Fall of a Villain – Cipher Pol 9

Posted by natechen on

This is a continuation of last week’s discussion of villainy as seen through the lens of One Piece’s Water Seven arc. For the first half, introducing the story and characters and examining the ascendancy of Cipher Pol 9, the saga’s villains, click here. Further links, if you wish to go back and reread the Art of Evil series where we discussed villains in depth, are available at the end of this post.

Knowing what to do with your villain after they reach apotheosis can be difficult. Many stories have the villains ascending for the vast majority of the story, reach apotheosis for the climax, and then rapidly fall into defeat. Some have the villain reach apotheosis then disappear to the top of a gigantic tower for half the story and never influence the plot again *coughKefkacough*. Not so CP 9.

The Cipher Pol agents hit apotheosis at the end of the Water Seven saga’s first act and remain at their most powerful and threatening throughout the second act. This helps ratchet up and the tension through parts of the story that would otherwise slow things down.

The second act kicks off with Dr. Chopper rescuing Iceberg and the other Galley-la people left to die in the fire CP 9 set to cover their tracks. Iceberg then tells the Straw Hat pirates that, while CP 9 was searching the other room for the blueprints they wanted he interrogated Robin about her motives for helping the world government. It turns out that CP 9 had access to a Buster Call code, a terrifying military clearance that would let the leader of CP 9 summon a fleet capable of wiping most national fleets off the map from a nearby World Government garrison. They threatened to deploy the Buster Call against the Straw Hat pirates unless Robin acquiesced to their demands and, out of loyalty and love for the people that gave her a home for the first time in twenty years, Robin agreed.

Resolve hardened, the Straw Hat pirates gather themselves together and try to catch the last sea train before it leaves the city and Aqua Laguna seals them in.

Usopp winds up with Franky in a hidden warehouse in the city. Franky’s brought Usopp and the Merry Go there as bait to lure Luffy out so he can continue a fight they started earlier but, being quite the emotional kind of guy, after hearing how Luffy and Usopp came to blows over the fate of the ship he’s been moved and has a friendlier disposition. Some interesting character building happens but the most important part is that we learn Usopp has seen a Klaubatermann, a kind of sprite that appears on well loved ships. Franky tells Usopp he’s heard of them but never met anyone who’s seen one before, and that they’re basically a sign that the ship has become a touch self aware and cares for its crew. This will be important down the line.

CP 9 has been searching the city for Franky, convinced he has the blueprints they want, and at this point they find him, defeat both Franky and Usopp, and take them prisoner. We learn that CP 9 also had an agent keeping tabs on Franky all this time, along with the three watching Iceberg. Out of respect for their old profession, before leaving the warehouse one of the Cipher Pol agents drains the drydock and lets Merry Go out for the tide to take her. Then there is a flashback.

Much of this flashback isn’t relevant to our discussion but it gives us a few useful facts: It confirms that Franky has the blueprints for the superweapon CP 9 is hunting. It introduces Spandam, the commander of CP 9, and establishes his history with Franky. And it sets up the sea train’s connection between Water Seven and Enis Lobby, an island where the World Government holds prisoners until they can be transferred through the Gates of Justice and put beyond the reach of the rest of the world.

Back in the present, the Cipher Pol agents take Franky and Usopp to the sea train and join Robin there to set out for Enis Lobby and put the whole lot of them beyond the reach of the Straw Hats. Luffy doesn’t catch the train before it sets out but it turns out there’s a prototype of the sea train stowed away in an old Galley-la warehouse they can use to chase CP 9. The prototype is just like the normal sea train with two exceptions. It has fewer cars and no brakes. The Straw Hats are on a one way trip.

Once they hit the rails Luffy and crew have several close calls, nearly getting swamped by Aqua Laguna as the tide comes in and having other close shaves with CP 9’s backup. Unfortunately Cipher Pol gets to Enis Lobby ahead of the Straw Hats and digs in to wait until the Gates of Justice open and they can transfer their prisoners. CP 9’s other field team is introduced and Spandam reappears, followed shortly by the Straw Hats making landfall. Luffy bounces his rubber self over the walls of the island fortress on Enis Lobby, rushing ahead to engage the troops there as the Straw Hats trail behind at a more normal pace.

Luffy gets far enough ahead to fight and defeat the first member of CP 9, a moment that might signal the beginning of the end for the agents if not for the fact that their goals don’t require they defeat the Straw Hats, just move Robin and Franky through the Gates of Justice before Luffy and Co. can rescue them. Instead the fall of CP 9 begins a few moments later.

It takes some time for the Straw Hats to navigate the layers of internal defenses that make up Enis Lobby. As they wait for their allies to lower a drawbridge across a moat the Straw Hats reassemble on top of the gatehouse where the bridge will lower from. The full roster of Cipher Pol 9 assembles on the far side, waiting for the pirates’ move, and Spandam takes the moment to mock them. He tells the Straw Hats how Robin’s home city was leveled by a Buster Call, killing her mother and all her friends, which explains how a normally coolheaded woman could be bullied with one so easily. Then he directs their attention to the World Government flag that flies overhead and warns Luffy that if they cross the bridge and try to take Robin back they’ll not be fighting CP 9 but rather the entire world.

