Episode 894, “I Just Think He’s Nika” (with GolferGareBear)

Summary

The One Piece Podcast — Episode 894: “I Just Think He’s Nika” (with GolferGareBear)

Date: November 24, 2025
Host: Zach (Maji Media)
Special Guests: Stephen Paul (One Piece translator), Kirsten Carey (musician/writer), Ken, Ed, Golfer GareBear

---

Episode Overview

This episode dives deep into One Piece Chapter 1166: “New Stories”, wrapping up the monumental God Valley flashback. The crew discusses the fallout of the God Valley Incident, the choices and failures of major players like Harold, Garp, and Sengoku, the emotional rescue and fate of Shanks, and how these stories ripple through the One Piece universe. The episode also touches on the anime’s Egghead arc, current One Piece news, as well as listener questions and theories.

---

Key Discussion Points

1. Opening Banter and One Piece News

• Introductions from Zach, Ed, and returning guests Stephen Paul, Kirsten Carey, Ken, and GolferGareBear.
• Kirsten checks in from Osaka, discussing the anime Universal Studios Japan One Piece show and the local Mugiwara stores.
• Excitement about the NBA × One Piece collaboration—Luffy and others in NBA jerseys, with Enel as the Thunder’s “perfect” choice.
• Zach self-promotes archival content: The One Piece Podcast Goes to Japan now on YouTube.

2. Manga Recap: Chapter 1166 “New Stories”

Color Spread & Cover Page [(09:01–16:10)]

• Autumn-themed color spread featuring the Straw Hats and Yamato—discussion on absent characters (Robin, Frankie, etc.), Japanese imagery like sweet potatoes, and “Nami’s silly ass hat.”
• Real-life story: Osaka’s “yaki emo” truck and sweet potato sellers (12:18).

Chapter Breakdown [(16:22–53:09)]

• Final Moments of God Valley:

  • Garp, Roger, and Rocks lie defeated. The Holy Knights approach.
  • “Absent from the pages of recorded history, like a curtain falling, the island crumbled…” —narration and visuals of the lightning splitting the sky, the aftermath, and a “broad account” of history-shaping events.
  • Interesting note: A difference between white (non-Haki) lightning here vs. classic black Haki effect (22:51).
  • Heartbreaking visual: Baby Shanks found in a treasure chest by the Roger Pirates, which closely mirrors, but is not identical to, the scene in Film Red.

• Ripple Effects:

  • Roger Pirates rejoice in the treasure haul, shocked discovering Shanks as a baby inside the chest.
  • “This is where babies come from, guys. Treasure chest. Because they’re our treasures.” – Zach (29:19)
  • Film Red & Stampede are referenced as “semi-canon” and subtly foreshadowed these revelations.

• Public Propaganda and Garp/Dragon:

  • The world celebrates Garp as “Hero,” but Garp is furious at being turned into propaganda; Sengoku counsels “look the other way when management does something insane.”
  • Dr. Fishbonen cameo—tribute to Steve Yurko, who voices him in the anime (34:30).
  • Garp and Sengoku’s ideological rift:
    • “If you turn out like them, I’m gonna kill you myself!” – Garp (37:02)
    • Sengoku: “There are tens of millions of soldiers out there; you can’t possibly control all of it.” (35:55)
  • Dragon, in a brief but important scene, tells Garp he’s quitting the Navy, disgusted by his father’s choices.

• Elbaf’s Tragedy and Harold’s Path:

  • Prince Loki mourns, remembering an uncle-like Rocks who spurred his imagination with “Nika” talk.
  • Loki: “I just think he’s Nika.” (40:30)
  • King Harold’s misguided attempt at atonement: He beats down a ruffian to “set an example,” helplessly weeping over his guilt for abandoning Rocks, culminating in the dramatic act of breaking off his own horns at Marineford as a slave’s gesture for apology.
  • “Allow me this chance to atone for a thousand years of history… If that means I must be a slave, so be it.” – Harold (52:09)

3. Emotional Reactions and Analysis (53:25–92:26)

Panel Reactions

• Each host reflects on the gray morality and tragedy of the chapter:
  • The many ways to contort oneself or “cope” with living under a corrupt world government:
    • Sengoku: Looks away
    • Garp: Protects the lower ranks
    • Dragon: Leaves
    • Harold: Willingly submits, misunderstanding everything
• Strong parallels drawn to real-world political complexities, with some hosts noting the relevance to current events:
  • “ODA can do this now, in his fifties, with this nuance... these are shades of gray only a veteran author can handle.” – Stephen Paul (59:58)
  • “Dramatic irony... like a secondhand embarrassment thing. Please stop. You’re doing the wrong thing.” – Zach (83:31)
• Discussion of symbolism: mist, lightning, vanishing islands (Florian Triangle, Davy Jones lore), and the mystery of God Valley’s fate.
• The chapter praised for its expert use of “flowchart” double-page spread, launching new “stories” for each surviving actor—especially Blackbeard, whose arc remains most mysterious.

The Tragedy of King Harold & the Giants

• Sympathy and frustration: his naive, desperate bid for “peace” only deepens the giants’ chains.
• “It’s almost pathetic—a gut wrenching act of self-loathing and self-sacrifice, handing the enemy everything they want.” – Golfer GareBear (84:31)
• Harold’s sorrow for betraying Rocks, and his inability to see the trap he's fallen into, compared with real-life leaders making wrongheaded choices under authoritarian systems.

Connecting to the Present, and Broader Themes

• Reflections on Garp, Dragon, and the “paternal” approach to justice/institutional change; how Garp shapes his “children” and proteges, many of whom depart the Marines.
• Nuanced take: Garp and Sengoku’s tragic limitations reflect reality—there is no clean answer to “solving” systemic evil.
• Oda’s increased political engagement highlighted—“As One Piece is used as protest iconography worldwide, the series itself is getting more political in the text, if that’s possible.” – Kirsten (91:24)
• The metaphor of self-determination and nationhood, with Elbaf’s arc as a study in realpolitik, internalized oppression, and the search for acceptance.

4. Anime Recap: Episode 1150 “The Iron Giant Activates” (95:50–110:14)

• Hosted by Sam with Ken.
• The Iron Giant’s role in Egghead and the Elders’ reaction.
• Notable scenes:
  • Cricket and the Saruyama Alliance’s winking link to ancient treasure hunting
  • Tashigi and Smoker updates
  • Marines vs. Giants: Vice Admiral Dahl’s highlight battle, “Rock and Roll Blaster”
  • Vegapunk’s broadcast about the “Will of D”—interrupted at the crucial moment by the Five Elders.
• “The tides are turning. The arc feels like it’s turning towards a conclusion.” – Ken (106:55)
• Chopper’s recap special—silly hijinks involving Carrot and trivia games.

5. Piece Together (Listener Q&A & Theories) (112:01–139:44)

• Hilarious Patreon nicknames (“horn tuggers,” “Remove Horn Souch”).
• Listeners question what happened to God Valley (Was it “lulusia’d”? Did Davy Jones drag Zebeck to the sea?); theories about ancient powers, devil fruits, and galela.
• Debate over the upcoming arrival (or failure) of Elbaf as a WG nation and speculation on what, exactly, ruined the deal.
• Listeners and hosts reflect on Garp’s questionable parenting compared to his role in the Marines:
  • “Garp will always treat a fellow Marine better than any biological offspring.” – Kirsten (124:13)
  • Meme: Garp’s family photo is just Koby, with little Luffy/Ace stickers.

6. Reddit / Community Roundup (132:14–139:44)

• Hair color debates (is Rocks’s indigo streaks a Buggy clue?), Dr. Fishbonen legacy, false propaganda ideas for the Straw Hats (Luffy “eats a nation’s food supply,” Chopper “giving drugs to children”).
• Blackbeard’s destiny, the role of the Will of D., and frozen giants—all left tantalizingly unresolved.

7. Lightning Round: Trivia (150:53–168:29)

• Manga trivia: guessing arcs, cover stories, and iconic chapter moments (notably, Binks’ Sake and other key “firsts”).

---

Memorable Quotes & Moments

• [25:57] Kirsten Carey: “Roger looks like Ace in this spread, made me very emotional.”
• [37:02] Garp (paraphrasing): “If you turn out like them, I’m gonna kill you myself!”
• [40:30] Loki: “I just think he’s Nika.” (Episode title)
• [52:09] Harold: “Allow me this chance to atone for a thousand years of history… If that means I must be a slave, so be it.”
• [83:31] Zach: “Dramatic irony... secondhand embarrassment thing. Please stop. You’re doing the wrong thing.”
• [91:24] Kirsten: “...The series is almost getting more political in the text, if that’s possible. Commendable respect for Oda.”
• [129:08] Zach: “Is there a real-world military leader who was openly anti-government, but still served? Metal Gear Solid.”

---

Highlighted Timestamps

• 09:01 — Manga Recap Begins: Discussion of the color spread and autumn visuals
• 17:02–23:35 — Aftermath of the God Valley incident, Rocks’ fate, and the implications of the “white lightning”
• 25:57 — Roger emerges; emotions about family resemblance and Shanks’s rescue
• 35:55–37:41 — Garp and Sengoku’s ideological fight post-God Valley
• 40:30 — Loki’s “I just think he’s Nika.”
• 52:09 — King Harold’s horn-breaking, act of atonement at Marineford
• 83:31–92:26 — Host roundtable: the tragedy and political allegory of Harold, God Valley parallels to real life
• 112:01 — Piece Together: Listener questions and theories
• 132:14 — Reddit: Community discussions, running jokes, worldbuilding speculation
• 150:53 — Lightning Trivia

---

Notable Running Jokes & In-Jokes

• “Steve got to voice Dr. Fishbonen in the anime.”
• “If you remove your horns, does the podcast end?”
• “Fishbonen.” — Recurring, intentionally random answer to trivia or debates.
• “It was all collapsing under the weight of the flashback.” – Satirical explanation for God Valley’s disappearance.
• “One Piece Babies” spinoff.
• Ice as a sarcastic sign-off (referring to anti-ICE, U.S. Immigration Enforcement).

---

Takeaways for Non-Listeners

• This was a landmark episode dissecting a deeply emotional and philosophical chapter in One Piece.
• Major theme: the many failed or flawed responses to injustice and corruption from beloved characters.
• Rich narrative and visual details explored, including subtle Oda clues and real-world allegories.
• A strong focus on how One Piece’s current events mirror and comment on real-life struggles of agency, accountability, and the search for justice.
• The humor and camaraderie of the host team keep the discussion lively, layered with deep fandom knowledge and playful ribbing.

---

Want More?

• Full podcast archives, community links, and bonus content at onepiecepodcast.com.
• Subscribe on YouTube and join Patreon for bonus art, stickers, and direct Q&A.

---

Next week: Chapter 1167, more recaps, and irreverent takes from the OPP crew!

Transcript

[Zach]

At New Balance, we believe if you.

[Kirsten Carey]

Run, you're a runner.

[Zach]

However you choose to do it.

[Kirsten Carey]

Because when you're not worried about doing.

[Stephen Paul]

Things the right way.

[Zach]

You'Re free to discover your way. And that's what running is all about.

[Kirsten Carey]

Run your way.

[Stephen Paul]

@Newbalance.Com Running.

[Ed]

Extra value meals are back. That means 10 tender juicy McNuggets and medium fries and a drink are just $8 only at McDonald's for a limited time only.

[Stephen Paul]

Prices and participation may vary.

[Zach]

Prices may be higher in Hawaii, Alaska and California.

[Stephen Paul]

And for delivery.

[Zach]

This is the One Piece Podcast episode 894 for the week of November 24, 2025. My name is Zach.

[Ed]

And my name is Ed.

[Zach]

And on today's episode, as I was gonna say, as usual, but he's our very special guest, the translator for One Piece and weekly Shonen Jump in Manga. Plus, his name is Stephen Paul. How's it going, Stephen?

[Stephen Paul]

Hey, everybody. It's going good.

[Zach]

Good, good, good. We have lots of special guests with us today. The musician behind our the music you you're hearing now on our podcast, as well as a writer for many wonderful publications. We have Kirsten Carey with us. How's it going, Kirsten? Hello.

[Kirsten Carey]

It's going good.

[Zach]

And where are you coming in from?

[Kirsten Carey]

Yeah, I'm coming in from Osaka. I moved here. That's why I haven't been on the pod in several months.

[Zach]

Excuses.

[Ken]

Yeah.

[Kirsten Carey]

Oh, no, I. Because now I have a real job, so I can.

[Zach]

I wonder.

[Ed]

They still have the Mugiwara store in Osaka in that mall you went to?

[Kirsten Carey]

They sure do. Yeah. Well, they have one in the Daimaru near Osaka station is where the Mugiwara store is here. But they have several jump stores as well.

[Zach]

So I. I love Osaka and I never spend enough time there. And by enough time, I mean more than 24 hours at a time. There's.

[Ed]

We spent a night there drinking Strong zero on Dotonbori Ridge.

[Kirsten Carey]

Yes, it sounds like a good night.

[Zach]

Well, we also got thrown in the air by.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, you got the wasp.

[Ed]

Steve got thrown in the air by Salaryman. Yes.

[Zach]

Well, it's not just Steve. Me and Greg also got thrown.

[Ken]

Oh, you're right.

[Zach]

Yeah, that's thrown in the air erasure right there. We also have our contributor, Ken. How's it going, Ken? Hello.

[Ken]

Thanks for having me back.

[Zach]

Have you been thrown in the air by anyone this evening?

[Ken]

No, I have not. I long for that feeling, but it just.

[Ed]

We definitely couldn't keep Ken off the show today. We'll see why.

[Zach]

Oh, I didn't even think about that.

[Ken]

If that color spread, you couldn't keep me off. Definitely.

[Zach]

Okay. Well, last but not least, special guest joining us once again, Golfer Garer is back. How's it going, golfer?

[Golfer Gare]

Howdy. How you guys doing?

[Zach]

Good. Always great to have you back on the show. I think the last episode we did was very well received, which I'm not just saying to segue into the fact that you should listen to it. It's raise. Raise our flags. Raise the flag. I think it's raised the flag. You could check out that episode wherever you get your podcasts in YouTube where we talk about all the crazy going ons in the world which have only somehow gotten more crazy with Dr. Gomez or Dr. Bentley and golfer here. So give it a listen if you haven't. Speaking of self promotion, one other thing, and this I'm very hesitant to promote, but I've put on to YouTube the entirety of the One Piece podcast goes to Japan. This is really segueing. Everything we've just discussed, that was like.

[Ed]

10, 12 years ago.

[Zach]

We recorded it 12 plus years ago and it came out 11 plus years ago. So, you know, finally we. I thought it was time you could check that out.

[Ken]

There's.

[Zach]

There's actually some really great stuff. My own personal embarrassment of looking at myself from 12 years ago aside. But if you want to watch OPP Japan, it has the first interview with the editor at that time. So it's like from 2012-14 with any Western press.

[Ed]

We also went to Universal Studios Japan.

[Zach]

We went. Yeah, we saw the USJ show, which at the time was a real novelty. Um, I will underline. We also have interviews with Oda's middle. One of his middle school teachers, homeroom teacher. We like went around to all of his old schools and talked to them. And we went to the original Bharate restaurant where Baratie was based off of, which has still some of the best beef I've ever had in my life, period. Like that. It was really good. Where the guy is convinced he's based off of Sanji was based off of him, but Zeff was definitely based off of him. So check that out. Opp japan.com or now on YouTube. Enough of self promotion. Let's do other promotion of one piece stuff.

[Kirsten Carey]

Wait, real quick. Yeah, I did go to the USJ show this year and it did kick off by Usopp coming in on a jet Ski.

[Zach]

Those, those shows are pretty, pretty awesome. I gotta say.

[Kirsten Carey]

It was, it was great. It was really good.

[Zach]

Forgive my footage from 12 years ago. But it's. You can't do that wrong. A few other bits of One Piece news. The English dub of the latest batch of Egghead episodes 1134-1143 are going to be coming online on Crunchyroll on Tuesday, November 25th. So a day after this comes out. So you should. Why aren't you watching those now? I know. You know what? Listen to this. Then watch it.

[Ed]

You should be watching.

[Zach]

No, that's not. Not anymore. No, that was. This Logan now. Now you could be watching maybe. I don't know. Probably something better than that. The big news we don't have Mike Patton here to really revel in it is that the NBA is doing a collaboration with One Piece even more so, which features figures of Luffy and Grizzlies, Knicks, Lakers, Celtics, Warriors, Bulls outfits. There's also a picture of Enaru wearing a Thunder Oklahoma City Thunder shirt. That's pretty jersey.

[Stephen Paul]

That's good. Perfect.

[Zach]

Which is. That's the best choice they made in that group there.

[Kirsten Carey]

I quite liked the Shanks Bulls connection that they made. That's pretty cool.

[Zach]

Oh, the color. Okay.

[Kirsten Carey]

Yeah, just some red on red.

[Zach]

There's something about him that's bull related Red. Exactly. Okay.

[Kirsten Carey]

His name.

[Zach]

What? So that. That's really the news though. I want to go through.

[Stephen Paul]

You don't remember Shanks's 4 Pete in the 1990s NBA Finals?

[Zach]

Actually, now that you mentioned it.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah.

[Golfer Gare]

Two, three beats.

[Ed]

Anyway, non consecutive.

[Zach]

Let's always, always sports with all you people. Let's go into the manga recap for chapter 1166. Yes. I knew I knew what I was doing.

[Ed]

1176 new stories.

[Zach]

We also have an anime recap pieced together more. We'll see you on the other side.

[Kirsten Carey]

Ford Bluecruise Hands Free highway driving takes.

[Zach]

The work out of being behind the.

[Kirsten Carey]

Wheel, allowing you to relax and reconnect while also staying in control. Enjoy the drive in BlueCruise enabled vehicles like the F150 Explorer and Mustang Mach E available feature on equipped vehicles. Terms apply. Does not replace safe driving. See Ford.com BlueCruise for more details.

[Zach]

This is the manga recap for chapter 1166 news stories. So finally turning the page on one piece. We're going to tell something new tonight. This chapter and all chapters available@shonenjump, viz.com or mangaplus Shueisha Co JP I was joking. That wasn't true. We're gonna talk about One Piece tonight. Ed, what's going on on the COVID of Shonen Sham.

