I Am Conflicted With One Piece (ALABASTA SAGA Review)

so I have finished another Saga of the One Piece manga reading now just over 200 chapters of the series and I am here to kind of give you my review for it but I will be honest with you guys I was really conflicted when starting this video because I have to be honest with you and now that I've read this much of one piece I think I can say that although I think there is really great storytelling here I think there is really great character work going on here overall I'm not sure if this is the manga for me because I think I think I figured out the reason why too and I'll get into it as I go through I have my notes over here to the side like the last two videos I have positives I have negatives But ultimately I think I have figured out why one piece just has not vibed with me and I did like a lot of the opening stuff you know I liked a lot of the character building stuff that we got before in the the East blue um but I think that a lot of my gripes about the series are not necessarily going away but only getting stronger as time goes on and I'll be honest with you guys there were times reading The Saga that I was really really struggling to get through it but let me go into it let me try to explain and uh we'll kind of go from there now the first thing from the beginning of the Saga is them kind of going into Grand line and I like this idea that they couldn't really pass uh just through the water itself because they had to go over this mountain and all these obstacles that are in the way to basically keep out people that are not prepared to enter this new world of grand line and the things that happened there and so I like these obstacles I like that it's not necessarily so easy and um this one might have to be explained to me a little bit more but there's these like magnetic forces that uh mess with equipment and mess with the compasses or or something like that to the point where if you are on one of the islands like within the grand line you need to leave at a particular point in order to actually uh be able to navigate and show the direction of where you need to go which adds urgency uh to particular Islands it also adds uh the point where it's like if you're stuck on an island and you can't get off and you don't know exactly what time to get off so it makes things very treacherous and it adds a lot of obstacles and I really like that idea and a lot of people talk about how the World building aspect of one piece is one of its greatest strength and I think that that's very very true I think that this definitely adds to that along with a lot of the other teases that have been kind of planted along the way because there's a lot of things that are mentioned that aren't really uh delved into yet but they all give you these little threads of like where the story could potentially go and I think if you're doing a story that is this long that's going to be over a thousand chapters I think that is a good way to do it and a good way to approach it actually one thing that I really did like was in the beginning we had that whale that kept like bashing his head up against the mountain because his crew had left and have been gone for who knows how long now like decades now and inside of the whale there was a ship that he swallowed that had this old doctor that apparently knew gold Roger which was like the most infamous pirate that started this whole journey to begin with so he supposedly knew this guy so it makes things seem a little bit more um like attainable I guess like now you're encountering characters that actually know these like big you know kind of legendary Legacy status characters you're actually meeting people that kind of interacted them uh the same thing when they meet Ace a little bit later on and the things that he mentioned so I do like that aspect of it too and I like that Luffy gave the whale kind of like a new purpose because odds are that the crew he's waiting for is not coming back who knows we might meet them later in the story I'm not sure but the point is this really sad tragic idea of this whale that just keeps waiting and waiting you know it reminded me of that Futurama episode where Fry's dog just like waited forever and eventually died it's like super super freaking sad so um so Luffy kind of gives him a new purpose where he starts this conflict and he says well now we have to fight again so now you have a reason to stay alive because we need to eventually fight again so I appreciated that and I appreciated that little moment I don't know I'm a big animal guy so whenever you're doing things with uh you know like the emotional aspect of like a connection with an animal I appreciate that so I like that I thought all that stuff was good when they get to Whiskey Peak that is also a aspect of the story that I really like because right off the bat you knew things were too good to be true everyone was so nice everyone was wel welcoming them in and you knew something had to be suspicious I mean I've read enough stories I've watched enough movies that if you just enter a town and everyone is that nice to you and that eager to like give you food and give you alcohol something is going down and obviously it was a whole town full of bounty hunters so I like that aspect and I really liked that Zoro was the guy that kind of like saw through it and stayed up through the night and basically said like alcohol is not going to affect me like what are you talking about like I can handle this and he basically takes on everybody which was great I love that because Zoro I love when he has his moments I love when Zoro has his time to shine um Zoro and Sanji as I read through the series are definitely like my two favorite characters and uh whenever Zoro has this moment to kind of just show what a badass he is which he has plenty during The Saga