 Wano is the worst Ark in all of One Piece. Just like how Holcake Island was also the worst Ark in all of One Piece. Dressroser, yep, Tick also the worst Ark. Punk Hazard, ugh, definitely the worst Ark. And as for Vichman Island, oh boy, it wasn't that a worst Ark to remember. Although actually, it's a bit weird when you think about it because they can't all possibly be the worst Ark. And yet, there seems to come a point during the life cycle of every Ark where it is labeled as the worst. And that's about where we are with Wano right now. But is Wano really the worst? Well, it's not quite that simple. Hello and welcome to the Grand Line Review, your source for everything One Piece. And today we are going to be breaking down a simply fascinating fan phenomena, a dynamic that most long-term readers or watchers of One Piece will be quite familiar with and have potentially even participated in at some point, which is all about riding the highs and lows of the Ark life cycle. Before that though, we need to interrupt this intro with a quick round of Kaidu or Kaidon to very simple minigame, the rules of which are as follows. Our alcoholic emperor has hidden himself in one of these three sake bottles. And it is now going to be your job to guess which bottle it is. However, should you guess incorrectly, then your punishment is that you Kaidu need to subscribe to the Grand Line Review, also resulting in consistent injections of One Piece culture, administered straight into your YouTube feed. Or as if you do guess correctly, then you Kaidon't need to subscribe. So pick your bottle now, A, B or C, and we shall reveal the answer in three, two, one, and bam, that sneaky fishy emperor was in bottle B. So if you guessed A or C, then you know what Kaidu and please do say hi in the comments below if you are a new member of the Grand Fleet, welcome. But here's a fun fact, according to a channel poll I conducted, a profoundly shocking amount of Grand Line Review viewers either started reading or watching this series in the last four years. Like legitimately 60% of you picked One Piece up that recently. And honestly, that kind of blows my mind. It definitely would have thought it would be just a little bit more spread out. However, more importantly, what that means is that the majority of you watching this here video right now have never experienced a full arc lifecycle by which I mean reading an entire arc weekly from beginning to end. No, the reverie does not count. Okay, Gailand began serialization in 2016 which I guess means that number may be closer to 50% of you but still for a whopping amount of viewers, Wano will be your first experience of reading or watching an entire arc weekly. And man, you guys got thrown a bit into the deep end here because given that we are now in stage four of the Wano arc life cycle and I'll explain what that means in a bit, we are encountering the much anticipated wave of what I am going to call Wano dissatisfactment. I'm not enjoying this arc at all. It's a cluster F, which I need to say because YouTube doesn't like swearing with too many characters, too many plot threads that will most likely not be resolved and too many too weak breaks. I honestly think Oda should take a proper holiday and get proper rest so that he can have a fresh perspective on this arc. This is the sort of comment that I feel best sums up the concept of Wano dissatisfactment. But the funny thing is you can take this comment and apply it to literally any mega arc in the series. I saw the exact same sentiment expressed during Hockock Island, Dressrosa, Punk Hazard and Fishman Island. And having lived through all of those weekly, I can safely say that this sort of sentiment has nothing to do with the content of the arc itself but rather the structure of the arc and the intriguing task of absorbing it through weekly reading or viewing. And to make this very clear, there is a colossal difference in reading an arc all at once or over a few days or whatever it is as opposed to reading a single chapter on a weekly basis. It is of course the exact same story but the difference comes entirely from pacing. Let's take one of the more infamously hated arcs, Dressrosa for example. This arc is 102 chapters long. Just Dressrosa that is, not including all of the other Punk Hazard stuff. And when you have all 102 chapters sitting in front of you right there, it basically allows you to have full control of an arc's pacing. When things are really fascinating you, you can take your time, slow down and really absorb everything it is that you're enjoying. On the other hand, when the arc is feeling a little bit slow, you can simply read a bit faster and blast through those segments which results in a net positive experience because you took in and appreciated what you enjoyed and you sped past and ignored what you didn't. Which is an option that you don't get reading weekly. The pace of an arc is controlled entirely by the format and you will receive anywhere from 15 to 18 pages per week and you've just got to deal with whatever that ends up being. Which could be anything from the best 18 pages of one piece ever crafted to much slower yet necessary stuff that doesn't provide enough for any narrative progress in and of itself. And those installments can seem frustrating and road blocky in isolation. But there is a particular section of every mega arc where these sorts of chapters comprise the majority of the experience. And as I mentioned earlier, it is what I refer to as stage four. But before we get there, let's take a look at the rest of the one piece arc lifecycle. Commencing with stage one, the blissful introduction which is by far the most exciting and enjoyable aspect of an arc. During the stage of an arc, Oda can throw absolutely anything at us and it will be simply amazing. Primarily because we just haven't seen it before. And with this, I'm very specifically thinking back on Dressroser and how fantastic it was to marvel at all of the Spanish inspired architecture on the island, taking in all of the weird locals, like the toys and seeing hyped up characters like Doflamingo as a common place fixture of the story. Or Hawcake Island where you have exactly the same sort of phenomena. All of the candy and food inspired buildings, the incredible array of local residents from almost every race on the planet as well as the weird Disney soul creatures and seeing a hyped up villain like Big Mom commonly. Stage one is arguably where one piece is at its strongest because it embodies the true spirit of adventure and discovery, which I will emphasize is far, far more important