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EDIT: Hey all! Bo is sick so we're moving this back another week to SUNDAY NOVERMBER 26TH, 2pm PST.

This covers the back half of Wano up through the current chapter, but we're likely going to spend a good chunk of time talking about One Piece as a whole, looking back on it, and thinking about what worked and what didn't.

Some discussion questions for you to bring to the club meeting!

1. Which arc was your favorite?

2. Which was your least favorite?

3. Who are five characters you really enjoyed and why?

4. Five characters you really hated and why?

5. If you could change one thing about One Piece, what would it be?

See you at the club, and remember next time around is Dungeon Meshi!

Files

***PATREON ONLY*** Jello's One Piece Book Club Chapters 979 - Current

Join the patreon to catch this and all other previous bookclub episodes! Jello's Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/jelloapocalypse Aloha's Stuff: https://www.youtube.com/@Stabbyness Bo's Stuff: https://twitter.com/beauhello

Comments

Anonymous

The book club was very fun, I feel very validated that I finally have someone that agrees with me that Marineford sucks. Excited for Dungeon Meshi

Anonymous

Wano for me is the best arc. But skypiea is one of the slowest and boring arcs i have read. I do like the sky islands but everyone on these islands have the personality of space trach.

Wincent, The Hollow Knight

1: My Favorite arc: Honestly, for style, I would say Thriller Bark, (Also best Franky) we ever get. For story, plot and characters, Whole Cake Island. Love myself some Katakuri 2: Least Favorite arc: Fishman island. Mostly because it kinda felt pointless? None of the villains was at any point a threat. Heck, Even if Hody had won (somehow) would he have been slaughtered instantly when coming to the surface. It was embarassing. 3: Five characters you really enjoyed and why. (Intentionally skipping the strawhats) - Katakuri. Oddly likable protector, playing fair and just being a genuinely threatening presence. Wish he was in the story more. - Kuma. You damn know why. - Crocodile. Massive chad, cool powers, amazing design. - Bon Clay. Biggest bro possible. Genuinely a great character and deserves more. - Perona. Cute, fun powers, fun personality. 4: Five characters you really hated and why. (Hated due to poor writing. Not due to them being bad people) - Hody jones. Never a threat, just a waste of time. - Ace. Kinda a waste of time as well? Don't really care about him as it is. - Trebol. Mostly due to the anime where he had the most ANNOYING voice in the show. "BUEHEHEHEH! DOOFY! NEEE NEE!". Also a nothing character really. - Ashura Doji. He just annoyed me with the NON-STOP COMPLAINING! Wish he could just be quiet and not exist. Glad he is dead. - Foxy. Once again just a waste of time. ANnoying fruit and way too "strong" for what he is. 5: If you could change one thing about one piece, what would it be? I would probably reduce Sanji's romantic shtick down to what he was at the beginning. He should be into women, love them and so on. but not go full "NAMI SWAAAAAN!" And want to peak at them in the bath. Think Gilder or something in that vein.

Anonymous

My best wishes to Bo

PurpleIsDebeste

hope Bo gets well soon! have a good noveRmber! anyway the best character is Nami and the worst is absalom is it cheating to just make the one thing i would change "make someone other than Oda write it"?

Anonymous

I'm sooooooo glad I can catch the last book club, i wasnt able to get the last one because it landed on the best/bussiest week of the year. im happy this finally got me into one piece