but this was one of those moments where he just like wreck shop on everybody and I really really like that that was a lot of fun the only thing I didn't like was during the fight Luffy wakes up and sees that zoro's taking out all these people and one of the guys says like Zoro beat us up and so Luffy just immediately goes to attack Zoro but I just thought there's two moments that with the characters that really really annoyed me um during The alabasta Saga and this one is with Luffy I have another one later with Sanji but like I just didn't because Luffy like values and respects his crew so much and that has been like the defining thing of his character and that's what makes him a good Captain is that he recognizes the value in each and every crew member and he brings out the best in them and so you know like in arlong park with nami you know he did everything he could to BAS basically prove that she was a good person and like belonged on his crew like he he had that kind of like emotional attachment to her to the point where like he's not going to accept the idea that she's going to be a bad person but he immediately flies into a battle with Zoro because of what one person tells him like why would he not trust zoro's word over the town's word I don't know it just seemed like a really weird moment for his character and I get that Luffy is like a simplistic character but I think that the beauty is in with the beauty is in his Simplicity and how he feels about his crew and how he feels about his friends and how far like what lengths he will go for the people that he cares about and it just seemed like a really weird moment maybe it was just played up for humor but that's going to kind of lead into I think where I don't Vibe with one piece as much but I'll get into that in a moment I'm going to continue just kind of talking about the positives so they meet a new character named Vivie and I really did enjoy her and I liked her story arc along the way uh at first I wasn't sure how I felt about her because she just seemed like maybe she's she was a little bit too similar to Nami and in a way they have a very similar story uh kind of because you know the alabasta you know the the kingdom it kind of felt like a more extreme uh bigger like bigger Stakes version of arlong Park how there's a villain there that is kind of taken over everything and uh you know vivv was kind of like subject to crocodiles Wrath where Nami was subject to um uh what was the fish guy's name you know what I'm you know what I'm saying so it kind of felt like a bigger higher Stakes version of arlong Park so at first you know it seemed like Vivie was a little bit too close to Nami but as things unfolded she definitely really really came into her own and actually I think I might like her character a little bit more than nami's character by the end of it um I thought she was a great addition and I like what they did with her to the point where um you know how much she values her town and how much she is willing to do for it like she is the princess I don't know if I mentioned that she's the princess of alabasta so she has this engraved like responsibility to do something about the situation that's there and just the fact that she feels like she's just incapable in some points but at the same time just continues to persevere uh there's I'm getting ahead of myself but there's a great moment where Luffy and the crew are locked within a cage and it's kind of like just her uh her and crocodile and she has to step up and she has to be the one to kind of like uh figure out this situation even though you know Sanji does come in and help and other characters help out but when she was kind of left on her own like she's the one that has to deal with this I thought they did a really really good job basically showcasing her character she wasn't just uh a character to get Luffy's crew from point A to point B like they actually gave her her own ongoing storyline and really she is kind of like the main character of The alabasta Saga so I thought that was really interesting and it was kind of like how Luffy's crew helps Propel her as a character so I'm wondering if that is something that one piece does periodically like as the story arcs go on did they introduce a character and they use you know the straw hat crew as a way to kind of build up and motivate and push and help a new character persevere as opposed to just having the crew themselves be the ones that do that uh even though the characters do have development I think that the crew themselves helped Propel viv's character until the very end uh there was an island that they went to little garden uh that I thought was going to be interesting at first and there was dinosaurs and I was like all right cool dinosaurs like give me dinosaurs I'm down but they were only there a little while um and they fought some of the minions and stuff and the two giants that were fighting each other they were kind of amusing but I'll be honest that whole segment I just I was like tuning out really hard I was tuning out really hard like I was trying to I was trying my best to pay as much of attention as I could but that whole island segment just wasn't doing it for me and this is is where I think things continued to go downhill for me a little bit before they started to pick back up when you actually got to alabasta uh there was that guy what was his name the I wrote it down um where is it maybe I didn't write it down the guy that was uh the the supposed leader of the area where Chopper was from where he shows up and he just starts eating the boat um this is where and I don't know if I want to get into my negatives yet I guess I I I will I guess I will I think I realized I think I realized why it's hard for me to connect with one piece and I think a lot of it really truly does come down to how silly the manga is and