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Fridge Brilliance
Bounties are in fact more and less reliable than simple power levels for people. They are more reliable because their level scales up not only by skill level, but also by how likely they are to immediately resort to lethal force (Kidd had a larger bounty than Luffy because he was prone to blowing innocent people up). However they are also less reliable because they can be misled by manipulation and trickery (such as Arlong and Crocodile's bounties being lower than they warranted), and error (Chopper's low bounty). They also can be inflated by the World Government to get individuals targeted (Robin), though in a way it is still accurate. Bounties measure 'threats' as dubbed by the World G after all, to both innocent civilians and to the World Government itself. All of this can be seen in the Four Emperors' commander bounties known by June 2018.
Big Mom's commanders were mostly shown with lower bounties than the known commander from Kaido's forces, Jack, with 600,000,000, 860,000,000, 932,000,000, and 1,057,000,000 to Jacks's 1,000,000,000 and Queen's 1,320,000,000. Big Mom's commanders are generally given the role of protection for Big Mom's core territory, and thus do not often venture out. In addition the poster of Cracker had inaccuracies, suggesting that his power level was under-appreciated by the W.G (something Cracker was quite proud of pulling off). Jack meanwhile was known for leveling islands like a natural disaster, giving him a higher bounty. The only Big Mom commander with a higher bounty than Jack, Katakuri, also happens to be one of the more stable and leadership capable Big Mom pirates. While powerful, the W.G would benefit far more from his elimination than pretty much any of his other siblings because he is a clear inheritor of the leadership of the crew should something happen to Big Mom (who's 68, often pregnant, and usually rather overweight) and would run a more productive ship than the insane Big Mom. Being more similar to Monkey D. Luffy and other D's such as Garp and Ace behind closed doors means they have a more unintentional reason to benefit from seeing him removed.
The bounties of Whitebeard's crew are also lower than you'd expect from the crew of the highest active bounty at the start of One Piece, with Marco, Ace, and Izou having bounties of 1,347,000,000, 550,000,000, and 510,000,000 respectively. Like Big Mom's commanders they aren't going around causing destruction and death all around them.
Bounties are also very good at playing the propaganda game: higher bounties do little to dissuade people from being pirates. Someone who is happy to be underestimated, like Arlong or Cracker, doesn't stop being a pirate, they are just more sneaky about it. Pirates see bounties as marks of honor and a means to encourage them to get higher bounties to get more respect. The main way of doing that is by attacking innocent people and causing chaos. The World Government gets to present itself as the bulwark against such people and thus reinforce its control and importance to the world and its people by fighting a piracy problem they subtly encourage with the bounty system.
Speaking of Bounties, as the series goes on and we keep finding out and raising the numbers, it becomes more and more economically unviable, even for a World Government. However, when you think about it, the genius of it is that after a certain threshold almost none of those bounties are ever or will ever be cashed out. Every time a pirate like Luffy defeats another pirate, they can't just walk towards the nearest marine base and expect them to give them the reward, in fact the only 2 known pirates that ever did (Blackbeard and Law) got a different non-monetary reward (they were made Warlords). Every time a Marine like Smoker catches a pirate, well they're just doing their job. The only people that could cash in a reward would need be neither a criminal nor a government agent.
Devil Fruits are rarer in the Blue seas, but common enough on the Grand line because overconfident Devil Fruit users go to the Grand line thinking that their powers can beat it and then die, causing most of the Fruits to reincarnate in there... eventually it would get to the point where there is barely any Devil Fruits in the Blue seas and be regarded as a mere myth.
Nami's obsession with money makes a lot more sense when you realize it's because she was always poor as a child. Plus, her name means "wave". That not only makes sense because of her navigational skills, but also because of the fact that she was saved from a huge storm as a baby; Bellemere may have (re)named her Nami precisely to allude to the fact that she survived such a huge storm.
Of course, Brook can do 45 degrees and not a radian more: a radian is 57 degrees(more or less).
Luffy's manner of dress (loose sleeveless jacket, cut-off jeans, sandals) just seemed like beachwear, but considering Gears like the third and fourth and some of his techniques, it make sense that Luffy choose this kind of clothes after he ruined too many jumpers whilst training his Rubber Man powers — allowing him to stretch without ripping his clothes, and avoiding having to waste money in clothes every time Luffy had a fight.
His new outfit, well shirt, reflects his improved control and uses of said powers, especially the fact that the sleeves extend out
Luffy's attacks are almost nigh intrackable/predictable to anyone without Haki or ridiculous instinct. Why? Snap a rubber band as hard as you can, did you see it move? Probably not. Now imagine SOMEONE'S FIST doing that. In the anime, we get long animations and a sound effect of Luffy's arm moving/ Luffy flying, in reality, Luffy's attacks look like this.
1. Luffy takes stance. 2. Luffy names his attack. 3. a split second after that, your face is caved in, and you have NO idea what hit you while you register the pain of something hitting you at insane speeds and forces greater than those required to SEPARATE MULTI STORY BUILDINGS. To anyone not superpowered or a Defensive Haki User, Luffy is a Lightning Bruiser with the "lightning" up to nightmarish levels (bruiser as well since he tries not to kill people). This probably explains why Luffy could predict where Bellamy was going to land despite his ridiculous bouncing maneuver, Luffy was already used to tracking things moving at those insane speeds. Even more frightening when you realize Luffy is constantly throwing himself at those speeds (Gum Gum Catapult anyone?) that by all rights, should snap a non-rubber human's neck from the whiplash.
While it's true that Luffy is much, MUCH faster than your average boring human, it's not that extreme. If Luffy could attack as fast as you just said, then there'd be no need for Gear Second, since he would already be attacking faster than human reflexes. In truth, the reason people let his attacks hit them is because of shonen logic.
In addition, there are some legit reasons as to why people can react to Luffy's normal attacks. Let's take a bullet, for example. When you shoot it out of a gun, it moves at almost supersonic speeds and you can barely see it. Now let's take a jet. If the jet moved at similar and faster speeds, would you be able to see it? Yes, because it's so big that the speed doesn't make it undetectable. This is the exact same thing for Luffy and the rubberband. A rubberband seems to snap back instantly because of how small it is. Luffy's body parts are visible because he's much bigger than a small rubberband.
Alternatively, Bellamy vaulted himself to a ridiculously wild attack to build up plenty of speed, leaping around those buildings in Mock Town. When he flung himself at Luffy traveling at about the speed of a sports car, he crashed into Luffy's fist. So hard it left an indent in his face. To clarify this statement, Luffy's punch had the impact of a car crash. And it was Bellamy's own fault he got knocked out. Luffy merely wound back to throw a punch and absorbed the force of Bellamy's attack through his elastic rubber body. That energy snapped back and hit Bellamy. Guess what his power is? A human spring. As in a giant shock absorber. So not only did Bellamy get hit by the force of a car crash, he suffered a realistic example of Collision Damage. And that would mean that Luffy didn't just knock Bellamy out — it's actually Bellamy's own fault, too.
Actually, Luffy hit Bellamy in an entirely different direction than he was going. He didn't just catch him with his fist, he caused him the halt movement, change direction, and crash into the floor beneath them.
Why doesn't the World Government just hand Luffy the title of "One of The Seven Warlords" since they'd probably solve a lot of their problems since he's dopey as all can be, and pretty manipulable? The PR spike would be ridiculous since having someone who caused SO MUCH damn trouble on their side would intimidate the shit out of new pirates. However, Luffy is insanely self righteous. If anyone exposed ANY WG conspiracy that hurt people, Luffy would flip his shit and barrel down the WG until he got the conspiracy dealt with. Not to mention if anyone in the WG touched any of his crew (Particularly Robin as she's a helluva risk to the WG) Luffy would go bonkers.
They actually did try that with Ace back before he met up with Whitebeard (having a 500 million beri bounty on his head.) He obviously refused and given that that the top brass knew he and Luffy were brothers, they figured Luffy would reject them as well. That and the fact that the top brass are also aware that Luffy is the grandson of Garp, who declined the promotion to being admiral countless times.
One of the first notable things that Luffy did was take down one of the Seven Warlords, Crocodile. Now, while Crocodile was corrupt and using his position to take over a kingdom and uncover one of the ancient weapons, that was not widely known to the world. Even if the World Government thought Luffy was worthy of being a Warlord at that point, they probably didn't want to hand Luffy the offer immediately and set the precedent of "defeat a Warlord, become a Warlord" to other power-hungry pirates. The next thing relevant to the World Government that the Straw Hats did was storm Enies Lobby to rescue Robin, and there was no way they were going to offer Luffy the job after that.
The Admirals and other major players all having such ridiculously overpowered Devil Fruit powers seems so unbalanced at first. However, they were once mooks, too! They just survived long enough to rise to that rank because of their powers being what they were (or they pulled a Blackbeard and sought that one out particularly).
Not entirely true. Some of the strongest characters don't use Fruit powers at all and other are Blessed with Suck. For example, Garp had been offered the position of Admiral countless times but he declined, the former Admiral and mentor to the current admirals, Zephyr, saw Devil Fruits as a weakness to be exploited and Tsuru having the ability to... wash people.
The Vivre Card turns out to be made from fingernails. After reading up on nautical superstitions for a class, it turns out that it was believed to be very unlucky to cut one's fingernails while on ship. It might just be coincidence, but knowing that Eiichiro Oda does do the research probably means that this wasn't an accident.
Garp has a scar around his left eye, the bottom part of which looks uncannily like Luffy's. Remember, now, that Luffy gave himself that scar in order to seem tough. That's not just Fridge Brilliance, that's Fridge Adorable (well, giving himself a scar isn't, but you get the idea).
Luffy got his scar by trying to be tough in front of Shanks, not his grandfather.
True, but he shoved the knife on his face because Garp is probably one of the toughest people he knows, so he wanted have a scar like Garp's because scar on face = instant Garp levels bad-ass.
And, if you consider for a moment that Dragon's facial tattoo may not in fact be a tattoo, but a burn scar or brand of some sort, it would give the Monkey D. family a case of hereditary facial scars.
At first Sir Crocodile just sounds like a cool name, but under a bit of scrutiny it becomes extremely meaningful/ironic. The most obvious is the fact that with the hook and being a pirate, he's a pretty strong shout out to Peter Pan. Then comes the fact that like any other DF user, he can't swim. Not only that, but water is his main weakness. If he so much as touches water, he can't use his powers, a sharp contrast to his namesake, which pretty much live in water. Finally there's his DF power (sand) and the fact that the island that he was the "hero" and "protector" of is a desert.
Also note, in that Peter Pan shout out, that Crocodile's named after the creature that ate Captain Hook's hand, necessitating the hook.
Another thing to consider with Peter Pan is that Hook could not swim in the waters due to the crocodile wanted to eat him (because hook's hand tasted so good), Hook was probably at his safest on land where there was no large body of water nearby (water=crocodiles), so a place like the desert which has no large bodies of water close by would probably be the safest place for Hook. Also Sir Crocodile in One Piece has a pet crocodile.
There's also something to be said for Crocodile hiding the bomb that was the key to his plan inside of the capital city's clock tower. The crocodile in Peter Pan swallowed a clock.
For that matter, his plan involving a hidden bomb is a Shout-Out to Hook itself.
Why Garp tried so hard to turn Luffy and Ace into Marines; He did it because he wanted to prove that children don't inherit the sins of the father, and in making them strong Marines he would also be able to keep them safe because the World Government and Marines would have no reason to hunt them or think of them as threats or monsters. Of course, it backfires badly, and some of it due to his own irresponsibility.
It also serves as a proper justification for Luffy and Ace's moral compasses. One would initially assume that since Luffy is the hero of the story, he's bound to be a good person. Garp's secretly proud of his two grandsons because he knows that while they are labelled as criminals, he's taught them to be good people.
Sanji was the only one who didn't get targeted by Baroque Works, due to being off-screen every time members of the crew were found out (Luffy, Zoro, and Nami at first; Usopp later). He's also the only member of the crew that wasn't touched by Mr 2 Bon Clay, making him impossible to mimic. This tendency to avoid scrutiny turns out to be massive foreshadowing for later on in the series, not only for being able to trick Crocodile as "Mr Prince", but after Enies Lobby where he's the only member of the Straw Hat crew the Marines are unable to get a photograph of for his bounty poster, which itself becomes important not long after when the crew make a new ally. Chances are good this will continue to be important for the rest of the story.
This adds even more fridge brilliance to the fact that Sanji is always failing with women. The suit and the womanizing and his tendency to work on problems from behind the scenes makes him a shout out to super spies like James Bond. Except, he's sort of an inverted version. James Bond succeeds with women without even trying, and is effortlessly cool... but he is perhaps the least sneaky spy who has ever existed. Sanji tries REALLY REALLY HARD to succeed with women and be cool, but ends up failing horribly every time... but he's fantastic at keeping his identity a (for a very good reason) and abilities a mystery and using his brains and ability to think ahead of his foes to his advantage. He just wishes it were the other way around.
Also, the only DF Sanji was interested in was the Invisibility Fruit.
Even after the time-skip, his wanted poster is still just a photo of the back of his head.
Not after the Dressrosa arc it isn't and believe me that opened a huge can of worms in the Zou arc, his family leads a very dangerous group of assassins in the New World and they recognized him so now he's being unwillingly married to one of Big Mom's daughters as part of an alliance between the two.
In the manga, Bellamy mocks Luffy, Cricket, and the Saruyama alliance for their dreams, even calling them the "same species" to top it off. At first it seems to be just a jab at Luffy's intelligence, but when you consider his animal motif (and of course, his name)...
The Devil Fruits are a fantastic source of Competitive Balance; no matter how strong Luffy gets, he will never be as effective underwater as Sanji, or even Usopp.
This point is similarly reminiscent of Sun Wukong's abilities (Journey to the West was the inspiration for Dragon Ball, at least initially). Though he is by far the strongest of the group, Zhu Bajie and Sha Wujing are still more effective water combatants than he is.
For something that's supposed to occur only once in a million people, the list of people who can use Haoshoku Haki in the series is pretty long. And yet, it's clear that almost all the characters that are shown to have this ability are among the strongest in the series.
Ummm... do those Red Shirt Armies and sprawling masses of civilians just not exist to you? Not to mention that there are three entire oceans that the story hasn't even touched, and even of the oceans we have visited, we've seen maybe a handful of the islands that are actually in them. There have been only nine people revealed to possess Haoshoku Haki (if you include the fact that Gold Roger undoubtedly did, too), and when that figure is only applied to people who are actually alive, it gets whittled down to six. Unless everyone in the series without a given name just doesn't exist to you, that's not many at all.
Assuming that literally one in a million people have the Conqueror's Haki and that the population of the One Piece world is comparable to our own, there should be around 7300 people who have it. Even if there are only, say, 1 Billion people instead of over 7 Billion, it would still be 1000. That's... a bit more than nine.
There are now 15 confirmed and 11 still alive.
The real world Age of Piracy was from 1650-1730. Estimates of the world population for that period range from 500M to 814M with an average of 666M. Population estimates for 1700, specifically, average 620M. World populations didn't really start to crack 1B until the industrial revolution with its rapid urbanization and mechanization. As the world of One Piece doesn't have a lot of factory filled cities and most ships are sail instead of steam, it's probably safe to describe it as pre-industrial. ~650M people worldwide means somewhere between 600 and 700 people capable of using Haoshoku Haki.
But here's my real question. How many people are capable of using Haoshoku Haki but never learn to do so? Haki is rare outside of the New World and despite the World G's corruption, there are still many parts of the world that are peaceful. I think Doflamingo is the best example here. If his family had never left Mariejois, leading to his mother dying and him being tortured as a child, he might have never unlocked his ability to use his Haki at all. Maybe a certain world percentage is capable of Haoshoku Haki, but what percentage of the world population will go on to live the dangerous lives of pirates or marines? And are these two variable independent of each other, or are people with Haoshoku potential more likely to go to sea in search of dangerous things.
On the other hand, the Grand line is viewed as a place where the strong will inevitably meet each other, so Luffy meeting others with that ability is more likely to happen in the Grand Line, than, says, in East Blue. The only surprising thing (till now) is Coby having such strong Haki.
The thing is, the distribution of powerful people in the world of One Piece isn't uniform because from the moment of Gold Roger's execution everyone in the world has wanted to get One Piece for one reason or another, and thus the entire grand line acts like a sorting device separating everyone by how powerful they are.
Luffy's ridiculously fast recovery after anything that happens to him seems to have no logical cause, but it could be a result of his Devil Fruit ability. He's made of rubber, and rubber always bounces back.
Chopper, after the Time Skip, has learned to use six out of his seven Transformations without the Rumble Ball. While this is a perfectly natural extension of his powers, could well have been inspired by his fights at Enies Lobby. Not just in learning to control Monster Point, but also because his opponent in that arc used Biofeedback, enabling him to change and manipulate his own body at will.
In the "Where are they now?" Cover story that ran during the Fish-Man Island. The covers detailing residents of Impel Down, the place widely regarded as "Hell on Earth" are taking place during the 660s, with the final one taking place at the prison itself being Bon Clay ruling New Kama Land in Chapter 666.
Of the Straw Hat Crew, only Chopper is the one that comes anywhere close to being a truly pure hero, the rest of them scattered across different archetypes of Anti-Heroes from Classical Anti-Hero (Usopp) to Unscrupulous Hero (Zoro/Robin). Why is that so? Besides them being the main protagonists of the story, didn't they also have flashbacks which showed their various role models making acts of sacrifice for them, influencing their moral compass? But look closely at their pasts and it seems their lessons are taken in a neutral view: Luffy learned how friends and being a friend is important but also remains one of the more egregious examples of Protagonist-Centred Morality; Sanji learned moreso the importance of sticking to your dream or how cooking is important rather than helping people/making sacrifices; Nami and Robin saw importance more in protecting or finding your loved ones/friends respectively, and as seen with Luffy this is subject to the same Morality; Franky was taught to be proud of his craftsmanship rather than being instilled with justice (Tom was a criminal after all) while Brook centers more on the importance of keeping promises or remembering your friends. At best, all their pasts have done was to let them exercise the morals of their lives with Chaotic Good intentions. On the contrary, Chopper's past was about teaching him that besides having a good heart, actual knowledge was also important. His role models also held strong moral compasses: Hiruluk wanting to save the country and Kureha, despite being greedy and sly at times, still having the passion to save and/or cure human lives. It shows really, why he would be the one who holds the strongest sense of morality/ethics (as seen when he expresses anger at Hogback and Caesar).
It's more basic than that, though. Luffy's positive role models are Shanks and Garp. Shanks, the pirate, was cool, laid back, and saved his life. Garp, the Marine, foisted him off on some bandits (which he hate thanks to Higuma) and constantly put his life in danger. Result: Luffy wants to be like Shanks. Also, Luffy has a natural disposition towards freedom, so a rigid military would never work. Zoro's goal is very personal, martial self-advancement. Zoro also is the one who takes being a pirate the most seriously. But as a swordsman, something like killing comes with the territory so his moral compass is very neutral, but in no way pacifistic. Usopp has started out as a liar, but his goal is to become a great warrior. But his role model is his father Yasopp... a pirate. Nami has a balanced experience. Her mother was a Marine, but at the same time, the pirates who enslaved her and her village paid off a Marine to not get hassled. She was using her criminality (thievery) as a means to a noble end. Robin was shown that everyone, Marine and Pirate was trying to kill her so she evolved to trust no one. As for Franky, Tom being a criminal is a technicality, all he did was build an excellent ship. The government is the one that attached criminality to everything attached to Roger including the existence of an unborn son. Franky saw that the government didn't care about justice sabotaging Tom just so they could acquire some blueprints. Brook was always a pirate so his moral compass started skewed but he also has a deeper understanding of death and loneliness than anyone else which shifts his compass in a different direction. As for Chopper, he is the only member of the crew who did not have a negative experience with Marines or Pirates beforehand. His morality was formed by two doctors who genuinely work to help people and a corrupt king, to say nothing of his outcast feelings. But Hiruluk did speak highly of pirates, which brings Chopper back to Luffy. They both want freedom.
Ace's crew are called the Spade Pirates, normally, pirate crew names are connected to their leader somehow — the Straw Hats, Whitebeards, etc. Ace is the Ace of Spades! In other words, the highest card in a deck. In fact, the U.S. military actually created a deck of cards featuring the most wanted members of the Iraqi government, and the ace of spades was reserved for Saddam Hussein, the Iraqi president. It's sorta the same way that the Marines view Ace — since he's the son of Gold Roger, his death becomes a priority above other wanted pirates. Oda probably didn't mean to make such a specific reference as the Iraqi most wanted deck, but it's just an example of the specific card's symbolism.
What's more, though, the ace of spades always carries the insignia of whatever printing house or brand a deck belongs to, and Ace has Whitebeard's logo tattooed on his back.
In a standard card deck, the ace of spades is also known as the "Death Card" and Ace's death is the most well-known in a setting where few characters die.
Here's a Stealth Pun that was probably entirely unintentional on Oda-sensei's part... He said that the language spoken in One Piece is English. English is "a language of pirates and traders, they beat up other languages and steal their words".
Robin's skin color post-timeskip. At first she was Ambiguously Brown, but now not only is the tan gone, but she's actually fairly lighter than the rest of the cast.. Well, she's spent the past two years in a land where it constantly snows.
This is actually simply a case of error, Robin's skin was always pale in the manga while the anime decided she was Ambiguously Brown (They had randomly guessed at a skin color for her before Oda made a colored image of her), before rectifying that with no explanation post-time skip.
The Magic Pants secondary power of Devil Fruits seems to extend mainly to whatever attire or items the user has on them. Luffy's clothes stretch, Buggy's clothes split, and Ace's clothes turn into fire. The only person who doesn't seem to have this power is Jewelry Bonney who instead wears a skimpy outfit so it will fit when she shrinks. However it wouldn't make sense for her powers to shrink clothes because she can only change age. The most she could do with clothing is restore it to new condition or age it to the point it falls apart.
The series is prone to using paper-thin disguises throughout the series. Among the outfits that were generally successful include the fake Straw Hats' outfits, the crew's disguises in Dressrosa, and Ace infiltrating a Marine base using a captain's coat and drawn on mustache AFTER he'd already been caught. Meanwhile, disguises that didn't fool anyone include the Sogeking outfit and Foxy's disguises. Successful uses of this trope only worked on people who either didn't already know the person, are naive (Chopper), or are stupid (Luffy). These disguises always fail whenever someone knows the actual person's face or a characteristic trait and aren't foolish enough to fall for the disguise.
The short "Monster Time" re-imagines the One Piece cast if they are monsters. Luffy was portrayed as a dragon. To quote a Youtube comment:
Monkey D. Dragon... Well played
Brook's backstory doesn't follow the Straw Hat tradition of having a traumatic childhood incident (death of childhood friend via stairs, accidentally poisoning your adoptive father figure, seeing your hometown destroyed, etc.) because his backstory is an inversion of the usual formula; Laboon is the "child" in this case who has experienced a trauma in the form of the death of his parental substitutes, with Brook now taking the role of a downtrodden parental figure instead of traumatized child. (Granted Laboon isn't exactly aware of the crew's death nor Brook's survival but the point on inverting the usual formula still stands.)
It's noticeable that Bellamy the Hyena and Donquixote Doflamingo share a number of similarities: blond hair with similar hairstyles, almost constant smirk, habit of sticking out tongue, massive ego and love for violence is present in both the characters. At first, it looks like Oda got lazy designing his characters, but then the realization comes: Doflamingo is Bellamy's childhood idol, and Bellamy just tries to imitate his ideal as much as possible.
Fish-Man Island is 10,000 meters below sea level. Fish-men and merpeople would have to withstand well over 1,000 pounds of water pressure. It makes sense that on land they are ten times stronger than humans.
Though the manga doesn't really show Ace doing anything terrible, he somehow has one of the highest bounties shown in the whole series, the highest being Kaido at 4,611,100,000. At 550,000,000, there must have been another reason for the Government to want him dead. Perhaps it's because he's the son of Gold Roger? Sengoku at least knew who Ace's father was, and the whole reason Marineford happened was because the Marines wanted to wipe out Roger's legacy. However, as the higher bounties are in the range of higher millions (or outright billions), it seems more likely that Ace was actually on the lower rungs of Emperor bounties. The World Government didn't know much about Ace before his capture.
It probably helped that he was a fairly young man compared to several of the other Four Emperors' associates (The Sweet 3's Cracker and Katakuri are in their forties, while Smoothie is in her mid-thirties), and that Whitebeard probably didn't spend his time attacking things as much as Big Mom or Kaido did. His men are dangerous, but they don't have the financial boon of also being psychotic or led by a psychotic. Also, if Sengoku does respect Whitebeard as much as some assume, he might not want to make his men as tempting for upstarts to go after as pirates he doesn't respect, like Kaido and Big Mom. Notably the commanders who we have bounties for, Marco, and Izu, other than Ace, are also on the lower side. Of course, had Sengoku made it public beforehand that Ace was the son of Roger, his bounty would have been much higher, respect or not.
Of course, Devil Fruits would taste like crap! If fruit isn't eaten right away, it rots. People are usually reluctant to eat Devil Fruits for a variety of reasons, and the Fruits we've seen have all been pulled out of chests, where they've been for who knows how long. The only Fruit which age we know for certain is the Mera Mera no mi that Sabo ate after it's been laying around for two years! We've yet to see anyone consume a Devil Fruit we can safely assume to be fresh.
So far, the lore behind Devil Fruits is that they were enchanted by the Sea Devil. Taking the Door-Door and Dice-Dice Fruits into account (According to Mr. 1, it turns the user's body into iron blades) the newest Fruits are from the Iron Age at the latest, around 1200 BC, and were enchanted well within the history of human beings. The oldest ones could have been enchanted as far back as the origin of amphibians and reptiles. Any and every Fruit would have millennia and millennia to rot, so some unnatural curse or spell would be the only thing keeping them from decomposing completely. No Devil Fruit in the world could possibly be fresh. Even if the enchanter took his time, they were most definitely all cursed before the Great Pirate Era, which is especially apparent due to the fact that animals can eat them as well. Naturally, a Devil Fruit would taste like thousands-or-millions-of-years-old dirt with some vitamins and minerals mixed in, not to mention the texture. So no Devil Fruit will ever taste at all tolerable until the source of Devil Fruits continues to make them. Given their rarity, it's unlikely it's been making them constantly.
We know Law learned the phrase "D will bring another storm again" from Corazon. Now, in Chapter 0, Sengoku noted that East Blue is a "weak but peaceful sea". In our world, the sea on the east is called the Pacific Ocean. But despite its name, it has a lot of storm going around. Now, which sea is the home of many D members like Luffy, Garp, Dragon, Roger?
Eiichiro Oda once held an SBS on where he revealed that Luffy would be Brazilian, Zoro Japanese, Nami would be Swedish, Usopp would be African, Sanji a French man, Chopper a Canadian, Robin a Russian, Franky an American, and Brook is Austrian. At first, the nationalities didn't make sense, like seriously, what could you get from Austria? But these, in a way, make perfect sense. Luffy is a party animal, wears button up shirts, and a straw hat, like many people in Brazil. Zoro's samurai motif speaks for itself. Nami's clothing pre Time Skip, and her hairstyle, matches that of many Swedes, even some dudes. Usopp is likely a North African, because his post Time Skip appearance has massive Mediterranean vibes: from the hat, to the complexion, to the hair, EVERYTHING, even his nose, (which is admittedly more Italy's thing,) it's just that a majority of these traits lie in Africa. Sanji as a French man isn't even subtle: he expresses love for the ladies, his meals are amazing, and he's a Badass in a Nice Suit. Chopper is more subtle as a Canadian, but at face value, he's a deer, he's soft spoken, and can't hide gratitude no matter how hard he tries. Now for Robin, all the qualities are there: Long dark hair, not at all loyal until a revolution occurs (Enies Lobby), puts her powers to great use by snapping her opponents spines, and can carry Franky, who is literally Made of Iron; it seems that Mother Russia Made Her Strong. Franky, like Zoro, speaks for himself in terms of being an American, what with the big muscles, Ace Ventura inspired hair, that speedo, and his love for root beer, not to mention being very good at fixing stuff up. Brook as an Austrian guy makes sense because of the country's history with music and famous musicians like Mozart; it also reflects his more European influences: instead of itaryu, he practices fencing. So there you go.
Usopp's nose being Italian would make sense too, in two ways: for a number of reasons, Italians have migrated in large numbers to Africa (in particular to Libya, Egypt, Tunisia, Ethiopia, and Eritrea) since the nineteenth century (with some communities being even older: the Egyptian one has been in continuous existence since the time of the Roman Empire), and for other reasons people from North Africa have migrated to Italy since the Romans won the Punic Wars. He's of mixed descent, with the nose being the best evidence of him having Italian ancestors.
Which makes another genius move on Oda's part: at the SBS, when he said that Usopp was African, that wasn't a mistake, that was Critical Research Genius. And thus, backing up the ever so true saying: ODA NEVER FORGETS!
Or it makes sense that Luffy would be from Brazil because that's where rubber trees grow.
Oda once said that Nami and Garp can hurt Luffy with their bare hands because they hit his heart. Since then, Garp was revealed having Haki. Well played, Oda...
But wait, if that's the case, then that means Nami is on the verge of unlocking Haki! And the thing is, this makes sense! Recently, Usopp, whom Oda pegs will always be the weakest of the crew, recently unlocked his Haki, which flips everything we know about the Straw Hat Crew inside-out, thus turning a Running Gag into a Chekhov's Gag! Oda, you clever bastard..
Observational Haki would explain Nami's navigational skills and uncanny ability to predict the weather if she had been using it subconsciously.
There's also Armament Haki. As you know, a prominent Running Gag involves Nami hurting Luffy with her punches. Again, it used to be chalked up to just Rule of Funny, but after seeing Usopp unlock Haki, it's no longer the case. Not to mention, Oda has the tendency of using Chekhov's Gag and Cerebus Retcon to make what were once jokes into something serious or plot relevant. Finally, it should be noted that in the story, people who have Armament Haki are usually very rude characters, and considering how Nami used to be like, it seems only inevitable that she would unlock Haki some point soon.
