As the wait for season 3 continues, it was time to check out the quick special for Ryusui. I’ve been looking forward to seeing that guy show up for quite a while now so it was neat to see him in the mix here. It’s a fun special all around and should be nostalgic for Dr. Stone viewers. You get some more adventure here and a solid amount of plot development so you will absolutely want to watch this before you officially check out season 3. Unless they decide to readapt this part I suppose.

The special starts with Senku and friends realizing that they are going to need a good ship captain for the voyages ahead. They’ll be dealing with some rough waters with a ship that isn’t ideal so not just anybody can pilot it. Fortunately there is but one man who can get them safely across any storm no matter how turbulent. That man is Ryusui, the pirate captain of legend! The downside is that this guy is rather egotistical and a huge fan of capitalism. He’ll bring back the currency system and could even take over the world. With another top notch mind around, Senku will have to be extra careful how they handle this guy. One wrong move and it could be the end for the kingdom of science.

The special’s a little under an hour so it’s a good way to fully introduce him into the mix. The characters prepare to build their first boat and before that they even build a blimp so they can see what the terrain is like. At that point is when Ryusui really gets to prove himself although Chrome looks really good as well. You definitely can’t count that kid out. He even has a little rivalry going with Ryusui since they are both explorers. Ryusui just focuses on the oceans while Chrome is a land guy. Immediately you can see how Ryusui is a good addition both for his skills and then also for the dynamic.

With the whole blimp scare near the end, the special does a good job of having a little danger in the mix while also being fairly low key. Ryusui’s introduction arc is actually perfect for a TV special like this because it has a beginning, middle, and end structure. I don’t think it would have been as easy for other points in the series to be used like this without some big cliffhangers. This way the story wraps up perfectly.

Gen is also useful for a change. One issue I always had with him is it felt like his skills as a mentalist never worked. The villains would always see through it or tell him not to talk so they wouldn’t get confused. That doesn’t happen here and aside from Senku, Gen successfully tricks the entire cast. It may be a small thing but I thought it was important because that’s Gen’s whole angle so you do want him to succeed at some point. Otherwise there wouldn’t be a point to keeping him around.

In general it was a good time for the supporting cast to shine as we saw Yuzuriha get to work on the sewing. She also showed a lot of other characters how to do this and before long it was a full community effort. Even Magma got to show off his boat skills even if he wasn’t the top ranking guy around. Everyone got to pitch in and help out which is a nice way to built unity within the kingdom. They have to savor this now too as not everyone will get a big role in the next arc. The series is finally at the place where the hero size is just big enough where you can’t bring everyone all of the time.

If Senku’s team had died on the blimp that definitely would have been a sad way to go out. Like you survived all kinds of threats and tough situations only to die like this? Yeah there couldn’t be much more disappointing news than that. In a way you could say that going on the blimp was an incredible risk that they all took. Personally I’ve never been tempted to go on a blimp myself for that reason. I always felt like it just wasn’t as secure as the others.

Overall, This was a fun special. At the end of the day this special gives you a chance to see all of the characters again and that’s always a good thing. It’s a pleasant little adventure. I’m almost a little surprised we didn’t get some foreshadowing for a villain showing up but maybe that would be going too far ahead. Ryusui is immediately a likable character and adds a lot of fun to the series. Senku and friends should definitely be real glad to have him around and of course now you want to see what Tsukasa says when he gets up since he was against all of these profit schemes right from the start. He may have a big “I told you so” coming to Senku. Still, Senku made the right choice here because as he said, skills have to trump personality right now. You need the best of the best to survive in the stone era. It’s worked so far so why change approaches now? This may be a special but it’s fairly important to the rest of the story so I’d definitely recommend checking it out.

Overall 7/10