How everything the strawhats did will, if not completely forgiven, will be overlooked enough to allow them to leave.
Yep. Been saying it for over a year now and peeps called me crazy.
How everything the strawhats did will, if not completely forgiven, will be overlooked enough to allow them to leave.
Yep. Been saying it for over a year now and peeps called me crazy.
Yep. Been saying it for over a year now and peeps called me crazy.
The cake was the main bargaining chip, yet they lost it, capone has it now.
That they would be friendly in the end to some degree has been clear since it was confirmed that Lola is in fact her daughter, and Pekoms speaks so highly of her. Yeah, obviously there's some messed up stuff going on, but Oda doesn't give us multiple hero characters with genuine loyalty to an actual bad person.
Misguided, greedy, amnesiac, maybe… but not unreasonably evil.
@uniaka:
The cake was the main bargaining chip, yet they lost it, capone has it now.
The cake isn't a bargaining chip, its the solution. Heck, BM's kids think the cake is poisoned now and don't want her to have it at all.
Also, for all that Capone is being told to take it as far away as possible so the SH's have time to escape, that's not going to matter.
How it's all going to boil out is still a little hard to see, but we've got missing memories and rampages, and half the family respecting/owing the strawhats by the end of this. Plus whatever the hfil actually happens between Sanji and Pudding.
That they would be friendly in the end to some degree has been clear since it was confirmed that Lola is in fact her daughter, and Pekoms speaks so highly of her. Yeah, obviously there's some messed up stuff going on, but Oda doesn't give us multiple hero characters with genuine loyalty to an actual bad person.
Misguided, greedy, amnesiac, maybe… but not unreasonably evil.The cake isn't a bargaining chip, its the solution. Heck, BM's kids think the cake is poisoned now and don't want her to have it at all.
Also, for all that Capone is being told to take it as far away as possible so the SH's have time to escape, that's not going to matter.
How it's all going to boil out is still a little hard to see, but we've got missing memories and rampages, and half the family respecting/owing the strawhats by the end of this. Plus whatever the hfil actually happens between Sanji and Pudding.
But that is the case with doflamingo pirates, like baby5 and segnor pink, or Mr2 and crocodile, hacchan and arlong, gin and krieg. The very fact that full heroes crew like fishman pirates had someone like along in the middle of them.
Bm pirates are unreasonable enough to kl that guy's relative because he didn't show up at the tea party. Even blackbeard or Kaidou didn't pull something that evil. And don't even consider keeping vinsmokes, they get rid of them. Kaidou beat up kid but still send him behind bars, or he allows apoo to join his crew.
@uniaka:
The cake was the main bargaining chip, yet they lost it, capone has it now.
Just because it's not in their hands at this moment in time doesn't mean that won't change.
Why are people so uncreative?
Is this what YTer culture has created?
Everyone latches onto that char. development scene about the ahole's relative they (supposedly) killed.
I say supposedly b/c Oda can create any number of reasons for how Mom has the real person locked up and just sent a fake head/body/etc.
Serious lack of creative thinking.
Not to mention, we're supposed to assume that, that individual is a total dbag to begin with. It's precisely how he he was set up.
Just because it's not in their hands at this moment in time doesn't mean that won't change.
Why are people so uncreative?
Is this what YTer culture has created?
I don't care about YT culture, you are the one with OP based YT theories. The point is that they made deal to give the cake to capone so they can get away and rescue luffy. Capone is the only free one, with bm on his tail that can worry about feeding BM, SHs are swimming in enemies on other islands.
Oda already delayed BM eating cake plot Like two times to extent this arc to almost dressrosa size, and Bm eating the cake has gone from exciting to '' when will it end'' already. This is not a football game, with the cake used as ball for half of the arc.
I say supposedly b/c Oda can create any number of reasons for how Mom has the real person locked up and just sent a fake head/body/etc.
Serious lack of creative thinking.
Not to mention, we're supposed to assume that, that individual is a total dbag to begin with. It's precisely how he he was set up.
Same way they didn't try to kill the real vinsmokes, just some fakes and the real ones are hiding?
And not sure how you can fake that, for someone that is organs trader of underworld, not to know the difference between real one and fake one…
LOla as BM's daughter counts for nothing when sanji is son of judge, doflamingo as brother and son of the only good CDs.
@uniaka:
But that is the case with doflamingo pirates, like baby5 and segnor pink,
Baby 5 left Dofla for another crew and Pink had a flashback that showed his compassion that had nothing to do with the Dofla gang. Violet didn't belong with or vouch for him either. None of them swore Dofla was a good guy worth serving, they just did. Note that the ones that WERE his peers and spoke well of him, like Diamante and Trebol, were nasties that got proper beat downs with no sympathy.
or Mr2 and crocodile
Bentham was constantly conflicted about working for Croc. As was Robin. Never vouched for him. And it's telling that the entirety of his agents (aside from Mr. 1) abandoned him once they had the chance.
hacchan and arlong
Hachi was with the fishman pirates because he grew up with them, not because he particularly loved Arlong. And he was the only one Nami considered okay. Note he was also the one fishman to escape captivity.
gin and krieg.
Gin was loyal to the strength, not the man. And any loyalty Gin had to Krieg was erased when Krieg betrayed and gassed him.