When asked about the lack of romantic love in the series, Oda replied that they're in love with adventure. Now, keeping in mind that the series' first chapter and the two prototypes are titled "Romance Dawn", read what Romanticism used to be before the Romantic love stole the word , and what Romance was in the beginning ...
Luffy is infamous for always choosing to take his ship and crew in the most dangerous direction possible, purely for his own amusement, or so it seems. Considering just how much he cares for the well-being of his crew, this doesn't make any sense unless you consider the following. The "heroes" of this story are pirates, criminals on the run from the law. Going the "safe" way is actually more dangerous for them. They're far more likely to find Marines, bounty hunters, or other pirates that way. In addition, as seen on Skypiea, going to the more dangerous location has a better chance of finding treasure, and increasing their effective strength, not to mention their reputation. Can you imagine how the World Government is handling Smoker's report that he chased Luffy, "in hot pursuit" to Punk Hazard, and how Luffy handled himself? Not to mention being allied with Trafalgar Law?
Try telling THAT to Nami, who feels no amount of treasure is worth all the dangerous stuff Luffy puts her through.
Also, in hind-sight, Luffy's grandpa may have rubbed-off on him. Garp all-but-kicked him into numerous, dangerous situations, all in the name of making sure he grows up into a strong man. Luffy may actually also pick the most-dangerous routes because deep down, he knows it's what Garp would want him to do. Luffy may disagree with Garp in many ways, but it's agreed that the two sincerely love one another regardless.
The fact that Issho is blind loses its merit when you realize that he has Observation Haki.
A great deal is made of bloodlines in this series. Many characters follow the philosophy of Sins of Our Fathers and those who are descended from important family lines put a great deal more stock into them than they should. You see this in particular with groups like the Celestial Dragons and aristocrats like them. That said, it says something about how accurate this belief actually is that between the three brothers of Luffy, Sabo, and Ace, it's Sabo who has the least remarkable bloodline despite being born to Goa Kingdom nobility.
The most prominent feature of those with the D initial is their ability to smile even in the face of death, right?
Luffy's laugh being 'shishishi'. Shi means death in Japanese. Luffy's literally laughing in the face of death!
May also be Fridge Funny, but Sanji's "Mellorine!" refers to an actual product, mellorine , a low-grade ice cream substitute made with different other fats like animal fat instead of butterfat. So, Sanji's been calling every pretty woman he sees what is basically the poor man's version of ice cream all this time?!
Well, it seems like a logical extension off of his old use of 'crap' as an adjective even for distinctly non-crappy things...
Why haven't we seen more Fish-men or merfolk that have eaten Devil Fruits? One, how many of such Fruits do you know actually grow under the sea? Only those Fish-men that have been to the surface would probably encounter them. Two, if your primary abilities and very lifestyles revolves around swimming and manipulating water, then knowingly eating a Fruit that robs you of that is the last thing you'd want to do! (Unless you're somebody like Vander Decken).
Further along this line is the reveal that Jinbe's favorite food is listed as fruits. They're probably a delicacy to him given his background at fishman island.
Chopper is shown to be still frightened of large beasts post time skip, but doesn't react that way to human sized opponents. Despite his strength, he is still reacting intuitively as a prey animal to predator animals larger than him.
Many note it is odd in retrospect that Sanji pointed a gun at Ms. All Sunday/Robin, despite his issues with hitting ladies. Thing is, pointing a gun at a lady isn't the same as kicking them, so there is some consistency.
Another reason why Sanji respects women is because two of the closest people in his childhood were women with good hearts.
Contrary to the men in his life, like his blood-related father and brothers, who were cruel, violent and abusive, and when he finally found a man he could regard as an affectionate father like Red-Leg Zeff, the man was an Ex-Pirate who would basically kick him around, not as badly as his brothers did, but Zeff's wooden leg on Sanji's head probably hurt a bit. The result? Sanji's a perfect gentlemen around women, but a hot-head who tends to be more aggressive toward men than most people. He has no qualms kicking men in the face, knowing they can take it since it's what he had to go through on a daily basis.
Per Word of God Sakazuki/Akainu is strong enough to find One Piece in a year. This means in a year he could defeat both Kaido and Big Mom to get their Poneglyphs. Akainu certainly would want to kill both of them, so what is stopping him? Simply put, the higher ups of the World Government. Those two being alive are very effective boogeymen to keep the populace needing the World Government regardless of what they do, and in a way that emperors like Whitebeard or Shanks just don't do.
As to how, even with his strength, Sakazuki would be able to actually read the Road Ponyglyphs, turns out that defeating Kaido lets you free someone who can from Kaido's dungeons.
Hence why the more 'get the pirates' minded Sengoku wanted Kuzan/Aokiji to take his place, and the 'Status Quo' Five Elder Stars wanted Akainu to take the job (plus not really liking Kuzan that much).
Both Sengoku and Sakazuki/Akainu get a lot of issue from their under and over types not listening to them or just acting annoying, but compared to the later the former seems to get a lot more respect and friendliness sent his way. The answer is simply the main source of Sengoku's grief was Garp, who is his friend. Sengoku is basically the Marine equivalent of a Straw Hat dealing with the Marine equivalent of Luffy. Garp rarely, if ever, wants to annoy or defy him. Sakazuki doesn't have the same friendship with his underlings who do mean to annoy him.
If one could explain One Piece to someone, like "pirate crew with a talking reindeer, a cyborg, and a skeleton" or "said pirate crew got attacked by a cyborg-bear-man...thing", one would then say, "It's a long story." Well, that's what One Piece literally is: a long story!
In the manga, the chapters in which crew members join are titled after the order in which they join, but there are a few exceptions, which foreshadow characters leaving and returning. Nami and Robin initially join the Straw Hats as an alliance of convenience, seem to betray the crew later on and then return to it, so the fact that they aren't given a "numbered" chapter title foreshadows that they haven't truly joined yet. Similarly, Usopp only joined because Luffy invited him (which he later says he saw as a gesture of pity), and also ends up leaving the crew temporarily during the Water 7 arc, albeit more over replacing the Merry and his own sense of inadequacy, and is included in the chapter "The Third and Seventh Person" (the latter being Franky). The only exception is Sanji, who joined in "The Fourth Person," but he'd wholeheartedly joined Luffy.
Following the reveal of the true nature of the Gum-Gum Fruit, many fans called foul about the classification change or that someone could just name a fruit anything they want and pass it off that way. However just because there is a classification system, doesn't mean it is a fully accurate classification system. Paramecia, Zoan, and Logia are what people call the fruits, and while it works there are fruits that just don't fit nealty in them, like Baron Tamago's Egg-Egg Fruit and Katakuri's Mochi-Mochi Fruit. It is not a fundamental rule of the universe that the fruits fit perfectly in one box or another, and someone had to invent the categorization system. The fruits (seemingly) didn't name themselves, others names them and in the case of Luffy's fruit, renamed them.
Given that Dressrosa is something of a Whole-Plot Reference to Alabasta, Rebecca, Law, and Viola all take on a similar role to Vivi. Rebecca is a young girl of royal descent (Same age, even) who Luffy befriends and decides to fight for. Law is the Guest-Star Party Member who hitched a ride with the crew in a prior arc, comes up with the main plan to stop the Big Bad, and serves as the Deuteragonist of the arc as a whole. Viola is a former officer of the Big Bad who defects out of a desire to protect her nation. All three are basically Decomposite Characters to Vivi.
East Blue Saga
The chapter in which Zoro joins is titled "Number One." Not only is he the first to join the Straw Hats, but he and Luffy both want to be #1 in their respective pursuits.
Apis's Whisper-Whisper Fruit is played up to be the weakest and most ineffective of all Devil Fruits. All she gets is the ability to communicate with animals. But this is a world where most of the animals are ridiculously deadly. Apis has the right personality and demeanor to get animals to join her side. For starters, she could freely travel about the Calm Belt because she can befriend a Sea King. She can make her way to Rusukaina and became pals with all the creatures there. She'd have an army 500 Luffies strong. She could break into Impel Down, and since much of the prison's muscles are animals, she could turn them against the staff and cripple the prison. She could sway the super-strong bugs in the Boin Archipelago to her side. And there are very likely even stronger animals in the New World, so this is far from the limits of her potential.
Ehrm, it pains me to destroy your theory: the One Piece Wiki stated that the Hiso Hiso no mi allows Apis to understand animals and talk to them, but it gives her no power whatsoever over their will. So, she could ask a Sea King for passage, but whether it accepts or not is up to the beast.
The first troper was saying she would befriend them and get them to do all that, not control them.
Sorry again, but befriending something that sees you as a tasty easy little snack? Even in Real Life, making friends isn't really that easy, let alone giant fierce animals capable of destroying whole countries by themselves.
In real life, most animals are fairly docile and peaceful when not hungry or in danger. You leave them alone, they leave you alone. (There are definitely some exceptions, such as badgers and tigers, though.) One would presume the One Piece world's fauna works in a similar way. There have already been cases of powerful hostile animals turning friendly through someone able to communicate with them, such as the birds on the Torino Kingdom and Shirahoshi with the Sea Kings, so one wouldn't consider it beyond Apis's ability and her charismatic, gentle nature to convince the animals to come to her side. And if one can't be negotiated with, they can be forcibly put to one's side through triumph in battles, such as with Cerberus and Momoo. Apis doesn't seem to have that kind of personality, but a user of the Whisper-Whisper Fruit could conceivably do that with animals they've befriended.
To be frank, what does any of this matter? Apis was the central character of a filler arc. In fact, her arc is not only non-canon, but it was also later directly contradicted by canon (Zoro not believing in dragons despite seeing them in this arc). This is probably why most fans seem to consider it the worst arc in the entire series.
Actually, there's a possibility that it's not contradicted by canon. Zoro stating that he doesn't believe in dragons happens in Punk Hazard. He encounters a dragon in the Warship Island filler arc. In between the two (but closer to Punk Hazard) is the Straw Hats' first visit to Sabaody, during which we actually see Zoro erasing his memory of Kokoro. Since he can apparently do that, I see no reason to assume that his not believing in dragons is a contradiction.
No comment on whether or not Zoro would or could have erased the memory of seeing dragons, but it is stated that he doesn't believe in the creatures before Punk Hazard — he mentions it briefly during Thriller Bark, before fighting Ryuma.
Another point towards the non-canonicity of the arc: When confronted with the steel chains blocking the Merry, Zoro says he can cut through them. Then, suddenly, he has to try and figure out how to cut steel again while fighting Mr. 1 in Alabasta.
At first during the Arlong Arc, it looks like Arlong was bribing the Marines to keep their mouths shut because he just wanted to stay hidden for simple reasons, like not having the Marines chase him or to just relax. But after Jimbei's debut, it's revealed the only reason Arlong was freed was that Jimbei became a Warlord of the Sea, and if word got up to Marine HQ that Arlong was terrorizing a small island, Jimbei would have no doubt gone there and solved the problem himself. Arlong was bribing the Marines because he didn't want to get Jimbei on him! And yes, this would probably happen since it has been implied that Jimbei hates Arlong's guts.
That theory would actually confirm what the Warlords of the Sea are for. Intimidating any minor pirate from doing anything. Or trying to cover it.
Oda's Foreshadowing in general is amazing. The examples are innumerable, and many of them are quite subtle, but here's a pair:
In Loguetown and just before reaching Alabasta, Nami is shown to have an exceptional weather sense (she predicts the huge windstorm that saves Luffy, and then a big cyclone with no plot significance). Then, at the end of the Alabasta arc, Nami's new weapon turns out to be weather control!
From way, way early in the series, even before meeting Sanji, Luffy says he wants a musician on the crew (the line, paraphrased, is something like "Man, I hate not having good food out here. You know what we need on this crew? A MUSICIAN!"). He repeats this a number of times, ("Luffy, since we all got so injured in that fight, you should really add to the crew — " "A musician, I know!"), and then with Brook, they finally have a musician... Hundreds of chapters later!
In Romance Dawn, Haki, of all things, is foreshadowed. Shanks uses it on the Sea Monster when he protects Luffy. More proof that Oda knows what he's doing.
Back in the Lougetown arc, Luffy was about to be executed by Buggy on the execution platform when it was struck by lightning. While Buggy is fried, and the platform burnt down, Luffy is miraculously unscathed. Cut to the Skypiea arc, and he is proven to be immune to Eneru's Lightning. Luffy's immunity to lightning was foreshadowed very early on.
After the execution stand is struck down by lightning in Lougetown, Sanji asks Zoro if he believes in God (canon says he doesn't). A few arcs later we end up in Skypiea, where resident A God Am I Eneru uses, yup, lightning.
It's amazing to realize Arlong, one of the first big-name pirates Luffy beat, SAILED IN THE GRAND LINE previous to his relocation to the East Blue. No wonder the World Government was startled by Luffy; he beat up someone who should, by all accounts, have been able to beat Luffy senseless without much effort.
Despite the infamous curse detailed in its introduction, Kitetsu III has obeyed Zoro's sword hand thus far. However, it is worth noting that it was only after he obtained it that his having No Sense of Direction began to be Flanderized into absurdity.
Jango's name. In his debut, he's the acting captain of the Black Cat pirates, or, to say, Jango of the Black Cat. In Japanese, that would be "Kuroneko no Jango", which is one letter removed from a classic children's song .
In the introduction to the series, Luffy is begging Shanks to let him join his crew, while Shanks gives Luffy all sorts of excuses as to why he can't: Luffy's too young, he can't swim, it's too dangerous, etc. With hindsight, a better reason should be obvious. Luffy is the grandson of Garp the Hero, the strongest marine ever. Shanks probably knows this, and knows that if he takes Luffy with him, Garp is gonna chase him down to get Luffy back. And while Shanks and his crew are badasses, even they probably don't wanna throw hands with the guy who was a rival to Gold Roger.
Little Garden Arc
When Sanji and Zoro are competing to see who can hunt the most they first encounter a T-Rex and a Triceratops respectively. One doesn't use their arms very much and the other has three sharp horns or blades.
Drum Island Arc
The noble quack doctor Hiruluk's last words are as follows "Sooner or later, I will die anyway. But a man does not die when he is shot. Nor does he die to disease, nor to eating a poison mushroom! He does not die due to a sword! A man dies when he is forgotten!" So what is he saying? If a man is remembered, he will never die. Flash forward to Gold Roger's old first mate recounting the man's last words to him before facing his execution because he's going to die soon anyway, due to a disease: "I won't die, partner." He then goes on to spark the Golden Age of Piracy with his last words, ensuring that he will never be forgotten. Not only do their death scenes parallel each other perfectly (Roger's death being grander), Gold Roger and Hiruluk have the same philosophy on death; Hiruluk probably picked it up from Gold Roger during their youth!
This exact point is stated the Hávamál, which is a part of the Poetic Edda of Norse Mythology. It might just be a coincidence, but I recall Oda saying that his interest in pirates started with Vikings.
I'm currently working on the theory that the entire show is Gold Roger's inherited will.
A running gag in the Drum Kingdom arc was Luffy consistently having a delayed reaction to the cold weather around him. At least two or three occasions went by where Luffy was slow on the uptake, usually only noticing the cold after someone else pointed it out. At first glance, this is just a joke at Luffy's idiocy, but isn't rubber an insulator? To be honest, It's quite possible that Luffy actually can't feel cold right away. His insulated rubber body gives him a slightly higher tolerance for cold than most. He's hardly immune (Aokiji aside he nearly froze to death in Drum), but he is noticeably hardier in the cold than others.
Oddly enough, Luffy seems no less sensitive to heat than normal people.
Rubber is an ELECTRIC insulator, which has nothing to do with temperature conductivity. People pointing it out to him wouldn't suddenly make him cold, it was simply done for laughs.
An interesting fact is that poor conductors of electricity are also poor heat conductors. So while not on the level of styrofoam, it is indeed a temperature insulator.
To add to all of this, rubber is, in fact, a good heat insulator. However, rubber's structural properties are affected by hot temperatures. This explains why, while Luffy would naturally be more resilient to both hot and cold temperatures, he's really only tolerant of the cold.
Drum Island arc ended with Chopper claiming that he can't go to seas because everyone would just call him a freak. Luffy yelled the legendary words: "SHUT UP! LET'S GO!". Think about what that meant to Chopper. He finally met someone who accepts him as what he is. And Luffy... He chooses his True Companions out of random people, who usually happen to be called "freaks" and "threats" by society.
Made all the more heartwarming because Luffy had no idea that Chopper is a doctor. He wasn't recruiting Chopper because his crew needed a doctor, he just wanted Chopper to be his nakama.
After Wapol fired on Hiriluk's Jolly Roger, Luffy went up and protected it, keeping it from falling. He then said to Wapol something along the lines of "This flag is not something you can just shoot down while smiling like an idiot." Now, of all the Straw Hats, which two are the ones who are, at any given moment, most likely to be smiling like idiots? Luffy and Usopp. Yet... neither of them were smiling like idiots when Luffy ordered Sogeking to shoot down the flag of the World Government in Enies Lobby!
Befitting the eponymous trope, Ace in many ways functions as the Ideal Hero not just in comparison to Luffy, but in general; friendly, sociable, is the son of the most influential figure in the series, has a classic hero power (fire), and is considered one of the strongest characters. With his death, the story emphasizes that despite these qualities, Luffy is the hero the story needs.
Ideal hero? We're talking about the same dine-n'-dashing, pirate-following, rebellious, Marine-busting, reckless Ace, right?
The idea still stands. One Piece is almost like A Song of Ice and Fire in regards to its moral neutrality. Pirates are either insane and dangerous or idealistic and Chaotic Good. Gold Roger is said to have murdered an entire crew because he was angry. Luffy released prison inmates who were obviously deranged at best. Compared to all that, Ace is an ideal hero. If you want an ideal hero based on niceness, go to Shanks (who probably has a morally ambiguous past himself) or Coby.
I think Ace is initially presented as a better version of Luffy and an ideal hero, mature, handsomer, and not a complete airhead, but his flaws become more apparent as the story goes on. His hunt for Blackbeard is revealed to be for vengeance more than any other reason, and he recklessly opts to fight him alone, not knowing the full extent of the threat he's up against, which is how he ends up captured. He takes his loyalty to Whitebeard too far, which Akainu takes advantage of by insulting Whitebeard, goading Ace into attacking, which leads to his tragic yet avoidable death.
If Chopper is the expy of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, then his Monster Point is the expy of Krampus. Pre time-skip being the much less friendly Krampus legends.
Alabasta Arc
So, in the Alabasta arc, after Luffy's defeat by Crocodile, Robin saves him and questions why "those with the initial of D. are so persistent." Of course, she was talking from experience, as we learn that the giant who saved her life 20 years before also had the middle initial "D".
In the Baroque Works saga, Mr 2 Bon Clay announces his special technique—composite face changing, where he can change each part of his face—and announces that he will create the strangest face known to man! Five seconds later, he turns back with "90% of his own face". That was funny in and of itself (see: the ten-second long awkward silence afterwards), but what I only realized the second time watching was the 10% he changed was his nose... To Usopp's.
A moment of Fridge Brilliance that occurred to me a while ago regarding the Alabasta arc. The key element that allowed the Straw Hats to escape Crocodile's fiendishly clever trap was the fact that Crocodile's information about the Straw Hats was incomplete, which allowed Sanji (who he never knew about) and Chopper (who he dismissed as a pet) to trick him. It wasn't for a long time that I realized he should have known about Sanji all along. The Unluckies only identified Luffy, Zoro, and Nami at Whiskey Peak, and the Mr. 3 and 5 pairs met Usopp at Little Garden. But in between Miss All-Sunday met all five current Straw Hats. The fact that Crocodile didn't know about Sanji despite his own Dragon having met him makes you realize Robin was undermining Crocodile's activities even then.
Okay, so during the final battle between Luffy and Crocodile, Antonin Dvorak's 9th symphony played during Luffy's finishing move. I love the New World Symphony and all, but I didn't realize the following until almost a year after I watched the episode when I was literally removing food from my refrigerator. Get this: baroque music was playing during the defeat of the leader of Baroque Works.
About that... Dvorak composed "romantic" music, not "Baroque" (the Baroque period was about a century earlier).
That only inspires another Fridge Brilliance: It's used for the triumph of romantic ideas, which Crocodile was just criticizing Luffy for having!
More brilliance... the name of the music played is From The New World. I'm not sure if this is just a coincidence or more foreshadowing on Oda's part, but what's the name of the latter half of the Grand Line that makes the first half seem like paradise?
Well, Oda really doesn't have much if any control when it comes to the anime (although unlike most creators, he likes the adaptation), but that just makes everything awesome in hindsight.
In the same vein, Oda stated in his SBS that the characters were in love "with adventure" in order to justify not having romance (the more serious reason being Romantic Plot Tumor). This actually makes a great deal of sense, however; Luffy's all about going on adventures and fulfilling "a man's romance"! The journeys that each character takes to achieve their dreams only reinforces that. As opposed to most heroes who only want to get stronger, Luffy really cares about the adventure that he goes on to become Pirate King, not so necessarily about being the strongest. After the war, it seems that Luffy even reinvigorated Crocodile's motivation as well. Romance is there... it's just not the kind you're thinking of.
It struck me as odd that the swan-themed Mr 2 Bon Clay was the only male member of Baroque Works that didn't have a number motif in his character design. But then I realized it was there all along — swans have the same shape like the number 2!
Actually a comment from One Piece Wiki: During the Alabasta arc, Ace tells Luffy that they will meet at "the summit". Though it's said to be a mistranslation (It was more "they will meet again after becoming great pirates), it makes sense. Where does Luffy finally meet Ace? At Marine Headquarters, in a battle of the three great powers!
In Crocodile's first fight with Luffy, when they were in the desert, he said he was unbeatable there. Simple villainous boasting? Yes, but it was proven to be true, Luffy only managed to defeat Crocodile when they met inside a city. Looking at what he could do in the desert as opposed to the capital (where his powers were limited by lack of sand), it's possible that Luffy would've never beaten him if their third fight didn't occur where it did.
Also, during that first fight, Crocodile is usually very calm and smug - except when Luffy insulted him or acted silly. Even then, his reaction after Luffy tried to eat him was even angrier than normal. Why? Moisture negates Crocodile's Sand-Sand powers. Saliva is mostly water. Luffy's ridiculous attack could have worked, which would have clued Luffy about Croc's weakness.
Another one for Crocodile. A lot of people thought for a long time that Crocodile was one of the weakest Warlords of the Sea because his former bounty was so low compared to the others, and in a few cases were confused as to how he was holding his own so well in Marineford. His low former bounty should actually be seen as proof of how tough he is. See, it's easy for pirates with bounties exceeding 300,000,000 berries like Gecko Moria and Doflamingo to have the intimidating reputations a Warlord needs, but it takes a special breed of badass to make the Marines suddenly realize that they need you on their side before your bounty even comes close to getting that high.
As for how he lost to Luffy, pay attention to the third fight; Crocodile almost never uses his powers throughout it. He himself stated that his mastery over his Devil Fruit powers was his main claim to power, and he forgoes using them in favor of simple meleeing, which is Luffy's specialty. He attempted an I Am Not Left-Handed gambit and severely miscalculated.
Also, pay attention during the fights Crocodile gets into in Marineford. No one ever attempts to use water to land hits on him like Luffy does, and his opponents are the other Warlords (his former allies) and Whitebeard's crew (who he fought at one point), the people who logically should know more about his fighting ability than anyone else Crocodile would be facing. With Crocodile's ability to instantly dry up moisture, Luffy may very well be the only one who actually knows about this weakness (well, except Robin and the few people in Alabasta who saw Luffy using water to kick Crocodile's ass, of course).
You don't need to use water to hit Crocodile if you have Armament Haki. Armament Haki makes it so that a Devil Fruit user's physical (real) body will be hit. While the Marines, Seven Warlords, and Whitebeard pirates may or may not know of his weakness to being hit by water or wet objects, why go through the trouble of soaking your limbs when you have access to Haki and Seastone?
Actually, no, Haki-infused attacks aren't that useful against him, either. Crocodile has been stated to have mastered his powers to the extent that he transforms reflexively the instant an attack starts to make contact (which makes water by far the more effective option; when an attack with a soaked fist/foot makes contact, it's already too late for him, while a Haki-based attack he can get out of the way of before it can actually do damage), and even Haki-infused attacks have to actually hit him to do anything. After all, he No-Sell'd a beheading from Doflamingo. Also remember, he's been to the New World, and it took Whitebeard to put him down; you don't get that far by folding to every combatant with Haki that comes your way.
The point of the above argument is that people who believe that Crocodile is one of the weak Warlords bring up that his vulnerability to water in the mostly-oceanic One Piece world is an apparent Weaksauce Weakness. Basically, the idea here is that not only is Crocodile capable of negating that weakness in most situations, but it's also entirely likely that no one even knows about that weakness.
Also, just pointing it out, but Seastone is almost exclusively available to the Marines and is used mostly for building their prisons/handcuffs and coating their ships so they can avoid Sea Kings; it's almost never used as a weapon against Devil Fruit users.
Seastone was used later in the story as a weapon of sorts to attack another fighter with Logia-like (but not actually Logia) powers — Marco. The reason why no one bothers with Crocodile may be that his major defense strategy is (as later shown) easy to beat for anyone who's been to the New World, which is almost everyone significant in the Marineford arc.
Pell surviving his Heroic Sacrifice is seen as an Ass Pull by many but makes sense after the concept of Haki is explained. He used a weak, instinctive, form of Armament Haki that left him with just enough life for that doctor to save him. It doesn't make it feel like any less of an asspull on first viewing, coming off as poorly implemented foreshadowing, but it would also explain why nearly everyone in One Piece is Made of Iron.
On the subject of Haki, one might wonder how Luffy Gum Gum Storm'd his way through the blades created by Crocodile's final attack. Maybe that was foreshadowing of his Haki.
Just having re-read that arc, I was wondering if the fact that Luffy was able to hit Crocodile in their last fight wasn't down to blood, but down to subconscious Haki.
Like many others, I was somewhat bothered that Crocodile, a villain who was fought relatively early in the series was capable of holding his own in Marineford while Luffy was continually struggling. But you have to remember that much of Crocodile's development revolves around his cynicism and disillusionment. He goes from a reasonably powerful New World pirate to terrorizing a kingdom in the first half of the Grand Line (not to say the latter isn't an achievement). When he lost his motivation, he stopped challenging himself and relied on the powers of other weapons (like Pluton).
I was thinking about Robin's alias in the Baroque Works and how funny it was that since she's the most powerful female member there it was sort of implying that Sunday is the ultimate day of the week which is totally all accurate if you ask me, when it hit me: the All in Ms. All Sunday counters Crocodile's Mr. 0: it's everything and nothing, respectively.
Also, her codename doesn't just refer to any generic Sunday, but to All the Sundays of the year.
All Baroque Works agents from the Unluckies upwards are a pair of a man and a woman, arranged to "least useful for the organization" to "most useful". Mr. 2 Bon Clay is the only exception, being a single Officer Agent with no partner. That's for two reasons: one, he considers himself to be part man and part woman, so he fills both roles. Two: his shapeshifting powers and combat abilities make him more dangerous than Mr. 3 and Miss Goldenweek combined.
There's a third point: Baroque Works was founded with an endgame already in mind, and the real reason to place him that high was to make sure he'd be at hand to cover needs for somebody who can do a specific impersonation. Fighting ability is just a bonus that keeps his peers from complaining much. Finding a useful partner who could get along with him and avoid notice while he's disguised — considering how good Officer Agents are at not being noticeable — was likely too tall an order.
Sanji and Zoro's feuding with each other really got started at Little Garden and with their hunting competition, which mirrored what got Dorry and Broggy to spend a hundred years hitting each other over. However, unlike the giants, no one is there to really spark the fire (like questioning whose was better), so it has never gotten out of control.
Jaya Arc
When Nami is humiliated by Bellamy's thugs and orders Zoro and Luffy to fight them, they simply refuse. Despite clear anger on both their parts, they don't fight back much to Nami's frustration. The reason neither fought back is simple: They promised Nami they wouldn't fight back, and one look at their backstories reveals that both deeply value promises.
Skypiea Arc
Fairly early on in the Skypiea arc Eneru's powers are shown for the first time when he tries to kill Conis for trying to convince the Straw Hats to run away. The first time you read the chapter, it looks like a straightforward sequence of events that you wouldn't question; Luffy manages to dodge the blast long enough for Gan Fall to swoop in and pull them the rest of the way to safety. But, if you reread the sequence later you'll notice that Gan Fall pops up with them through the massive hole in the clouds left by Eneru's blast, implying that he wasn't actually the one who saved them, he just caught them once they were blown through the ground. Which means that this is actually neatly foreshadowing Luffy's immunity to Eneru's lightning, disguised in a way that people wouldn't think twice about. It also means that Conis is very lucky that he held her close enough to shield her while trying to dodge.
Chapter 597 made this fridge brilliance hit me like a ton of bricks. The entire Skypiea arc WASN'T ultimately pointless to the rest of the plot, as most fans have dubbed it to be. In Skypiea, we see several examples of what we will eventually know as Haki, displaying several different types of it and what exactly can be done with it. In other words, the entire arc is ONE MASSIVE PIECE OF FORSHADOWING.
There's also the fact that the Skypeia Arc gets the crew treasure, giving them enough money to warrant a visit to Galley-La in Water 7, starting off the conflict with Usopp during the CP9 saga.
In fact, the immense strain put on the ship from the journey to Skypiea is a large factor in why the Going Merry broke down.
The 'dial' technology introduced there was later integrated into Nami's and Ussop's weapons, giving a completely logical explanation for their sudden increase in power.
This arc reinforced that "Gold Roger" is in fact "Gol D. Roger" (first mentioned in an aside by Dr. Kureha in the Drum Island Arc). Readers didn't think anything about Ace having a D. because he's Luffy's brother, but seeing the King of the Pirates sporting the initial made the whole 'Will of D.' thing a pretty big deal.
And it also served as Foreshadowing that the Roger pirates had figured out the Void Century (or Lost 100 Years, or whatever you want to call it).
