One Piece (Volume 1) – Romance Dawn

When Gold Roger was executed by the Marines, his final act was to cause chaos. He revealed that his treasure was out there for anyone worthy enough to find it. It was the beginning of the Great Pirate Era!

One Piece (Volume 1) – Romance Dawn

What happened?

Monkey D. Luffy was a child with a dream and that dream was to become King of the Pirates. Of course, few took him seriously. The pirates that had made his home their base for the past year enjoyed his company but refused to take him out to sea with them. Then, some mountain bandits came into the bar and caused some trouble. Luffy was upset that Shanks and his crew sat back and let it happen. Shanks tried to explain that sometimes it’s more manly to not fight back. You can’t fight over every little detail. It was just booze and food. Even calling him names was meaningless.

However, Luffy got into a fight with the bandits the next time he saw them, and having eaten the Gum-Gum Devil Fruit, he was sure he could regain Shank’s honour. The bandits were in no mood to play and planned on killing Luffy. That’s when Shanks and his crew got back and showed that there was a line and the mountain bandits had crossed it. Their leader escaped to sea with Luffy as a hostage. However, a sea monster appeared and ate him and the boat. It came for Luffy next, but Shanks saved him, losing an arm in the process.

Others might not believe that Luffy would achieve much but Shanks and his crew knew better. Ten years later, Luffy set out to find the One Piece. First, he’d need to find a good crew, and a ship, and survive a whirlpool, and defeat a pirate, and defeat a marine. Basically, he had a lot to do!

One Piece Volume 1 Luffy punches a sea monster

What did you think?

I began my One Piece journey back in 2018 when I started a crazy challenge that I called One Piece a Day! Basically, my goal was to become the King of the Pirates… no, that’s not it. I was going to watch one episode of One Piece every day until I had caught up, which should have taken me about three years. Anyhow, I got up to episode 574 before taking a break. I also started reading the manga but only got to volume five. Recently, I started re-watching One Piece, but this time with my kids. It’s slower going, but I think they’re enjoying it.

Anyhow, I’m starting the manga again and this time, I’m going to the end. One quick observation is that the events in the book don’t quite go in the same order as the anime. We start off with young Luffy and Shank’s crew before getting a ten-year time skip to when Luffy sets sail on his own. I actually liked this way of doing it, even with my general dislike of time skips. It’s possible that I dislike flashbacks even more. Then, the scene with Alvida was completely different except for the conversation between Luffy and Koby.

Overall, this is a nice way to open the story. I like that we’re meeting the new characters slowly which gives us a chance to get to know them and how they will fit into everything. Some stories seem to want to throw a dozen characters at you at once and hope you’ll love them all. I think you get a much better sense of who they are when the author takes the time to introduce them. Well, I’ve got quite an adventure ahead of me, so I’ll be setting sail!