A mildly interesting chapter of manga for One Piece fans, this prototype story mostly fails to stand on its own merits with so little room to work with. It’s cool to see Oda’s art even more East Blue than East Blue (angular and more in line with his experience as an assistant on Kenshin) but removed from the context of being the first go at One Piece, it mostly falls flat. Recommended for established One Piece fans only, there’s plenty of aspects that are not fully formed here (Luffy’s character is most apparent) so it can be interesting to see where Oda’s head was at whenhe was giving it a first go. If you’re somehow considering reading this and you’re not (yet!) a One Piece fan, don’t. You have nothing to gain and maybe a little to lose.

Overall, my greatest impression with this one shot is: I’m really happy Oda worked hard to nail down how he wanted to kick off One Piece when the time came to do it for real.