And the Poneglyph in Skypiea will probably be important in the Fish-Man Island Arc, and possibly much more important later on as the Straw Hats get further along in the New World.
The conflict with Bellamy and the quick scene at the end of the arc establish Doflamingo and his idea of the "new age."
And most importantly, it puts time between Robin joining the crew, and being forced to leave it. If you pay attention to her character throughout that arc, she's continually pleasantly surprised by the Straw Hats' happy-go-lucky attitude, and tendency to choose adventure and fun over practicality. Especially in the bonfire scene, and at the end when she is the only one who knows the residents of Skypiea aren't chasing them to get the gold back but to give them more. Without the experiences of getting to know the crew she gains in Skypiea, Robin wouldn't have given a damn if Aokiji blew them up, and probably would have betrayed them as per her usual MO.
During a meeting between Gan Fall and a young Wyper, Wyper's Berserk Button was pressed when Gan Fall mentioned he enjoyed drinking pumpkin juice, leading to him to irrationally attack Gan Fall. At first, it seemed rather strange for Wyper to flip out over something like that. Then we see in the flashback of Noland with Wyper's ancestor Calgara that Noland introduced pumpkins to Shandians. So it was possible that pumpkins were considered sacred to the Shandians or perhaps Wyper felt that pumpkins belonged specifically to the Shandians and for the former Lord of the Skypieans to enjoy it must have felt like a terrible offense to him.
It was probably simply the fact that pumpkins come from Shandia. They are plants and therefore, can only be grown in Skypiea on Upper Yard. Gan Fall's statement could be interpreted (and clearly was by Wyper) as "I really enjoy the things my people have forcibly taken from your people."
The anime reinforces this by having him specifically mention where the pumpkins are grown.
The Straw Hats may have misinterpreted the Skypieans bringing them the giant golden pillar, but if you think about it, it's really just as well and might be why Robin chose not to correct them. If they hadn't done so and accepted the Skypieans' gift, it would have sunk their ship, even if the Going Merry was in peak condition and they left behind all the gold they "stole".
Also in the Dressrosa Arc, we learn that Bellamy also made it to Skypiea and took that same pillar that the Straw Hats left behind and gave it as a gift to Doflamingo, allowing him to rejoin the Donquixote Pirates after his expulsion back at Jaya. Thus making Bellamy's return make a lot more sense than if he reappeared without explanation.
At the end of Chapter 253, the Shandians are discussing attacking Upper Yard. In the panel that talks about them taking back their home, the view switches to the moon above. Where do we eventually find out the ancestors of the Skypieans and Shandians were from?
Luffy claims that despite Eneru's power he's not much compared to guys he knows on the Blue Sea. At first, it seems like just another one of Luffy's boasts (probably the only candidates he'd know would be Shanks, Crocodile, Ace, and Smoker and even then it'd be difficult to compare). Yet of the three, the one person he's had firsthand experience of being repeatedly unable to defeat is Ace from his childhood (Unlike Crocodile who he has managed to defeat albeit with difficulty, and Smoker who he fought only once). Symbolically, Oda labeled Eneru as a guy with a bounty potential of at least 500,000,000 berries. The first guy who was stated to have a higher bounty? Ace, who is stated to have a bounty of 550,000,000 berries.
Sarkies (one of the Bellamy Pirates) dismisses Luffy's 100,000,000 berry bounty by claiming that Luffy isn't a "vicious killer". And he's right: to date, Luffy has yet to kill (on purpose or on accident) an antagonist.
This one is subtle but still noticeable. It has been stated that those with the Will of D are the natural enemies of God. Luffy is a carrier of the Will of D and faces off against Eneru a man who considers himself a God. Eneru Devil Fruit power is electricity and he is invulnerable to all physical damage, except for Luffy because his Devil Fruit is the natural weakness of Eneru. Luffy is and his Devil Fruit is the natural enemy of God Eneru.
Water 7 / Enies Lobby Arcs
Tom's catchphrase, "Do it with a Don!", seems like a general "put effort onto what you do" at first, but when you realise that throughout the manga important panels often have a DON sound effect, it could also mean that he's saying to do everything in a manner worthy of one of those panels.
In the scene where Luffy and Usopp were fighting about the fate of Going Merry, Zoro was the only one who barely reacted to the situation, keeping a calm head, when everyone else was arguing and yelling. At first, it seems a little cold of Zoro to be like that. Everyone was actively trying to stop the fight, but even if they had, Luffy and Usopp would have butted heads over the matter again sooner or later. Imagine what would have happened if they fought later on while trying to rescue Robin? It would have brought everyone's morale down and made their teamwork less effective.
When Spandam boasts to Luffy about the power the World Government wields, and asks him if he could possibly understand what defying the WG to rescue Robin from Enies Lobby would mean, Luffy responds: "Yes, I understand exactly how the WG thinks." Taken at face value, it could be seen as simply Luffy being badass enough to not cower before Spandam. However, a World Noble is responsible for shooting Luffy's brother Sabo waaaay back in his childhood.
This is a great scene, not only because it references parts of Luffy's then-unrevealed past, but because of how it subverts Luffy's status as a classic Idiot Hero. Up to this point, Luffy, while obviously brave, could have been doing all the crazy shit out of ignorance of how badly it could go wrong, and his over-confidence has only been enforced by his extreme luck. But, in acknowledging that he KNOWS how big a threat he's facing, and is still willing to fight and act in his reckless manner, it shows that he's not merely an idiot running around Cutting the Knot because he doesn't know better, but instead someone who's made a conscious decision on how he wants to live his life despite the consequences. And the latter is much more badass, and casts a different light over a lot of his antics.
This also lends some rather heavy significance to Luffy's words to Vivi during the Alabasta arc. Words which, in retrospect, he said to her because he himself had to learn the truth of those words the hard way. "Vivi... people die."
When Robin tells them the kind of life she's had, Luffy didn't order the flag to be shot just because he and his crew would never leave her, nor was it purely out of sympathy. Luffy's been through that kind of thing, where the World Government could screw you over, since he witnessed Sabo's ship blowing up. He knew EXACTLY how Robin felt, which was why he waged war. And here we thought he was an Idiot Hero...
Why didn't Spandam eat a Devil Fruit himself and chose to give the ones he got through connections to Kaku and Kalifa, while he could have done so and at least mitigate his physical weakness? Simple. He knows he is weak, and that Kaku and Kalifa can use the fruits better. Also, due to having bad luck, he fears he could accidentally fall in water and drown.
I got to thinking about Aokiji warning Luffy repeatedly that having Robin aboard his ship would spell certain doom for the Straw Hats... and is struck by how closely that mirrors the old sailor's superstition that it's bad luck to have a woman aboard.
But...they had Nami on board their ship for quite a while before they got Robin, and Vivi as well...
Both of whom led to trouble: Nami kick-started the Arlong arc (where she steals the ship and leaves the crew), and taking on Vivi launched the Alabasta arc (where they got involved in world politics, and Luffy, you know... met Crocodile), respectively.
All but one of Luffy's bounty-rises were due to these incidents (Arlong Arc got him a bounty in the first place, Alabasta Arc more than tripled it, Enies Lobby tripled that).
So I was wondering, what's the deal with CP9!? They are still way low on the Sorting Algorithm of Evil (Think lv 50 boss out of 200) when they can be beaten, by the Straw Hats, and by extension, all eleven supernova crews, then there are the World Powers, and basically everyone in the New World... But then I realized something, CP9 are assassins! They don't need strength, because even Mihawk would die if you slit his throat in his sleep; in other words, CP9's strength is only proportional to their quality as assassins, which is also why everybody else in CP9 seems to hate Fukuro.
In addition, it's highly probable that they're the best of Cipher Pol not only because they were strong but also because they were good at gathering info and other spy stuff (like, yeah, assassination). It's a testament to their ability that they managed to even give a good fight to the Straw Hats, despite direct combat technically not being their strong suit.
One small thing. The Straw Hats are probably the second most powerful Supernova crew (out of the Supernovas, they had the second-highest captain bounty and the second highest non-captain bounty at Sabondy, behind Kid's crew). Since the Straw Hat's pulled out all the stops and barely beat the CP9, it's doubtful that most of the other Supernova crews could pull it off. Still a good point, though.
Mind you, Shakky stated the explicit reason Kid had a higher bounty than Luffy was because Kid was a rather loose cannon who often caused a lot of trouble for the civilians — in other words, while Kid made a name for himself for behaving more like you'd expect a pirate to (by being a dick), Luffy earned his bounty by kicking the ass of everyone who got in his way... which includes people like Crocodile in the list. Now, you don't get that high a bounty without being notorious yourself, so doubtless Kid's crew is amongst the strongest of the Supernovas, but remember that we've already been shown before Sabaody that "bounty =/= power level".
In their encounter with Aokiji, he claims that every organisation Robin has been part of has been destroyed, and not one person has escaped except her. A few episodes later, she starts working with CP9 to retrieve Pluton. Naturally, the Straw Hats defeat CP9. Looks like what he said was true after all.
Mainly because they never accepted her, they never came to love or care about her, becoming True Companions. They only used her as a tool. The Straw Hats, however, care about her regardless of her past. And they not only survived but became even stronger.
During the raid on Franky House, at the start Luffy starts using Gatling in what seems to be him charging up a punch. His skin also goes red. This is really neat foreshadowing of Gear Second, in which Luffy pumps blood round his body to increase his power.
Robin's Seastone handcuffs are unlocked by the #5 key. Said key was held by Kaku, meaning Spandam gave the key to his strongest enforcer left.
Likewise, in the anime, Usopp accidentally got cuffed to Zoro through a screwed up plan (blame Kaku for his really silly Devil Fruit appearance and subsequent tantrum) to disable one of the Devil Fruit users of CP9 with another set of Seastone cuffs. The #2 key was needed to unlock the cuffs. This key was taken from Kalifa, who, while undercover, previously served as Iceburg's Number Two — his secretary.
During the Enies Lobby Arc, Sanji leaves the battlefield to go close the Gates of Justice. This is around the time the higher-ranking Marines start attacking the Straw Hats and Franky, and in that scuffle, pictures are taken of a few crew members. Except Sanji. This sets up the stage for the inept undercover photographer to screw up a candid shot of Sanji in Water 7.
Nami inflicts Clothing Damage to an unconscious Kalifa after her fight is over as she tears them apart searching for her handcuffs key. Kalifa liked to say "that's sexual harassment" in the most inappropriate situations. Now she's the victim of what would be considered sexual harassment.
Fukuro, a perpetual gossiper, has a high-pitched voice... like a teenage gossiping girl!
Jabra and Lucci get on each others' nerves because it's a natural animal rivalry- Jabra ate a dog species Devil Fruit, while Lucci ate a cat species Devil Fruit.
Usopp would occasionally talk about being the captain and/or vice-captain. Luffy's first bounty was 30,000,000 Berries. Guess the amount on Usopp's first bounty.
This might only apply to the anime since this troper hasn't read the manga. Right after Ace has blasted Blackbeard with a Fire-Fist, notice how long he stays on fire. Back in the Alabasta Arc, Ace was able to light Sanji's cigarette from a distance (at least in the Anime, anyway). That's why Blackbeard took so long to stop burning: Ace was purposely keeping the fire on Blackbeard's body burning!
Thriller Bark Arc
It annoyed me that Brook and zombie Ryuuma's slightly different personalities were handwaved by saying that Brook's shadow had just forgotten his past. That couldn't be the only explanation because Ryuuma showcased Blood Knight tendencies that Brook lacks. Then I remembered Cindry, a zombie who somehow retained a bit of her free will. I realized that there's a line hinting that something similar happened with Ryuuma: "It feels as if I am about to fight a titanic creature... It even sends shivers down my body. What a feeling! Yohohoho!" I have to conclude that "a titanic creature" refers to a dragon which samurai Ryuuma slew meaning that his zombie form still has some unconscious memories of his life. Therefore zombie Ryuuma's personality is, in fact, a mix between amnesic Brook and a loyal zombie with shades of Ryuuma's old personality.
Moria is the subject of a lot of hate for being a Flunky Boss and for going down easily when he went One-Winged Angel and at Marineford. But he's not shaped like that (entirely) because it's funny, since we've seen him at Roger's execution looking slim and muscular: His defeat at Kaido's hands led him to become morbidly obese, and therefore has very poor mobility and hand-to-hand combat, which he was forced to rely on both times he seemed to have been worfed.
I was watching a video of the Straw Hats / Oars battle when a thought hit me. In Thriller Bark, Gecko Moria turned Luffy's power against the Straw Hat crew by putting Luffy's shadow into Oars and using his own powers to simulate Luffy's stretching on top of that. How does Luffy respond? By turning Moria's powers against him in the form of Nightmare Luffy.
Upon recently rewatch of the Thriller Bark arc, I realized something. When Zoro offers his head to Kuma as a substitute for Luffy, Sanji steps in to fill his spot, claiming that they should take him before he can cause any real trouble. This always seemed strange to me, while Sanji is indeed a powerful member of Luffy's crew, his value isn't equal to Zoro's or Luffy's. A potential King of the Pirates that is the son of the Revolution Dragon that has taken down 2 Warlords and a man gunning for the title of greatest swordsman who survived an encounter with Mihawk and earned his respect. Sanji is a strong chef that wants to find the All Blue. Compared to those two, he seems a bit outclassed in terms of threat potential, but then it hit that Sanji isn't just a strong fighter Sanji is a member of the powerful Vinsmoke assassin family. With his background he could potentially be an equal threat to the government as much as the other two. Sanji was not offering himself as a Straw Hat, rather he offering himself as Vinsmoke.
Brook has been stuck in the mist for fifty years. Crocus sailed with Roger 20 years in the past. Roger must have sailed through or around the mist during his voyage. Knowing the mist, they could have been feet away and not known. They missed their chance to reunite by who knows how small a margin, and Brook lost his chance to escape the mist 20 years early.
Sabaody Archipelago Arc
Despite the unbridled awesome to come, I was somewhat disappointed after the Straw Hat crew were scattered across the globe by Kuma and the manga's focus shifted almost entirely to Luffy with only hints of what the others were going through. Upon consideration, however, it could be brilliant because when the anime catches up, instead of making up Filler Arcs to give the manga time to pull ahead again, the animation team will be able to spend time telling the stories of the rest of the crew.
Perhaps the most brilliant part of the separation arc occurs at the end after Luffy's heartbreaking loss of his brother. After focusing on Luffy for so long the crew is pushed to the back of the reader's mind, as they were pushed to the back of Luffy's. In this way, his realization that he has not lost everything and wants to see his crew becomes that much more poignant and accessible to the reader. It allows us to feel the chunk of time they weren't together more personally.
In a meta sense, this works out perfectly: The Straw Hats are separated in Chapter 512, released on September 1, 2008. They're finally reunited in Chapter 602, released on 'November 1, 2010'. There's a two-year timeskip after the Summit War in which the Straw Hats are separated, mirroring the two-year real-time gap during which the rest of the crew was largely absent.
Some of the Logia powers shown so far in the manga have all had an element of mystery. Kizaru is once heard to mumble a cryptic Pre Ass Kicking One Liner — "Light is...weight." If one isn't familiar with Einstein's relativity theory, it makes absolutely no sense. — Spirit Of Sahara
For the sake of those that aren't familiar: Things get more massive (and usually heavier as a result) as they get faster, and reaching the speed of light gives you infinite mass (infinite weight if there's anything with gravity nearby). Light can do it because it had no mass to begin with, so infinity times nothing is still nothing. Kizaru's immense destructive power need not be superhuman strength at all, as if he kicked someone at the speed of light, he would have to turn back at that speed to be solid, giving him a mass that rivals a black hole for the instant it takes him to slow down. And according to Newton that makes the force greater than.... yeah.
The bottom line being that Kizaru's mass destructive powers are actually based on solid physics, and that Oda did the research yet again. The other Fridge brilliance being that Kizaru is much, much, smarter than he appears at first glance.
Bartholomew Kuma asks "If you're going on a trip, where would you like to go?" before his target is propelled to a far away location, possibly torn away from True Companions, with no way of getting back anytime soon... except every time he's done this, he's sent them 'exactly where they want to go or need to be. This gives an impression he's benevolent and/or a very good Chessmaster... or rather WAS.
And after the two year time skip, Brook has become a celebrity soul musician. Why hasn't he been arrested after these two years? Because no one from Marine HQ knew that he was part of the Straw Hats yet, and therefore, despite him having a bounty while alive, has no price on his head for those particular incidents.
This also explains why there are people impersonating each of the Straw Hats except for Brook.
Whitebeard (Edward) and Blackbeard's (Teach) names are based of a single real pirate: "Blackbeard" Edward Teach. Now that Blackbeard has absorbed Whitebeard's DF and killed him, Blackbeard has metaphorically become the real Edward Teach.
When Rayleigh first meets Luffy, his first comment to him is "That straw hat suits you". Seems like an odd offhand comment at first...then it's reveal that Rayleigh's old captain Gol D. Roger wore a straw hat (if not THAT straw hat).
It was revealed before the group headed to Fish-Man Island that the hat was originally Roger's before it ended up with Shanks. Not only that, but Roger looked just like Luffy when he was younger.
As sad as it was to see the Straw Hats separated, it did make sense. Considering everything Luffy went through from Impel Down to Marineford, if the other Straw Hats had accompanied him on his mission to save Ace, they would've been slaughtered.
It also gave Luffy a chance to develop a strong bond with soon-to-be crewmate Jimbei. Heartwarming in Hindsight because that would mean when the other Straw Hats couldn't be there for Luffy, he already had a Straw Hat with him, albeit unknowingly.
It's almost as if Kuma planned it that way. Think about it. He could've easily sent the Straw Hats all to the same place, but instead, he separated them. He no doubt knew that once Luffy learned about Ace's execution, he'd want to save him, and as his loyal crew, the others would follow him to Marineford only to be wiped out. This way, the crew was safe while Luffy participated in the war.
Doflamingo's comments about slavery being out and the world entering the age of "smiles" make a lot more sense when we find out about the SMILE factory.
A really minor thing: at the beginning of the arc, as Zoro leaves the ship to go wandering, was Sanji imploring Zoro not to leave and be careful, he even threw an honorific at him in a completely serious way. Why would Sanji be so open about caring about Zoro and try to get him to stay behind on the ship instead of wandering around, Sanji knows Zoro can take care of himself and they're always fighting anyway, why the sudden change of heart? It's rather obvious, actually, Sanji knows about Zoro's Heroic Sacrifice and feels somewhat beholden to him (hence the increased politeness) and he also knows that Zoro is substantially less than 100% due to the injuries he accrued and is legitimately worried about his well-being. I mean, despite the way Zoro and Sanji fight all the time, they actually care about each others lives and Sanji's facade happened to crack a little because Zoro has a habit of getting into trouble.
According to Rayleigh, Gold Roger was able to translate the Poneglyphs because he could "hear the voice of all things". This power may seem like an Ass Pull, but it actually has been foreshadowed. Way back in Logue Town, Zoro instantly figured that one of his new swords was cursed. In Alabasta, he began to hear the "breath" of any object, which enabled him to cut steel. And in Water 7, according to Franky, if a ship has been loved enough, it will develop a soul of its own. This "voice of all things" is just a fusion of these many hints scattered throughout the story.
The lack of any other Supernova Crews from the East Blue can be attributed to Smoker, who was a very effective stop gap measure to them. Either he'd capture them when they stopped at Loguetown, or they'd try to avoid him by bypassing it and get utterly wrecked by the Grandline (for example either by lack of supplies or the lack of a log pose). The next top tier pirate from the East Blue, the Cannibal, didn't come out until after Smoker left, and after that point the pirates in question would be behind the Straw Hats and have difficulty getting to Saboady at the same time they did.
Amazon Lily Arc
Several of my friends rolled their eyes when Luffy turned out to have a one-in-a-million superpowerful Haki in one of the more recent arcs of One Piece, and at first I agreed, since it made Luffy seem more like he was just lucking out into a sort of Chosen One rather than just an insanely determined kid with big dreams. On further reflection, however, it occurred to me that Luffy has ungodly powerful Haki not because he had good genes or a destiny, but because he is Luffy. Luffy's willpower and ambition exceed that of practically any being on the planet, and he acknowledges no authority higher than himself; the World Government's authority means nothing to Luffy, and he even talks to Whitebeard like an equal, to the shock and alarm of nearly everybody, and tells him to his face that he's going to be the pirate king. Conqueror's Disposition indeed!
Luffy's "Conqueror's" Ambition/Haki both grated and ended up making sense for a different reason. What grated was the fact that, assuming the Mook-KO part of the power is exclusive to the Conqueror's, this supposedly one-in-a-million power was seen to be possessed by at most four people (Luffy, Hancock, Shanks, and Rayleigh) and the Contrived Coincidence of all of these people winding up in direct contact with Luffy. What actually causes it to make sense though, is the fact that nearly all of these people are among those who have aimed for or reached the top of their game. In that regard, given the escalating nature of the Grand Line, it makes perfect sense that people with this power would show up together even in small groups farther up the Grand Line. I also has a "Wild Mass Guess" that people with this particular form of Ambition are instinctively attracted to one another, explaining how Luffy managed to meet them all. — Sgamer82
Actually, both Ace and Coby have Haki as well, Ace's being similar to Luffy's and Coby's being the ability to hear "voices". Coby's Haki in particular points to the powers of the people of Skypeia (most notably Eneru and his priests, and Aisa) being some form of Haki as well despite going by a different name (likely due to the fact that they were floating in the sky apart from the rest of society).
It is possible that other minor events in the series that didn't draw much notice or seem notable at the time may have been perpetrated with the help of Haki ...
To the above, I like to think this about how Luffy was able to stop Arlong's sword. It may have been rage-induced strength, or his unknown Haki, or even just a combination of both.
Don't forget there are instances of clear foreshadowing leading up to this arc. Remember when Luffy fought Iron Mask Duval he took his bull, Motobaro on by himself and got angry enough to release a dose of Haki that scared Motobaro into shaking in his boots.
Pell. Armament Haki. Could be why the plot had Robin take him out before he could get a chance at Crocodile himself.
It's not as much of a Contrived Coincidence as it originally seems that so many people with rare and/or powerful Haki end up meeting each other. Nor is it really fridge, either. Von Auger stated before that the Grand Line makes strong people meet each other.
Impel Down Arc
It has been stated that the winner in a fight is one with the stronger convictions. The Straw Hats have only lost to Aokiji, Kizaru, Kuma, and Sentoumaru, with a near-loss to Magellan. Combined with Hannyabal's "You Shall Not Pass!" speech and his impressive showing despite having no Devil Fruit powers, it seems like their convictions are stronger than the Straw Hats. Even villains can have ideals and dreams too... — Fish Stampede
Well, that's also assuming that all of those characters are straight-out villains. Aokiji seems like a very decent guy ('Lazy Justice' my ass, he was deliberately trying to give Robin a second and even third chance, despite his obvious duty being to kill or capture her.), Kuma may or may not have been an actual good guy at some point, and Kizaru seems more neutral than villainous. What must be remembered is that most of these 'villains' are actually protecting people, the normal citizens of their world, from the pirates who would harm them. Luffy's crew is the exception, not the rule. I wouldn't call the enemies 'heroes', but most of them aren't straight-up villains, either. Even Akainu, that most bastardy of bastards in the Marines, is basically a Well-Intentioned Extremist / Knight Templar with lava powers — he's utterly ruthless and definitely takes things way too far... but he's not deliberately doing cruel or evil things. He doesn't seem to enjoy hurting people, but believes in absolutely NO mercy. In fact, the sheer complexity of every character is what makes Oda-sensei so great... if you compare Luffy's reaction to that of the fans, you'll see that initially, they're similar (both the fans and Luffy see things extremely simply at first; Luffy's simplicity doesn't change, however, even when the situation gets complex). On the other hand, as can be seen here, the situation is immensely complex, and who is or is not a villain/hero can be up to debate, just like in the real world. Despite how over-the-top the show is about EVERYTHING, very few of the characters are overtly and absolutely of a specific alignment — as in real life, you get far more neutral-leaning characters than you do extreme law or chaos, and even then, they can't be defined strictly by their alignment.
So Akainu's act of murdering a ship-load of Oharans just because an archaeologist MIGHT have been among them is justifiable, then.
In his mind, yes. He was ordered to make sure none of the archeologists escaped. He felt he couldn't take even the slightest chance. It doesn't justify it to US. But he was acting "for the good of the world."
Keep in mind that hundreds of people had probably already died because of the Buster Call. If any archaeologists escaped, that would mean they died for no reason, and furthermore that OTHER islands further down the line might suffer the same fate.
In a way that is true fridge brilliance, afterall Robin did escape, and another island was destroyed. If Akainu's will had been respected Enies Lobby would have been spared.
Problem being those people didn't have to die if the government just summary executed the scholars when they were rounded up instead of wiping the island off the map. Also, was it too much for the Marines to search the escape ship after it dock to see if they were anyone who snuck onboard? Seeing what happened to their home, I doubt any of those citizens would had protect any scholar. Really, blowing the ship up was an act of laziness and a disregard to human life on Akainu's part.
As it was, killing the Marines that tried to escape the Marineford War to go home with their families when they saw they stood no chance against Whitebeard's troops.
For the two above: Laziness? Maybe, but it seems more like desperation instead. You think it would be good/easy enough to inspect all the people in the ship while in the middle of an assault? As for the Marines in the Marineford war, they're technically deserting and, even in Real Life, deserting can be punishable with death (not to mention they're supposed to be protecting the HQ).
Yes, it was laziness. He could have checked the ship after it dock and kept all the people for questioning to assure that none of them were scholars. You know, like what the real military do. No one in real life, except the extremists, would defend a boat filled with citizens being blown up because a terrorist may be onboard. And in the middle of an assault? The only people attacking were the Marines. The evac boat certainly wasn't firing back and the only person able to fight was Saul, who they had a clear visual of. Finally, if they were just going with a 'kill them all' approached, why even pretend to evacuate the citizens. They could just let them die on the island instead of trying to 'save' them.
This troper would like to ask how they would have known someone was an archeologist. They wouldn't have known Robin was one if she hadn't said so, and then she'd have been on that ship as it sailed out. So in reality, Akainu was doing what he believed to be the safest and most certain possible solution to the "problem". This troper does wonder how he'd react to learning that the world government attacked it's citizens to hide the truth, rather than protect anyone, though. Could become a plot point later on.
Considering his reaction to the reveal that Doflamingo altered press footage, and Fujitora's public apology to Dressrosa, Akainu does not freaking care about civilian lives, as long as the Marines don't look bad, or at the very least, cares far more about how Marines look to the public than about piddling little things like human lives. Further, as Saul's backstory spells out, the WG had a very good track record of sniffing out archaeologists and the Marines attacked them with far more zeal than actual pirates, much to Saul's confusion.
Even then, one can't just assume how many archeologists escaped in their ships, and quite a few people in Real Life also take archeology as a hobby, so Akainu just assumed each civilian is a possible archeologist, and reacted accordingly. Quite a brutal but very efficient example of Establishing Character Moment for one of the future big bads of the series, if there was one.
Marineford Arc
The way Whitebeard died. Quite a few characters had wanted to land the killing blow themselves, but in the end, who does it? Not Blackbeard, but the Blackbeard Pirates as a whole, reinforcing how Blackbeard feels about his crew and his Evil Counterpart status with Luffy by having them take part in his big moment.
It's more like showing that despite all his big talk and apparent similarities to Luffy, Blackbeard's nothing but a coward. The anime shows it especially well. Whitebeard, despite his condition, is easily trouncing Blackbeard, and you can see the fear in Teach's eyes, and the instant Whitebeard hesitates, Blackbeard calls his crew in to gang up so that he can be sure that he finishes the old man off, rather than risk defeat.
This was from a filler part of the War on Marineford arc where Ace is officially made 2nd Commander of Whitebeard's fleet. The crew pulls him in as he eats and crowds on him, which exactly mirrors Chopper's first party as a member of the Straw Hats. Essentially, it was the same dynamic of an outcast that had been taught that he was a monster finally finding acceptance in group that treated him like family! It also gives a heartwarming spin on the Whitebeard pirates' determination to rescue Ace: he's their Chopper! — PickledPlums
You could also draw plenty of comparisons between Ace and Robin. Both had to grow up being told that they were scum simply for existing (even if the people were only being hypothetical with Ace), and both found crews that were perfectly willing to invade heavily defended Government bases in order to get them back. Also, each rescue started somewhat similarly, with Ace/Robin screaming for the Whitebeard/Straw Hat pirates to just leave him/her alone and leave him/her to his/her fate. Followed by the rescuers ignoring the request and just commence with the rescuing, anyways.
In the same vein: Luffy went to a government island (Enies Lobby) to save one crewmember, declaring war on the world in the process. Whitebeard went to Marineford (another government island) to do essentially the exact same thing. Luffy was also the only one involved in both, and he caused major troubles in Impel Down to save one person, too.
Why did Whitebeard's ships come up to Marineford? He had just come from Fish-Man Island.
Or Whitebeard was, you know, getting past the first line of defense.
In an SBS a while back, Oda said that if a human ate Chopper's Human-Human Fruit, they'd become "enlightened." This is actually foreshadowing Sengoku's powers because he ate the Human-Human Fruit Model: Buddah!
Luffy is pegged as a threat by the government early on because of his defeats of Buggy, Krieg, and Arlong. This level of danger only escalates in the government's eyes as Luffy's accomplishments increase. This comes to a head during the Paramount War, when Luffy's uncontrolled burst of Haki levels many of the combatants. Sengoku makes Luffy his highest priority short of Whitebeard himself. As noted in a few entries above, Conqueror's Haki users are among the most powerful people around, but there's even more to it here. According to Whitebeard, when someone finds the One Piece, it'll shake the world and Sengoku is afraid of that happening. Among the known users of Supreme King Haki, Luffy is the only one seen actively seeking the One Piece and Sengoku knows it. This puts Luffy high on the kill-before-he-can-become-a-serious-threat list.
