 So this chapter, we did get the much anticipated reveal of Marco's message, but it was pretty redundant in the end, because as it turns out, Luffy had already subscribed to the Grand Line Review and was already receiving regular One Piece content, uploaded straight into his YouTube feed. Still, I personally think it was good of Marco to be concerned anyway. Hello and welcome to the Grand Line Review, your source for everything One Piece, and today we have a review of chapter 982, Scoundrel meets Scoundrel. And this week we have what is for all intents and purposes a setup chapter. But I do want to be clear what I mean by that, because this terminology gets used a fair bit in the online One Piece fanbase, and it's usually in response to a chapter with no world-shaking developments taking place. When something like that happens, it's given the label of setup chapter as a result because it is building to something rather than achieving something, in theory anyway. I tend to disagree with that quite a bit, but chapter 982 very much does both, and I honestly could not believe the amount of insanity that took place this week. It was absolutely beautifully weaved together, and by the end of it, there are a fair few solid foundations of conflict brewing, like that whole infiltration thing really didn't last too long did it. And this chapter is a massive step up in terms of enacting chaos, although very very interestingly, all of the samurai are still very much flying under the old radar. Every piece of anarchy being caused on Onigashima right now can be directly attributed to the pirates forming part of the invading force. Meanwhile, the presence of the vassals and the thousands upon thousands of samurai is being masked underneath all of this, which I think is really cool and will potentially culminate in a brilliant moment, where all of a sudden Orachi will be confronted with the vassals and a few thousand samurai, and just have this ultimate oh damn moment, because he's already pretty on edge to say the least. On the other hand, the large majority of the chaos being caused on the side of the beast pirates is also coming directly from either members of the worst generation or the Tobirapo, and I am very happy to see the latter group continue to be focused on in this chapter, because they have some very satisfying interactions which we will get to. But you know, I'm actually not really sure where to start with this chapter, because there was nothing that particularly popped to me. The entire thing was just such an incredibly solid experience from start to end, so I guess I'll do something that I very very rarely do, and start with the beginning. So first up we have Kaido and Black Maria, the most adorable couple, and you know I'm definitely not at all a shipper, but I'm very happy to set sail with this one. And you know what, seeing the two of them together actually made me very briefly forget just how absolutely massive both of them are, because side by side they just look like completely normal people. And it's not until your eyes scan further down to see the more average sized minions, where that gigantic reminder occurs. What I also really enjoyed about this opening was seeing Kaido in a state of pure bliss. He's almost always portrayed as this sobbing angry mess, so I'm really liking the subtle expansion on his character here. I still think he's a pretty tortured soul, and even though he's a mercilessly cruel antagonist, there is something really bizarrely nice about seeing him happy here. Although having labelled him as a mercilessly cruel character, that description actually comes to be challenged in this very chapter, when Kandro appears holding a very very depressing form of Momonosuke, having been rather savagely beaten. And there's this panel where Kaido sees this and the look on his face, it is everything. He is not on board with this idea at all, and while he won't go so far as to actually stop it from happening, or to chastise Kandro at all for implementing the act, this situation clearly violates his own personal code of morality. Which is not only fascinating, but it's what I'm really searching for in the Kaido character right now. He's such a difficult creature to pin down, because there are moments where he seems like an ultimate force like unbridled villainy, but then sprinkled in with all of that you have times like these. And I'm very eager to learn exactly where he stands in this world, because I have this feeling that he's a much more noble character than he gets credit for. Well you know what noble is probably the wrong word, but he seems to be capable of some form of either sympathy or empathy. And maybe this ties into how he was treated as a young dragon lad, but you know what with that said Kaido is still undeniably a prick, but clearly not on Orochi or Kandro, levels of cockery. And speaking of this is probably the first chapter where I've been truly disgusted by Mr. Kandro. I was actually really excited when he was revealed to be the traitor because I was keen to follow him as an antagonist, but now this guy, oh this guy, he just needs to have the utter crap beaten out of him, preferably in a similar manner to what was delivered to Momonosuke. And I guess I just think that beating children is definitely one of those lines that we just don't cross all that often in Shonamanga, and they come to characterize some of the darkest times in One Piece actually, like when Child Luffy was being tortured by Porchemi. This is very different though. Momonosuke is certainly not in a good way here, and it's going to make Kandro's downfall a very satisfying event to watch, to