seems like the oden way to just ditch wano and explore the world then

perfect!

I'll be real, if perona/carrot/gancock/pedro explicitly stated that their dream was to sail with luffy and conveniently knew his true dream i'm sure their supporters will probably be arguing that they would be a lock-in for now (i wouldn't even disagree)

Like you need to do big mental gymnastics to argue that no, this character who has been steadily built up isn't going to sail and they actually just want to play bodyguard for the rest of their life

Honestly putting aside the extreme cherrypicking some people are still doing in the thread, Oda still has a long way to really seal yamato's crewmateship imo. Like sure, there's a ton of red flags that typically point towards main character (huge focus from introduction, has repeatedly stated desire to go abroad with luffy, knows the protag's true dream, unique enough design for an oda-female design and the fact he made effort to make him look distinct after first reveal) but the key things needed to sell the character to viewers is barely fleshed out compared to the other crewmates.

We've only gotten a single chapter in regards to yamato's flashback, their full dream is still some vague "sail out to sea" (yes i know jinbei didn't really have his explicitly stated, but it wasn't well done either) and all the moments for him are really touch-and-go (yamato and luffy's very brief teamup, Ace's meetup, power showcase). I'm still confident we'll get some form of that sooner or later, but my biggest fear is that given how oda has botched the writing recently, he's going to end up screwing that bit up too.

Other than the issue of ash being the face of the anime, there's the totally-not small issue of the electric rat not being in the front centre of it. Imo that's the dealbreaker - pikachu will always be the pokemon face of the franchise and removing ash is the equivalent of removing pika.
Sure, people raised the example of digimon where agumon was only around for a couple of seasons, but marketing + pokemon being a way bigger deal than digimon probably dictates that pika be a big part of that series specifically.
And didn't jibanyan always had front centre spotlight in yokai watch too?

Shiryu using the fruit for underhanded victories (for example, pulling a backstab on mihawk when he was on the verge of defeat) doesn't have the same impact as using the diamond fruit for me. Yea sure, both are scummy ways to steal wins from "stronger opponents" (assuming mihawk is stronger than him), but the diamond fruit sets a benchmark for zoro to truly surpass mihawk by proxy. If he can cut diamond shiryu, that by itself is an achievement that mihawk himself couldn't do in the fight and makes him worthy of achieving the title and avenging the former.

However if shiryu just happens to use the fruit to take cheap dirty shots at mihawk and win, zoro isn't really surpassing him in terms of strength or all the conventional stuff that a swordsman should have? If zoro wins its because he happened to be more capable of countering the invisible shots and not anything else? The victory doesn't have that much of a satisfying ring to it compared to the get harder fruit to me.
That said i'm more than willing to wait and see how it goes. Oda could do something interesting with it and/or show shiryu being close to, if not almost equal to mihawk. It's not as much of a hangup than the nika fruit for me.

Probably easier to accept that oda's plan is not as airtight as many of us assumed and that the man himself can be susceptible to retcons and poor storytelling (sometimes). It's the best way to explain the whole "ehhh we don't know that the gomu fruit is the legendary fruit" boo-boo that's happening now (same for imu)

@theackwardstation:

If you're seeking for answers why these events could enhance the story, I think you should wait because the story can go different ways, so it's premature to make a thematic analysis of Oda's personal take on these themes. What folks appreciate in this chapter is the sense of awe they get from reading it, or the pleasure for aesthetic and poetry, or simply the mechanical satisfaction of seeing important events unfold in a story. It's electrifying! Besides, these tropes are popular too…

What you can do for now is start thinking about these concepts in general beyond a superficial understandment -- researching them, reading mythology, etc -- so you'll have more baggage to digest the story. After all, it's inexorable that all interpretations are made from personal references, biases, morals and knowledge -- and ours are much different than Oda's. By the way, people love to point out all the mythological references Oda put in the story, but people like to think about them as mere easter eggs and cool visuals, and ignore that these things may have significance for the author beyond the surface. But that's the author's choice to place his work alongside the tradition where he wants it to belong.

...

Personally, I'm so used to the idea of Luffy being the spiritual successor of Joy Boy that it's the only way the story makes sense to me. It's not only all the foreshadowing and prophecies, but the storytelling itself. The narration boxes in One Piece are like an ancient poet (oh Muse!) singing the story of a great Hero or a great King, traditionally mystified to be of a higher order to justify his greatness, like it's a tautological correlation for old poets. That's aesthetic, metaphor, and the mythification of virtues – that's art! The craft is that Luffy sets out on his journey to become King, but a playful misdirection named Pirate King. Nevertheless, the more we discover about the quest of finding the One Piece and about the Ancient Kingdom, the more the Pirate King becomes the purpose of liberating the world. I understand that, mechanically, anyone can arrive at Laugh Tale and become Pirate King (and do nothing), but this is a story, so it also functions on a thematic level – and here we see the narrative fusion of the mechanical with the deontological, thus the Pirate King is the Just King. (That's why I like theories of Black Beard getting to Laugh Tale first, since even though he accomplishes the mechanical goal, he only becomes a false king.) Every arc of One Piece feels like a construction of the ideals that make Luffy the Just King – especially the stretch from Romance Dawn to Skypiea --, and the values that make him prevail over any villain in real battles of will. Ages before the timeskip, the language of the story portrayed Luffy as a light that liberates the world from darkness. Even sheer luck conspires for Luffy's success all the time – and that's regardless of the story calling it destiny or not, although characters comment on it every time. In the words of Woop Slap, "is it his dream or his destiny?". Meanwhile, the character many see as the final boss – Black Beard -- is always talking about fate since his introduction. And all of this is rather mythical, especially on a meta level thinking about our history and the tradition of Epic stories.