Benn Beckmann threatens Kizaru enough for the man to halt his attack. What could Benn have in his gun to make Kizaru hold off? Seastone bullets. Unless bullets could be imbued with Haki, Seastone bullets would be the one type of bullet which could even harm a Logia-user.
It may be possible that his bullets are imbued with Haki since the Kuja of Amazon Lily do this with their arrows.
Being the the two major deaths in the major timeline, Ace and Whitebeard meet their ends in rather similar ways. They both die for the sake of family, but in different ways. Ace of course loved the Whitebeard pirates like his family, but symbolically gave it up to protect Luffy (with his Whitebeard tattoo utterly ravaged).
Sengoku tells Blackbeard that Marineford can just be rebuilt. He would know after the fight with Shiki and Garp left it destroyed.
When Trafalgar Law is treating Luffy's wounds, he doesn't use his "Room" during the surgery. His "Rooms" are stationary, and they are moving as fast as possible away from Marineford. He would've exhausted himself if he tried.
When Buggy tells Shanks that he hates him so much because is his fault that he ate the Bara-Bara Fruit, Shanks' response is only "so that's what happened" followed by Buggy bewildered that Shanks takes it so lightly. While Funny as hell, it actually makes sense. Shanks, along the rest of the crew, saw Buggy eating the Fruit, and the next time he sees him, he can't swim. Everybody knew the rumors of not being able to swim, so there was no reason for Shanks to think that was his fault anything happened to Buggy.
Whitebeard's death, despite the Marines thinking it would be a good thing, was not due to the territories under his protection being open for conquest by his enemies. While this consequence would occur from the death of any of the Four Emperors, it's more significant with Whitebeard's. Other than Shanks, Whitebeard was the only Emperor that was a good guy. The other two were revealed to be evil, after the timeskip. If one of the two villanious Emperors, or possibly both died, their death(s) would actually be good for the world of One Piece, because their evil rule would be put to an end, leaving their territories open for Whitebeard or Shanks to become their benevolent rulers. Whitebeard's death is significant, because without him balancing out the good/evil ratio of the Four Emperors (two good guys and two bad guys), the ratio is now one good guy (Shanks) to three bad guys (Kaido, Big Mom, and Whitebeard's replacement: Blackbeard).
Going along with this, it also gives a logical reason as to why Sengoku respects Shanks, as well as Whitebeard. Sengoku knows that while Shanks and Whitebeard are pirates, namely an Emperor, he also knows that they are good people, who are pacifistic (aka not causing chaos), and care about maintaining the balance of peace, unlike most pirates. While he did put up Ace's execution publicly, due to being the son of the Pirate King, he could have also done it out of respect for him, knowing that as the good-natured man that he is, doesn't want to risk the bad side of him attacking Marineford. You can see this, in that Whitebeard held back by not attempting to destroy Marineford, until Akainu killed Ace, deciding to use his full power. Also, Sengoku allowed Shanks to take Whitebeard and Ace's bodies because he secretly agreed with not wanting to dishonor Whitebeard, even in death, which could be supported by Shanks stating that Sengoku respected Whitebeard.
This also explains why Sengoku stepped down after the war. He knew that with such a big of change in the balance of power, old ways would probably not work. And now we have much crueler world, with 3 out of 4 Emperors being evil and head of the Marines being extremist.
Something this troper only thought of years afterwards: Luffy using Buggy as a human shield against Mihawk. Buggy freaks out, Luffy just brushes it off. Standard One Piece humor, until it occurred to me. Buggy, having traveled with Roger, must know about Haki, while Luffy still doesn't. Luffy thinks Buggy is just overreacting since his Chop-Chop Fruit powers saved him from Mihawk's blade, while Buggy is pissed because if Mihawk had coated his blade in Haki, Buggy would have died.
Except that's not how Haki works. Haki-infused attacks can ignore the protection provided by a Devil Fruit user, but this applies only if the attack actually hits the opponent's body. (This is why Katakuri Charlotte can dodge Haki-infused attacks by transforming his body into mochi and moving it out of the way of the attack.) Buggy's Bara Bara Fruit allows his body to split his body the instant a cutting attack makes contact - which means that his body divides itself before Mihawk's attack can actually damage him. However, since Buggy is an idiot, it's possible that he mistakenly believes that blade attacks infused with Haki can kill him.
Post-War Arc
First time we meet Ace, he is more or less 100% fangirl bait with a shapely bod, no shirt to hide that or his tattoos, and a cool head to contrast with Luffy's impetuity. However, every facet of this has a reason for existing: he's went under more rigorous training living under Dadan than Luffy (since living under Dadan meant you ate what you hunted); his tattoos actually illustrate very important stages of his pre-story Character Development (the Whitebeard mark being an obvious one to his acceptance of Whitebeard as his true father and the misspelled name on his left arm being a tribute to his first friend Sabo); his flame powers would burn off any shirt he put on since his Logia powers woule instantly activate if anyone tried to hit him torso-up; and his maturity is not only based on him being Luffy's main caretaker when they were kids, but also Sabo's last request to look after him, their little brother.
Before he died Ace mentioned that one of the reasons why he watched over Luffy was because he was afraid that Luffy would turn out like him. Now think about it throughout their childhood Luffy developed a Big Brother Worship for him and wanted to be as strong as Ace was. So why didn't Ace want Luffy to become just like him because it all comes down to Hidden Depths. Throughout his childhood Ace was always bitter and hateful of the fact that Gold D. Roger was his father and even thought he shouldn't have been born in the first place due to him being related to the Pirate King in the first place. Also Ace felt as though he was unworthy of love and affection from anyone due to his bloodline. So later on Ace realized that he didn't want Luffy to be as hateful and angry about himself as Ace felt about himself so he made sure that Luffy was always shown love and affection no matter.
Luffy is often considered to have the least tragic backstory of the main characters. Yet in more recent events, Oda decided to break the "One Piece characters only die in flashbacks" rule, starting with Ace. However, it rather fits Luffy's character; he's the kind of person who doesn't care about the past, as evidenced with his disregard for Robin, Law, and Nami's pasts. Therefore, the worst tragedy for the hero himself happens in the present day.
ABSOLUTELY averted thanks to his surprisingly long flashback arc, in which Luffy suffers not only an insane amount of beatdowns from various people, but also the death of his and Ace's other brother, Sabo. When Luffy told Vivi that people die, he meant it. He also, as one troper above mentioned, knew exactly what he was talking about when he faced down Spandam in the Enies Lobby arc — it was the World Government that was responsible for all the horror he had just witnessed, as well as and most importantly the death of his brother.
As the date of his execution drew near, Ace told Jimbei that he didn't have to worry about Luffy after meeting the Straw Hat crew back in Alabasta. After Ace's death, Jimbei reminds Luffy of his crew, giving him a much-needed snap-out from his Heroic BSoD. The first scene actually makes more sense in the anime, since about 400 episodes ago Ace had spent a good time travelling with the Straw Hats, rather than the brief encounter he had with them in the manga. In other words (at least in the anime's context), what we thought of as filler episodes with one of the series' Ensemble Darkhorses a few years ago indirectly led to one of Luffy's most crucial moments in the whole story.
In the anime, there is a brief scene showing Kuzan sneezing. He's been doing a lot of work because of recent increase in piracy. The most effective way to do his work is by using his Ice-Ice Devil Fruit. He caught a cold from too much ice.
It was a Sneeze Cut, as Sengoku and Kong had just been talking about him.
Return to Sabaody Arc
The fake Straw Hat pirates look nothing like the real ones. The only exception is fake Sanji. If he cleaned his appearance, he could pass for the real thing. Now why would he be the only one who looks like the Straw Hat pirate he's trying to impersonate? First, the bounty posters would be the only reference available to determine what the Straw Hats looked like. Second, Ruleof Funny would make them look nothing like the posters they're copying. Therefore, it stands to reason the fake Sanji would look almost exactly like the real Sanji because Sanji's poster happens to look nothing like the real thing.
Luffy's Haki. He has his own form of Armament Haki, the only one to make his own except Shanks with Conqueror's Haki and Eneru with Observation Haki. Why wouldn't The Hero specialize in the chosen one Haki? Because the point of Luffy isn't that he's chosen, it's that he's ridiculously determined. Now, if not that Haki, which one? The one that lets you hit really hard, of course.
He specializes in all of them. He simply prefers to use Armament Haki because there's a good chance a lot of his opponents have very high willpower.
Add in that it is obvious, especially on re-reading, that he is using Observation Haki; take note of how he dodges attacks, even from behind, or being shot at from the side.
Why Chopper couldn't tell that the fake Straw Hats were impostors: ever try to tell apart a group of reindeer?
Except Chopper has never demonstrated any difficulty differentiating individual people, so this is just more of his naïveté.
Fish-Man Island Arc
Hody Jones is what Arlong would have become if he hadn't fought Kizaru. Hody is very similar to Arlong, but with one major difference: he's never been to the surface. He's always been on Fish-Man Island, the big fish in the small pond. Arlong saw the strength of others, and found out just how small he was. Arlong knows to lay low, Hody thinks he can chew the admirals up and spit them out — Jcogginsa
It's also become clear that the majority of his crew has most likely never been to the surface, either. If Hody got his ass kicked by Luffy so easily, while the crew (all 100,000 of them) got so easily decimated, then there's no way in hell they'd last against the World Government. Surely some of them had been to the surface, and they'd been smart enough to know that such a small army wouldn't stand a chance against what is effectively the entire world. They'd have enough common sense to at least warn Hody of the possibility, though considering how he treats his crew, it would have been a moot point. — Nyame
Luffy declares during Fish-Man Island that he has no desire to become a hero, and explains it using an example of having a huge piece of meat that a pirate would devour himself and a hero would share. He wants to eat meat! The beauty of this outlook is that, if that were true, Luffy would get meat whatever happens! — Sgamer82
Franky's nipple lights. Why? How is he supposed to see if he's using his eyes as lights?
As disappointing as it is that Jimbei turned down Luffy's invitation to join the Straw Hats until a later time, Oda had a good reason for it. Right now, Jimbei's bounty is higher than Luffy's, which would go against Oda's rule of having a member of the crew with a higher bounty than Luffy (Zoro, despite being equal to Luffy, has a lower bounty). Obviously, during the time between now and Jimbei returning to join the Straw Hats, Luffy's bounty is going to get a major increase.
I beg to differ; we've never seen Jimbei's bounty yet. Some of the Warlords of the Sea (of which Jimbei is formerly a member) had a comparatively little bounty before they got "frozen" (heck, Blackbeard's got no bounty). Of course, this doesn't take into account the possibility of bounty increase after Time Skip, especially since Jimbei's bounty might've been reinstated again...
It WAS reinstated. And it was said that it rose to over 400 million, which is Luffy's current bounty.
Numerous parallels exist between Skypeia and Fish-Man Island. Some are more obvious than others.
They're both several thousands of meters above and below respectively.
Both possess Poneglyphs, and we later learn Skypeia's explicitly refers to Fish-Man Island.
Large ships, the airship Maxim and the sunken Noah, feature prominently in each arc and are a potential source of mass destruction until stopped.
The villains of each arc believed themselves all-powerful, with Eneru thinking himself a god and Hordy Jones thinking he operated under divine mandate. Both villains are also big fish in a little pond.
Odd as this may sound, both feature the Straw Hats' first extensive experiences with Haki. Even if we didn't know it at the time, Skypeia showed us the first unambiguously identifiable instance of it in the Mantra used throughout the arc. Fish-Man Island showed the first in-depth, deliberate, and controlled uses of it by Luffy against a major villain.
Hell Saboady, Fish-Man Island and a bit of Punk Hazard are full of references to things that happened pre-timeskip. Luffy befriending a princess: happened for Alabasta, a swordsman full of himself challenges a opponent he cant hope to beat: happened at the Baratie, frog reference included, Luffy fighting alongside Jimbei: happened in the Whitebeard War saga, etc, etc,
There are even parallels between Fish-Man Island Arc and way back to the Romance Dawn Arc; Luffy after telling the cowardly, pink-haired crybaby (Shirahoshi and Coby respectively) that he doesn't like them, yet ends up both befriending them and inspiring them to be stronger, not to mention being (to an extent) pivotal in unleashing their hidden powers later; Coby unlocks his Observation Haki during the Whitebeard War, Shirahoshi unleashes her power as Poseidon in calling forth Sea Kings.
Luffy's declaration that he's not a hero isn't just to address the morality issues. Later, he declares Fish-Man Island to be his territory to Big Mom, mirroring Whitebeard before him. Despite his denial of heroism, Luffy found a way to help his friends while still remaining true to his pirate ideals.
It seems really convenient that Oda had Robin come up after Jimbei's flashback since otherwise we would be aware much sooner that Koala would become a Revolutionary.
The modified version of the Mark of the Sun tattoos that Hody's gang uses is pretty significant too. The center is hollow, which would defeat the original idea of masking a slave brand and further demonstrates that none of Hody's crew have actually been slaves themselves. As an extension of that, it shows that they have abandoned the core principles of Tiger's mission and don't intend to protect anyone.]
For that matter, Fisher Tiger's Sun Pirates tattoo appears to be a deliberate tracing over the template for the mark of the Celestial Dragon so that it would completely absorb the dragon claw marks into a bigger design of sunbeam flares. But why this and not another kind of Sun Pirates brand? Tiger designed it to cover up his own slave mark!
I don't really see how this is Fridge Brilliance at all. Covering up the slave mark is the explicitly stated goal of the Sun Pirates' tattoo.
Why do Luffy's post-timeskip attacks tend to be named after animals? (Elephant Gun, Grizzly Magnum, etc.) Because he was training on an island with dangerous beasts. Maybe each technique is actually named by the first animal he defeated with it?
Luffy's attacks are also all patterned after kinds of firearms, and his first post-timeskip techniques are, for the most part, named after hunting guns.
May fans complained in subsequent arcs that Mansopp reverted to Usopp the coward after this arc. However as many noted, very few if any opponents of Fish-Man Island were at all a challenge for the Straw Hats, and villains like Caribou and Hody could have been fought by pre skip Luffy and company and the battles would just have been less one sided, not a complete stomp. Usopp had overcome his fear of things he was used to fighting: he was not toughened up to not be scared of the New World.
Punk Hazard Arc
Why did Doflamingo know about the final phase of Kuma's cyborgisation when the said information should be classified and the Marines don't trust the warlords enough to reveal all their secrets to them? Marines didn't share the information about Vegapunk and Kuma, but Doflamingo has another means to get valuable information to be sold to a highest bidder.
Trafalgar Law has stated his immediate plans are to be one big Spanner in the Works for Donquixote Doflamingo. Given this, it's no wonder he teamed up with Luffy. Who better to ally with when that's your goal? Pity the poor Emperor this monkey wrench gets thrown at.
Logia types are likely to be the rarest type of Devil Fruit power you'll find in the New World. You would think that since they are supposedly the strongest type of Devil Fruit powers, they would be more common in the most dangerous sea in the world, right? However, if you think about Pekom's comment about Logia types having short lifespans, it makes perfect sense. Logia types have a habit of depending entirely on their Logia defense; however, since everyone in the New World has some kind of mastery over Haki, this makes this defense useless, and their inability to cope with this causes their deaths. It should be noted that the Logia types that have survived the New World (the Admirals, Crocodile, Ace, Smoker) are some of the most powerful characters in the entire series.
Protecting children is certainly not an uncommon redeeming quality, but I wondered specifically why Nami was so defensive of them (going as far to keep Usopp from attacking them while they were enraged). But I also realized that of the Straw Hats, Nami was explicitly one of the few who expressed shame at her familial circumstances initially (wishing she had been adopted by a rich family). Therefore, she didn't want to turn her back on them, especially when her own adoptive mother risked her life and pride as a mother.
Moria's fascination and usage of an army of zombies at first seems to be just tying a Freudian Excuse and a horror themed villain together. But his Arch-Enemy Kaidou seems to have an army of Zoan Fruit beasts. Inspiration perhaps?
Law constantly seems surprised or frustrated with Luffy when he acts goofy and disregards Law's plan. To us the audience it's obvious that Luffy would act that way, so why is Law surprised? Because the two times he interacted with Luffy before, Luffy was totally serious. Law encountered Luffy when the Straw Hats rescued Camie from the slave shop, and right after Ace died. Luffy wasn't screwing around either time, and Law thought that was his default personality.
Or it could be that his swings between seriousness and goofiness, as well as wide-eyed optimism are traits that were shared by the late Corazon. To Law, it's like his big brother/parental figure has come back in the form of a little brother!
Doflamingo's Devil Fruit powers are so much stronger than one would expect. How can simple strings be so durable? Answer: they're not. The Haki he imbues them with is incredibly powerful.
Or maybe the strings he uses are simply that strong. Moria's powers aren't exactly that you'd expect out of a shadow, either.
Despite being a Six Powers master, Vergo is never seen using Tempest Kick, which actually makes a lot of sense: Vergo is trying to keep the facility safe, and Tempest Kick is one of the most destructive attacks he has!
When Chopper told the young girl Mocha a flashback in Chapter 688,, that there were always giants growth experiments that failed for at least 100 years (some translation even use hundreds of years), something clicked. It was always strange that so many people are more than twice the size of people at times. Could it be that those big people are actually descendants of the failures?
Dressrosa Arc
After Zoro, Sanji, and Kinemon run after the thieves who stole Shusui, Franky holds Luffy back and tells him that he's already figured out how the local underworld faces work and knows what needs to be done. How? Because HE used to be the underground face of his own home town and is basically falling back on the knowledge of his previous profession.
When the Caesar Return Team cross the bridge to Green Bit, it made sense that Caesar would be able to turn to into a hot air balloon. Apart from his Devil Fruit allowing it via turning into something like helium, it makes sense since he's full of hot air considering most of his experiments are either copied from Vegapunk's, or are complete failures.
Chapter 708, when Luffy accidentally reveals his name in the Colosseum after they see the Lucy name tag one of the competitors reassures the others by saying that the real Straw Hat Luffy is an eight foot giant. If you go back to the Return to Sabondy arc, Demalo Black is an eight foot giant. Ole three tongued, just helped Luffy maintain his cover, and that idiot fell for it too. — Rayfire
Chapter 719, which concludes the fight between Luffy and Chinjao, offers two pieces of Fridge Brilliance in one shot.
First, the revelation that the treasure Chinjao wanted so badly was encased in an unbreakable block of ice goes a long way to explain why he was after the tournament's prize to begin with.
Second, we see something of the contrast between Garp and Luffy in Chinjao's backstory. We see that Garp is responsible for flattening Chinjao's once-very drill-like head, locking him out from his prized treasure. How does Luffy finish their fight? By hitting Chinjao so hard it pops his head right back into its old drill shape. As a Marine, Garp dedicated his life to stopping the goals and dreams of pirates (and, often, rightfully so). Luffy, as a pirate, is a firm believer in dreams and will typically protect someone else's dream unless he's attacked first or the other party otherwise prove themselves villainous. For all his antagonism, Chinjao isn't truly the villain of this piece. As for Luffy, take away the Sins of Our Fathers scenario and he has no real animosity towards Chinjao. In the end, Garp's act crushed Chinjao's dreams. Luffy's restored them.
Donflamingo claims his mission to dispose of Moria came from "higher up" than Sengoku. Who's higher up than the Fleet Admiral? Him.
Chapter 722 appears to truly confirm this with the revelation that the Donquixote family were the rulers of Dressrosa before going to Mariejois becoming Celestial Dragons. It explains a lot about what we've seen about Doflamingo so far.
His declaration during the Paramount War about how history is Written by the Winners? He is descended from people who did exactly that.
How he, as a pirate, successfully took over a country and be regarded as a hero rather than usurper? He's descended from the original royal family, giving him a claim to the throne. And that's assuming he didn't simply set up the Riku family to take the fall for his own actions.
In addition, he had Sugar erase the memories of anyone who could have negatively impact the takeover, causing everyone to forget the violence and bloodshed.
Law and Fujitora wondered if Doflamingo had the authority to fake the newspaper article claiming he'd quit the Warlords? The answer: He was a Celestial Dragon, and uses his knowledge to blackmail the WG into letting him do whatever the hell he wants.
More of a Wild Mass Guess, but the Human Shop way back on Sabaody? It was frequented by Celestial Dragons likely because they knew it was run by one of their own.
The Nefertari family is one of the twenty royal families whose kings founded the World Government. Meaning that technically speaking, Vivi is a World Noble in spite of the fact that she does not reside in Mariejois.
And both these revelations go some way to explaining why Doflamingo's Human Shop was tolerated but Crocodile's attack on Alabasta was not. Doflamingo still has some leeway as a former Celestial Dragon, and the fact that he caters to his former peers helped that. Crocodile, however, engineered what basically amount to a coup of one of the founding kingdoms of the World Government, and was ruled by what are essentially Celestial Dragons even though they do not reside in Mariejois or use those privileges bestowed to the descendants of the twenty kings. If it had been any other kingdom they could've easily covered it up as the rulers being complete despots and Crocodile being a champion of the impoverished people, had he not acted so directly against them.
Robin's Facefault in Chapter 728 might seem like just a normal gag, but in the world of One Piece, secrecy is huge. Even Luffy had Hidden Depths. It's only natural for characters to always hide something, only revealing those things to people they trusted. The Tonnatatas, however, immediately trusted themselves with Franky, Usopp, and Robin. Considering how her whole life taught her the value of secrecy, this was so against what she was used to that not even she could hide her surprise.
Sabo's statement and reaction after meeting with Luffy again in Chapter 731 is understandable when dealing grief, pain and guilt because Sabo started to cry as he was mentioning to Koala that he thought Luffy would punch him when they met again. The reason being is because he thought that Luffy would hate him because Sabo never came back to see him and Ace again and probably thought that Sabo had abandoned them both and left them to die during the war. But instead of being angry at him Luffy was so overjoyed that Sabo was still alive and he even broke down into tears and hugged him and showing that despite everything Luffy still loved him deeply.
Another one for Robin is during the story of how Doflamingo took over Dressrosa, when the Thuderous Soldier of Rage explains that the King's daughter Viola joined Doflamingo's crew in exchange for sparing King Riku's life, you can see a saddened and somewhat pained looking expression in Robin's face since it mimicked her circumstances in how she joined Crocodile.
Why did Doflamingo shoot Law three times instead of finishing him off with his Devil Fruit power? Because if he uses it in public, people will figure out what happened to King Riku 10 years ago and revolt.
Confirmed when the people of Dressrosa finally figure out what actually happened when Doflamingo initiated "Birdcage".
The Straw Hat Crew disguising themselves with ridiculous mustaches and disguises? Silly. Said disguises allowing Sabo to disguise himself as Luffy/'Lucy'? Not so silly after all.
While Usopp momentarily running away from the fight with Trebol could be seen as Character Derailment, Oda has an excuse for it. He didn't lose his nerve until Robin was turned into a toy. The Hobby-Hobby Fruit Retcons its victims' existence; meaning that, in Usopp's mind, Enies Lobby never happened (they had no reason to go there without Robin) and he never defeated Perona in Thriller Back (remember how he asked for help before turning the tide of the battle? "Sogeking" answered that call, but if Sogeking never existed in the first place, he probably figured someone else from the crew saved him). With his two greatest Moment of Awesome retcon'ed out of his mind, is it that surprising that he lost most of the bravery he had since the Time Skip? In other words, Usopp lost his memories of the brave things he did, returning him to his pre-Character Development state. It also explains why he acts more courageous later once Robin is back to normal and his memories restored.
How did Doflamingo know about Scarlett and Rebecca if Scarlett had faked her death earlier? Monet, having spied on the Riku family and most likely figured out who the royal family was sneaking off to visit.
Actually, it's much more likely it was on account of Scarlett and Kyros' marriage being an open-ended secret that everyone knew sixteen years ago, but Monet certainly wouldn't have helped, that's for sure.
Usopp was called "God" by Doflamingo and the latter issued a 500 million Berry bounty on his head. Who else was called God and stated to have that much bounty? Enel. Usopp even does his infamous face after the announcement!
For fans that make the connection it also foreshadows Usopp developing Observation Haki, which was the source of the infamous mantra power Enel was also known for.
Throughout the Arc, Law's coat has the word "Corazon" written on the back. At first, it seems like a Bilingual Bonus referencing his crew, the Heart Pirates, but it actually refers to Corazon, who saved his life as a child. In fact, that's probably how the Heart Pirates got their name.
When Oda showed the Warlords were as children, Doflamingo seems to be enjoying his life. However, Doflamingo says he killed his World Noble father because he made his life hell and he's experienced an unlucky past due to his position. It seems contradictory, but then it's revealed that Doflamingo's father renounced his title, status, and privilege because he wanted his family to live like normal people. Doflamingo wanted to go back to being a World Noble with all the privileges it entailed, and blamed his father for the misfortunes the family suffered when the locals learned of their former status... and this was enough for him to kill his own father. The information regarding his past and Oda's depiction of him as a kid in light of this further emphasize how he's a spoiled, egocentric psychopath with few redeeming qualities.
Chapter 763: Law's choice to ally up with Luffy instantly becomes Fridge Brilliance with the revelation that his full name is Trafalgar D. Water Law.
Doflamingo seems to be familiar with the abilities of the Op-Op Fruit, implied to be because he wanted its ability for eternal youth. However, the fact that his brother Corazon died to save the life of the kid who ate it, means he can't actually use that ability without making his brother's sacrifice pointless. With this in mind, Doflamingo's patronage of artificial Fruits suddenly takes on a new light.
Baby 5 and Buffalo claim that Corazon hates children. The first thing he does when he meets a ten-year-old Law is to literally throw him away. However, later we see him talking with Sengoku who asks how the children are doing and if they are still there. Corazon answers that yes, those three (Buffalo, Baby 5, and Dellinger or Law) are not going away. Corazon doesn't necessarily hate children, he is just scaring them away so they don't become pirates!
Sengoku disrespect toward Doflamingo make sense beside the fact they on the opposite sides. Corazon was Sengoku adopted son and Doflamingo cause his death.
Sai is from the Happo Navy of which has the Japanese word for 8. 8 + Baby 5 = 13, the number which adorns his abdomen and is a reference to him being the 13th leader of the Happo Navy.
When Bellamy fights Bartolameo and keeps failing due to his Devil Fruit power, no one can figure out what his power is. This could be like when Krillin fights Roshi and are moving faster than people's eyes can track.
Gear Second was introduced in Chapter 387. What chapter was Gear Fourth first mentioned in? Chapter 783, which is 387 backwards. Additionally, Gear Fourth was also first used and made its actual debut in Chapter 784, which can be rearranges to Chapter 478, the same chapter where Nightmare Luffy made his debut.
In Chapter 783, Luffy introduces a new technique called Gear Fourth. One aspect of this technique is the ability to compress his limbs and using elastic potential energy to increase his strength tenfold. Sound familiar? It's like Bellamy, who Doflamingo cut off from his family for being 'too weak'. Starting Chapter 784, the aforementioned Warlord is getting his ass kicked by Luffy's new technque.
Why Bellamy was rejected by Doflamingo. He accepted even kids into his family, so it wasn't strength that mattered to him, and it's not that he only accepts bloodthirsty people, because Baby 5 is as bloodthirsty as a baby lion. However, in Chapter 769, when Bellamy and his crew are trying to join the Donquixote pirates, he says that they're from the town of Notice, which Trebol notes to be fairly wealthy. Bellamy and his crew left the apparently well-off town because they were bored and wanted to become like the Donquixote pirates. Sugar and Monet, who joined after Law left, pledged their loyalty to Doflamingo after he rescued them from some form of bad past.
Also, Doflamingo takes in children who've had it rough. While this seems nice, children like Baby 5 and Law are incredibly vulnerable. It's easy for someone like Doflamingo to become a child's sole source of stability when they've lost everything. By the time they grow up, it would be hard for them to break away from Doflamingo if they wanted to.
Doflamingo shoot Law before capturing him. Once able to use his powers freely again, the first thing Law does is operate on himself and remove the bullets. At the time, Law takes the time to remark that Doflamingo specifically used lead bullets. This seems odd until his flashback comes around, and we learn that Law spent his entire childhood in fear of dying from a form of lead poisoning. Doflamingo was being particularly sadistic with that.
In 794, Sabo reveals he did not intervene during the Whitebeard War to save Ace because he had forgotten about Luffy and Ace after the accident where he was presumed dead, and only remembered after reading about Ace's death in the news. But then, couldn't he have read about Ace and remembered in the past 10 years, considering Ace was a notorious pirate and commander under Whitebeard? The answer: Akainu's real name is Sakazuki. Sakazuki also means sake cup . It was the combination of reading about Ace and "sakazuki" at the same time that caused him to remember about his sworn brothers, who he shared cups of sake with again!
The event that made Law want to defeat Doflamingo was his killing of Corazon. Law was 13 at the time. Doflamingo is defeated by Law and Luffy in the present time, where he is 26-years-old. Corazon was 26 when he was killed by Doffy.
The whole Dressrosa arc had shone some of the spotlight on the fellow prisoners in the Arena. It's odd, but each got their moment in the spotlight, and even pitched in during the final fight against Donflamingo by stopping the Birdcage from consuming the country. Couple this with a crewmember joining after such a dramatic and explosive arc, there were some guesses as to who would join the crew afterwards. It turns out that it was a buildup for ALL of them pledging Undying Loyalty to Luffy and the formation of the Straw Hat Grand Fleet.
Kaido's horns and size make him look quite similar to Oars. Coupled with the fact that Moria only started collecting zombies to rebuild his strength after his original crew were killed by said Emperor, it's possible that Oars was supposed to be Moria's attempt to create a counter against Kaido specifically in case they ever met again.
At first, Law's dislike of bread seemed to be a gag. But then it revealed in SBS that Corazon disliked bread, too. Fridge Heartwarming?
The Awakening allows Doflamingo to transform anything into string. The String theory in physics claims that everything IS made from minuscule strings…
Awakening also explains Doflamingo's freakish amount of vitality; In Impel Down, the Jailer Beasts were able to get up quickly after getting KO'd, explained by being Awakened Zoan Fruit users.