say the very least. The biggest development to come out of this scene though is Orochi's decision that Momonosuke is going to be publicly executed. Because if there's any way to liven up an already rowdy party, it is to murder a child on stage in front of everybody. Yep, that's cool. This sets up a pretty important plot point though, because now we might have a bit of a mini-Marineford-style situation on our hands with Momonosuke needing to be rescued before the appointed execution time. And my guess is that Luffy would be the one naturally set up to prevent this, perhaps with Zoro on hand, because he witnessed Yasu's execution and may be particularly driven to make sure that that does not happen again. What it does do though is it further forces attention into one centralized location, which provides an even better distraction for Kinamon, Dentro, and the rest to position themselves perfectly for their ideal attack conditions. So Orochi is not making the greatest of moves here, and you know the thing is that Orochi probably thinks that he's being super super clever by making the decision to kill Momonosuke, but he's also making the greatest possible mistake at the same time. I mean dude, if you want to be rid of the Kozuki clan, then doing so in a very public setting would several confirmed members of the worst generation running loose probably isn't the best way to go about it. And if you were thinking intelligently in any way shape or form, then you would just put an end to Momonosuke right here and now. But I guess that's the ongoing character Orochi. We are seeing him gradually being crushed by his own fear of Toki's prophecy, and that is causing him to make this series of grand mistakes that is going to culminate in his defeat. All according to Toki's Keikaku. Now as for my favourite panel of this chapter that is such an easy choice, it is this one of Fukuro Kujo bringing Orochi's attention to the worst generation members and don't they just all look fantastic. Especially Killa because even with that mask on, we've still managed to give him that almost comically menacingly evil face with the sharp teeth and everything. And at first I thought this panel was kind of out of place because Fukuro Kujo doesn't seem like the type of guy to have this sort of imagination, but then I very quickly realised that what we're seeing is how Orochi envisions them. Which are these powerful beings here to destroy him, which I think is really fun. And it's always great to see Zoro in particular given a different art style than his standard stoic look. But while we're here I do also want to say that this impression of the straw hats as well as the worst generation in general is not exclusive to Orochi. These characters are very much how the general public of One Piece view these pirates. They're very fearsome entities and they're viewed that way primarily due to world government propaganda. Which is something that I think that we can forget being as close to these characters as we are. Like Luffy for example, we know he's a fairly gentle guy unless someone really deserves a rubber fisting, but his very name sparks this brand of fear all throughout the world. And it's always nice to have a reminder of that perspective in the series. Next up we have some expansion on the situation with Marko and Nekomomushi, which tends to bring up more questions than the scene actually answers. Although one plot point that was immediately resolved is the whole notion of Marko sending a message to Luffy through Nekomomushi, which actually turned out to be really wholesome. I love the fact that he essentially just said, yo Luffy, I'm in. I'll just be a tad late. And this is one of those situations where I think my own head canon got in the way of this event proceeding as smoothly as it did. Because I went back and I read the chapter where Marko and Nekomomushi were having their conversation and absolutely nowhere does Marko deny that he is coming to warn her. The most that happens is Nekomomushi saying that hmm, well I guess I can see why you wouldn't want to leave this place. And then Marko wanting to deliver a message gives the impression that he isn't coming which is very, very tricky and annoyingly well constructed by Oda. He very deliberately gave us one impression whilst leaving the simple solution completely open to be explored. And I guess my conclusion is similar to that of the last chapter review. Marko needed to take some time to ensure the safety of Whitebeard's home prior to embarking. And the question that's borned within me initially is what took Nekomomushi so long then. He and Marko travelled to Wano separately so Garfield should have gotten there much earlier but then you remember Iso. So I guess after meeting Marko Nekomomushi more than likely sought out Iso and that's where all the time went. I did find it interesting that Oda chose not to show Iso in this chapter but not only that Nekomomushi didn't even mention him or Marko for that matter when speaking to the other vassals. So for whatever reasons, Kitikad is keeping them a surprise which I don't know. Maybe it has something to do with the idea that Nekomomushi knows there is a traitor amongst the vassals somehow. I'm not sure if anyone else knew I think it was just Kinemon though. But if Nekomomushi did know then he could be purposely hiding not only Iso but Marko's existence as well. And the others didn't have time to tell him about Kandro's betrayal because Nekomomushi hung up so quickly so there's just some very poor communication happening here to say the very least. Skipping to Dendro and Sasaki now and what the hell is this? When