468: Battle After Battle! Devil Fruit Users vs. Devil Fruit Users
As the fighting rages on, Ace is still stuck watching everything while he thinks that they're all fools for trying to save him. After some more angst and flashbacks, he reaches an epithany and finally calms down. He tells Garp that he'll accept whatever is in store for him, be it life or death, and apologizes to all of his friends and family.
Meanwhile, the Impel Down prisoners have been left behind, and one of them tells Buggy that they can't afford to let Luffy hog all the glory. Buggy heartily agrees, but is really thinking that he should lay low on the battlefield. Someone then calls him "Red-nose", but Buggy's anger turns to fright when he realizes that it was Whitebeard himself. Of course, the prisoners take this as him being recognized as a legend. Whitebeard recognizes Buggy as a member of Gold Roger's crew and asks if he's come to take his head. Buggy's forced to say yes lest he loose face in front of his admirers, but Whitebeard says that he has no problem with that. He does point out that there are too many Naval marines though, so he suggests they team up to fight the Navy, and then afterwards Buggy can his head. Of course, Buggy lets this go to his head, and proclaims that he'll back Whitebeard up.
Marco comments on Buggy's simple-mindedness, and Whitebeard says that this way, he doesn't have to deal with his forces messing up his own strategies. At this point more Navy ships appear to out-flank the New World fleet, so Whitebeard tries to contact Squardo via telesnail, but since he's nowhere to be found apparently, he calls up the De Calvan brothers and tells them to focus on fighting the battleships instead of rushing into the bay and to spread the word to the other New World captains. Sengoku notices the change in formation, and states that that still will not be enough to change the pirates' fates.
Eyecatches: Zoro and Luffy
The New Kama's are trapped by the marines, but Luffy, Jimbei, and Ivankov manage to break through them to find Moria waiting past them. Jimbei challenges him and orders Luffy to keep moving. The soldiers lament the fact that the Warlords are fighting each other, but Moria strips them of their shadows and absorbs them in order to bulk up. Jimbei's unfazed, saying that Moria will never become stronger by relying on others' skills. Moria angrily retorts that it doesn't matter as long as he wins, and he separates his giant pair of scissors into two blades to use as swords. Jimbei easily deflects the blades and finishes Moria with a single punch to the gut, bringing him to his knees and coughing up the shadows.
The next opponent Luffy catches the attention of is Smoker, who shoots forward and smacks Luffy away with his jutte club. Luffy remembers that it has Sea Stone in it, and thus can negate his powers. He activates Gear Second and attacks with Jet Gatling, but naturally he cannot touch Smoker's intangible smoke body. Smoker comments that they've both gotten stronger since their last meeting, grabs Luffy, and slams him to the ground, pinning his down with his jutte. Now that he knows why Dragon saved him in Loguetown, Smoker says, he's not going to let Luffy go this time.
But luckily, Luffy has friends in high places. Hancock, openly infuriated at Smoker's treatment of her beloved, kicks Smoker away, proclaiming that she'll feed him to wild animals. And of course, one word from Luffy is enough to turn her into goo.
Meanwhile Ivankov desperately tries to reason with Kuma to no avail. Doflamingo steps off of a pile of bodies he had been sitting on and tells him that it's no use, for the man that he once knew is now dead.
Less recap this time. So Ace finally accepts his lot and settles down. I hope that this means we'll be hearing less gutteral noises from him, but then again, this is the same studio that made Dragon Ball Z...
The art and animation was still pretty good, not as flashy as the last episode, but still nice to watch. Moria's "fight" with Jimbei was entertaining because they threw around weight insults and that they're both voiced by Katsuhisa Hoki, yet sound nothing alike. This was also the start of Moria's "Memetic Loser" status, I believe. The finsher was rather weak though. The animation lacked that certain oomph to it.
Luffy's fight with Smoker, on the other hand, was animated superbly! Some prime fast-paced eye candy right there. Not a fan of the scene with Hancock though. Openly attacking and proclaiming to be allied with Luffy in front of someone like Smoker is a really stupid move, and is exactly the kind of thing Nyon warned her against doing, thus throwing that aspect of the Amazon Lily arc right out the window. I'm hoping that something happens to kind of give her a wake up call to give her some positive Character Development and remind her that she does have responsibilities, but given how Oda's been writing material related to her so far, I doubt that's going to happen. And this scene is only going to get worse next episode...
Ending cliffhanger is not much of a cliffhanger for the audience, since Kuma being fully robotized was something a lot of fans predicted. Gives another meaning to his final words to Luffy on Sabaody, which I think is acknowledged in the next chapter/episode.
