ONE PIECE #609 - - Special Review

| Tuesday, September 3, 2013



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ONE PIECE #609 - - Special Review



Now that he’s using all these Wesker-like super moves (and remembering
to clean his face
), Vergo is finally living up to the badass rep that Oda wanted
us to just buy when this dude was introduced however many episodes back. The show’s kind-of getting into soap opera
territory (where half the conversations seem to consist of terse talk about
characters’ bitter history together
), but I do appreciate the irony of this guy toying with Law in exactly the same fashion as when he
tortured Smoker earlier.

Actually, “the show being on the other foot” seems to be an odd,
recurring theme for this episode. Between the narcotic candy that the lil’ big’uns
are hooked on and Caesar’s uncanny resemblance to the weed demon from CARTOON
ALL-STARS TO THE RESCUE, it feels like Oda’s been weaving some greater theme
about drugs in this ‘Punk Hazard’ arc. It’s all the more striking when Chopper frets about the effects of his performance-enhancer (a steroid by another,
fantastical name
) running out while he’s warning the kids not to take any
more candy because it’ll ‘ruin their bodies forever.’

I always felt like there was something… noteworthy about how
most of the superhumans in this world get their powers from ingesting exotic
plants. Hell, ‘Devil Fruit’ and ‘Logia’ are only a few syllables away from ‘Devil
Weed’ or ‘Lotus.’ No, I’m not trying to
draw some tenuous point about “What ONE PIECE is really about” on the
order of a head shop clerk’s radical interpretation of ALICE IN WONDERLAND.
Nevertheless, drugs do pop up a lot in this series, with wildly varying levels of
malevolence and benevolence, and I’ve got to wonder if Oda’s parents might’ve
been doctors or pharmacists or some such, because there is undeniably a message recurring here about one must know the difference between good drugs and bad ones.

Now, one of you go run with this thesis for your grad school paper.Watch this
episode,
"Luffy Dies from Exposure?! The Spine
Chilling Snow Woman Monet!” here and decide for yourself,
then read my comments about the previous episode here.

About the Author

Tom Pinchuk’s a writer and personality with a large number of comics, videos and features like this to his credit. Visit his website - - tompinchuk.com - - and follow his Twitter: @tompinchuk







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