again I I want to like I want to State this very very clearly I am not saying there's anything wrong with one piece by doing this this is a particular style a particular tone and particular artwork that Oda does and it works for the series it's just it's going to Vibe with some people and it's not going to Vibe with other people it's just how if you took a manga that's drawn you know very realistically detailed and dark you know if is something like a like a vagabond or or a gance or something like that's not going to Vibe with everybody and I completely understand that and I respect that even though I love those manga I could understand how maybe it just wouldn't work for some people and I think for me the thing that it comes down to is just the silliness the wackiness the cartoony Vibes to it uh and how everything has to be under undercut with humor and a joke or like an exaggerated character face like every single chapter every like almost every chapter almost every chapter uh there has to be a character whose mouth is like gaping wide and we're looking staring like directly into their mouth with gigantic teeth and it's like I understand that that's Odus style and that's just the way the way that he writes he writes things silly he writes things light-hearted I understand that but I think after getting to this point after getting to like nearly 200 chapters it just started to it just just started to bother me and and it just started to get worse and worse over time for me like and I think the thing that just takes me out of it is because he is writing some serious here like when we get into alabasta and the uh like the Rebellion that's happening and the Waring between all of these characters and what's happening with VI's character you know there's a lot of uh important like impactful things that are happening here there's a lot of dramatic stuff that's happening there's a lot of serious stuff that's going on Within the story but I just felt it was very hard to connect to the story because it kept being so silly chapter to chapter it's like the ongoing story like what's happening is serious but it was hard to be able to take it serious when every single chapter just is like more cartoony jokes over and over again and again like I don't want it to sound like I'm on the series I'm not saying that one piece is doing anything wrong by presenting its story this way I'm just saying that for me personally my sensibilities and my taste it was very very hard to connect and to feel the dramatic weight of what was happening because of the silliness and that's just me personally that's not I'm not saying anything's wrong with one piece I wanted I want to state that I'm not saying anything is wrong with the storytelling I'm just saying for me the wackiness of it the silliness of it it was just hard for me to connect to it speaking of silliness we introduced a character named Chopper who is a reindeer that ate a human fruit and it just got me thinking okay so if a human ate a human fruit what would happen would nothing happen would they just become more human also uh Chopper can like transform into like these different like humanoid like forms so I don't know uh I didn't hate Chopper you know I thought he was kind of cute I actually really liked his story because he was an outcast and I I really uh and this is something see this is where my confliction begins because uh like the silliness of it just kind of takes me out of it but at the same time the actual story and character of Chopper and how he's this out and how you know the reindeer didn't accept him I I know it's like a Rudolph I know it's a Rudolph parody but like but like the reindeer didn't accept him and then you know he was part human but the humans don't accept him because they see him as a monster and so he doesn't really have a place and then he finally finds this one doctor guy that you know is a little bit nice to him or at least nicer than anybody else and he's sick and he goes through this journey to find this magic healing mushroom I think it was a mushroom right and so you know he brings it to him and the doctor's like thank you you healed me but really the doctor lied to him just to make him feel better and like it didn't heal him and so there's that tragedy there and so like the whole Chopper story line is actually like really sad like it's actually really good and like that's the thing and I think that that's where that's where my confliction lies with the series is because I like the story that's happening here but chapter by chap reading it chapter by chapter it just like the wackiness and the silliness just takes me out of it and so like I think if you told me like the storyboard for the Chopper story I'd be like oh man that's a pretty like that's a pretty sad little thing this poor little guy but then reading it chapter to chapter it chapter chapter to Chopper it just didn't hit as much as I wanted it to when Chopper just doesn't feel accepted and Luffy is just like just shut up and come with us like I I like that it's just like we don't care we don't care that you're a monster I think they they even call him a monster in like a positive way like look this monster over here like they like it so I I kind of like that because I I Just Vibe with like the outcast kind of uh Motif and stories and so like I like that kind of stuff so Chopper stuff was all right for me you know what I mean as far as like the story of it goes uh also I do want to say like the old lady like the old doctor she says that there's no magic that can heal like he wants to learn medicine so that he can heal people I understand she says there's no magic mushroom that can heal people I I mean I'm just saying like in the real world yeah absolutely there's no magic fix that's just going to like heal somebody from cancer or something like we need science and