None of those guys went "My captain is a great person, you should meet them and they'll treat you right." They pretty much all… just worked for them. Compare that to Ace speaking highly of Whitebeard, or how every strawhat speaks of Luffy. That's how Lola spoke of her mother, with apparently no idea she was on the outs with her. (So something went down over the last couple years, possibly Pudding related.)
There's a difference between a minion boasting and a hero vouching.
The closest example really would be Monet willing to sacrifice herself for Doflamingo, but she was a child poisoning not-a-good person.
No one is saying Big Mom is a saint or that she's done no wrong. (Luffy's done some bad things too.) But she IS suffering from problems and false ideas, things that can be fixed and put onto a better path, and has a lot of children who are being represented as good, including Lola, Pudding, Chiffon,Praline, Katakuri . Add in Pekoms and even Jimbei vouching for her and that is a lot of upstanding characters in her area. Some nasties too, but that's a LOT of sympathetic characters in her corner.
Bm pirates are unreasonable enough to kl that guy's relative because he didn't show up at the tea party. Even blackbeard or Kaidou didn't pull something that evil. And don't even consider keeping vinsmokes, they get rid of them. Kaidou beat up kid but still send him behind bars, or he allows apoo to join his crew.
BB pirates rampaged through Drum and are conquering islands by force and killed Whitebeard and led to Ace being killed
Kaidou was first mentioned as the guy that single handedly murdered Moria's entire crew and broke him. And he's the scary guy even Dofla is afraid of. And his underlings tortured, amputated, and tried to murder everyone on Zou with poison gas, and then kill the elephant.
No, in order to have OP-based YT theories I'd have to stick my finger in the air to catch wind of what would rile ppl up and make a few Illuminati-inspired connections.
No, what I'm doing is called making educated guesses based on known factual evidence about policies and patterns displayed by the author.
I wouldn't contend that makes them 'better' than thought-out theories, but certainly a cut above manufactured theories.
I draw the similarity with your own conjecture because it lacks imagination.
'No that's not possible, they don't have the cake'
Um, they don't now. But who knows how that can change ^0^
You've gotta stop declaring that something cannot happen and instead question if/how it could.
Looking at the puzzle pieces won't solve the puzzle, you've gotta try and see how the unlikely can become the norm.
See, you just did it again by saying, "I don't see how you can fake that."
When you say that you're really saying you don't want to see how it's possible and therefore you don't bother spending 15 seconds thinking about it.
First, are recipients really going to start dissecting the remnants of their loved ones?
I'd be surprised if they took more than a glance at 'what's in the box'.
I mean Cracker had Nami and Luffy believinghis jam was blood. With confectionary geniuses at her fingertips, Mom can make totally realistic martzipan heads with accurate organs.
Haven'tyou ever seen dessert art?
So yeah, I'm not even saying I believe this. Just, you gotta stop saying 'no' and start asking 'how'instead.
The point is why would BM bother to make such fakes, when she has no problem doing the same to all vinsmokes, or wreck countries for candy or just steal years from everyone.
I can definitely see Luffy vs. Katakuri ending any way at this point. The fact that they (BM pirates) have all gathered and commented upon that fact on more than one occasion would justify Luffy losing in the end. Though, from fanboy perspective that would be sad :)
The fight has basically been Luffy catching up to his level, so if the fight were to reset with both of them at "full health" I'd imagine Luffy would be victorious… now I don't know what Oda will do. Personally I'd like to see Luffy win, or at the very least knocking Katakuri out of the mirror (with Brulee, somehow) and have him land on his back in front of everyone.
What I don't really like at all about this fight is how Luffy is getting hit over and over. It's been going on for hours. Most of what we see if Luffy getting hit, fast forward a few hours, hit again. I interpret that as Luffy getting hit over and over for a long period of time. I would like to see it as "the fight goes on and on with no clear winner. Luffy is getting hit on rare occasions", that would make it feel more 'realistic' to me.
I suppose most people do see it as "Luffy getting hit all the time", as it feels like that's the way it is presented...
I think that the fact that Katakuri's back touches the ground must be known to all the family as well, it is something he loves. To relax and eat donuts. Just showing his face would be an incomplete transition.
These are the kinds of issues that Kubo couldn't handle with Bleach and because of it messed over the story.
The power balance of Bleach was simply "Who throws the bigger rock wins".
It didn't really made a difference with the most closer arcs to the epilogue, because it is a simple concept and mah boi Tite cares more about the ability rather than the power impact of it. The main issue is that readers wanted a cohesive flow of the story, without thinking that the story unfolds about a boy that wants to be acknowledged despite his differences with other people. So the complex story wasn't going to what readers wanted :/
Oda enhances the idea of a weak guy defeating a strong guy like his Papa on the matter, Toriyama. Problem happens when he creates a skill to the ability that was already fully explained by one of his masters, and can't fit well on that. To me, Oda fails on the department of powers, much more when all what he has showed can't put a strong difference on the VOAT ability.
Togashi is obviously better than Oda btw, he can manages difficult ideas in his already complex system that makes fans unite those concepts to others already created before, much more when a master says "every person will have different interactions with the power".