Anonymous

This has been so fun! Thanks for providing a good justification for me to read all of One Piece, haha. It's been a good time being part of the streams (I plan to stick around for Dungeon Meshi) and throwing in my ideas to make OP better. I swear Oda is so often "almost there." Anyway I'll do the questions. 1. FAVORITE ARC: Water 7: Oda clearly (at least at the start of the series) is much much better at worldbuilding and creating an interesting setting for the Straw Hats to explore. Water 7 is one of the cooler ones, and I think emphasizing the sea, ships, and storms aspects plays to the whole series' strengths. It's also notable as one of the unfortunately few arcs where the main characters are important and undergo development. Usopp gets to shine, Robin gets to finally have her big climax, Sanji's never been cooler, Chopper gets a great moment with healing Usopp, etc. The Aqua Laguna rising creates so much tension as everything starts to go to shit. It also benefits from not having to resolve with 1v1 fights, since they're all saved for Enies Lobby (side note: I think I've finally come around to the random straw hat powerups in that arc). I also think Kizaru and Fujitora are the only members of the World Government who have matched the sheer intimidation CP9 initially provides. 2. LEAST FAVORITE ARC: Fishman Island: What a fucking shame. I tend to let Skypeia off the hook somewhat for some aesthetics I like, it being connected to Jaya, and a good villain. Whatever interesting aesthetics Fishman Island offers are completely overpowered by the arc being a combination of all of Oda's worst writing sensibilities. Is it bloated? Yes. Do 1v1s with probably the most forgettable group of henchmen take up a large portion of the arc? Of course. Is it the nadir of One Piece's pervertedness? Of course it is. You can't save the Sanji nosebleed arc, man. Does it reveal that the Fishman racism part of the worldbuilding wasn't very thought out? Yep. And it being the big return of the series after the timeskip? Horrible omen for the New World. I tend to like stories with villain alliance duos, but Hody and Vander Decken are probably the worst villains together and on their own. It's One Piece on autopilot if the autopilot was slowly drifting the car off the road. I think it could be fixed, but you'd have to scrap most of the arc and just try again. Nami gets to be the focus and the antagonistic force has to include a human taking advantage of the Fishmen. How did Oda not do that???? I think Punk Hazard is fun so I personally wouldn't fully combine it with FMI, but I think you could do something to set up the big New World arc other than the Big Mom stuff being in the background. 3. FIVE CHARACTERS I LIKE: Someone else in the comments did non-Straw Hats only for this, which I kind of like, so I'm gonna do that. (My thoughts on the Straw Hats are generally positive for all of them, confused on why Franky does literally nothing in the second half of the series, and for Sanji--well, more on that later) -Buggy: he's always good. He makes Impel Down, and I'm really hoping his shenanigans with Mihawk and Crocodile will be good. -Law: a little overused and definitely becomes less interesting by the time we get to Wano but he's still just the coolest guy ever. -Kaku: one of the few "second strongest guys" that Zoro fights who's actually memorable, a lot of fun, and has a real nice moment when he regrets being fired. Hope he does more in Egghead. -Caesar Clown: he was funny after Punk Hazard -Doflamingo: I really like his design and powers, and he works as a long-term overarching villain much better than Kaido Honorable mention: Charlotte Pudding if she wasn't 16 would be a really good foil to Sanji! When I read WCI I didn't know she was a minor. Real bummer, Oda. 4. FIVE CHARACTERS I HATE: Yikes. -Absalom: get him out of here -Trebol: completely useless and ugly, apparently groomed an 8 year old but none of this is ever developed and he literally just stands around for all of Dressrosa. -Sasaki: incredibly cuttable character, exists to give the most useless Straw Hat a useless fight. Helicopter is funny though. -Boa Hancock: She sucks. A really uninspired design and a character made fully terrible by her one gag. I liked her better when she kicked dogs. -Sengoku: shouldn't exist. -Eichiiro Oda: 5. CHANGE Okay, I'd change a lot about One Piece but here's my biggest one (it's a bit of a cheat). The timeskip sucks for how it affects the Straw Hats. Most of them don't really change or gain anything except Brook, which is a bummer. It should have been an opportunity to go experimental and also Robin and Franky look way worse. What I'd do: -Really I'd remove or change Haki, but if we're keeping it the same way, there's no reason why Robin shouldn't have learned it with the Revolutionaries. She uses ARMS guys, no amount of "ohhh she's more refined she's not a fighter" will convince me that her still not knowing Armament Haki makes sense. Also by the end of Wano, Nami should know Observation and Chopper should know armament. Usopp should have Conqueror's Haki. -Idk how I'd change Franky but change him. Lean into him being the dad of the crew even though he's like 30. Give him a real reason to stick around. -Sanji. Between Thriller Bark and Whole Cake Sanji is the worst character in the series. I can tell he's Oda's favorite to write and it's AWFUL. Watching the Live Action makes it even more unbearable how cool and normal he is there. And Sanji going to Trans island and coming back as a worse pervert because he's "been denied Real Women" is just so so bad--honestly it's almost jarring because of how much I can tell Oda loves writing Bon Clay and Ivankov. I think Sanji should have come back from the timeskip trans, or at least with some sort of trans element. Every other Straw Hat comes back with something new from the island they got sent to--Sanji is the same except he can do the sky walk because he was running away from the Kambakka queens. It really sucks, because I genuinely think Sanji has a lot going for him as a character, way moreso than Zoro, for example, but Oda's unwillingness to move away from the pervertedness just makes him unbearable. Instead of spending hundreds of chapters getting nosebleeds in the New World how about we could have set up his identity crisis and fears about his place on the crew so that Whole Cake would have actually hit? Because WCI more or less works if taken standalone, but with the context of who Sanji has been for so long, it just doesn't really land all of the emotions it could have. I think the biggest marker of how One Piece just isn't as powerful as it used to be is that it could make me cry the whole way up until the timeskip, even with Ace, and I don't think I've really felt anything or teared up at all in the 600 chapters since. Maybe Corazon? Anyway, I have a lot to say about Onigashima but I'll save it for tomorrow.