research and medicine and all that kind of stuff but in the world of One Piece where there is Magic iic fruit that can make people into rubber or fire or sand or turn a reindeer into a human you're telling me there's no like magical like items out there that can heal people there's no like senu beans out there somewhere in the whole world of One Piece where there's magic and Giants and dinosaurs and all this stuff come on come on there's got to be a healing something out there like I just don't believe that but then we actually get into alabasta and I do think there was a lot of great stuff Happening Here we meet the guy number two they're all like numbered like all of the minions of crocodile they're all numbered he comes aboard the ship didn't really love his character but you know he has one of those abilities that's very very useful and he does kind of like connect with the crew in a way although just them allowing him to touch all of them so that he can kind of like um shape shift into them was like dude like what why would you let him do that anyways um and I like the idea of the crew coming up with these secret coat like they draw the the thing on their arm and wrap it up and stuff like that so that they they know who is who kind of like in the future so I liked all that stuff that they did um and we got into crocodile who I think is probably the best um the best villain so far in the manga uh although he is kind of like just an evil guy but he's really good at being evil I liked him more than the fish people I liked him more than uh C you know I liked him more than the other characters so he was fine for me he actually worked pretty decently as a villain as a bad guy doing bad things that is causing this basically this massive chaos and Rebellion you know drying up you know making everything into a desert and stuff like that for these people and you know uh just doing like really bad doing bad they also mentioned that he's one of the seven warlord Pirates which is something that was mentioned earlier so so this means that you know he's kind of a big deal right he's one of the seven I mean there's probably more characters that are more powerful than the seven out there and I don't even actually know who all of the seven are they've mentioned a few of them uh and crocodile is one but they also mentioned things uh in these chapters where it's like they mentioned Blackbeard and Whitebeard so I'm imagining because of the name difference those are probably two people that are like uh at each other's throats so they mentioned them so that's a setup and then Ace shows up which apparently is Luffy's older brother he's there and again like I recognize that the ace introduction is pretty much just to say hey look at this guy he's a badass he has fir Powers he gives Luffy a note uh that seems to have nothing on it but it's probably magic in some way and'll help him in the future but like um they don't really do anything with him he's just kind of there he just kind of introduces him but I think it's just more of Oda just kind of like throwing little threads like we're going to mention Blackbeard and Whitebeard and here's Ace and stuff like he he does this thing where like he just kind of mentions things but then goes on with the storyline and then like these things don't come back into play until like hundreds of chapters later so that's kind of his thing and that's what I just imagine the the ace thing is like hey we're just going to mention Ace he's going to be important later but then he pieces out same thing with like the guy with the cloak um from before that controlled the weather or whatever or like uh you know other things that he's done like that or Shanks or you know something like that so other things I me actually already mentioned I liked when VI had to fight for herself when the crew was captured um oh yeah also the cigar guy is there and and the other girl Bounty Hunter they've kind of like they they kind of interacted and they had moments where they could have gone after Luffy but they kind of let him go to like help him uh help the town basically so it's like even though they're after him they do recognize the good that he's doing and that's kind of the interesting thing is like they're bound keeps going up and they're known as pirates and all like like Pirates are you know uh seen as like the you know Outlaws and stuff and like you know criminals or whatever but like everybody notices that all Luffy's crew is doing is is good for other people so that's one of the things in there that I thought was pretty neat uh when Luffy actually does fight crocodile we get his power and he's basically uh taking a devil fruit that turns himself into sand so he's like impossible to hit he's basically the Sandman from Spider-Man you know you try to hit him and you go right through him and uh again this is one of those moments where like the first fight with him and Luffy I I was trying to take it seriously but you know Luffy would do all these silly things and exaggerated kind of body movements and stuff that just didn't make the fight feel serious to me also when you get stabbed with a hook I mean obviously I mean obviously I'm only in chapter like 170 by that point so I obviously know he's going to be fine so I didn't really feel anything when that happened uh I like that Robin helped him out so Robin is a character I was looking forward to meeting because you know I like my nice you know long darkhaired women I I'm a fan so I like seeing Robin I didn't know that she had a a power because I knew about Robin just from like knowing about one piece but I didn't know who she was or what her story was or what her backstory was or even if she had a power so she had kind of can uh create limbs in different places which is you know what I'm not going to go there but she helps Luffy out so she definitely