Oda: "Yeah you can increase your power to the other guy's level if you hang with that guy for a while and constantly work on the ability, but you'd best have the willpower to take a lot of abuse in the process"
Kubo: "Yeah you can increase your power to the other guy's level thanks to this alternate dimension where time happens to move really slowly"
Togashi is pretty much turning Nen into Stands at this point.
@Kaido:
Oda: "Yeah you can increase your power to the other guy's level if you hang with that guy for a while and constantly work on the ability, but you'd best have the willpower to take a lot of abuse in the process"
Kubo: "Yeah you can increase your power to the other guy's level thanks to this alternate dimension where time happens to move really slowly"
Honestly, that just made Kubo's approach sound better. "Train for a few hours, or train for years."
Don't get me wrong though, I think Oda's doing an overall better job. But that's mostly just because the power gap between Luffy and Katakuri isn't nearly as huge as the one between Ichigo and Aizen.
Honestly, that just made Kubo's approach sound better. "Train for a few hours, or train for years."
Don't get me wrong though, I think Oda's doing an overall better job. But that's mostly just because the power gap between Luffy and Katakuri isn't nearly as huge as the one between Ichigo and Aizen.
At least the thing luffy is learning is an upgrade to something he's already had training in for 2 years. Combine that with rayleigh saying I dont think thats enough time to master it and the win probably being based on the improvement he has made + snake man it's a lot easier to buy than of luffy surpassed katakuri's CoO
Didn't Toriyama done this Alternate Dimension Training Room first?
The point is why would BM bother to make such fakes, when she has no problem doing the same to all vinsmokes, or wreck countries for candy or just steal years from everyone.
I'm not saying she did ^o^
I'm saying she can.
And your point about Vinsmokes I didn't address b/c I was on my phone and it was a pain typing, is that Mom v. Vinsmokes is a perfect case of two ahole personalities clashing and trying to betray each other.
Don't forget, Oda was careful to include that scene of how Judge was totally planning on holding Pudding hostage on top of the fact that he's just a terrible person.
We've seen that Mom has willingly caused suffering for largely evil people.
And evil people have caused suffering for her and manipulated her.
But at her core, she's not evil.
She's selfish, and wields dangerous power that she doesn't understand, but a lot of what we've seen can easily be accepted because the targets of her misguided efforts are largely aholes themselves.
The only innocent people we've seen featured whom she's causing unprovoked suffering is the Strawhats, as it should be. She is a villain ^o^ But many of her actions, when boiled down, can be explained away.
Especially if memory manipulation is at play.
When Streusen and Pudding show up, ish is goin' down.
At least the thing luffy is learning is an upgrade to something he's already had training in for 2 years.
This is the point I was going to make.
It's not implausible.
If you believe Luke can start sensing training droid blasts on a short jaunt on the Falcon, Luffy can improve his Force, I mean, Haki-sensitivity using what he's learned over two years.
So, Greg, if I may ask, the cake seems to have been made without much of a hitch besides Oven being a obstacle, and BM looks like she's skin and bones, so I;d rather doubt if it somehow got destroyed they could make another one before she starves to death. But this seems to deviate from what you predicted earlier, right?
I'd say they'll definitely not be ennemies after the fight. Unlike the other persons in that family, Katakuri hasn't even been an asshole
edit: why am I always replying to old stuff on this thread??
So, Greg, if I may ask, the cake seems to have been made without much of a hitch besides Oven being a obstacle, and BM looks like she's skin and bones, so I;d rather doubt if it somehow got destroyed they could make another one before she starves to death. But this seems to deviate from what you predicted earlier, right?
So! She's not going to starve to death. The whole point of that is Sanji being kind and feeding anyone that needs food so don't worry about that. It can't/won't happen from the story perspective.
Now, the point about making a cake is that Sanji should be so good that even a quickly made makeshift one (if even necessary at this point) should do the job.
However I don't see that happening because I'd much prefer that Mom eat the entire cake and pop back to her normal size. I can't see Oda passing up that opportunity.
Similar to this I also suggested the existence of a taster cake, commonly made for wedding cakes, that they might have to basically snipe to her.
Now, as for the plausibility of the cake being destroyed at this point.
It makes terrible sense and also perfect sense depending on your expectations from Oda/the story.
It makes perfect sense because we know that the family doesn't want to let Mom eat it. So, like I've said in my columns, there's plenty of reasons for it to be targeted for destruction. Streusen, if indeed he does play a role (and Capone's comment about his battle prowess is BASICALLY Chekov's Streusen ^o^) then Streusen may have his own reasons for desiring to destroy the cake possibly as an underhanded attempt to kill Mom.
It makes terrible sense because it means all that time in Chocolate Town was a total waste from a progression point of view which is very uncharacteristic of Oda. The only way the destruction of it could be justified is if something happens SPECIFICALLY at Chocolate Town because of their decision to make it there.
Which is….sort of happening? The meeting place for Luffy is scheduled to be there so it's a pretty big deal and if that's the result of the cake being made there sigh it's not a very important reason, but it can be justified since Oda didn't go through excruciating detail of how the cake was crafted.
So yeah! Whether the cake is destroyed or not really hasn't changed where I can see the arc going from this point.
The point of making the cake together was so that the family would have some way of respecting the SH crew and seeing them for what they really are. That's actually been happening, just in other ways.