BreadBunny

Hell yeah, another trans Sanji truther. While I'd just go all out and make Sanji a transfem lesbian casanova. I'd love to hear in what ways you'd want to have Sanji's gender transed. Also Absalom should get out of here solidarity, lmao

BreadBunny

Okay on one hand I'm sorry to keep making these essay lengths comments but on the other I am contributing to the bookclub by thinking about One Piece as hard as I am and even now that we're technically done I've just been thinking about The Emperors and how crowded the New World feels in regards to them Because it's like Big Mom has an entire 30 something island empire right, but Kaido is squatting in Wano and Blackbeard is squatting in Pirate Island which is apparently right next to Wano, and Shanks is squatting on Elbaf which is apparently ALSO right next to Wano. And it's like where are their empires? We know Joker (Doflamingo) was an underling/associate of Kaido so we can say that Punk Hazard and Dressrosa are under his influence, but One Piece gives us no reason to believe Kaido's influence is bigger than those three islands. And while Shanks is said to have several islands under his protectorate. Big Mom really is the only Emperor who has an empire. On a Grand Line that is both big enough to accommodate her three dozen islands all circling out from her home base and small enough that the other three emperors are sitting within one islands distance from one another with the Grand Line barely able to contain that little space. It's just left me thinking about how the Emperors being stuck in the New World together is such a missed opportunity especially given how Aloha talked about how Kaido could work better by having him take at least part of the Red Line for himself (which also neatly loops back in with King being a Lunarian whose race was banished from the Red Line when the World Nobles moved in). And then moving this to the other emperors it could have been so much cooler to see one in the first half of the Grand Line at a time when the only thing the Strawhats could have done was comply or run like hell. So I've been thinking about what emperors could serve what roles better. And I've really come to like the idea where Big Mom mostly stays the same, she's still in the New World her empire is maybe a little bigger but all around she's THE New World Emperor who combined her real desire to create her own country with her personal power and the fact that the World Government simply does not have a strong hold on the New World. Then Whitebeard could have been like the Roaming Emperor who just goes around the world, and is unstoppable and just mostly travels with his ever expanding crew of sons and daughters that he picks up more of every time he lowers the anchor. Because Whitebeard legit just does not give a shit about the One Piece, he's just the only pirate who cares about other things. So he has no reason to stay in the Grand Line, choosing instead to travel the world. Kaido then can be the Red Line Emperor who has control over Reverse Mountain requiring every Pirate crew who wants into the Grand Line to pay him tribute and thus also requiring the Strawhats to sneak past his forces to get to have their adventure (also through that essentially marking the Strawhats as the Beast Pirates target for much of the series). In this version the Marines would also literally just have a very weak hold on the Grand Line because they only way they can get in is through Mary Geoise or with Seastone lined ships through the Calm Belt (which of course would be a very new invention) and make the Grand Line not just dangerous due to the way its currents work but dangerous because the Strawhats are moving through as the Marines are attempting to re-establish their power in the region after Kaido cut them off by taking Reverse Mountain. In this version Kaido would just also be actively fighting the Marines and World Government like he is implied