One Piece (ワンピース) is the epic pirate themed shonen battle anime based on the manga of the same name by Oda Eiichiro. The fourth story arc of the series, Arrival & Fierce Fighting in Alabasta Island, originally aired between December of 2001 and October of 2002 for a total of 39 episodes, between 92 and 130.
In the the third part the Straw Hat pirates are in desperate need of medical attention for Nami. The first land they find is an eternally snows island who's residents recently gained their independence from a tyrannical king. Finding help is harder than they imagined as the only doctor is a crazed witch and her talking Reindeer Chopper.
With Chopper as part of their crew in the capacity of the ship doctor, they finally land in Vivi's country Alabasta. They land in the first port to gain supplies for their trek across the desert to talk with the rebel leader. Things go sideways from the beginning as Luffy runs off in search of food, getting himself lost in the process. The remaining crew recognizes the danger being in town posses them as the underlings of the Baroque company occupy the sea around the island. To make matters worse they spot Marine captain Smoker and his underlings also searching through the town for Luffy and other pirates to arrest. Smoker is distracted with the appearance of a top level pirate, Ace. Before they can face off against each other Luffy makes a dramatic entrance back from being lost in the desert. Ace is Luffy's brother and the reunion distracts them from the dangers around. Luffy understands his crew has probably escaped the city and heads off with Ace to meet up with them. Happy to see his kid brother after so many years, Ace joins the team as they prepare to cross the unforgiving desert wastes.
The desert proves to be more treacherous than the pirates anticipated, full of dangers and traps at every turn. As they overcome giant creatures, sudden dust storms and friendly sand pirates, the top members of the Baroque Works gather to finalize their leaders plans for the island nation. Just as the Straw Hats reach their target village, they learn that the rebel army has moved location, making their journey across the desert pointless. Vivi is trying to meet with the rebel leader, to use their past as a leverage to get him to back down from his fight. With time running out, Luffy convinces Viv that the most important thing to do now is to defeat Baroque Works, hoping this will stop the coming civil war before it begins.
The crew runs into more unexpected trouble on their way to the capital city. Captain Smoker and his Marines have anticipated where they will be and have waited to capture them. Unfortunately for all of them, the leader of Baroque Works, Crocodile, has captured all of them instead. The Marine Captain calls a truce with the pirates as they work together to escape, Crocodile having left to execute his take over of Alabasta. Knowing at least part of his plan they head to the capital city to try and stop him. The plan appears to be set in place and the agents are waiting for them to come, fearing the trap wouldn't do its job. The crew has to spread out to deal with each encounter, hoping to make it in time to cut off the plans before its too late. The struggle engulfs the entire city as the rebels arrive to make their move, facing against the royal forces. As the plan begins to unfold they scramble to try and keep the casualties as low as possible but hope diminishes with each passing minute and a threat of utter annihilation at hand.
This is the first cohesive and draw out plot line that has appeared in the series up to this point and in all honesty it was handled rather well. Sure they wasted quite a bit of time meandering about in various desert locations, but it ultimately did little to drag the story to unbearable levels. Part of my feelings on the quality of this arc is probably due to being able to binge all of it, instead of struggling 20 minutes at a time for three quarters of a year. That would have probably been annoying. But to be able to just crush through the entire thing in a few days is the ideal approach.
Once again we get to see Oda flex his freak flag with all of the absurd and over the top Baroque Works members, each presenting their own unique and clearly pointless skills against the heroes of the story. Yet, each battle isn't stretched out to the point of tedium and seem to stick with in the realm of acceptable stupidity that already exists in the world of One Piece. Its so hard to take the story serious when everyone in it is so comically designed. There's all sorts of badasses walking around but even their machismo is overshadowed by how insane they look and behave. You really can't take this story serious to the point you do with its peers in the industry. Everyone's just such an idiot!.
Even though it was a pretty good story arc, I'm glad to be past it and moving on to something else. We begin the next segment with a bit of a blank slate, aside from the notoriety of Luffy and his misfit crew growing. Now they have a much harder time hiding who they are as they continue their journey through the abyssal expanse of the Grand Blue...hunting for the elusive One Piece, something they haven't even started to do. Which is a bit of a problem. The story really doesn't advance us anywhere towards the actual goal of the series. They have no idea where to even begin looking for the One Piece and haven't even considered searching for those clues. They just got wrapped into a crazed plot by a bunch of obsessive weirdos...so they can be forgiven for being a bit distracted, but it will be interesting to see how long it takes for them to actually take the next step...really the second step in their long journey.
Next up, Part 5 Dreams!, The Zenny Pirate Crew Sortie!, Beyond the Rainbow.
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