One Piece V: Black Leg Wedding

[LaZodiac]

Fun fact: The Swedish translation (which is sadly discontinued) set out to translate literally everything to Swedish. No titles or names were left out. So when I first read the chapters with Aokiji, the admirals were introduced as Blåfasan (Blue-Pheasant), Gulapa (Yellow-Monkey) and Rödhund (Red-Dog), and I didn't think any further of it. Years later when I opened up some old volumes in a bookstore after having read the English fan translations, the Swedish titles suddenly looked silly to me. Funny how that works. I also remember Shichibukai being translated as Krigshav Sju (War-Sea Seven). That meant, grammatically, you couldn't be an individual shichibukai/warlord, you could only be a member of the collective Krigshav Sju.

Are you a translator? (That's a genuine question, not a snide comment of any kind.)

No but I know some and have read a lot into that subject because it fascinates me. It's something that's always interested me, and One Piece seems to be the only fandom that is weird about how the official translation refers to thing vs the unofficial. Official Naruto and Fantranslations tend to be nearly always the same, though they disagree on wheter they should put the "no" in the Jutsus or not. My Hero Academia is also rather locksteppe except for the occasional name that they just refuse to change when the official name comes out like La Brava.

[Braininthejar2]

Ok, how many more allies do they have?

[Kato]

Ok, how many more allies do they have?

As many as they need?

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Good chapter. Really turning up the tension for the finale next week (?). It's not a surprise the Sun Pirates make an appearance but... do they really pack the punch needed to turn this around?
Also, the scene with Judge was very... Luffy.

[Togath]

So for a newcomer to the series... are there any episodes/arcs worth skipping over? Like, stuff that doesn't add much to the story or cases where an episode ends up fully explained in recaps?
I'm at episode 107 right now and the Alabasta arc is... feeling sort of slow right now. Though that might just be because of the endless sand backdrops for everything.
Like, has anyone made lists of stuff to possibly skip?(and does the story pick up a little later in this arc? A little reading seemed to indicate they managed to squeeze a lot of this arc into just a 90 minute movie later on)
Like... there are a few short arcs I liked, but the Alabasta one is kinda lackluster.

I do have some vague knowledge of the plot... they eventually get two more crew members, the king and princess live through this current arc I'm on, the next major arc involves flying islands or something. Eventually there is some sort of jailbreak plotline and Luffy's brother dies. After that(I think?) there is some sort of time skip. And later on something involving a giant elephant carrying an island and Sanji ending up in an arranged marriage of some sort.

[Razade]

So for a newcomer to the series... are there any episodes/arcs worth skipping over? Like, stuff that doesn't add much to the story or cases where an episode ends up fully explained in recaps?
I'm at episode 107 right now and the Alabasta arc is... feeling sort of slow right now. Though that might just be because of the endless sand backdrops for everything.
Like, has anyone made lists of stuff to possibly skip?(and does the story pick up a little later in this arc? A little reading seemed to indicate they managed to squeeze a lot of this arc into just a 90 minute movie later on)

Skip the anime altogether and read the manga.

Skip all the filler arcs, you can find what those are and their episode numbers online, if you can't read the manga for some reason.

[Cozzer]

Even skipping the filler arcs, the anime has very low quality and an unbearable pace, at least in my opinion... but yeah, if you'd rather continue it than jump ship to the manga, skipping everything that's filler (including recap episodes) sounds like a very good idea.

[Cizak]

There's a fan project called One Pace that supposedly cuts out all filler and padding to create a faster, closer to manga adaption. I've never checked it out myself though, so I can't personally recommend it.

As for the Alabasta arc, I don't know how much filler there's in it in the anime, but it's not really skip-able. It's a major arc that introduces a lot of core plot points and recurring characters. As a manga reader, I never felt the set-up was slow, but I would say it does pick up speed nicely once the major, arc-ending conflict starts.

[Togath]

There's a fan project called One Pace that supposedly cuts out all filler and padding to create a faster, closer to manga adaption. I've never checked it out myself though, so I can't personally recommend it.

As for the Alabasta arc, I don't know how much filler there's in it in the anime, but it's not really skip-able. It's a major arc that introduces a lot of core plot points and recurring characters. As a manga reader, I never felt the set-up was slow, but I would say it does pick up speed nicely once the major, arc-ending conflict starts.

