@Daz:
Why would Oda have her join this way?
That is a perfectly valid question. I merely speculate that this is where it would all lead, but genuinely that lies in the question that you mentioned us saying:
“why else is she here/ why else was she in Whole Cake”
The Minks were always going to be involved in Wano, regardless of the events in Whole Cake and both Pedro and Pekoms, Mink representatives, had narrative reasons and ties that pushed them towards going towards Totland initially. What was Carrot's? To go on an adventure at sea, like she always wanted. Narratively, her inclusion didn't discuss major plot/narrative elements when introduced into the story nor explain why this role couldn't have been fulfilled by the existing Minks that went into the arc as shown through Pekoms who later explained his Sulong transformation towards Luffy. In fact, both Wanda and Pedro reprimanded Carrot for her treating the situation in retrieval mission seriously. They already acted as her guardians.
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Since Carrot didn't actually have any grounded narrative ties that grounded and explained her initial reason of coming to the island, that was always brought to question. And yet, she's separated from the Mink Tribe again and Oda is setting her up with a confrontation that was built up (albeit kinda poorly) in Whole Cake Island.
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In the grand scheme of things, Peropspero is not relevant to the situation in Wano, nor was he even involved directly till the third act. Oda brought mainly as a roundabout excuse to have this eventual confrontation. So why does this battle matter and why even include it in the story? What exactly is Carrot even avenging and why? These are questions that Oda brought up and has since never answered. Carrot herself admits that its because of Pedro's sacrifice that they are fighting right now, even if Perospero is right to say that Pedro was the one who blew himself up.
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So until this is, the question that we have proposed and you have made is still in limbo.
What is the purpose of these particular choices -or rather, the absence of them- leading up to her joining? How does this supposedly chosen approach serve Carrot, as an alleged future crewmate? How does it build to the catharsis of her joining?
That's mainly speculation on my end and its revolving around mostly unanswered questions that inevitably will be addressed why Oda even made Carrot tag along to begin with. Why have her so associated with the crew and so prevantly if at the end of the day, she's just a lesser positioned Mink compared to the more narratively prominent and significant ones that were better established? More questions than answers.
If she is to join at the end of this arc, this quite big arc we’re currently in, why
- NOT develop her bond with supposed Real Time Dead Mentor Pedro until the very, very last moment before killing him off, if this is intended as her formative moment?
- NOT capitalize on her alleged formative moment of tragedy with Pedros death by using it to develop her on-panel in the subsequent 100 chapters, or at least planting an explicit Pedro – related hook for future development well in advance? If beating Perospero is supposed to be it, why not plant that well in advance in the actual story with an actual motivation for Carrot to build up to the current moment? Instead of it just being “Perosperos here? Gotta go beat him!” (Yes it “””makes sense””” she would want to do that, but I’m talking about constructing the story in order to build up and maximize the impact of the alleged future nakamates supposed “big moment”)
- NOT have her showdown with Perospero revolve around her alone, but instead give her equal billing with Wano-MIA Wanda, and have the fight physically and narratively detached from what the entire rest of the crew is doing?
- NOT even make the visit to supposedly Real Time Dead Motivational Mentor Pedros’ grave a personal highlighting moment for her, but rather lump her in with Wanda (again) and Sicilian and give Carrot the most blank reaction of all of them?
- NOT pair her up with a range of other crewmembers or characters she can play off of, but Nami again, whom she’s already been with in Whole Cake? Despite showing up extremely late to the party, fellow WCI cast member Jinbe has managed to play off of Sanji, Franky, Zoro, and especially Robin, why not do the same for Carrot?
- NOT deliberately highlight her lookout skills in the leadup to her joining, if this her intended role on the crew? And by highlight I don’t mean her merely being seen doing some scouting 100 chapters ago, I mean other characters, or at very least the story itself, highlighting her skill in this regard in unambiguous fashion, as with Nami and Cartography, or Jinbe riding a wave etc.?
- NOT give her a dedicated mission or subplot during the second act of the arc, which would allow her character to shine and get more involved? And not put her on complete standby for a huge chunk of the arc, in the literal background of the mink scenes?
- In general, why NOT give her more than a mere handful of panels highlighting her specifically this arc, which she is supposed to join at the end of? And why almost exclusively have her either in the background relative to other characters, or at least never the focus compared to them?
