#One piece marineford arc series
And compared with arcs that can be compared in terms of length, like Jaya, it's an unpopular opinion but for me that arc was executed faultlessly and captured the essence of what One Piece as a series is fundamentally about so much more than MF.ġ. which have much more actual storytelling, plot and character exploration & development, it just can't compete on that level as far as I'm concerned. But it didn't try to do nearly as much as the greatest of the series- compared with Skypiea, Arabasta, EL etc. The last and greatest flame of the age past going out in a giant blaze - the sad death of a young man who had it in him to stand at the top of the new - the establishing of the new era's great pirate terror and the man who will lead a more determined and harsher Marines - and the old guard making a last stand to protect the one they and their fallen comrades believed in to carry him to the next era as well.Īll of this was conveyed very well and that's why MF was a definitive success, if not a flawless one, as an arc in terms of what it tried to accomplish. Even though it was the climax of part 1 it was also a precursor, it set the stage for the next era even as it ended the current age. The best parts about it were 1) the successful conveyance of the generally great scale and scope of the events going down, and 2) the presentation of characters like Whitebeard, Ace, Luffy, Blackbeard and Akainu.
It did have emotional moments, but they were almost exclusively tied to two events: the death of Ace, and the betrayal, struggle and eventual death of Whitebeard. Characters were presented well, but with a few exceptions rather shallowly, because there wasn't much time to focus. I do think it's a far cry from the best arc of OP however. It isn't nearly as egregious in a war arc as it is on current Dress Rosa, but I think the arc would have nonetheless been improved with a bit more focus and fleshing out the major participants more.
I would sooner think the most major issue was the disjointed storytelling and presentation of the actual fighting being done. What MF could have done to make events seem relatively natural, it generally did do. Problems that it did have - contrivances and plot-shield - aren't strictly faults of the arc itself, they're tied into the much larger issue of how Oda has handled escalating power levels across the series (not horribly, but not particularly well either). I did not dislike it, I think it did most of the things it set out to do in a pretty great way. Weird impression to have of the consensus considering MF is probably the most popular arc alongside EL in terms of people who consider it the best.