looking up at paradise

Sky Island Saga

Jaya Arc (Ch 218 - 236)

Heard you were talking shit

An average start to frankly an average saga. I didn't like the Sky Island Saga much, nor the Jaya Arc, especially coming from the Alabasta Arc which had so much heart and characters that were easy to love. As for the Jaya Arc I liked two things mainly. One of them was the bar fight where you can see how much Shanks helped Luffy to mature (and Zoro who stands down on his captain's orders). Plus Nami mirrors Luffy from before and gets angry on their behalf because like Luffy from before, these two are precious to her and damn straight you ain't gonna talk shit about them. And the second thing I like is Luffy, like Shanks, takes the abuse but when someone else gets hurt, is immediately ready to wreck shit up and damn does he do it well. I love it when they find out about their new bounties.
What I don't love about it is Blackbeard. Fuck that guy so hard.

Skypiea Arc (Ch 237 - 302)

"Being on this ship sure makes you lose the will to even worry, doesn't it?"

Arc fatigue with this one...I didn't like any of the fights...I think a large part of it is the Alabasta Arc that preceded it. There's another super powerful being ruling over a place, a rebel army of sorts, and another group helping our protagonists. But the crew starts getting involved not because of a promise with a friend, but they were looking for treasure and happened to be in the same place. Rather than Luffy getting hit then getting back up it just turns out he happened to be the one material resistant to lightning. I get that he does have to struggle to get the victory, but it just seems less epic especially since in the end Enel sort of just gets up and lets them off. I had almost no attachment to Skypiea so there wasn't much at stake for me. Ace's mini-story was more interesting seriously (no really 'coffee is now served with milk' HOW CUTE)

There were some little moments I enjoyed, like the whole backstory about Norland and the cute snake monster, as well as Robin laughing with her crewmates and Chopper resolving to grow up. Then always the ending, no matter what happened, how they had another giant bonfire because that's the spirit of adventure. The giant silhouette of Luffy hella cute, and Cricket asking the Saruyama brothers what their new dream should be.

And I always really love the voice-over text at the end of each arc, every one of them saying something to the tune of 'happily ever after'.