One Piece: Alabasta Arc Review

One Piece: Alabasta Arc

I've always wanted to see what happened in the Alabasta arc, but I figured if I was gonna watch the entire thing without commercials interrupting it, I would purchase the FUNimation dub instead of the dub from that company whose name shall not be mentioned. That, and I didn't feel like reading subtitles--it takes away from the experience for me.

Although, before I get into the Alabasta arc as a whole, I would just like to get a few things out of the way--ADR processes on FUNimation's part, and my opinion on One Piece project as a whole.

The dubbing for these episodes have just simply been AMAZING! Whoever was in charge of direction and scripting in the ADR department did their job well. I have not once noticed a half-heart or poor attempt at a single part in this series yet. And the same applies to the Alabasta Arc as well. Everyone at FUNimation did an extraordinary job, and anyone who likes One Piece should buy their DVDs.

And then there is One Piece, Eiichiro Oda's most praised manga and anime series. Without a doubt, this has been one of my most favorite anime series to date. Not only is it action-packed, but it balances out the more emotional parts, and it takes a really good script writing and execution to get you to actually care about an animated character, which is quite an accomplishment. I almost cried at a few points during the series--it was THAT good.

Me talking about it doesn't do it much justice at all so I honestly think you guys should go watch it if you ever want to know why anyone loves One Piece. However, here's a few things you might want to take into consideration.

For one, the emotions are sometimes over-exaggerating--but it's still funny nevertheless--and executed quite well, in my opinion. Next, there may sometimes be a lack of physics, but in an awesome way. If you can suspend the idea of a law of realism in your mind, you can enjoy this series. There are quite a few moments where people can actually move around while in the air, or make imprints in the wall of themselves, but when these things happen, they are done really, REALLY well.

Also, if you've seen pictures of this series, you'll notice that it has a cartoon-ish look to it. I understand that there might be a lot of people who really dislike the cartoon look. If any of you can get over the cartoon-ish look of the series, I highly recommend at least renting the First Voyage.

Another thing is the little sequences that pop up before each episode, the ones that recap the last episode. The only reason these should EVER be around is if the series has disappeared for a long time and is only now just reappearing, you know, like maybe 2 years. There is no reason why I should have to re-watch the same scenes I saw last episode. And while I'm at it, it's also pointless to include a 'next-episode' sequence as well at the end of each episode. I guess I can see why it might be necessary considering it might be used for hyping up the next episode, but you don't need it. It's meaningless to have it up, especially on a DVD. Just leave both sequences out of the next DVD. They take away too much time.

And while we're talking about the DVD, the one gripe I have is that when I skip chapters, they skip over a lot of the beginning recap sequences, which isn't a bad thing, but it also skips over most of the beginning of the episode as well, which can be annoying. Meaning I have no choice but to watch the entire recap sequence if I want to watch the entire episode as a whole. This needs to be fixed NOW!

Also, one last tiny thing: this does not include the events of Whiskey Peak, Little Garden, and Drum Island. They are arcs of their own accord. Now with that out of the way, let's move on to the actual arc.

This arc is probably the longest of the series that I've seen so far. I do feel that it was kinda dragged on by certain events, even if they were meant to add to the atmosphere to the situation. Aside from that, these last 3 voyages were pretty good, if not, interesting.

Last they had just recruited Tony Tony Chopper--a human-reindeer with the ability to transform into different forms of physical abilities via Devil Fruit powers--into their crew. Now having a doctor to tend to their wounds if anything bad happens, they sail towards Alabasta in the hopes of returning Vivi to her home to stop the inevitable war that might break out between her kingdom and the rebellion, and to expose Baroque Works as the ones scheming this entire situation.

I won't say the details about everything that happens in their journey, but all I can say is that all the events involving Baroque Works will all come full-circle with the appearance of the Straw Hat crew--who traverse the desert to make their way to the main rebellion base in Yuba. They also meet tons of new friends along the way--some of whom I hope will be mentioned later in the series.

And above all else, they finally meet Crocodile--a maniacal man known as one of the Seven Warlords of the Sea, who wields the Devil Fruit powers of sand--the mastermind behind Baroque Works aka Number Zero. Not gonna spoil why he wants the Kingdom and it's people out of the way, but let's just say that it involves some important secret to the Alabasta King and is the precursor to a new member joining their team.

Although I did say that the episodes drag on a bit, it's still not so jarring that it'll make you stop watching it all together. And when there is action, it is done fairly well even if it does defy physics. There is even a point where Sanji hits someone so hard with his foot, that it actually causes an excruciating amount of pain within their body, forcing them to fling himself against a wall to cancel out the pain. It only gets even better when Zoro tries to cut steel and even better when Luffy figures out how to hit Crocodile.

Overall, it's an enjoyable arc. Although it could have been shortened a bit, but I find that it progresses just fine enough to resolve the main plot points in it, and make room for new ones in the next voyage. Here's hoping that all of you would enjoy it too.

Credit to Devils-Lock for proofreading my review! You shall all now visit her DeviantART page and praise her! ^^; http://devils-lock.deviantart.com/

Thinking about it.

I am seriously contemplating whether I should record footage from SWAT 4 and post it up here. I mean holy crap! These guys just tear the place up. Hell, their was one time a guy just tripped and he died. And another time a guy fell and his gun just started spiraling out of control towards my direction. It's hilarious! But their are a few reasons why I don't want to do this. For one, I don't have Sony Vegas, and the last trial version I installed told me I only had about 15 days to use it, so I uninstalled the program.

I don't want to seem like I rip off a very popular internet reviewer, and maybe it isn't considered ripping him off for just posting up game footage, but I still think I should probably ask before putting up a Let's Play. But in any case, I'm wondering what anyone that actually follows me might think.

Scheduling!

Alright, I think it's about time I set up a schedule for doing text reviews. Perhaps not as enlightening as video reviews, but hey, I've gotta see if anyone will actually listen to what I have to say first. So in the meantime, I'll be doing a few text reviews each month. To me, this is just a project to see if I can keep up with my schedule, and still dish out reviews on different games. So here's the list for next week and onward!

03/23 - One Piece Alabasta Arc (FUNimation dub)
03/31 - Final Fantasy 13
04/08 - Dynasty Warriors 6 Empires
04/16 - SaGa Frontier Part 1
04/24 - Legend of Legaia
05/01 - Let's Play: Bioshock

And that's all I have planned for the moment. Now, if you will excuse me, I have DVD's to watch!

Rumbling with the Big Sister

Not really much of a rumble, especially if the Big Sister's health is already 4/5th's depleted. That, and I'm not really fighting her, more or less the Big Daddy Rumbler is. Point being, just enjoy the video.



Edit: Here is an extra!

Excommunicate?!

Have a nice day! ^^

Edit: When questioned about it:

Where has the time gone?

Okay! So, where do I begin?

I've been sitting around for a while thinking of a few different ideas. But although they are okay ideas, I lack the grammar and sentence structuring abilities to write them into words. So I'm in a bit of a jam via writing. But I can do scripts. Or at least I would like to. Never been much of a screenplay writer (btw, screenplay and scripts are the same thing, aren't they? That's always bothered me), but I do know how to instruct. I'm trying to go for more of a comedic, yet informative feel to producing movie and game reviews, like what Atop the Fourth Wall does, without blatantly ripping them off. I have actually found a website that shows off drafts or completed scripts for everyone to gaze at. Kinda lost the link though. I'll probably find it via Google anyway.

So what to do? I think I'll try writing up a few text reviews soon. I have a few games I've been wanting to review for a while now. Although, as beaten to death as they already have been, I think I still want to offer my two cents. So stay tuned!