The Elbaph arc continues to find ways to thrill One Piece viewers, but its latest episode contained a brilliant nod to Death Note that is sure to put a smile on nearly any anime fan. After the production’s most dramatic shift in the anime’s twenty-seven-year history, the latest One Piece arc has proved its new release model was the right choice with improved pacing, consistent stellar animation, and entirely new scenes that animators likely didn’t have the time or resources to add in the past.

Both the Egghead and Wano anime arcs helped raise the franchise’s popularity to unseen levels, thanks to several incredible moments that caused the series to trend worldwide consistently. However, the episodes between those epic moments often suffered from poor animation and more breaks than the series had seen throughout its decades of production. However, now that Toei has shifted its focus to deliver around twenty-six episodes a year, each episode has shown improvement on all fronts, including some pleasant surprises.

One Piece episode #1160 finally featured Luffy and his first batch of Straw Hats breaking out of confinement and setting foot on the giant’s homeland of Elbaph. The episode also included Dorry and Brogy, along with their crew and the other Straw Hats, approaching Elbaph’s waters. During that time, Robin shares that the two friendly giants now have some of One Piece‘s highest bounties, according to a newspaper written by Big News Morgans, who resembled a fan-favorite Death Note character more than usual in the episode.

One Piece’s Death Note Homage Was Killer

Many would argue that the pen is mightier than the sword, and if that is true, then Big News Morgans is easily among the most powerful characters in all of One Piece. He’s made a habit of not always telling the public the truth in his globally distributed newspaper, but his obsession with printing the most exciting headlines has created problems for the Straw Hats and even the World Government. It’s a fearsome power which helped make an episode #1160 scene (posted by X user Soul_StormOP) of Morgans acting like anime’s most serious writer, Light Yagami from Death Note, all the more hilarious.

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One Piece Finally Proves That Even The Weakest Straw Hats Are Now Total Monsters

Luffy’s crew has each grown a lot since leaving the East Blue, but even the weakest Straw Hats have transformed into total forces of nature in Elbaph.

The anime includes a new scene not from the manga of Morgans writing an article for his newspaper at his desk. The huge albatross-man theatrically extends his arm into the air after writing what he surely believes to be a brilliant piece of journalism. The same iconic action and framing were used in the Death Note anime when Light Yagami wrote in his killer notebook to vanquish the world of people he deemed deserving of his judgment. While Big News Morgans’ writing doesn’t directly murder people, there’s no doubt that his words affect One Piece’s world in their own way.

Morgans and Light Prove How Dangerous The Written Word Can Be

Dory and Broggy’s bounties have risen significantly after they showed up on Egghead Island to help Luffy escape. However, Morgans decided to print a much different version of the truth, stating that the two giant pirates helped destroy the futuristic island and murder Dr.Vegapunk, a particular line that made Lilith Vegapunk break out in laughter. Fans are more than well aware of what really transpired on Egghead, arguably one of One Piece’s best arcs, but Morgans’ version of the truth will help control public opinion and likely stir up even more excitement in the story’s final arcs.

Light’s extreme levels of narcissism proved to eventually be his downfall, and Big News Morgans will likely not reach the same type of heights. However, each character takes themselves extremely seriously, which makes the animators behind episode #1160’s obvious nod all the more clever and entertaining. Death Note can now be included as one of the iconic series that One Piece‘s animators found a way to reference in a way that functions in its world, without taking viewers out of its fantasy, and it likely won’t be the last time.