[Ed]

Sure. We got A shot of our hero Luffy, who we haven't seen in the story for a while, making a sad face or sort of a stern face with a sort of a triple burst of Rox. Roger and Garp, who are basically up against some graph paper. It looks like it's various colors and you can see how white rocks hair is. And the like, it's like he's got like indigo streaks in his white hair. Doesn't look blue like Buggy's hair at all. And Roger's. Roger's smirking in. Garp has got his big jolly face.

[Ken]

Well, and it's funny you mentioned that. That's the first thing I saw online when the colors for Zebik were revealed. Like, oh, it's. It's kind of bluish whitish hair. If you mix the blue and white together, you can kind of get a light blue like Buggy. I just rolled my eyes off the Internet.

[Ed]

Yeah, it's white hair with indigo streaks.

[Zach]

It's very dark blue to be fair. Like, since I put so much stock into saying that hair color should not be like, oh, this X is related to Y for the same reason. I should also say that just because the hair color is different does. Should not necessarily completely negate that that X could be related to Y. So there's the hope for the people who have that. Really. That theory I really do not endorse at all.

[Ken]

We keep talking about how like the world government, like, how did they not know Blackbeard is his son? Maybe they just go by the hair theory. Like, oh, it can't be Blackbeard's son. It's not white and blue. It's completely different color.

[Zach]

That's true. Actually. That would be. That's the tip off.

[Kirsten Carey]

Blackbeard dyes his hair.

[Ken]

That would be funny, actually.

[Zach]

And then. And then Emu's like, oh, yeah, we got.

[Ed]

Let me read it here. Based on the request. Yamato and Otama collecting leaves and baking sweet potatoes with tanukis and foxes. By now Yama finished the yard work.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah. I wonder why they thought of this.

[Ed]

Yeah. Collecting leaves.

[Zach]

Yeah. Oh, I thought it was just a way like to tell their parents. See, I finished it.

[Ken]

Yeah.

[Ed]

That one tanuki kind of looks like he's doing a ninja raizo pose there above Nami's head. Nami's lovely sort of Dennis Rodman silly ass hat.

[Zach]

That should, I think is the head.

[Stephen Paul]

People were saying that she stole Kaku's hat. And no one has the bravery to say Namiro Kwai except for me. I said that.

[Zach]

Hating that. And they're cook there. Okay.

[Ed]

And they're eating those purple skinned sweet potatoes.

[Zach]

Taro. Is that. Is that what.

[Stephen Paul]

That's not necessarily. It's. It's their own.

[Ed]

Those are.

[Ken]

Yeah.

[Ed]

It's a very Japanese thing of like the purple skinned sweet potato.

[Stephen Paul]

It's got orange flesh still. Satsuma emo is. Is what they call them sometimes. And. Yeah.

[Kirsten Carey]

And we got in Osaka, there is a man who will drive around. Actually I think it. It's a recording. But to pretend that he's just singing through a speaker and he has these like yaki emo. Like in this. But the. There's just this song going. Ya Emo, Ya emo. Over and over and over again. And I hear it at least a couple times a week.

[Ken]

So I feel like a fake Yamato fan here. Because I don't understand what the 15 on the sweater stands for. Unless they are the 15th straw hat and I can start coping again.

[Ed]

Ichigo.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, I'm not really sure what the 15 is from Oden. Isoto is like. Like Oden's kind of. I am Oden. Yeah, I got that one right.

[Zach]

Yeah. Give him 15.

[Ken]

I'm not sure.

[Ed]

Yeah, yeah, I figured.

[Ken]

It's very cute though. Even I think, Steven, it might have been you.

[Ed]

And Yamato's potato looks overcooked.

[Stephen Paul]

That's the foil.

[Zach]

I thought it was the foil.

[Ken]

Yeah, it's the foil.

[Zach]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Ken]

Steven, I think it was. You posted in our discord the progress of this color spread.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah.

[Ken]

And Yamato was at the focus for a lot of the ideas Oda was drawing. And I was very excited. Like they're still front and center here. But like there was so much more Yamato focused ones in there then like, oh, we were so close. But I love this spread. It's absolutely gorgeous.

[Ed]

Yeah. I love the foxes prancing on the bridge in the background.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah.

[Zach]

As an adult, fall has definitely become my favorite holiday. Favorite holiday, favorite season and my favorite holiday.

[Kirsten Carey]

It's kind of like a holiday.

[Zach]

Yeah. Well, because it lasts just as long as a holiday would usually. And Ed, I was going to make the joke since you said we hadn't seen Luffy in a while. And I was going to say, oh yeah, he's wearing glasses to show that time had passed. That's. That's how we know.

[Ed]

And Luffy has burned his hand trying to eat this.

[Zach]

Well, that doesn't surprise me.

[Ed]

Hot potato.

[Ken]

It's interesting that it's only the straw hats pre Alabasta too. There's no Robin, Frankie. Any of the others.

[Zach]

Yamato symbol.

[Ed]

Jim, Bay or Bro.

[Ken]

Oh yeah. Yes. Yeah, Yamato's there. How can I lose my credit? Color spread.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah. Zoro took a break from his trucking job to. To enjoy a snack here.

[Ken]

What is that?

[Golfer Gare]

Seeing him in jeans is wigging me out. Like, it feels so unnatural.

[Zach]

Yeah, I know what you mean.

[Kirsten Carey]

Yeah.

[Stephen Paul]

Yes. Nami's jacket appears. It looks like. It probably says any port in a storm.

[Zach]

Yeah, that's. Yeah, you're right.

[Stephen Paul]

Sleeves.

[Zach]

Yeah. You see it in. So.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah.

[Zach]

Unless it's something funny. That's probably what it is. Yeah. No, this is. This is probably a new friend. We don't have a ton of autumnal and looks. Color spreads.

[Ed]

Looks like Luffy is wearing it. We have the football one. The American football color spread. That's in one of the calendars.

[Zach]

It's. Or a Kill Billish type.

[Ed]

He's wearing an Adidas tracksuit, it looks like.

[Zach]

Yeah, that's it. That's it. That's the correct answer there. Any other comments on the color squad otherwise?

[Kirsten Carey]

No.

[Ken]

It's very pretty.

[Zach]

Okay.

[Ken]

Very timely.

[Zach]

Well, it would have been timely a few weeks ago. I'm going to be honest.

[Kirsten Carey]

I. It is still timely in Japan. It's not quite the Koyo. The fall colors are not quite crested.

[Zach]

To be fair. They only have seasons in Japan. So that. That makes sense. That's. That's a dig. More on Japan. Thinking that they're the only ones.

[Kirsten Carey]

I mean, it's mostly just summer now in Japan.

[Zach]

Okay. Well, I'm gonna go cry in a corner.

[Kirsten Carey]

Yeah.

[Zach]

And what's the first page? Sure.

[Ed]

Yeah, we have the sort of the crackling. The black crackling hockey there still. And see Roger with his sword stuck in the ground. He's laying against a rock and rocks is in a pile on the ground here. And we. And it's started to rain and there's a.

[Ken]

Of sort of.

[Ed]

I think that's the crackling hockey in the background.

[Zach]

Oh yeah. Garps there too. I didn't even notice that. Yeah.

[Ed]

And you can hear rocks sort of weakly coughing. And you hear the sound of the rain. And we see Roger there with his sword stuck in the ground by his side. And.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah.

[Ed]

Garp face down on the ground. You know, blood trickling out of the hairline as it does. And close up, top view of Rock's face on his back. He says. Or he's thinking here, will I leave this island alive?

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, well. Well, he's Noticing too at the top that the he's. The curse seems to have worn off because it's now normal Rocks again.

[Ed]

Yes, his teeth are back to normal.

[Zach]

Yeah, yeah.

[Ed]

And he sees. It looks like he sees figures in the distance. Is that. I see Garling's hair in the middle.

[Stephen Paul]

These fucking Cenobites walking up on him.

[Zach]

That could be anyone's moon shaped hair.

[Ed]

The Adobe Reversi is kind of the.

[Kirsten Carey]

Lament Configuration back tonight, finally making its appearance in one piece.

[Zach]

Oh, we have mentioned that many times on this show. Yeah, don't even.

[Ed]

Oh, this is a group of. Of this is the group of celestial Dragons here.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, it's the Holy Knights.

[Ed]

Yes, the Holy Knights.

[Zach]

Well they are also those.

[Ed]

I forget the one with the sharp teeth. What's their name?

[Zach]

Oh, Mafi.

[Stephen Paul]

Maffy.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Ed]

Or if you're British, Matthew. And yeah, Summers is there. And so this is continuing Rock's internal thoughts. Oh right. I forgot to say one thing. I'm glad you stopped me. So Garling is poised over Rocks with his sword at his throat. And Rocks continues. Thanks, you know, for stopping me. And then Chunk and we get the spurt of blood apparently.

[Zach]

Probably.

[Stephen Paul]

Okay, is this, Is this me here, Zach?

[Zach]

Yeah, you could. You could finish this off as well if you want.

[Stephen Paul]

Okay. So yes, after just to kind of paraphrase that, you know, Rox is has he has been imagining or sending silent signals to Garp and Roger to. For them to flee because they don't need to to stick around and die with him. Which is apparently what has just happened. But speaking of other folks on the island, we see some legs running and then we, we. We find out that this is actually Gabon and Rayleigh who are carrying Roger and Garp. And someone seems to be. Garp is saying where's Rocks? And Gabon is like you're worried about your enemy. And he says you guys are my enemies too. So. Touche. And Roger is wondering what happened to Rocks as well. Yes, really. And Rayleigh just says they killed him. And that is all for that. Then we get this huge shot of the island. Not really clear what exactly is going on or how this is going on, except as it is summed up here by random voices over the the Denden Mushi.

[Zach]

Hurry.

[Stephen Paul]

The island's collapsing. Don't let the pirates escape. Roger's ship is on the move.

[Ken]

Open fire.

[Ed]

It kind of reminds me of that Treehouse of Horror episode on the Simpsons where the. The haunted house sort of zapped itself into it into a singularity because it couldn't stand them anymore.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, yeah. Rather than have. Have the Simpsons inside of it. Yeah, yeah. Yes. In this case, it seems that God Valley is. Is no longer content with it's collapsing.

[Ed]

Under the power of hockey.

[Ken]

I gotta say that this really eats into my God Valley is still a bark. If the island is completely gone, I'm hop just like sank momentarily because for.

[Stephen Paul]

A loop, I think it's collapsing under the weight of this flashback, actually.

[Ken]

Yeah.

[Stephen Paul]

But then we get kind of. And just to, you know, to send the message home, we get one of the classic Oda monologues, which he always does at the end of a, you know, momentous story sequence. So he says, absent from the pages of recorded history. We get a cool double page spread where we see a whole bunch of different people, which I'll go through real quick, but I'll just read the text first. Like a curtain falling on a stage, the island crumbled in upon itself and was shrouded in a deep, deep mist. This is a broad account of what happened in the mysterious, obscure God Valley incident. But after a brief moment of silence, a massive lightning bolt with countless branches split the sky. And with that, a number of new stories began. So what we see in all this is, you know, we see like navy cannons firing and then Garp and Roger, they've all been bandaged up. Garp's on the. The blood transfusion bag and everything. Whitebeard is there, Big mom is there. And they're all kind of. They all kind of have like different takeaways, different emotional reactions to what's just happened. Like, Big mom kind of seems excited almost, which is. Which is odd. And we see the. The aforementioned lightning bolts that is coming out of kind of one of Oda's classic, like, sort of the clouds have parted. We've. We've seen that with a lot of big hockey moments and stuff like that, but there's a big old lightning bolt that's just kind of crackling across the sky as all of these ships depart. The. The ruins kind of smoking in the background. And Roger's ship is going, let's make our escape full speed ahead. They're having a great time. We get.

[Ken]

It's noteworthy that the lightning bolt is a. It's a. It's like a white lightning bolt.

[Zach]

Yeah. This is like very different than what it was.

[Ed]

The rain. It was raining on the first page.

[Ken]

That's true.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Stephen Paul]

Yes, it's true. I mean, I guess I would say usually, I think Oda's style would be to at least give it an Outline so that you can see, because it just looks like, you know, they just, you know, slapped down some. Some white out to. To cut over the. The. Which is. I mean, that's literally like how they would do. Yeah, that makes.

[Ken]

That makes sense.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah.

[Ken]

I'm just saying it's. It's not like the black hockey lightning we've seen split the sky before.

[Stephen Paul]

No, no, it's definitely not the black lightning.

[Ken]

Yeah.

[Stephen Paul]

Which I think makes sense because that was.

[Ed]

That was still crackling on the ground on the first page.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. He reserves that for, like, when it's actually, you know, characters going up against each other and. And this seems to be more of a. Of a nature wide thing. And yeah, we see Kaido look in his goofy dragon form dragon, regular dragon, the human dragon, I should say, who is bloodied, but he's on the deck of the ship. Little baby Shanks, who is just snoozing away, very, very cozy on a pile of hard metal coins and jewelry. And then Ivankov and Ginny are administering to Kuma, who's kind of knocked out. I'm sure he's tired after all of his heroics. And lastly, little baby teach in his mama's arms, wherever they are now, with.

[Ed]

Like a single tear.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah.

[Zach]

Poor guy.

[Kirsten Carey]

The how much Roger looks like Ace in this spread made me very emotional.

[Zach]

He is, like, transforming more into Ace somehow during this flashback, like to a point where it's like, kind of annoying me.

[Ed]

Yeah, his hair is getting more Ace. Like.

[Kirsten Carey]

Yeah, the hair.

[Zach]

No, he's everything. It's just. He's just Ace without freckles at this point.

[Ed]

And you can see his mustache starting to grow in.

[Ken]

Yeah, he has a little stubble of a mustache. Starting.

[Kirsten Carey]

Yeah, the stubble. The stubble is the difference. It's all in the stubble.

[Ken]

He gets Shanks. I'm a dad now. Trying to grow the stash.

[Zach]

It happens a little before, but he is a feeling. That's a fatherly intuition.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah.

[Zach]

Kirsten. Yeah.

[Kirsten Carey]

Oh, my. My turn. Yes. Yes. So cut to the Roger pirates talking among themselves. We still gotta wait. Yes. Not until Roger wakes up. Hurry up, Captain Roger. I want to open those chests. And then there's a click of a door as the slightly less Ace looking Roger comes out of the infirmary and his whole crew shouts, Roger. And he says, is that Gloriosa there? Yes, it is.

[Stephen Paul]

Gloriosa wiping her brow like she's done some amazing, you know, medical work instead of the ship doctor whoever.

[Kirsten Carey]

I. I wonder if I. Who's that guy in the hat? Behind her. Is that the doctor perhaps? I don't know.

[Stephen Paul]

I would guess.

[Ed]

Yeah, well, crocus doesn't join until later, right?

[Zach]

Yeah. Crocus is for like the explicit purpose of whatever disease that he gets. Yes.

[Ken]

Yeah. His last year of living.

[Zach]

Yeah. So he's not there for that long. Yeah.

[Kirsten Carey]

Roger coming out says, sorry to worry you all like that. And they. They reply, oh good, you're better now. Anyway, check this out. Roger says, were you really worried for me or not? Treasure Roger priorities. And then we get a very adorable shot of Rayleigh and Chalky. Rayleigh's face is very clearly not trying to. He's trying to hide how pleased he is.

[Zach]

Or alternatively, he stays into the middle distance pretending to have an emotion. Yeah, yeah.

[Ed]

He's the real winner here.

[Zach]

He.

[Kirsten Carey]

He really is.

[Stephen Paul]

That's his version of that. He's the real winner of the Fishman island look. The blank eyed Luffy look. That's. That's really.

[Zach]

Hey, look at this guy who has like Magellan wings. I never.

[Ed]

And look at all those. There's hearts just floating off of him.

[Ken]

It's very huge.

[Kirsten Carey]

Her as both of them.

[Golfer Gare]

Really?

[Ed]

Yeah.

[Kirsten Carey]

I think it's a mutual heart.

[Zach]

Okay, Zach.

[Ken]

I didn't notice the guy with the double wings. I'm like, oh no, there's a Tony reverse guy in the ship. Hurry somebody.

[Zach]

No, those wings are purple. They can't be related.

[Ken]

Yeah, right. Wrong color.

[Stephen Paul]

If he gets dummy reverse he do they like turn into angel wings. And he's like super nice.

[Zach]

Wow, that guy was a real dick before. But now he's great and his canines like go back up into. Wait, no, that's not good. Cursing you.

[Kirsten Carey]

Anyway, the crew announces over this cute picture of Rayleigh and Chalky. We got Shocky out safe and sound. And Shocky just goes haha. With the little heart. Cute shit.

[Ed]

Very cute.

[Kirsten Carey]

Very cute. Then cut to the rest of Roger's crew, all super excited for the treasure, saying, we made up. We made off with all this treasure. Roger saying, wow, what a haul. And then there's a. And Roger goes. And then from. From the treasure chest itself, we hear a duh. And Roger's crew says, hey, that came from inside the chest. There's something in here.

[Ed]

Oh, that was the wing guy saying that.

[Kirsten Carey]

Yes. Wing. Wing.

[Zach]

Wingman. No, no. On this crew it would be something really stupid.

[Kirsten Carey]

Barents B. Wingman says, careful when you open it.

[Zach]

Did you say Barents or Baron?

[Kirsten Carey]

I said. I said Varintz.

[Zach]

Baron. The name. Barents. Okay. Baron.

[Kirsten Carey]

Yeah.

[Zach]

Baron's D, B, B. Oh, thank God.

[Kirsten Carey]

Yeah. Not a D. No, no, no. But he wants to be. He wants to be.

[Zach]

Oh, that's why. Yeah, yeah, I don't like any of that.

[Kirsten Carey]

I. I pre thought all of this.

[Zach]

Anyway, that's how this podcast works.

[Kirsten Carey]

There's a click as Roger opens the treasure chest and he audibly gulps. And then there's an absolutely incredible shot of all of Roger's crew.

[Zach]

They're all saying the name of that one chapter from Egghead. Wasn't it just A.

[Kirsten Carey]

I do not remember.

[Zach]

That's. That's for, like, three other people out there.

[Ed]

What?

[Kirsten Carey]

Baby?

[Ed]

Somebody left a baby.

[Zach]

This is where babies come from, guys. Treasure chest. Because they're our treasures.

[Golfer Gare]

The hell is Captain John doing there?

[Zach]

That's not.

[Stephen Paul]

Oh, that's Spencer.

[Zach]

Is that really his name?

[Stephen Paul]

Yes.

[Golfer Gare]

Wait, really?

[Stephen Paul]

Yes.

