第96回：No Sunny Business

BIG MOM IS TERRIFYING! Yes, this is the ravaging version of Mom we knew existed and have been waiting for!

I’d like to direct your attention to what I think is the most important panel of the entire chapter:

“This!? You’ve gotta be kidding me! With Sunny in danger and Mom at full potential!?”
Woah there partner. Lemme explain first before you question my sanity. This chapter is largely devoted to moving our cast into very specific positions for events that will pay off in the next chapter but Oda-sensei is establishing far more than just Chapter 890’s events here.

I’ve been wondering now for weeks, how this story could have a dramatic conclusion with the cake. Consider that the cake appears on the field of battle, what’s the most logical conclusion? Everyone cooperates to feed Mom the cake and that’s that.

No! That’s not One Piece! There’s no conflict, struggle or tension! Oda-sensei’s biggest problem was creating a scenario in which every member of Mom’s family or crew *not involved with making the cake* would want to prevent the cake from being fed to Mom, and in the above panel, Oda-sensei made such a hard-to-swallow concept, as palatable as pizza with extra cheese! We now have a scenario in which the Strawhat-side must fight Mom’s family, just to feed her the cake. It’s *brilliant*!

Aspiring authors, take note of this subtle but god-tier technique!

Big Mom tearing Sunny apart is kind of a big deal.

We know that Franky already had some heavy-duty repair work ahead of him since Luffy set the kitchen on fire and Mom was literally eating the ship in Chapter 878 but this is some of the most severe damage Sunny has ever endured.

According the Sunny guide from Volume 46, we know that extra Adam Tree wood is stored onboard, but will it be enough for these repairs?

If not, the crew might have to search for real Adam Wood at the source. Might that be the mysterious and TREMENDOUS tree-like figure glimpsed on Elbaf? If so, looks like the Strawhats might have a good reason to travel to Elbaf!

We finally have a cross section look at the inside of Big Mom’s Whole Cake Chateau as a map!

The breakdown of eight floors seems to be a little odd as it seems that each ‘floor’ is a particularly large region comprised of multiple subfloors but be that as it may, we finally have some frame of reference for the layout of events in the palace! I’m particularly thrilled to see the location of Pudding’s room on the left side and that Mom’s throne room is at the top, just like any self-respecting video game boss character!

The full-color versions of Mom’s human soldiers helped suggest their potentially fairy tale-inspired designs. The characters ‘Snow White Man’ and ‘Wolf Man’ received names in the credits confirming previous speculation but what about this trio?

The white rabbit in the foreground seems to be self-explanatory as the famous MacGuffin from Alice in Wonderland.

The pig-tailed man was tough to pin down without color but the red hood suggests he might be Little Red Riding Hood to the ‘Wolf Man’ defeated by Pedro in the hallway.

And the burly fellow with a drinking problem? I honestly have no idea, even in color I haven’t picked up on any visual clues that help define him but his beard does make him look like a burly huntsman! What do you think!?