One Piece Reignites Luffy and Kid Rivalry

After a short detour giving us a quick glimpse at the seas outside of Wano, the latest episode of One Piece has officially kicked off the second act of the Wano Country arc. As the first act came to a close, it revealed that Luffy was being thrown in one of Kaido's prisons after he was soundly defeated. Luffy getting thrown into prisons is one of the long running narrative devices of the series as a whole, but the real surprise came when he was thrown in a cell alongside his fellow Worst Generation member, Captain Eustass Kid.

Kid is one of the few characters in the series that could be viewed as Luffy's "rival," and now that the two have been reunited in the Udon prison, their loud personalities have made them turn on one another quite quickly once again. Although he's popped up a few times throughout the franchise, this marks his official return to the anime series!

Episode 918 of the series reveals that Luffy has been taken to the prison in the Udon region, which forces some of the most "serious" offenders to work hard labor until they die. No one has ever escaped, and it's a prison that was built with the explicit reason of breaking its prisoners spirits. Not only do the prisoners have to carry heavy bricks, but only get a single serving of food for every five huge bricks moved.

This would have been tough for Luffy on its own, but it's made even tougher thanks to Kid being in the prison as well. When Luffy is about to eat the single dumpling he's "earned," Kid rushes through with another block and knocks it out of Luffy's hand. Kid's apparently earned a mountain of dumplings this way, but Luffy is currently out of luck.

This rivalry will make his time in the prison tougher, for sure, but this is also the best case scenario for Luffy. Given that the prison is meant to break one's spirits, having a rival to compete against will fuel Luffy in a way that food won't be able to. One of Luffy's strongest qualities is his unbreakable will, and it will come in handy here -- prison or not.

Excited to see where Act 2 of the Wano Country arc goes from here? Let us know your thoughts in the comments or talk to me directly about all things anime and other cool things @Valdezology on Twitter!

Eiichiro Oda's One Piece first began serialization in Shueisha's Weekly Shonen Jump in 1997. It has since been collected into over 90 volumes, and has been a critical and commercial success worldwide with many of the volumes breaking printing records in Japan. The manga has even set a Guinness World Record for the most copies published for the same comic book by a single author, and is the best-selling manga series worldwide with over 430 million copies sold. The series is still at the top of the sales list, and although some reports claim that honor might have gone to another series, One Piece is still going strong regardless.