The Absurdity of the One Piece SBS (Volume 5)

Added: 2026-06-07

[00:00:00]Yo, what's going on guys? Zach here bringing you guys a brand new video. And today we're here to continue a series that's going to be running for quite a long time here on the channel. About a month ago at this point, I started a series where I plan on covering each SPS section that we've ever gotten in the volume releases of One Piece, one volume at a time. In all honesty, the first video in this series didn't perform all that well. Link to it in the description, but it was a video that I enjoyed making, so I'm fine with continuing the series. And as I said in that first video, I truly believe this series is only going to get more interesting with each passing volume that we cover, especially since I don't own very many physical copies of the volumes myself. That means that this series will be the first time that I really see this additional information about the series. And I had a lot of fun last time, even though all the information that we learned was from the early series. With that being said, last time we covered all the SPS sections from volume 4 of One Piece, so it only makes sense that this time we'll be covering all the sections from volume 5.

[00:00:55]Volume 4 also took me a lot longer to cover than I expected it to, so I know how long this video could potentially be before just hopping into the writing process, which means that we should just probably hop right into things today.

[00:01:06]Now, for those of you that know stuff about the SPS, you know that I must have been talking out of my ass when it came to how long this video could potentially be because it turns out that volume 5 only has SPS sections after three of the chapters in the volume. To put things into perspective, volume 4 only had eight separate SPS sections. So, I think it only makes sense that I thought that that would be the case for each volume moving forward, especially since volume 4 was the first ever appearance of the SPS in the first place. With that being said, the first SPS section of volume 5 isn't even your typical SPS section, as Oda just gave us information about the first OVA instead. This means that we'll be talking about the first OVA in this video as well, and I'll basically be giving you guys a synopsis because I don't really know much about it either.

[00:01:49]Take down the Pirate Ganzac, also known as Defeat Him: The Pirate Ganzac and Defeat the Pirate Ganzac, was the first animated adaptation of One Piece, an original video animation produced by production IG. It was originally released in the summer of 1998 with a limited screening across Japanese theaters as it predates the Tolli anime.

[00:02:08]This OVA features cell animation instead of the digital ink and paint and different voice actors. It also doesn't adapt or reference any specific story from the manga, though its setting vaguely fits the period between the Orangetown arc and the syrup village arc. A drift in a small boat on a sunny windless day, Luffy, Nami, and Zoro sit paralyzed with hunger. As Nami berates the two men for squandering the month's provisions, a plesiosaur suddenly attacks, snapping their boat in half.

[00:02:36]Overjoyed at this new source of meat, Luffy and Zoro prepare to counterattack, but are quickly overpowered and swept away in the tide. While a panicking Luffy drags Zoro deeper and deeper down, the monster carries Nami off. Sometime later, a half-drown Luffy washes up on an island. Here, two pirates, Alto and Chico, prepare to loot his body, only to be challenged by Madaka, a small, heavily armored girl who demands they return her father. Though unimpressed, the pirates are annoyed enough to give chase and unwittingly trample Luffy enough times to force all the water from his lungs. Waking in rage, Luffy beats the pair senseless and promptly collapses from hunger. Odd, Madaka brings Luffy and hatesly found Zoro into the local village where an elder named Skid offers them food. Skid warns them of Ganzac, a vicious pirate whose crew has enslaved the whole island. While the women, children, and elders have been left in the village as hostages, all the able-bodied men, including Madaka's father, Herring, have been put to work in the so-called Devil's Tower on the far shore. These accounts are interrupted by a tremor from the devil's tower, which spills Luffy's meal, the last the villages spare food. When Madaka suggests that the devil's tower might contain more, and excited Luffy immediately rushes off with her, followed by an exasperated Zoro.

[00:03:52]Infiltrating the tower, the trio find an armory inside with Ganzac's men forcing the villagers to build guns and cannons.

[00:03:59]The tremors had come from artillery tests fired from the tower's mouth.

[00:04:03]Heedless of danger, Madaka cries out to her father as soon as she finds him, alerting dozens of hostile pirates.

[00:04:10]Unfazed, Luffy and Zoro eagerly meet the challenge until a mass figure suddenly appears and takes Madaka. While Zoro holds off Ganzac's men, Luffy chases Madaka's kidnapper out of the tower and down to the shore, only for the kidnapper to reveal herself as Nami. At first, puzzled, Luffy is shocked when the plesiosaur reemerges with a pirate in crablike armor at top it. This pirate is none other than Ganzac, and Nami has already thrown her allegiance to him.