during the weekly arc experience because in binge settings, you can very much zoom through aspects like the setting, how an island looks, how it's residents dress and all that sort of stuff. You can just sort of blast past it and subconsciously take it in. However, when all you have is a handful of new pages every week, details like that tend to become a lot more important because it is a huge glob of new information to digest. So even if there's not much happening in these chapters and let's be honest, there often isn't, it still manages to feel like a fresh and properly packed experience. A great one, for example, would be spending almost a whole chapter speaking with Tengu Yama in his history house or fighting against a forgettable sumo dude. Really incredibly mundane events on paper that are made exciting simply due to the fact that they take place somewhere new and with new characters. And quite honestly, there is probably nothing that Oda can do wrong during the section because we as an audience have no expectations. And even if we did, there is still no expectation that Oda will meet those needs right in the beginning of an arc. So there's this wonderful grace period where the fan base is just, you know, sitting there content, perhaps even hyped to go along with this journey and make all sorts of new and fun discoveries. It is a truly magical time. However, this feeling can only last so long after which point we enter stage two, the maddening middle. This is the point of the arc where the shininess of the new setting and the new characters begins to wear off. And it takes a surprisingly short amount of time to get to. For example, in Wano, there's actually a very clear line between stage one and stage two because stage two begins with act two, which in the case of Wano was 16 chapters into the arc. Now that might seem like a very small amount. And if you were binging the series, that would be, you know, nothing. What is that? Like an hour of reading maybe? It's about a volume and a half worth of chapters. However, when reading them weekly, at this point, we would have been invested into the arc for at least four months. And honestly, that's being a little generous. That would be assuming that there was one chapter every week without fail. More realistically, including breaks, we're looking at about five months, maybe even six months at the worst of the worst. But by this five month mark, the setting in and of itself, no longer really holds the power to impress you on its own. Which means that we are very much falling back on the characters and the story to once again do the heavy lifting. And that's fine because in most cases, this is where we really start to flesh out the arc specific conflicts and the stories that are happening. For example, on Dress Rosa, this is where we would investigate Kuros, Rebecca, King Riku, the Tontar tribe, the Colosseum Fighters, et cetera. All of the stuff that's basically designed to achieve the setup for the eventual chaotic action piece later on. But the reason why I call stage two the Maddening Middle is because you never quite know when it's going to end. It's the only stage that doesn't have a distinct flow to it. And it will continue for as long as Oda needs in order to set up his pieces. So in the case of Wano, that happened to be about 31 chapters, which yeah, sure, that's quite a chunk to do in one sitting. However, when doing it weekly, you're looking at almost a full year of publication. Given that at this stage, the yearly average is releasing about 39 chapters. So it takes an awfully long time. And towards the end of the stage, weekly readers are going just a little bit insane, wondering exactly when this setup is going to be complete. But here's the funny thing about stage two. You still won't find a whole lot of strong, dissatisfactory comments going around, which is because there is still quite a bit of good will at play. The general thought is that we need to get through the stuff so that we can get to the good stuff. Everything we're doing right now is fine. So long as it pays off because that sweet, sweet payoff, that's what we're all about, isn't it? Although I'd also like to say that in the Wano specific case, Oda has definitely learned from past experiences of Dressrosa and Hawkeye-Kyland because it was far easier to become fatigued during this stage of those arcs because the setting was quite similar. No matter where you went on Dressrosa, look at all look the same. And Oda did try to spruce that up a tiny bit on Hawkeye-Kyland with the weird Disney vibes and the Mirror World. But the Wano solution is the best one yet. Having created an extraordinarily diverse landscape where every territory looks pretty radically different, that definitely helps the maddening middles somewhat. But after all of this setup, there is still one more roadblock to overcome before any sort of payoff, which presents itself in stage three, the fundamental flashback. This section of the arc is required because generally the big action-packed payoff isn't going to land as powerfully if we don't have an emotional backing behind it. So Oda often prefers to place these flashbacks right before we begin properly tackling the big bat. Like how Law's flashback happened just after we began facing off against Orflamingo, so that when we did eventually cut back to that fight, we were reinvigorated with the desire to bring that flamboyant man down. Or Robin on any slobby, we received her flashback right before we began fighting against CP9. Meanwhile on Hawkeye-Kyland, the fundamental flashback actually belonged to the antagonist, Big Mom, which was different, but still very much served the same function. However, these sections do far more than just cater for the emotional setup. They also provide a much-needed break from the current setting. An event that occurred in a faraway place, in a faraway time to refresh your eyes and your mind. Sort of like a pallet cleanser before we move on to the main course. And to add to that, they also tend to be one of the shorter components of the arc, usually between four to eight chapters, so they don't outstay their welcome either. Although Wano is, well, it's an outlier in that regard, as the Oden flashback consists of 15 chapters, so almost the entirety of Act One, actually, come to think of it. But once again, this section is not only tolerated due to the promise of what's to come immediately after it, which just as a reminder, big action climax, exciting, yay, yay. But this section is also welcomed because it's something different. And by stage three of a Megarock, we really