One Piece (2026-)

Episode 1170

Episode 1170 of One Piece is another triumph of weekly animation prowess.

Before dessert, let's eat our vegetables. The events this week are a diverse grab-bag of tones. Action, flashbacks, character moments, teeing up the big events to come - there's bound to be some sliver of the runtime that appeals to you even if the whole thing doesn't. For my money, I had a great time with all of it. The divided nature gives less time to really dig into any individual portion of course; despite that, I thought the net effect kept things entertaining and novel throughout.

The Scopper Gaban fight was terrific. It's interesting how the high visual fidelity is normal to me now, as the Toei team has continued to set an incredibly high bar for themselves (especially in the post-Wano era). The fluidity of the movement, the expressive character work, the deadly feel of the attacks, and all the other minor details add together to create the kind of vibrancy once reserved only for films and OVAs. Everybody gets a bit of shine here, with Scopper showing us the old dude still has it, while Luffy and Zoro are just about to rev things up when things draw to a close.

The real star of the show for me was the environmental destruction. It was a very smart call to use the castle to shape the fight. The oversized pillars and railings provided interesting terrain for Luffy to jump around on or swing from, creating a good sense of movement and making an otherwise standard flurry-of-blasts type attack seem as though it was more of a tactical exercise. The use of the exterior shots was rather brilliant too. By cutting to shots outside the castle, it could add a moment where the viewer could register what their eyes had just seen, then have a giant explosion sell the scale of the attack. Plus the speed of the attacks when following Luffy juxtaposed with the time delay before they would hit the outer wall helped relay how tiny they are in comparison to the Elbaph castle.

Then, of course, the tumbling masonry became the transition piece to the other events. Shamrock and Gunko do moody bad guy things like summoning evil eldritch… knights?! Another fun sleight of hand where the contrast between the voices and the visuals helped add to the tension before the comedic pop of the knights realizing they had been transported unawares. It's all around beautifully rendered and carefully executed (despite what the flurry of color and motion might lead one to believe).

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