[Ken]

Yeah, they look similar, but.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah. Spencer has bangs.

[Zach]

Yeah, come on. Spencer has bangs. Everyone knows Spencer has bangs.

[Ed]

He bangs. He bangs.

[Ken]

This is super close to the shot that was in Film Red too, where they had the flashback of looking like. I don't think it's exact. I saw someone talking about how there's different people standing around the chest in the film Red version, but it's very, very close to the flashback there. And although Film Red isn't considered canon, this scene seems to be kind of canonized now.

[Stephen Paul]

Was that, like, it didn't I forget? Was it supposed to be Shanks as a baby? Or was it supposed to be uta when they find.

[Ken]

Well, so it's Shanks talking about, like, huh, I wonder if this happens all the time. And they first. It's the flashback looking down at UTA and he remembers himself being discovered by Roger, and they show this exact scene.

[Stephen Paul]

Oh, okay, okay. I forgot that.

[Golfer Gare]

Yeah.

[Ed]

I haven't watched Film Red since it was in theaters.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah.

[Zach]

Once after. Yeah.

[Ken]

The first time I even heard the name Figarland was in Film Red too. So there's lots of little nuggets in there that are coming back in a good way.

[Zach]

Yeah, that one.

[Stephen Paul]

Kind of like how Stampede was where Laugh Tale was revealed and stuff though, right? Yeah.

[Zach]

Yeah. So if people want a canon movie, we get little canon tidbits in movies. Isn't that better?

[Kirsten Carey]

I think I've been sort of subconsciously treating the Film Red version of this scene like actual canon for years, so. And I'm right. I was right.

[Zach]

You were right. It was in the. The red data book thing that came with the movie. There were, like, sketches in the timeline, so it had been confirmed canon.

[Ed]

I Wonder if that was like a separate release or that was like a movie program.

[Zach]

No, I think it was a movie program. I think it was a movie program Room Golfer.

[Golfer Gare]

We cut to, do we know which island this is? I think this is just an indiscriminate island.

[Ed]

It's not Hachinosu, which I kind of thought it was at the beginning, but it's not a skull shape.

[Golfer Gare]

We see the downfall of the Rocks pirates. The story, of course, was heavily sanitized and prominently featured the exploits of Garp, the hero. We see a couple of folks reading newspapers. The Rocks pirates are done for. We see a guy cheering that looks like a more real version of what Teach would grow up to look like. At least that's what if you just expanded him. If you just hit him with the age ray and he didn't become Blackbeard. He says, rox is dead. And then there's people cheering, and they said, I just knew. Vice Admiral Garp was the real strongest man around.

[Zach]

These people all have British accents because there's Big Ben in the background.

[Golfer Gare]

My British accent isn't very good. No, I'm not impersonating Gordon Ramsay.

[Zach]

There it is.

[Golfer Gare]

And they're cheering for Garp, and they say, now there's a true hero. We see Navy HQ grand line. What is this drivel? Vice Admiral Garp. Stop. We see Garp flipping out, ripping up a newspaper, says, bring me this. Morgan's guy. He needs to answer for this. Sengoku says, oh, stop it, Garp. The government clearly paid him off to write this. And then we see they're chatting in, like, an infirmary, and the guy in the background just looks real bummed to be a part of this conversation.

[Zach]

Oh, you are. You are not skipping over. Yeah, It's a very important character. So only us here at the One Piece podcast. Stephen, do you wanna. Or you sounded like you were.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, I mean, as a fellow. Steve, I can explain that. That is Dr. Fishbonen, which is his actual name, because we see him in the present day, and he was. Was he literally shooting two years ago?

[Zach]

Yeah, yeah.

[Ken]

He has a fishbone sticking out of the corner of his mouth, so I.

[Zach]

Assume this is a tiny version of that fishbone.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, it looks like there's something. There's some little detail.

[Ken]

The bone grew over time.

[Ed]

Actually, I don't see. Which panel are we looking at? Sorry.

[Stephen Paul]

The first panel on page 11.

[Zach]

Page 11, yeah. So, yeah, go ahead.

[Stephen Paul]

But he's important to us because Steve got to voice him. His, like, one line of dialogue that he has two. Sorry. Sorry, Steve. I was cutting you short by 50%.

[Zach]

I don't know. I don't know how much, but.

[Stephen Paul]

But yeah, Steve Yurko does the voice for Dr. Fishbone. And so we'll see if they get him back for this scene where he has all these lines of dialogue that we're seeing.

[Zach]

I do want to say I did not notice how he just looks like Onigiri in Like this. And he does then too, you know, because, yeah, the hair. But what a character. So much lore.

[Stephen Paul]

Unforgettable.

[Zach]

Unforgettable. If you missed him, how could you call yourself a true One piece fan? Really? Golfer, please continue.

[Golfer Gare]

And then Sengoku says, the world government and the Navy are both massive organizations. If you include the militaries of all the member countries. There are tens of millions of soldiers across the world. It's impossible to com. To be completely aware of what every last one of them is doing. So when I notice that the upper management is doing something insane, I can just look the other way. And Garp hits him with a. Huh? And then goes into karate, kicking him as they fight in the panel below. And he says, that's why I hate. Or that's what I hate about you, Sengoku, you ladder climbing fool. Go. Or Sengoku says, shut up.

[Zach]

What?

[Golfer Gare]

What is barking from the bottom of the cliff going to accomplish? There's, you know, unnamed marines. Unless you guys know somebody who voiced them in. In the anime.

[Zach]

Oh, yes, that's Marine A and C of the. No, I don't know.

[Kirsten Carey]

Chadley and Bradley.

[Zach]

Oh, Chad Lee and Bradley.

[Ken]

That's a good friend.

[Zach]

They used to be good friends with Varenz. B wingman back.

[Ed]

Andre and Kandre.

[Ken]

No, that's stopping you two in. Come on. Yes.

[Ed]

Those are different guys.

[Golfer Gare]

Garp and Sengoku are face to face. And he says, if you turn out like them, I'm gonna kill you myself. Then Sengoku says to him, well, with friends like you, how can I possibly go wrong? As they turn away from each other, he says, don't tell me you're quitting, Garp. Garp says, you some kind of idiot? I've got plenty to protect down at the bottom of the cliff, as you call it.

[Stephen Paul]

I love this scene. Very good scene.

[Ed]

And they're both lumped up pretty good.

[Zach]

Well, you know, friendship.

[Ken]

It's a real good fight. And it really shows their ideologies very clearly from the start here. And that last line of Garps is just so good.

[Ed]

They're fighting like Zoro And Sanji.

[Ken]

Yes. Yeah, kind of.

[Zach]

Yeah. I. Well, I like Sengoku's look, particularly in the. His penultimate panel there on the left, there's like. It's. It's not just that he's like a brown noser. It's just like he is like, I'm gonna do what it takes and I don't really care. It's just a. It's just an interesting character study there. About Sengoku, who has always been an interesting.

[Ed]

Is like, I intend to amass power for no particular reason.

[Zach]

I don't.

[Golfer Gare]

He's trying to get that retirement.

[Zach]

That's.

[Golfer Gare]

That's how he reads to me. 25 and I'm done.

[Zach]

Senpu crackers. Right?

[Ed]

Senbe.

[Zach]

Senbay. Say Senbu. Because I want to be wrong. Kirsten.

[Kirsten Carey]

Meanwhile, in Elbaf. Waa waa.

[Zach]

Thank you, Kirsten. Everyone on the plane listening to this. Everyone listening on a plane is like, who was that crying baby?

[Kirsten Carey]

Thank you. I am thinking about going to actors school.

[Zach]

Is that what it's called?

[Golfer Gare]

Yeah.

[Kirsten Carey]

A large shot of the island zooms in and we see it is poor. Our poor little guy crying here. And he hears rocks in his head. Loki saying, you're back again. And Loki saying, or rock saying, I'm not taking you with me. How many times do I have to say it's squirt? You really think I take kids onto my crew?

[Zach]

Oh, I just noticed. This is the bear and wolf, the name of the wolf from the beginning of this arc several millennia ago.

[Ed]

So when is this happening? Because Rox is here and he's not dead.

[Zach]

No, he is dead.

[Ken]

Remembering back to when Rox was here in the past. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Kirsten Carey]

Remembering and crying and hiccuping. And he remembers Rox saying, what a mess. Ignored by the guy whose attention I want and followed around by some annoying snot nosed brat instead.

[Ed]

Literally snot nosed in this one.

[Kirsten Carey]

Yeah. Poor guy. And in the flashback, Loki says, I think you're Nika rocks. And Rox goes, nika.

[Zach]

I just think he's Nika.

[Kirsten Carey]

I just think he's Nika.

[Stephen Paul]

Is he holding a sweet potato?

[Zach]

Yes, he's holding the sweet potato from the color sword.

[Ken]

Oh, my God.

[Zach]

Kirby.

[Ken]

Nice.

[Zach]

Yeah. Thanks to Kirby for drawing this week's image, which we'll see. I guess at some point we don't know what it is as we're sitting here. Yeah, go ahead, sir.

[Kirsten Carey]

The warrior of liberation. He laughs as he tears down the world. And Loki says, he tears it down. Well, I'm gonna be king of the World, if anyone's got that kind of power, it's Harald. Loki goes, huh? Rock says, listen to this. Loki, slumbering somewhere out there in the world is a bunch of incredible destroyers by the name of Galela. And the guy who can actually control them is your old man. I could have all the outlawas in the world under my command if me and Harold team up. Who could possibly stop us? And Loki, smiling, goes, wow, that's so cool.

[Zach]

Tell me more of your secret plan that you're just telling to some random kid here.

[Kirsten Carey]

I don't have friends.

[Zach]

To be fair, it is. It is the son of the king. So then, yeah, it's his best friend's son. I mean, yeah, it's like. So it's like Uncle Roxy.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, Uncle Rocks.

[Zach]

Yeah, unky rocks.

[Kirsten Carey]

Unky Rockle. Loki in the present day, just sadly looking off a cliff and thinking, so why doesn't my dad team up with you? And Rock says, because of love. To which Loki just responds with.

[Zach]

What'S love? I don't. I haven't experienced it. Wait, that's.

[Kirsten Carey]

Baby experienced it?

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, that's a.

[Zach]

That's called gallows.

[Stephen Paul]

It's harder from Loki than.

[Kirsten Carey]

Yeah, yeah, Rock says, but I'll keep coming back. A hundred times, 200. As many as it takes. Boy does it to Loki just reading the tiny, tiny newspaper in his hand.

[Zach]

We wondered if they had large print editions and they don't.

[Ken]

They don't.

[Stephen Paul]

No.

[Zach]

No.

[Ken]

What is this, like paper for ants?

[Golfer Gare]

No shot he's allowed in that library.

[Kirsten Carey]

It's like. It's like less than the size of the palm of his hand and he's just looking at it.

[Ed]

Yeah, take it to the owl.

[Zach]

Yeah, take it to the owl. Yeah.

[Stephen Paul]

It's like he. You know how they sell.

[Kirsten Carey]

He hasn't taken it to the Owl.

[Zach]

Because he hangs out in the underworld. He doesn't want to.

[Stephen Paul]

You know how they sell those, like little, like, cell phone strap charm, like volume one of one piece, and it's like it's about that big.

[Zach]

It is.

[Stephen Paul]

You can flip through it.

[Zach]

Yeah, I have one of those somewhere.

[Ed]

He can't squint with all those bandages over his eyes.

[Zach]

Oh, that's true. How is he reading it? Wait, well, we don't.

[Ken]

That's fine.

[Kirsten Carey]

Maybe through the bandages. He has like, extra.

[Zach]

I wish I had the ability to read.

[Ken]

It was finally time.

[Zach]

Just having a random memory of rocks and crying for no reason.

[Ken]

Yeah, I'm convinced he can look through the. He can see through the bandages. It must be like he could also.

[Zach]

Take off the bandages when no one's around if he doesn't. If that's the reason he has them on.

[Ken]

I think he's ashamed of his eyes. That's his whole thing. He's ashamed of his beautiful eyes.

[Ed]

So page 14. Who's up?

[Ken]

That's me. Alright. On a certain island, we hear some commotion going on. There's been an assault. It was King Harald of Elbaf. Has he hurt any civilians? No, not really. It's a giant ruffian that he's beating. But it's so brutal. And you see all these onlookers of the kingdom looking up at some scene. You hear crying and screaming and exclamation points. And we see Harold. You still don't get it, do you? And there's a giant who's gotten the ever living shit kicked out of him on the ground. Yeah. Yes I do. I'm sorry. I'll never pillage the humans again. And Harold is looming over like a frickin balrog looking down at the city. You don't get it. None of you do. And then it cuts back to a panel of Harold pulling back for a punch. And then just boom, boom, boom, boom. Over and over again. All of you scum with sighs as you your only quality are the ones who built the giant's history of terror. And because of you, no one believes us.

[Stephen Paul]

They don't believe that we seek a.

[Ken]

Peaceful seat among the nations of the world. And that's why I couldn't help him. And just Harold is just beating into this giant over and over again. The entire village is running away. And then we get a zoom in on Harold's face as tears start welling up. And we see that he's thinking about Zebeck the entire time. And we get a little flashback bubble and it says, whoever side fortune is on, it doesn't feel like mine, so lend me your aid. And Xebek's words go on deaf ears as Harold keeps screaming, My greatest friend begged me for help. And I turned my back on him. I left him there to die. All through tears and punching.

[Zach]

And this guy's literally unconscious also.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, yeah, you missed the little metal panel.

[Ken]

Oh yeah. Oh yeah, sorry.

[Zach]

Well, he's unconscious. That's really all.

[Ken]

Yeah, yeah, my apologies. I got caught up there in the beating of this poor guy.

[Zach]

We, we continue.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, I was gonna say I. I hope that like when they animate it that like every syllable he. He's punching him like for this whole speech, like he hits him like 50 times that would be pretty funny.

[Ken]

Like no one believes like every single.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, exactly, Exactly.

[Ken]

Oh, what's that?

[Ed]

What's that. What's that hat say? Sort of at the top of the page. Nap handle there.

[Zach]

Sig.

[Ed]

Gi. Or I mean gigantic. Or gig.

[Zach]

The one flying in the air in the middle.

[Golfer Gare]

Oh, it does look like it just says gig on it.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah. Or maybe Sig.

[Zach]

Yeah, I thought that was an S.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, it looks like an arale, like Dr. Swamp Hat.

[Zach]

It kind of does. I do want to note also that it is funny that we started this flashback where Harold was the one who was being the ruffian beating, you know, like.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Zach]

The self awareness there might be. Might not be, you know, oriented.

[Kirsten Carey]

I mean, I understand he's describing himself at the beginning of this flashback.

[Zach]

He is anyway.

[Ed]

And he's not that guy anymore. And at this point now I'm trying.

[Kirsten Carey]

To set an example, but is he.

[Ken]

Well, and he's. He's undoing all the goodwill. He's beat up. Like he's trying to prove the giants are not violent. And here he is, like, even not against. It's not against humans, but he's beating up this poor guy who's like, he's had enough.

[Ed]

That's what you get from being violent.

[Zach]

And also destroying the town in the process, seemingly. Right.

[Stephen Paul]

It's like when a parent is punishing like a rowdy kid in public and they start like yelling at them and causing more of a scene than the kid was actually causing.

[Ken]

Exactly.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Ed]

It hurts me more than it hurts you.

[Zach]

No, that's a darker way to. Anyway, now. He says, now I cannot turn back from this path. I refuse to overlook the evil of the giants screaming into the distance here. And we see everyone's reactions, which is, what the hell is this guy doing? Meanwhile, the King of the Giants has become deranged. So says Big news Morgan's.

[Kirsten Carey]

Morgan's coming in with the. With the occasional truth.

[Zach]

Yeah, well, that's how you. That's how you tell a good lie. You have to tell all the truth in there.

[Ken]

No, the truth can be the truth.

[Ed]

But only when it's convenient.

[Kirsten Carey]

Yeah.

[Zach]

It's not a lie if you believe it. That's my Seinfeld reference for the day I'm done. Navy HQ or Marineford. I believe in the underground cells, so not impel down. I'll make that clear as we see Garp talking to his son for the first time in the series. Is this true? Like seeing the two of these?

[Kirsten Carey]

I think that's true.

[Golfer Gare]

Which he's only alluded to it one other time.

[Zach]

And when was that? I'm trying. I was trying to remember. Stop putting golfer on the spot. You could come back. I could come back to you. I want to. Okay. While golfer gets that. Yeah. So it's only also quarantined to, like, half of a panel at the bottom. Half of a page at the bottom. I found interesting. Anyway, he says, I'm quitting the Navy. Dad. No, but he has legitimate reasons. I'm sorry I gave it that kind of. Anyway, I know. And on that topic, I'm disgusted by you. And you see Garp closing his eyes, saying, I know. And then he turns Dragon into a key. No, he throws him Mr. Three.

[Ken]

Oh.

[Ed]

So, yeah, earlier, there he was, I think, opening the door with the. That's that there. And then he drops the key after.

[Zach]

Oh, I couldn't tell if he was, like, rustling for his key in his pocket or if they were like, closing a door behind him. I was.

[Kirsten Carey]

I was having trouble tossing the key to Dragon.

[Golfer Gare]

That's what I thought.

[Zach]

No, that's the clink. That's the clink. But I'm trying to think of what the clank is at the beginning of that scene. Oh, yeah, yeah.

[Stephen Paul]

This is like.

[Kirsten Carey]

This is like manga up against the door.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, this is like manga speedrunning of, like. How quickly can I convey this scene? Just, like, over in three seconds.

[Zach]

This needed more space. That said, I do like how they give the next page more space. Like, I'm not saying they shouldn't have, but this one needed, I think, a little more time. Although it is really Harold's story. And I. I'm. We'll get to that at the end. So we head back to Elbaf at Eda's bar. As Eda is saying, harold, that's all you could say today. And Harold's like, I've made up my mind. Ida, Chief Jarl, it's time for me to set aside these half measures. Haradin, Loki, you are my sons and I love you both. And I want you two to work together. That was Loki laughing to support Elbaf after I'm gone. And you see the ship heading toward Marineford as you see someone on the loudspeaker. It's an Elbaf Royal Navy ship. What? And here, Marine guy number 17, says, I'm very sorry, King Harold, but I have been instructed not to allow you to land. Not to allow you to land. Yeah, that's what I said. Not to allow you to land. Yep, got it. Got it. Golfer saved me.

