One Piece Volume 1, Chapter 1 manga review

Title: Romance Dawn
Author/Artist: Eiichiro Oda

What Happens:

We start off with a quick exposition of Gold Rogers execution which kicked off the Pirate Age.

Then the story makes a time jump to introduce us to Monkey D. Luffy, a young boy who wants to join Shanks' pirate crew. Shanks and his crew treat him like the kid he is to his dismay. A group of mountain bandits come to town and try to pick a fight with Shanks and his crew. They do not fall for the taunts and the bandits leave.

Luffy gets angry at Shanks and his crew for not fighting the bandits, thinking that they were showing weakness. As he mopes he ends up eating a Devil Fruit and gains the ability to stretch his body but loses the ability to swim.

While Shanks and his crew are off on the sea Luffy gets into a fight with the mountain bandits, putting himself in danger. Shanks and crew return to this and the leader of the bandits kidnaps Luffy to try to make a getaway when the pirates prove they are not the push overs he thought them to be.

The bandit takes Luffy out on the water and Shanks follows. On the water the bandit finds out there is something else to worry about as a sea monster appears. It eats the bandit but Shanks stops it from getting Luffy as well by staring it down. In the process though he does end up losing an arm.

As Shanks and his crew head off to sea a few days later Luffy goes to see them off. Luffy tells Shanks that he is fine with not joining his crew as he will gather his own when he heads out to be a pirate himself when he is older. Shanks gives him his hat and asks Luffy to return it to him when they meet again on the sea.

We then get a time skip of ten years as Luffy heads out on his journey. He starts it off by defeating the sea monster and the chapter ends as Luffy's journey begins.

Why It Matters:

The way Shanks handles the mountain bandits is something to take note of as it is a theme that can be seen throughout the series. And that is that there is a strength to not fighting. Especially if it is over something that is inconsequential and could cause problems for others.

We get the first use of the Haki power in the series as Shanks uses it against the sea monster. Haki does not get brought up for some time but it is nice to see it being tied back to something so early on in the story.

Review:

This chapter is not Oda's first take on Luffy's origin as he had an earlier version that was published as a one-shot before getting the green light to make One Piece into a Weekly Shonen Jump series. There are massive differences between the two but you can see where some of the ideas from that earlier take is worked into this version while other elements are used in some of the other early stories in the series.

That said I do prefer this version of Romance Dawn, even though it mostly sticks to focusing on the past to explain how Luffy ended up with his powers. But it lays out the groundwork and tone of the series well and lets the reader see Luffy's motivation instead of just telling us, which is always a sign of good story telling.

As a lover of character driven stories this introduction chapter hits all the right buttons for me. It gets the reader to become invested in Luffy as we follow him grow with this experience and give us a clear understandable reason for wanting to go out and become a pirate.

Honestly if you feel nothing while reading this chapter than it is probably a sign that the series may not be for you. If you are at least slightly interested in seeing what happens next then I would recommend sticking around for a few volumes as the series. This is a nice little start to a grand adventure.