As I said in my column, I'm MOST impressed by Oda's truly elegant move of putting the cake on Capone's ship and the BM Pirates' reaction to that. It's BRILLIANT and I'm still in awe of it.
How do we get them to try and AVOID giving the ONE THING that could stop Mom's rampage? Make it seem like poison. Boom! So good.
I'm not saying she did ^o^
I'm saying she can.
And your point about Vinsmokes I didn't address b/c I was on my phone and it was a pain typing, is that Mom v. Vinsmokes is a perfect case of two ahole personalities clashing and trying to betray each other.
Don't forget, Oda was careful to include that scene of how Judge was totally planning on holding Pudding hostage on top of the fact that he's just a terrible person.
We've seen that Mom has willingly caused suffering for largely evil people.
And evil people have caused suffering for her and manipulated her.
But at her core, she's not evil.
She's selfish, and wields dangerous power that she doesn't understand, but a lot of what we've seen can easily be accepted because the targets of her misguided efforts are largely aholes themselves.
The only innocent people we've seen featured whom she's causing unprovoked suffering is the Strawhats, as it should be. She is a villain ^o^ But many of her actions, when boiled down, can be explained away.
Especially if memory manipulation is at play.
When Streusen and Pudding show up, ish is goin' down.
This is the point I was going to make.
It's not implausible.
If you believe Luke can start sensing training droid blasts on a short jaunt on the Falcon, Luffy can improve his Force, I mean, Haki-sensitivity using what he's learned over two years.
i mean she did order bobbin to burn down an island, Which he was said to have done, because of the sweets and the threat of her doing that to fishman island was the prelude to the entire conflict between big mom and luffy. Thats dangerous levels of selfishness, and the motive behind it isnt deeper (that we know of so far ) than damn this candy is good. She also got those ingredients stolen by pretty violent means.
Idk how I'd title her, we know she is gray in morality but she's at least a part evil alomg with whatever part good she is.
There was that scene with Oven heating up the sea water and Sanji being worried that the temperature might ruin the cake. That scene might have been made in the purpose of establishing how the cake will be done in later on, which is by high temperature. And now in the latest chapter, one of Bege's crew noted that Prometheus -the literal fire- has increased massively in size.
i mean she did order bobbin to burn down an island
But what do we know about that island?
It could have been an island of murderers ^o^
And that aside, I was careful in choosing my words because I said unprovoked.
sigh
I dunno, maybe everyone hasn't had the same experiences so it's hard to express or understand but…just because something appears one way, unless Oda has written something to be such there could be more to the story and when I say that I don't mean Oda has some intricate backstory for nameless islands whose entire existence is in order to characterize a villain. I'm saying that he's showing you only two of maybe ten cards.
You, based on those cards, are making assumptions about the other cards and guess what? Those 8 cards, they might be from an entirely different deck ^o^
And the fact of the matter is, Oda may not even have some of those ten cards in his possession.
That's why when we're told that this character did some horrible terrible thing, remember, there are multiple sides of every story and ODA IS SPECIFICALLY SHOWING YOU A FRACTION OF IT TO MAKE YOU FEEL A CERTAIN WAY
I mean, that's his job and he's pretty darn good at it ^o^
So yeah, Mom being provoked to burn down some island certainly makes her appear terrible.
But maybe she just destroyed an island of small-time pirates who were planning on raiding East Blue.
And maybe they all survived.
And maybe they went back to their families on other islands rethinking their life choices.
This is why I firmly stand by my assertion that being a comic author means you need to be a bullshit artist. Week to week your job is to deceive your audience in hopes of ultimately surprising them. It's a beautiful thing.
To date.
The one piece of info we got on Mom from a reliable source that seems to establish she willfully and unprovoked physically carried through something cruel with the direct intention of harming an innocent purely for her own selfish reasons was the fact that she beat Chiffon.
That was the first thing that, back when I first read it, I thought, my gosh, there's no way explaining this away… That was a nonredeemable act...
But then I started thinking about memory manipulation and well, even that might not be what it seems.
There was that scene with Oven heating up the sea water and Sanji being worried that the temperature might ruin the cake.
So from Oda's perspective, the purpose of that line from Sanji was to place their cake in peril so that we felt worried for the safety of the cake and thereby the plan as a whole. Another classic case of BS utilized to make us subconsciously feel a specific emotion.
Now, having established that, could he bring it back into the story? YOU BET! But the point of it, at that time, was ultimately make us respect Pound's ….erm....'sacrifice'...? Because if he hadn't acted, that meant the cake would have been ruined. So Sanji's line there is helping us feel the weight and effects of Pound's actions.
But what do we know about that island?
It could have been an island of murderers ^o^
And that aside, I was careful in choosing my words because I said unprovoked.
sigh
I dunno, maybe everyone hasn't had the same experiences so it's hard to express or understand but…just because something appears one way, unless Oda has written something to be such there could be more to the story and when I say that I don't mean Oda has some intricate backstory for nameless islands whose entire existence is in order to characterize a villain. I'm saying that he's showing you only two of maybe ten cards.
You, based on those cards, are making assumptions about the other cards and guess what? Those 8 cards, they might be from an entirely different deck ^o^
And the fact of the matter is, Oda may not even have some of those ten cards in his possession.