[Golfer Gare]

Then Harold is stepping on to marine board and says, officers of the navy and dignitaries of the world, please hear me out. Grabs both of his horns as his muscles flex and he rips them off of his head.

[Ed]

Ouch.

[Golfer Gare]

Blood spewing out from both parts of his noggin. All of the marines are absolutely perplexed. And they're all saying, what Yow. As he. As Harold holds both of his horns out in front of all the marines, he says, allow me this chance to atone for a thousand years of history. I want to apologize for all the mistakes that giant kind has made. I wish to prove my oath of peace so that the children of Elbaf can lead fruitful lives without hurting anyone, that they can live hand in hand with humanity. I want a chance to atone for our sins. If that means I must be a slave, so be it. And then we see Loki's eye or Loki Imu's eye.

[Zach]

Loki's eye is much sweeter than that.

[Ed]

And it's. To be continued. To be back in a week with chapter 1167, I was gonna say.

[Zach]

Yeah, that's the big cliffhanger. No, I'm glad I got golfer to read something that was antithetical to everything he would do in this situation. Right. I think that's fair. Hopefully.

[Golfer Gare]

You'Re 100% right.

[Zach]

Well, golfer, I'll start with you. What did you think of the chapter?

[Golfer Gare]

So I thought this was. I mean, this was. We're used to the end of. You can call this an arc. Like this is the God Valley flashback is Loki's memory within Rox's memory. And we just get so many different perspectives as we round all of this out. And it feels like we kind of button everything up really, really quickly. It's nice to get little bits of answers of how everything kind of happened. How Shanks ends up on Roger's ship. How does Dragon end up leaving the marines? What's the big inciting incident that is going to transform Elbaf? How we know it now, and knowing this is like we've known. Harold is walking the path of willingly giving up his people for the idea of prosperity without truly understanding, like, what lies in front of them.

[Ed]

Well, it actually seems like, as I remember it, it's been a while since we've seen Elbaf in the current day, but Elbaf is sort of living up to that now with the sort of. The children who know peace.

[Golfer Gare]

Oh. Are different than the children who know war.

[Ed]

Yeah.

[Golfer Gare]

Yeah. And so it's I thought it was really interesting and to round that out, like, especially with having the juxtaposition of Dragon right before this. To see the person who is willingly.

[Ed]

Leaving and Loki allegedly killing his father.

[Golfer Gare]

Yeah, there will be that as well. But with Dragon leaving the Marines, leaving this apparatus and showing kind of like the fans of like a perspective of somebody. Because we've had Garp for so long, we've barely ever known Dragon outside of he is Luffy's dad and what happens on Log Town and then the revolutionary stuff. But to see the inciting incident for him to leave and have that perspective and then we know Harold does not understand what happened on God Valley. Like we saw all of this. He is seeing none of this. He was stopped from going to God Valley and he just had that bullshit newspaper. Yeah. And he could have gone alongside rocks. Would his perspective be different if he saw what happened there and if he knew the truth of what actually happened to his friend and then just basically falling into the hands of Emu is. It's. It's. I feel like it's going to be a tragedy of like what's going to happen to him. Like it's going to. It's going to take everybody else on that island, especially Loki, to stop from just being the ultimate tool for EMU and the world government to take over the world.

[Zach]

It's a dramatic irony. Like. Yeah, but yeah, I mean, like this feels like cut and paste that because he. By feeling like he's avenging the, you know, what he did or like, you know, trying to atone for what he did to Rox, he's instead doing the exact opposite. So. Yeah, Ed. Or call for anything else. Did you?

[Golfer Gare]

No.

[Zach]

Kirsten, thoughts?

[Kirsten Carey]

Yeah, I mean, definitely echoing everything golfer said. Like it is sort of this sad, dramatic instance of just not just completely misreading the text and everything in front of him. Like, Harold should know better. Like he had the information. He had the people telling him the information, but he just refused to believe it. Like it's. It's very frustrating. To watch him go down this path because it should have been different. And his own kind of stubbornness about what he thinks the world government is and his sort of weirdly naive, idealized vision of what that is is now going to make him not only not avenge his friend, but actively kind of like stamp on everything that his friend was going for, which is pretty brutal. It's like, I feel like this whole God Valley flashback has been interesting, especially for the reasons that one piece has been kind of in the Global news for being sort of a study on how people react to, you know, this major governmental force being corrupt, being a source of genocide. Right. And, I mean, we see four different approaches in this chapter. Like, we see Sengoku having his. Like, I turned the other way, pretend I didn't see anything. We have Garp being like, I'm gonna stay low and try to protect as many people within the organization as I can. We see Dragon just leave, and then we see Harold go towards it and with a misunderstanding of the situation. And, I don't know, it's interesting. It feels very close to real life in many ways right now. So, yeah, it's like, while I wish scenes like the Dragon Garp scene had far more time because as you pointed out, that was the first time we've ever seen them talk in 1166 chapters. I would have maybe liked a little more than effectively two panels of that, but, yeah, I. I thought it was a very effective chapter overall. I felt the feels and the Roger Pirates looking at little baby shanks was very cute, Steven.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, I do. I feel like I'm probably echoing what some other folks have said already, but it's a really interesting look. Kind of a moment in time of a bunch of people, you know, kind of reacting to and grappling with some very. A very difficult set of facts that they can't necessarily control themselves. And you see, you know, how. How their responses to it, because they don't have the answer. They don't have the right answer. They can only kind of do. They can play the hands that they've got, the. The cards that they've got in front of them, and you can see how they're. They're imperfect responses, and while at the same time you know, still kind of being true to who they are as. As characters. And it's. It's kind of by. At least by storytelling necessity, because this is all happening in the past. And, you know, the characters that you see in this moment in time can't have, like, the. The right answer. They can't have the solution and be able to execute on it, because then, you know, then the problem is solved and there's no. There's no dramatic tension. This has to be explaining why we're stuck in the situation that we are today in the present. And that's why, you know, you get these really interesting depictions of, like, you know, Garp is trying to protect the. The rank and file of the Marines. Like, how successful is he? I don't know. That's kind of up for debate. You know, he's certainly not like stopping the root of evil that is causing all of this. But you know, you could easily say, well he's not even Garp is not capable of doing something like that. And Sengoku is. He's like many people who are idealistic and join, you know, kind of take the political path but then find themselves kind of more at the whims of the game that they're playing than, than actually fulfilling the, the ideals that they had when they got into it, stuff like that. I mean, I think it's, it's all, it's, it's fairly nuanced stuff and I think it's one of those things that Oda, Oda can do well now because he's, you know, 50 years old and he's, he's, he understands a lot of these things better than you know, an artist who's like 21 coming up, you know, and has not quite had the same life experience. But you know, it's, it's definitely a lot of shades of gray that we're looking at here. And same thing with Harold, you know, yes, he's making a tragic choice. But also, you know, it takes someone with this level of commitment to effect change in a, in a culture like the Giants. And so he can't be the one to single handedly solve their, you know, to make that, that break with a thousand years of history. But you know, perhaps by, by this gesture he is taking the, the first step towards seeing that, that dream come true. And yeah, it's a great, great chapter though. There's a lot of good, good conversations, good dialogue in it and kind of really setting the stage for where we are coming out of the God Valley events.

[Zach]

Ken?

[Ken]

Yeah, this was a really phenomenal chapter. I'm not gonna try. I'm gonna try do my best not to reiterate all the, the Harald discussion we've been having so far, but there's a bunch of little things in this chapter that really intrigue me for the future. Even starting off in the first page, we see that the attack that Garp and Roger did together, it knocked the dummy reversi out of Zebeck. So now we know that it can be reversed, which I think is huge for the current events. We left off the story.

[Zach]

You reverse a reverse.

[Ken]

Yeah, they played the UNO reverse card, the UNO hockey card back. Cause he's fully cognizant at the end there. His teeth are back to normal. So now we know it can be reversed with enough haki or maybe Other ways. But that alone shows, okay, our characters in the present. There is a chance they could be brought back one way or another, which I think has great implications. God Valley crumbling in on itself. It destroys my thriller. Bark theories. But then the next line, the next line, it mentions, like, oh, a thick mist came in and surrounded the area. So it's like, okay, the mists of the Florian triangle. Is there something else there? And then the weird lightning. That's not hockey lightning. There's some unnatural force. And it's not like when Lulucia was destroyed, because at this point in time, they don't have access to the weapon yet or the mother flame. So there's more there. And I thought it was funny. There's. What's the line? Oda says this is a broad account of what happened in the mysterious, obscure God Valley incident. So I doubt we'll ever return to God Valley in a substantial format. But this is a broad account that gives him an open opportunity to like, okay, now for a more specific account of what happened or things you didn't see. Even though we got pretty much all the major beats here, so. Yeah, I think there's just a lot more to this chapter than meets the eye. While we were talking, I did look up the scene in Film Red where they find Shanks in the treasure chest. It's different in the fact that it's an older version of Roger. Roger, Rayleigh and Scopper are. Look. Yeah, Scopper. They're looking down. And it's their older design where in this. It's their young design, which I think just for the movie, like, Oda probably didn't know what time frame to get in.

[Zach]

And Roger should always have the mustache because of his fricking Jolly Roger. And we've talked about this a lot, but it's still annoying.

[Ken]

Plus, like, this scene is like two seconds in the movie. And if this had flashed on screen. Why did Ace have a baby?

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, yeah.

[Ken]

It's much easier for the visual. Like, oh, Roger found Shanks in a chest. That's Khalil, Roger. Let's move on. But it's just nice seeing that scene.

[Zach]

Finally, Ace was Shanks dad.

[Ken]

No. Yeah. Just to end up my thoughts, the Herald stuff, to me is tragic just because he's so upset that he had this goal and his pursuit of this goal got his friend killed because his hands were tied the entire time. So instead of turning his path around, like, all right, I'll avenge my friend a different way, he's doubling down. So, like, I can't make all the. I can't make his death not worth it. I had this goal in mind. He died because I had this goal. If I give up my goal now, I'm kind of like insulting his memory. So seeing him double down is just, it's, it's, it's tragic. Especially because he's been spending all this time trying to court the world government to let Elbaf in. And it's like, no, no, Harold, you're still too violent. You're still too violent. And he's been working for years and years and years. He has this one outburst and it's like, ah, those giants can't change their stripes. And like, I know, I understand his goal and why he wants to be part of the world government, but it's so frustrating just knowing what's happening, what his eventual end is. Yeah, just a tragic story in general, but this chapter was a good wrap up to all the God Valley stuff and I think has enough here to chew on for a little bit as well.

[Kirsten Carey]

Actually, what you said about the Florian triangle and the mists, the mists from God Valley, I think you might really be onto something.

[Ken]

I hope so. I'm going to keep chiming about this theory until I get something out of it.

[Zach]

Yeah, I think I'll start with that. I think the way that God Valley disintegrates is like supposed to make us think about. It's. It's weird. It's. First of all, it's like you're never seeing this island again. Like that. You know, it is definitely ODA closing a book on this. However, it's also just, it's a little too weird that the, the lightning stuff and all that. There's like we are supposed to. I think as readers assume something is up there. This could be where the lightning rain happened back at the time. Skip. Well, that we're never getting an explanation of that. I'm sure. This, I love this chapter. This might be one of my favorites of this flashback. Not just because I love post battle, post arc kind of stuff generally. It's usually my favorite stuff in the series. It was it, you know, first of all, a really interesting, I think, good decision that ODA made to have rocks killed at the end of the day by the. By God's knights. God's the holy knights of God. Yeah. Like instead of it being Roger and Garp as reported, which, you know, that part's not surprising. But I think as we close the book or close the page on last week's the last chapter, we Assumed that was it. So to see like this extra, literally extra sword, you know, through him at the very end here, Kashunk, you know that it's a, it's a. I think it is a, A very good ending to the, the story of Rocks. Particularly. I think I mentioned this last time of how undignified it kind of is. Like the fanfare we usually get for like a Whitebeard in Marineford or, Or even Ace. You know, like there, there's. This is just like, okay, we're gonna just get rid of this now. I, I actually really like that because runs as a good like contrast to what we see generally in one piece. Like it's a, it's a. Yeah. Tragic, but I think well told. Especially since Mafi gets a last laugh here. That's not fun. The. I. I want to talk about that two page spread just for a second. I. It felt like a flowchart to me. I mean this is, this is a, this is a, A compliment to the page. Like, okay, and now all of these other stories could happen which we'll tell in a future flashback. Like now we have the story of Garp and the story of Roger and the story of Whitebeard and Big mom and Kaido being, you know, a stupid teenager and human dragon and Shanks and Kuma. We saw already. So that one, that one. You know where that one goes. And Blackbeard. I, I do. I do find that like a really cool device because I mean we, we have known that those pieces were all being put on the board here and we're. And kind of where they all go and end up. But it's kind of interesting, you know, to sit here in the shoes of all these folks. Like, okay, and now their adventures are all going to start from this point. Even though Rox is. Is. Is ending here.

[Stephen Paul]

A very, very clever choice to end it with Blackbeard as well. Because like yes, we kind of, we kind of know what everyone else's story is, but Blackbeard is, is like how he gets to where he is in the present day is still kind of mysterious in, in like how he, how he reacts to what he thinks or what he knows about his father and his. His. His people. I guess.

[Zach]

So like two years old here, right? Like he's still alone.

[Stephen Paul]

Something like that. Yeah. So like the, the idea of Oda placing and like. Well, like we were saying with the. In the sb, he was saying in the SBS last week's episode, like you put the anticipatory thing in the very bottom panel before you move on. So we're kind of primed to, like, oh, yeah, that's right. Blackbeard. What. How does he fit in all this?

[Zach]

So, yeah, it's clever use. It is very clever. I just that I very much appreciate that spread generally. Like, I don't. I'm trying to remember last time, like, a page did something this narratively interesting. I feel like it's been a little bit. Yeah.

[Golfer Gare]

In a previous episode, we had talked about how, like, we were, like, dreading the idea of humanizing Blackbeard's backstory. We were talking about how it could end up in a way where it's like, we watch what ends up happening to him, and then it goes back to just how evil he actually is. But I think this is a really great way to display. He's mimicked a lot of the exact same things that Rox was saying about wanting to big king of the world. And what is your ultimate goal? When they're talking to Saturn on Egghead and Lafitte. No, it's not Lafitte, whichever the sniper name is.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Golfer Gare]

I found out Van Auger says the world, and it all kind of mimics it, but it all feels corrupted. It all feels very. Even though Rox isn't, like, a good guy by the. You know, at the end of the day, he still feels a bit more in the pursuit of freedom than the pursuit of, like, control, whereas Blackbeard seems to be in the pursuit of control rather than freedom. So we get to kind of see where the, like, the seeds of that, and hopefully we get to see what does his mother say? Because, you know, by all accounts, like, they get away. Like, what does his mother say to him? Like, what Rox's ultimate goals were? How does Blackbeard interpret rocks from all the stories that he eventually gets, either from the world government as propaganda or, you know, other people that might have some kind of affinity towards rocks, like Loki has. Does he interact with anybody that kind of leads him astray from what his dad's actual goal was into what Blackbeard becomes.

[Ken]

Just to piggyback off that real quick, we go back into this chapter of the talk between young Loki and Zebeck, and he's like, oh, when you're Nika, you're the one who's gonna tear down the world and tear down the walls. And earlier in the Elbaf arc, we heard, like, yeah, there's different ways to interpret Nika. He could be the one that brings everything up or brings everything down. And the fact that Zebeck Hears. Ah, you think I'm Nika, I'm tear it down. He's much more positive, like, no, I'm gonna be the king. That's not necessarily me. I'm going to tear it down. That's just a very different viewpoint that Loki's presenting as well, which I think is interesting.

[Zach]

What's in. Oh, curse him, please.

[Kirsten Carey]

I just wanted to note that maybe for the first time in series history, the dad died, but the mom's still alive.

[Zach]

Eris.

[Stephen Paul]

Let's go.

[Ken]

Give it time. Next chapter.

[Zach]

No, we know these orphans.

[Ken]

Death of Eris.

[Zach]

To be fair, everyone dies. So it's. It's gonna happen. It's how it happens and when it happens. But she outlived him.

[Kirsten Carey]

And she outlived him.

[Zach]

That's a big deal. That's. I think we should all celebrate that Rocks was put into a fridge. That's what I want to say. On a more serious note, it's really interesting what you put the Blackbeard parallels together with Rocks, the Harold parallel, you know, like how Harold interprets Rox's visions. Like, it feels like everyone kind of, you know, had like an unreliable narrator, kind of digested Rox's lessons wrong. Everyone digested his lessons wrong. Everyone heard the wrong things. It's heard a few things and figured they could put everything together. To be fair, us as readers don't know what was specifically going on with Rocks, but what is clear is it's not what Harold thinks. And I think we could sit here today and say it's probably not what Blackbeard thinks either, or at least quite though it is. So this is one of the other things. There's like this gradient of respecting the authority of the government or like the governmental structures that are really, like, prominent here. So you go from one end. Like Blackbeard, for example, is someone, you know. He wants to make his own country. We talked about that. He, like, wants to usurp an already existing, like, tyrannical kind of infrastructure. You get Rocks, who I don't think is quite trying to do that, but close to it. Like, he doesn't trust anything about what's currently there. But it does sound like he wants. He wants, he says it to be king of the world. Like, he. That implies. Doesn't that imply, like, something similar infrastructurally there? Harold is like, I just want to be. I just want to be included here. I want my people to be included. I want to be ostracized. I want you all to love me and love us and it's. There's actually a lot of similarity. I wonder if this is on purpose with, like, Loki's personal story of, like, seeking love and affection and just like. And a place in the world. And Elbaf, like, Harold representing the Albafians, the giants in, like, we are just the, you know, we are those bastardized people, so to speak, like, who don't have a place and, and we're misunderstood and please accept us. And I think that is a really cool parallel now that I've thinking about it. But it's. So you get those. And then you see Garp, who's looking at the government as like, okay, everything here is rotten, but I have people that I need to protect. And I kind of see him filling, like, Zephyr's shoes from Film Z. Like, we talked about that. Like, that person who taught all the Marines, you know, how to do their thing. That kind of feels like what Oda is turning Garp into. Which is not bad. But it, like, explains that, like, paternal, like, I have to protect all of the, the people under my employee because if I don't, they're going to just get run over because obviously the people at the top don't give a shit about them. So someone has to give a shit about them. Like, I get that. Would I do that in his place? Probably not. But, like, I, I do very much get where he's coming from there.