has more going on then meets the eye um she definitely has her own motivations but you know I I couldn't really get a good grasp of like what side she was playing so from a writing standpoint again I think that was done well because you know I couldn't really tell if Robin was really on board with crocodile or if she was playing her own game so I like the way that they kind of like introduced her where she has this like kind of mystery aspect to her but she also doesn't seem like a good person because she blew up the ship that um the one guy was on that I thought died but I guess he didn't die so yeah so yeah so like I said thematically I think there's a lot of really important things that are happening here uh with the Rebellion between the city and also you know the idea that it was all drowned out and the old man said you know it's not going to or when it rains again or when when the water returns you know that's when the town will find peace and how it all kind of culminates to that moment at the end was a pretty like pretty well written Moment Like I said the storytelling is good like I have no problem with that whatsoever um my problem is just like it just doesn't feel I just don't feel the weight of it I just don't feel the importance of it that's my problem with it um and there was this moment uh all the characters kind of get their own moment you know during the battle sequence towards the end you know with Zoro like finding this new Strength with himself and everything uh there's a lot of Great Moments even you know Usopp and uh Chopper you know they play their part so there's a lot of great stuff happening here but the thing that really annoyed me was the Sanji fight with uh with number two that can like transform himself to look like the other characters so like okay I get it this is like the other character thing that I didn't like because the the first was Luffy fighting Zoro after like not even listening to him or not even hearing him out about what's happening the second one here is with Sanji because the Dude turns into Nami or makes himself look like Nami and it just makes Sanji unable to fight him and I just thought this was I just thought this was dumb because like I get it I get it sanji's a s right he's a s he's a s for Nami he loves Nami whatever like I get it I get that but like he's not an idiot you know he was the one that helped helped get him out of the uh the Trap uh you know calling his identity like the prince or whatever he was the one that helped him out like numerous times like he's really good at figuring things out he's capable he's competent everything they've written about Sanji as a character you know he survived on the island when he was just a kid uh seems like he's a really really intelligent competent character and I get like okay he's around pretty women he he becomes stupid whatever but he knows definitively that this is not NAMI it's like the only thing that makes him not want is because she looks he looks like Nami therefore he doesn't want to hit her but like it's not Nami like moments like this really made me miss characters like yusuke from uaka show I don't care if she's a girl or a baby or somebody's grandmother I'll still knock her out like I get the joke is that he's a s but like it just didn't make sense to me because Sanji is smarter than that and and it's like they kind of took away his intelligence just to play into a joke and I didn't like that anyways as it continues and Luffy has his rematch with crocodile I thought this fight was pretty well done and as far as like the paneling and the artwork goes I think this is probably like the best fight scene so far in one piece uh at least in my opinion um and like I said I love how it culminates to like the rain finally falling and you realize obviously this guy that's made of sand is the one that caused the drought and so you know all these things kind of like poetically poetically link up towards the end which was good um the fight scene was a little bit better here he's using water because it kind of like uh it like hardens the sand and then he couldn't do that and he started using his own blood so you know Luffy is just determined to take him down and Luffy is a you know so selfless when it comes to his crew which is another reason why I didn't like the Luffy Zoro fight from before because he's basically saying like if VI continues to fight this battle you know she'll eventually die and I can't have that happen and crocodile's like well you're fighting it you're going to die and he's like like I don't care if I die so it's like you know he's he's very selfless in the way you know you could say uh Reckless obviously Reckless but obviously selfless too because for all intents and purposes he considers VI to be a part of his crew and he's willing to do anything to kind of take this guy down for that and that was his goal from the start and it's funny like you look at the early kind of entering alabasta stuff he's like yeah we're going to go kick this guy's ass and it's like that's not going to solve everything but like when it gets to the end when it gets to The Showdown Luffy did exactly what he said he was going to do he's like I'm going to kick your ass I don't think he said I don't think Luffy would swear I don't think Luffy is the kind of guy that would swear but like you know he kicked his ass and the finale with viie I thought was really good I liked her speech to everybody that everybody could finally hear her uh speak and and kind of like understand what she's been doing this entire time and also you know kind of like considering her a part of the crew but not keeping her with the crew because this was her story like I said like alabasta is really her story and so I think it makes sense that she doesn't go with the crew because it was like the crew was there to help enhance her