need something different to save us from fatigue. But then there comes a point where stage three is finished and we finally arrive at the part we've been waiting for. The part that makes all one-piece arcs worth it and memorable, the ever-revered stage four, the apathetic action. And that's kind of an underwhelming name, isn't it? Not at all how I remember this part of one-piece arcs. The action-packed climax is like, that's my favorite bit. And generally, yes it is, until you need to experience it weekly. This is where every Megarock encounters its greatest magnitude of hate from the fan base. And once again, it has very little to do with the content of the actual arc itself, but more the pacing. Because these chapters are obviously action-centric and action chapters and episodes, they're phenomenal when you can read them back to back because they feel fast, snappy and satisfying, which is how good action should always be. Get in, do the job, get out. And extending action sequences is one of the most fatiguing experiences that you can possibly put an audience through because there is only so long that you can sustain that level of tension. And furthermore, whilst all of the other fighting is happening, the story itself is not actually progressing. Stage four of the arc lifecycle pretty much freezes one piece in time because nothing else can happen until the roadblock of the antagonist has been dealt with. And this feeling is only exacerbated by the idea that prior to this, in universe time, saw us swiftly moving through days or at the very least hours, whereas in stage four, we are often experiencing events play out by the minute, sometimes by the second. Now, to be fair, there is character development that does occur during stage four. Heroes and villains are like learning about themselves through combat-based encounters, but progress occurs on a subtle macro scale. And unfortunately, it even gets worse because action-based chapters are also by far the shortest in the series. They don't tend to be dialogue heavy and the swiftness of movement as well as more frequent use of double-page spreads means that these chapters can be read far more quickly than those of the previous stages, which only hinders that stagnant stage four feeling further. The weekly chapters feel shorter and no big picture progress is being made. At times, it can feel like the entirety of one piece comes to a complete halt. Fun example, Whole Cake Island. Stage four of this arc was notoriously painful, perhaps even more so than Dressrosa because it took around 35 chapters, which you now know, is about an entire year of publication. So that's one whole year where the state of one piece was completely frozen in time because the plot of every chapter could be described in the exact same way. The straw hats need to escape Totoland. And until they actually do that thing, the story itself does not move on. The characters themselves do have some pretty great moments and this part of the arc really is where all of that juicy personal growth stuff happens. However, it doesn't stop that feeling of stagnation setting in. And all of the action you remember so fondly from binging the series up until now is barely even satisfying because it is so painfully slow to play out on a weekly basis. And the worst part is this is the thing that you'd been telling yourself you wanted. All of the hype and build up from the previous three stages were leading to this. This is the part of the arc that the large majority of one piece fans look forward to the most and it simply cannot meet those expectations with the mandated weekly pacing. Which is why during stage four of every arc we without fail always encounter comments like this. I'm not enjoying this arc at all. It's a clusterf once again because of YouTube with way too many characters, too many plot threads that will most likely not be resolved and too many two week breaks. I honestly think Otis should take a proper holiday and get proper rest so that he can have a fresh perspective on this arc. And this is where we are in Wano right now. Notice that this commenter is worried about plot threads not being resolved. That's because right now not a lot of story can actually take place because we are so busy fighting. So there's a lack of satisfaction there but at the end they also call for a quote unquote fresh perspective on the arc because to them it feels like Wano has stagnated. And unfortunately this is just the nature of the one piece arc structure. Rather counterintuitively the big action focus is always going to feel slower than anything else. But in retrospect, it's going to be appreciated and remembered as one of the great action climaxes in one piece if not anime and manga in general. It always is. Looking back on every arc that was labeled the worst during this point, they have all undergone a renaissance of opinion when they were able to be consumed in bulk. And Wano will be no different. But we're not quite done with the arc life cycle yet because after the inevitable action climax we hit stage five, the epilogue. And this is very much where we get to restart the cycle. The big villain is gone, the country thing is saved. And we're spending a handful of chapters sort of cleaning up as well as having a long way to check in everywhere else in the world. And stage five is generally where some of the most memorable chapters of one piece come from. Stuff like Kaido's introduction, Luffy's 1.5 billion very bounty. The reveal of the dragon is Luffy's father, et cetera. All of that world shaking stuff. This is where we see the big moves and developments that occurred during or as a result of stage four. These chapters send shock waves of pure hype into the fan base, reinvigorating us for the next challenge. A completely unknown island with a new and hyped enemy where we get to encounter the blissful introduction, the maddening middle, the fundamental flashback, the apathetic action and another epilogue all over again. Such is the arc life cycle of one piece. So is Wano the worst arc in one piece? No. In my opinion, it's actually been handled far better than every mega arc that came before it with brilliant consistent setting changes, captivating characters, probably my favorite flashback in the entire series and the promise of incredible things still yet to come. But if you'd like to experience a bit of shorter storytelling, then please do check out this video outlining the lifelong conflict of Shang's versus Blackbeard, a very intriguing subtle story playing out in the background of the series. So I look forward to seeing you there.