 Hello and welcome to the Grand Line, review your source for everything one piece. Last week we concluded a highly destructive journey to take back Niko Robin, but we're not quite finished with this saga just yet as we bored the roller coaster of emotions, that is the Return to Water 7. Return to Water 7 is the 17th arc in the series consisting of 11 manga chapters and 13 anime episodes, so it's quite short considering what we've been dealing with lately, but my god does it make an impact. Unfortunately though I think we need to start on one of the more somber moments of this arc, as well as the series as a whole by discussing the funeral of the Going Merry. It was really touching to learn the story of how Merry managed to set sail and reach any slobby through sheer willpower, and yes a little help from Iceberg. And this is just such a classically straw hat thing to do, even when you're beaten and can barely move to overcome everything and accomplish your goal anyway. Really if it hadn't been already this really solidified in my mind the Going Merry was much more than a simple vessel and indeed a valued member of the crew, which made it all the more heartbreaking when she began to literally fall apart through sheer exhaustion and overuse. And then came the painful moment when it was finally time to say goodbye. Now One Piece is a pretty unique series and one of the reasons why that is, is because it can make you tear up over a ship. Merry has a proper Viking style funeral with everybody breaking down, including most of the audience I would say, but the part that really tugs at the old heartstrings is when Merry begins speaking to the crew directly. And that's kind of that. Beautifully heartbreaking moments that never fails to get me, and even the anime, which I criticised pretty heavily, managed to pull off this moment just as well if not better than the manga. But Merry was never entirely gone because her will is inherited by our new and still current ship, The Thousand Sunny. So when I saw The Sunny for the first time, I'm not gonna lie, I was slightly disappointed because as a ship, it looked really over-designed. But that makes a lot of sense considering it was built by Frankie, a man who over-designed himself. And as The Sunny's various functionalities present to themselves in future arcs, I really did come to love the ship. But just heading back to Frankie, this arc is where he becomes a straw hat officially, and I think it's fair to say that he probably has the funniest recruitment story, whereby the Frankie family had to steal his swimsuit to lure him to the straw hats. There's actually not a lot to say about Frankie during this arc, because all the hard work to make him worthy of joining the crew has already been put in. All this arc did was finally push him over that line and make it official. And he isn't the only straw hat to have concluded a story arc during Return to Border 7, as Robin's plot is also wrapped up very nicely with her conversation with party-crusher Al Kijie. This whole exchange is incredibly satisfying because it shows us just how much Robin has grown since the first time Al Kijie showed up. This woman has completely transformed into the Robin we know and love today, and Al Kijie himself left us on a rather optimistic note as well, signalling that there is a faction of decency that exists within the marines. Who knew? But hey, speaking of decent marines, we have the pretty damn shocking revelation that Vice-Admiral Garp is Luffy's grandfather. Yep, wasn't expecting that. Furthermore, we have the revelation that Dragon is Luffy's father. Yep, definitely wasn't expecting that. And finally, we have the reveal of the existence of the four emperors of the new world, of which Shanks is one. The info dump in this arc is just mind-blowing, and at the time it did a fantastic job of setting up the future of the One Piece world, while simultaneously wrapping up our immediate storylines. And while I'm here, I also need to mention the transformed Kobe. Now this was a shock because up until now, Kobe had always been that pretty weak-looking nerdy kid with the glasses, but damn, he had a growth spurt. One of the many reasons why I love One Piece is because it takes characters who maybe weren't so likeable, and then puts them through their own often off-screen journey, and reintroduces them into the series in amazing ways. Kobe being the prime example of this, he reappeared stronger, more determined, and even having learned one of the Rokushiki techniques. I definitely became a huge fan of Kobe after this arc, and to this day, I get really excited when he makes his rare appearances in the series. But more than that, Kobe serves to tell the audience that even though we are following Luffy, the rest of this world is still moving. Everybody has their own adventure going on, and it makes the world feel very organic and lived in. Return to Water Seven further graced us with a few key details of world events. On this particular occasion, we were treated to the meeting of Shanks and Whitebeard. Now how often is it that two of the four emperors meet in the series? Apart from that one mention of Shanks being intercepted by Kaido, I think this is pretty much it, because Blackbeard was not an emperor when he stood in front of Whitebeard at Marineford, and the resulting conflict between Whitebeard and Shanks was enough to split the sky open, which was a fantastic reminder of just how far the Straw Hats have to go before they can even dream of competing with the top tier players of this world. And that's a theme that would reoccur in the next couple of arcs actually. Then there's also Ace vs Blackbeard, which was a great fight to watch, because it gave us a glimpse of the power of the Yami Yami no Mi, a very unique devil fruit that we still don't quite understand. And Ace's defeat here actually sets up the climax for the entire first half of the series. It's crazy to think just how instrumental this one event was going forward actually, but it was particularly great to see Blackbeard again, because we hadn't gotten anything from him since the Straw Hats escaped his grasp on Jaya. And while there was definitely something weird and unique in the air around Blackbeard then, his appearance during Return to Water 7 really transformed that into a very sinister aura. From this moment on, every time Blackbeard or one of his crew members appeared in the story, it gave me a very terrible and foreboding feeling that no other villain in the series so far has been able to pull off. Now I briefly want to mention the hilarious name dropping a Fishman Island during this arc. After speaking to Kokora, it becomes clear that the next island the log pose is directing the Straw Hats to is the long awaited world of Fishman and Mermaids. I remember very well just how excited most fans were at the prospect of going there at the time, and it's pretty ridiculous to think about just how close we physically were and just how many arcs there actually were before we would get there. By my account, we have a whole seven arcs between Return to Water 7 and Fishman Island. So yeah, let's not hold our breath for that. Next, we're going to move to another in a series of touching moments this arc presents us by wrapping up the story of Usopp. And I found it pretty surprising that Luffy was immediately willing to just forgive and forget, but I'm sure we've all been in a situation where we've had a heated argument with somebody, and then like an hour later, you just feel like an idiot and want things to return back to normal. And here I need to throw a huge bucket of respect onto Zoro for stepping in and towing the line here. I'm sure that Zoro felt the exact same way as Luffy in regards to wanting Usopp back, but he did make a great point about not being able to trust somebody who can just up and leave the crew in the way he did. He wants Usopp to take responsibility for his actions, as I believe we all did. As much as I loved Usopp's journey in my opinion, he was definitely the one who was most wrong in the situation on Water 7. And after some math, I'll start. Usopp gives us the heartfelt apology that we wanted, which results in both he and Luffy breaking down into tears and a proper rejoining of the crew, which completes the Straw Hats at last. One of the things I appreciate most about this saga is that it follows three major Straw Hats, Robin, Usopp, and Frankie. And despite the grand events that take place, it really is the personal story of these three individuals, coming to terms with who they are and their place in the world, which rather conveniently for all three happens to be aboard the Straw Hats ship. It's writing on a scale that we have never seen before or since, because most arcs in the series follow the struggles of a third party, with the Straw Hats stepping in or if they do focus on an individual crew member, it is the sole journey of that member. And I'm not saying these are bad at all. On the contrary, the writing for these arcs is also brilliant for the most part, but it will never match just how beautifully Oda weaved the personal stories of these three Straw Hats at once during this whole saga. And that pretty much does it for the Return to Water 7. Next week, we'll be leaping into the unknown realm of the Florian Triangle to experience the horrors awaiting us at Thriller Bark. If you enjoyed this video, then please feel free to like, favorite, or subscribe. And please do comment with your thoughts on the Return to Water 7. This has been the Grand Line Review, and I'll see you next time.