@Greg:
The following isn't a mean attempt to be facetious. It's to get you to consider what Oda's been doing and how he's done it.
I would agree that the BB pirates don't seem like a threat.
After all, we've only seen them pop up a few times in the story. Imagine if that was real life and these low-level snots just appear out of nowhere as if they actually mattered.
They were nobodies. They had very little backing. Sure, one has a fancy name and was part of a big crew but he's far, far, far outshined by his 'father' figure and former captain.
And then they just all of a sudden show up outta the blue and start taking down a backwater kingdom?
Or turning in an insanely powerful pirate whose 'existence poses a threat to the world' just to get closer to his goal?
And all the cray-cray stuff they do? Like throw away govt. protection/titles by playing with fate?
And before you know it, these backwater pirates are, lolwut, now considered an Emperor Crew???
….any of this sound familiar?
Of course they don't seem like a threat bc Oda has been handling them exactly the same way as he's been handling the Strawhats in the world. The difference is, we have the Strawhat's pov. The same notoriety is following BB's crew, we just don't get that end of it bc Oda doesn't want us to see it yet. Ane frankly, beyone BB, it would be stupid to do otherwise. Fans prove this time and again. Give them someone crazy powerful to look forward to and they will never enjoy what they're currently reading.
Instead, he's threaded hints of how he can later explain how threatening they were. My particular fav is probably how Avalo is likely Kaido's former King. There's stuff in there that, in retrospect, Oda can expand on and show us how threatening they are. The sacrifice here was Jesus. That poor dude... His debut demanded that he be taken down a few pegs. Whether he was holding something back, or whether he received an augmentation since remains to be seen, but make no mistake, that was a calculated fake-out if one's counting on that as a litmus-test of BB's crew.
It's all...part of the plaaaan.
Thank you for the response. I also thought about alvaro being kaidos n1 before, altho the timeline makes it iffy.
Anyways the point I was making is not that blackbeard will not be a great villain, I said that he would even be a great final villain but the story from my point of view is not heading that direction at all. Here are a few points I’d like to make:
1. The WG has been established for 800 (possibly 900 years) henceforth their role in the one piece world is bigger then anyone else connecting them to the great ancient war. While Blackbeard is just a pirate that will come and wither with time.
2. The whole promise or joy boy and the poneglyphs that connects the D clan to the celestial dragon, their sworn enemy as emphasized by the dressrosa arc.
3. The ancient weapons being born at a specific time not connected to Blackbeard.
4. Roger and his crew arriving too soon and not being able to face the WG, again bb was a child at the time.
I could go on but the control the WG has been exerting over the world with stuff like the great cleansing is just much bigger then any single pirate crew, the shs alone couldnt possibly face the WG either so the RE will most likely join them in battle.
I could see the BB pirates take the over the WG as a cheap trick as he does, but I think the feud is more between the D’s and the cestial dragons not D’s against D’s, even whitbeard mentioned that hes not a D that roger is waiting for, meaning there need to be a D that will challenge the entire world.
On top of that the whole “trust” the WG has built around the world, and the whole control of world politics and rejuvination of their older members through bonney is just way bigger then BB.
Again I might be wrong, but it seems to me that the whole final ending of the story will be the prophesized boy against an evil ancient government.
Also fun fact, bb was introduced exactly 10 chapters before the WG, chapter 223 compared to chapter 233, maybe simbolising the defeat of the first quickly followed by the 2.
Again time will tell. Thanks for reading.