story not the other way around although although it does kind of work the other way around because you know the characters do develop during this I guess it does work the other way around but like from where I'm looking at it it seems like Luffy's crew is kind of this group that helps Propel the main character which I thought was Vivie during this segment and I thought her goodby was really good and them kind of like raising their fist to her uh moving forward and so I thought that was good and at the end uh of the arc Robin shows up on the ship and says hey I want to be part of your crew and that's kind of like where I left it that's uh chapter 217 I believe was the last chapter I read so anyways where do I come down with one piece at this point like I I am uncertain if I want to continue it because although I do like the story that's happening I have a very hard time reading it chapter to chapter just because of the silliness of it and I also think that a lot of the silliness and the jokes and the humor kind of undercut the serious aspects of the story in my opinion where dramatic things that are happening don't land as hard as I want them to because I you know I can recognize how the writing leads up to that rain at the end of the of the um of the Ark after you know we've talked about like the desert and the drought and the war and you know crocodiles powers and I see how it all links together and from a storytelling standpoint I can see why that's great but reading it myself I didn't feel I didn't feel the impact that I wanted to feel I didn't feel the emotion I wanted to feel because it was like every chapter I read it would just be like another joke and another joke and another joke and another joke if it was like serious you know and like I felt the stakes being as high as they were and then that happened it would feel like a relief it would feel like I could breathe like a a sigh you know of uh you know fresh air like I I would feel like you know we went through this like intense struggle and got to the end but I didn't feel the intensity of the struggle as much as I wanted to just because of like the wackiness of it all but I realized now after reading 200 chapters in one piece that that is just the style of the story that is just the style of the manga that is just what Oda does with his story and that's going to be a staple of the series and that will continue moving forward so I guess I am just having difficulty kind of comprehending that I still have like 8900 chapters to read dealing with the consistency of that style of writing and again that's not to say that it's bad but I don't know if it's for me so I don't know if I want to continue the series right now I think I might put it on hold I don't know if I'm going to drop it entirely but I'm not really eager to continue at this point I I like I understand the story like I respect it um and it definitely has Merit but I just don't know if it's for me and like I was saying before you know I really like uh I'm sorry I don't know if this makes me like a masochist or something but I really like dark stories I like dark stories that have like an idea of a semblance of hope you know in the human Spirit but like I like things that get serious I like things that get dark I like things that get tragic I like things that get depressing like I don't know these are just the kind of stories that I like and I just think one piece is maybe even though it does you know delve into darker subject matter I think it might be too light-hearted for me and that's not to say it's bad it just might not be for me anyways guys if I didn't make all of you mad and make you hate me I'm you know I just I'm just trying to be honest with you I'm just trying to be honest about my thoughts so I apologize if uh you know I'm not trying I'm not trying to insult the series or anything like that like absolutely not but that's my feelings about it right now so I don't know if I want to continue one piece I feel like I've read a good enough chunk of it to at least understand what one piece is all about but maybe not maybe I need to read more I don't know uh if I do it's I'm going to take a break I I'm I'm absolutely going to take a break before I go any further so I don't know when my one piece Journey will continue but you know at least I at least I can say that you know I've experienced a chunk of it anyways guys what do you think about the alabasta arc or The alabasta Saga sorry let me know your thoughts and opinions down below uh let me know if I'm out of my mind you know uh or if you agree with me or if you had a similar experience or maybe you did have a similar experience where you're like man I like the story but like this is just too wacky and silly for me and then you read further and you're like oh wait this this moment is like the moment where it gets really good so maybe maybe I'm just still too naive maybe uh you know it just hasn't gotten to that like Breaking Point yet so uh let me know down below let me know your thoughts and opinions I really don't know how this video is going to do I don't know uh anyways regardless of how you feel about this video I love you guys and I appreciate you for watching so thank you thank you for spending this time with me uh check out the other stuff on the channel if you want to if you don't want to be here anymore if you want to unsubscribe because of my one piece opinions I understand I respect you being here as long as you have so thank you guys anyways and I'll talk to you next time

Channel: RealLifeRyan

Views: 11,289

Keywords: one piece, alabasta saga, first time reading one piece, one piece manga, vivi, luffy vs crocodile, reverse mountain, whiskey peak, little garden, drum island, chopper, zoro, nami, review

Id: ip3as1M50UU

Length: 30min 51sec (1851 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 08 2024