One Piece episode 1094 has a few bright spots, but doesn't quite satisfy for the runtime.
The majority of this episode is honestly the costume change section. Much like with Luffy and co, the remainder of the Straw Hats (well, except Zoro and Brook) head into Egghead Island to get on new outfits to fit the environment. This is standard stuff as far as One Piece goes - sometimes we get an explanation, other times it just happens without much fanfare. This is a case of the former and I'm not all that convinced it was a worthwhile use of time. There's the “monkey brain see Robin: neuron activate” dimension for me, but I don't think there's much enjoyment in spending this much time with a wardrobe overhaul. Especially when I think the results are… mixed, at best. I really like the retrofuture aesthetic of the Egghead Island arc thus far and I like a lot of individual components for the outfits (the smooth Astro Boy-like boots and headsets in particular) but I think most of the crew's outfits are less than the sum of their parts. This is a shame, given how I usually look forward to the new costumes with each arc.
There's a good chunk of character beats in 1094 that also fall flat. The discussion about Kuma and Bonney's relationship with him, the hijinks with Luffy and co getting age-changed, the petty fights with Usopp and Sanji outside the changing room - in theory, these could work, and they're not bad per se, they just didn't work for me. The biggest bright spot by far was the crew discovering what an escalator was, I thought all those bits were pretty hilarious.
Even the action sequences were rather ho-hum this week. A pacifista running around shooting a laser over and over again is not engaging, sadly. Hopefully, next week's episode will spice things up again for us.
Rating:
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