That's why when we're told that this character did some horrible terrible thing, remember, there are multiple sides of every story and ODA IS SPECIFICALLY SHOWING YOU A FRACTION OF IT TO MAKE YOU FEEL A CERTAIN WAY
I mean, that's his job and he's pretty darn good at it ^o^
So yeah, Mom being provoked to burn down some island certainly makes her appear terrible.
But maybe she just destroyed an island of small-time pirates who were planning on raiding East Blue.
And maybe they all survived.
And maybe they went back to their families on other islands rethinking their life choices.
This is why I firmly stand by my assertion that being a comic author means you need to be a bullshit artist. Week to week your job is to deceive your audience in hopes of ultimately surprising them. It's a beautiful thing.
The thing about big mom is given luffy's relatively amoral perspective of "I dont really care what you do, if you dont mess with my friends or me I dont really care" I dont think we need oda to explain big mom wasnt as bad as she was. She was a business women and set the terms clear, if the island didnt pay up and she had the whole placed burned down is that really something like a deal breaker to lufy, he teamed up with bege after bege shot pekoms, he teamed up with crocodile who did much worse things to luffy's friends than big mom, and hell he'll most likely team up with kidd and shakky even mentioned he has a higher bounty from the WG because he specifically attacks civilians and does more damage to surrounding areas than the much more honorable luffy.
Big mom doesnt have to be a nice pirate to acknowledge her failings as a parent and the issues with her family. They can still pillage, steal and enslave as a merry band (off-panel of course, oda never shows allies with previous questionable behavior, exhibit it after the strawhats team up with them ) but just with stronger bonds between them. I dont think you or I expect big mom to give up being a pirate after this arc no matter what the emotional reasoning. She wont be "talk no jutsu'ed" out of being a yonko.
Thats partially why I assert the actions under big mom dont need to be worked around because oda has used this plenty of times for previous antagonists / former antagonists and then either explained them or expected us to not pay heed to them afterward.
So the whole oda having big mom be more benellovent than he showed her originally, to align the viewer into not disliking her as much wouldnt be his style IMO.
Because she hasnt really done anything to people we care about outside her family. She can still be a greedy, selfish, a schemer and all that but he could just not show it to us the audience afterwards, focusing on her positives like he has done with others. Like barto's past, capone's betrayal, duval being a damn slave trader. As long as she patches things up with her family the motives behind her territorial squabbles, the threats to show up to tea parties and all that could not be completely resolved. Because the main narrative thrust is about the family here and oda could simply imply she shapes up a bit without going into depth about her change.
Totally!
I'm not suggesting for a moment Oda needs to explain even 1/10 of what she's done because it's so ambiguous.
What I'm talking about is how we as readers can and will in retrospect, in the years to come, interpret/rationalize those actions.
What I'm doing, is trying to rationalize them now instead of years later when Mom is giving a heart-warming grin when Luffy actually helps her (not intentionally of course) accomplish her dream but in ways she'd never considered.
Think also about every time Oda "kills" a character. He presents it as legit and strings it along and makes you think characters are dead for months, or even years at a time.
Because he's not telling you everything and he's keeping some of his outs to himself. He doesn't need to show us everything to explain why something isn't as bad as it once seemed, when he can usually explain it in a sentence or two either in dialogue or SBS after the fact… and sometimes doesn't even explain at all.
"Oh, the lightning didn't kill me, I just fell through the cloud." "I didn't die and not tell you guys I was alive for 10 years, I just developed amnesia." "Yeah he took the full brunt of a city leveling explosion but he was found by a doctor immediately afterward." "He bit off his own tongue and was declared dead, but he's actually just a good faker." "He didn't actually stab her heart, just the edge of the cube and it slid away." And so on.
Same thing extends to a lot of the misdeeds from BM.
Big Mom is not a likable character, but she is a sympathetic one. She is not rotten to the core, but has the mentality of a five years old child. That's what the manga told us. A perfect example is her reaction after (her goldfish) Brook died.
As for killing all these people, actually there isn't even any need to downplay it by something like fake heads. Big Moms biggest flaw is that - mainly due to being as natural born monster - she never had anyone whom she could consider as equal. Hell, even Roger went for underhanded tactics instead of going for a direct confrontation. In our perception, sure, what she does is murder, but in her own perception it's nothing more than getting rid of a few goldfishs. Sure her perception is heavily twisted, no one denies that, but it's perfectly justifiable in her own twisted value system. From her own point of view she doesn't do anything evil at all.
Like how many people actually think it's wrong to kill animals which annoy you like mice, ants or wasps? Hell, you can buy stuff to specifically kill those animals freely in your local store. And again, for Big Mom everyone else - even including Katakuri as shown when she talked to him at the wedding ceremony - are puppies and kittens at best and ants and mice at worst.
So what does that mean for the future? Especially regarding the Luffy/Big Mom interactions? Remember what Luffy did at their snail talk? Yeah, he did something no one else did before - never ever. He talked to her - as another human being. He was neither a puppy, goldfish nor an ant - he talked back to her on eye level. Eye level… Isn't that her dream anyway? No one ever talked back, instead they always made up excuses instead of putting the blame on her - even if one of her children died. But not Luffy... He talked back on eye level and put the blame on her alone for not being Pirate King already.