Trebol and the other executives believed that Doflamingo was the man "chosen by the gods" to become the Pirate King, and because of his background as a World Noble and having subordinates who would kill anyone who got in his way, Doflamingo believed that he was better than everyone else because of his bloodline and "destiny" and that it was impossible for him to fail. Now compare this to Luffy, who decided himself that he was going to become the Pirate King and is working hard to achieve that dream, who doesn't give a damn about people's bloodlines or backgrounds, and who certainly doesn't think he's worth more than anyone else. In fact, the concept of people being controlled by their destiny and people deciding their own fate through their dreams is a major theme of the story.
Rosinante deciding to throw away his undercover work in order to find a cure for Law seems pretty reckless until you remember that his name is Donquixote: Rosinante is a reference to a foolish, well intentioned man deciding to devote his life to protect a woman he doesn't know the first thing about! Law is actually the Dulcinea to Corazon's Knight in Shining Armour: a helpless person he had to help even if it's against rationality.
Pretty much every officer of the Donquixote family has an equivalent officer in Baroque Works, but there's one other parallel. Luffy defeated Crocodile by smashing him upwards through the ceiling of an underground chamber and the surface ground, destroying the city block above in the process; and he defeated Doflamingo by smashing him downwards towards the island, destroying multiple city blocks as he split the island's ground in half.
So Luffy, the kid from Windmill Village, is the one who eventually takes down Donquixote.
Rosinante, while working under his brother, pretended to be mute for years. How did he manage to do that without ever making a sound by mistake? Thanks to the Calm-Calm Fruit, he can cancel any noise he makes or causes. He might have developed a variation of that ability in order to selectively silence his voice, but still allow him to cause noise otherwise.
Luffy telegraphing his attacks against Fujitora isn't just because they are Friendly Enemys. Luffy is using this once-in-a-lifetime chance of a "friendly" bout with an Admiral to see if he is truly ready for the New World. If he cannot even stand toe-to-toe against a one that is friendly and blind, he will have no chance against the other non-handicapped heavyweights of the New World like the other Admirals, Fleet Admiral Akainu along with the Four Emperors and their crews. He want to simulate those inevitable scenarios by removing Fujitora's blindness!
Zou Arc
Why do Wanda and Carrot seem so obsessed with Luffy's skin, biting him? Many toys made for animals to chew are made of very tough rubber. He's probably almost as appetizing as Brook to the Minks!
It always seemed weird how Sanji was basically the stealth expert of the crew (possibly even surpassing Robin who was on the run from the whole world since she was eight). At several points in the story Sanji goes off somewhere on his own to thwart whatever the current villain is planning i.e.. disabling Ark Maxim, closing the Gates of Justice at Enies Lobby and no one, is ever the wiser until it's too late. This now makes sense for a guy who comes from a family of assassins.
This also puts a lot about Sanji into perspective. Why would he be the only Straw Hat wanted alive? If the Vinsmokes are as formidable as we're lead to believe, not even the government wants to be on their bad side. It would also explain how he mastered his own versions of Six Paths techniques like Moon Kick all by himself, he always had the potential since being Badass in this universe is at least somewhat genetic.
Remember all the way back in Thriller Bark, when Zoro was offering his head to Bartholomew Kuma in exchange for Luffy's? And how Sanji tried to intervene? Back then, it just seemed like the typical nakama trying to protect each other/talking his own reputation up. But with the revelation of Sanji's background, it takes on an entirely new meaning. Turns out he wasn't bluffing when he told Kuma "Out of everyone in this crew, the one who's going to cause the most trouble for you is me", if the reactions to the Vinsmoke family are to be believed.
Furthermore, this adds more weight to his unwillingness to use his hands when fighting and solely for cooking (minus the time he fought Wanze.) In fact, his skilled usage in using kitchen knives for combat during said fight with Wanze isn't just a result of his culinary mastery, but also potentially his assassination heritage.
Somewhat jossed in the following arc though: It is shown that Sanji refuses to use his hands for fighting out of a sort of spite towards the rest of his family, who mainly use their hands for fighting, and who look down on him for his passion for cooking.
The Wham Episode of Chapter 818 doesn't bring up the subject directly, but goes a long way towards answering a long-standing question: Why was Roger able to reach Laugh Tale when nobody else could for centuries. The key is lies in the fact that even reaching Laugh Tale requires finding a set of four Poneglyphs that provide the directions for reaching the island. This clears up all the hints that were given in Skypeia and Sabaody about how Roger could follow the Poneglyphs thanks to his ability to "hear the voice of all things".
In addition, those four Poneglyphs have coordinates that, when marked on a map, form a big "X" with Laugh Tale where the lines intersect. In other words, if the One Piece is there, "X Marks the Spot" where the treasure lies. Leave it to One Piece to take old and tired pirate clichés and make them into something grand and magnificent.
Let's assume the "X" is actually a perfectly shaped "+". If, on that "+", you draw a large circle on each of the locations told by the poneglyphs, and another circle where the points intersect (where Laugh Tale is), you get a very familiar design
The fact that interpreting Poneglyphs is a major part of getting to Laugh Tale also gives an extra meaning to the World Government's Buster Call on Ohara. Not only were they trying to destroy illegal research into reading an ancient language that can uncover secrets of the Void Century, but they were also trying to eliminate anyone who could potentially lead the next Pirate King to Laugh Tale by reading the Poneglyphs.
In Sabaody, Rayleigh claims that Gold Roger was able to decipher the Poneglyphs by "Hearing the voice of all things", and had no real knowledge. So how was he able to leave that poneglyph message in Skypeia? Because Lord Oden, whose clan created the Poneglyphs, was part of his crew, and probably went to Sky Island with him!
Momonosuke's perversion towards grown women like Nami and Robin was hardly endearing, but then we find out that his mother was killed. As he is still a young child, he may just be craving the continued touch of a mother figure. The game of Shogun he played with the Straw Hats on Dressrosa supports this, especially since the Shogun of Wano Country helped kill his parents, and he's said to brood when they don't play the game, most likely thinking of the day that happened.
The reveal that two of the Poneglyphs being owned by Kaido and Big Mom answers the question as to why the Yonko never forged a temporary alliance to raze Marineford and Mariejois before going back to fighting each other. They are too busy fighting for the map to Laugh Tale and One Piece, which is considered a bigger priority by all parties involved!
Totto Land Arc
Sanji's family the Vinsmoke family are all revealed to have curled eyebrows just like Sanji, but the eyebrows of Sanji's brothers (and sister) all point to the left, while his eyebrows point to the right. In some cultures, there is a belief that anything on the left side of the human body is evil and related to the Devil. This would make Sanji, as the only person in his family whose eyebrows point to the right, the White Sheep.
Also, the Vinsmoke family are the royalty of Germa 66. Sanji's and his sibling's iconic swirling eyebrows look like 6s, and they have two of them (one for each eye), making 66.
Germa 66 traveled through the Red Line into the East Blue to battle another pirate crew. It's shown that they went up the Red Line, which you would need the permission from Mariejois to do, instead of via the ocean floor like most pirates do. So what gives? Well, the Vinsmoke Family are royals, ones in Reverie. So the WG won't take action and de-legitimize its sovereignty.
Meta: Robin leaves the crew at Chapter 348, Sanji leaves at 843. Also, Chapter 43 is titled "Sanji" in the Viz translation, and Chapter 843 is titled "Vinsmoke Sanji". Something all these chapter numbers have in common is that the "3" and "4" digits are right next to each other. In Japanese, "3" is "san", while "4" is "shi". This doesn't make much sense on its own, but if you add a dakuten (voicing mark) to "shi", it becomes "ji". Put those together and you have Sanji.
Luffy declaring a hunger strike not only makes it clear he's serious, but it also is actually an attempt by Luffy to draw Sanji back into the group. All the way back in the Baratie Arc, Luffy watched Sanji feed Gin and state his personal policy only a little later, namely: if someone is hungry, he will feed them no matter what. Beyond that, he has no issue with clobbering them if needed. Luffy doubtless, still remembers this, and he's trying to take advantage of Sanji's personal standards to get him to come back. Luffy's going to be hungry, so Sanji's personal standard would dictate he provide food to the starving captain.
Sanji's acting was able to fool everyone present, including Nami, yet Luffy said his acting was so forced and fake. What gives? Well, at the end of Dressrosa, Fujitora demonstrated the ability to sense people's emotions using Observation Haki. When the citizens were putting on an act to stop Fujitora from dropping the rubble, he said "There is not the least bit of anger in their demeanor". Sanji's acting seemed fake to Luffy because of his Observation Haki! Also, because of said Haki, Luffy could tell Sanji was in more pain than he was!
In addition, Luffy had to deal with two crewmates of his doing this before: Nami with Arlong and later Robin with CP9. He's probably figured out Sanji was lying from prue experience alone.
This is also confirmed by Rayleigh, stating that whereas Katakuri can see into the future via visual info, Luffy "sees" into the future by reading the feelings of living beings around him, when using Color of Observation.
Nami is hit particularly hard by Sanji's harsh words toward Luffy to drive him away...she would know because she attempted the same verbal tactic back in the Arlong arc. Though it does make it confusing that she was convinced like the others (barring Luffy.)
At first, it seems weird that the Vinsmoke boys of all people were still disturbed by Big Mom's collection of live humans; given that they're said to literally not be able to feel empathy or sympathy, you'd think they'd find something like that amusing. Then we find out that their mother Sora took a drug while she was pregnant with them to try and counteract the effects of Judge's genetic engineering (designed to make them TykeBombs with a Lack of Empathy) and it makes sense; though it only fully worked on Sanji, it's likely that the others also still retain at least a tiny shred of their humanity due to its effects.
It is also possible that they instantly knew this was Big Mom's collection of unusual humans, and since the Vinsmoke boys are themselves unusual humans, their fright could've come from the idea that they might also wind up in that collection.
All of the Vinsmoke children were named after numbers, if only to indicate the time of their birth. But remember that the Germa Kingdom, their home, houses a powerful military and secret Lineage Factor-altering technology. And after Chapters 851 and 852 came out, the names are cast in a sinister light; it shows how little the warmongering Judge cares for his children, except for how strong and ruthless they are.
Why is it Judge and Sanji have blonde hair, but the other Vinsmoke kids all have different hair colors (Ichiji's a red-head, Niji's a bluebonnet, Yonji's green, and Reiju's pink)? Judge altered his children's Lineage Factor (their DNA) and their different hair colors are a side-effect. The fact that Sanji's Lineage Factor came out completely unaltered due to the drug his mother took, supports this.
Reiju having poison-based powers actually makes sense. It's symbolic of how Judge's toxic mindset (his dream of reconquering North Blue and his belief that Virtue Is Weakness) 'poisoned' his family, starting with his oldest daughter and child, leading to the Vinsmoke children (except for Sanji) becoming incredibly dysfunctional and/or abusive in adulthood.
In Chapter 858, Luffy and Brook drink some milk found in Bege's fridge, and their injuries (Luffy's tooth gap, Brook's skull cracks) are healed instantly. Milk contains calcium, which promotes bone growth.
There's a reason why Germa's entire civilian populace is made up of clones — when a kingdom is ruled by a family that is full of social darwinists who also mistreat their subjects on the flimsiest excuses, having clones that are easily programmed to have Undying Loyalty no matter what for subjects is a very good idea. It's safe to assume that their reign over North Blue ended for the same reasons.
Judge being absolutely terrified of death, to the point of having a mental breakdown in the middle of the wedding, adds a whole new dynamic to his character. Why would he want his children to be emotionless? Because he seems emotionally unstable, the second things don't go his way he breaks down into terrified tears. Why did he want them to be strong? Because despite his imposing size and cruel personality, he's a weakling without natural talent who needs his tech to come close to the bigwigs of the world.
Fitting with the Fairy Tale theme the reveal that Big Mom is a giant human helps create parallel's with Jack and the Bean Stock. A tremendous giant who has various treasures, in this case Sanji, Brook, and ponygraph rubbings, that the Straw Hats have to retrieve with cunning. The Giant also ate people which is a trait shared with Big Mom.
There is no wonder that nobody — not even the bosses of the criminal underworld knew who Mother Carmel was: the Mountain Witch was not only specifically selling the orphans to one main buyer — the WG — through the CP, being inactive (and dead) for over 60 years left too much of an Evil Power Vacuum for the annals of the history of crime for her to be remembered by anyone aside Linlin and the survivors from Elbaf. And even then neither of them had a clue about her real nature. Not to mention that she was planning to retire shortly after selling Linlin.
After the Paramount War Arc, and the ridiculous extremes that the Marines went through to kill off the very memory of Gol D. Roger, as well as the lengths they went through to execute Ace, it is strange how Mother Carmel could have reasoned them out of executing the pirate giants. (After all, at their time, they seem to have been the de facto main threat to the WG.) And then we learn that she has ties to the WG... Also Fridge Horror.
Furthermore, having spent 37 years on Elbaf, the Mountain Witch was possibly also a spy for the World Government. The fact that Elbaf is still considered a major military power in the present that almost allied itself with an Emperor just a few years prior makes it even more likely. As she was soon planning to retire anyway, suddenly leaving Elbaf didn't mean much for the World Government. In fact, the whole incident with Linlin enabled her to smoothly leave the island for good without causing any suspicion.
How did Mother Carmel appear under a heavenly ray of light to resemble a savior in such a coincidental manner? She was the previous user of the Soul-Soul Fruit, which allows someone to manipulate the weather and forces of nature if they channel life energy into it.
Way back in Alabasta, the first time we heard the name Nico Robin, we were told she gained a bounty on her head at the age of eight for allegedly destroying several Marine battleships. This claim was always suspect, even with as dangerous as Robin could be with her Devil Fruit abilities, and ultimately proven to be a lie when we see events from her side during Enies Lobby. This leaves one lingering question that the Totto Land arc answers: Why would people believe an eight-year-old child capable of such destruction in the first place, whatever anybody said? The answer is because Charlotte Linlin was terrorizing the world at the age of five. People were willing to believe eight-year-old Robin was an Enfante Terrible because there was precedent.
Keep in mind though Linlin is a giant, and capable of destruction on a much grander scale than a human like Robin.
While Big Mom's decision to slaughter the Vinsmoke Family is partially driven by her sadism, there is pragmatic thinking behind it as well. First and foremost, it's fairly obvious the Vinsmokes are Normal Fish in a Tiny Pond. While they are the scourge of the Blue Seas, particularly their home sea North Blue, in the New World the only thing that really gives them a leg up is their advanced technology. They aren't much stronger than a standard New World pirate crew, judging by how easily Sanji dealt with Yonji when he bothered to fight seriously, and how quickly the Big Mom Pirates defeated them when they were pitted against each other. Secondly, the Vinsmokes clearly have no intention on staying in the Grand Line — they sought Big Mom's support so they could reconquer North Blue. As such, that means they have no intention on serving Big Mom herself, as she clearly has no designs on North Blue, only on the New World. Knowing all this, why would Big Mom waste resources sending military support to a family of assassins that equates to a minor crew in the litany she has under her command, one that has no real intentions of actually serving her, just to gain access to their cloning technology? Why do all that, when she can "cut out the middleman", so to speak, by killing them all and taking the technology for herself? It's a perfect mix of the business-like thinking and brutality that is so prevalent with the Big Mom Pirates.
The fact that the cloud-homie, Zeus is easily drawn away and convinced to shift loyalties by what amounts to food (courtesy of Nami and her clima-tact) actually makes sense when you consider he was made using Big Mom's own soul. Of course he'd easily be swayed when he was made from the soul of a Big Eater!
Also, Big Mom's a pretty big backstabber and opportunist, when something comes along that she wants she'll do what she can to get as much of it as possible, so a fragment of her soul would be just as disloyal and prone to jumping ship for a little bit of hedonistic pleasure.
Why was Chiffon so angry with Gotti when he pulled his gun on Sanji? If the Vinsmokes' contract isn't met, not only will the Firetank Pirates lose their captain, Chiffon will lose her husband, and Chiffon's son, Pez, will lose his father.
Big Mom not tolerating anyone leaving Totto Land or betraying her "family" makes sense — in a way, she's losing the family of orphans she used to live with as a child all over again.
The Vinsmoke family members favoring kicks as a method of attacks is connected to their philosophy: They trample over the weak.
Why does Charlotte Pudding pretend to care for Sanji when he shows her physical evidence of his family's abuse and tells her of his Dark and Troubled Past? Because of the two of them, Sanji's abusive past was nothing compared to Pudding's. Unlike Sanji, a weak "dud" who received support in his darkest hours, Pudding had the entire world against her just for having a third eye, so she snapped and covered her brokenness under a thick layer of anger, sadism, and resentment. This also dulled her empathy to other people's suffering, even though they suffered as equally as she.
Luffy is revealed to dislike eating mochi. Given how the prior chapters have compared how Karakuri's powers mirror that of Luffy's, it could be that for a Rubber Man like Luffy, it takes a considerably amount of working eating mochi because of its similar consistency to rubber.
Mochi also is sweet. Luffy's favorite and least favorite foods (revealed in an SBS) are meat and cherry pie at a certain bar (which is Marshall D Teach favorite), indicating a preference for savory over sweets.
This may be stretching things a bit, but why is Brûlée such a Butt-Monkey? Her powers revolve around mirrors, which everybody's been breaking! Seven years bad luck! It could also be a joke in that Luffy, being rubber and extremely lucky, that all the bad luck the Straw Hats would accumulate is bounced off back onto her.
Joconde asks those around her how the Big Mom name has managed to fall so hard so quickly, and Snack replies simply with, "Worst Generation." Though you are to recall that Urouge defeated him not too long ago, what he actually speaks to is on a deeper level than that: The Big Mom Pirates, in a short time, have been targeted by a Worst Generation member four times, each more damaging than the last. Kidd sank two of their ships; Urouge took on a Sweet Four General (Snack) and defeated him; Capone covertly rose the ranks in her own organization and, by destroying her most prized possession, was the closest to assassinating Big Mom herself while crashing a wedding and luring Big Mom out to sea; Luffy defeated two more of the Sweet Generals (Cracker and Katakuri) while his crew has inflicted heavy losses onto the Big Mom Pirates and the Charlotte Family, with seemingly no one able to stop them, not even Big Mom. That Snack was pummeled by Urouge and is now witnessing an extended Mook Horror Show at the hands of Capone and Luffy has made him wise not to underestimate the Worst Generation and that they are getting weaker as an organization the fewer they become in number. He may even be terrified as to what might become of them should another Worst Generation member attack them soon after Capone and Luffy have had their way with them.
Luffy's bounty being kicked up to 1.5 billion may be a lot to blame from Morgans' embellishments of the truth in what he published in the news, but the most powerful opponent Luffy bested, Katakuri, had a billion-berry bounty, and was someone who was at first beyond his level of combat experience. Luffy had to force himself to speedily master a technique that would put him on Katakuri's level and then beat him just narrowly. This means he is at least worthy of the same level of bounty as Katakuri. Factor in his defeat of Cracker, and the World Government sees he's beat down two of the most powerful people in an Emperor's crew in the span of two days — something no one else has managed to do — and it merits an even bigger jump in bounty to separate him from being just a mere "Worst Generation" to somebody who IS on the top priority list to get rid of.
Another reason why Luffy's bounty is so high and why the World Gov considers him on the level of the Four Emperors: Morgans made them think that Luffy destroyed Big Mom's Chateau on purpose. The only other person who even attempted this on purpose was Whitebeard, a former Emperor who waged war on the Marines and did major damage to Marineford.
Totto Land being a fairytale kingdom thats seriously darker behind the scenes mirrors real life where a lot of fairy tales had darker or disturbing origins.
Lola insisting that Nami holding her mother's Vivre Card would grant the crew some help from her was an error in her judgment, not knowing the vendetta that Linlin had against her. However, by taking on the Big Mom Pirates, Luffy mastered more of his Haki, Sanji gained a Raid Suit and the respect of his siblings not named Reiju, and Nami, most notably, took a piece of Linlin's soul as a power-up in the form of Zeus. Additionally, Jinbe officially joined the crew. In a way, Big Mom did help the Straw Hats, just not in the way that Lola thought she would.
A notable trend in the Big Mom Pirates is a notable weakness to pain. Cracker was clearly not used to actually being hurt and preferred to use biscuit soldiers instead, the anime at least suggests that it was Urouge's ability to take pain and turn it into power that beat Snack. One notable trait about the Big Mom Pirates is the fact they are all bullies: to each other, to others, etc. Bullies, at least in the west, are often treated as being quite fond of dishing out pain, but not at taking it.
Pound is revealed to have survived Oven's final attack on him. Being so tough may be why Big Mom sought him out as a husband in the first place.
Reverie Arc
There was an offhand comment by Doflamingo at the end of the Dressrosa Arc about a succession war beginning to see who would rule the world. Then we see that there is an actual singular ruler in power who sits atop a throne. Doflamingo was referring to the secret top echelon of Mariejois.
Related to that, Doflamingo's ability to get away by seeking a power higher than the Marines to avoid having to step down from being a Warlord seemed to be a bit strange when we learn that the World Nobles hated his family and wouldn't let him back in. He likely knew about Im and managed to get away with everything he did because he could have — at any time if he felt the Nobles were about to backstab him — tell the world about them and effectively cause a societal apocalypse by proving the tenant of the empty throne was a massive lie. Im seemingly willing to judge and target people for assassination also gives a bit more context for when Doflamingo tried to off Moria, as far as the audience knew it was just the World Nobles, but now the odds are high that Im themself ordered it.
Considering how the WG values bloodlines, and the lengths it can go to preserve/exterminate them if necessary, it seemed surely weird that the WG will allow an entire Celestial Family to just 'defect' to the humans, even considering the 900 years worth of privileges and brainwashing. Then, we find out the Donquixote family line still exists in Mariejois, with none other than Mjosgard himself being their face, which could explain why the WG let the main family to die in a non WG controlled island.
We can also find out a hint about why the Celestial Dragons absolutely loathe humans. Possibly the incident with the Donquixotes became a 'cautionary' tale on why humans are dangerous, and interference with the lowly beings can cause destruction, which the future Celestial Dragons happily licked up.
The existence of Imu being the ruler of the world was already foreshadowed with the existence of the Five Elder Stars. While the Celestial Dragons have the power, they are too busy living as gods to actually exercise their authority on lowly beings. Meanwhile, despite supposedly being the idea that all rulers are equal and there is no singular authority, you suddenly have five old men from seemingly out of nowhere having absolute control over everything, even the WG. Given this logic, the Empty Throne being not so empty makes a lot more sense in hindsight.
Wano Country Arc
The daimyo's name is Orochi, which in Japanese can translate to "dragon" as well as a legendary eight-headed snake. This implies that the daimyo's nature is snakelike and he has some connection to dragons, of which Kin'emon despises.
The reveal of Kaido's Devil Fruit power makes it clear where Kin'emon's hatred of dragons comes from. His country has been taken over and utterly ruined by someone who, as far as he's concerned, is a dragon that can take on human-form (remember: Kin'emon doesn't really understand the nature of Devil Fruits since he didn't even know what gave him his one clothing-related ability).
So, some of Kaido's enforcers are looking for a soba-shop owner who is actually Sanji and Sanji needs to keep his identity hidden. But he also wants to protect some civilian women the enforcers are threatening to draw him out. Unable to ignore his sense of chivalry, Sanji comes out to confront them, brandishing the Raid Suit he got from Niji before they parted ways. Seems kind of counter-intuitive, doesn't it? Using a Raid Suit from the Germa 66 would identify him as one of the Vinsmokes, wouldn't it? Well, in an odd sense of logic... that's actually the rub about it. Sanji himself declares no affiliation of any sort with his family. And likewise, Judge doesn't consider Sanji his son. So, Sanji officially has no actual affilation with them. Yet the suit would seem to indicate someone affiliated with the Vinsmokes or Germa 66. This conflict in logic may be just what Sanji's counting on. Effectively, the Raid Suit makes him unidentifiable, which is precisely what he needs.
There's also the fact that no one in Wano would know who the Vinsmokes or Germa 66 are since they're cut off from the world. To them, he's just some masked stranger either using magic or ninja techniques, and what soba seller would know those?
The power of Sanji's Raid Suit being Invisibility makes sense in context to his relation to his family. It's implied that the suit was already made before the Totto Land arc, so it's likely that it was meant to be Sanji's before Judge realized he was normal since there's no reason for it to have been made otherwise. Law refers to the "Stealth Black" suit as something well-known to anyone who read the comics associated with Germa, and his knowing its capabilities means there is an established mythos about the suit like there was with the rest of Sanji's siblings'. It's possible that Judge used this trait — or even had the suit designed that way — to justify why the alleged user of this suit was never seen while still being able to inspire fear of this supposed Germa agent.
Alternatively, Judge may have come up with the idea of the suit's powers so that if Sanji ever did use it, he at least wouldn't have to look at him.
When Orochi mentions the prophesized return of the Akazaya Nine during a party, Kyoshiro simply responds that, should they indeed appear, he'd be happy to show the shogun his talents with a blade. The line makes sense in context, as it sounds like he is stating he would be protecting Orochi, but when it is later revealed that Kyoshiro is actually Denjiro, one of Oden's retainers, the line still holds true, as Denjiro would in fact be very happy to show Orochi his blade wielding up close.
Yasuie's bravery when Orochi executes him makes sense after Chapter 960. Yasuie was willing to belittle and mock Orochi not only to help the Alliance change their plans, but also rubbing it in hard that Orochi used to be his servant, who would then betray him and the daimyos. No wonder Orochi got so angry that he executed him himself. Yasuie lamenting Orochi is an Ungrateful Bastard is also literal, as we learn Orochi's family was absolutely hated by the nation by trying to pull a coup in an underhanded manner, and Yasuie was actually trying to help them by staying under cover, which Orochi misinterpreted as contempt.
The fact that Ebisu Town's poverty and unhappy condition bothered Orochi (thus leading him to feeding them failed SMILES Fruits) makes a bit more sense when you consider Orochi's humble origins. A different despot Shogun probably would've just ignored them... but given how Orochi used to be in their shoes once, it probably made it harder for him to ignore.
In the flashback to Oden's time sailing, Shanks waving off Buggy's paranoia regarding Blackbeard when they first met because of Blackbeard not needing to sleep makes sense because there are a large number of different races and half-breed between those races, Shanks just might think Blackbeard is apart of a race of beings who may not need sleep.
The fact that Roger and his crew called the last island "Laugh Tale" might throw some people off... but given how long ago they were there and how similar to "Raftel" sounds, it's not hard to imagine Malaproper had a hand in things and rumor muddied the pronunciation so "Laugh Tale" became "Raftel". This certainly explains where the name for the legendary final island came from. Heck, the World Government might've had a hand in it, much like how Gol D. Roger was better known as "Gold Roger".
This makes more sense in Japanesse as the "R" and "L" sounds are very similar to each other because of the dialect.
The name of the attack Roger used to send Oden flying backwards was called Kamusari, or "God's Demise". Then you remember Corazon mentioning that those with the "D" initial are the enemies of god, AND that in Whitebeard's flashback, Roger told him the meaning of the "D" initial, showing that Roger must have known about the aforementioned legend.
Wano Country is more colorful than other arcs. It is also the arc where Kanjuro is revealed to be the traitor, hiding his identity by hiding the extent of his abilities and artistic talent. One could say that in this arc he... showed his true colors.
Why is Hyogoro angry at the disloyalty Orochi's forces show when Kaido kills Orochi despite the misery the latter put on Wano? It's because this kind of disloyalty has caused great pain for the Wano people including Hyogoro himself as he had his men and more importantly his wife killed.
Sanji was particularly angered when he learned about the truth behind Ebisu Town. At first, it just seems like he was just angered by the fact that the people were forced to experience starvation. Then you remember that his brothers were altered so that they couldn't feel certain emotions, very similar to what happened to the people who were forced to eat the SMILEs. As such, Sanji is angered both because of the forced starvation and the idea that someone forcibly altered the emotions of others, reminding him of his dislike of the Germa 66.
Further, as demonstrated when he refused to let Capone "Gang" Bege poison Big Mom's wedding cake, the idea of deliberately feeding someone tainted food is a further affront to Sanji's sensibilities.
Back during the Fishman Island arc, Luffy came up with an analogy that explains the difference between pirates (like him) and heroes: if they have some food, pirates will eat it, while heroes will share it with others. Some time later, Zoro came up with the exact same analogy by himself - only using booze instead of meat. Fast-forward to the Wano arc: Luffy is undercover inside the Animal Kingdom Pirates' base, but when he sees them wasting oshiruko, he attacks the pirates for wasting food while the people of Wano are starving. Immediately afterwards, Zoro arrives and chides Luffy for blowing his cover... but then, after learning Luffy's reason for doing so, Zoro changes his mind and attacks the pirates for the exact same reason.
Upon learning that Kaido was a Devil Fruit user, one of the biggest questions fans had about him was why doesn't he just drown himself or eat a second Devil Fruit if he's such Death Seeker? In Chapter 994, Kaido state a person become completes when they dies, he felt Roger and Whitebeard did their deaths right and he wanted to do the same thing.
Alternatively, with the reveal that Kaido's fruit is a model of the Fish-Fish Fruit, he can likely breathe underwater so trying to drown himself would cause him to end up like Jack after Zou: at the bottom of the sea unable to move but otherwise still conscious and aware.
When Luffy first attacked Kaido, he got his ass handed to him in one blow. Come their rematch, Luffy is able to dodge him with ease. Why? He's only trained in Ryou since, not speed, right? It's because this time he's keeping his temper. As Katakuri demonstrated, losing your cool means losing your future vision. Before, when Luffy thought Kaido had hurt his friends, he flew into a berserker rage and would have logically lost that ability. This time, even with the Nine Scabbards lying broken before him, Luffy's reaction is the total opposite. He's learned his lesson and is deliberately staying calm.
Roger smirking and calling Oden a scoundrel for leaving his wife on Wano becomes even funnier when you remember that Roger did the exact same thing to Portgas D. Rouge back in South Blue. Bit hypocritical huh? Though it might dive into Fridge Horror when you realize that Roger might have had some real regrets about what he did to Rouge.