[Golfer Gare]

There's a curiosity in the timeline, too, when it comes to this perspective of Garp, because so much of what we see in Garp is like, does not want apprentices, does not want anybody following him. So he has this ideal of, like, we have to protect the, the, the rank and file of the Marines. But he is like the biggest asshole to so many different people that we see. Like, the whole flashback, he's just like, dude, I don't want anything to do with you. If you come and punch the ship next to me, like, that's your own business. Until we get to, to Garp or to Kobe and Helmet, where he's taking, like, an active role in the younger Marines. It's funny to hear him say this. I guess it's more so as, like, protection from a distance kind of the idea that, like, he's always a threat to the world government if they came in too close to his people. But then there's also the part where Sengoku is saying there's tens of millions of these people. Like the idea that, like, Sengoku can't police all of them. Well, Garp can only protect so many. Like, he can only protect the people that he decides deserve the freedom in the Marines to not be kind of subjugated by the world government as employees of the world government.

[Zach]

I mean. Yes, I agree. I think ODA may be changing his, like, characterization a little bit. Might be part of it. The other part, though, like, his relationship with Kobe is. I think that Garp kind of sees Kobe as, like, this is what I want to do. Yeah. He's not just a future leader, but he's also, like, who I was, like, aspiring to be and never quite was able to, like, not only is he, like, trying to save them save, you know, not only is he trying to protect the Marines under. Under him at the bottom of the cliff, I think, is how he put it, but he's also trying to protect those. The nations of the world, you know, like the citizenry. Like, like that is his. And, you know, you could discuss, like, the Marines as an infrastructure we have, but, like, in his mind, what he is doing is stopping bad guys from, you know, pirates or whatever they may be from steamrolling over the citizenry because he's Garp, the hero. And. And that's, I think, an aspirational thing for him. Less than something he actually ever achieves. Whereas Kobe is certainly more idealistic. I think if Kobe. Let's put it this way, if Kobe saw that stuff in God Valley, I don't think he would stay. Probably.

[Golfer Gare]

I guess he hasn't. And he's technically put in his resignation. That's one of the. We've talked about sword a thousand times.

[Zach]

But yeah, that's a whole other. Yeah, yeah. Anyway, I thought. And then you get. So I was going through the gradient, so then I'll make it quicker, though. And then you get Sengoku who's like, the info, you know, the government is important. It's the only thing keeping us, you know, like, I also want my, you know, I want to rise through the ranks so I can make the Marines that I want to make or whatever it is that we don't quite know what's going on in Sengoku's head. So that's. He, I think also with the stuff with Corazon in particular, like, really thinks he is also doing the. The right thing. I also, like, think of him in Marineford. Very interesting. Him and Garp are like, genuinely really, like, complicated and interesting In Marineford, they really, I think, hold that arc. They, they. They. They hold it up another level. So that, that part's interesting how he. That whole Conversation. Yeah. And what a tragedy at the end. Like, I didn't quite know how Harold would come around to the pulling his horns out. I mean we all knew this was coming. This is like a real gut punch. And I gotta say, like, you know my qualms, I say this every week. There's two things I say about the flashback and one of them is that I will not judge it until it's over because I don't know the full story. And I think every step Oda has been taking, particularly as we lift out of God Valley, has been like, okay, he knew what he was doing. This is, this is pretty great. And it's really, I think golfer, you put it this way. It's like a book in a book in a book. You know, like we have the story in the middle of rocks, surrounded by the story of Harold, surrounded by the story of Loki. And we're kind of pulling out of that sandwich here. Not to mix metaphors, but it's really. I think he's doing a particularly good job this week showing how those three stories intertwine and how why we had to hear the story, had to. Why we listened to the story of rocks and why we had to listen to the story of Harold in order to understand not just Loki, but also where we are today in the story. And I think he's been doing, I think these last few chapters have really been a huge step up there and has this like, for me, like the Harold stuff here is much sadder, much more gut wrenching than Rox's actual demise. Just because it's so wrong headed like, and you know it and the reader knows it. But also he's going to be adored at the end of this for this decision and, and how this goes. And there's just the dramatic irony is just really cutting here. I feel like, please, it's like a secondhand embarrassment thing. Like, please stop. You're doing the wrong thing.

[Golfer Gare]

I hate to say the word specifically, but it is, it's almost pathetic. Like it's almost to that, like pitiable, like. Yeah, to slavery. You are so self loathing as a giant for your kind. And then also you feel you've made mistakes and now your entire population is going to. Granted, we know they don't actually join the world government, but they could have all been turned into dummy riverside slaves. Like what we're seeing currently on Elbaf or whatever that would have entailed. Like, I know he doesn't understand that but like as the reader, it's like it's watching someone like walk off the cliff thinking that they're going to make it to the promised land.

[Zach]

I don't even think. I think he is what he thinks. I think he's, he's, he's going to.

[Stephen Paul]

Win the gold medal at the Woke Olympics. Here, this is handing in your privilege card, tearing off your horn.

[Zach]

No, I, I think he thinks he is doing what is best for his people. I really like the self loathing thing. I think metaphorically is, is accurate. I don't think it's that he knows that his people are not as they are perceived for the most part, which is why he was beating up that one guy who was like, don't be a stereotype. I'm trying to explain to people that we're not like this.

[Ken]

Stop being so violent.

[Zach]

Right. It's also a title.

[Ken]

I think it's funny though too because we're good. Like we know Harold's eventual outcome in like, I want to say the present day, but later on and we've heard like Summers make comments like, stupid Harold, you just had to follow directions. You screwed everything up, yada yada. So I'm like now that if this taking off his horns is what gets them into the world government, something has to go wrong.

[Zach]

No, I do not think it gets them into the world government. I think they're going to use the shit out of him here because he's, it's like when, it's like handing your enemy exactly what you want without knowing they're your enemy. You know, it's like, hey, by the way, my next four moves are going to be this. And it's just like.

[Ken]

So you think after all this they're never going to officially be part of the world government?

[Zach]

Well, we know they are.

[Kirsten Carey]

They haven't. Yeah, right.

[Ken]

Well, we know they aren't. We know they aren't today. But like, do you think it, like it comes up like, oh, here's Coronation Day, you're going to join in today. And that's when he, because we know he turns against them, he does something different.

[Zach]

No, we, yeah, he might at the very, very end.

[Ken]

So I, I'm just wondering how far does it go?

[Zach]

What happens between that goes into the palace at the beginning of the flashback or the closest to the present day to see Harold, he was like stupid dad, you know, kowtowing to the government, like. So as far as out of that point where he is murdered or killed or dies or whatever it might be, up to that point he did not, you know, the.

[Ken]

Okay, it never Became official.

[Zach]

I don't think it ever became official. All right.

[Ken]

And.

[Zach]

And more importantly, I. If he did do anything to kind of, like, undercut the government, it hadn't been made public or it was just happening for the first time then.

[Ken]

Gotcha. Yeah, that makes sense.

[Zach]

Yeah. Yeah, it. Pitiable, I think golfer pathetic. Like, I. I don't think it's pathetic because he doesn't know he's being pathetic. Like, he. I. Internally, you know, like, he subjectively thinks he is doing the right thing for his people. He's wrong. He's extremely wrong. And as readers, we know, like, it's pathetic, I guess, to us as readers, but I think he isn't a pitiable does position. And like, he.

[Kirsten Carey]

Yeah, he did have more information, though, than like, the average world leader. Like, he was friends with Rocks and Rocks was telling him, like, don't. The government's not working. But he still.

[Zach]

He didn't really, like, believe him. And he, like, yes, I agree. I think Harold is just. It's this. What's tragic about him is he's so wrong. He's so misguided. And he's gonna meet. And we know he is going to meet his fate because of that. And in fact, like, the whole kingdom is going. He's. He's like. It's the kind of the inverse of what we often see in the series. And generally it's this character who is perceived as a hero trying to do heroics and instead dooming himself and everyone that he cares about, which is kind of the Alpaphian things in the series so far.

[Golfer Gare]

But, yeah, he's living up to the. I might butcher it, but the. The Benjamin Franklin quote of, if you give up liberty for safety, you shall have neither. Like, he's just kind of delivering into exactly that. And the one thing about Rocks, like, at least I. I feel like it's fair to have a healthy amount of skepticism of anything that guy says. Like, even if he was like, yeah, in the world government, it's like, have.

[Zach]

You seen his hair? Your locks, like, it's purple. Yeah, he did lie about his name several times. At the end I found out his name wasn't even Zabek or what was it was.

[Ken]

No, no, Davey. Davey D. Oh, his name wasn't even Rocks.

[Zach]

Why is he still calling him Rocks?

[Stephen Paul]

His name was Derek.

[Zach]

I could. I could talk about this for a while. I'm going to choose not. There's like, some really meaty philosophical discussions like to be had here that we've had many of it is Like a very. This. I like. We talk about Kirsten mentioned, like, current events in this chapter. And it is. There's a lot of people in our country, I think, who are doing this Harold thing, thinking it's gonna work. It's like, what was it? Oh, I saw something recently. It's that we're like, inching closer to the. Someone made like, a tweet, saying something like, okay, but the Cor. At Coronation Day. I'm gonna be so angry when I'm on my knees about this. Like, you know, as it inches closer to, you know, like, at what point will you actually stand and say, okay, this is wrong. And I guess for Harold, we're gonna find out at what point he actually makes a literal stand and sees, I guess, the government for what it is. Because I. Despite having the. Despite having been told, he does not believe it, but he will.

[Kirsten Carey]

He'll learn on a larger note, like, you know, as one piece is getting kind of, like, folded into real world events and being used as this iconography for protests around the world. Like, I. I love that and deeply respect that the series is almost getting more political in the text. If that's possible. If that's possible. Like, yeah.

[Zach]

It is.

[Kirsten Carey]

Commendable respect for oda.

[Zach]

Yeah, I think golfer. We must have mentioned it. Like, we were. We talked about, like, our fear of the series losing political identity for. Out of fear of, like, instigation, you know, of violence or which, you know, we discussed. But it's. It is kind of interesting seeing him double down the other direction. Oda, not Harold in this case.

[Golfer Gare]

Well, I also love that it's a lot of the earlier arcs, it's kind of siloed into like, singular ideas of different types of, like, political foundings. So, like, even with just like Drum island and access to healthcare or Sanji and access to food and the different nations that we end up visiting. And we've hit a point where he's literally, like, writing an entire story about the dichotomy of self determination for nations and how things should be governed. Does one leader have the right to determine what everyone else's, like, fate will be? And then also, especially early on in Elbaf, like, the ability to be an independent nation and work alongside the ones around you, but still be the end of the violence that was coming from the world government, because they constantly were still messing with Elbaf, even though they weren't like a partner nation and they were still begging to be in the actual world government. Like, what a. It's one that you have to zoom out a lot more from just the chapters in and of itself. Like, I feel like you have to assess the entirety of Elbaf as an arc to really take in what I feel like Oda is trying to say on the idea of like self determination and like the freedom of your people. But what a way to never shy away from having a series about happy go lucky rubber boy punching people, having a real message within it and how you choose to interpret it like is is going to be person by person. But I feel like it's he's giving you at least a lesson here. There's never the loss of theme within this story. No matter how many different examples of something political within one piece coming up. It's it like always has this like little nucleus of constantly trying to teach you something alongside silly pirates.

[Zach]

Please teach this in political philosophy classes. I guess is. I mean seriously. Agreed. Okay, I'm sure we'll talk about this more. So let's move on into next segment.

[Kirsten Carey]

Did you know that parents rank teaching financial literacy as the toughest life skill?

[Zach]

That's where Greenlight comes in.

[Kirsten Carey]

The debit card and money app made for families. With greenlight, you can send money quickly, set up chores, automate allowance, and track spending with real time notifications. Kids learn how to earn, save and spend responsibly while parents have peace of mind knowing smart money habits are being built. Try Greenlight Risk free [e-mail] Spotify this episode is brought to you by McAfee Swimsuit Passport Phone with VPN activated VPN cell phone service is going to be spotty on vacation, so we'll be using public Wi fi.

[Stephen Paul]

Sounds sketchy.

[Kirsten Carey]

Exactly. The networks can leave your personal info like like credit card numbers exposed to hackers. McAfee's secure VPN lets you browse and bank safely from wherever, whenever. Learn [e-mail] online protection.

[Sam]

This is the anime recap for episode 1150. Get the ship moving. The Iron Giant activates. I'm your host, Sam, and today with me we have Hope Harbinger Dragon, Titanic Galaxy. We have Ken o'.

[Zach]

Connor.

[Ken]

I don't even know what that's a reference to. Wait, what is that? Was that an attack in the episode?

[Sam]

I thought you played Yu Gi oh, Ken.

[Ken]

I played Yu Gi oh like way back in the day. Like Duelist Kingdom and a little bit of GX. I didn't go over to to 5ds or anything was after that. Is that an earlier one or a later?

[Sam]

You don't Know your staple XZ monsters that can negate a spell?

[Ken]

Apparently not. I feel foolish now and steal it as a.

[Sam]

As an attachment.

[Ken]

Yeah, that's way. As soon as. Yeah, no, we're not getting into this. But that's way above what I remember from Yu Gi. Oh.

[Sam]

Okay. So episode 1150. The title is the Iron Giant activates. I would argue it activated three episodes ago, but. We start the episode by cutting around to the various elders who are on their hunt for said iron Giant. And we're cutting around to the world. Different scenes in the world where some of the rando pirates on full lead or Beehive or whatever we're calling it. They're starting to daydream about all the treasure that might be on the ocean floor if there was a whole old world that sunk back then. And then they're debating over whether or not it's realistic to ever even get down to the ocean floor with sea monsters and all that. We have our old friends Montblanc, Cricket, Mashira, and Shojo. They're on a ship. They're doing some salvaging somewhere. Cricket's got a beard going, and they're remarking on how amusing it is that, you know, I was like, oh, a kingdom that sunk to the bottom of the ocean, eh, Wink, wink, nudge, nudge. Isn't that interesting? Maybe we weren't so crazy after all.

[Ken]

And I like that they paired up, too, with, like, all the treasures too, because they are treasure hunters. So, like, they would be more interested in sunken cities and treasures as well. So it's a nice little, like, connection.

[Sam]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. The pirates who would have no idea how to do that. And then we got the professional sea divers.

[Ken]

Yeah.

[Sam]

We are. We see GS General Hospital is the. This Navy Hospital. Tashigi is wandering through the halls, answering a snail call from Smoker, who's on his billowing bike, just cruising through the ocean. They're, you know, looking after Kobe and all that Hibari and the other sword members. They're. They're in Koby's waiting room, and Kujaku walks in and starts talking about how. How the captain is recovering as well, which I wasn't sure what they meant, but I guess. I guess in the sword context, Drake is a captain.

[Ken]

Yeah. They cut to him kind of like arms folded and kind of just like sitting there contemplating life. Yeah.

[Sam]

Is he still bandaged up from Wano?

[Ken]

From Wano? Yeah, that's the implication.

[Sam]

Everyone else is on their feet, but Drake got it pretty bad back on Egghead. The Sunny crew is. They're getting ready for takeoff. They're getting the barrels ready. And Jinbe is calling to warn of Venestro who's coming after them. They're like, what?

[Stephen Paul]

What do you mean?

[Sam]

Where are you? Like, we're right behind you. And it's Jimbe chasing Venus, who's going around after the Sunny.

[Ken]

It's funny because Nami is like, what is taking them so long? And Jimmy's like, listen, we found something weird. We're chasing it. It's heading your way.

[Sam]

We get to see a team up attack between Jinbe and Zoro Fishman Jiu Jitsu piggyback. And that he launches Zoro into the air to do a two sword style Restful Paradise Rushomon and Venus. Like, the pose makes it look like he's very casually blocking behind him, but his face is kind of in anguish as he's like, I don't want to be fighting a guy right now.

[Ken]

He's more annoyed than anything else. Like, it's like another insignificant little insect.

[Sam]

I kind of got the sense that like, you know, of all people, Zoro is probably somebody who could get a hit on Venus.

[Ken]

Yeah. I did enjoy though, when he showed up, I think it was Chopper, Usopp and Lilith all did like the. The sugar face with the eyes bugging out like an elder. Just I like that little bit of animation.

[Sam]

And as he's clashing with Venus, Kitetsu the third just kind of surprisingly erupts into flames. And then Zoro and Venus, they kind of like fly back against each other. And Jinbe has to catch Zoro. That brings us to the eye catch of the episode. And we come back to. To some marines are getting to extended shootout with the giants. It's. Yeah, like the Marines cannons are basically peashooters to the giants. The giants, you know, handgun pistols are like cannons to the Marines.

[Ken]

I think this is. There's a point where one of the giants fires a bow and arrow. And the perspective, it looks like a normal bow and arrow, but then it smash cuts to the arrow hitting the ship. And it looks just like this giant. Like, I don't even know. Like just it obliterates the ship. Just the cut between normal arrow to giant arrow. It was like something out of like Ant man or something like that. It was very funny.

[Sam]

Just the. Yeah, just the perspective.

[Ken]

Yeah, just the gigantic.

[Sam]

The relative. Yeah. And yeah, the giants are. They're making firewood out of the marine ships. They're jumping on them. They're chopping them. I like this one. Like Mustachioed giant is, like, peeking through the nets of one of their ships, like, their curtains, like, peekaboo. And then finally, Bluegrass and Vice Admiral Dahl appear riding the robot giraffe. And the giraffe shoots a laser punches a hole through the. The giant's ship. And there's. They spent a lot of this episode, like, talking up the giant ship as, like, this. This kind of legendary, like, ship of myth.

[Ken]

Yeah, it's the great Eric. Whatever it's called. It's like this all important ship.

[Sam]

Yeah. And there's this great kind of sequence of doll, like, super fast, like, walking up the little, like, ridges of the giraffe's mane, jumping into the air, looking really cool, pulling off her coat, getting a hockey fist ready. And, like, as the giant, you know, like, responding to one of the giants, like, oh, my God, they just shot a hole in our ship. Doll's like, well, I'm gonna punch a hole in you.

[Stephen Paul]

And then she.

[Ken]

Yeah, whoever did this episode really loves Doll. That entire sequence, like, her eyes are closed and she's, like, doing almost like a Luffy, like, Gatling gun. And her, like, I can't imitate on an audio podcast, but, like, her head almost looks like it's like, rocking to, like, a beat. Like. Like she's in, like, a movement. And like, the giant she takes down, just. She's the only one to take down a giant. And even taking him out crushes a ship below him. It's a phenomenal sequence.