What's ingenious is that Luffy already does on his journey the mission that the Pirate King is meant to do after learning everything in Laugh Tale. When two separate things (Luffy and Pirate King) are thematically so equivalent to the point of being conceptually inseparable, and finally they crash together at the end despite the theoretical "odds" in-universe (Luffy finds the One Piece), this is the definition of Destiny. You can't measure it empirically, you can't see the forces of the universe acting, but it's the human abstraction of extreme "coincidences" and special "circunstances". The writing is just accepting this concept by speaking it out loud. Moreover, it's the self-awareness of the story – and also its moral, a devir of sorts.

At last, nothing of what I said negates other themes in the story, like freedom. I just feel like people don't know how to contextualize other themes and facts once fate comes to the table. Which leads me to my next point.

…

I don't see much real criticism other than strict distaste for this direction... which it totally valid, btw, nobody has to like it since enjoyment always comes from personal biases, and that's how it should be. I really want to emphasize that nobody is wrong for hating it, but we should acknowledge that this debate is a moral conundrum instead of a mere storytelling critique. The issue is that most of this stuff are meaningless concepts for most people nowadays, even inadequate and outdated, especially in the West – so some people feel like "what's the point of this shit?".

What people crave for in stories is for the stories to reinforce their cultural myths and ideals – to inspire them in their beliefs. And what could those values and myths be today? For example, from rags to riches, freedom (the blockbuster version of the principle), individualism (your success is only your own), equality (not only of 'state rights', but ontological equality), equality of opportunities (which is the theoretical "meritocracy"), scientism (even in fantasy), secularism, etc… and these principles are all good to me -- I'm not criticizing¹. Therefore, the next step is projecting these values into the story as much as possible to extract personal meaning.

Thus, while One Piece seemed """ambiguous""", readers could ignore the contradictions and still find those ideals in the story. However, now Joy Boy returned like a wrecking ball, which apparently crashes all of our modern principles. I mean, Luffy is special, priviledged, destined, and all of this is kinda religious/spiritual too, and there's even the possibility of reincarnation. It just feels like the antithesis of our morals and beliefs, right? Well yes, but actually no.

We can still talk about freedom and effort in One Piece, no doubt about it. We can also think about fate under different angles (for example, I like the concept of Karma). It's very clear that Will moves Destiny in One Piece – and there are old Wills at play in this story which shape destiny all the time. Besides, you can still find inspiration in the story, or just admire the craft. Don't forget that stories are metaphors, not reality. But, of course, a deeper analysis of all of this will depends on how Oda tells the story from now on.

¹ I'm also "westerner" (latino, actually), leftist, a science-dude, atheist, secular, etc.

So basically you're arguing that people align beliefs to what they want to see happen in those stories. Which may be true sometimes, and i've enjoyed stuff like LoTR because of its themes, but given how oda has always wrote the One Piece as something that many people have risked their lives for despite the costs, and having it all be thrown away because of how specific the prophecies does stink up the overall message that oda has, in no small part, being building up to (unless you think all the people chasing after the OP are foolish when they were locked from the quest to begin with).
Like even if the themes of destiny and whatnot are prevalent in one piece, the opposite that freedom and free will are also very prevalent ideas consistently developed since the start of the series (and not some made up preference some of us have), and having the series take a sharp dive into the former at the detriment of the latter does hurt your narrative at the end.

And how does luffy being the hero equate to him having all the symbols be granted to him on a platter? My statement wasn't about the criticism lobbied at this revelations, but how does all these sacred icons being given to luffy enriches the themes of luffy having to struggle to get there and/or how he always saves the day because of it.
It's one thing for luffy to be a spiritual successor to the joyboy title, its another to realize he has all the pieces of the ancient kingdom from the start.
The former is absolutely not served by the special fruit/hat/one-in-a-million haki/heritage and the latter doesn't need these blatant comparisons unless you're a 6 year old schoolkid (and even i don't think they're that daft not to see how luffy will, in fact, manage to save wano irregardless of whether he has a chosen one fruit to begin with).

https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/tdjtni/russia_has_requested_military_assistance_from/

Supposedly US intelligence has picked up indications that russia has requested some form of assistance from china? Could be a hint from the US to china not to interfere before the upcoming diplomat talks, but both china/russia has denied the claims. We'll have to see, but i really don't think china can just sit on the fence and throw shit at both sides for any longer.

Putting aside all the (valid) criticisms about the direction that oda is heading towards…i'm still trying to figure out why, or how this even enhances the story in any way other than vague plot? Like, i go to social media and the people cheering all these recent revelations are mainly headed around "oh wow this is so exciting, what's going to happen" but its all in a very superfluous way? A lot of it just feels like getting excited because of something unexpected or "grand" that's happening rather than something that's linked to any themes or ideals of the story, and even if its meant to flesh out the macro story of one piece, it's done in such a unsubtle way in how its pointing "luffy's the messiah! He has all the icons/tokens from the ancient kingdom!!!!"

Does oda think that he needs to be as explicit as possible to the audience on how luffy is going to be the chosen one? Somehow i got the feeling that even 6 year old schoolboys aren't that daft at knowing luffy will be the one deserving of one piece and doesn't need to be slammed in the head on this?

Smart guy, he's milking it for all it's worth for the next election. Not that its not worth the effort, but baldy seems to have doubled down on his dumbass invasion of ukraine.

Seems like they're mobilizing for a hail mary push against kyiv soon?

I've been reading reports regarding the fallout from oil and gas sanctions and seems like putin is trying to play a game of chicken by threatening to cut off gas to europe?

If anything i hope europe realizes the importance of energy independence and seek alternative sources to avoid overreliance (like, ahem, the current shitstorm). Especially germany who seems to have put too much stock on russia gas anyway.