It make sense that Ashura was one of the two to see through the fake Oden for two possible reasons. The first one as a former bandit he would be use to certain tricks. The second is Ashura is more cynical compare to the other Scabbards, so he would be skeptical to seeing Oden again. Raizo meanwhile as ninja would recognize different forms of techniques to fool your enemies.
Big Mom saying that Kaido owed her a 'life-long' debt isn't based on arrogance from her power and influence or that Kaido has a Mythical Devil Fruit due to her (although these things can factor into her beliefs). It is because a Devil Fruit users keep their powers until they died hence why Big Mom considered it a 'life debt".
During Luffy's battle with Kaido on the roof, he is confused at first how Ryuo still isn't the form of Haki that the Emperors have been using, and has a "Eureka!" Moment wherein he realizes that, like Armament and Observation, there must be an advanced form of Conqueror's, as well. Kaido gives some backhanded praise for piecing it together, stating how only a handful of people had ever managed it, and Luffy surely can't — only for Luffy to respond by countering using Conqueror's Haki to empower himself the exact same way immediately. Of course Luffy would be able to start using it like nothing; Conqueror's Haki was the first form he ever awakened to, and the one he's been using the longest; it's his specialty.
Jack being notably younger than King and Queen plays a bit into their rivalry: not only does Jack get the 'baggage' of being younger, lower bountied, and weaker, King and Queen also to acknoweldge, at least privately, that Jack rose up so fast in bounty ranks he could, theoretically, surpass their bounties, especially since he fights foes above his league and so pushes himself forward very fast.
Jack's status as a non-human also applies to Who's-Who interest in overthrowing a member of the Lead Performers: not only does he dislike Queen in general, but he's racist against fishmen like Jack.
Black Maria is a perfect foe for Robin. She lets minions do the work for her and is always surrounded by them, savagely beats up helpless captives who won't fight back because of a crippling weakness, while using even weapons to do so, and has a living weapon which has eaten a Devil Fruit. Maria also uses her dark past in Ohara to psychologically torture Robin, plans to violently extract information from her, destroys her own base/brothel and her living weapon's laugh is even "Wahahahahahaha!" So, Robin is probably thinking of a certain old personal foe of hers when she beats her the exact same way as him.
Even better: The means Black Maria used to beat Robin through mind games are superior to Spandam's, as she actually can use supernatural powers to back them up. So, why she is less effective than him at mentally harming Robin? To show how much she grew and trusted her Nakama.
After learning that the Beast Pirates burned down Okobore Village, Big Mom calls off the alliance and attacks them. Besides Even Evil Has Standards (the villagers offered her food and hospitality), there's an even deeper reason for her actions. When she visited the village, Big Mom had amnesia and partially reverted to the personality she had back when she was a child: a Big Eater, naive child who Does Not Know Her Own Strength, but overall means well. The way she was treated by the villagers mirrors the way Mother Carmel and the other orphans treated Big Mom during her childhood... and now, just like back then, her friends have been taken away from her. It's no wonder that Big Mom got angry despite having already regained her memories and reverted to her evil personality.
Sasaki, King and Queen display weird abilities in their dinosaur forms, claiming that they're innate abilities of their respective dinosaur species. Both are initially met with disbelief. But keep in mind that the One Piece world is a World of Weirdness, and we already met several animals that look similar to real-world counterparts, and yet display fantastical abilities. Why should ancient animals be different?
Also, the only way to acquire accurate informations about dinosaurs would be to study either dinosaur fossils (which wouldn't give much information about the special abilities of those dinosaurs); the still-living dinosarus of islands like Little Garden (which are incredibly dangerous, not only because of the local fauna but also because of lethal illnesses); or someone who ate a dinosaur-type Zoan Devil Fruit (who are incredibly rare). Because of this, it's entirely possible that the almost totality of people simply has no idea of what dinosaurs could actually do.
Furthermore, as Crocodile once stated, Devil Fruit powers do not grow more powerful, but the user can become more creative with them: maybe that weird abilities are a result of that, pushing the user's powers beyond the mere transformation.
Apoo's willingness to betray Kaido makes sense as he stated earlier that pirate alliances don't have happy endings. There is also the earlier incident where Queen put Apoo in danger by making him hold the antidote for his Ice Oni disease and then threatened his life if he failed to keep it away from their enemies.
Why does the narration at end of the duel between Kaido and Luffy simply say "Rooftop fight" without a "Kaido vs Luffy" like it did with other fights? Because not only did a CP0 agent intervene at the end, but Kaido had also been fighting the red Scabbards, the Supernova, Luffy Yamato, and Luffy again one after the others.
When reflecting on the Devil Fruit they were desperate to keep from getting out into the world again, the Five Elders briefly reminisce on how Zoan Devil Fruits possess a will of their own, to an extent. While this is the first time that is hard-confirmed, it isn't coming out of nowhere — when Zoans are "fed" to objects, those objects take on a life and personality of their own, after all, which could only come from the fruit. Likewise, SMILES —fake Zoans— often result in a mishmash of a person and an animal, sometimes with an entirely new head with its own will separate from the user's. The only conclusion to draw must be that there is effectively an entire living organism contained within Zoans, it's just that when consumed by an already thinking, feeling creature, the latent will doesn't manifest or doesn't need to.
With the reveal that Luffy's Gomu-Gomu no Mi is also called Hito Hito mo Mi Mode: Nika, which takes the It Runs on Nonsensoleum nature of the manga and runs wild with it, basically giving Luffy Toon Physics powers, him being made out of rubber seems like an unrelated side-effect. Then you remember that the animation style that pioneered those kinds of gags is known as "rubberhose animation".
Further, Nika's role as a liberator who brings smiles to the faces of those he helps. Of course he's supposed to bring smiles and laughs to people, he's literally a cartoon character.
Certain things, like Nami being able to hurt Luffy despite not having Haki, can likely be explained by Luffy's Devil Fruit too. If it's funny, the Devil Fruit would likely let it happen. It's funny for the normal Nami to hurt Luffy and so, Nami is able to hurt him.
Gear Third foreshadows the true nature of Luffy's Devil Fruit since inflating their fists to gigantic proportions by blowing air into the thumb is a classic cartoon thing to do.
When Luffy unlocks his 'Joyboy' form, he uncontrollably laughing non-stop, having a total blast with his new state. his laughter is the relatively normal-sounding 'Ahahaha', which contrasts with everybody else's Signature Laugh in One Piece being generally weird, but especially Blackbeard's 'Zehahaha'. Their laughter is literally opposite sides of the alphabet from each other.
Of course Luffy would turn out to be the Warrior of Liberation so many have been looking for. The very first act he committed as a Pirate after leaving Windmill village (second chapter in the manga, part of his Establishing Character Moment in the anime) was freeing Coby from his self-imposed life of servitude towards Alviva, very specifically not rescuing Coby himself, but rather challenging his views of the world and proving an example to him that his dreams of being a marine were possible if he had the courage to try and risk himself for it. It was only when Coby proved he did have the grit to put himself in danger for his hopes and dreams that Luffy beat down Alvida, in much a similar manner that the Revolutionary army is later demonstrated to operate, inspiring the downtrodden and weak to free themselves rather than accept oppression.
A Devil Fruit whose ultimate powers grant Toon Physics to the user may seem like an odd choice for a Warrior of Liberation, but when you consider the nature of cartoons around the era of World War 1 and 2 it starts to make sense. Especially since such cartoons were intended to inspire the common people to rise up and fight for their nation (often while depicting their enemy as dumb, incompetent, and/or particularly evil).
This reveal further ties him to being Blackbeard's counterpart. Luffy's fruit refers to the sun, (light), and releasing people. Blackbeard's is darkness, relies on black holes and imprisons them!
Luffy can now grow to giant size at will thanks to his awakening. I guess we know now how the giant straw hat at Marijoise could fit…
The Epithet that accompanies Kaido is "Land, Sea and air—out of every living thing in the world, this pirate is said to be the strongest creature alive". By becoming a living cartoon character, Luffy has become something that doesn't belong to any of those categories, hence why he's now capable of facing Kaido on truly equal footing, dragging him into a chaotic battlefield that the Emperor doesn't fully understand due to the world around Luffy now operating on Toon Physics.
Luffy's Gear Fifth form paints him completely white, and was described by Kaido as "coming out of a comic book". Luffy is a character from a black-and-white manga.
The fact that Luffy's Awakened Devil Fruit allows him use Toon Physics adds another layer of logic to why he's unaffected by blunt force. Even if he wasn't made of rubber, when was the last time you saw blunt force trauma do lasting damage to a Toon?
Crossed with Hilarious in Hindsight, but the first serious fight in the series that pushed the group somewhat to their limits, as well as the fight where the Straw Hats unofficially gathered together into a small crew, note Luffy and Zoro were basically wayward bums who couldn't even steer their ship in any direction without Nami's aid at that point was the fight against the Buggy pirates, capped off with Luffy's one-on-one with Buggy. The first challenging fight of the series, and the one where we first saw two different Devil Fruits in combat against each other, was a fight between a Clown and a Cartoon Character.
Luffy's Gears share a lot in common with Chopper's Points, both being a variety forms that each emphasize a certain trait, like speed or strength. As it turns out, after learning it's secretly a Zoan fruit, Luffy's Gears basically are the same thing, unconsciously manifesting his ultimate Nika form in specific ways.
Luffy's 'Joyboy' form is otherwise known as the 'God of the Sun' and manifests a whitened colour scheme, which makes sense as sunlight is actually pure white when viewed outside earth's atmospheric pollution. Given that Luffy has now effectively become a cartoon character, it also makes sense why he's connected to light — the first cartoons were projected reels beamed on a wall through light, allowing them and their contents to be seen by a wide audience, which fits also with why the Five Elders are so concerned with Luffy's awakening — he's going to become a widespread symbol of defiance that attracts the attention of the masses the world over and unites the hearts of the people, despite their differences with each other.
Sukiyaki not having his topknot not only add to his disguise but also it symbolizes his feeling of lost honor.
Kaido and Luffy's first fight demonstrated the power gap between them by Kaido clowning around drunk and goofing off, not taking the fight seriously at all, relying on his inherent invulnerability to more or less ignore Luffy's attacks, whereas Luffy was more serious and focused than ever before, having just witnessed him apparently destroy his crew without effort and breaking out the big guns from the start. Their final round in Onigashima is punctuated by Luffy's Awakening into 'Joyboy' which makes him clown around and treat the fight as one big joke and constantly goofing off despite the high stakes, and Kaido finally taking him seriously, recognising him as a Worthy Opponent who deserves him fighting at full strength and holding back nothing to beat Luffy's new power with all his strength.
Zoro from the SBS having one of his swords "eat" Kaido fruit is a Stealth Pun. Oda stated that Zoro would be from the area call HokKAIDO.
Kaido's defeat does not downplay him at all. If it's one on one, still always bet on Kaido. Except Luffy had the help of over ten people who landed good hits on the King of the Beasts, and had to recover at least twice while his friends kept softening Kaido up.
His flashbacks show that his captures don't downplay him either. He kept turning himself in and wasn't half as strong as in his prime.
Another thing about his flashback: Despite being so strong and amassing a huge bounty for a child, Robin started with an even higher one. Meaning strength alone doesn't give you a bounty, and knowledge of history is more dangerous to the Government than even the greatest brute strength.
Both Big Mom and Kaido were defeated by knocking them down to the Earth from the floating Onigashima. It's fitting for the two Emperors who stood at the top for so long to be knocked down from the heavens, proving they're mortals like everybody else.
Why is Buggy so highly thought of considering many top ranked people could immediately deduce his pathetically low power level? Simple, his influence. His legitimate history with being a part of the Gol D. Rogers' crew would have been enough to gain a moderate size following, but thanks to his involvement in breaking out of Impel Down, thanks be being credited with Luffy with orchestrating everything, his supposed action during the Marineford war and escape, which earned him the Warlord title, his influence only grew. Many of his followers would undoubtedly be capable of defeating him with ease, but either fear or respect him to not try. He has an army full of powerful people at his disposal, even as the Warlord title was discontinued, he still has that power, so much so that it probably influence the decision to make him one of the new Emperors, with, ironically enough, Luffy, the man semi-responsible of thrusting said responsibilities towards him.
Even funnier, Buggy would have never wanted the spotlight to begin with. He knows his strength is nothing compared to everyone else note Word of God, however, states that Buggy does have the potential to be Yonko level if he wasn't lazy and trained himself and has been surpassed long ago, heck, he was scared throughout the War simply because everyone is making him out to be this good, even Whitebeard (though that's just to make sure he can lighten the load since dealing with Buggy's army of tough pirates would waste valuable time), he's faking it for the sake of surviving at this point. He is most likely scared out of his mind because it only takes one mistake to ruin his entire empire he accidentally made, becoming an Emperor only made it better and worse for him.
Aramaki having a positive connection to Sakazuki is a reference to their Devil Fruits as magma ashes work as a really good fertilizer for plants.
Plants grow well after volcanic eruptions and fires fertilize the soil. Aramaki joined the Marines after Marineford where magma and fire ran rampant.
With the reveal of Chapter 1044, many fans were wondering why the Five Elder Stars didn't just kill Luffy relatively early on with CP0, making the whole reveal look like an ass pull. Except they did try to kill Luffy. As summed up from these two posts , there are actually multiple factors that explain this when you add the overall context:
They wanted to prevent any other people from knowing about the existence of the fruit. Suddenly bringing in the entire Navy on some nobody would raise a lot of eyebrows from the high command.
With all the dangers the Straw Hats go into, they assumed that the pirates would just get destroyed by the Grand Line's inhabitants. In Alabasta, Smoker chose not to capture Luffy. Hina tried to arrest the Straw Hats but Mr.2 helped him escape. Skypeia was beyond their reach. When they got their asses kicked by Aokiji at Long Ring Long Land, the Straw Hats fell off the radar of the Five Elder Stars as they thought that they got worried for nothing, unaware of Aokiji's insubordination. From Enies Lobby onwards, they gambled on the CP9 killing the Straw Hats without needing to tell them about Nika. They failed obviously. This happens again multiple times with Garp (Post-Enies Lobby and Marineford) and Kuma (Thriller Bark and Sabaody). Luffy suddenly disappeared for two years thanks to Rayleigh and Hancock. In Dressrosa, Fujitora spared Luffy while Punk Hazard and Zou's events is completely hidden from them. By the time the Five Elder Stars realised that Big Mom and Kaido were going to lose to Luffy, it was too late.
They originally wanted to retrieve the fruit. Killing Luffy would have them search the seas all over again. Better have it on some supposed scrub they can keep an eye on.
Information travels very slowly around the world thanks to how the press works. The events post-Time Skip are shown to take place very quickly In-Universe. Punk Hazard until the end of Wano took only around 2 months.note This is based on the number of Sulong transformations, which happens during the full moon.
Early in the arc, we see Law and Hawkins fight. Law appears on the verge of losing because Hawkins is threatening his crew with his Devil Fruit. But the next time we see them, Law has defeated Hawkins. How did this happen? Law figured out the secret behind Hawkins' Devil Fruit, and just simply removed the straw dolls from his body with a Room leaving him defenseless.
Law, Kidd and Luffy using their Awakened Devil Fruits to beat Big Mom and Kaido (who haven't awakened their own fruits) make sense - we have only seen awakenings from those Devil Fruit users who have mastered their Devil Fruits to a high extent and unlocking creative uses, Doflamingo, Katakuri, Law, Kidd and Luffy (excluding Impel Down Guards). Big Mom and Kaido - who were both monstrously strong even as children, never had to much practice and hone upon the skills of their own Devil Fruits - Big Mom is pretty much Unskilled, but Strong and Kaido has immense durability to cope and never faced any true serious battles (until, of course, their battles with the Worst Generation), so they never had any need to awaken their Devil Fruits in the first place.
Fridge Sadness, but Orochi did have all means to restore the Kurozumi clan to its former glory without committing atrocities: Oden, Yasu'ie and Sukiyaki all trusted him despite him being a Kurozumi, and Sukiyaki was willing to promote Orochi on "Oden"'s words, and the other Daimyos also agreed on it, meaning they were willing to forgive the Kurozumis and re-integrate them into Wano. If Orochi wasn't so blinded by his hatred on citizens of Wano and was willing to look past it, he could become a legitimate Shogun and proved to Wano his clan isn't Always Chaotic Evil and Oden and others might have put the vigilantes on trial. Instead, his desire for vengeance and Wano's ruin brought nothing but pain and suffering to all the parties, and the complete destruction of Kurozumi Family, which could have been easily avoided.
Egghead Arc
Blackbeard wanting Boa Hancock's devil fruit makes sense of his original plans. He was originally aiming to become a warlord by capturing Luffy, which would not have gotten Whitebeard's attention particularly well. He might have gotten Ace, but Whitebeard was a huge stretch from there. But if he was also after the Mero-Mero fruit (Love-Love fruit), he was still in the right place to get one of his objectives. Ace showing up instead just meant he could go after another fruit on his radar first.
Boa and Luffy didn't have any connection prior to Kuma sending Luffy to Amazon Lily during Sabody, which was AFTER Blackbeard fought and captured Ace. So him capturing Luffy instead wouldn't have gotten Boa's attention at that point. It is more than likely, however, that it would have gotten Shank's attention and also sparked a war between the Marines and one of the Yonko, which would have brought the Seven Warlords together just like with Whitebeard, so he could have been targetting her that way. Whether or not that was his part of his original plan entirely depends on how much Blackbeard knows about Shanks and Luffy's connection.
Boa's ability to be targeted would be due to being a Warlord, not Luffy. Being a Warlord would make it a lot easier to get near Hancock, a fellow Warlord.
The petrifications caused by the Love-Love Fruit's powers can only be undone by the same person who caused those petrifications; a new user cannot restore those who have been petrified by a previous user. This makes sense when you consider that the Love-Love Beam and similar techniques only work on targets that feel lust towards the current user - and that can change if the user itself changes (for example, people who feel lust towards Hancock might not feel anything towards Blackbeard). Reversing the effects of the Love-Love Beam works under the same principle.
If Imu can blow up a kingdom from the sky so easily, why is the Buster Call needed at all? Two reasons:
The Buster Call is just one step below Imu's Final Solution. It allows civilians and Marines to evacuate before the target island is obliterated. Imu just erases everything.
For the same reason Imu attacked Lulusia and Sabo: public image. If Imu personally attacked too many islands, they would leave enough trace to be exposed, plus they leave more casualties than a Buster Call, making the Government look worse.
On the subject of 'leaving traces', there's already been evidence that Imu erased a location from the map shown once before...at Enies Lobby, a massive hole in the middle of the sea that looks like somebody gouged out a massive chunk of the world and left a scar that never healed, a hole that never fills up with seawater no matter how much flows into it and the sun never stops shining over it, almost like the natural laws of the world were effected by whatever erased the land that stood there before. At the time it was chalked up to another quirk of One Piece's weird geography, but if the same phenomenon was repeated elsewhere, then it becomes evidence that something is capable of deliberately causing these 'impact craters'. Tellingly, nothing is shown of the aftermath of what Lulusia looks like after Imu erased it, only a shot of the surrounding oceans, likely because said sight would be markedly familiar to readers.
Indeed, if one looks at the actual hole at Enies Lobby, they'll notice its shape is markedly oblong, and Enies Lobby itself was noted to be located close to the Red Line and Mary Geoise, the 'home of the gods'. Such a location may indeed once have been a prime candidate for somebody to term the island that was once there 'God Valley', serving as a metaphorical front-door to the land of the gods. Of everything seen on the island before the Buster Call, nothing appears to be markedly ancient or something that couldn't have been built over a period of 10-20 years of back-breaking labour, and it would fit what we've seen of the WG's Modus Operandi to erase whatever stood there, such as the site of a publicly-embarrassing, yet historical fight, and build over with with a new history and function to obscure what was erased.
Since the Ohara scholars' leader Professor Clover was arrested multiple time, it made its very easy for the World Government to vilifiy them.
Of course Vegapunk would consider Momo's fruit a failed copy of Kaido's because of its colour, even if all the others aspects of it were copied perfectly; Kaido's fruit is explicitly the "Azure Dragon" one, and what kind of "Azure" dragon is pink?
Also, the World Government has been trying to get an army of giants for years; now, considering that dragons are better than giants, the world government would have tried to mass produce the dragon fruit made by Vegapunk. It's not impossible that Vegapunk just lied to the World Government so they wouldn't create an army of dragons.
Or maybe Vegapunk just told the World Government what he saw as truth: that the artificial fruit was a "complete failure".
Jimbei is the one to raise the problem of dangerous ideologies "infecting" Punk Records if it ever became possible to link every single person to it. Jimbei is a Fishman, was on Fisher Tiger's crew, personally knew Arlong for years, saw Hody nearly destroy his homeland and just defeated the incredibly racist Who's Who in the previous arc, he knows firsthand the damage dangerous ideologies can do.
The "satellite" Vegapunks are paired up bases on their functions, with their names reflecting that:
Shaka "The Good" and Lilith "The Evil" represent part of Vegapunk's morality, and are named after mythological figures considered to be important representations of goodness and evilness respectively (Shaka is one of the names of Buddha, while Lilith is a progenitor of demons).
Edison "The Thinker" and Pythagoras "The Wise" represent Vegapunk's intellect, and are both named after important academics - American inventor Thomas Edison and Greek mathematician Pythagoras.
Atlas "The Violent" and York "The Greedy" take care of Vegapunk's most instinctual impulses. Both of their names reference apples (a theme that is reflected in the main Vegapunk's appearance): Atlas in Greek mythology was sent by Heracles to fetch some golden apples, while the "Big Apple" is one of the nicknames of New York.
Vegapunk stating that Devil Fruits are ultimately 'born from the desires of humanity' to achieve various feats and actions people desired or deeply wished for gives new context for why Haki can affect and even nullify them outright, despite apparently being unrelated to the fruits themselves. Haki can mean 'Ambition' or 'will', meaning that controlling a devil fruits's effects through Haki is akin to mastering a strong 'desire' with a stronger 'will'. This is why Law was able to reverse his Gender Bender status through his Haki, effectively 'willing' himself back to his proper sex, and why Haki is a universal measure that combats Devil Fruits. If they are made from the desires of humanity, then the wills of individual humans can also combat them, even if they're not that of the wielder themselves.
Furthermore, a fruit becoming 'Awakened' through desperate situations can also be seen as said holder's 'will' shaping and controlling their powerful desire into a more manageable and controlled form, effectively bringing them more in line with said desire. This is showcased with both Lucci and Luffy's Awakened Zoan fruits, as Vegapunk notes how atypical it is for Lucci to retain his mental faculties, because the 'bestial' desires the fruit contain usually overwhelm the 'human's rational mind. Even Luffy is showing signs of this, as despite facing an opponent he's got every reason to fight seriously against, he is almost uncontrollably goofing around, as he's channeling the strong desires of Joyboy, and thus compelled to preform silly stunts first and foremost. Furthermore, it also explains how Lucci's Awakened Zoan form also manifests a flaming cloudy shroud around his shoulders like Joyboy, despite Lucci's Zoan powers not bestowing any flame or cloud-based powers upon him — because both Zoan fruits are effectively at the apex of their desire as shaped by the holder's wills, meaning other similarly-awakened Zoans may possess the same shroud.
Said 'desire' essence within the fruits also finally explains how weapons can 'eat' the fruits and turn into Living Weapons — however the fruit is 'consumed', since said weapons lack any sentience or will, the 'desire' of the fruit can manifest wholesale without clashing against the will of one who 'ate' it as normally happens, growing a body through it's new physical form as shaped by whatever desire it was. Note than of all the weapons seen so far, all of them were Zoan fruits, which thus naturally possessed intelligence and locomotion once they manifested through said powers. This also explains why the SMILE fruits, incomplete as they were, resulted in haphazard growths of animal forms and body parts throughout the users', which also possessed minds and intelligence separate from their 'masters', as depicted by Holdem and others
Another way the kanji can be read during Vegapunk's explanation is that Devil Fruits manifest from the 'Dreams' of humanity. Blackbeard was noted in a flashback to apparently have the unusual ability to stay awake 24/7, implied to be involuntarily on his part, meaning that no matter how hard he wants to, he cannot dream himself. Fittingly, his Devil Fruit is the one that ties thematically closest to nighttime and possesses the similarly-atypical ability to apparently steal the Devil Fruit abilities of others, in essence, 'stealing their dreams'.
Why does Luffy refuse to take Lucci seriously during the rematch? Well recall whether it's Sylvester, Tom or any of the dozens of one-off antagonistic slapstick cartoon cats, they (usually) fail horribly by the end. Gear 5's cartoonish logic and thinking probably assumes that Lucci being defeated is a forgone conclusion, because he's an antagonistic cat attacking a cartoon protagonist! Sure enough, the next chapter completely validates him.
Fridge Horror
Don Krieg is a walking armory, can use poisonous gas, an exploding spear, is ruthless and fights dirty. Yet, while as a real pirate he would be fearsome, in One Piece he is established to be a blowhard. This makes early fans to wonder how much worse the enemies in Grand Line will be. They live up to the hype, with a few exceptions.
Brook is pretty lucky, considering how if he had found his body earlier (but still having gotten lost), he would have been a rotting zombie. Being 100% skeleton runs on nonsensoleum, but if he still had flesh when he came back to life, would he have become a leper due to all the bacteria that were decomposing his body? All the other undead have been preserved (IE Oda) or made from fresh corpses, while Brook's body has been completely exposed to the elements for one year.
Speaking of Brook, remember the Bink's Sake song? Theoretically, he can outlive the Straw Hats, too, even though they're all pretty young now.
To be fair, Brook's power-up after the timeskip has shown that the Yomi-Yomi no Mi is more than a fruit granting a second chance. It gives the ressurected user control over its own soul, meaning the body becomes nothing more than a vessel. Even if Brook had came back with a regular body, it is entirely possible that he would have been unstoppable as long as the body is not completely destroyed.
Two of the Devil's Fruit powers of the Seven Warlords of the Sea, Bartholomew Kuma and Marshall D. Teach can be this. Kuma's power is pushing anything, which one such example is pushing people so fast that it's akin to teleporting. Now, there's nothing saying he can't poof you to the center of the sun or thousands of miles under the sea, and there's nothing you can do about it. Teach's power is basically being a living Black Hole, and during his raid on Impel Down, he sucks in some guards inside of him, and later expels them. The guards are horribly crushed, bleeding, and can only mutter Darkness!, meaning no light, and being crushed by gravity, utterly helpless to avoid it. Boa Hancock's power of turning people to stone could have been this, but they are unconscious while turned into stone.
You think Kuma's powers is bad? You haven't seen half of it. He can literally push pain and injuries away from one's body (and that's nightmare fuel in itself), so what stops him from pushing your soul out? Maybe... The characters have no soul. Now this is Nightmare Fuel.
He probably just never though of it. If he did, he probably wouldn't WANT to do that to someone. Seriously, that's just way too cruel.
They have souls. Brook's one was seen when he explained his powers. So, yup, he can push your soul out....
Apparently, Law has this ability.
Almost, but not quite. He can't cut your soul out with his ability, he cuts your heart out. The soul isn't a tangible thing. (I mean, where does Brook keep his? We'd be able to see it.) The heart is, but it seems hearts have the 'essence' of the person in the same way Brook's soul does when he escapes his body. Maybe in One Piece, your soul is stored in your heart?
No, we've seen Law cut out Smoker's heart and it seems that it's not at all the same as what he did to the Straw Hats.
Adding to this, Law's ability affects only the physical position without regards to function. Within his Room, he can rearrange things at will but they still work like normal. This explains why Monet died when her heart was destroyed and people that have been dismembered are still living like nothing has happened, albeit in multiple locations.
Upon getting a good look at Franky with his skin burned off, we can get a good idea of just how much of his body was replaced when he became a cyborg. But then, keep in mind that he did all these modifications by himself, on a rusted old ship, without any anesthetic. Look at just how much metal he's got in there, and try to imagine doing that to yourself. Then try not to barf.
Now remember, he didn't rebuild his body in a single day. For some time Franky looked like a mess of meat and metal. And he was missing for four years, maybe living all that time in the rusted old ship. Stranded in a boat, alone for years, with a scary appearance... Does it remind of someone? That's right: Brook. Even Robin was perplexed about the question which Franky asked to Brook in Thriller Bark, but his insight becomes less surprising in hindsight. Franky knew Brook should need a strong motivation to continue living, because he went through the same situation.
Franky: "If you go out and meet people with the way you look you know what kind of reactions they'll have... right? You're a talking skeleton. There's no way that you could become friends with a guy that creepy. Something that abnormal will die of shame! Even if you got out of this Cursed Sea, your fate will be the same as those hopeless years you spent here. You said that "You were lonelier than death", right? If I was you... I would've given up living a long time ago!!! Living such a small existence... Acting like a gentlemen from time to time... Tell us what you left out of the story! To go that far, to live like that... What did you want to accomplish? What was the promise that you made with your nakama!?"
While he did mention that getting shot with bullets hurts, isn't it possible that at least a good deal of his pain receptors are dead? So it still hurts, just not as much as it would for other people?
There's also the implications of the Pacifista project in which Bartholomew Kuma was on, substituting his body part by part until they finally ripped off his personality and free will.
There were several Marines and pirates who had half of their face turned to stone by Boa Hancock when she kicked them. That part of their head or face now is frozen in stone possibly forever (seeing how Hancock isn't so forgiving to men) and also cracked and shattered from her kicks. Even if Hancock reversed the process, they have a gaping hole where their brain and face should be.
Decken had been stalking Princess Shirahoshi for 10 years. Chapter 622, which took place 15 years ago from present time, shows Shirahoshi as an infant. That means when Decken first touched Shirahoshi, she was around six years old.
Chapter 625 reveals that the real reason why Decken wanted to marry Shirahoshi was because of her special ability to summon Sea Kings. He wanted to marry a six year old just to get her powers. It doesn't make it any less creepier.
626 reveals that He's after a large stash of treasure somehow related to Shirahoshi's powers, and intended to use a magic item to age her, so that makes it...slightly less creepy?
