Zoro just needs to be convinced that Tashigi is a person on her own … and when this happens also Tashigi gets back her respect
I agree, I think she wants to prove (1) that she's her own person – but also : (2) that she's capable with a sword. Comparing her to Kuina and not giving her a fair fight belittle Tashigi both as a person and as a swords-person. Tashigi chose a difficult path for herself by being a female swords-person, and I think she really wants acceptance and validation for that decision as well as for being her own person.
For a brief while there in Loguetown, she found someone who recognized that she had sword skill, recognized that she was capable of identifying a good sword among bad ones, and who teased her a little, but didn't belittle her dream -- even though it was in conflict with his own ... And then all that validation vanished a few minutes later, and she felt betrayed. She desperately needs him to validate her existence again, after he affirmed, and then denied it in Loguetown. And this seems like the only way she can think of to make that happen. So that's why she's chasing him around the world now: to try to reverse that sense of betrayal and win back his acceptance. That's why it has to be Zoro, too. (and why even if Mihawk himself were to tell her: "hey, you're a great individual and very talented with the sword too!" it STILL wouldn't stop her from demanding a fair fight from Zoro).
Hopefully that makes sense.
She knows he is somehow a good guy and only need a last prove … So afterall i rly cant see her fighting him longer than a few strikes in which it
s more about talking and showing of her skills as a individual swordfighter instead of fighting out who`s the better one to the bitter end.
I don't think that their fight will be to a "bitter end" – it think that by the time they finally have their rematch both will not want to kill each other, but will want to give each other a fair fight. So it will be about finding the balance between fighting fairly and not causing massive injury.
[Think about Sensei's lesson to Zoro that we saw in the Alabasta flashback: a truly competent swordsman slices only what he intends to slice: the same slice that can't cut a single piece of paper can split a rock in half, as long as the swordsman wills it. So the key to the fight with Tashigi would be learning a way to "not-slice", so that a powerful swing won't hurt her badly].
I think that it's because she knows that underneath it all he's "good" (both as a swordsman and as a person) that she feels compelled to have a fair and serious fight with him. Because a fair fight with him would be an unspoken validation that: (1) she exists (2), she's not Kuina, (3) he thinks she's skilled enough to fight him – though maybe not enough to win and that (4) and that he respects her enough as a person to respect her wishes.
I don`t think Zoro ever doubted that a woman could become a swordmaster
http://read.mangashare.com/One-Piece/chapter-005/page014.html
http://read.mangashare.com/One-Piece/chapter-005/page015.html
Good point, but I have a different take on that scene. Up until then, he hadn't been able to defeat her. His dream at that point was only to "become" her. So by giving up her own dream, she is effectively killing his, too. So the only way at that point that he can keep his own dream alive is by keeping Kuina's alive too. So for me at least, at that point in the story, it's more of self-preservation: not "hey! women can be world class swordspeople too!" so much as: "you can't stop dreaming because you'll crush my dreams, too."
I don't remember him ever giving her a pep-talk about feminism – only about dreams, and about how hers were closely-tied to his.
his whole goal was to get as strong as Kuina because he knew that she was able to be the strongest swordman on her own.
I don't think he knew that. I think he just figured that as long as she was stronger than him, she should at least be able to dream more ambitiously than him, because he'd have to catch up to her first. ;)
@herr_sebbe:
The way he's been acting lately has been too flat. "Look cool. Rise in ranks to get to Luffy. Leather, rince and repeat."
Well, to be fair to Oda, he's got thousands of characters to juggle now, so it's understandable if some of the old favorites go on autopilot for a while. I'm sure that when the time comes for them to move the plot forward in a significant way, they'll be fleshed out more fully.
@HikaruYami:
I know this conversation has advanced since this post, but yeah…. This series does not revolve around Zoro: I'm sorry.
Of course not. It's Luffy's story. But that doesn't mean that it can't follow a similar cycle for Luffy, too. defeat Blackbeard –> defeat Smoker ---> become pirate king (or something like that).
The Blackbeard pirates cannot be overtaken by the Straw Hats before a nearly unaffiliated swordsman is dealt with in some way beforehand.
Why not?
I do not believe that Mihawk would side with the World Government in the final battle, so in my mind, Zoro would not really have a further opportunity to fight him.
How about just meeting him on a beach somewhere after the big cataclysmic war with the WG? It doesn't have to happen in tandem with the WG arc. It didn't start with the WG, so…
Arrgh. sorry for making this so TL;DR, but there's no time to edit it now...