One Piece Every Day is a column where I read a chapter of One Piece every single day—more or less—and discuss my thoughts on it. Each entry will have spoilers up to the chapter covered in that day’s column.
Please keep in mind that many other readers are also first-timers. Do NOT spoil anything beyond this point in the comments!
I have to be honest, until now I haven’t been entirely on board with this arc. “Guy with a big nose learns not to lie” is….well, it’s pretty far away from my usual interests as a manga reader.
Today, secret murder plans get involved. That is drama I’m here for.
No wacky misunderstandings here; Klahadore has been going deep cover for the past three years as part of a winding long con to bump his ostensible mistress off and take her vast fortune. That weird backwards-walking hypnotist guy from last chapter is, of course, also in on it. As for Klahadore; there is no Klahadore. It’s a persona. His real name? Captain Kuro.
Despite his protests, I will be calling him “Kuro” from here on out, because it is easier to spell than Klahadore. Kuro’s plan is rather elaborate. Overly so, I might even say, given that it also involves Django’s hypnotism powers.
This step seems a bit unnecessary to me. Maybe it betrays a lack of confidence on Kuro’s part in his own plan? Maybe he’s just paranoid. In any case, the predictable happens; Luffy shouts from atop the cliff that they can’t do this thing, because the Silly Putty Pirate has never met a knot of rope he wouldn’t try to slash in half with a cutlass.
Although in this case, he meets something that being made out of rubber can’t help with. As he rushes down the cliffside, Django hypnotizes him—and also himself—and the two conk out simultaneously. Leading Usopp to play the role of the boy who cried….well you know.
Predictably, nobody does believe him, other than his own three little buddies. Zolo, though, notices that Luffy’s gone missing, and I suspect that no matter what Kuro may have planned, he’s probably not accounting for a guy with three swords.
Tomorrow: A guy with three swords saves Luffy’s straw hatted hide. (Probably.)
Also this.
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Yes, one of my favorite things about Usopp is all the references to Western culture and children’s stories in his background. Like how both Usopp and his father Yasopp get their names from Aesop’s fables, and Usopp’s name is a combination of Uso (to lie or fib in Japanese) and Aesop. How Usopp’s dad is a sharpshooter and in colloquial English a sharpshooter/straight shooter is someone that is very honest, and Usopp wants to be more like his dad which parallels his desire to be more honest. How Usopp gets his long nose from his mom (long nose, reference to Pinocchio) who also used to tell elaborate stories to Usopp about his dad. It’s so much fun to catch all the little Easter eggs in Usopp’s background. I’m sure there’s even more references I haven’t noticed yet!
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CATBOY CREW LETS GOOOOO
also I do have to defend Usopp. He’s not simply another example of the boy who cried wolf, he’s a direct reference to the writer Aesop of the Aesop’s tales! Not a liar but a story teller! Someone who inspires the weak and teaches moral lessons to children! Very important when your target audience is like 9 years old and think they’re too old for picture books but still develop their morality from stories
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