Big Mom has to learn that there are other human beings as well - with their own feelings - as well as that you cannot always solely put the blame for your outrages on the others. And Luffy is the one who will teach her that lesson. Not by beating her in a 1vs1, but instead by acting as and treating her as an equal.
Therefore I expect that at the end of this arc Luffy taught her the true meaning of her dream. Like you don't have to be big and strong to be on eye level, but instead you as a human being have to treat the others as human beings as well. Which will lead to character growth. I really would like it in the afterwards of this arc she would go to see Jigra (who of course lives) and actually feels genuine remorse and at the end (not immediately) Jigra who lost all of his family gets part of her family - her new family where everyone is on eye level.
Remember how Big Mom was introducing devouring people, who later were revealed to be Hommies, and then later was revealed that her backstory involved at the least horrifyng, giving her mother figure a deathly wound, and escaped but died shortly after, but most likelly ate her and her siblings.
She is a canibal! no she isn't! oh, she is, but she didn't know!
(people keep misremembering how Opera and Moscato were KOd/killed?, she didn't eat them, she ate their lifeforce)
Especially if memory manipulation is at play.
When Streusen and Pudding show up, ish is goin' down.
Now that you mention that. There was also a giant that saw it, just like streusen, and he informed all Elbaf.
So based on that, don't you think BM finding out about her past could be saved for Elbaf? Do all plot point open this arc have to be solved this arc only?
There is also BM's dream that plays well with elbaf. The only way she can get her dream, a giant family to look in the eyes at the table, is if she gets the giants from elbaf under her. And is also only race she lacks from totland, and race she wanted so she can take on the other yonkous. On top of it, BM was born as normal giant size even if she is human. Lola was also going to marry into the giants family.
There is too much elbaf in bm's story for her not to return there.
I agree for the most part but the excuse and notion that the islands she orders be destroyed could be "villains" themselves falls flat considering she was literally ready to destroy Fishman Island who we know do not belong to said villains.
If Oda is gonna sell the "misguided child who never learned what´s right or wrong and only acts out because she is selfish", he has to do a really good job explaining every aspect of it, otherwise it will simply not work.
And that includes enjoying gambling on taking body parts or lives of people we do know are not villains either.
Because he's not telling you everything and he's keeping some of his outs to himself. He doesn't need to show us everything to explain why something isn't as bad as it once seemed, when he can usually explain it in a sentence or two either in dialogue or SBS after the fact… and sometimes doesn't even explain at all.
Yeah, that's one of the most common and biggest mistakes an amateur storywriter can do. That is, not finding the right dose on how much information they give away to the audience. I see it often that many people just want to spell out everything as claer as possible, and some years ago I did so myself as well. Because hey I'm intelligent and a good logician, so I've thought through absolutely everything and there's absolutely no need for any ambiguity or interpretation from your side - because… Well, I already did all the thinking, look how much effort I went under in creating my fantasy world, really no need for you to bother thinking about it at all. See, ain't I smart?!
Pound said to get revenge for him before he died. BM's actions led to his death and her actions led to the abuse of her own kids. Her actions have also led to the murder of the families of people whose crime was not attending her tea parties. She was innocent as a child…..even the most psychotic people are innocent as children. But in this arc she has been set up as the villain, no one else. Theres nothing ambiguous about her moral character. Even Doflamingo had some admirable qualities, but that didn't excuse his actions. The only way BM could be redeemed is if we find out that Mother Caramel somehow infused her soul into Linlin, but that seems unlikely imo. She's too fargone at this point for this arc to end in an alliance. Hell, Katakuri shown to have COC could just be a hint from Oda that he is the next ruler of Tottoland and the BMP. And somehow BigMom ends up dying before arc end, as Capone and Peros have hinted at the possibility and also with the cake literally being decorated by skulls and crosses
Yeah, that's one of the most common and biggest mistakes an amateur storywriter can do. That is, not finding the right dose on how much information they give away to the audience. I see it often that many people just want to spell out everything as claer as possible, and some years ago I did so myself as well. Because hey I'm intelligent and a good logician, so I've thought through absolutely everything and there's absolutely no need for any ambiguity or interpretation from your side - because… Well, I already did all the thinking, look how much effort I went under in creating my fantasy world, really no need for you to bother thinking about it at all. See, ain't I smart?!
You get it right, that's why Kubo is the best fucking author of his country! xD
I agree for the most part but the excuse and notion that the islands she orders be destroyed could be "villains" themselves falls flat considering she was literally ready to destroy Fishman Island who we know do not belong to said villains.
Nope, it works because she never delivered on destroying FMI.
Provoked intentions are the easiest thing in the world to explain away.
If we're judging characters on 'provoked intentions' then Luffy is evil because he in his own words was ready to kill Zoro on Whiskey Peak.
Well he wanted to kill Zoro for beating their hosts that nourished entertained them so hardly evil. He did try to steal some gold from Skypeia.
He did try to steal some gold from Skypeia.
Which the Skypieans wanted to give the Straw Hats coincidentally, unbeknownst to the Straw Hats.
A better example would be Nami stealing her village's wallets, but everybody calmed down quickly and still wished her a merry farewell.
@Count:
Which the Skypieans wanted to give the Straw Hats coincidentally, unbeknownst to the Straw Hats.
A better example would be Nami stealing her village's wallets, but everybody calmed down quickly and still wished her a merry farewell.
