Going. Please stop. And here's the thing. I won't. So if you like my antagonistic energy, it's Worse on every other thing that I get to be in charge of. So go devalidate.com. you can find all of our stuff there. Like I said, Oddity Road show, the Star Adventures, the SS Batship, and Critical Bits are three actual plays. Rift Tank is an improvised podcast where I come up with a movie or TV show concept. Within an hour, Evan's been on an episode. Chandelier episode of Together. And then if you got. If you all like quality stuff, which I know you do, because you. You like one piece. We got a Riverdale fan cast called Jingle Jangle, which I was on.

[Vero]

Christ.

[Joel Ruiz]

Which. Which Evan's on, and so is Shannon. So that's. Yeah, go check out my stuff. And I don't care that you got mad at me this whole time. It fuels me.

[Evan Brando]

Jody has something else you'd like to say or could say to make somebody mad about your one piece opinions.

[Joel Ruiz]

I. There's too many side characters later on the arcs. I don't think that's a. I don't think that's like a.

[Shannon Strucci]

That's. I think Wano has too many people. That's not.

[Joel Ruiz]

That's like a crazy, crazy thing. Also. I just. You know, I don't know what ODA identifies as sexually, but it better be. He better just understand that he's just a little queer man having a fun time.

[Shannon Strucci]

That's crazy what you say.

[Joel Ruiz]

Look, the way he draws men and women. That dude's trying to get it across the board.

[Vero]

That's it.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Zach Delaney]

Oh, he's having a dime.

[Shannon Strucci]

You should really read Golden Kamoya.

[Vero]

Yeah.

[Shannon Strucci]

Me. The energy off that. About how much that man loves men.

[Evan Brando]

Oh, also, JoJo. JoJo's the big one because he did women once. It was like, no, never again.

[Joel Ruiz]

Did he. Wait, did ODA do that?

[Shannon Strucci]

No, I'm just saying.

[Joel Ruiz]

Oh, no, I'm not saying that. One piece is like. I'm just saying, like, listen, we all know who loves big buff men other than me.

[Evan Brando]

He wrote a hockey manga before that, and that is, like, one of the gayest.

[Joel Ruiz]

Hockey's the gayest thing you can do.

[Zach Delaney]

Speaking of big buff men, Vero, where can people find you? Hi.

[Vero]

You guys. Skinko Crown. You know where it is? I should plug this. You guys can see art and cosplay stuff on my Patreon. You can. It's Ganko Crown. That bitch is everywhere. And you can come say hi to me and steve@momocon if you're gonna be attending next month. But be normal. I'm giving out jello shots on Friday. So if you find me Friday, come get a jello shot. Okay, Bye.

[Zach Delaney]

You fucking better.

[Vero]

I'm dressing up as Juniper from fields of Mystria and her whole gimmick is that she makes you take fucked up potions. So I'm gonna give up fucked up potions.

[Joel Ruiz]

That's great.

[Evan Brando]

Nice.

[Vero]

Walmart brand and jello shots.

[Zach Delaney]

The. The greatest potions of the modern era.

[Vero]

The.

[Zach Delaney]

The best shit. And I've been Delaney as always. Infinite Snow on Blue Sky, Delaney Jordan on Twitter. But I'm trying to ease off of that. Infinite Snow Productions on YouTube. A couple of you guys came from the last time I was on. Thank you so much for your comments. It was really nice.

[Vero]

Nice.

[Zach Delaney]

Even if Zach woefully misrepresented what it was about, he did everything in his power to make that sound bad. But it. It is looking like it's gonna be like the best performing on the channel. And I'm so stoked. My patreon is Infinite Snow Productions as well. By the time this episode goes up, I'm gonna have opened a new producer tier where if you pay 20 bucks a month, you get a big credit.

[Vero]

It.

[Zach Delaney]

We chat future videos and you get. I think there's some other perk, but it's four in the morning. I don't remember. But that's about what's going on with me. As for the One Piece podcast, you can find us on Blue sky at One Piece Podcast. We have our website. We have a Patreon as well, which I mean like by proxy, is also kind of my Patreon because, you know, it. It every little bit. But it's not the same. It's not the same one. It's just, you know, your. Your funds help us grow the podcast and try new things. We have. I don't think the Skype number has been disconnected yet. I believe we were still on a time limit for that.