[00:04:36]Defiant, Luffy proves an even match for both Ganzac and the Plesiosaur, but eventually falls when Ganzac's armor sprays an adhesive foam that binds his entire body. Shortly after, Ganzac's men force Zoro to surrender by threatening to fire on the slaves. As Zoro is taken away in chains, Herring quietly reassures his fellow slaves, showing that he has smuggled some dynamite out of the pirate stores. Soon, Luffy, Zoro, and Madaka find themselves shackled to a wall, forced to watch the Ganzac pirates, and a disinterested Nami feast and party. When Luffy continues to defy him, an annoyed Ganzac seizes Luffy's hat and stomps on it. Enraged, Luffy shouts that the hat is a treasure entrusted to him by Shanks, and to Madaka's surprise, proudly declares himself a pirate. Moments later, an explosion rocks the tower as Herring leads the other villagers out in open rebellion. While the Ganzac pirates rush outside to quell the villagers, Nami cheerfully approaches the shackled trio, returns Luffy's hat, and presents the keys to their shackles. All along, she had meant to double cross Ganzac. Once freed, however, Madaka immediately runs off alone. Now, considering Luffy and his friends no better than Ganzac's crew. Outside, having easily crushed the rebellion, Ganzac prepares to execute Herring as an example to the other slaves. As Herring braces himself, Madaka jumps in the way. her armor deflecting Ganzac's bullet. Unimpressed, Ganzac unshaths the bladed pincers on his own armor, ready to kill both father and daughter until Luffy, Zoro, and Nami join the fry. The crew's arrival reinvigorates the villagers attack, spurring Ganzac to reveal his ultimate weapon, the Devil's Tower itself. At his signal, the Plesiosaur towes the tower along with him and his crew apart from the rest of the island, revealing it to be the main cannon on a massive warship.

[00:06:25]To the villagers horror, a single shot from this cannon sinks a good part of the island, and Ganzac means to keep shooting until he sinks it all. As Luffy and Zoro prepare to engage, Herring desperately tries to hold Madaka back.

[00:06:37]Though touched by her father's concern, Madaka refuses to stay behind and grabs on as Luffy rock himself and Zoro onto the ship. On board, Zoro engages Ganzac's men while Luffy confronts Ganzac himself a top the main mast. Now prepare for the projectiles in Ganzac's armor. Luffy presses his advantage until Ganzac binds him in a long powerful chain. Gloating, Ganzac swings his pincers for a killing blow, only for Madaka to once again block him and fall.

[00:07:05]Her armor unable to withstand the razor sharp blades. Spurred on by her sacrifice, Luffy shatters his chains and forces Gansac into melee, quickly overpowering him and his armor with Gou Nosuchi. Soon after, Luffy finds Madaka applauding, cheerfully, revealing that Gansack had only sliced off the top half of her helmet. Meanwhile, Zoro finishes off the last of Ganzac's men and prepares to confront the plesiosaur, but is beaten to it by a small fleet composed of Nami, Herring, and the rest of the villagers. Together, they send a small fire ship filled with the Ganzac pirate spare dynamite against the Plesiosaur, sinking both it and Ganzac's warship. Refusing to admit defeat, Gansac struggles to his cannon and fires one last shot at the island, all while proclaiming himself as the future pirate king. In response, Luffy scornfully punches him into the sky on a collision course with his own shell. As Ganzac is swallowed by a huge explosion, Madaka helps Luffy off of the sinking warship and back to the island. Sometime later, the crew prepared to depart, the grateful villagers having supplied them a new boat and plenty of food. Though Nami remains disappointed over Ganzac's lack of valuables. To Luffy's surprise, Madaka runs up with her own gift, a life preserver. As she teases Luffy about his hammer status, Nami and Zoro quietly smile at the thank you scrolled on the gift's underside. With Madaka's encouragement, the crew sail off into the sunset, hopes aimed at the Grand Line. Now, as some of you guys can probably tell, that was the synopsis of the first One Piece OVA from the One Piece fandom. mainly because it isn't easy to find an OVA from 1998 and I wanted to give you guys as much information as possible. Even though I do own a copy of One Piece volume 5, I couldn't find it for some reason. And since I just went on this tangent, there definitely has to be someday in the future where I cover that very first OVA after actually watching it. It definitely seems interesting enough, and it might even be featured in a video where I cover all of the OVAs in a single sitting, especially since YouTube really rewards movie length videos these days. With that being said, it was really interesting to learn the stuff about One Piece's first OVA that I did for this video. But we do have two more chapters left to cover when it comes to the SPS for volume 5. And those two chapters actually features questions like a normal SPS section. Chapter 42 is the first of two chapters in this volume that has a real SPS section. And it actually has some questions for us to talk about. It actually begins with Otis saying this. Hello. I might as well start the SPS corner now. Stand. Be careful. Okay, stay there. In all honesty, I'm happy that the series is the only one on this channel where I have to do any kind of voice acting, no matter how terrible it might be, especially with some of the insane questions that I'm for sure going to have to cover. With that being said, our first real question goes something like this. I have an inquiry, sensei. Doesn't the first mate on Shanks' ship have a name? And also, the meat guy. This seems like an insanely basic question based on what we know about the red-haired pirates these days, but this was definitely a really interesting question back when volume 5 first dropped.

[00:10:06]Anyway, this question sees Oda answering like this. Take your seat. Of course, he has a name. At first, he was chof Nazumi because his face kind of looks like a mouse. That's what Usoppp said. He was lying. His real name is Ben Beckman, and the meat eatating fat guy's name is Lucky Rue. There's really no need to remember something like that. But since I got asked enough, I might as well clear it up. Now, you have to remember that this is just volume 5, and Oda might have been trolling, but the names of the people in Shanks's crew are some of the most important names in the entire One Piece story. Ben Beckman and Lucky Rue are some characters that we want to learn more about to this day.