- NOT, at the very least, make any sort of dramatic point or character beat of the fact that she’s at first hanging out with the other minks instead of helping the crew, and her now not being with the other minks (sans Wanda)?
- We mostly didn't know Carrot even had a pre-established relationship with Pedro till the very end. However, the signs in advance were there. She's the only Musketeer that doesn't wear the standard Musketeer uniform, she fights predominantly with a glove while a majority of the Musketeers use swords (though there is that one panel of a Musketeer using a glove, which is strange since we know in Carrot's mini-flashback Shishillian tried to train Carrot with a swords before Pedro became her de-facto mentor). We know that this was introduced last minute to bridge a relationship between Carrot and Pedro, but it was also a way to make Pedro's last words more intimate with her and follow the narrative of the Dawn to the readers attention and into Wano and indirectly the story past this arc.
- Falls back to my previous question: what is Carrot supposed to gain from this confrontation haphazardly set up the arc before and what does it actually resolve for her character? Oda introduced a personal vendetta for Carrot against Big Mom, its now up to Oda to see it through and address why it was necessary for it to occur since it seems like out of field fighting conflict that's less elaborated than say the retainers and Momonosuke (and Yamato) against Orochi and Kaido, which were the main focus of Wano. More questions than answers.
- This is a valid criticism. Wanda was nowhere shown when Carrot followed the Straw Hats in the tank, when she pursued Momo into the brothel hall to attempt to rescue Momonosuke, when Carrot reconvened with the Straw Hats in the banquet hall, and only appeared when Carrot rushed out of the dome to confront Perospero. Her involvement in the matter is strange and once again brings more questions than answers.
- Carrot has moved on from Pedro's death, that was settled in Whole Cake, the rest were more than likely notified from her regarding his status. That said, why its not a highlight and why its the main reason why she's confronting Perospero is another question that has yet to be answered.
- It's highlighted through the frequency she's done it and the fact she's doing it at all. No tag a long guest that has ridden with the Straw Hats has consistently been a deck hand to the crew for whatever reason and behind Pedro, she's one of the first to do so and was seen doing it very often. It's not pointed out by other characters in story, but it has been noticed by us readers. Which is why this collage was formed:
! The sheer number of times she did it is kinda weird for a character who narratively wasn't supposed to be present.
- Once again, more questions than answers. The second act was preparing the stage for the eventual raid on Onigashima and Carrot's role (and initially Chopper's) was to hide from the view of Wano's citizens due to the "close minded" nature of the country. Her resurgence in prevalence in Act 3 is certainly a surprise since her role in Act 2 was close to nonexistent.
- The arc isn't even over yet, not even Act 3, and she just started her fight with Perospero (albeit alongside Wanda). She just returned to the spotlight again and more than likely is going to return again. It's not like she's not gonna show up beyond what we've seen.
- Once again, she's come back into prevalence in Act 3. She showed up at the port with the Straw Hats on their way to Onigashima, disguised with them into the Skull Dome, went on a rescue mission that ended up reconvening with everyone inside only for her to have her grudge match. Your question should be what was the reason for the redirection for her character to only have her get this fight with an antagonist not relevant in this arc?
If Oda does indeed ”have a plan” that Carrot gets a big, emotional, crew-joining moment at the end of the arc, why would he go about it this way? And I don’t mean “why didn’t Oda do exactly as I listed?”, more that, as the Swan Princess once said, “What else is there?”
The Dawn of the World. This solely brought to her attention and her attention alone back in Whole Cake Island during their escape from Big Mom at the last minute. Doing this for no reason and having this as narrative loose end for Carrot would contribute to it being nothing for her, and by proxy, Oda wasting panel time and space to readily address the significance behind. I speculate through much because I take Oda as a better writer than to just have it mean nothing for her involvement, whatever it may be.
If Wano is indeed about finalizing the crew before the home stretch of the manga and Carrot is the supposed missing puzzle piece, why give her so little to do before her big moment? Oda has consistently built to the big emotional catharsis of a crewmate joining by making them very prominent throughout the arcs prior to that moment, so how is this supposed approach for Carrot establishing such catharsis?