I don't get why the Skypiean thing is always discounted. The only one who knew the Skypieans were gonna offer better gold was Robin - the rest were in full on pirate mode and deserve the points for that. Though personally I kinda wish there was a regular end-of-the-arc gag where they always steal treasure from whoever they helped out only for it to be revealed, unknown to them, that they were gonna be rewarded anyway.
I don't get why the Skypiean thing is always discounted. The only one who knew the Skypieans were gonna offer better gold was Robin - the rest were in full on pirate mode and deserve the points for that. Though personally I kinda wish there was a regular end-of-the-arc gag where they always steal treasure from whoever they helped out only for it to be revealed, unknown to them, that they were gonna be rewarded anyway.
They do deserve credit for their piracy, but it's clear that the Skypieans' generosity is supposed to put the Straw Hats in a positive heroic light instead of a maliciously selfish one. It was basically Oda saying that they can get their reward and the praise that a pirate shouldn't get without knowing it too. A free pass keeping them looking righteous.
The closest Luffy has gotten to doing something harmfully selfish, something almost completely unjustified on an ethical level is… I don't know, breaking into Enies Lobby to save Robin out of sheer naive belief in their friendship and the Impel Down raid to save Ace. But even in the latter, the only nasty people that got out of there were Shiryu and the Level 6ers. Of course, that could have only happened thanks to Luffy's actions, but it was an indirect consequence. Teach is the one who beat up Hannyabal, Magellan wasn't defeated, and Teach freed the bad guys (minus Crocodile, but he got his dream shattered and had a leash put on him by Ivankov). And Spandam is such a cartoonishly evil person while Lucci's a human bloodhound.
I do believe that Luffy is the type of person to be a selfish Robin Hood or kill somebody he deems irredeemable. I also believe that Big Mom is capable of killing innocent people when push comes to shove in getting what she wants, no matter how petty. But the question is if the manga, if Oda, will let them do so for the type of narrative he wants to create. And so far, he's conveniently set up the entire story so far to not have either of them cross that threshold of "you know, that's really messed up. It's impossible to condone that" by having unfulfilled threats, making any potential victims terrible people who deserve penance, or pulling the rug out from under us to reveal something supposedly deadly was a hoax.
Sure, we can argue that from a realistic sense, just making those kinds of threats and chaotically good/neutral actions is disgustingly irredeemable or nothing other than pure reckless selfishness. But One Piece isn't that type of morally layered series. It's always clear who you're supposed to like and who you're supposed to not like barring the occasional twist or character progression, like what happen to Bellamy and what's bound to happen to Big Mom.
@Carboar:
Pound said to get revenge for him before he died. BM's actions led to his death and her actions led to the abuse of her own kids. Her actions have also led to the murder of the families of people whose crime was not attending her tea parties. She was innocent as a child…..even the most psychotic people are innocent as children. But in this arc she has been set up as the villain, no one else. Theres nothing ambiguous about her moral character. Even Doflamingo had some admirable qualities, but that didn't excuse his actions. The only way BM could be redeemed is if we find out that Mother Caramel somehow infused her soul into Linlin, but that seems unlikely imo. She's too fargone at this point for this arc to end in an alliance. Hell, Katakuri shown to have COC could just be a hint from Oda that he is the next ruler of Tottoland and the BMP. And somehow BigMom ends up dying before arc end, as Capone and Peros have hinted at the possibility and also with the cake literally being decorated by skulls and crosses
For that to matter Pound would have to actually be dead. He's not, he'll be fine and reunited with his daughter before its all said and done.
Also, there is amnesia and memory altering at play.
Nope, it works because she never delivered on destroying FMI.
Provoked intentions are the easiest thing in the world to explain away.
If we're judging characters on 'provoked intentions' then Luffy is evil because he in his own words was ready to kill Zoro on Whiskey Peak.
Context is important, like desa pointed out. Luffy´s actions were based on the supposed actions of Zoro that were deplorable in Luffy´s imagination + that scene was played off with a comedic undertone.
Here you literally have her crew destroy islands over islands over ingredients. That makes the threat against Fishman Island tangible and real, even if it does not happen and it only does not happen because Luffy shifted her anger from the island to himself. Heck, how you gonna explain it away anyway: "The bad islands she destroys, the good islands she only threatens", nope that does not work. Intention is very much important.
Just because she did not take hundreds of limbs of Jinbe´s crewmembers does not mean she was not ready to do so because she has done it before to people who, within the context of OP, can be considered good. Just because Jinbe refrained from spinning it does not mean her intentions can be ignored and "explained away".
1. Islands we know nothing about.
2. Islands that are provoking her by either breaking agreements or witholding.
Yes, you're absolutely right, context is the key.
And we deliberately aren't given it.
I'm just telling you how she'll be rationalized down the line, like it or not this is Oda's MO.
Not saying she isn't a vilain or troublesome, but saying nasty things that aren't carried through on like an assassination plot creates a grim aura, but one that with enough time or context, can be understood and accepted.
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Well he wanted to kill Zoro for beating their hosts that nourished entertained them so hardly evil.
You have proved my point.
You rationalized Luffy's words because we knew the context of the situation.
Surely I don't believe Luffy is evil.
