477: The Power Which Shortens One's Life - Return of the Tension Hormones
With Garp now on the field, the pirates begin to halter, hesistant to attack the man who fought against people such as Gold Roger and Gold Lion Shiki. Whitebeard shouts for them to not get intimidated by his name, that he's just an old marine. Akainu shouts that he should be paying attention to the foe before him, and attacks with Inugami Guren (Crimson Dog Fang). Whitebeard deflects the lava with his weapon, causing even more collateral damage to the city.
On the execution scaffold, Ace starts sobbing to himself as he has some flashbacks to his youth. His younger self is shown asking townspeople about Gold Roger, and every last one of them has nothing good to say, calling him a liar, a worthless criminal, and blaming him for the new wave of pirate hordes that ravage the seas. And every time Ace would get infuriated at their words and start fights, earning him scoldings from his caretaker Dadan. Garp found this amusing, untill Ace asked him if it was alright for him to have been born. The only answer Garp has for that is that he'll have to discover that answer for himself as he grows older. In the present, Ace admits that the reason he's crying is that even though his friends, family, and comrades are falling all around him, he's happy, and that makes him want to live.
Meanwhile, Ivankov is with the unconscious Luffy, and is told that he can no longer be treated with basic first-aid, that he needs proper care, something he can't get on the battlefield. He declares that they'll have to rescue Ace himself, but Luffy then grabs his leg and weakly asks for one final favor.
Eyecatches: Zoro and Luffy
Outside of the walls, Buggy regains consciousness and wonders what happened. The Impel Down prisoners explain that he was frozen by Aokiji, but afterwards the frozen men fell into the ocean and were thawed out thanks to Akainu's Ryuusei Kazan (Meteor Volcano) attack. Buggy notices that Mr. 3 is missing, and then notices the giant encircling walls. He declares that no wall is going to stop him, but inside is at a loss at what he's supposed to do.
Inside the walls, Whitebeard suddenly goes down clutching his chest and coughs up blood, leaving Akainu to comment that even he can't beat old age. Marco thinks to himself that their captain's health failing was their greatest fear, and Kizaru takes advantage of his distraction to plug him with two laser shots, while Aokiji starts freezing Jozu, and Akainu takes advantage of Whitebeard's weakened state to nail him square in the chest with his lava-coated fist.
Meanwhile Helmeppo tries to disuade Coby from going out onto the battlefield, saying that the Navy's already as good as won. Coby remembers his promise to Luffy to become an Admiral, and admits to himself that as long as he is as he is, that's only a pipe dream. Still, he manages to steel himself.
Ivankov yells at Luffy for wanting another dosage of the Tension Hormones, arguing that all they do is deceive his body, not heal it, and he's already heavily wounded from his ordeal in Impel Down. If continues on like this, he'll die for real, and then there'll be no way he could show his face to Dragon. Luffy retorts that if he doesn't fight, and he doesn't save Ace, then he'll want to die anyway. Ivankov gives up and telling him to do whatever the hell he wants before injecting him with another shot of the hormones. Upon hearing Luffy's scream as he gets back on to his feet, Helmeppo exclaims that it's impossible for Luffy to be up after all the punishment he's taken so far before Coby finally runs out onto the battlefield, having found his resolve at last.
So, while this episode had a fair bit of padding, for the most part it was good padding. I think the centerpiece of the episode is Ace having his little epiphany regarding that there are indeed people who care and would sacrifice their lives for him. I don't know why it took him this long to arrive at that conclusion, but better late than never, I guess. His flashback was extended a wee bit. I liked how the townspeople here actually gave rational reasons for why they hated Roger, as opposed to the manga where they came off as hating him for the hell of it. Of course, they had to express their opinions in the most dickish manner possible, but that's something that I will address in full later on. We saw more of Dadan here than we did in the corresponding manga chapter.
I don't really care that much for Luffy to be knocked out, being told that he's done more than enough, and then bring him back so quickly. I think that could've waited another chapter/episode or so to make it feel less sudden. The end's nearly here, now that Whitebeard and his top men are taking heavy blows from the Navy. Speaking of blows, Akainu's looked pretty brutal. I did like how that was animated. Nice and light.
The next episode's title hypes up Luffy and Coby's encounter, but, well, we'll see about that.