[Vero]

Yeah, I think Zach still has to.

[Zach Delaney]

You.

[Vero]

You can call anytime. I don't know the number. Something Maji you can currently call.

[Zach Delaney]

The last episode has that number. I don't have that number.

[Vero]

You guys are listening to it.

[Zach Delaney]

So go back to last week's round off and look that shit up. But with that being said, that's all of our plugs for this week.

[Vero]

Delaney, cue the yaoi. Thunderdome theme song.

[Joel Ruiz]

Kiss him.

[Zach Delaney]

Kissing men. Kissing men. I'm gonna. I'm gonna edit something in. I've made it my life's mission to make it worse every time in the uk.

[Vero]

Yeah.

[Joel Ruiz]

Wait, wait, wait, wait.

[Vero]

Can I Wait, can I was in the monkey movie. Robbie Williams.

[Joel Ruiz]

Can I give you. Can I give. Can give you some stuff?

[Vero]

Uh huh.

[Zach Delaney]

No.

[Vero]

Okay. We have 10 minutes.

[Joel Ruiz]

All right?

[Vero]

Right. Dear listeners, for those of you who are here. You guys know by now what y Thunder dumb is, but our contestants here have never played Deline. Have you played any Thunderdome? I don't remember. I think you did last time, right?

[Zach Delaney]

Yeah. Last time we were on.

[Vero]

Yeah. Okay.

[Evan Brando]

I thought it was just a hit song.

[Vero]

The people in front of me. So the being. Okay, I got to do this in 10 minutes. So basically, fanfiction. We all know it. We all love it. It. Who doesn't like to read about boys and girls smooching? Maybe each other. There's a website called Archive of Our Own. It's great. People upload their fanfictions here. I'm going to give you ships two. Two character relationships. And I'm going to ask you how many fanfictions. How many works do you think are written about each fic or about each ship to. To help narrow the numbers down in your mind? There are less than 100,000 fix for one piece. There's. It's not. I think the. The. The thing is that AO3 in relative to one piece is new. I think the website popped up around the time of 2010. 2013, something like that. So.

[Evan Brando]

So much older. That's so weird.

[Vero]

Well, you had fanfiction dot net. Yeah, fanfiction dot net died.

[Evan Brando]

Rest in power.

[Vero]

There's many fics where I'm like, damn. I want to know what they thought in 2003 to go on Arlong park or whatever the hell that is. Were you reading fan fiction on there there? No.

[Shannon Strucci]

But I was on there. Yeah, you were under a different name. I'll never tell.

[Vero]

There's. I'm gonna keep it small and I'm gonna have all of you guys play against me because I don't want this to have to take too long off the bat. Lalu Law and Luffy or Lou Zo. Luffy and Zorro.

[Evan Brando]

Whoa.

[Vero]

Or Zolu. Whatever.

[Joel Ruiz]

Which one has more?

[Zach Delaney]

It's more popular.

[Shannon Strucci]

Lalo's really popular.

[Vero]

Better.

[Zach Delaney]

Lalo is the hot new toy.

[Evan Brando]

Let's lose though. What are we talking about?

[Joel Ruiz]

I feel like Lalu probably.

[Shannon Strucci]

It's a contentious because some people are like, Luffy is asexual and a minor.

[Evan Brando]

Both of them. I think it's. It's.

[Joel Ruiz]

The show's been going for 30 years.

[Shannon Strucci]

He's not a minor anymore either. I mean, just from seeing Phantom stuff I'm assuming Lalu, but I might be wrong.

[Evan Brando]

There's going to be a lot of people who are writing just the live action show. It's so lazo.

[Shannon Strucci]

Are those people writing fan fiction, though? Well, whatever. I'll take. Okay.

[Vero]

All right. So what's. What's. What's our final.

[Joel Ruiz]

I do. I think Luffy La La.

[Vero]

Is that it?

[Shannon Strucci]

You might be right.

[Vero]

That is correct.

[Evan Brando]

Damn.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Vero]

There's double the Lalu fic than Luffy. And so can you guys.

[Evan Brando]

I like it.

[Vero]

It's the second most popular ship in the fandom. Them right after Zosan. Because son is the bread and butter you get at an Italian restaurant that you didn't order.