to want to but never actually does in One Piece actual. In this version Kaido is just convinced he's Joyboy and taking the Red Line back for King is his "drum of liberation" It would also give Kaido any character at all lmao. Shanks then would have just gone to Laugh-tale with Roger's crew instead of staying behind to take care of Buggy because in this version sorry Usopp. Buggy just also doesn't catch "you'll die if you go to that island disease" and Buggy will just also know what the One Piece is because I think a Buggy who if pressed on it would just know and maybe even use that to fight Luffy who does not want to hear it would be very funny. But yeah Shanks actually went to Laughtale and knows how to get there again full stop. And he because he gave the strawhat to Luffy (thematically handing the reigns to the new generation) Shanks just makes Lodestar Island his, and sits there with the message that he'll tell whoever he finds worthy of becoming Pirate King how to get to Laughtale. In that way Shanks would be the one who could have become Pirate King but chose to sit on the steps instead of Whitebeard. This would also make Shanks fit better in his role and give him an actual reason to never do anything more than Haki Stare at people. Then of course after Whitebeard dies and Blackbeard becomes a new Emperor, you could literally have Blackbeard be working with the World Government to get to Laughtale. Okay so this is going to need some convincing but in this world The Marines use the Warlord system as a way of gaining ANY amount of control over the Grand Line impeded as they are by Kaido, and Blackbeard does everything he did as normal except he doesnt stop being a warlord when he becomes an Emperor he just renews the deal using his newfound power essentially to get the World Government to let him become Pirate King and in return he'll help them get rid of the other Emperors. Shanks would then also either be killed outright by Blackbeard and the World Government together or at the very least be made to cough up how to get to Laughtale. Essentially he promises to help end the age of piracy by taking out the other three emperors and that he won't threaten their rule because it's profitable for him to engage in the slave trade and even more profitable to have no more pirate competition to stop him, and being Pirate King for him would be about having total control over the oceans thematically clashing with Luffy who does all this specifically for the freedom that being Pirate King would grant him. In this version where Kaido has taken a significant part of the Red Line, Big Mom would have most of the New World in her hands, And Whitebeard just literally roamed around the entire world scot-free for decades. This is a world where the Marines are significantly more on the backfoot than they are in actual One Piece because this great age of piracy that started with the death of Gol D Roger is like genuinely hurting them and the World Government's control, incidentally this is also where the Revolutionary Army could start playing a bigger role. This way also Blackbeard can be the final boss both for Luffy in getting the One Piece but also as a stand-in for the world Government as a whole because it's with their help that he got this close and also because he's emblematic of the system the World Government has set up. An outsider who neatly adds on to the horrifying machine for his own gain by make it run even smoother Vs an outsider who fucking demolishes the damn thing. Because it impedes on his freedom (and incidentally everyone else's) to live a good life.

Chandler B

I think my favorite thing from the book club was seeing Jello go from “Sabo is pointless and dumb” to “wow, Sabos actually kinda good, I wish he got to do more”.

jelloapocalypse

In my defense Sabo's existence is still unbelievably stupid and Sabo should've just been named "Ace" and been doing revolutionary stuff from minute 1