[Sam]

Yeah, they make her real cool. So her attack is rock and roll Blaster. So maybe that's where the.

[Ken]

Yes, that makes sense.

[Sam]

It feels like she's listening to music or something.

[Ken]

Yep.

[Sam]

It made me think. It made me think of, like, Luffy practicing the advanced observation hockey.

[Ken]

Yes. Yeah, absolutely.

[Sam]

They're, like, closing your eyes and just kind of, like, feeling things out.

[Ken]

Yep.

[Sam]

And, yeah, this is enough for the Marines to regain some. Some confidence and continue the battle. And so the tides are turning there. It looks like the elders, they. They kind of circle around the iron Giant and they recognize it as the. The very same giant that attacked mary geoa in 200 years ago. Which is an interesting comment on multiple levels, because were the elders there 200 years ago, or did they just recognize it? Why 200 years ago when everything we've been referencing is, like, older than the Void Century. Very strange.

[Ken]

I just like how they're, like, their agency kind of disappears for a second because the four of the five of them are gathered around it all just, like, looking at it, like, little Kids looking at bugs like, oh my God, look at that thing. You would think they would immediately charge it or do something to it, but they all just politely stand around for a minute, kind of observe it before it kicks into the sequence later on. But very interesting to see them just look at it.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Sam]

Vegapunk's broadcast comes to. He starts bringing up those with the name D. And we get a little montage of Sabo, who's thinking about Ace and Luffy. Kobe, who's thinking about Luffy, and Garp, you know, Blackbeard's listening. Beppo's like, oh, Captain. You know. So they're all thinking about the. The D's in their life.

[Ken]

I think we see Dragon too at one point as well. Another D.

[Sam]

And Vegapunk is saying. He's like talking to the people with. With the will of Dean and saying, within you there is. And then like, this is the. This is the thing where the elders are like, oh. Oh, fuck this. We can't.

[Ken]

Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Sam]

Warcury smashes into the giant really hard and it does disrupt the broadcast. And the broadcast goes to static, cutting off his sentence. And then it pushes the giant into. Falls off the edge of the island and starts sinking into the ocean. And it rocks. And a bunch of marine ships that were in the area start like rocking and bustling on the. On the waves. And then as the giant is sinking, we hear his voice thinking to himself, like, joy boy, where did you go? I want to see you. You were here, right? So strange and just like sinking slowly. Talking slowly to himself. To be continued.

[Ken]

We should mention there was a part of the episode where Luffy realizes that he's not being chased anymore by Warcry, so he's not in Nika form anymore. So technically the robot can't hear the Nika drumbeat or anything activated before. So that's why it's like, where'd you go? Like, I thought you were here now. You're nowhere to be seen.

[Sam]

Yeah. So that is episode 1150. Any general thoughts on the episode, Ken?

[Ken]

It was a good episode. It literally felt like the tides were turning. Finally, because the straw hats, they were getting ready to launch off the top of the clouds. Luffy told the giants to get their ship turned. All the ships were getting ready to leave now, so it feels like there's a finality happening. Vegapunk's speech feels like it's getting to its conclusion, or if not the most important bits. And the Elders are distracted now. So just a lot of finality across the entire episode looked good. There was a lot of. They used the CG ships a lot for all of Egghead, but wasn't too egregious. The Elders were animated well for the most part. Yeah, it really felt like a very good. Okay, we're turning towards a conclusion here. And it felt pretty. Pretty entertaining, in my opinion.

[Sam]

Yeah, I felt like they did a really good job animating basically all of the naval combat everything with the Marines communicating back and forth and throwing their hand out to give orders and the Giants playing around, playing with their food, waving their weapons in front of the camera in kind of a three dimensional way.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Sam]

That. I thought that was kind of the standout of this episode. Otherwise, it's again, like, I'm thinking a lot about, like, what is the term? It has me, like, trying to remember what. What the, like, proper climax of this arc even is. So we'll. We'll see what. What comes next here. This is also. This was last week's episode that aired, and this week it was one of the Dr. Chopper.

[Ken]

Oh, a special recap.

[Sam]

Which.

[Zach]

Which.

[Sam]

This is the first time I actually, like, sat down and watched one of those just because it autoplayed.

[Ken]

Are they good? Are they worth watching?

[Stephen Paul]

I mean.

[Sam]

I mean, no. But I don't know what I was expecting, really, but I was amused. I was amused that it's like. It's a little story of Chopper got, like, kidnapped and now, like, Carrot and Bartilla Mayo have to answer a weird mystery person's quiz questions to get him back.

[Ken]

Interesting. I didn't realize it went that deep or that meta.

[Stephen Paul]

I wouldn't say.

[Sam]

I wouldn't call it deep, but it's. It is what it is.

[Zach]

But.

[Ken]

Yeah, that means we're all.

[Sam]

Yeah, it's like. It's like some mysterious person. I didn't watch the. I have a few minutes left. So I didn't actually get to see who the perp was, but it was like somebody who's being like L from Death Note, except it's Q for question.

[Ken]

Okay, again, that's a lot more than I expected. So that's actually kind of interesting.

[Sam]

In the whole episode, they have to keep Carrot fed with carrots and or other foods so that she can think.

[Ken]

Wait, no, you can't be serious. Really?

[Sam]

Well, she stress eats and then she runs out and then she gets mad at Bartolome for trying to stop her from eating. And then Tomma has to come in to save the day with an apple because Carrot got hungry.

[Ken]

I really can't tell if you're being serious or not.

[Sam]

Why would I make any of this up?

[Ken]

Because it seems. How do they recap the episodes? It feels like this is an entire plot of all its own.

[Sam]

Well, they're sort of recapping Vegapunk and then the rest of it is like the story. Well, no, there's no story. Like they don't progress the story. It's the gimmick for kids to catch up on different parts of the arc. They're doing trivia questions for the characters to answer, like Dora the Explorer almost gotcha. And that's how they're buying time.

[Ken]

That's wild. I gotta check that out, actually, because I didn't think it did that.

[Sam]

Anyway, thank you, Ken.

[Ken]

Thank you for having me.

[Sam]

Anything else you want to say before we move on to the next segment?

[Ken]

No, I'm all good. Thanks for having me on, Sam.

[Sam]

All right, thank you very much.

[Zach]

This episode is brought to you by White Claw Search. Great podcast pick, friend.

[Golfer Gare]

No surprises there. After all, you're all about finding the tastiest flavors out there, just like White Claw Surge. And with big bold flavors to enjoy like blood orange, BlackBerry, cranberry and more, it's time to go all in on taste.

[Zach]

Unleash the flavor.

[Golfer Gare]

Unleash White Claw Surge.

[Zach]

Please drink responsibly. Hard seltzer with flavors.

[Golfer Gare]

8% alcohol by volume.

[Zach]

White Claw Seltzer Works Chicago, Illinois. Hey Varen, Speed Wingman, Chad, Bradley and Bradley. This is the Piece Together segment where we take your questions, comments and theories and decide whether or not Spencer indeed had bangs. And our first segment, Ken Dis Piece.

[Ken]

This is the section where we read all your comments on our Discord and our Dis Piece section. Starting off with the Slave King subscribers. Patreon subscribers. Yes, join the Patreon. Join our sticker club. Get your questions read each week. It's all good stuff on our Patreon. Alright, The Sleigh Bell King says hello, my fellow horn tuggers and barkers. I don't like that at all. Sorry, that's me interjecting What a chapter. Though I can't help but notice how Zebeck made a silly mistake of saying thanks as he died. He clearly meant to say shanks. He was trying to remind Figarlind Garlic that he has two babies out there that he should be looking after during the Genocide Olympics. Worst Father of the year contender. Anywho, much like our dear old Harold, I'm sure there are sins y' all need to atone for. We all do. What's yours Wrong answers only unless they're pretty little thing. Petty, petty little things like taking too long to catch up on a show you like and stuff like that. Have a great week. All right y'.

[Zach]

All.

[Ken]

Confess your sins as a true.

[Zach]

We have a holidays for this and it happened already. Boy, is it a fun one by the way. Figarland Garlic somehow an improvement. The name. I. I don't think I have mentioned enough how much I don't like him, his design or his name, but yet also perfect because I should hate him. So great Genocide Olympics. Sorry, I'm just reading. What do we have to atone for this year? Yeah, I'm not talking about it on the podcast exactly.

[Kirsten Carey]

I feel like it's.

[Zach]

That's how podcasts work. Okay, safe space. No one is listening.

[Golfer Gare]

I would put nicotine above God. I'll give you that.

[Zach]

That's.

[Golfer Gare]

That's about it.

[Stephen Paul]

Buying a like a 12 pack of croissants from Costco and no, do not finish them.

[Zach]

Well, how could you?

[Stephen Paul]

You did not finish them.

[Zach]

Yeah, so I still remember buying a 12 pack of Kirkland blueberry muffins thinking we would somehow eat them all. And I think we had like four, which is too many.

[Ken]

But no one needs that much bulk items.

[Golfer Gare]

The optimism you have in Costco is almost unmatched anywhere else.

[Zach]

They know it. That's. They know it.

[Ken]

All right.

[Zach]

Yeah, I'm not answering that question. Sorry. I know you're a patreon and you could ask us anything, but this is taking it too far.

[Ken]

What are your deepest darkest sins? Find out now. All right, moving on. To remove horn souch.

[Zach]

Wow.

[Ken]

Hey, my sweet potatoes baby chapter as always, let's get to the real question. What the hell happened to God Valley? I kind of see how a big punch could sink an island, but then a bunch of mist came in and a big old lightning exploded everything. Could it be that Thriller bark blobbies ate up the place? Did whoever had the rumble rumble fruit 30 years ago before Eniru use some sort of proto arch maxim or Uranus to lulusia that thing to bits? I like that we're using lulusia as a verb now. Could it be related to Ragnir Loki's big ass lightning hammer? Did Imu try to use the big big laser without the mother flame? Right answers only. Although I guess nobody really knows so yet it doesn't really matter if you're right or not.

[Stephen Paul]

Well, good luck for you. I've already explained that it was collapsing under the weight of the flashback, so.

[Ken]

Yeah, yeah, I don't think we mentioned it, but like, this flashback, I think is one chapter away from surpassing the Odin flashback in terms of laying it was 11:52.

[Kirsten Carey]

It's definitely going to.

[Zach]

Oh yeah, it's 14. This is 14. Yeah, we're one away.

[Ken]

So we're one away from tying and then anything past that.

[Zach]

I don't think it's going to end in the next chapter. However, it could end in the next chapter. Like, I think it's at a point.

[Ken]

Zack, you and me were talking that as soon as his horns are off, like, that could be like the beginning of the end. But I'm holding onto. We still need to see Loki reject Lola. So now I'm moving the goalpost.

[Zach]

We're not seeing that now.

[Ken]

I think we have to. We don't know why he turned it. We don't know what happened.

[Kirsten Carey]

It's a panel.

[Ken]

Okay, well, if it's a panel and two chapters, then I win.

[Zach]

That's a separate flashback. And that one will be 17 chapters. Yes, but it's just about their relationship.

[Ken]

Going back to the disc piece question, though. Do we think it has anything to do with, like, we know that Davy Jones getting dragged down to Davy Jones locker. Do you think because Zebeck is a Davey and he died on the island, he gets dragged down? The weight of him getting dragged down. That's a ridiculous theory. But do you think it has any connection to like the devi stuff at.

[Zach]

All or is that interesting?

[Kirsten Carey]

Was on the island, right? Like, it wasn't just rocks.

[Zach]

That's true. But they were hiding a lot of.

[Ken]

The Davey clan off, I think.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Stephen Paul]

Yes.

[Ken]

So if Zebeck is like the Davey and he dies, then he gets dragged down. Because if you. Look, I don't want to overanalyze the art, but like the island, like, it crumbles in from the center downwards and like the ring of the island is still there.

[Zach]

Seaford has answered it. I think again, it's the way the flashback. I'm sorry, you know, I can't beat that answer. And there's. I. I will say I think there is an explanation for it besides Steven's explanation. Maybe I don't. We don't have enough information to answer it.

[Ken]

I need Vegapunk to come back and explain what happened to that island too.

[Golfer Gare]

This is just masterful Oda stuff. Like he's. He leaves himself enough space if he needs to go back and retcon this to like what they did before they had the mother flame. That's. This is just like leaving it open.

[Zach]

Hey, you Want to go back to it? If you want to enter. It was born. It was one years old during this. So it could just be a really.

[Ken]

Angry One Sinks island.

[Zach]

I look. I have seen one year olds and they have a. They have a temper. You. And they're strong.

[Ken]

They could indeed I.

[Zach]

If. If anyone would destroy an island for no reason. A baby.

[Ken]

That's the baby. One Piece spin off. All right, moving on.

[Zach]

One Piece Babies. I'm excited.

[Ken]

One Piece babies.

[Zach]

They have a one piece university or whatever that one is. Or the high school. One piece High school Host Club, but which is what I'm calling it. One Piece babies. I want it. I want them all to have powers but also be babies and have the intelligence of babies. Yes. Please continue.

[Ken]

All right, next up we have Vegapunk's hairstylist Ahoyo pp. Not only was it a banger chapter this week, but emotions are high. So the world government kind of sucks, huh? Do you believe this was IMU's plan the whole time? To obtain strength out of Elbaf? Very interested in seeing how Harold ruined the deal. As mentioned by Summers. Only time will tell, I suppose. On an unrelated note, got my first sticker after upgrading and as a subscriber whose message is going out to the world. Best investment I've ever made. Even my wife fell in love with it and complimented all the artists when I showed her the different designs. Keep up the fantastic work. Love you all.

[Zach]

Even my wife.

[Ken]

All right, your check is in the mail. Thank you. Vegapunk's hairstylist.

[Zach]

Ken, why are you paying off people? Yeah, which sticker is the question? Obviously the Demono Robin. I'm trying to think of which it might be. The Loki on the raft. That one's pretty great too.

[Ken]

Oh yeah, the Loki on the raft is great.

[Zach]

The question was do you believe this.

[Ken]

Is asking how does Harold ruin the deal? Because Summers mentioned Harold screwed things up. So what does Harold do to mess things up?

[Zach]

He didn't follow through. He died. Yeah, it could have even just been as simple as that. It could be a lot of things. Yeah, he could have tripped accidentally. What? I'm now trying to remember the Simpsons episode. Oh yeah, he uses the parchment to wipe himself. That doesn't really work here. But Ken, what's next?

[Kirsten Carey]

It would be interesting if it is that like the people under Harald figure out what's going on with the world government and just turn on him for wanting to join.

[Zach]

Could that. Actually. You're right. That would be interesting. Did he have horns in. In that silhouette?

[Ken]

His his portrait in the throne room.

[Zach]

Silhouette in 1150, like at the very beginning. No, he has no horns because he definitely had that. His robe has those horns.

[Ken]

Yeah, I was looking at that chapter the other day, trying to theorize and I thought, oh, is that the emergence of bat wings? Thinking he got demonia reversi. But it's just the epaulets of his cape sticking out, but no horns. It's just him looking up. You can see his mustache hair, his beard hair. But we gotta get to that point eventually. That's, I think, where the Harold segment will have to end.

[Zach]

And there's also a forbidden devil fruit treasure in Elbaf that seems to have been stolen.

[Ken]

Yeah, we had a silhouette of someone walking into the room and we don't know what that is either.

[Zach]

The thing is that that could even be someone sympathetic because Harald is doing such unsympathetic things like to just add another wrinkle to it. Yeah, I don't know. Very interesting stuff. Okay. Yeah, go ahead, Ken.

[Ken]

Yeah. Oh, just one last thing. If you are part of the Patreon, make sure you're voting for this month's sticker. It's between Flaming Hot Kaido and Nika Luffy using gear 5. Luffy using Kaido as a jump rope. So check those out for the next sticker club.

[Zach]

Thank you, Ken.

[Ken]

Of course. Alright, next up we have Sailor Karna. Hey, Opp. This message is for Harold. Harold, come here. Brox could beat the crap out of you what you just did. Dude, I thought you were smarter than that. Brox definitely did. But look at you. Making a total a tool of mass destruction as way to atone for the sins of your kind giants. Please let me stop before I get my blood pressure up. Thank you, Sailor Karna.

[Zach]

I think that was a really tough feeling.

[Stephen Paul]

The way we were feeling.

[Ken]

Yeah, yeah, we'll get that to Harold right now.

[Zach]

Yeah, we'll send that. We'll send that over.

[Ken]

We now get a chance.

[Zach]

He's dead, but we'll try.

[Ken]

All right, last one. Oh my God. Okay, I'm gonna try my best to pronounce this one. Do you have to buckram cram wussy? I think that's how you say it. Ahoy, Opp. Banger chapter. As always, so dense. Baby Shanks is adorable, but I hate that Oda ripped off the writer of film Red here. What the heck? What a hack. I'm very glad that Garp and Dragon had a small but emotional interaction here. My question this week is, do you think Garp was A better dad, at least until this specific incident, than he is a grandfather. Have a great week.

[Zach]

Yeah, I don't think he's very good at either.

[Ken]

Do you think he pressured Dragon into the Marines?

[Kirsten Carey]

Yes.

[Zach]

Well, absolutely. Best case scenario. Well, like, okay, let's say you're a loving, attentive father, but you also want your kid to go into the military. Like, knowing already. I don't know. That doesn't seem like even under the best case scenario, like.

[Kirsten Carey]

Well, it's interesting that. I mean, earlier, I think, Zach, you used the word paternal to describe how Garp feels towards the Marines. And it's interesting that this is the very chapter where he has a split actual biological son.

[Zach]

I said that knowing that he Garp always. And I think we talked about this too, like with Kobe, like, he will always treat a member of the Marines and his, like, under his service better than any of his biological offspring. Yep. Yeah, it's the.

[Golfer Gare]

There's like a picture where it's like. There's a meme where it's like Garp showing off his family and it's a giant picture of Koby and then like a smaller picture of Helmeppo and then tiny little, like, sticker pictures of Ace and Luffy.

[Zach]

I don't know if Helmeppo would be there, but the rest. Yeah, I think Kuzan would be. Well, he would have been there before. I don't think he would have Luffy on the wall. He would have Luffy in, like, his wallet or something. He wouldn't be showing people that where.

[Stephen Paul]

No one can see.

[Ken]

Yeah, I feel like I've seen that meme before of like, the dad in the pool holding the kid. And then there's a kid next to him that's like, struggling to swim. And at the bottom of the pool, there's a skeleton. And it's like, holding. It's like holding up Koby. Luffy's the one struggling aces the skeleton at the bottom of the pool.