The biggest question is why Carrot at all. In the grand scheme of the narrative, Carrot is seemingly irrelevant. She has no narrative basis for her involvement in Whole Cake Island, never pushed the story along into territory yet explained or alluded to, and yet she's the most prevalent Mink with the Straw Hats and Oda has implemented her presence far higher than her leaders, her mentors, her guardian, and other well established characters, most of which are more relevant than her this arc. Understand I'm not talking about panel significance or presence, simply chapter presence. That said, if she's to be irrelevant, this confrontation with Perospero and singling her out from the Minks shouldn't be a thing at all.
And especially, If the angle is that Carrot is supposed to be a “real-time developing crewmate”, where she goes from a wide-eyed carefree stowaway to a crewmate-level motivated character, shouldn’t we then have spent the last 2½ years seeing her actually develop in real time, rather than supposedly “saving” her entire development for one big spoonful at the tail end of the arc, which has yet to materialize? New facets to her personality, history or goals, new attacks, new crewmate interactions could’ve been sprinkled throughout, there have been ample opportunities in Wano to keep her in the forefront of readers minds, but these haven’t been capitalized on.
Where was the motive to have Carrot in the story? To hype Sulong? Pekoms later did it. To develop a relation and be a buffer of influence for Chopper? Didn't need to happen, but Oda wanted to lay the foundation for their sibling relationship. Even set sail. She could have left Zou at any point in her life. Inuarashi, Nekomamushi, and Bepo have shown that their age was never a determining factor for leaving the back of the elephant, yet Carrot waited for Luffy and his crew to go on a mission to finally leave? She rarely engages or interacts with Luffy narratively besides following his every lead, immediately subordinating to his calls. It falls back to more questions than answers and Oda is the one who showed them, at least to those who support Carrot for becoming the next crew member. A lot of these questions mainly exist to explain "What was the point for Oda to do this for such a seemingly irrelevant character". Besides, the 3rd act has yet to conclude, match-up are still being made, and her conflict with Perospero has just been brought to attention and commenced. Such questions would be better suited when those are made.
If Carrot specifically is supposed to be a “real-time developing crewmate character”, isn’t this the worst possible approach to take? Surely, she should’ve gotten more relative paneltime in advance to her joining than a prospective crewmate who is more fully formed from the getgo, especially if she is the very last crewmember to join, and thus automatically more pressed for time than the veterans?
A lot of us agree that Carrot has been handled far worse than candidates in this thread, namely Yamato and even Tama. We have those same questions and skepticisms, too. It's not like we see Carrot as void of criticism. So yeah, another question without an answer unfortunately. The reason I speculate is being I want to know how Oda bridges the gaps between Carrot being notified of the Dawn of the World and foreshadowed confrontation with Perospero. We know the Dawn is important. Both the Mink Tribe and the Kozuki Clan await for it, but we don't know what. Not even Oden's current retainers, including Kinemon and Inuarashi:
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I know she had a bigger role in Whole Cake. Absolutely. No argument there. But the entire argument of “Why would this be the case is she were not to join” effectively render the subsequent 100 chapters irrelevant. Whole Cake (an arc where Carrot was a prominent supporting player at most, not the focal point) becomes a blank check of Crewmember Points Carrot can check at any time, even after falling into a pit exposure-wise for a literal 100 chapters- but these are the chapters supposedly ramping up to her big joining moment. If she’s supposed to join here, in Wano, her arc prominence is in completely the reverse order in terms of servicing an emotional payoff.
Or, to put it another way, if Oda is indeed still aiming this manga at the 12 year old casual fans – the kind of people who don’t know what a “kingsbird” is, and have not noticed the color of Carrots cape or the fact that she wears gloves and so on - and not older fans who spent much time perusing over and debating and theorizing over nitty gritty details spanning the entire 1000 chapter series…
Is Carrot, in her current form, going to register as being dramatically groomed to join in an extensive way? Is she at the forefront of their minds in the way Oda worked to make prior crewmembers?
In her current form as of now? Nope. I don't think she's been developed in an extensive way that so far has groomed her towards joining the Sunny. That said, she does have a personal narrative playing out, despite it not being shown nor being put at the forefront and a lot of things can immediately change from here to the resolution of Kaido's defeat. Yamato was mentioned around 25 chapters ago, made her appearance around 18 chapters ago, and became a complete game changer in this discussion. There is potentially more to address.