Without hesitation Luffy orders Usopp to shoot the flag down. Without hesitation the crew’s biggest coward puts a hole through the center of the World Government’s symbol of authority and declares war on the world.

CP 9’s apotheosis is an interesting one and reflects their goals quite well. Their ability to hunt down Franky quickly once it’s clear he’s the missing piece is noteworthy and, on top of the way all four undercover agents were introduced long before their reveal, establishes that Cipher Pol is indeed the world’s foremost experts in intelligence and infiltration. Their willingness to turn on old friends and a well crafted plan to escape the city is testament to their cold and professional conduct. But all this will not be enough to save them.

Villains are destroyed by their contradictions. Cipher Pol 9 was an organization built on secrecy and information gathering. But they failed to gather who had the plans they needed and what he had done with them. They failed to understand Luffy’s temperament, that he would ignore what his crew said under duress and refuse to give up on them. And they missed numerous other small things, like Sanji stowing away on their train as they escaped, that would add up to just enough of a delay to keep them in the Straw Hats’ reach. Additionally, in chasing superweapons, making threats with massive fleets and finally invoking the public face of the World Government they ceased to be anything like a secret organization. Spandam’s ambition and tactics ignored the nature of his role in the government and doomed him to failure.

The long apotheosis of CP 9 gave us time to not only see them at their best, dancing away from the Straw Hats time and again, but it showed us all the cracks in the armor that would ensure the pirates would catch them in the end and win out.

Once the Straw Hats confront Cipher Pol at Enis Lobby the collapse of the World Government’s top spies is only a matter of time and the defeat of the individual members of the group aren’t really important from the perspective of building villains. But the finishing touches on their defeat that wrap up the story’s plot threads and seal CP 9’s fate are instructive.

First off, One Piece is a “shonen battle manga”, meaning the emphasis of the story is on action, typically in the form of one on one duels. Usopp doesn’t have a duel with a CP 9 member per se, somewhat fitting since he’s not officially a member of the crew at the time. But he knows that the fact he hadn’t parted ways with Luffy when Robin left means she’d taken a fall for him as much as the others and so, when Spandam is dragging her towards the Gates of Justice and none of the other Straw Hats are in any position to help her, Usopp takes to the top of the gatehouse once more and snipes Spandam and his men, guaranteeing that the World Government will always consider him part of the Straw Hats. CP 9 didn’t take a direct hand in dividing him from his friends but they were the driving force that would bring the Straw Hats back together. Usopp ultimately stays with the crew after they leave Water Seven.

Second, as his minions are defeated one by one Spandam begins the Buster Call protocol and brings the Navy down on the Straw Hats like a hammer. With the sea train far behind them on the other side of the island the Straw Hats have no way off the island and find themselves surrounded by more and more powerful Navy combatants. As the situation begins to look hopeless Usopp hears the voice of the Klaubatermann and the Merry Go arrives, now aware enough to sail itself to its crew, to take the Straw Hats to sea one last time.

From the moment Kaku of CP 9 declared the ship useless the ship has served as a symbol for the health of the crew. Every setback the crew suffers in the Water Seven saga sees the ship become more and more tattered. Multiple people declare Merry Go will never sail again, including Iceberg and Franky. The infiltrators from CP 9 tell the Straw Hats over and over again the ship is dead. They might as well be saying that they’ll never have Robin back, that they’ll never be a family again. But when Merry comes for its crew we realize that all that disdain was meaningless. The Straw Hats hung together in the end and so did Merry. The crew was broken and struggled through to a new unity and Merry answered that. Sadly, the stalwart ship was still well and truly done for with this final task complete. But that… is not a part of the story of CP 9. For now, just know that the ship’s final act, not Usopp sniping Spandam, Luffy punching out Rob Lucci or Franky freeing Robin from her chains, marks the final defeat of Cipher Pol 9. When Merry sails into view every last aspersion cast on the crew’s honor is blown away and the crew is whole again, if only for a brief time.

Your villain is not defeated when he lies on the ground. He is defeated when the shadows he cast are gone.

As the villains of the Water Seven arc, CP 9 stands out as one of the best parts of one of the best arcs in One Piece. Built less as an extension of the One Piece world and more to oppose the Straw Hats at this particular juncture Cipher Pol 9 is, in many ways, an inversion of the Straw Hat Pirates. Their personalities match in many ways but the group dynamics are completely opposite. CP 9 has none of the Straw Hats’ camaraderie or cohesion. Spandam is a small and petty man who engenders no loyalty, Luffy a generous man who’s comrades trust and love him. With over a year and a half to tell the story of Water Seven, Oda clearly layed out these contrasts and made it very easy to see why pirates like the Straw Hats are better than self proclaimed emissaries of justice like CP 9 and his excellent command of the first two thirds of villainous storytelling made the third act less a flurry of realizations and desperate gambits and more the visitation of a well deserved reckoning on misguided villains. It’s worth the reading if you have the time and opportunity.

Further reading on the art of the villain:

Leave a comment