March 19, 2016

The Extraordinary Stubborness of Shipright Tom!


The

Extraordinary 

Stubbornness
of

S h i p r i g h t   T o m ! ! !


Shipright Tom working on a sailing ship at Water 7
Ah, Water-7, the most famous and suspenseful arc in One Piece, right?

A million things happening at once, a secret syndicate out for heads, another secret government organization vying for world domination... Then there's Luffy's crew and the people surrounding mysterious yet crazy Franky, of his self-titled Franky House.

But what about Franky's role model, Shipright Tom??? This post is about him!

Family picture, right? Bad timing...


Franky before destroying the blueprints for the PLUTO weapon
You can't really be a fan of Shipright Tom without being or secretly being a fan of Franky. Maybe (not) even vice versa (lol!). But what's Franky's claim to appeal, in Water 7, if not Shipright Tom? Well let's review the key scenes of the Water 7 arc that include good ol' Franky.




 

 Water 7, if you're a big fan, is centered around the ships and blueprints there, at Water 7. What had been the big deal was that The Strawhats and Robin traveling to Water 7 area, which was going to provide CP9 and the World Government with enough chaotic cover to attempt to find the blueprints for the Legendary Weapon that was alluded to earlier in the One Piece series. While all that was going on, they were going to try to capture all of them, Robin and the Strawhats, (including Monkey D. Luffy) for their individual bounty money and poster.
Franky showing off his retractable punching forearm...
The Franky House
The only character who hadn't had a record yet was Franky, he lived at Water 7. He was pretty well off and the leader of some kind of weird cultish group of comrades. Mostly good-for-nothing since he wasn't really making ships, just ship mods. So when he got involved with The Strawhats at Water 7, they changed the whole course of what CP9 and the gov't had planned...






The other person with the complete blueprints for the Legendary Weapon was Iceberg-san, Franky's adopted brother. Not particularly cool or with abilities, Iceberg-san is smarter than Franky both at the art of ship design and in most other areas. That including, mouse rearing hahaha.  ---(Tyrannosaurus the mouse)--------->

So with Iceberg-san, his problems started when he was confronted by The Strawhats to fix their new boat, The Going Merry. Which he obliged, even with their criminality status as rogue rookies. The mystery was, whether or not Iceberg actually knew that his key shiprights were part of CP9.




In Water 7, the arc, Nico Robin does become a prisoner to CP9 and is eventually sent to its leader "Spandam". There a sort of struggle ensues where she will have to be taken to the execution center Enies Lobby, by Spandam himself. She's in sea-salt cuffs so she can't use her Devil's fruit power.

But luckily, there's Franky and Franky has nothing better to do...!
Franky and Spandam looking upset over one of his plans being foiled, by Franky

FLASHBACK:  Franky was the reason Spandam wore a facial mask in the first place... 
Franky confronting Spandam with Robin
Franky wrestling Spanam's elephant daggar!
Once free, Robin immediately used "Clutch" on Spandam
And again! hehehe

During that time, The Strawhat pirates were using the second and last remaining water-train to get to Enies Lobby for Luffy to rescue Robin and fight Rob Lucci. The time it would have taken for that water-train to finally get there, without Franky already there, would have meant certain disaster for their nakama, Robin.






Franky battling the marines during Luffy's fight with Lucci
Franky's showdown with CP9's top brawler


 For Tom, the shipright business was going to take off. He would head off to Enies Lobby and the Marines would approve of his shipright business in the honor of the Water 7 train system that he built and perfected. All was going to plan. That was, until Franky was testing out his battle ships on the incoming marine envoy! Which destroyed many of the marine ships, to freekin' piss them all off! They were going to be on fleek! ...correction ---> Fleet!...

The finished Water 7 train running during the night, to get to Enies Lobby express style!
After all of that, Tom took one of Franky's harpoons right to the stomach and accepted his Enies Lobby sentence. The same one that Nico Robin was going to in the future, before Franky came on the scene.








The Extreme Stubborness of Shipright Tom!
Such stubborness led, to Iceberg taking over the Water 7 enterprise, the blueprints, and the shipright business from then on. ...And Franky went off, to the outer area to build the Franky House. Where he started a pirates-only business that would only help Franky's wallet.






Check out the openings for the Water 7 arc. A total of 3 for the whole arc!

One Piece OP 5

 One Piece OP 6


One Piece OP 7


The Cool.ness of Post-Timeskip Franky!

Super Franky!!!


March 13, 2016

Anime Introspective: ERASED and the American Serial Drama Tropes


 Most people live life on the path we set for them. Too afraid to explore any other. But once in a while people like you come along...


Guess which anime has topped the MyAnimelist charts in just a short few months?


"Boku Dake Ga Inai Machi" - The Town Where Only I Am Missing, or simply "ERASED" as the English adaptation title, is a story about Fujinuma Satoru, a young 20-something manga author who has a mysterious ability called "Revival" - returning a few moments in time before a tragedy in order to prevent its eminent occurrence. Without revealing too much, a major catastrophe causes Satoru to use Revival to the point where he is sent back 18 years in time to prevent a tragedy deeply rooted in his childhood. 

The concept in all honesty is not far from being cliche, at least in the world of anime. It is not the supernatural or over-the-top powers known to many anime which made ERASED an instant fan favorite. It is the nature of each episode, strongly intertwined and the tension / hype tools used to pull the viewer in that have made this show so popular.

Time to take a short departure from reviewing like an Otaku, and putting on my "Westerner" hat. Who here hasn't seen "Breaking Bad", "Lost" or "How to Get Away with Murder" - or any other popular "Serial dramas" that have pervaded American society of late? The premise of these shows is deeply based in reality, but a strong character takes a twist in his normal fate and becomes something more than they are - someone who drives their storyline, a thread in a multi-threaded theatrical puppet show, where everyone else's plots weave into their in a very strategic way to further the main story. 

ERASED functions in much the same way: it is highly character driven but to the point where these characters drive their own plotlines with their actions. One small example we can take is of Katagiri Airi - the part timer who works with Satoru. She is unassuming until they delve into her backstory, and she forces herself into Satoru's life and helps him out. The same goes for Kenya, Hiromi, Jun, and Kayo - they lead organically disparate lives but their plots weave with Satoru's.  


Another success formula that ERASED uses is the heavy plot twists and cliffhangers. You may think "All anime series' have cliff hangers at each episode," but ERASED uses them in a 12 episode series - and in a way which is deliberately used to increase tension instead of just make you happy / excited. Ring any bells? American Serial Dramas use the same tools. Amazingly, your fear of Walter White's last decision in BB is the same as Satoru's desperation in protecting his friends. It's not the same as the 800 episodes of Case Closed that do next to nothing to bring the viewer back into the story for the next episode.

What would the face of anime be like if all new anime focused on episode-by-episode crescendos, story tension used as a cliffhanger-y element, and crime-drama style character development? Would anime mirror Western Netflix binge-able serials or AMC's next big psychological drama?

-chansu

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This blog, "The Otaku Reviewers", was started in February of 2010 on this very same platform, Blogger. At first, it was a venture into the informational and informal world of comics, anime, video games, and Japanese culture. In other words, just a random blog.

Over time, the founder of the blog credited with the pseudonym "RPGhero" was joined by two fellow bloggers and friends with the names "Chansu" and "Deretsun". Together the three bloggers looked up interesting Japanese culture facts, recommended new anime, talked about their own "otaku" interests, and traveled across the United States to various anime conventions.

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