第118回：Just Tryin’ to Be Friendly♪

There’s a lot to unpack from this chapter, not the least of which are some amazing Devil Fruit reveals and of course Blackbeard but…let’s take a step back from all of that and appreciate the small things…like this fellow wearing a ‘LEAVE’ shirt.

Why is there a monkey there? Monkey in Japanese is ‘saru’ or 猿　but ‘saru’ written with a different kanji as 去る means instead ‘to leave’. Where are they going???

While Onigashima has been confirmed to be an island separate from the mainland of Wano, we still don’t have a solid idea on the layout of Wano. Is it divided into islands like the real Japan?

If there *are* actual islands, I wonder if the Udon region is based on Shikoku island, home to Kagawa Prefecture which is famous for, yup, udon noodles. Thanks to Kaido’s factories the area is a shadow of its former self, but if Luffy and his team can restore its former glory do you think they might get some udon from Udon?

Well, that was unexpected! Bege showing a moment of simple kindness to the sea lion here! It looks like Bege is about to straight up shoot the poor guy when instead he breaks the poor guy’s bonds and leaves him to safety! Bravo Bege! I know there’s a heart of gold in there…somewhere.

For manga readers, the year of waiting for Carrot’s transformation sequence into her Sulong form was worth the wait as it was every bit as elegant and terrifying as we’d hoped it would be!

Somewhat embarrassingly, I didn’t notice the puff of her around her neck until seeing it in the anime!

Kudos to Toei’s art direction!