One Piece TV SP 8: 3D2Y – Overcoming Ace’s Death! Luffy’s Pledge to his Friends (2014) [REVIEW]

Director: Naoyuki Itou

Writer: Hirohiko Kamisaka, Jin Tanaka, Tomohiro Nakayama

Runtime: 108 minutes

I’d say “SPOILER ALERT”, but it’s not like the title itself even tries to hide it, with the subtitle being “Overcoming Ace’s Death”, and since i have seen people parade this “spoiler” arounds anime cons pretty much anywhere (combined with Jump banking on his life status for later derivative works, like One Piece Novel A).

That aside, with “3D2Y” we’re finally getting started for real, finally talking about quite interesting and intriguing stuff, with some ambition and scope to it, instead of just being an abridged retelling or a cute filler-type mini-story, and utilizing the 2 year time-skip to its advantage, not only to evoke an emotional response, but to fill some of the narrative “gaps” left in the story.

In this case, the special is set during Luffy’s training on Amazon Lily, as he learns to control Haki/Ambition from Silver Rayleigh on the island of Ruskaina. Suddendly Navy ships are being attacked and destroyed by Byrinn World, an incredibly powerful pirate that was betrayed by some of its crew members and was held in Impel Down, but escaped after the Paramount War/Marine Ford events. Now reunited with his older brother and the rest of his crew, World kidnaps Boa and Marigold Sandersonia (Hancock’ sisters), so Luffy and Hancock set out to rescue them from World’s ship, while the other Warlords Of The Sea are summoned to deal with the issue at hand.

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One Piece TV SP 7: Episode Of Merry – The Tale Of One More Friend (2013) [REVIEW]

Director: Katsumi Tokoro

Writer: Hirohiko Kamisaka

Runtime: 106 Minutes

Time for another frigging special that retells with the new animation older story arcs.

In this instance, it’s…not even based on a person, but this is One Piece, so of course the ship itself ends up being a character, important enough to warrant crucial conflict over it, to say without spoiling some surprises for fans that have not yet made their way up to Enies Lobby’s conclusion.

It is the crux of some of the fondest memories for the main characters and i mean, it really speaks of how profoundly One Piece romanticize piracy from the age of conquest. Also, there’s the plain fact of the Going Merry having actually been ranking fairly high in characters popularity polls for the series, heck, even in the most recent one (held from January 3 through February 2021, on a worlwide scale) it ranked 32^th, just below Whitebeard and above Silvers Rayleigh. Amazing.

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One Piece TV SP 6: Episode Of Luffy – Adventure On Hand Island (2012) [REVIEW]

Director: Hiroyuki Morita, Mitsuru Hongo

Writer: Yasuyuki Tsutumi

Runtime: 102 Minutes

Worry not, this time we don’t have another recap special.. kinda.

It’s not totally uncommon, as in 2008 they already did a similar thing with the 9^th One Piece movie about retelling the Drum Island Arc… while making it happen after Water 7, and adding some new characters that change the story a bit. We’ll get to talk in more detail about that… next year.

Well, this special doesn’t actually go that far, as it is an originaly story, but also has extensive flashback sequences retelling the very beginning of the series, with Luffy meeting Shanks for the first time to his first encounter with Coby. The story sees Luffy befriend a wax sculptor called Diego and helping him save his son Regis, imprisoned by the corrupt Marine Commodore Bilic.

This after witnessing a “Straw Hat fashion show” held by Usop, meant to present all the crew members… for reasons, most likely padding out the special by 6 minutes, as if you don’t know anything about these characters while deciding to watch a TV special about their series.

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One Piece TV SP 5: Episode of Nami – Tears of a Navigator and the Bonds of Friends (2012) [REVIEW]

Director: Katsumi Tokoro

Writer: Hirohiko Kamisaka

Runtime: 106 Minutes

Like with the One Piece movies, eventually Toei went for the “lazy” route and decided to occasionaly not even bother writing some new material for these TV specials.

This is not to rag on the Toei animators, writers and such, but i’m sorry, these “recap movies/specials” are lazy from a creative standpoint, they are, and it’s not like they serve much purpose as seeing the same scenes and parts of the story you already saw done with a slightly better animation and production values, all repackaged in an abridged fashion running over 90 minutes.

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[EXPRESSO] The Suicide Squad (2021) | King Shark is in it

Let me preface this by saying i find stupid the whole “release the [director’s name] cut” shtick, and i’m sorry, but i did saw the 2016’s Suicide Squad movie, and it was such a mess nothing would have “saved” it. Look, David Ayer it’s not that bad a director, at all, but he made a crap movie with Suicide Squad.

That’s it, nothing special, it happens and can happen to anyone, the world will go on.

You’re free to pursue this crusade if you will, Ayer has all the right to be happy about it (who wouldn’t?), but i personally don’t “get” it (what you’re gonna do next, request the Proyas’ cut for Gods Of Egypt?), honestly, and i was quite happy to see James Gunn give the concept another go.

So yeah, it’s the same idea of getting together a group of DC supervillains to send in a do-or-die important mission, using the expandable baddies instead of the superheroes themselves, this time tasked to take care of “Project Starfish” on a secluded island instead of an american city.