[Joel Ruiz]

Wait, who's. Who's that? Oh, yeah, yeah. The enemy. The green haired guys. The enemies to lovers.

[Vero]

Now bringing it back. Something smaller. Oh, also, our dear listeners submitted most of these. You guys. Some of you gave me some really serious ships. And I was like, oh, I can work with these. And some of you guys gave me absolute. I was like, guys, come on. What are we doing here? I love you all. And then a lot of the ones you guys requested just had no. No fix whatsoever written about it. So try to include all of them. Hina and Smoker or Jinbe and Robin.

[Shannon Strucci]

I like Hina and Smoker a lot, actually, just as a side.

[Evan Brando]

This isn't a question of like. This is just popularity fandom.

[Shannon Strucci]

People are so weird. And Jim bae. I love Jim bae. He's not like traditionally attractive at all. As much as I love. I don't know. I'll go with whatever y' all say on this one.

[Joel Ruiz]

I'm going Jim Bay, Robin. Because I want to see it.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah, I'm more here. I'm more curious about it, but I do. I also just think that straw hats.

[Joel Ruiz]

Like, imagine I was wrong about the.

[Evan Brando]

Lou the Luzo, though.

[Joel Ruiz]

Robin's hands just how met. My God.

[Evan Brando]

Yeah, no, for sure.

[Shannon Strucci]

What do you think, Delaney?

[Zach Delaney]

What's the other option? It was Smoker and Smoker and Hina.

[Vero]

And Jim Bay and Robin.

[Zach Delaney]

I'm gonna go with Smoker. I feel like they don't write a lot of. Of age gap fanfic. One piece.

[Evan Brando]

Interesting point. Oh, I might be coming around on this one.

[Vero]

What's your final answer?

[Zach Delaney]

That's my. That's my call.

[Evan Brando]

I think. I think I flipped a smoker.

[Vero]

Smoker. Hina. Yep, that's correct.

[Zach Delaney]

Hell yeah.

[Vero]

Which is kind of crazy. Only 16. Timber. Robin Fix.

[Joel Ruiz]

Mine was solely based off of.

[Vero]

Okay, we're going fast. Next Next. Sanji and Katakuri or Barook and Sanji.

[Evan Brando]

Oh, Sanji Katakuri. People are freaks. Not close. People are close. He's got a giant mouth. He's so tall.

[Shannon Strucci]

Luffy fights in whole cake.

[Joel Ruiz]

Oh, yeah. Yeah.

[Evan Brando]

Of it all. It's. It's. Yeah. No brainer here.

[Joel Ruiz]

I. I'm gonna go Sanji Katakuri because I don't respect anything about Brooke.

[Shannon Strucci]

I think Sanji Katakuri makes no sense. But just based on how Phantom works, that's probably the more. More popular.

[Evan Brando]

People love Katakuri.

[Shannon Strucci]

I love. I love Katakuri.

[Vero]

Is that your final answer?

[Joel Ruiz]

Right?

[Vero]

Yeah. That is incorrect.

[Evan Brando]

What the hell?

[Shannon Strucci]

What are the numbers?

[Vero]

69. Brook. Sanji.

[Zach Delaney]

Hell yeah.

[Evan Brando]

Oh, because they're both. They're both freaks, right? Yeah.

[Joel Ruiz]

We were.

[Vero]

Yeah.

[Joel Ruiz]

Okay.

[Vero]

If.

[Joel Ruiz]

If your favorite's Brooke Paul Byron, you're wrong.

[Evan Brando]

This is the chance. It's the chainsaw man thing. Because they're both so sexually frustrated.

[Zach Delaney]

We don't want to attack anyone for their opinion. Opinions on Brooke, Paul, Whitebeard and Roger.

[Vero]

Big mom and Kaido.

[Evan Brando]

Big Mom.

[Shannon Strucci]

Kaido, Roger.

[Joel Ruiz]

I think White Beard. I think for more. I think. Yeah. Also. Also, I. I drew that book.

[Evan Brando]

It's White Beard or Whitebeard Rogers.

[Vero]

That is correct.

[Evan Brando]

I like Big Mom.

[Vero]

Here's another two. Diametrically opposed to Shigi and Nami. Love them. Garp and Single Goku.

[Evan Brando]

Whoa. That's. Yeah. I think. I. I think no.