Not one bit: It was revealed that said treasure was the Energy Steroids pills, which can make the user stronger and stronger but eventually make him/her grow old when overdone. So, yup, he was going to feed a 6-year-old girl steroids.
After escaping from the Straw Hats, Caribou has been kidnapping mermaids and planning to sell them later. Said mermaids happen to be pretty, curious and friendly. Caribou also happens to be a homicidal serial killer who wanted to privately ambush Nami in her room when he was captured.
At the beginning of the Skypiea arc, we are shown a ship that fell from the sky, with all the crew long dead. It is later that we find out that said ship, and all those aboard had been given the slow death sentence of Cloud Drifting. This means that these poor saps weren't all killed by the Skypieans, they drifted around on that cloud for years, surely they must've run out of food. Now this is where it gets the horror from, after exhausting all their food supplies, what's left on the ship to eat? The crew. Just consider that little fact for a while, before we move on, in order for a slim chance of some of the crew surviving, they more than likely had to eat each other, which may have been a last resort on their part. In fact, we have no idea the level of their bond as crewmates were. However, we do know that the latest people, thus far, to receive the life sentence of Cloud Drifting, 3/4 of Eneru's priests, none of whom like each other, and considering that Hatori is the plumpest, and the weakest of the trio, guess who was most likely first.
He's explicitly not seen when Kaido stops on their cloud and jumps off...
Kaido jumped off of Balloon Terminal not where the priests were. The people who were ther were actually Uronge of the "Worst Generation" and his crew the "fallen Monk Pirates"
Kuma's power is to push something. Now beyond physical objects, like people, he can push medical conditions from people as well, even if a fraction of it, like Luffy's pain. Now we know he was key in making the Pacifistas with that doctor and Admiral Kizaru. Now, if we assume the Devil Fruit alters the most basic parts of its user, then it is a physical condition. These points make me realize Kuma could strip a person of a Devil Fruit power permanently. Hell, he could even push the life out of a person, considering he was called The Tyrant in the past. To me, he has the scariest power in the One Piece Universe, beating out even Blackbeard's.
Wild mass guessing as it may be, but it may be entirely possible Kuma could do just that. Why? Well we know that Vegapunk has developed a way for inanimate object to eat Devil Fruits and that Kuma has been working with him for a while now. Who's to say that the process isn't 1. Have some poor sod eat a Fruit. 2. Kuma pulls that power right the hell out and shoves the bubble into said object? Fridge horror indeed if the fact that most people would die with two powers in them. Two users come in, oneshot one and the other lacks his main form of combat — easy pickings.
Trafalgar Law's Devil Fruit ability allows him to literally dis-assemble opponents, and put them back together anyway he desires, such as attaching a head to a barrel. We don't know if the disassembly effects persist after he dis-engages the sphere, but I just realized what would happen if Trafalgar Law simply disassembled someone, and then released the technique...*SPLAT*
No, we know it keeps going. After his first use of it, he held the Marine's head in his hands for quite a while. I just hope there's a time limit to the thing, or the entire platoon he rearranged is gonna have some serious problems (I'm not sure which one was worse, the guy with two torsos or the head with someone else's feet).
Apparently, the latest chapters seem to show that you can still survive with your heart taken away from you (see other fridge horror below) but goodness knows how long...
Apparently, one can live for a while. Downside is holding the heart of a person gives one power over them as when you crush the heart, they feel it in their body and react accordingly. Now, remember those 100 hearts Law sent to the Marines, they just got 100 slaves who must obey or die.
Boa Hancock's childish and borderline ridiculous obsession with Luffy and love is a result of her being made into a slave at age 12 or 13 tops and enduring unspeakable abuse at the hands of her masters, who were the first men she had ever met up close. When one thinks of it, it's much less ridiculous... and much more horrifying and sad, as it means that despite all of the power and strength she adquired upon the years, Hancock still has the mentality of a very young girl — one who was horribly abused in many ways, which wrecked her view of the world. And Luffy is one of the first males who offered her something akin to genuine kindness. No wonder she clings to him.
If the reader looks closer, most of Hancock's Kick the Dog moments, especially the Narm-iest ones are very similar to typical Tiny Tyrannical Girl/Shana Clone shticks, which are usually Played for Laughs. It's because she is one, only that her physical age is much larger. It also means that while her logical mind is akin to an adult's, her heart is still that of the scared traumatized pre-teen girl she was years ago. It also paints her relationship with "Elder" Nyon in a whole different level, since one can cast her abusive treatment as a troubled girl who is rebelling against her foster mother.
If the Straw Hat crew didn't arrive to Fish-Man Island at the time they did, Hody Jones would have taken over Fish-Man Island and he would have begun his plan to kill everyone at the next Reverie, which included princess Vivi who will be representing her father and Alabasta.
Or... They would have all been killed and destroyed by Big Mom. Can you imagine such an hungry behemoth feasting on the fish-people?
Or... Hody would have been killed by the top ranking Marines likely guarding the place. I highly doubt the Marines would leave the place unguarded, so Kizaru would likely be there and he could kill Hody on any level easily.
Or... let's not forget that this was a meeting of all kings. If Straw Hats didn't ally themselves with Law against Doflamingo he would still be the king of Dressroa. Meaning that Hody might have ran into him there.
In a flashback of Chapter 644, Hody was shown actively terrorizing Fish-men who had given blood to humans by burning down their houses. This happened when he was a member of Neptune's army and Prince Fukaboshi pretty much admits that they neglected to reach out to those in the Fish-man District. How many Fish-men and Fish-women were attacked by Hody under the watch of the Neptune army?
Remember that one Fish-man that Otohime was seen slapping? He said his home was burnt down by arsonists. That was Hody's crew!
It is stated by Oda that the Devil Fruits do not grow stronger, their user just grows more imaginative. Now consider that if Wapol was not a total idiot he would be able to eat everything including abstract meanings Kuma is able to push. Think about it for a moment and tell me if you still think Kuma's power is stronger than Wapol's. Now think how many unintroduced Devil Fruits remain that, in the hands of a user like Kuma can manipulate abstract meanings...
Trafalgar Law was able to become a Warlord of the Sea after extracting and delivering 100 pirate hearts to the World Government. Knowing said person's ability, the government could easily kill those pirates slowly and torturously or even force them to do their bidding, similar to what Cutler Beckett did to Davy Jones.
In hindsight, the Heart Pirates moniker has a whole new meaning.
Hody planned on killing any of the merfolk and fishfolk that signed the petition to migrate the the surface, calling them traitors for sympathizing with humans. If he's willing to kill them for wanting to live alongside humans, then what would it mean for someone like Chimney who the grandchild of Kokoro, who is a mermaid and a human? What would Hody do to someone who is an offspring of a human and merperson/Fish-man given his already violent tendencies to humans that did nothing against him personally?
It's been shown that the energy steroids caused the users to grow extremely old after a certain amount of time. It has also been stated that the New Fish-Man Pirates had their giant sea beasts take the steroids as well and at the time, Surume was working alongside them before the Straw Hats showed up. Was it ever confirmed that he was among the sea beasts that took the steroids? If so, what would it mean for him since the last time he was seen, he was carrying Wadatsumi (Who also took an Energy Steroid) out of Fish-Man Island since he was too big for any of the prisons, as well as the other sea beasts who were forced into working with the New Fish-Man Pirates? They may have just basically robbed their unwilling servants of most of their lifespan!
Blackbeard's Devil Fruit nullifies the Fruits of others. What exactly would happen if he came in contact with Brook?!
Also, Blackbeard is able to steal abilities from other Devil Fruit users as shown with Whitebeard. What if he were able to do the same to Sugar?
On the subject of the Blackbeard Pirates, there's some Fridge Horror to the true extent of their power. Remember that it was said that their attack on Drum Island was so devastating that Wapol abandoned the island without even fighting back? Forget the idea that the "ultimate form" that Wapol used to punish Dalton wouldn't be enough to stop them, but it sounds like, compared to that, the time Chopper first triggered his Monster Point and razed an entire village is minute! No doubt, the Blackbeards are dangerous.
Post-timeskip, we've already seen two antagonists that have now seem to make it child's play out of crossing the Moral Event Horizon: Hody Jones and Caesar Clown (and to a certain extent Big Mom). To keep the long story short, let's just say Hody and Caesar serve as examples of Fantastic Racism and Would Hurt a Child respectively... taken up to eleven. This in itself isn't Fridge Horror though. The Fridge Horror is that they are merely two of the first villains we are starting to see in the second part of the Grand Line: Just how much worse will the later pirates be?
Considering that this is the second half of the Grand Line and where the most powerful of all pirates are located, we're going to see the greatest of all pirates, and the worst of them.
The next antagonist is the most evil Warlord, Doflamingo. What can be worse than him?
Aaaaand... Big Mom just ate a guy alive for the hell of it. Yeah.
It was recently revealed that the experiments done on the kidnapped children will cause them to die within five years. FIVE FUCKING YEARS. Even if Chopper can somehow heal them, that'd take time and medicine, and it was medicine that caused the children to enter this condition. So this seems to imply that even if they can be healed, their lifespan will be shortened immensely. If it's true, then fuck you, Caesar Clown.
In later chapters Chopper revealed that Dr Kureha has been working on the Punk Hazard kids and they will soon gain their normal lives back.
In general, whenever the Straw Hats reach a new location, it seems like they often arrive just in time to save the day. If they hadn't reached Reverse Mountain on time Vivi and Mr. 9 would have killed Laboon, Brook's main reason to keep on living. If they hadn't reached Alabasta in time, the country would have been devastated by the civil war Crocodile started. If they hadn't reached Fish-Man Island on time, Hody Jones would have slaughtered everyone before doing the same with the people at the Reverie, including Vivi (Granted, he would have probably been stopped before, but you never know). They never plan to save the day, but still. This goes triple for Punk Hazard, Dressrosa, Zou and Momonosuke's group; had Luffy not decided to fuck common sense and go to Punk Hazard instead of a safer island, the children on Punk Hazard would have eventually perished from Caesar Clown's experiments, the Riku family and Dressrosa would have remained under Doflamingo's reign of terror and false peace, and/or died trying to fight him, and Jack wouldn't have gone to save Doflamingo, and burned Zou and its inhabitants to the ground. Also, Jack would have succeeded in finding and killing Raizo, Kinemon would have died in Punk Hazard itself, Kanjuro would have been eventually turned into a toy, and Momonosuke would have ended as Caesar's experiments, making every sacrifice Lady Toki made to be Senseless Sacrifice, and the bad guys in Wano would have completely won without even knowing this. Only because Luffy didn't want to tread on the safest island. Or even better, if their journey would have been say, a month askew, everything would have been lost completely.
For that matter, think what would have happened to the Straw Hats if they didn't meet Luffy. Zoro would have been executed that day by Helmeppo. Nami and her village would remain under Arlong's rule. Usopp would have died fighting Kuro pirates. Sanji and the rest of the Baratie crew would have died from fighting Don Krieg and his crew. Chopper would have got eaten by Wapol's Munch-Munch powers. Robin would have never regained her will to live. Franky would still be stuck on Water 7 out of guilt. And Brook would still be stuck in the Florian Triangle.
If we look at Luffy himself, it becomes clear that even if he didn't become an infamous pirate, his family line and connections would've put him in danger anyway. His father and grandfather are a infamous revolutionary and famous Marine respectively, while his adoptive brother was in one of most infamous pirate crews. Ace's death served to show what could potentially happen to Luffy if he doesn't become strong enough.
If you think that's bad, then try to think about all the places where the Straw Hats didn't go. By all accounts, the world of One Piece is rather a Crapsack World, where something is always going on someplace or other. Just as some examples among the countless, there was the country Big Mom had burned down because it could not produce candy, and Chapter 700 briefly shows one very much like Alabasta. For every island or kingdom the Straw Hats rescue, for every individual they help out, another goes without a hero of their own and is plunged into oblivion. And just because we do not know much of them does not mean they deserve being saved any less than Nami, Vivi, or the others the Straw Hats did help
Anyone remember from the end of the Skypiea arc? Aisa said she wanted to be just like Luffy, a "Gum-Gum Warrior". Now recall what exactly would have to happen for that to become possible. She obviously has no idea what that would incur, but at the very least its Harsher in Hindsight.
It takes time to be traumatized to the extent Koala was. Knowing that, remember that when Fisher Tiger met her, she was 11-years-old. That was three years after she was freed, which means she was only eight when she was saved. Just how young was she when those assholes kidnapped her?!
It's heavily implied that Koala was either born into slavery or she was kidnapped along with her mother when she was still a baby. Either way, the fact that she's overcome that trauma to join Sabo says a lot about her.
Not only is it not heavily implied at all, it's also impossible; she was separated from her mother, and recognized her when they were reunited. Still, she had to have been very young when she was kidnapped, considering how young she was when she was saved...
Baby 5's quirk is that she cannot say no to anything. Some of the things she accepts are in the more innocent end such as subscribing to 50 different newspapers and lending out way too much money, but she has also been engaged to many men, and who knows what they would ask her for other than marrying them... Maybe there is a a reason that she has become a villain (other than the fact that she cannot say to joining the baddies, either) and acts extremely capricious and frustrated. And that's not even mentioning that all the fiancés she actually liked are killed off. The reason her quirk is played for as much comedy as possible is possibly to avoid all those complications. Even worse, how often has someone tried to in taking advantage of her this way in the present day? It has been stated that Doflamingo kills her fiancés to try to protect her, but he can't be everywhere.
We do know that Baby 5 does genuinely care about the Donquixote family and is happy to be there, along with the rest of the family, so there's nothing to worry about in that regard, at least.
...And then it stops being played for comedy when she takes Sai's request that she kill herself seriously and turns her own arm into a gun, ready to blow her own brains out. With a smile. Thankfully, Sai immediately makes her stop.
On the subject of Baby 5, her name, given that it's the only one we've ever been given regarding her (though apparently she had another one she told Law at some point?). A codename given to her by the Donquixote family, or her actual birth name? We've seen that the society she came from would abandon people if they weren't useful, so perhaps she was simply assigned a number and never stuck around long enough to become useful to them and get a real name. It might speak something of her self-esteem if she's never bothered to change it in the latter case (and also speaks a bit of the Donquixote family that they had her keep that name as if she were still a disposable number). Speaking of her self-esteem, that might be a darker side of her quirk all its own. Some examples of such, taken from her main entry on the character page:
Her accepting an assignment from Doflamingo despite wanting revenge for him killing eight of her fiancees, putting his priorities way before her own. May also be because she knows he outclasses her far too much for it to be possible, but that doesn't change the fact that she's still working for him.
The fact that she gets attached to these fiancees purely because they somehow need her, rather than actually knowing anything about them or loving them deeply. Desperately needing to be acknowledged that her existence is worth anything to anyone, much?
Every instance ever of her doing something because someone "needs" her and exploits that psychosis of hers. It's not just the fiancees; pretty much everyone she's ever been close to that we've seen after her abandonment has done this. She's got a very altruistic mindset, but also an unhealthily self-destructive one.
Also on the subject of Baby 5, she is neither evil enough nor ambitious enough to perform acts of cruelty and destruction that guys like Blackbeard have. However, if she was, her Devil Fruit power, which enables her to assume the form of bombs and explode without harming herself, could be utilized in much, much more destructive ways. (Any weapon at all? Nuclear bombs count as weapons, you know...)
In an early episode of the anime (the one where Smoker intercepts the message between Crocodile and Little Garden). After Smoker gets the message, he calls for Tashigi. Tashigi runs over to him, in the process tripping down a few stairs. The sword she was carrying lands on the ground just inches away from her face and she takes on a startled expression, but the whole thing is Played for Laughs. Remember how Kuina died (hint: falling downstairs) and realize just how close Tashigi came to being even more similar to Kuina.
When Doflamingo captures Law during the Dressrosa arc, he doesn't hand him over to the Marines like he's supposed to, even though Fujitora's right there. He's likely planning to brainwash and torture Law into performing the Perpetual Youth operation once he's dealt with the Straw Hats.
Chapter 722 has a huge one. Donquixote Doflamingo was already a strong and influential pirate by himself. As a World Noble however, he, as a pirate that has no qualms about doing whatever it takes to get ahead, has access to all of their resources, which includes not only the strongest Cipher Pol, CP0, but also the Admirals. And it's also been established that he's downright psychotic.
Believe it or not, it goes From Bad to Worse. Chapter 727, besides cementing his Jerkass status in the OP-verse, also has terrifying implications of his DF powers. He was shown as not just being able to control King Riku but even his army simultaneously in all the chaos. One can hope the trouble he has in store for Luffy when the latter is inevitably going to fight him...
Warning: Unmarked Spoilers: There is a peaceful kingdom. It is not terribly rich, but even the poorest man has something to eat. That kingdom has a king who, like the long line of kings before him, is inhumanly just. That king has a lonely daughter who can carry herself in a fight. One day, one of the Seven Warlords of the Sea decides he wants the kingdom. He is a schemer and a magnificent bastard so he decides to use his resources to villify the king in order to "save" the kingdom, becoming its hero and king in the process. Now for the million dollar question: Am I talking about Alabasta or Dressrosa? Both: Dressrosa is what Alabasta could have been, the parallels are too much to ignore. That also casts the conversations between Crocodile and Doflamingo in the Paramount War in a new light: Oda had already constructed the parallel back then. As a last insult to the injury, in terms of who wound up ruling in the end, the winning sides of both situations are both, technically, World Nobles. This truly makes Dressrosa a dark mirror of Alabasta...
With Doflamingo initiating "Birdcage" on Dressrosa, essentially a deadly hunting game complete with sabotage within citizens, Marines, and pirates, chew on this: Imagine if Crocodile got really desperate and somehow managed to get his hands on Pluton in Alabasta...
Wasn't it established that Crocodile's intentions were to use Pluton to destroy Alabasta?
Ok, so we know that the toys on Dressrosa will go back to normal if the Fruit user is knocked out. That means a lot of toys become humans. But what about all those scrapped toys and toys missing parts?
It is shown that toys who revert back do not show signs of aging or damage as Kyros, whose leg was bleeding at his turning point, had a stump and toys that had been cut by Cavendish were unharmed as humans. Just as well toys that had already died do not revert back to humans at all, though their memory likely returns to others.
In the Fish-Man Island arc flashback, Vander Decken expressed his wish of being able to use the Tamatebako to age the then-6-year-old Shirahoshi into a young woman, so he could marry her. At first, the Insane Troll Logic he uses to actually try and carry out that plan (He intended to get his hands on the Tamatebako by marrying Shirahoshi) is funny, but then you learn that what was in the box was the Energy Steroids Hody and his crew used. These pills make the user much stronger for a period of time, but shave off their lifespan and cause Rapid Aging, to the point that Hody's crew turned into frail old men from overuse. But since those effects don't kick in until later, and Decken didn't know what was in the box, let alone its effects, it also stands to reason to think he would have assumed those pills didn't work, and fed tons of Energy Steroids to Shirahoshi to try and get an instant reaction. Not only would this have caused her to age dramatically, but it also would have triggere the other bad side effects of the stuff, namely intense pain and fury. Thank goodness Decken never actually succeeded in stealing the Tamatebako...
Sugar's power just in general, she can turn people into toys that are forced to do Doflamingo's bidding is bad enough but the fact that being turned into a causes everyone to forget your existence? Even the Doflamingo crew themselves? The people who have forgotten must have had to do some serious cosmic retconning in their own minds to explain event in which someone who is now a toy was integral to.
Now entering Ascended Fridge Horror as Chapter 738 reveals that Sugar can use her powers and immediately make a contract with your allies. Not only will they suddenly turn against you, a former friend, but you too have forgotten everything about them thanks to her "contracts". The paranoia and Nightmare Fuel arising from such a situation is unthinkable.
Sugar's power grows more and more terrifying the more you think about it. Doflamingo can easily rewrite history on world scale. Toyifying someone high profile would pretty much Mind Rape he entire world into forgetting them. All their actions and their consequences forgotten. Depending on whom Doflamingo captured the entire world might be experiencing massive headaches after Sugar is beaten. He had ten years to accumulate a massive army of toys, who knows whom he has there.
Not to mention when Robin was turned into a toy: Everyone forgot about her. She'd spent her entire life searching for a family, only to have it ripped away by an evil bitch with an even more horrible power. Thankfully it didn't stick.
Robin being completely forgotten meant history of the Void Century was threatened to be erased forever.
And now World Government has Sugar in their custody. In Impel Down they had a level specifically for people they wanted to erase from history. Now they have the power to actually do that.
Doflamingo enragingly declared during his and his family's torture that he was going to break out and kill them all. Now, as we see when Trebol and the future Donquixote Pirates rescued him, they burned down a whole town because Doffy nearly injured himself badly on their pavement. It's quite safe to assume that these kids along with Doflamingo tracked down their torturers and killed them all to their last line and did the same to their cities... Probably a good reason why Oda never elaborated on what happened to them.
Remember in the Jaya Arc when Bellamy used the Going Merry as a springboard? The force of his rebound caused the bow to rip open. It is repaired with a brace, but not much later in the Water 7, the Merry is revealed to have a great big tear in her keel around the spot where Bellamy broke the ship. Which would mean Bellamy mortally damaged the Going Merry. And by extent, Bellamy caused Usopp to fight Luffy''.
If not, the keel may have ruptured when the Going Merry ran aground on the Sea Train tracks at the very start of the arc, or gotten worse from the above and then cracked.
Law's Radio Knife technique supposedly lets him inflict Wound That Will Not Heal on its victims. Obviously, a lethal technique with less than pretty results, right? Lucky that Trebol (the only victim we see) is a Logia and can survive being cut (although being unable to reform is problematic in itself...)
Trebol is specifically not a Logia. He's a Paramecia pretending to be a Logia. While he looks like a very fat "intangible" man, he's actually exceptionally thin and frail (despite having enormous arm strength). He's just hiding under a massive amount of flammable mucous. Once Law manages to wound him, he sets himself on fire to try and take everybody, including himself, out.
Corazon's "silence" power seems somewhat weakness weaksauce (he even thinks so himself). But consider that such powers are usually up to interpretation and, had Corazon figured this out, he had an amazing overpowered power on his hands, such as shutting an adversary completely by making him unable to "listen" to his own body, essentially becoming a ragdoll.
Not only that — he has demonstrated that he can silence people's voices. Imagine the victim being unable to talk for the rest of their lives until Corazon lifted the curse or he dies. Good thing he did it once with Law, with good intentions, and he was slowly dying anyway.
In Chapter 1040, Law has figured out how to use a similiar silencing technique with his Room to prevent Big Mom from communicating with her homies. He also demonstrates just how horrific this utilization can be psychologically, as Big Mom can be seen screaming and writhing in pain as he and Kid beat her into a bloody, broken-boned mess. And it's all done in complete silence.
Here's a terrifying concept: Kaido, one of the Four Emperors, has an army of over 500 Zoan DF users (albeit, artificial). Imagine if he learns about Chopper's Rumble Ball, a drug that can enhances a Zoan DF's power, and decides he wants it for his army?
Think of the Straw Hats for a second. Think about how and why joined the crew, their relationship with their captain, as well as their tasks during the Dressrosa arc. What would have happened to them if Luffy became a toy?
An anime Filler arc answers that, partly. The villains made some Straw Hats forget everything that happened to them after meeting Luffy. Chopper freaks out and thinks he's been captured to be sold off as a pet or eaten, Usopp is scared out of his mind, Nami makes off with the crew's gold and tries to get back to Cocoyashi, Zoro tries to kill them all for their bounties.
It gets worse for Nami. She hated pirates before meeting Luffy. How devastated would she be if she were to find out that not only was she one herself, but had her own wanted poster?
Good thing Nami, Sanji, Chopper, Brook, and Momonosuke (and their hostage Caesar Clown) headed to Zou before Sugar was knocked out; the Birdcage not only encompassed Dressrosa, but a portion of the sea around it. Had the other Straw Hats not left, the Thousand Sunny would have been cut to pieces or crushed into smithereens against the rocks around the country by the shrinking Birdcage, maybe even taking its occupants with it.
What the hell did Fujitora see that was so terrible he decided it would be better to blind himself? Nothing Is Scarier indeed.
Sanji once mentioned that his inability hit a woman is due to his upbringing. We now know he comes from a family of ruthless assassins. Thinking about the kind of methods people like that may have used to hammer this rule into him, really puts the severity of said compulsion in a less humorous light.
Fortunately in Chapter 842 we found out it was Zeff who implanted this line of thinking into him and not Germa 66. Though they are still responsible partially... Sanji didn't want to hit innocent women because only Reju was kind to him and everyone else deserved his spite.
A bone chilling possibility is on the horizon with the reveal that Cobra intends to ask the World Government about his ancestors' connection to the Poneglyphs at the Reverie. Considering what the World Government did to Ohara when they began studying the Poneglyphs, there's a terrible chance that Alabasta is not long for this world.
Not necessarily. Remember the reveal in the Dressrosa arc. The Nefeltari family are descendants of the World Government founders and thus World Nobles — even though they have never exercised the associated privileges. Which leads to another Fridge Brilliance as to why Cobra is taking what normally would be a terrible risk. He's one of the few people in the world who can legitimately get away with asking — indeed, the WG might be obligated to tell him — and he knows it.
However, he still might be in trouble. It's been shown that the World Nobles are absolutely dismissive and hateful towards those who forsake their privileges, as evidenced by Donquixote Homing being rebuffed when he tried to gain asylum for his children and wife. If the government feels the same way about Vivi and Cobra, they might still be at grave risk.
Ascended Fridge Horror, as of Chapter 908. The Five Elder Stars totally want to silence Cobra and Vivi on account of being traitors, and also foresaw that the Nefertari family are close to asking about the True History.
With the recent reveal of Charlotte Pudding, how the hell was someone like Big Mom able to have a daughter, no less 35 of them? And what happened to the poor sap who had the misfortune of marrying her?
Who said they were married? Or that it was consensual?
It's since been confirmed that Big Mom has had multiple husbands that she's dumped after they sired a few kids for her.
All of Big Mom's kids were named after sweet treats. Now considered her Sweet Tooth, hunger-induced rage that led her to eat one of her kids...
To add to that, Caesar's experiments on the kids in Punk Hazard were for Big Mom. The room where they were kept in was called the "Biscuit Room"
Stay with me on this. Its been revealed that the Vinsmoke children are genetically engineered. However, as Caesar Clown states, just "magically" altering people is impossible, (more so for adults, considering that he had to use children). We also see that the Germa 66 army are clones born in artificial wombs and rapidly aged into maturity to be their soldiers. Now, Judge Vinsmoke never elaborated on how long or when it took for him to perfect the cloning process. The Vinsmoke children's mother was also very sickly. Given all these factors, it's possible that either she was Judge's first "experiment," in the hopes that if he modified her, that her genes would be passed down to their children... or he experimented on each child in utero. Given that there are five children, the effort may be what ultimately killed her!
Seems to have been confirmed by Chapter 851, Judge ran experiments on Sora herself to make her children not only extremely powerful Tyke Bombs but also to make them utterly emotionless. Sora herself went behind his back to stop at least the lack of empathy (if not being born as inherently badass), eventually killing herself in the process.
Might be a case of Cerebus Retcon, but the reveal of Sanji's Dark and Troubled Past also adds more depth to his initial confrontation with Duval, since his monicker as "The Iron Mask" is even more salt in the injury that could trigger Sanji's Trauma Button.
When we're first introduced to how things are run in Big Mom's kingdom, it all seems fairly reasonable. Residents staying in Totto Land are required to give two months of their lifespan every year as payment for staying. Big Mom's incarnations collect this "tax", asking each resident "Life or Leave?". In exchange, everyone is protected by her and is apparently happy. Fair enough, and not too bad. However... as we discover more and more, the more we find out Big Mom's friendly face is all a charade, culminating with Charlotte Brulee making it crystal clear: "Everyone trying to enter is welcome. Everyone trying to leave dies!" The "tax" from Big Mom is merely an illusion of choice just like the roulette. The choice is: you pay life-span and stay... or you die. Totto Land is possibly the biggest Gilded Cage in all of fiction!
And now you know why the kingdom's name is "Totland". It's the land of death.
Luffy and company really do have the Devil's luck; imagine if Judge and Big Mom had successfully managed to find Sanji before the Sabody Arc — as in back when the Straw Hats were still pretty weak. Big Mom's crew would've absolutely massacred them and, knowing what Linlin herself had in store for them, Sanji and the Sanji retrieval team probably would've met a gory end.
Given that only one Devil's Fruit of a type exists at any time, and it doesn't refresh until its user dies, how many atrocities must have been committed against random villagers in the name of getting these to refresh? Would they be kidnapped and conscripted into some fighting force? Would they be outright killed if the power alone couldn't defend a non-combatant? Would their family/friends be held hostage in exchange for their life?
When you think about it, it's very possible that Big Mom had even more than 85 kids but already killed some of them. The only reason we know she had 85 kids is because Pudding told the Straw Hats — but, Pudding was still faking being nice and was trying to make it sound like Big Mom wouldn't hurt her own kids at the time. The fact that we later see her kill Moscato and then see her other kids say in a very matter-of-fact way that she'll kill them if they mess up suggests that she's done so in the past before killing Moscato.
Robin's powers allow her to sprout any part of her body on an opponent, does stomach acid count? She doesn't have to see where she's sprouting limbs, so what's stopping her from putting stomach acid in their heart? Or having some skin plug up their esophagus?
The heavy implication that as a child, Big Mom inadvertently devoured Mother Caramel and all of her fellow Lamb House orphans without even realizing it.
With the revelation that Mother Caramel is in fact a child trafficker who specializes in selling orphans to the World Government, one has to wonder just how many children she ended up selling to them and for what purpose.
Mother Carmel uses the Soul-Soul Fruit to transform the fire that is consuming the entire town of Elbaf into a "sun", Pandora a fraction the size of Prometheus. How big of a fire did Big Mom have to cause to create Prometheus?
Mother Carmel didn't start the fire that resulted in Pandora. Big Mom could have simply run into a fire that big. As for what could have made a fire that big though..
