Here's a thread for discussing the "WTF happened to Usopp as a character?" debate. I don't care whether some guys here end up flaming each other, but please…if you indeed end up flaming each other, just keep it in this thread and don't take it personally.
Let me start.
Now, I like One Piece. I like the whole deal about the lost history, the rich world of the Grand Line, the gray area between what is good and evil in terms of being a marine, a pirate or in-between. I also liked some fight scenes, some humorous scenes, and other stuff.
However, one single moment in OP made me hate Oda a lot.
Don't get me wrong. The recent developments in the story bring back my faith in Oda as a good storyteller. But I still can't keep my mind off Usopp's er..."development".
Okay...lemme get this straight. We get a bad-ass fight between Usopp and Luffy over Merry. What's the point? Lots of people thought it was to show that Usopp could indeed fight like the others...but the more you think about it, it was more like a fight of principles. When you look at it, Luffy could have ended it anytime but maybe he was playing the "But no, Usopp...you're wrong. You need to let Merry sleep." part.
Forward to CP9 fights. Usopp debuts as Sogeking and has a new weapon. Burns down the gov't flag, shoots Spandam a bit and...er...gives a cheerleading to Luffy during his fight against Lucci. (The whole "Stand up and fight! Let's go home together!"
Am I the only one who's seeing what's wrong here?
Out of all the Strawhats, Usopp has been the most annoying because you can't make out whether he's suppossed to be a comic relief character or a serious character. The other guys have clear-cut moments when they are serious and when they are comic relief characters. Hell, when Zoro was fighting marines, right after Usopp's "cheearleading" speech in the Enies Lobby saga, Usopp was shown "helping" Zoro by doing the 'scratch your fingernails on a blackboard' attack. I mean...what the fuck is that? One panel, you have your character doing some serious motivational shit to Luffy, the next you revert him to his stoogies-face again?
Seems to me that Oda does not know what the hell he will do with Usopp. I mean, even freaking Nami got a break and showed a bit of bad-assery during her fight with Califa. She has a method of fighting that is cleanly developed throughout the manga.
I'm not asking for Usopp to be ultra-badass. I'm just wondering, "what the hell is his purpose in the team?" He's suppossed to be a sniper but after the Mr 4 fight in the Alabasta arc, he has not grown up in one bit. Not one. The whole Luffy vs. Usopp thing was like "Luffy - 1, Usopp - 0" to me because it showed that Luffy was right and Usopp was wrong and it seems like he's back to square one.
Another thing. During Merry's death...why wasn't Usopp the one who gave the funeral to Merry? She was HIS ship. Sure, he was highlighted along with the others, but it was Luffy who stood out the most. I don't really get it. Even if he's the captain of the ship, shouldn't the owner be the one to put her to "sleep"?
If you guys say "Well, Usopp maybe can't do it. He can't burn his own ship, that's why Luffy does it" well then it just proves my point that the whole Luffy vs. Usopp fight did not make sense. That whole fight was, IMO, shown in order to make Usopp understand that it was time for Merry to go. If he cannot burn his own ship...if he cannot let him go, then Usopp has not learned or accepted anything and can't move on.
Chapter after chapter, we're expecting new attacks from Luffy and co. We're also expecting character and history development. What the hell are we expecting out of Usopp? He's not, in any way, being geared up as a threat in sharpshooting and him being comic relief/cowardly member is getting reaaaaaally stale and annoying.
Your thoughts?