Is it all supposedly about making Carrot joining a “surprise”? Which would be different from the surprise of Robin joining, as in not “a prominent enemy from the prior arc joins out of nowhere!” but “this character who has been pretty anonymous for the last 3 years – as in, she’s very low on the Character Prominence Totem Pole in this arc - suddenly joined”?
Or Is the value of the handling of the supposed “Carrot plan” just in the stoking the speculation machine itself? In which case, again, how does that serve Carrot herself? Why not go all in and make the teasing explicit in this case, like with the setup for the CP9 arc being a literal game of “guess the new shipwright”? Or when the crew go to an island of doctors with a sick Nami, in order to make the readers play “guess the doctor crewmate”? Oda knows how to play this game, but it requires putting the pieces into the present story, and not in promotional material or 100 chapters into the past.
But as of now, I do concede she's not developed enough to officially join the crew. Though I do speculate she can easily just stow away again. Nothing has stopped her from traveling with the Straw Hats so far, what reason has shown up in the story so far that has proven otherwise?
The Dawn of the World was brought to our attention from Pedro in Chapter 849 and subtly hinted throughout the series how the world of One Piece is heading towards an imminent war with the World Government that will fundamentally change everything that is the status quo. We know Carrot is aware of this, its on panel. Those are present story elements, not in promotional material or 100 chapters in the past. The current narrative. There's more to extrapolate, but that's only through speculation.
Whatever the case, if Carrot somehow does join, its’ gonna be coming off an arc that has so far done less with her than a vast majority of the arcs cast, including the senior crewmembers themselves. That just seems like such a crummy way to welcome a new member aboard, and certainly none of the prior Straw Hats have been subjected to this.
I don't disagree with that sentiment currently. That said, look at Yamato. Barely foreshadowed, not even made addressed in story till 25 chapters ago, and now has more narrative reason to follow Luffy off Wano than both Carrot and Tama. Carrot has existed close to 200 chapters in the story and Oda has yet to justify why she's still here or has this character arc laid out in front of her that he rarely addresses. That said, my speculation is based on how her story will progress moving past these questions that will inevitably be addressed. Most of the posts i remember in the past were of mainly petty things to state Carrot's insignificance, but Oda wouldn't waste time with a character that has been shown in story Top 20 that hasn't narratively made a case to be around that long for no reason. It falls back to waiting, which is unfortunate.
Of course this is all operating under the base assumption that being a crewmember is a huge character privilege and a big deal, but given the approach of current One Piece to handling its cast -and crewmembers specifically- that assumption might be seriously outdated.
Still, Oda is still clearly capable of putting characters in the spotlight for an extended period of time, even in Wano…Carrot just happens to not be one of them.
Carrot has a narrative to address, it's been stated by me and many other. Often consistently over the years, including from me to you. It's just constantly hand waved to say it means nothing because Oda never immediately answered it. For example:
- BOTH the Kozuki Cland and Mink Tribe await the Dawn of the World. We don't know the extent and history of the relationship between these 2 factions. Oden clearly showed he didn't know but through Inu and Neko, we knew their main motivation for traveling to Wano was to validate that…and Oden had no clue that was true till he was taken to the Whale Tree with the Roger Pirates. Clearly there's more to them than we know.
- @Monquito and @Kira brought this to my attention about 3 years ago near the conclusion of Whole Cake Island, but the Minks will eventually have to abandon Zuneisha and he was roaming the world of One Piece because of a millennium long punishment. Momo also had a conversation with Zuneisha prior to leaving for Wano, meaning there's more to discuss for both the Kozuki Clan and the Mink Tribe. Knowing through Yamato that Momonosuke will also be involved in bringing the Dawn of the World lends more questions to what it actually means and how Carrot's inevitable understanding of it will lead credence to whatever action Oda has planned for her moving past this arc.
I've said it before and I'll say it again: just because we can't see the narrative doesn't mean it doesn't exist. I've been patient, yet admittedly disappointed with Carrot because she has existed close to 5 years in the story, has rising conflict with an antagonist not related to the arc, and became aware of an important facet of the One Piece story without in-narrative explanation why. The general dismissal of the community can continue and I'll concede to cons against Carrot, including presence, but I'll never adhere to disingenuous remarks about her character because people don't want to acknowledge that Carrot, as it stands, is a narrative anomaly.