Looks like... 19-ish episodes left in the arc? Admittedly, the fact that action might finally happen does help. Up until now, this part has mainly been the Straw Hats walking through the desert... and then another episode of that, and so on, with a few flash backs or an episode where they fight like, a scorpion or a guy named scorpion and beat them quickly. ^_^;
The best parts have been the cutaways to stuff like Baroque Works or the Marines.
Also looking forward to when Ussop, Nami, and Chopper become less background-y. They haven't done much since this arc started.

[Cizak]

Looks like... 19-ish episodes left in the arc? Admittedly, the fact that action might finally happen does help. Up until now, this part has mainly been the Straw Hats walking through the desert... and then another episode of that, and so on, with a few flash backs or an episode where they fight like, a scorpion or a guy named scorpion and beat them quickly. ^_^;
The best parts have been the cutaways to stuff like Baroque Works or the Marines.
Also looking forward to when Ussop, Nami, and Chopper become less background-y. They haven't done much since this arc started.

Alabasta arc is chapter 155-217 (63) and episode 92-130 (39), so you've got 23 episodes left. Episode 107 corresponds to chapters 171-172. That's almost an equal amount of chapters and episodes trough the arc, but each epiosde corresponds to multiple chapters. Percentage wise, it's 25% through the manga arc and 38% through the anime arc. A guy named Scorpion is filler. So it does seem the anime has padded the set-up part of the arc? A quick glance at chapter 171 tells me some action should be happening fairly soon.

As said, I'm only a manga reader. I'm just pulling these numbers from the wiki and speculating.

[ben-zayb]

Speaking of skippable, I still can't believe that the Foxy arc happened. I guess it's a nice breather arc between two major ones.

Spoiler: New Chapter

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The thing that stands out to me the most is definitely newspaper boss amd CP-0 spy finally escaping the island. AKA the 2 people you must be careful the most about providing intel.

In other news, I'm sure some rule 34 people enjoyed that bit where Carrot licked Luffy's neck.

I can't remember Wadatsumi joining the Sun pirates, so that was also a nice surprise.

Interesting that Perospero's injury is still being addressed. That would likely be plot relevant later on., and that might even link to his predictions.

Big Mom finally got the cake! Alright, here we go!

Wow, look at that! Oda showed lots of different angles this chapter. I can say I'm really pumped for Chapter 900!

[Cizak]

Speaking of skippable, I still can't believe that the Foxy arc happened. I guess it's a nice breather arc between two major ones.

I think its main point was

Spoiler: since we have a newcomer reading these latest posts

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to have Luffy screaming "I will fight to the death for my crewmates" while Robin was watching. Robin was supposed to bond with the SHs between Jaya and Water 7 arc to such a degree that she then would be willing to die for them. In Jaya she was mostly off-panel and on Sky Island she had her own solo adventure looking for the Poneglyph. She needed to see Luffy's willingness to die for his crewmates and then be defended as such when they were confronted by Aokiji.

With that said, I think Robin's bonding with the SHs could have been slightly better, and the Foxy arc probably is the one canon arc that does feel the most like filler.

[Togath]

Honestly, thinking of just looking up summaries of plot arcs and skipping to something like the timeskip around episode 510-ish. I really want to catch up to more recent episodes, but trying to watch hundreds to just know what is going on seems a little daunting(or read hundreds of chapters if I went for the manga).
I mean, 200-300 is still a lot, but it's less than 800.

[Kato]

Honestly, thinking of just looking up summaries of plot arcs and skipping to something like the timeskip around episode 510-ish. I really want to catch up to more recent episodes, but trying to watch hundreds to just know what is going on seems a little daunting(or read hundreds of chapters if I went for the manga).
I mean, 200-300 is still a lot, but it's less than 800.

Hm.. I can see where you're coming from but those are some really important bits you're skipping. Also, I hear the anime gets even worse after the time skip because... They're banking on the fans watching it anyway? I could be wrong about that but then jumping into the animé at that point would be a poor choice..

[LaZodiac]

Honestly, thinking of just looking up summaries of plot arcs and skipping to something like the timeskip around episode 510-ish. I really want to catch up to more recent episodes, but trying to watch hundreds to just know what is going on seems a little daunting(or read hundreds of chapters if I went for the manga).
I mean, 200-300 is still a lot, but it's less than 800.

I would say reading plot synopsis's of the arcs and jumping in post time skip would be fine, if you're reading the manga, because the series is such a behemoth of content. You'd be missing out, but you'd get most of the details.