Streusen's Devil Fruit power, the Kuku-kuku no mi, allows him to turn everything in the world into ingredients, as demonstrated when he turns a small log into a raw steak. Does that include people too?
Somehow, when Charlotte Linlin ate Mother Caramel, she gained her Devil Fruit abilities. Unless there was a Fruit lying around when she got eaten that the power transferred into that Linlin then ate, it means that there is a new way to gain Devil Fruit powers — cannibalism. And not just any cannibalism, mind you — completely devouring someone!
A similar thing happened in Naruto with Madara biting off a piece of Hashirama's flesh to gain one of his abilities, or more recently, a foe introduced in the sequel Boruto who eats brains to make his abilities work. Many people who read One Piece concurrent with Naruto and Boruto will see this is so much harder to stomach than either of those horrors combined.
Another stated fact about Devil Fruit is if someone without an unusual body type — which Blackbeard has — ingests a second Devil Fruit after their first, it will prove lethal. If Bege knew the above about Devil Fruit power cannibalism, and that Big Mom was a people-eater, he might have tried to force-feed Linlin another Devil Fruit eater, causing the collision of two Devil Fruit powers to destroy her if she wasn't like Blackbeard.
Plus, it's been said that Blackbeard is looking for powerful Devil Fruit users. What exactly does he plan to do with them?
Sanji's said the one Devil Fruit he would be willing to give up his power to swim for would be the Clear-Clear Fruit, which grants invisibility. When this is revealed, it's treated as hilarious because he wants to use it for its Power Perversion Potential, but after learning of his backstory, it's a lot more tragic why he would want to disappear from sight entirely.
Remember the cravings Big Mom has? Cravings that make her rampage for what she wants? Remember Big Mom craving the wedding cake without ever having tried it? Remember how she can only be snapped out of those cravings by eating something that tastes exactly like she knows or better? It was said she was craving something that she didnt know how it tasted, and thus was IMAGINING how it tastes. The Straw Hats might be lucky for having the best chef and two masters of creating the exact ingredients they needed so they have a chance. But imagine, just imagine, Big Mom is a little hungry and you make her imagine the most tasty sweet, describing and naming it in a way that makes her mouth drool even more, and just keep on describing it to make it better and better, tastier and tastier, and more specifically, describing it containing some of the most rare and delicious ingredients in the world, and maybe even an imagined ingredient or two. Keep on going until she enters one of her cravings, tell her who has it and watch the fireworks, knowing that the treat does not exist and is impossible to be made. Congratulations, you have just created an Advancing Wallof Doom aimed at Mariejois, Baltigo, maybe even Windmill Village where Luffy was born, or one of the Yonkou. And if you forgot to give her a target? Then say goodbye to whatever island you are on and your soul, and maybe even your body, because she will eat it all. And that is if she was told, now imagine if she ever imagined something like that on her own, with nobody knowing what she wants.
Now that Luffy has unofficially been declared the fifth Emperor, his life just got a whole lot worse. Big Mom demonstrated that for all of his gains in ability, he still isn't shit compared to the real deal, and not only is she still out there and not at all happy with him, but he's now on Kaido's radar as well. Furthermore, Neptune almost immediately declared Fish-Man Island as being under Luffy's protection after hearing the news, and if the actions of other pirates who want to gain the attention of Emperors (including Luffy) are any indication, Luffy now has to worry about not only the World Government and other Emperors, but also up-and-comers who want to make a name for themselves. Sure, Luffy wasn't a bad guy at all, but what if one of those up-and-comers is a bloodthirsty psychopath like Kid? Point is, Luffy's new title means that he now has a massive target on himself, is utterly out of his depth, and has placed the lives and wellbeing of all of his allies past and present in jeopardy, all for nothing in return whatsoever.
Though the fact that Luffy is an Emperor is also a very good deterrent. Remember, Morgans' report didn't state that Luffy defeated Big Mom, the reason Luffy is an Emperor is that he amassed a 5000+ strong army by himself, has connections to Revolutionary Army, destroyed Big Mom's castle, and defeated two of Big Mom's feared top generals. Also, the Emperors themselves follow a non-aggression policy, where two Emperors hardly interact with each other. This is so deep-seated that a meeting between Shanks and Whitebeard was considered a grave threat. Yes, you read that right, a meeting. Meaning the other Emperors wouldn't simply go after Luffy just because he's an Emperor. The only person who is a direct threat to Luffy is Big Mom herself, as she still has scores to settle with him. And Luffy defeated a billion-plus bounty commander by himself, many times more threatening than the likes of Kid. ALSO, the name of an Emperor itself is sufficient for protection, as Whitebeard and Big Mom proved in regards of Fish-Man Island, monthly debts of candy notwithstanding. But this means Luffy has to be more cautious than ever, as his one wrong move can cause global issues.
Fujitora's goal to have the Seven Warlord system abolished. While this mostly isn't a bad ambition, considering that the majority of the Warlords have proven untrustworthy, there have been a few that are allies with the Straw Hats, particularly Boa Hancock, and her deal with the World Government is for Amazon Lily to be left alone in exchange for serving as a Warlord. If Fujitora succeeds in his goal, then the deal would be off and the World Government would be free to invade Amazon Lily, and considering how the inhabitants were worried about Hancock losing her Warlord status when she initially refused to participate in the Marineford War, it's a clear indication that they'd be powerless to stand up to the World Government on their own.
Might count as Fridge Brilliance as well, as Fujitora's aims are to eliminate the privileges the Warlords enjoy rampantly. Crocodile wanted to rule Alabasta to capture Pluton, Moria was responsible for numerous kidnappings and disappearances in Thriller Bark, and Doflamingo topped all of them by not only ruling Dressrosa after destroying the reputation of the previous king, he oversaw a terrible degree of mass murder, rampant arms dealing, illegal transactions of Devil Fruits to Kaido, and the disappearance of notable citizens and government officials. Also, Hancock's own status was in jeopardy due to her attacking numerous Marines and publicly declaring herself as Luffy's protector. Ironically, this same declaration got Law expelled. The Five Elder Stars and the Marines kill numerous birds with one stone; not depending on Pirates to provide Absolute Justice, crackdown on the Warlords' illegal rule of various islands in claim of Justice, take control of various illegal resources they hoard on a legal basis, and to end their powerful crews' open rule. So, the crackdown on the Kuja Pirates (along with other Warlord crews) is their desired outcome for Absolute Justice.
Which is what exactly happens in Chapter 956.
Big Mom is one of the single strongest people on the planet, with such sheer power as to be on par with Kaido, Shanks, and Whitebeard... and she's still a novice fighter who swings her sword like a baseball bat. Big Mom has likely never trained a day in her life, but she's got such sheer overwhelming power due to being a mutant that she never needed to. If Big Mom is that strong naturally and training in One Piece can turn someone into a Person of Mass Destruction, just how strong would she be if she actually did train?
To make a cross-series reference, that is basically the revelation of Dragon Ball Z: Resurrection 'F': the idea that Freiza never trained a day in his life, and that training for four months put him at a level where he could fight a Goku who had trained for over a decade since and obtained several transformations since. So yes, Big Mom training herself in combat could be very dangerous, even if she probably won't gain a 'Golden Mama' form. Probably...
Depending on when the Vinsmokes made Sanji's raid suit, it could very easily be this. As its primary function being granting Sanji invisibility, it really adds insult to injury when you consider that after all the harassment and cruelty they did after forcing Sanji to rejoin, his suit would basically be at its most effective when completely removing him from the family's sight just like what happened when he was a child. While invisibility is Sanji's dream come true, it's unlikely that his siblings were aware of that when they had it made.
Just how did Gekko Moria come to realize that he could reanimate corpses by sticking shadows into them? How do you stumble on that use of the power? Best case is that he had records of a past user doing that, but even then how did they get the idea?
Why are the Pleasures so numerous in the Animal Kingdom Pirates? Given that the whole point of SMILES is that they are artificial and mass-produced, if you eat a dud, why not just keep eating SMILES until you finally get a power that works? Well, if even the dud SMILES give you the Super Drowning Skills of a real Devil Fruit, then maybe they also give you the It Only Works Once aspect as well; so not only do you get the problems of a SMILE, but you can't ever benefit from a real Devil Fruit either!
Plus, Orochi does want to have as many Pleasures as possible so he can hide he is a spiteful tyrant.
Ivankov forcing gender swaps on people really is just as horrific as any of the Body Horror examples on this list because you are effectively inflicting gender dysphoria upon these people — which is a condition which at its most extreme can cause people to self-harm or end themselves. What seems at first glance to be a bit of a joke is just one Surprisingly Realistic Outcome away from becoming incredibly dark. The men also visibly lose a lot of their muscle mass during the swap too, which is not a good thing in the incredibly dangerous world they live in.
Streusen didn't just create Big Mom, the man's actions in creating Big Mom would lead to Kaido getting his Devil Fruit. While Kaido wasn't a nobody without it, this one man is responsible for not just two Emperors, not just two of the most destructive Emperors, but every action those two did to negatively impact the world came from him. Moriah's shadow thievery quest to destroy Kaido: Streusen's fault. The slavery of the dwarves of Dressrossa by Doflamingo to grow SMILES: Streusen's fault. Wano's misery with the rule of Kaido and Orochi: Streusen's fault. Short of the founders of the World Government and the World Nobles themselves, or possibly Rocks D. Xebec, Streusen may have unleashed the most misery upon the world of any one person. And unlike the above, Streusen may not face any consequences if the Big Mom Pirates were to survive in any form solid enough to keep their central territory afloat for the rest of his life, which being in his nineties is not a unreasonable possibility. However he was severely injured after the destruction of Whole Cake Chateau and if he ever regains consciousness, he's in for a very rude awakening when he learns what happened to Big Mom and Kaido...
In chapter 1053, Admiral Ryokugyu is seen sucking the life out of the Beast Pirates hiding out in the Udon Prison, including King and Queen. However, when you remember the fact of King's past with being an experiment in Punk Hazard then this could set off some pretty bad PTSD out of him.
Also given King's status as the last known Lunarian and Ryokugyu's devotion to the Celestial Dragons- whose ancestors wiped out his people in the past, the admiral would have knowledge about them and treat him as an inherent threat to the World Noble's sovereignty and would probably try to recapture him for the government to be used as an experiment again or worse, just exterminate him so that his race can die with him.
After the reveal that Zoan fruits have a will of their own, this begets a question - is Chopper truly uplifted by his own Devil Fruit, or his original personality is suppressed by it?
When Luffy ages due to Bonney's fruit, he gets the bad timeline look. Meaning that if things continue to be as they are, his future isn't bright yet.
It's a good thing that no one bothered to check if Vegapunk's artificial fruit worked. If anyone in the research lab had eaten it then the world government would have discovered it was not such a failure and the marine would have an army of dragons.
Fridge Logic:
Fridge Logic
It was stated that Queen Otohime's body was very weak. Then you see how big Shirahoshi was as a baby...
Not entirely impossible, since we don't know how the mermen/Fish-men birth process works. She could have laid an egg which grew bigger over gestation.
Fridge Brilliance: Maybe the reason she's so frail is because she gave birth to a giant little girl like Shirahoshi!
In an early episode, Luffy is trapped in a cage, with Buggy the Clown about to fire a Buggy Bomb at him, and Nami burns her hands putting out the fuse. Oh yeah, wait, Luffy is made of rubber. Possibly just a Plot Hole for some.
When he did repel the bomb later, he was shown expanding himself. Maybe he couldn't have done it from the cage?
Blunt impact can't hurt Luffy, but sharp shrapnel? That would probably do it.
The whole cage bomb incident happened before Nami knew Luffy had the powers of the Gum-Gum Fruit. She assumed that if Luffy was hit by the Buggy Bomb, he'd go splat like a normal person. The very reason she put the cannon's fuse out was because she didn't want to be a 'murderer.'
No, no, no, think about it. Luffy is still vulnerable to explosions and fire, right? Well, the "Buggy Ball" would have exploded on the metal cage first before it would have hit Luffy's rubber body and bounce off — that's why he said "I'll be blown to bits"!
I think the original point here is that Luffy should logically have never been in any danger to begin with; his rubberman abilities would have allowed him to squeeze through the bars, or stretch his arms out to yank the fuse out of the cannon or something. He just...didn't. Then again, he is kind of an idiot.
Then again, Luffy never displayed "Mr. Fantastic" powers of fine stretch control and squeezing; so maybe that's his limitation: he doesn't have fine control (pretty much confirmed as he was shown to hurt himself a lot when learning to use his powers) and it's also possible he cannot make his body smaller (other than as a drawback to Gear Third) at will as he's a paramecia, not a Logia, similar to how Buggy can "fly" but his feet cannot.
Speaking of which, why couldn't Sanji hit Eneru? He has rubber soles on his shoes, and yet his kicks went right through him. Worse still, Eneru would have never seen it coming even with Haki because he doesn't know about rubber. It seems like a giant oversight.
Because Eneru's power is a Logia type. He can avoid any physical attack that is not enhanced with Haki. The only Logia that can't do that is Blackbeard's power. As for why Luffy could hit him... maybe he used Armament haki without knowing it?
Luffy's hitting Eneru is explicitly because of his rubber body. Like hitting Crocodile with water, Haki never entered into equation at all.
Crocodile is weak to water because all Devil Fruit users are cursed by the sea. Remember Morias zombies? they were defeated with salt because it carries the power of the sea. Rubber cannot nullify Devil Fruit powers. Luffy didn't have the slightest chance in his fights against Aokiji (just before reaching Water Seven) and Akainu (at Marineford).
This is true in a sense, that rubber cannot nullify DF powers, but it's still an insulator meaning it dosen't conducts electricity, and Eneru is basically electricity itself(well, at least he can turn into it), so it makes sense that Luffy's attacks hurt him.
Further, while all Devil Fruit users are vulnerable to the sea, Crocodile is specifically noted as being more vulnerable to water in general. Volume 41's SBS specifically notes the difference by stating that while most Devil Fruit users are fine taking a shower, Crocodile would be one of the only ones completely unable to use his powers while doing so. Luffy also notes during their second fight that this is the reason Crocodile worked so hard to put Alabasta into drought. Taking away rain helped ferment rebellion but, more importantly, he was afraid of it and the potential disadvantage it could give him. The whole "Water-Luffy" shtick would not have worked on any other known Devil Fruit user for the reasons it did on Crocodile. In short, most, if not all, Logia have some specific weakness that prevents use of their powers. From what we've seen in-series, water is Crocodile's, rubber is Eneru's, Akainu's Magma was Ace's, and if you want to get into the movies, we had flour for Gasparde.
It should be noted that it's specifically water or rather liquid, not sea water that is Crocodile's weakness. Fresh water doesn't have the same effect, otherwise Mizu Luffy would've defeated himself as well. For the same reason that only the tip of Smoker's Jitte is Seastone, a Devil Fruit user just can't use the sea on another Devil Fruit user. And at the end of Alabasta, Luffy was using his own blood to bypass Crocodile's sand powers. That's right, blood and sand.
Normal water can work, but they have to be submerged. When Nami fought Califa, Nami noted that Califa should be weakened due to being mostly submerged in a bathtub. Drinking water, which is what what the whole Water-Luffy thing basically was, is not an issue.
If he can't shower Crocodile must use a lot of cologne. Look at your captain, now back to me?
He can shower, he's just unable to use his Sand-Sand powers while doing so. Which, come to think of it, would go a long way towards explaining how he can be so Crazy-Prepared. If you have every legitimate reason to worry about attack while bathing you'd develop an insane level of caution and foresight.
Rubber is not instant isolation vs. electricity, if a current is high enough, like the one coming from a thunder man, rubber soles just isn't enought to cut it; sure the sole is not electrified, but it still passes to Sanji fairly fast. Now compare that to rubber everything: Eneru's electricity found a literal limbo in Luffy's body, concentrating it and disabling pretty much all his powers. Rubber is not Eneru's foil, but the rubber man is!
Also, Sanji wears dress shoes, which often have leather soles, not rubber.
If the OP World is divided in four seas by the Grand Line (with the Calm Belts) and the Red Line, and the technology to cross the Calm Belts without being sunk and devoured by Sea Kings is exclusive of the Marines. Then how is it possible the communication between seas? For example: How does Sanji, born in North Blue, meet Luffy in East Blue?.
It would seem they could travel to say one of the mountain range that span the circumference of the world and pay for passage over it, referenced when the Straw Hats came back to this range in the Thousand Sunny and didn't have the means to go underwater at the moment. We don't know where Zeff and Sanji met, so it could be they moved the restaurant into the weakest of the seas for safety reasons.
Not to mention that they have those snail-phone thingies. Wireless communication works pretty well too.
For simple news(papers) they have those birds carrying them around. This way they should be able to reach the whole world.
But when it gets to human transport it gets really difficult for non-VIPs / non-Marines, since the only way to get out of the Grand Line into one of the four seas is to cross the calm belt with sea kings and maybe even Fish-Man Island before that. Now we just need to ask Don Krieg about how he made it back. My own theory is that the land in-between (Red Line) is as stated above passable. This way North / East and West / South are connected.
We know how Don Krieg made it back. After Mihawk demolished his fleet, the poor miserable bastard drifted back through the calm belt and was attacked by Sea Kings doing even more damage. Because he came back through the calm belt he had no propulsion which plainly explains why they ran out of food and water by the time they got back to the East Blue.
Another likely theory is that there are certified passenger ships that have special permission to have such technology or that there are gateways, controlled by the Marines of course, in couple places which while 100% safe, aren't exactly an option for a pirate.
Confirmed: The Marines and the World Government have ships designed to ferry passengers through the Calm Belt and some as-of-yet unknown transportation method for crossing the Red Line, but they only do so for VIPs and other influential people. In the Totto Land Arc, Nami realized just how difficult it should have been for Sanji to cross seas, and she deduced that he must have needed the clout of the Vinsmoke Family in order to do so.
Don Krieg got his start as a pirate by stealing a Navy ship. There's a very good chance that the flagship he got to Baratie with used to be the Navy's property, and thus was designed to cross the Calm Belt.
If the Marines have the technology to enter the Grand Line at any point, what's keeping them from just sailing around one of the calmer seas and crossing directly over to Laugh Tale without fighting through the entirety of Paradise and the New World?
Whose to say they can enter from the side like that? Perhaps there is something so powerful it keeps the Marines from going that way? Or maybe they don't want to go there as that holds the secret to the Void century and the less people know of it the better?
It's even mentioned that there are some places the Marines simply won't go to, such as Wano Country. Why would they risk going to Laugh Tale?
It should be remembered that the New World isn't a vacuum. It's the territory of the Four Emperors. Marines just surprise cruising into Kaido or Shanks' backyard is not only a suicide mission, but an act of war. Also the New World's climate is supposed to be vastly worse than Paradise's, and speaking of there's the navigation issue. Don't forget you need a log pose to set on an island to go anywhere at all in the Grand Line. Trying to cruise in from a calm belt would leave you completely directionless and a sitting duck for any insane natural phenomenon or angry New World Pirate trying to boost their bounty.
The Zou Arc has provided an explanation: Laugh Tale does not react to any Log Poses and cannot be found through normal means. Rather, there is a series of Poneglyphs with coordinates written on them that, when read together, will show where Laugh Tale is and make the island accessible.
For the longest time, it bothered me that the Straw Hat Pirates apparently have no first mate (although popular opinion is that Zoro is the first mate). And then it hit me... of course they don't have a first mate! Luffy has zero intention of dying, why would he bother picking a first mate?
Zoro is the first mate. He is the one who takes charge when Luffy's not around and they are not at sea, then Nami's in charge as Navigator. Zoro is also the voice of reason at times, such as letting Ussopp back in the crew after he left and self-sacrifice by taking Luffy's pain during Thriller Bark. Zoro has his own dreams but is more than willing to give them up to serve the crew and his captain. That is the epitome of the First Mate.
Even so, Zoro is not 'officially' the first mate. His statue among the crew is simply swordsman and he has no official job unlike the other crew members. The only real 'job' he has on the ship is to rise the anchor. Nami could almost be consider the first mate since she runs the ship and tells everyone what to do when they are out on sea. She also tends to plan ahead and also acts as Luffy's common sense at times. At Thriller Bark 'everyone' on Luffy's crew was willing to die and give up their dreams to protect Luffy and Sanji offered his life as well before Zoro knocked him out. So, Zoro is not the only one who fulfill the status of first mate.
But notice another thing: when someone else takes charge, like Zoro or Nami, Luffy never says anything. The Straw Hats don't need a first mate because anybody can take charge of any situation that may arise depending on who the strongest against a particular threat is.
While Zoro has not officially been identified as the first mate, there are a few points (including some already outlined above) that would make him a better fit for the role. For one thing, he was the first crew-mate Luffy ever recruited, Luffy has described him as being the "champion" that he (Luffy) wants on his crew, and he's been described as the only crew-member who's able to physically match Luffy in terms of raw power (think of their fight at Whiskey Peak, although in fairness that was more a case of Let's You and Him Fight arising from a misunderstanding on Luffy's part). Yes, Zoro's got a rather loose grip on sanity, he gets bossed around by Nami more often than not, and he sucks at knowing which way is up, but those are largely played for laughs — when it comes to serious matters, such as the whole issue with Usopp rejoining the crew, Zoro is the one who has to set the whole crew straight as to the lack of respect for Luffy's position as captain that it would indicate if Usopp was taken back like nothing had happened (it bears noting that Sanji admits Zoro is right about that, something even Nami was hesitant to acknowledge). Also, when Luffy's duel with Usopp was over, who was the first person Luffy admitted his heavy-heartedness to? Not Nami, not Sanji, not Chopper — Zoro. And Zoro was the only one there who was able to keep emotionally calm and outline what they needed to do next (Nami was in tears, Chopper was leaving medical supplies for Usopp while crying, and Sanji was resignedly smoking), while chiding Luffy that as captain, he needed to man up and be strong for the rest of the crew. The first mate is expected to be the one to help the captain stay on course as a leader, and to take on the leadership when the captain is somehow unable to do so, and in this case, that's what Zoro wound up doing, to keep the crew in line. So, yeah, even if he has yet to be officially called the first mate, Zoro more or less behaves like one — it's just a matter of when Oda will settle the issue for us one way or the other.
One thing about the Marineford arc that is truly chilling, the Marines that were "deserting" pleaded with Akainu to assign them somewhere other than the front lines because, A.) they weren't very effective against the pirates they were facing, and B.) they weren't suicidal and wanted to live to see their families again. Cody and Helmeppo saw one such Marine actually say "Please. I want to see my family." Akainu's response wasn't to reassign them elsewhere, it wasn't even to give them words of comfort, encouragement or support, or even provide them with the logistics needed to do their job. No, his response was to loudly proclaim "If you cared about your families, you would not disgrace yourself" before immolating the Marines in lava. It does suit Akainu's mentality, as Real Life desertion is equal to execution, and for Akainu, the pleading Marines were no less than traitors to the war effort.
Fridge Logic: In the Fish-Man Island arc, Otohime's signatures catch fire, and she immediately panics. Understandable, since she spent years trying to get them. But, why didn't anyone tell her that they could just sign them again? It wouldn't have taken long,and it just would have been a minor annoyance in the long run.
Because there's a fire that could immediately go out of control if left unchecked. She also happens to be right next to the fire, and would instinctively avoid injury before trying to put it out first. She after all worked years just to get that many, and it was a shock to her that so many signed it at all. She probably felt that she will not allow the universe to screw with this Woobie again. Alas, it was not to be...
Or, it could be the fact that leaving a fire in the open for too long would eat all the oxygen in the bubble that surrounds Fish-Man Island, therefore suffocating all the residents.
Fridge Logic: Why don't Ace's pants burn off when he uses his powers?
Asbestos pants?
The same reason other Logia uses don't lose their clothes when they transform. For whatever reason their clothing is incorporated into their powers. My question is whether or not that's a trained ability or something Logias have from the get-go.
It is an oddity common to all Devil Fruits : The user's (and sometimes victims') clothes change along with them with only three exceptions so far (Ain's rejuvenating powers, Honey Queen's Toro Toro no Mi, and Jewelry Bonney's age-manipulating Fruit).
There's an easy explanation for those exceptions. Ain and Bonney's powers change the age of the target. Shrinking is just a side effect of reducing the age of a human. Clothes however would simply lose the wear they've developed. As for Honey Queen, Rule of Sexy.
The Minister of the Right put a bomb in a treasure chest in order to prevent thievery. Okay, but is it really smart to put a bomb in a confined room, surrounded by countless treasures, for years on end? Especially since only one person seemed to know about it, and forgot?
Brook is either a jerk or extremely forgetful. During the time skip, he spent 2 years traveling all across the seas doing concerts and never once visited Laboon.
Or his tour never took him in that direction and he couldn't force them to go to this tiny lighthouse with only two people there. Considering how much money the managers were raking in, it seems unlikely they would give up time at what could be a packed concert for such a trivial visit.
Brook's entire goal isn't just to reunite with Laboon, it's to reunite with Laboon after crossing the Grand Line (Quoted from Chapter 488):
Brook: Laboon... if you've been waiting there for fifty years... can you be patient for one or two more? I have my pride as a pirate!!! You're waiting for us to return after circling the globe... and I intend to keep my promise and return from the right direction!!!
Give just how curved Crocodile's hook is, how did he manage to stab it through Luffy's body so easily without making a huge gaping hole?
It made a hole, but muscular action closed it.
Why is it so important to knock out the user of the Hobby-Hobby Fruit to undo the power? It seems an unusually Weaksauce Weakness for One Piece. Putting aside the fact that nothing seems to change when she sleeps normally, we know from past experience, specifically Gecko Moria, that simply defeating a Devil Fruit power with a power like this isn't a guarantee of undoing the effects. Moria had to either be convinced to release the shadows he had stolen, or be put into a situation that he lost control of his power (as happened in the end).
Just a theory, but what if she sleeps when the population isn't allowed to go out? They would keep the reality hidden and the two groups seperated.
Actually, we've seen this happen a few times in the past already. Decken was knocked out, and his power stopped working. Shiki was knocked out and his power stopped working. Moria released his power moments before he passed out. There's probably a lot of seemingly "permanent powers" that would end if knocked out at the right moment. In fact, since Robin guessed it, it's probably an accepted fact that "unnatural" results of power use will end if the user loses consciousness.
When you fall asleep, your brain keeps going, monitoring heart rate blood flow and all that. So when a Devil Fruit user with that kind of ability goes to sleep, the brain probably just continues keeping the effect running. But when you're violently knocked out, your brain goes "Keep vitals running, fuck everything else." Thus why you sometimes shit or wet yourself. Your brain isn't trying to keep your anus clenched when it's too busy going "KEEP THE HEART AND LUNGS WORKING!".
TLDR: It's probably subconscious. Mentally trying to keep track of all those thing you altered would leave the user functionally brain-dead/comatose from overloading the brain because you can't do 1,000+ thing consciously at once.
Fridge Logic: Just... the existence of Ivankov and his/her Okama kingdoms. So, we have all of these men who apparently sincerely want to be women, and a leader who has the ability to give a Gender Bender to people courtesy of his/her Devil Fruit power. And they prefer to run around as hideously, offensively bad-at-it drag queens rather than just get the gender-swap they want? And their leader would rather use his/her Gender Bender powers for his/her own amusement or to punish guys who react negatively to his/her horde of ugly drag queens? Yeah, Japanese values in regards to homosexuals and transexuals are very much unique in the world, but still, it's hard to believe that these characters are even remotely funny, even in Japan.
Unless they follow the same "Okama Way" that Bon Clay follows: he states himself that as a transvestite he "doesn't follow the path of the man, nor the path of the woman, but the HUMAN path!" (or something along these lines). The inhabitants of the original Okama kingdom might act too feminine for this, but Ivankov his/herself and the Newkamas at least somewhat follow this ideology (it's stated that most of them went through the Gender Bender several times, to the point some of them don't really remember their original gender).
Monet has wings but no arms, legs, and can turn into snow. She's a snow angel.
Here's an easy one from Film: Z. Ain, one of Z's top henchmen, has Fountain of Youth powers; she can revert people's ages by 12 years every time she touches them. Now, seeing as how Z basically loses his fight to Luffy due to being old and past his prime, you'd think it would be obvious to them to just have her use her powers to de-age him so he could be in his physical prime again (Z was 74, so 3 touches would make him 38 and a fourth, 26). This is never brought up in the movie and Ain's potentially devastating power basically only amounts to being used to get some 18-year-old Robin Fanservice.
He probably had personal pride standing in the way of having to rely on someone else, especially his own students, to get him through a fight, like Whitebeard did when he got pissed about having to wear intravenous bags ("You want my enemies to feel sorry for me?") and ripped them out before going to Marineford. Z relied on his own power to get him this far, and when it proved deficient, he admitted it was a sign his time was over and trying to avoid it would be delaying the inevitable and take away from the time of those to come. And given how shitty his life had gone up to that point and that his loved ones were dead and his disillusionment in the Marines- the two things that gave him a real purpose in life — he was a Death Seeker who did not want to return to his youth because he had nothing left to live for. He decided to let himself wither, be brought down by the overwhelming numbers of his own pupils in the Marines, and march into the sunset in a blaze of glory.
If Bege wants to kill Linlin so bad, why didn't he just get his hands on another Devil Fruit? Even though they're rare, he can try killing someone weak who has eaten a Fruit, then have at least one ordinary fruit on hand to serve as a vessel to reincarnate it, then shove it into Big Mom's mouth. Though if it had been anything like the poison gas launcher scenario, Big Mom's incredibly destructive Conqueror's Haki and Charlotte Katakuri are hitches in the plan.
For that matter, if through Ceasar, he had access to that poison, in which they used overkill amounts already, why not simply spike the cake with it, and then let Big Mom eat it?
The above point is touched upon later when Bege does try to fill a new wedding cake Sanji is baking with poison to bring down Big Mom, but on his honor as a chef, Sanji won't have it, because poisoning a dish he helped to make is beneath him. He fights off Bege in a small scuffle, and then proves the cake is so tasty it has a massively incapacitating effect in its own right. Oda covered his bases well.