But when you understand both sides of the story we can see that Luffy is upset because he believes Zoro killed their benefactors in cold blood.
So here's what's happening with Mom in the context of that scene.
Let's say Zoro is an island and Luffy is Mom.
We do not know that Zoro has supposedly killed the benefactors.
We just see Zoro minding his own business.
Luffy appears out of nowhere and ferociously announces that he's going to kill Zoro for breaking a crew rule.
How does Luffy look there? Does he look anything other than evil?
That's exactly how we see Mom now.
*How Big Mom is being presented.
I don't think oda would give BM one of the worst actions in a flashback if she was in the good zone and not villain. Every good character gets a flashback that makes them look like the victim, but bm there is no way you can feel sorry for her. Intentional or not, she still did it. And note that bm in her tantrum is not full zombie, she still has some conscious and aware of her actions at least to some extent. BM is similar to doflamingo, as in they got raised the wrong way.
And the '' if they are evil it's ok what she did to them'' doesn't work because BM is not WG or justice, it is not her job to spread justice and It's not like bm is doing it to stop evil guys, she is doing it for her own gain. Perfect example are those mobster family wars. The winners are not the good guys, they are still bad. And you also assume they are evil based on nothing. If yakuza beat some rival evil guys then they are good?
And in the case of vinsmokes, some of them may deserve it, but reiju and sanji are good so that argument doesn't work.
She accidentally killed her family. She got blinded by gluttony and killed, and ate all the people who she tougth that loved her, and to this day she thinks that she was abandoned. She's a tragic monster, not just a monster who decided to kill her father because some snot guy gave her a gun.
Who gives the authority to the World Goverment to be "justice"? Their military might, and that they decide to take care of a population, if we go to legitimacy of goverment, Big Mom who carved these territories herself, and had her family turn them into food lands has a better claim than the assholes a top of the world who inherited it and barely care.
From what I have gathered here, seems like Big Mom is barely a character with little, to no agency at all.
We can't really say we know nothing of the islands she reigns over. We have seen several from Fishman Island, Cacao, Peanut not to mention I doubt she raided her own islands to get the ingredients for the wedding cake. We have seen in her territory that civilians do love Mama, but they are not pirates per se. They are civilians that have come to terms with Mama's reign of power. So, maybe the islands broker their agreement, or withheld it, but couldn't it be that Big Mom's demands were to high to begin with? That she puts these islands in a deal that takes more than they can produce over time.
We can always find an excuse: her prison library? Well it is just random animals, and the humans/humanoids inside are all bad people that deserve to be punished. Seems like a convenient setup. If Big Mom's evil, selfish nature is all a superficial act, in other words they are conveniently affect people that we should not feel sympathy for, then what a waste of time. Might as well just have her be a good pirate from the get go.
That still does not tackle how she treated every one of her children's fathers. How she had sent Pound to be assassinated even though he was not really doing anything but be buried in the seducing woods. How she abused of Chiffon for looking like Lola. These things being explained away by memory manipulation would be cheap as well.
@Count:
Which the Skypieans wanted to give the Straw Hats coincidentally, unbeknownst to the Straw Hats.
A better example would be Nami stealing her village's wallets, but everybody calmed down quickly and still wished her a merry farewell.
Also literally left 93 million berries so they probably still ended up in the black
I know you didnt count but people always forget that she left them the money and use the theivery as proof that nami is a greedy asshole, when she left them with 93 million she risked her life for and was completely entitled to as a parting gift.
She accidentally killed her family. She got blinded by gluttony and killed, and ate all the people who she tougth that loved her, and to this day she thinks that she was abandoned. She's a tragic monster, not just a monster who decided to kill her father because some snot guy gave her a gun.
Who gives the authority to the World Goverment to be "justice"? Their military might, and that they decide to take care of a population, if we go to legitimacy of goverment, Big Mom who carved these territories herself, and had her family turn them into food lands has a better claim than the assholes a top of the world who inherited it and barely care.
Doflamingo is the same, tragic monster, he got raised among CDs and just took them as examples, then he lost everything because he saw the consequences of CDs actions, and was manipulated in his weakest moment by evil guy.
Ok, you don't see the difference between "He took a gun and shoot his father fully aware of what he was doing" to "She was eating so fast that se ate her Mother and siblings, and is unaware of what she did".
Doflamingo was an entitled little prick who wanted revenge for someone daring to remove his privilege. Linlin was an ignorant little giant monster of a girlwho didn't knew her strenght and had no table manners.
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Besides, there's a factor that will forever damn Doflamingo more than anything. Rocinante. Someone who lived the same life as him, and who didn't sold his soul to a snot monster for revenge.
Any change of perspective would only make Doflamingo angrier and more kill happy, any change of perspective (except revealing that Carmel was a child traficker) would have caused Linlin to not eat her family.
Her whole eating all of the kids seems fishy to me still. And if we are in the spirit of "everything Linlin has done is a misguided action with noble roots" then, that scene was Oda misguiding us to build this image of an uncontrollable monster. The only thing that remains is that the new cake will make her do exactly as she did during her birthday party. Sanji's cream has been presented as the epitome of bliss and Linlin "ate" her family when she was in that blissful state. We will get the answers to what happened once she starts reacting the same way. If she eats a couple of her children/people in present time, then I am more on board with her having eaten the children.