OK I´ve eaten so everything´s fine now. Thanks for the responses.
Let me clarify. Not sure how well I will be able to explain this though, English is not my native language. I understand we are here critics by default, as forum members who post every week, so a basic level of "knowledge" is expected.
But there are many fans, it´s a wide range of people. Some have a truly astonishing understanding like Greg, others might only remember major story developments.
But that´s not my point. What I´m trying to say is that the #1 reason we are here gets lost at one point in the analysis (unless the analysis itself has become the #1 factor for a person). The enjoyment of reading a damn good manga.
That for me personally means reading One Piece because it gives me an awesome feeling of adventure, action and comedy with the occasional drama. When it fails to do so, I criticize the stuff I didn´t like.
I can only experience this by getting involved within the story, like "in the moment" this is happening and I´m right there with the characters.
So, I wouldn´t enjoy it if I went to read a chapter with the mindset of OK, I should believe absolutely nothing that is going to happen because it might not be true. Note that I dislike "it was all just a dream / fake drama", especially when it comes to death.
So, as I read this chapter, I really felt "oh no, Pound is about to die, I hope/expect somebody to save him, go Sanji!" only to see him smile, fix his tie and wish his daughter and grandson the best in life as he is about to get executed.
Had I read with the absolute mindset that death is impossible unless it´s world-changing, it would be like "oh, he is about to get beheaded, mkay, chill, nobody really dies in OP, OK the blade is bloody, I´m sure it´s nothing, Pound is 100% alive because nobody really dies in OP".
I consider character deaths meaningful as they happen and believe them.
My question is, were you guys instantly calling bullshit as it happened?
What does it say about the meaningfulness of the whole sequence?
Should I be satisfied with just the fact that a more important character got away and the reason doesn´t matter?
You guys are annoyed that people seem to ignore stuff that seems to be too obvious to be ignored but that´s a common misunderstanding that often happens when you focus on seeing things your way.
Basically, I do believe that a character dies in One Piece or any other story until it´s proven otherwise. This approach is needed for me to enjoy a story. Most of the deaths that were disproven or are disbelieved have been sacrificial and meaningful in OP.
This is not me trying to blatantly ignore "common knowledge" if that makes sense.
EDIT:
- I believed that Pell died, it was a meaningful sacrifice worthy of his position,
- I don´t have Bon Clay as clearly dead because Blackbeard was around and might´ve disrupted the fight,
- I didn´t believe Sabo was dead because of the scene with Dragon on his ship,
- I believe that Pedro died, his sacrifice was meaningful and the only way of the others surviving,
- I believe Pound has been beheaded after he protected his daughter twice from harm.
Last but not least, I don´t want to think the author writes the story with an evil grin on his face, thinking "oh I´m gonna troll/surprise everyone with this death which is a fake death".
There´s just way too much sincere goodness in this story, which I tend to be drawn to, so I believe the author simply wanted to show us an emotional scene with a grandfather who didn´t have the chance to see his family grow up say his farewell and die. It was pretty impactful, for a side-character.
Also, as far as I know, Oda is not a robot. He might change his stance, fix past mistakes, approach things differently. But this is just a general "people change" statement, I don´t know that guy personally.
@Greg:
What's cool is, I've made my peace with Oda's style of handling (non) death.
I get being angry about it.
Lacuba's situation made me furious and I quit the series for several months on the chapter Hody 'stabbed' VDD.
But….I let all that go and I've been able to enjoy it.
It's still a problem but now it only bothers me as much as....oh iunno, 'Zolo'?
EDIT 2: It´s good to hear you can still enjoy the story even if you get really angry at times with the way specific things are handled.
I can sympathize with that, it happens when you really like something to the point you want to be part of its creation (happens to me with things I have not created but have expert knowledge of).