[00:10:43]And we have to be close to learning more about them, especially with the fact that One Piece is currently in its final saga. And with that answer, we've got another question that we need to talk about. And it goes a little something like this. I have a question. I always see the sound effect done. Tada. But why Don? I think Benin would work just as well. To be honest, I know that this is basically a comic and that the page and sound effects are important, but I've never really paid that much attention to them. I've always felt that the art and dialogue are just way more important, but the page effects do happen to do a lot when it comes to making it feel like the pages are coming to life. Maybe that's because One Piece has always been a comedy alongside being a battle shown in, but I don't really think that that matters all that much given the quality of the story. With that being said, that tangent that I just went on distracted me from the answer that Oda actually gave that went a little something like this. No, no good. I use don when I draw scenes to give them that Don kind of feeling. So, if I drew Benin, it would give the picture a Benin feeling, but maybe in a gag scene or something like Ufun giggle. That's different. In all honesty, this feels like one of the Joky entries that I talked about in the first episode of this series. And as I've already communicated, I don't really care about sound effects all that much.

[00:11:55]With that being said, I was hoping that this volume's SPS section would be as interesting as volume 4's, but it seems like that unfortunately won't be the case. And with that, we only have one chapter left to cover when it comes to this video, and it just feels so weird when comparing it to the first video of this series. We literally only have four questions left to cover today. So, I can only hope that they'll be interesting and entertain not only me, but you guys as well. With that being said, the first question of the last section goes something like this. Nice to meet you, Oda Sensei. I love the manga you draw.

[00:12:25]Nepi. This is pretty clearly a play on the way that the title is written at the beginning of chapters and on volume releases. So, this is what Oda says in response.

[00:12:35]Damn, I love it when boys and girls misread and omit the letters like that.

[00:12:39]Makes me wonder if anyone can read those weird letters. I'm sorry for making the O and the I in the title logo pictures and not simple letters. It's correctly spelled One Piece. Remember that if you have the time. So yeah, even though it seems a little crazy for Oda to answer a question like this one nowadays, it actually would have made a lot of sense back then as this is only the fifth volume of the story and One Piece wasn't the juggernaut that it is today. With that, we've only got three questions left to cover today. And the next one is actually about one of the characters.

[00:13:07]That question goes a little something like this. What does the MOA written on Morgan's chin mean? To be completely honest, I never really noticed that that was written on Morgan's metal jaw. But now that I've seen it, I am interested to learn what it means. And Oda tells us exactly what it means when he answers like this. It's a German word. It means seagull. The pronunciation is kind of like mave. He really is a sailor, isn't he? Now, I'm really glad that Oda decided to give us the pronunciation in this answer because I know for a fact that I probably would have ended up pronouncing it wrong and had a lot of people tell me about it in the comments.

[00:13:41]Hell, I'll probably still have people telling me that I'm pronouncing it wrong despite the help from Oda, but I gave up on the pronunciation police a long time ago. With that being said, we've only got two questions left, and the second to last one goes like this. You know, with Zoro's three sword style, I don't think he'd be able to talk with a sword in his mouth. Could it be ventriloquism?

[00:14:01]This is honestly something that's tripped One Piece fans up for years now, and I'm happy that Zoro talks normally with his sword in his mouth, because it would quite literally ruin the anime if he didn't. With that, Oda gives a pretty much perfect response given Zoro's character when he says this. It's his heart speaking. Now, this actually makes a ton of sense given the amount of heart that Zoro shows throughout the story, especially as the East Blue saga continues to unfold. I just really like how it seems like Oda is tapped into his character's minds at all times. And this is another example of that. And with that, it's time for us to cover our final question of the video, which goes a little something like this. You don't seem to use much tone. Is there a reason? Now, you guys might be thinking that this van is asking about tone in terms of writing, but that isn't the case, and Oda tells as much in his answer. Speaking of that answer, it goes a little something like this. Well, it takes forever to start a fixing the tone. It takes a lot of time and it's a pain in the blank. My policy is if you can only do partial tone, it's better to just make it black and white. That's my policy. This is Oda explaining why we don't get super shaded or colored pages in the One Piece story very often. And it honestly makes sense that we don't.

[00:15:09]I'm assuming that the black and white drawings already take a ton of time. So adding a ton of extra shading or even color can't be something that's worth doing all of the time. And with that, we've covered every single question in every single SPS section that's present in the fifth volume of the One Piece manga. This one was definitely a weird one, seeing as it only had three sections and only two that were true sections, but I'm sure that that's something that'll be changing rather quickly. I also got to learn more about the very first OVA that One Piece ever got. So, that was a cool piece of history to learn more about. With that being said, since I'm out of stuff to talk about, it's unfortunately time to end things here. I know that this video is a little short compared to the ones that I normally make, but sometimes that might be okay so I can keep my sanity intact. Please join me next time for whatever I post next. Please leave a like and maybe subscribe if you enjoyed the video. And I will see you guys next time.