Episode 1116 is a hilarious and jubilant visit with a selection of fan-favorite pirates, marines, and revolutionaries.
This week’s entry is like a quick check-in with all your favorite characters from yesteryear. The Straw Hats are always on some island or another, battling against deadly foes and meeting a few dozen new faces. And look, I love that, we all love that, it’s what the series has always been about. But I often end up missing the characters we haven’t seen for a while, my old favorites from prior arcs. Episodes like this that revisit those familiar faces always get a big pop-off from me for that reason.
Far and away the longest stretch of time is spent with the Cross Guild. I think I can count on one hand the number of people in the world who don’t enjoy Buggy, Mihawk, or Crocodile in some capacity, so this was a huge win in my opinion. Not only do we get to see Buggy’s lowest lows (being pathetic) and a hilarious discussion scene where he’s being pseudo-tortured by Mihawk and Crocodile but we also get Buggy’s highest highs as well (inspiring others through his overwhelming capacity to fail upwards). The rousing speech he gives while his face is superimposed with the masthead clown of the vessel… it’s art, ladies and gentlemen.
The Navy and Revolutionaries segments are somewhat less exciting but still good. Sabo is a character who I am rather lukewarm on but I know a lot of folks love him. His return gets us brief moments with Ivankov and Koala, which is more than enough for me to be on board with these sequences. I still wish we saw more than fleeting glimpses of the revolutionaries and their activities but I appreciate seeing them all at this stage of the story.
