Buggy responds to Law's demands to hand over Luffy by insulting him while the doctor pirate continues to insist on it as warships start to close in on his submarine. Meanwhile the marines manage to cross the fissures in the plaza and resume their attack on the pirates. Sengoku continues to bombard the Blackbeard Pirates. Burgess tries to assist his captain, but Garp appears to swat him away, proclaiming that it's his duty to protect Marineford as a marine. Blackbeard says that his and Sengoku's era is over and tries to unbalance the island in the same way Whitebeard did earlier against John Giant. Burgess complains that he'll destroy the ground beneath them, and Garp says that Whitebeard would be rolling in his grave knowing that someone like Blackbeard has his power.
Eyecatches: Luffy (twice)
Helmeppo breathes a sigh of relief as the tremors die down, and then sees that Coby's clutching his head and sobbing, as he has for some time now. Coby admits that he doesn't know why he's so sad, but in his head he can hear the voices of marines and pirates vanishing one by one. Helmeppo thinks he's losing his mind, and Coby ends up running off screaming.
Meanwhile, a potshot from Kizaru finally convinces Buggy to toss Luffy and Jimbei to Law, where his Giant crew member Jambarl catches them and Law yells for them to dive.
Over with Akainu and the division commanders, a voice cries out for this to end. Somehow this causes everything to come to a stop as Coby stands spread-eagle before Akainu, imploring for the battle to end now that the Navy has accomplished its primary objective instead of dragging the battle out and throwing more men into the battle.
Too bad he chose someone like Akainu to deliever his filibuster to. Akainu says that he's wasted his time and that the Navy has no use for a soldier like him, but his blow is blocked by a sword blade. His rescuer congratulates Coby on his "seconds of courage", claiming that they have changed the future. Elsewhere Kizaru is about to shoot the submarine when a gun cocks in the distance and Ben Beckman, sitting on a ship's rigging, tells him to freeze. A dragon-headed ship pulls in and the pirates express their shock at another one of the Emperors being here.
Shanks sheathes his sword and picks up Luffy's fallen hat, and declares that he's come to end this war.
And so most of the fighting comes to an end. To be honest, I don't really find myself to really care about Coby's predicament all that much. Having been attacked on their home turf, the Navy is pretty justified in continuing to fight, and well, he honestly doesn't really seem to be cut out for the Navy if this is his reaction to a real battle. And I guess it doesn't help that the crying and closeups on his distorted face make him come off as even more pathetic. The episode tried to bring more attention to his plight like with him tripping over the dead body and such, but the directing wasn't really effective enough to make me care. I will say though, the Navy sucks for apparently not having any battlefield medics.
Plot-ish, oh, apparently Coby has Mantra now. That's great for a fresh recruit who's never seen real combat before. It just traumatises him even more! Shanks's arrive was a bit too out-of-the-blue for me. He's supposed to be occupied with Kaido, so I don't see how he could've made it to Marineford in only like, two days unless his skirmsh somehow took place right on the New World side of the Red Line. His entrance should've been given better animation. I had pictured something similar to when Rayleigh saved Zoro from Kizaru on Sabaody, but alas, that was not to be.
Meh episode, and there's a break before the next one. The art in the preview looks very good, at least.
