One Piece: Season Three, First Voyage Buy Now

As many of the other DVD sets for One Piece, Season 3, 1st Voyage holds 13 episodes...or episodes 144-156.

This set pulls away from the filler arcs of the final voyage of Season 2, and jumps back into the manga based arcs with the Jaya arc and the start of the Skypiea arc.

The Jaya arc (ep. 144-152) is a pretty interesting arc in my personal opinion. Nami is confused because the log pose (for those of you that don't know much about the series a log pose is a sort of compass that points to the next island you need to go to by using magnetic fields) is pointing towards the sky. Not long afterwards, a gigantic ship falls from the sky and sinks in the ocean. Luffy and others gear up to go underwater to see what sort of secrets the ship has and find a 200 year old map to an island called "Skypiea". In the midst of this, a salvage crew led by Captain Masira, are also trying to get what's in this ship that just crashed. Eventually one thing leads to another and Masira and crew are beat down and the Strawhats continue forward until they find an island named Jaya and dock at a town appropriately named Mock Town. This town is filled with pirates fighting one another at almost every turn. Eventually Luffy & Zoro run into an up and coming pirate named Bellamy who ridicules them for their high aspirations and furthermore when asked of the possibility of an island in the sky. There's a small altercation and Luffy and Zoro are left beat up a bit, but still in good shape (they don't fight back). Not long afterwards they run into a pirate named Blackbeard, who seems like a very likeable character. He urges Luffy to continue to pursue his dreams and that he'll definitely find Sky Island. Eventually the Strawhats run into a man named Montblanc Cricket whom is ridiculed across Jaya Island because he had an ancestor who told stories of an entire city made of gold but the city was never found and he was labeled a liar. Over the years the story of his ancestor grew so famous there were children's books written about the man who eventually achieved the name 'Liar Norland'. Cricket believes Norland may have been telling the truth and as proof he has some gold artifacts from his daily underwater excavating in search for gold that could have been left behind from the ancient city his ancestor spoke of. The Strawhats ask for help finding Sky Island, and the old man recommends they find a Southbird (bird that always faces South), and use it to find the Knockup Stream in the ocean that could possibly blast them up to the island. While they are looking for the Southbird, Bellamy and crew find their way to Montblanc's house and rob him of his gold artifacts that he'd worked so hard for. When the Strawhats return to find Montblanc beat up and his gold missing, Luffy finds enough reason to give Bellamy the beat down he deserves and does so thoroughly. Not long after this the scene changes to marine HQ where they are trying to decide who will take Crocodile's place as a Warlord. At that moment, Blackbeard's own crewmate shows up and nominates his Captain to become a Warlord of the Sea. At the end of this arc, the Strawhats finally leave Jaya to get on the Knockup Stream and find Sky Island.

The Skypiea arc (ep. 153-156) is the next big arc of the series after the Alabasta arc, but this DVD set just starts to crack into it. The Strawhats ride the Knockup Stream to the very top and eventually land on clouds thick enough to hold the Going Merry above it. Not long afterwards, the Strawhat crew find their way to Skypiea, a town in the sky, which is a beautiful place, but deep down has very troublesome dangers that not only awaits the Strawhat crew, but the entire population of Skypiea itself. This DVD set ends with the Strawhats becoming criminals in Skypiea for not paying the admittance fee when first entering Skypiea and it eventually turns out worse when they attack the White Berets (name given to Skypiea's police squad).

This DVD set is simply awesome, the introduction of Blackbeard plays a major role later in the series. Cheers to the start of a new season, 5 stars...it's definitely worth a buy because it sets the tone for so many things that will happen in Season 3 and future DVDs of this series, but I would not pay the Amazon price that is currently listed at almost $50.00. Look around and you'll see most One Piece DVDs going for $25-$35, if you read my last review of the voyage before this one that's the price range I recommended buying that one for, and the same applies here, find it cheaper and definitely buy it especially if you're a fan of the series and even if you're not one but just a casual anime fan this is one of the best series you'll come across.

Get more detail about One Piece: Season Three, First Voyage.