[Shannon Strucci]

One who works.

[Vero]

She looks like. Yeah.

[Joel Ruiz]

Oh. The one that we're like. They just don't care about her backstory because she's a woman and they made it suck. Wait.

[Evan Brando]

Are you telling me? I think Garbage and Goku up to shig.

[Joel Ruiz]

I feel like. I feel like the shig. Nami. Because everyone. And we got some horny people.

[Vero]

What's your final answer?

[Shannon Strucci]

What's the lady.

[Vero]

That is correct.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Vero]

47. Usually the lesbians don't win. Last one. You guys are winning against me. But you know it's not. We're just having fun. Last one. Somebody specifically requested the Citrus Trio, which I thought was really cute. Which is Zorro. Sanji and Nami versus Usopp and Sanji.

[Shannon Strucci]

Ooh, I know. Usopp and Sanji is pretty popular.

[Evan Brando]

Is it really?

[Vero]

USO san.

[Shannon Strucci]

Uso San. But the threesome is interesting.

[Joel Ruiz]

I feel like there's just. We're just going to sheer volume. It's gonna be.

[Vero]

Actually, I'm throw one more in. I'll do a three way. Because they are three ways or Yamato and Ace.

[Joel Ruiz]

Ooh, fuck.

[Evan Brando]

I think.

[Joel Ruiz]

Fuck.

[Shannon Strucci]

I think. USO san.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah, I think. I think that too. Yeah.

[Evan Brando]

Yamaton. Ace is. Yeah, good, though.

[Zach Delaney]

I'm gonna go with Sasan.

[Vero]

Sorry. For like a sneeze. That is correct.

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah.

[Vero]

You guys are so good at this. You know who sucks ass? The guys. But I usually kind of try to trick them a little bit. I try to I. With them.

[Zach Delaney]

I. I won't hear this Stephen Paul slander he has gotten. Steven is really, really good at it.

[Vero]

Cause he's sitting there and he's like, okay, well, then in chapter 372, they talked for this and they said this tweet.

[Zach Delaney]

He's got the Sherlock Mind Palace.

[Vero]

Yeah, he's doing the Sherlo, like, mind Palace. I'm write that one down. Stephen Paul's Mind Palace.

[Joel Ruiz]

Stephen Paul's Stephen's Mind Palace.

[Vero]

Yay.

[Joel Ruiz]

How many fanfics are there of Bon Clay and Boa Hancock?

[Vero]

None but our listeners.

[Zach Delaney]

And where can Joel find them?

[Vero]

You guys, you did so good at the Aoie Thunderdome. I'm so proud of you. Can we get at the children's like.

[Zach Delaney]

Yay, our little starch by yourself?

[Joel Ruiz]

Yeah. Do a British boy being happy right now, Delaney.

[Zach Delaney]

Huzzah.

[Evan Brando]

Why, sir?

[Zach Delaney]

Well, I. Then I haven't missed it.

[Joel Ruiz]

Sir, is it still y Thunderdome?

[Zach Delaney]

I will keep y Thunderdome in my heart always.

[Joel Ruiz]

Sorry, sir. Sorry, sir. I can't open the door. My. My head's so sore from doing all the fanficing. Oh, sir. Sir, please tell me Yaoi Thunderdome hasn't ended. I have another cough.

[Evan Brando]

You boy, spend the rest of the day on U3.

[Joel Ruiz]

What day is it? Oh, sets. It's Yahweh Thunderdome day.

[Evan Brando]

Yes, it is.

[Vero]

You know what day it is? It's Fujo Friday.

[Joel Ruiz]

But there's still time.

[Vero]

Go to.

[Zach Delaney]

Bless us, everyone.

[Vero]

Take us away from here.

[Zach Delaney]

This has been the One Piece podcast. Thank you so much for joining us and we'll see you next week. I don't know if there's a chapter. Who's to say what ended what? Whatever happens. But until then, my name is Zach.

[Vero]

My name is Steve.

[Zach Delaney]

Goodbye, everyone.

[Steve Yurko]

Bundle and safe. With Expedia, you were made to follow your favorite band.

[Joel Ruiz]

And from the front row, we were made to quietly save you.

[Steve Yurko]

More Expedia made to. Travel savings vary and subject to availability. Flight inclusive packages are atoll protected.