The problem with your question on "hey what can and can't be skipped?" is that One Piece is a series where something that was shown in three panels of chapter 8 was seeding the future for chapter 600. It's kind of insane and every little thing actually kind of matters. But you're not missing out if you start post time skip, you can always go back and read those earlier chapters.

But like everyone else has said, don't watch the anime. It's actually just really bad, and they've started to meld the non canon filler in with the canon so it's harder to skip the not real stuff.

Anyway, new chapter thoughts:

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Really good, really intense, I love Luffy's reaction to Judge listing all of Sanji's good qualities. Though it amuses me that Luffy thinks "having normal skin" is a positive trait.

[Braininthejar2]

I think the Navarone (196-206) story was the only filler arc anyone liked.

[Kato]

In other news, I'm sure some rule 34 people enjoyed that bit where Carrot licked Luffy's neck.

I... I don't know what would make you think that...

Anyway, new chapter thoughts:

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Really good, really intense, I love Luffy's reaction to Judge listing all of Sanji's good qualities. Though it amuses me that Luffy thinks "having normal skin" is a positive trait.

Hm... fantranslation says soft skin, which is actually something that is kind of attractive, though generally more attributed to women than men. (Yeah, men's skin must be rough like sand paper, it must hurt to touch them )

[Tvtyrant]

Honestly, thinking of just looking up summaries of plot arcs and skipping to something like the timeskip around episode 510-ish. I really want to catch up to more recent episodes, but trying to watch hundreds to just know what is going on seems a little daunting(or read hundreds of chapters if I went for the manga).
I mean, 200-300 is still a lot, but it's less than 800.

I mean, there are some skips you could make and get away with it.
Skypeia for instance is fun but fillerish, the aforementioned foxy section, the vast majority of The War itself.

Water City-Enies Lobby is my favorite arc and establishes some very important characterization, you need Thriller Bark, saboady, Amazon Lily, the prisonbreak and the last bit of the War. The war itself is long and too big, I didn't enjoy that much and most of the introduced characters and events are self-contained or C listers.

Then saboady ii, then skip straight to punkhazard.

[LaZodiac]

I... I don't know what would make you think that...



Hm... fantranslation says soft skin, which is actually something that is kind of attractive, though generally more attributed to women than men. (Yeah, men's skin must be rough like sand paper, it must hurt to touch them )

The official translation actually has Judge say "His skin has no armour" I was just phrasing it the way I would

[Sigh]

Not that I would know from personal experience but I hear that the R34 content for One Piece is actually shockingly low, or at the very least if it is made it's not posted to sites that are easily accessible by English speakers.

[Cizak]

Honestly, thinking of just looking up summaries of plot arcs and skipping to something like the timeskip around episode 510-ish. I really want to catch up to more recent episodes, but trying to watch hundreds to just know what is going on seems a little daunting(or read hundreds of chapters if I went for the manga).
I mean, 200-300 is still a lot, but it's less than 800.

You could, of course. I can't personally recognize that line of thinking, as it never really would occur to me to skip the first half of a story just to get to the second half. Kinda defeats the purpose of reading a story, but that's my opinion.

One Piece is an incredibly long story, but it's also one of the best lengthy stories out there. It's amazing how consistent it is all the way through and how well put together all the details are in order to form the whole. It's both a story about a journey and a journey in itself. I recommend it to people with the envy of knowing they get to experience it all for the first time.

I actually have watched the anime... For 17 episodes. That's how long it took me to realise I can pretty much read three to four chapters in the time it takes me to watch an episode. The difference in pace is definitely what killed the anime for me. My recommended solution is an echo of most other people here: Dump the anime. Read the manga.

[Kato]

Hm.. I remember enjoying the anime as a kid. I don't think it's that terrible and watching it as it airs is probably very different compared to catching up on it. But.. Yeah, I would have a hard time watching all of it.
BUT.. I really prefer the fights in the anime. Oda is an amazing artist but on the page the battles still don't get me nearly as excited.

[Braininthejar2]

Soo...

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Either Pudding has pulled something epic with her memory powers, or the Strawhats need a new ship.

[lord_khaine]

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I could see the strawhats needing a new ship now. It would be the actual, meaningful price they paid from their fight with one of the 4 emperors.

