Review

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One Piece - Episode 853 [Review]

So we've now established the three battlefronts facing our heroes: Luffy's fighting Katakuri in the mirror world to keep the mochi man from interfering with his crew, Sanji, Pudding, and Chiffon are on Cacao island, baking Big Mom's replacement wedding cake as fast as they can, and the remainder of the Straw Hats sailing the waters of Totto Land to avoid a starving Big Mom and her massive fleet. There are a few ways in which these individual scenes can still interact and influence each other, like Katakuri's flunkies having access to the Sunny through its unbroken mirrors, and the plan to take the cake itself to sea once it's ready.

So far we've gotten episodes that have covered Luffy and Sanji's subplots pretty thoroughly, and this week we're putting our focus back on the Sunny crew and their naval battle. Sadly, the recent surge of quality for the One Piece anime is starting to simmer, and it's falling back into its usual stiffness. It's an extra shame because the centerpiece of the episode is adapting one of my absolute favorite scenes in the arc. Big Mom uses her soul powers to possess the water itself and animate a giant tidal wave (complete with a big cartoon face in the middle that's equal parts dopey and menacing), and Jimbei takes the wheel to steer the ship towards the danger and narrowly surf through the "green room", the open space within a collapsing wave.

With Jimbei's formal recruitment into the Straw Hats imminent, the audience has been wondering what his official job on the crew was going to be. Jimbei as the helmsman has always been the most realistic guess, but it's always been speculation based purely on the fact that we briefly saw him steering a ship hundreds of episodes ago. This episode makes it crystal clear that's where he's heading, and it makes perfect sense. It's a great confirmation scene that requires Jimbei to pull of a massive feat of technical skill. If he screwed up, they all would have died, so it feels nice to know our fish uncle is so reliable.

Unfortunately, as much as I like this scene in essence, it's barely a step above the rest of this chore of an episode. It's extremely underwhelming in execution and you can tell the anime's going to hit a rough patch while we wait for the next big exciting turn to get the anime staff enthusiastic again. The scenes that cut back to Luffy and Sanji's parts are also at risk of getting tiresome already, since they're easy padding for the episode. It always sucks when the anime can take something good and ruin it by repeating it too many times—which is where Sanji and Pudding are for me at the moment.

This is a limp episode that covers some good material that serves as a benchmark for Jimbei's painfully endless journey to Straw Hat Land. It's also a really novel use of Big Mom's powers, with a giant tidal wave being a perfect beat to really hammer home how aggressive and inescapable the villains are, but the heightened drama just doesn't come through enough this week.

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Gintama - Episode 364 [Review]

Even with the series' Big Bad purportedly vanquished several episodes ago, all is far from well in the Gintama-verse. With the Tendoshu rumored to be making a comeback and terrorist attacks occurring on planets with nationalized Altana, a brand new battle appears to be in store for our heroes. Although Gintoki is able to track down Takasugi (and inadvertently meet up with Matako and Takechi in the process), the two are soon set upon by a battalion of plain-clothes assassins who bear the mark of the Naraku. Through several ham-fisted attempts at teamwork, the duo is able to defeat the assassins before setting sail on a ship Takasugi prepared. As it turns out, the attackers were after Shoyo's heart, which Gintoki is currently in possession of.

Meanwhile, back in Edo, Sogo and “Kanna” continue to duke it out. During their skirmish, Sogo reveals that although the Shinsengumi are rumored to have disbanded, many of its former members are currently working in the shadows to eliminate threats to the country. He also claims that having Mutsu deliver Kanna was part of a larger plan to bring Gintoki, whose help is needed in combating a larger threat, out of hiding. When Sogo begins directing his attacks at Shinpachi, Kanna alters her age and size and reveals herself to be Kagura. Having somehow learned the technique used by the Yato elder from earlier in the season, Kagura opines that despite two years of searching, she hasn't found a way to awaken Sadaharu.

Three episodes into Silver Soul's third act, the action has already been turned up to eleven—even if the majority of it is humorous in nature. Gintoki and Takasugi's bickering and Gin's newly revealed (One Piece-esque) inability to swim set the stage for lots of humorous banter and creative fight sequences. It's always fun to see the perpetually stoic Takasugi brought down to Gintoki's level, and the duo's various methods of fending off their attackers while fighting one another make for some of this week's funniest gags. Matako and Takechi aren't given much to do this week, but now that they've confirmed their fearless leader's survival, they'll probably be able to rest a little easier. Their presence also facilitates what is arguably the best “Takechi impersonates Takasugi” gag the show has ever given us.

The revelation that Kanna is, in fact, Kagura isn't terribly surprising, but it probably wasn't meant to be. Although one of the main characters having a surprise daughter (after only two years) is an effective parody of other flash-forward epilogues, Kanna's presence stood to make Kagura redundant if the latter was indeed her mother. (Plus, Tamako already has the whole “miniaturized version of a regular character” schtick covered.) It's disappointing to learn that no progress has been made on the Sadaharu front, but the pup's eventual awakening will likely serve as an important plot point moving forward.

Each week, the proceedings feel less and less like an epilogue and more like an entirely new arc. If approached with this mindset, we may be looking at the beginning of one of Gintama's most promising storylines yet. In the past, the characters acknowledged that the show utilized a floating timeline, thus preventing the characters from aging, and taking the story into the future represents a bold move for any comedy. (The future presented in the second movie was a “bad end” scenario instead of the genuine article.) At present, there are too many plot threads and character arcs that need to be resolved before the series can reach a satisfactory conclusion. With the recent announcement that the parent manga failed to conclude as planned and will publish its real final chapters in Giga Jump, it's become clear that Gintama isn't going away any time soon.

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