the scans dropped, I saw posts all over Twitter about thick necks and now I understand, I understand completely because this, ladies and gentlemen, this is no neck. This is more like a second torso plonked on top of another larger torso and then having Dendro's head attached directly to it, sans neck. It is a pretty epic panel though. I do love the reveal of the Kozuki Clan tattoo on Dendro's back and I hope that it comes back in some sort of phenomenally dramatic shirtless combat scene. Although I very recently made a video of potential deaths on Wano and Dendro's name did pop up and after having seen this it's giving me visions of a panel where Dendro is back in the tattoo of being penetrated by like a sword or another type of blade in yet another instance of Kozuki related tragedy. But more importantly for right now, Dendro has managed to rather comically deal with Sasaki and I guess I have to assume that he's been bound with some sort of sea stone right? I really can't imagine a member of the Tobi-Roppo being comfortably sealed by two wrappings of chains and they did use sea stone on Big Mom so they clearly have access to it. With that though, this is very potentially one member of the Tobi-Roppo taken out of action although I doubt it. It feels like far too comical of an ending and we really haven't explored Sasaki yet but then again, one piece is a comedy and characters in gigantic arcs are often left without their own individual time so maybe this is it for him. Either way someone or something would need to free him to put Sasaki back in play which is highly possible given the future chaos on the island and as a smooth segue from that we now move to Big Mom and I will willingly admit that I am a fool and utter utter fool for heavily misinterpreting that last chapter where I took a questioning as a sign of amnesia but upon further inspection it was clearly very very clearly just referring to the fact that she had no idea that Wano had an easily accessible port. I think I wanted the amnesia to return so much that my brain did not allow me to comprehend the actual facts of the matter. In any case I am pretty thrilled at all of this and I particularly love the panel of Big Mom chasing the straw tank having clearly had a cannonball shot directly into her mouth. Although I know this is probably going to spark more inevitable annoyance about how Big Mom is treated in the series, Big Meme and all that. In fact I even got into a Twitter argument, you know the highest form of online discourse, with some dude braw about it who claims that Oda kept disrespecting her as an emperor. And my counter is simply that one piece is an action comedy as I've already said to once this chapter. It has great doses of drama and very properly epic moments but the comedy will always be there no matter what kind of character you are. It's the same sort of annoyance that's born to when Kaido did his goofy dragon face like oh my god Oda has made Kaido into a joke such disrespect. And to anyone out there who believes in the disrespect narrative just because she doesn't fit your own personal head canon of what an emperor should be does not mean that Oda is disrespecting the character. Big Mom has always been portrayed as a volatile child. That's the entire appeal of her character and without moments like these she would be the epitome of boring. And with that little rant done I do love that this current situation has Usopp and Chopper alone going up against this emperor which will probably further annoy people but I think this is perfect. Usopp is the king of running away and he is perfectly poised to take Big Mom on a merry chase and lead her into further chaos elsewhere. But I also really like that the two most cowardly members of the straw hats have really stepped up and made the active decision to antagonize an emperor of the sea for the benefit of Kinamon and the samurai. That is such an understated part of this scene and it is brilliant. And the final thing I want to touch on is of course the very end which is actually one of my favorite parts of the chapter where Ulti runs into a certain monkey D. Luffy. It's not something that had ever come close to crossing my mind in the past but these two are such a perfect recipe for chaos. They're both such unreasonably strong minded that it's easy to see them starting a fight right here and now but on the other hand because they do seem to share a certain wavelength I could also envision a situation where Oda instantly makes them best friends or something and they both try to have a piggyback ride on page one maybe even in his beast form. But at the moment this is still very much confirming to me that while who's who is probably the most fascinating Tobi roppo to me, Ulti is by far the most enjoyable. And what's also interesting is that none of the other worst generation members show up in this scene. It's just Luffy that ran into Ulti so I do wonder if they have separated or if this is just one of those Oda things where the characters are present but he has chosen not to focus on them in order not to muddle the scene. Like with the whole Iso and Nekomomushi situation earlier. Oh well we shall find out next week I suppose. But that pretty much does it for chapter 982. So what did you guys think? Please do leave your thoughts in the comments below or even join my discord server and if you'd like to see more videos like this then please do go and check out some of my other content or even subscribe to the channel for more glorious one piece business uploaded straight until YouTube feeds. But for now this has been the Grand Line Review and I'll see you next time.