[Zach]

I will say, all that said and all that true. Garp's moment in Marineford, like, still moves me to this day as the, like, taking the punch from Luffy thing. When he, like, closes his eyes, he's like, you know what? I'm not gonna punch my grandson in the face. But like, that is like, he's a. He's like a good grandfather in the one piece sense, you know, like, not in the real world sense. He is an awful grandfather.

[Kirsten Carey]

Present. Somewhat present.

[Zach]

Yeah. Like. Or like, he does love Luffy and he does, I think, love Dragon. I Think we could say after this, like, he, he like, knows it actually like really puts. Oh, I forgot to mention this in, in the manga recap. But this really puts stuff in perspective for both Garp's point of view and Dragon's point of view and how they, like, treat each other and their missions generally. Like, Garp doesn't ever really seem to badmouth his dragon. Maybe once, I don't know.

[Ken]

And he doesn't badmouth his dragon interest.

[Zach]

Doesn't badmouth his dragon. His son. Did I say his dragon? Yeah, look, can all be Kaido, but what was I gonna say? But it's really interesting how Dragon specifically, more recently, maybe after ODA has had more of like, kind of time to, to make things more concrete. It's very interesting how Dragon is like, no, the Marines are not my enemy. The Celestial Dragons are. And he has two reasons for that. We know now. One, I think he does have some begrudging respect for his grandfather, despite what he says here in that, like, he's like, I don't agree with what he's doing, but I'm not gonna, you know, I don't, I don't hate him, even though he does say that here specifically. And also because he was a Marine and like, he knows that there's probably lots of people who are like him who just don't know what they're doing is wrong. So I, I thought that was interesting because I remember at the time it was like, kind of like, why is he parsing this here dragon? Like, come on, if you're gonna. Acab. Acab. You know, like, that's, I think, how, how it was viewed and, and now it definitely. Oda's good at nuance. And I think there's a lot of nuance here. There's never. Nothing is, well, okay, except Emu maybe, but there's very little black and white in the series, which is mostly true in the world, the world we live in. I think it's.

[Kirsten Carey]

It's interesting too to note, kind of like going back to the idea of Garp's like, quote unquote, children and protege. It's interesting to note how many people under Garp's tutelage, especially after what Garp goes through in this chapter in the flashback in general, have left the Marines or are fighting against the world government. It's sort of like taking Garp's lessons, you know, it is sort of like that the anti world government sentiment does exist within Garp. And I think a lot of the people who have studied under him have felt that.

[Zach]

I'm not trying to move it. I'm trying to think golfer. You probably would be the one most likely to know the answer to this. If there's, like, an example of, like, any real world kind of military leader who very much was open about hating the government that he served, however, you know, also being a military leader in that government, I'm trying to think Metal Gear Solid.

[Golfer Gare]

Oh, I mean, it's happened multiple times, like, in the US Specifically. There's always been, like. There's, like, differing paths to, like, when force should be exerted or how it should be exerted. Even after, like, 2001, like, 9, 11. Like, there was a lot of split in the military brass over the fact that, like, some rando got into George Bush's cabinet and was like, I know all these guys are over here, but we should invade here and don't be starting on that.

[Zach]

Oh, he's dead now, though, finally.

[Golfer Gare]

Who? George Bush?

[Zach]

No, Dick Cheney. Oh, I. Breaking news.

[Golfer Gare]

It was a. It was one of. If I remember correctly, it was somebody that was like. Like, in, like, worked with Dick Cheney, but it was just, like. It wasn't like, a guy traditionally.

[Zach]

Oh, yeah, Paul Wolf. I used to read all those. Yeah, I know. I thank God. Anyway, so I got a flashback to that era.

[Golfer Gare]

But it's, you know, it's also dependent upon, like, time and, like, what the actual purpose of the military has ever been. But the idea of, like, this, the ideological split but falling in line is generally, like, that's present throughout, like, at least all of our history that I know of. Yeah, there's always been an ideological split.

[Zach]

Yeah. I think sometimes the ideal. I'm gonna say, I think oftentimes the ideological split is in the reverse. Like, I. I think there. There's both of those things happening where you have some in the military who are probably like, what are you doing? And then there's others in the military who are like, we should be bombing more people in random countries. Like. Yeah, I guess that's just that. Nothing. You can't. What is it? You can't paint anything with, you know, one brush stroke. But, yeah, it's. I. I'm just, like, wondering if out there there is a monkey d guard making some poor decisions. Yeah. I don't know. I guess I was going to say we're not in quite as crazy a situation, but we are. We are. Any other questions on this piece?

[Ken]

Nope, that's it. Thank you to everyone who asked a question this week. Really appreciate it.

[Zach]

Yeah. And for those who didn't want a political episode this week. I apologize. Stephen. Where do we have on Reddit?

[Stephen Paul]

Yes, back to One Piece over on the subreddit Archipelago, which is Reddit.com r One Piece podcast. We will start with the the thread made for us by Brad Wonder, who says we got an interaction between Dragon and Garp. What do I do with my hands? With Rock's official colors released, we will get a hint on. Will we get a hint on the origin of a certain clown in this flashback?

[Zach]

No.

[Stephen Paul]

His connection to Rock seems like a plot hole at this point. But it's mean of ODA to pick that hair color. Look, there's only so many hair colors that he can choose from.

[Zach]

Oh, you say that, but ODA will find a way. So as a colorblind person, as I mention often, apparently is it's indigo. Is it white is just like regular old white.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah.

[Zach]

Okay. Yeah, I'm like making sure I'm not missing something. He could have made that white a different color if you really want to go crazy. Right? I don't know where he's going with that. He is just such. There's too much going on with Vox's design. I don't know if I like it.

[Ken]

I don't hate the colors. They're fine. I really had no idea what to expect with them. I think it would been boring if it was black hair with white accents. Like, okay, it's just older Blackbeard at that point. I think the white and blue is cool.

[Zach]

Did Steve or Dr. Fishbone and his voice actor have an opinion on this? Because I know he's a big purple fan. That's one of the two big facts about Steve Yurko that everyone needs to know. Elephants.

[Ken]

I don't think Steve commented, but he's.

[Stephen Paul]

Chiming in right now.

[Ken]

Okay, we're getting a live feed in.

[Zach]

Well, he said if you had any fish or bone questions we should ask, but this is neither, so I won't. Yeah, yeah, go ahead.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, I. Yeah, I. I came around on Rocks as a character. I did not come around on his design, but moving along 23 years Virgin says. Hey, OPP. Seeing the end of a great legend. That was Davey. Davey zvec. You can say that he was actually a great pirate who was misunderstood. He had loyal companions, friends who supported him and family who loved him. But the government decided to erase his existence so that no one would follow in his footsteps. And that made me think of a question. What false propaganda could be correct for the straw hats? In my opinion, the captain could eat the nation's food supply. And the vice captain could drink the alcohol rations. Cheers. And keep up the good work.

[Zach]

Actually, surprised Luffy hasn't done that yet. That is very good propaganda against Luffy there. He would do that?

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah.

[Zach]

I mean, I don't think he would do that to forsake a people, but accidentally he might eat a country's food supply.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah. I mean, their. Their shipwright blew up a city.

[Zach]

He kind of may have. He did. He did build weapons.

[Ken]

Frankie is indeed a battleship. He's not a person.

[Golfer Gare]

Their pet is a dealer.

[Zach]

And then they just show a picture of the cutest Chopper picture you could possibly show.

[Ken]

Chopper gave drugs to children.

[Golfer Gare]

And giving Depo the. The Sulong drug.

[Zach]

Oh yeah. There it is. I like that he's making. He's giving animals rabies. Infected something. What? Oh my God. This is a fish man.

[Golfer Gare]

Lives on islands.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Kirsten Carey]

Entire country's treasure.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Ken]

Yeah.

[Zach]

Giant diamond of some sort.

[Stephen Paul]

One guy has a God complex.

[Zach]

Luffy. Because he's a God?

[Stephen Paul]

No.

[Zach]

Usopp. Usopp. Right. Oh, wow.

[Ken]

He's got a God of Kamala.

[Zach]

He could have lied about something, Usopp. And the lie could have led to something that ends up destroying the country.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah. He's a propagandist.

[Zach]

He is. He's the propagandist. Yeah. That's the thing.

[Golfer Gare]

They parade around a skeleton saying that it's alive. Last one I got.

[Zach]

Yeah, it's a.

[Stephen Paul]

They were this. Yeah, they were the Satan worshiper summoners. Okay. Our last one is From Ice Fisher 10 who says hi opp. I bet emu has Herald's horns mounted above Pangea Castle's fireplace. That's gross. With another mention. Sorry.

[Zach]

No, that's true.

[Stephen Paul]

Editorializing there. With another mention. With another mention of the Galila band who. Who we reason to be the giants that are frozen and preserved. Do you think Emu had Zbek's corpse similarly put on ice in her giant freezer? Along with that large straw hat that maybe to fight as a puppet demon soldier. Well, they would have to have have done that very quickly since I think the island sank approximately two panels after that. After the scene where he dies.

[Ken]

But no, they say Harold or Zebec.

[Stephen Paul]

Whoops. I was looking at the chapter where. Because Zebec.

[Ken]

Yes. Well. Well, Zebec told Loki that Harold's the only one that can control Galila.

[Stephen Paul]

Yes.

[Ken]

So. Wait, I. Maybe misunderstanding the question.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah. No, no. So. So if we're assuming that the Galila band are the frozen figures on Punk Hazard Punk hazard. So, speaking of people who are frozen, do you think Emu put Xebek's corpse. Roxy.

[Ken]

Gotcha, gotcha, gotcha.

[Stephen Paul]

In the fridge, in the freezer with the giant straw hat. I mean, that was a very big place that it looked like there were lots of little cubby holes to put stuff in. I guess so. Possibly.

[Ken]

Just spinning off that, though, just because I don't think we talked about Galila, really, during the discussion.

[Zach]

True.

[Ken]

If Harold is the only one that can command them, it would make sense that now with Harald gone, if Loki has that same power, like, if it's an actual power for giants with ancient blood to control the Galila giants, it would make sense why at the start of this arc, where they saw them trying to recruit Loki to join them, like, hey, we're gonna need an ancient giant at some point or someone with ancient giant blood to use Galila. That could be why they need Loki.

[Zach]

I thought they just needed Loki. Cause it's like, he is the son of the king. And so we need a new person, right?

[Ken]

Yeah, I thought so too.

[Zach]

Which is what they did with Dorian Frogi.

[Ken]

Yeah.

[Zach]

Yeah, right.

[Stephen Paul]

Like, they'll. Right. They'll only answer to someone who can actually, like, beat them up, basically. Only someone who's that strong.

[Zach]

They're. They're Klingons.

[Stephen Paul]

Yes. Yeah, yeah.

[Ken]

Maybe I'm looking too much into this work. Like, the fact that, like, your. Your dad can control them. Maybe it has to be someone of royal ancient giant lineage. And it's an actual power, not just a command. But that can be me overthinking it.

[Stephen Paul]

But, I mean, yeah, it kind of sounds like a Shirahoshi thing again, but. Yeah, but, like, he could absolutely write that into the story for sure. There's. There's plenty of room for something like that.

[Ken]

Yeah.

[Zach]

All right, but that.

[Stephen Paul]

That's it for Reddit.

[Zach]

That's it for Piece. Together. We'll round off. Do you guys want to do trivia? Should I really ask this, or should I. No. Okay.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, we don't usually get the option then.

[Zach]

I'm not giving you one. We'll do one. No, Ken. Okay, fine.

[Ken]

I'll do. Hey, if you're. If you're gonna do it, then I have no choice.

[Zach]

That's how that works. Okay, we'll see you on the other side. That's how I have to present choices to my son. It's like.

[Ken]

If I tear off my horns, will you end trivia.

[Zach]

Delaney? Keep that in.

[Stephen Paul]

No.

[Ed]

Join me, Jacqueline Coley.

[Zach]

As I sit down with Mark Platt, producer of Wicked and Wicked for Good.

[Kirsten Carey]

As he reveals how his family and collaborations have shaped his storytelling. Plus how Wicked for Good delivers the satisfying finale fans have been waiting for. Listen now to Seen on the screen wherever you get your podcast.

[Zach]

Kraft Mac.

[Golfer Gare]

And Cheese is the best thing ever. It's even better than pop music.

[Zach]

You look just as natural enjoying us.

[Golfer Gare]

At age 13 as you do 55. Kraft Mac and Cheese. Best thing ever.

[Zach]

This episode of the One Piece podcast is collapsing under the weight of its own, if its own lane.

[Stephen Paul]

This is a runtime.

[Zach]

Yeah, its own runtime. But I'll continue until we collapse into the bottom of the earth. Thank you all for coming on the show.

[Golfer Gare]

Yeah.

[Zach]

2025. Waiting until we collapse into the center of the earth. Speaking of 2025, we have lots of really cool stuff planned for our 900th episode coming far too soon, so keep an eye out for that. Not announcing anything at this time because it's still too early, but keep an eye. Yeah, lots of fun stuff. The end of the year is always great. People were asking us if the SGS is going to come back and why we didn't have one last week. Steven it's because Greg was resting his voice.

[Stephen Paul]

Yes. He had a big thing to do and it was going to be close enough to our recording. And let me tell you, you know, two to three hours of just two people trading back and forth that it will do a number on your voice and he didn't want to jeopardize that. But you know, the holidays are coming up. We will have plenty of weeks with no manga. So we'll get to the.

[Zach]

Don't worry, there'll be plenty of no material weeks for us to give you stuff. Stuff. Well, we also have the magazine number 20. Is it the. With the ODA interviews, what were your initial thoughts? Did you read through all them yet or.

[Stephen Paul]

I did not read through like every single word. But I will say that it is not so much an interview as it is like it's not structured as an interview. It's sort of like. It's almost like each one answer is like a, like an S. A little mini essay where it's like ODA talks about this topic or ODA talks about that topic and it's just his comment because it's not like a back. It's not a back and forth with like another, you know, celebrity or whatever, which is. That's a very popular interview format in Japan. So yeah, it's more just like, okay, here's, here's him Talking about all these different topics and, and stuff in his history as a, as a mangaka. So I, I would like to like present all of that, you know, like, like actually translate it all so that I can go through them and, and deliver them. Because.

[Zach]

Well, is this gonna be like another four part episode or like, I don't know how much, how dense it is.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah, it depends on if how much of the other stuff is. But I, I think that part is like reasonably. It's not super long. It's not like a 30 page section or anything like that.

[Zach]

So I just don't want you to lose, lose your voice. Yeah, if you have something important.

[Stephen Paul]

I mean if I have translate, I have to write it down so some, anybody can read it, you know.

[Zach]

Oh, that's true. Yeah, you're right. Okay, well, we'll get some dramatic readings of Oda's voice in the coming months.

[Stephen Paul]

Yes. Everyone, do your voices. Your silver voices.

[Zach]

Do your fish voices. Yeah. So look forward to that in the coming weeks. If you haven't listened to last week's episode, we did the SBS for volume 113. It was a lot of fun. It was a lengthy one too, so very long. Yeah, give that a listen. Not the episode, but the sbs. I think it was a regular size episode and I think the anime is going to be wrapping up Egghead soon, which means it's going to go on another hiatus after that.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah.

[Zach]

So listen to our anime recaps every week until those wrap up. Kirsten, have you been able to watch those as they air? I know they're at a weird hour, so we're.

[Kirsten Carey]

I am not plugged into Japanese TV in my apartment, which is very sad. So figuring that out, figuring a lot out. Turns out moving to another country pretty hard.

[Zach]

Speaking of cursing, where could people find you?

[Kirsten Carey]

You can find me on Instagram at K I R C A R E Y G T R and on Blue sky with. Without the GTR bit. If you are in Japan in the second week of December, my band is actually playing some shows here. I've announced those on Instagram. Yep, that's it.

[Zach]

I'll say. I feel like everyone I know is in Japan right now for some reason. Like I know a lot of people who are there. My father in law is there right now. So if you see a very tall, very white man.

[Kirsten Carey]

I mean, you know, you go to survey. There's quite a few of those. No, but this one gets specific. We're playing in Tokyo on. Oh boy. Can I remember this off the top of my head Sunday, December 7th. We're playing Osaka Tuesday, December 9th, and Kyoto Wednesday, December 10th. My band's called Throwaway. Our music is on Bandcamp and all the streamers. For now, though, I might take stuff off of Spotify because Spotify.

[Zach]

Yep, yep. If you're listening to. Well, that's the thing. Also, like, I feel like every company is evil right now. Not the ones listening to this little.

[Kirsten Carey]

More than the others. But like, yeah, how loud is the.

[Golfer Gare]

CEO about liking investing in drone companies? Like, we all know you do it. It's just. How loud are you about it?

[Zach]

How.

[Kirsten Carey]

How many people are allowing ICE ads on the platform?

[Zach]

Yeah. So I will say that I'm not. This is sounding like I'm about to defend Spotify. I'm not just like, for like a little like behind the scenes is how these things work. Is that for. I know at least for like the dynamic ads, which is like what we have and a lot of have. Most podcasts have like, you could ask for certain codes, you know, of types of ads like military related or, you know, because I know we've had in the past, like that pop up and we're like, what the hell? We said none of this. So like, I. It's a little like the individual person should be saying, hey, I don't want ads for ice on my. On my podcast. However, allowing them in the first place is also effed up. Yeah. And as we say on this podcast, as a motto, ice. So. Well, yeah.

[Stephen Paul]

Golfer.

[Zach]

Yeah. I have no words.

[Golfer Gare]

I was wondering if we were gonna get one of those without Alex. So I'm glad I got addressed.

[Zach]

Yeah. I was thinking this should just be our sign off from now on, but we'll see. Hopefully it won't be relevant much longer, but we'll see. Golfer. Where could people find you?

[Golfer Gare]

You can find me on TikTok as golfer Garebear and then you can find me on the. On Twitter as Golfer Gare.

[Zach]

That's it. Thank you. I don't have a band. Why not?

[Ken]

Ken, you can find me anywhere on the Internet under kindking01, whether that be TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, Twitch, BlueSky. I'm the same thing everywhere. You're on TikTok and if you like me, I'm on TikTok. I don't have a lot on TikTok, but I'm on there. I'm everywhere. Trust me. And if you like the art for this week, we have Kirby again on this week doing the art. You can find Kirby at DKirbyJ, BSky Social. And if you like one piece art in general. Me and Kirby actually hosted the One Piece Art Collab Volume 2 last year. We got hundreds of artists to draw hundreds of one piece characters compiled all together into one big kind of digital zine magazine collection thing. You can find that at Opcollab Bsky Social.