[Kato]

Spoiler: 900

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Eh... I'm kind of curious how they got away, ship or not. I mean, at least Luffy and Chopper can't swim, there are loads of enemies and surely someone considers checking under water now. But maybe Mom will have a true change of heart upon remembering her past? Maybe the Strawhats wll be at her mercy and she will grant it to them? We'll see.

Also: Pudding really can be so adorable.

[Braininthejar2]

Spoiler: 900

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Eh... I'm kind of curious how they got away, ship or not. I mean, at least Luffy and Chopper can't swim, there are loads of enemies and surely someone considers checking under water now. But maybe Mom will have a true change of heart upon remembering her past? Maybe the Strawhats wll be at her mercy and she will grant it to them? We'll see.

Also: Pudding really can be so adorable.

I too am curious - and of course no chapter next week. Also, I will be waiting to see this scene animated.

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The sea is boiling hot enough to one-shot Wadatsumi. The ability to swim is irrelevant.

[lord_khaine]

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They could for a start have escaped though one of the submarines.
Hmm.. but it is hard to predict. Will Oda let them get away cheeply. Or do they need to sacrifice their ship?
Of course it would lead to a rather long delay as they get a new one. And a lot of time has been spend on how perfect this ship is.
It is possible this is a trick. Either a mirage made by Nami, or something that allowed the ship to submerge.

[Traab]

Having just watched a review of the chapter,

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That was way too bleak to be real. There absolutely has to be a twist here. Just to throw out a random guess/theory. This is actually the official version of events from the big mom pirates. "Oh yeah, they fought hard, we reversed it all, obliterated all the enemies with casual ease, then blew the straw hats out of the water." Basically, this is a dramatization of the news report of what took place. Its hardly the first time luffy and company have been declared dead after all. Then we will get a "Meanwhile, what ACTUALLY happened" And they will cover the actual sequence of events from luffy leaving the mirror after the katakuri fight and how it was a tough struggle but the sun pirates made the escape possible. Or something along those lines.

[ben-zayb]

I knew Oda will do something big for Chapter 900. But, of course, it's something that I could never have thought of.

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We got a taste of it against Chiffon's daddy. And now, Holy Sea Hell, Oven shows he's one powerful mother soldier! Considering he wasn't even a Sweet Commander, I'm so glad to see what even a mid tier can bring to the table, and I'm now pumped to see Smoothie and Snack fighting, if at all (Snack vs Judge could be a stomp). As Smoothie said, it's like we're bullying them at this point.

I love how the tables suddenly turned against the Strawhats; Germa-66 getting wrecked, Sun Pirates OHKOd by Oven, and the Queen Mama Shanter blowing up the Sunny.

Of course, I'm taking things at face value. That said, I wouldn't discount the possibility that it's all fakeout. So far, I've heard multiple explanations:

• Luffy's new Future Sight a la Katakuri
• Nami using mirage trick
• cake's so good that Mama's hallucinating her wanted happy ending
• Pudding doing a memory trick

[Cizak]

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I'm immediately reminded by this fake-out.

I sincerely doubt the Sunny is going to be destroyed, because I sincerely doubt any of the SHs are going to end up without their Personal Dream fulfilled. Franky's dream is to build a ship that can make it to Raftel, and it while he could build a completely new one, the Sunny is already set up for the task, being made by Adam wood and all.

But, hey. Oda has surprised me quite a lot this arc. For me, it's easily the best on post-timeskip and maybe even in my total top 3.

[Braininthejar2]

I knew Oda will do something big for Chapter 900. But, of course, it's something that I could never have thought of.

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We got a taste of it against Chiffon's daddy. And now, Holy Sea Hell, Oven shows he's one powerful mother soldier! Considering he wasn't even a Sweet Commander, I'm so glad to see what even a mid tier can bring to the table, and I'm now pumped to see Smoothie and Snack fighting, if at all (Snack vs Judge could be a stomp). As Smoothie said, it's like we're bullying them at this point.

I love how the tables suddenly turned against the Strawhats; Germa-66 getting wrecked, Sun Pirates OHKOd by Oven, and the Queen Mama Shanter blowing up the Sunny.

Of course, I'm taking things at face value. That said, I wouldn't discount the possibility that it's all fakeout. So far, I've heard multiple explanations:

• Luffy's new Future Sight a la Katakuri
• Nami using mirage trick
• cake's so good that Mama's hallucinating her wanted happy ending
• Pudding doing a memory trick

Well, he might only bring things to a boil, but by the volume of matter he affects at once, that's an energy of a nuke. Someone did the calculations.