One Piece East Blue 1-2-3 cover image is courtesy of barnesandnoble.com.

Rated “T” for Teen

Fans of the popular shonen manga, One Piece, are well acquainted with its premise.  When he was a child, Monkey D. Luffy was stirred by the stories the pirate, “Red-Haired” Shanks told to him.  Luffy dreamed of being a pirate, but not just any pirate; he wanted to be the King of Pirates.  However, Luffy found the Gum-Gum Fruit, an enchanted “Devil Fruit” that Shanks had brought on his ship, and ate it.  The Gum-Gum Fruit gave Luffy the ability to stretch like rubber, but it took away his ability to swim, a serious handicap for someone who wanted a life at sea

Years later, Luffy still set out to sea.  He gradually enlists a motley crew:  Roronoa Zolo the master swordsman; Nami, the treasure-hunting thief; Usopp, the sharpshooter who loves to tell lies; Sanji, the high-kicking chef; Chopper, the walkin’ talkin’ reindeer doctor; and crafty archeologist, Nico Robin.  Luffy and crew sail the oceans in their ship, the Merry Go, searching for the legendary treasure known as “One Piece.”

One Piece: East Blue 1-2-3 collects the first three volumes of One Piece.  Volume 1 opens a decade before the main events of the series.  Readers see Luffy as a boy, enthralled by the stories of “Red-Haired” Shanks and wanting the life of a seadog for himself.  A decade later, Luffy sets sail in a dingy, gets his nickname (“Straw Hat”), and battles the lady pirate, Iron Mace Alvida.  He also meets Zolo and Nami.  Volume 2 introduces Buggy the Clown and depicts Luffy’s outrageous conflict with him, which carries into Volume 3, where readers also meet Usopp.

For the most part, I enjoy One Piece.  Some volumes are pure fun and feature so much fantastic, comedic invention.  Other volumes are pretty good, but the weirdness just doesn’t connect with me the way a rousing volume of Naruto or Bleach does.  However, I can say that I unequivocally love One Piece: East Blue 1-2-3.  Perhaps, I needed to read the early volumes of One Piece to have a better understanding of the series as a whole.  I’ve certainly enjoyed East Blue more than I have any other volume of One Piece.

Everything that makes One Piece so popular:  the weirdo characters, the exotic locales, the surreal battles, and the plucky Luffy and the crew of the Merry Go are obviously in evidence here.  What makes One Piece: East Blue 1-2-3 such a good read is watching the series all come together from the beginning.  Page by page, the magic that makes One Piece grows before our eyes into a narrative spell that binds the imagination.

A