[Zach]

Ken, you're doing my job too. I like it.

[Ken]

I'm trying to help out here.

[Zach]

No, you were helping.

[Ken]

Thank you.

[Zach]

You can find [e-mail] on Bluesky. Unlike Ken, I'm nowhere. Except there.

[Ken]

So I'm the dummy. Reverse Zach.

[Zach]

Yeah. I've always known you were the evil version of me, and it's kind of true. You're the cooler version of me anyway.

[Ken]

Oh, now you're giving me too much credit.

[Zach]

I'm sorry I didn't see the Funko Pops behind you. Sorry, I had to. I had to. It's Funko Pops. I have to. It's like it's obligatory. Steven. Where could people find you?

[Stephen Paul]

I am on Bluesky at StephenPaul BSky Social, and as always, I'm working on Simul pubs like One Piece, Kane, Banashi, Kurumizawa's Folly, and Trillion Game. You can check all those out. Those are all on the Viz Shonen jump app, I believe.

[Zach]

You can find [e-mail] I said on Blue sky when I. I almost forgot, Stephen. You can find [e-mail] or on patreon.com One Piece Podcast. Please subscribe to us on YouTube YouTube.com One Piece of Podcast. Hit that subscribe button because that's what everyone says, right? Okay. Gonna make a. Making this a lightning round because it got later than I thought after all of the. The stuff. So we're gonna play Random Number Generator Game. Thank you, Ken. Wow, I could really depend on you here. So this was chapter 1166. So random number generator 1165.

[Ken]

Let's go. What happened last week?

[Zach]

Okay, two weeks ago. Who wants to. Who wants to bite the bullet and go first? I'll explain how this. I will. Thank you, Kirsten. Okay, so the way this works is I pick a number between 1 and 1166 and I ask you some questions about those chapters. I'm only gonna do three this time, so it goes faster. The first question will be what arc is. I'm just telling you now. The first question will always be, what arc is this? What cover story? Or something like that, if there isn't is this. And then the third question will be a question about the chop Chapter proper. Okay, so you.

[Kirsten Carey]

I'm gonna do so bad at this.

[Zach]

That's why I bit. The bullet is yours. What arc is this in?

[Kirsten Carey]

Would 488 be Marineford?

[Zach]

Not even close.

[Golfer Gare]

488 is the episode range for Marineford. Yeah, the conversion was way different back then.

[Zach]

Yeah, now it's the same. That's like exactly the same.

[Kirsten Carey]

Does anyone want to steal anime first?

[Ken]

What's the chapter number?

[Zach]

488.

[Golfer Gare]

I think I know the arc. I believe it's Enies lobby.

[Stephen Paul]

No, no, that's more like Thriller Bark.

[Zach]

It is, Steven.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah.

[Zach]

Second question is, what cover story is this? So it's a kind of a trick question. Will be my. Will be my hint. It is a cover story, but it's a specific type of COVID story. Oh, are you muted cursor? Oh, no, you're back.

[Kirsten Carey]

Am I? No, I'm back, I'm back. I'm just confused.

[Zach]

That's. That's what I always say.

[Kirsten Carey]

Oh, no. Thriller part.

[Zach]

Gonna have to.

[Kirsten Carey]

Yeah.

[Zach]

All right. Anyone want to steal. Do you want to say something, Kirsten?

[Kirsten Carey]

I was gonna say an eru, but I know I'm wrong.

[Zach]

No, that's a good guess because that's a good guess. Anyone?

[Ken]

You said Thriller Bark was the arc we're in.

[Zach]

It is.

[Ken]

Is it the water 7 folks?

[Zach]

I'm gonna give it to you. It's. Where are they now? And it is specifically. Yeah, it's specifically about Paulie, though.

[Ken]

So don't give it to me then. That's too broad. I would. I wouldn't take that.

[Zach]

Okay.

[Stephen Paul]

The way. The way that Zach phrases it is like. It's a certain kind of. I was like, okay, so it's one of those catch up things where. Yeah.

[Ken]

Oh, Dex of the world. Okay. Yeah, no, that wouldn't count.

[Zach]

Okay, Kirsten, this chapter. How am I gonna put this question? This chapter features one of the most iconic. The introduction of one of the most iconic things in one piece. Again, Thriller Bark. And it's not fishbone. And the way that you were saying.

[Kirsten Carey]

That, I was like, is this the shower scene?

[Stephen Paul]

Iconic?

[Kirsten Carey]

One of the most iconic things in one piece. No, the Nami shower scene.

[Zach]

This. How do. How do I put this in a way it's not like, substantially obvious?

[Ken]

I think you're screwed here.

[Zach]

I am screwed. Okay, I'll. My hit will be. It ends in a solo.

[Kirsten Carey]

It ends in a solo.

[Zach]

I think Ken knows it because he's making a lot of motions. There's no way to do this without either making it painfully obvious in a solo.

[Kirsten Carey]

I'm like, what band is rocking out in the middle of Thriller Park?

[Zach]

That you were asking the right question. I will tell you.

[Kirsten Carey]

Excellent guitar solo.

[Zach]

Maybe guitar is the instrument.

[Stephen Paul]

Or is it the middle of the Taylor Bark? Or is it.

[Zach]

Some.

[Stephen Paul]

A different part of it?

[Kirsten Carey]

I feel like my brain. I can feel my brain actively dying on me.

[Zach]

That's the new name of this segment. I could feel my brain actively dying.

[Kirsten Carey]

I feel like, by all means, I should know this. And I feel like my brain. I have had to cram an entire certain video game into my brain. And I feel how that has taken, I cannot say, because I'm under any water.

[Stephen Paul]

It's a work thing.

[Kirsten Carey]

Yeah. It's related to my job. And I can feel the space that one piece has left that this has taken in.

[Zach]

Stop killing time and just give me an answer.

[Kirsten Carey]

I am gonna say it's shit. I'm just thinking of anime shit because the Zombie Night song isn't in that.

[Zach]

To be fair, that is also in Thriller, but that's also.

[Kirsten Carey]

Yeah.

[Zach]

Also iconic, but does not end in a solo. Is it.

[Kirsten Carey]

It's not Brook. Is it Brook playing the piano?

[Zach]

Yes, but what's. What specifically is he singing? Oh, God.

[Kirsten Carey]

It's the flashback where all his crewmates dance.

[Zach]

Thank you. Can I give that to her?

[Kirsten Carey]

Okay.

[Zach]

Yes. Eventually. She made it.

[Ken]

The trivia section's collapsing under its own weight.

[Zach]

Okay, Kirsten, at the end of that, you have one point, Steven has one point, and Ken has a rescinded point.

[Ken]

Yes.

[Zach]

That is. That is the Binks's sake with all the lyrics. And, like, that is the chapter, like, I don't know if that's what it was called. Song of Life. It was called.

[Ken]

It's a quartet. It's a duo. It's a solo.

[Zach]

It is that. Random generator knows the good chapters. That's a golfer. You wanna. You ready?

[Golfer Gare]

Go for it. Go for it. I'm born ready.

[Zach]

172. What arc is this in.

[Golfer Gare]

Post.

[Zach]

172?

[Golfer Gare]

This. This pre Alabaster. Is this Whiskey Peak?

[Zach]

No. Would anyone like to steal?

[Stephen Paul]

I mean, I was gonna guess, like, very, very early Alabasta.

[Ken]

I was gonna say Alabaster too.

[Kirsten Carey]

Alabasta.

[Zach]

Although none of you committed to it.

[Ken]

I didn't commit. So give it to Stephen.

[Zach]

And you know what? Not very early Alabasta either. Kind of in the middle.

[Ken]

Is it the. Is it the final Alabama?

[Zach]

I won't say what it's. No, it's not the end. It's middle That'll be my hint.

[Stephen Paul]

I always remember. I always remember that. It's like, in the early days, there were a lot of, like, nine chapter. So when I hear 17, I'm like, okay, volume 17 was, like, the end.

[Zach]

Of drum, but 172.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah. So 172, it's not actually in Drum. It's like. It's, like, significantly further ahead in alabaster.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Ken]

That's volume 19, then. Probably this.

[Zach]

Ish.

[Stephen Paul]

Ish.

[Zach]

It's volume 19. Good job.

[Ken]

Oh, okay.

[Zach]

I would give you a point if that's what we were doing here. You made up your own.

[Ken]

I can count by tens.

[Zach]

Golfer. What cover story is this?

[Golfer Gare]

I've got no idea. Let someone steal this from me.

[Zach]

Okay, go ahead. Anyone?

[Kirsten Carey]

Steven, Garp and Toby.

[Stephen Paul]

No, no.

[Zach]

Good guess in that. I think it's that time range.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah. It's not hot cheese, is it?

[Zach]

No, no, Ken, I'll let you have a guess, and then I'm gonna give a big hint and not give any points after I give the big hint.

[Ken]

I don't. I don't even have a guess.

[Zach]

The person who was supposed to make it here would be yelling at all of you right now.

[Ken]

Oh, it's.

[Zach]

This is even worse that no one's getting it.

[Ken]

Full body. It's the dancing.

[Zach]

Yes.

[Ken]

And Django. The dancing one.

[Zach]

Okay, I'm gonna give you two half points. One for that one and one for the other.

[Ken]

I have a point now.

[Zach]

I think you have a point. Okay. Golf. I'm trying to think of. First of all, I think you would enjoy this chapter because it involves the beginning. Although this is happening a lot in. In this arc, but it involves the beginning of this conflict.

[Golfer Gare]

So is the beginning of the Civil War. Is this when we're first meeting crocodile or the straw?

[Zach]

Not that early. You're. You're right. That is the beginning of the Civil War. So I would give it to you for that. But which. Which, if you. If you want to get the full point.

[Stephen Paul]

Exciting incident?

[Zach]

Well, there's a lot of those. Oh, yeah. Actually, this is. Yeah. Which inciting incident? I'll take it. This is the result. So this chapter shows the result of what inciting incident of the Civil War?

[Golfer Gare]

I cannot recall. Have someone.

[Zach]

Anyone?

[Stephen Paul]

I mean, I'm. I was thinking of. Is this the one that has, like, mist when Mr. Two, like, they find the rain powder or whatever? Pretends to be.

[Zach]

Yeah, it's. I don't think it's the rain powder. It's when they crash into the harbor and the kid got Hurt.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah. The kid. The little kid.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Ken]

I would have never.

[Zach]

I'll give a half point to golfer there, because that's essentially what I was going for. The Civil War. Go. And then Koza has the. You know, we have to fight because they're murdering children.

[Golfer Gare]

They are locked up in jail. I was read. Okay. I remember that now.

[Zach]

Okay, Steven or Ken, who wants to go next? I already picked the number.

[Ken]

Who's has more points?

[Zach]

You each have one.

[Stephen Paul]

Who do you think has more points?

[Ken]

I'll go. I'll go.

[Zach]

Stephen. Jeez. For someone who hates trivia. Okay, Ken, you're lucky. Or unlucky, depending on how you see it. 1062. Wow. What arc is this?

[Ken]

Egghead.

[Zach]

Correct. This is definitely the furthest along we've got in one of these.

[Ken]

Yeah, this feels. This feels too easy. But keep going.

[Zach]

Which cover story is it?

[Ken]

Oh, Is. It's a. It's a cover story. Like, it's a continuous one. Right? It's not just.

[Zach]

Okay, so far, you've all picked continuous cover story.

[Ken]

Yeah. It's not. Oh, my family. Is it. Is it the Capone? No, no.

[Zach]

Say you have an answer, and then I.

[Ken]

Okay, I'll say. Okay. Okay. No, it's the Germa one, then.

[Zach]

Yeah. Did I shake my head, though? Because then I don't want to go with you.

[Ken]

No, no, you're good.

[Zach]

Okay. Ken. Lastly.

[Ken]

Fishbonen.

[Zach]

Yeah. How did you know? How hard am I going here in this one?

[Ken]

Go hard, because this has been too easy.

[Zach]

Okay. I don't even know the answer. I saw this posted. Oh, no. This was a. Oh, if you were listening last week, that's what it is. You'll know the answer. An SBS question from last week was that we discussed if you were listening to the episode like you said you were, there was a series that Oda enjoyed as a child that is referenced in this chapter. I don't remember what it is, but Steven could confirm which one it is. Do you remember, Ken?

[Ken]

I'm gonna throw away my answer. I'm gonna say Vicky the Viking and throw away my answer.

[Zach]

Do you know what I'm talking about, Steven?

[Stephen Paul]

Were you talking about the item of clothing or the. The design?

[Zach]

Oh, yeah, I forgot that was also a thing. Although that is also in this. But that's the. The robot design.

[Stephen Paul]

The robot designs. Yeah. That you do want me to say the.

[Zach]

Yeah, you tell me the answer, because I don't know what it is.

[Stephen Paul]

Right. It's the. The Time book on series, which is where Yadderman comes from.

[Zach]

Like lady sweatpants, right?

[Stephen Paul]

Yes. Weapons. And all of the other Mecha designs that. That ODA has done.

[Ken]

I like Zach. Even if I knew that answer, you would have to turn to Steven. Anyways, can write.

[Zach]

Steven will tell you I didn't remember. Stephen gets a point for that for stealing my job.

[Ken]

Steven has the Oscar envelope.

[Zach]

Okay, last one goes. Here's Steven. You only need two points to get this. 670 is yours.

[Stephen Paul]

670.

[Ken]

670.

[Zach]

Not 669. Because that would have been nice, but this isn't.

[Stephen Paul]

That would have been nice, but this is 670.

[Zach]

Oh, I forgot it's a. Yeah. Okay. Apparently my son did that to my like. Oh no. It's happening.

[Stephen Paul]

Oh boy. 670. Yeah. I do think that is Punk hazard. Isn't.

[Zach]

Is. Love the title Blizzard with a chance of Slime. Excellent title, Steven. I'm assuming that that's definitely you. How do she do? I want to go with the COVID thing. Okay. Frankie, in this one, I'm going to go as douchey as I possibly can because you might. If anyone knows this answer, it would be you. In that you translated this 15 years ago, so you might remember. This is a reader request. Robin interferes with an arm wrestling match between Frankie and a gorilla by Takahito Ogura from this country. This real life country.

[Stephen Paul]

Okay, so it's a. It's a Japanese name, but it's from a. It's from a different country. Not a. Not a prefecture.

[Zach]

You would not expect. Like, it's not. I'll give you. I'll give you this hint. It's in the Western hemisphere.

[Sam]

Okay.

[Ken]

Oh, great.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah. Is it Canada?

[Zach]

It is.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah.

[Zach]

You deserve that, Stephen. You win. But I could ask you.

[Stephen Paul]

That was literally. Even if you hadn't said West, I was gonna say. Okay, it's gonna be something where it's not. It's not the US Because I would remember if some. If. If he randomly said so and so from America, but Canada sounds right. So.

[Zach]

Wow. I'm so genuinely impressed. I don't know why, but I am. Okay, I'll. I'll ask the last question because I got to. Even though I don't, you know, have a reason. This. This. This chapter features Luffy squaring off against this person in this person's body, briefly.

[Stephen Paul]

Well, a couple pages into this person's body or the.

[Zach]

So.

[Stephen Paul]

So Luffy against someone else in someone else's body. So Luffy is normal.

[Zach]

Luffy's always.

[Stephen Paul]

That's right.

[Zach]

I don't think he Ever.

[Ken]

Yeah.

[Stephen Paul]

He didn't get switched. By law.

[Zach]

He's. He's too cool to get switched.

[Stephen Paul]

Was this when he was like. Was he threatening to hit, like, Sanji and Nami's body or something like that?

[Zach]

No. You're thinking.

[Stephen Paul]

I'm thinking. I remember. Yeah. I remember. There was a whole thing about, like, don't hurt.

[Zach]

Let's say if Ken steals this, he ties.

[Stephen Paul]

Yeah.

[Zach]

So we're actually still in the game here.

[Ken]

That's true.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Ken]

Fishbonen.

[Zach]

Oh, wow. How did you know? But in whose body?

[Ken]

Steven way.

[Zach]

Steve Yurko's body. Chris Boonen and Steve Yurko's body. Oh, wow. In 670.

[Ken]

No one can see that gesture.

[Zach]

They're all doing the gesture.

[Kirsten Carey]

See, everyone's doing it in their head.

[Zach]

See, kids, we know what's happening. I just think now that I've said that sentence, I've long lost it. What's your answer, Stephen? An answer?

[Stephen Paul]

Oh, you. You want me to do another answer?

[Zach]

Oh, was that your answer? Okay, that was my.

[Stephen Paul]

I mean, that's what I said.

[Zach]

Do you have an answer besides I.

[Ken]

Said fish bone and Steven?

[Zach]

That was your answer. Okay, Stephen, congratulations. You won four to three to one to one half.

[Stephen Paul]

So what was the answer?

[Zach]

The answer.

[Kirsten Carey]

Is it Tashigi?

[Zach]

Yes. Kirsten, two points. Now.

[Ken]

That was worth seven points. Kirsten wins.

[Zach]

Where Luffy says, we'll fight next time. There's no use squaring off when you aren't your best. How dare you say that about to Shiv. That was when Smoker was his best. To be fair, it's when he was to Shigi. Okay, that's a different discussion for another day. We'll see you next week with another chapter of One piece. That's shocking. 1067 next week, everyone. My name is Zach. Ice, everyone. Goodbye. No one else. I'm the only one saying I said boy.

[Ken]

No, I say Maji sometimes.

[Zach]

Ice.

[Golfer Gare]

We can add it in.

[Ken]

Fish bone in 1, 2, 3.

[Kirsten Carey]

Eyes.

[Zach]

Heard it here first.

[Ken]

1, 2, 3. A baby.

[Stephen Paul]

You're right.

[Zach]

You're right.

[Stephen Paul]

It is. It is 1167 next week.

[Ken]

Oh, is it? We wasted it in the trivia section.

[Zach]

No one listens to that.

[Kirsten Carey]

Experience. The sequel everyone's been waiting for with Sideline 2 intercepted, join Drayton and Dallas as they navigate the challenges of college life while trying to stay true to themselves and each other, catch all the drama and watch Sideline 2 Intercepted, starring Noah Beck and Sienna Agudong for free on Tubi this Thanksgiving.