But yeah, it’s a bit surreal to see the same movie done twice in just a span of 5 years, even more since it has most of the same cast and selection of characters, as it’s supposed to be a sequel to the 2016’s movie, which explains some of it but still comes off as confusing since this is basically a re-do of the concept and doesn’t really require seeing the previous Suicide Squad movie, at all.

Honestly i loved it, it’s such a fun, bloody, stylish and funny take on the concept, it’s not just that it’s the FAR better execution of it so far, but it’s also pretty good on its own, with a lot of style and substance.

[EXPRESSO] Jungle Cruise (2021) | Steamboat Amazon Ride

Time and time again, Disney comes back to the familiar well of turning Disneyland rides-attractions into live action movies, hoping to avoid another The Country Bears and strike that sweet, profitable Pirates Of The Carribean lightning once more.

Can’t say i’ve ever even seen this ride in person, but then again i’m not even sure i even went to Disneyland to begin with, and this doesn’t matter anyway.

This time we have a throwback to 40-50s jungle adventure films, with steamboats, fearless guides with pith helmets, treasures guarded by perilous jungle animals, cursed soldiers, evil german royalty (not nazis since this is set during WWI, but it makes virtually no difference if they were), adventurous researchers and natives in “ethnic get up”. And Dwayne Johnson.

It’s as generic as it looks and as generic as they come, clearly prioritizing spectacle and action in order to avoid the audience NOT being stimulated, even if the scenes don’t call for action, there is it anyway, just shovel it in. This is through and through a manifactured Disney summer blockbuster, as obvious as me pointing it out (as if was needed), and ones expectes it to be just a fun, throw-away experience to kill 90 minutes.

BUT i gotta admit it’s fun, it manages to incorporate ride-like elements into the plot, often giving them some minor little twists to the usual cliches for fun, the cast is clearly overlyqualified for the roles and the dialogues, but they clearly have fun with the stock characters and the often silly lines (or deliberately bad jokes), it made genuinely laugh in more than a couple occasion.

It’s quite cute, it’s pretty much what it says it is, it’s a cute, mild, fun little adventure while it lasts, one you’ll quickly forget in any detail after watching.

One Piece TV SP 2: Open Upon the Great Sea! A Father’s Huge, HUGE Dream! (2003) [REVIEW]

Director: Munehisa Sakai

Writer: Yoshiyuki Suga, Junki Takegami

Runtime: 46 Minutes

Now we’re getting started…kinda, but as this came out when the anime series’ technical quality rose, it’s fair to say it looks better than the previous TV special, and features better presentation overall.

The story see a couple of pirates, Bonnie and Max, tired of working under their captain, Zap, but also have no money or resources to attempt an escape. One of the kidnapped children on the ship, Amanda, overhears them, and proposes a deal to them, since her was a treasure hunter and told her the location of this bounty. They agree, manage to escape to a small island, where the Straw Hats also happen to have landed to see if there’s anything or anyone there.

As the Zap pirates were chasing after the runaways, they find and capture again Amanda… while a narcoleptic Luffy accidentally launches itself into the enemy ship only to fall asleep and it’s also captured and brough to Zap’s boss, Bayan, who wants the treasure Amanda’s father hid for his children. After struggling with the inusual ability of Bayan and his crew, Luffy and company fight the Bayan pirates, find the treasure and Amanda finally understand why her father was never home and why he dedicated so much time and energy on his craft…

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One Piece TV SP 1: Luffy’s Adventure at the Bottom of the Ocean (2000) [REVIEW]

Director: Yukio Kaizawa

Writer: Hashimoto Hiroshi, Junki Takegami

Runtime: 50 minutes

We start your journey through the One Piece anime’s TV specials with one most fans known, and a fairly long one, even if it’s actually on the shorter side for runtime among the TV specials.

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Sky Sharks (2020) [REVIEW] | Gott ist im Himmel

Let’s close this year’s Shark Month with a big bang, shall we?

And frankly i don’t think there’s anything better in that regard as Sky Sharks, a movie you’ve might have heard of but wondered when or if it’s actually coming out.

Borne from a succesful Kickstarter campaign, Sky Sharks was supposed to come out in 2018, but production hit roadblocks, various issues came up, for some time we didn’t hear anything about it at all, but then, in 2020 it resurfaced, complete and was released, even on home video (might have to import it, though).

And it was definitelly worth the wait, since this one of those rare shark movies that sets out to be a big B-movie by design, trying to tick all the usual exploitation-but-awesome points… and actually succeds in living up entirely to its trailer promising flying sharks piloted by undead nazi uber-soldiers, alongside nudity and lots of gore. It’s just missing vampires, a christian-protestant feud, psycho priests with bayonet-blades longer than an arm, but i’m really nitpicking in this case.

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Maneater PS4 [REVIEW] | Megalodon’s Revenge

As a “bonus” to this year’s Shark Month, let’s talk about Maneater, from Tripwire Interactive, of Killing Floor and Red Orchestra fame, as they basically try to make the spiritual sequel of Jaws Unleashed… i would guess, i haven’t played that one yet (strange, i know), but i really can’t think about anything else that would fit the bill for a single player, story focused console/pc release.

I wouldn’t exactly count the Hungry Shark games or Depth, you know, and it’s kinda surprising there haven’t been more attempt at an action game focused on exploration where you play as a shark, so Maneater does fill a very unexplored niche, the open world shark action rpg.

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