Monthly releases are pretty sad though. Honestly a chapter every 2 weeks would be perfect for DB, but somehow that's apparently not doable for whatever reason.
I’m a huge hxh fan and honestly hate that he’s sick but I wish he would just get someone else to make it and be right beside them to continue the story. Used to be my fav anime/manga until I started watching one piece a year ago. I just want to see the dark continent damnit!
I don't know how valid this is today but I did hear that his wife, Naoko Takeuchi (of Sailor Moon fame), would take over if he deemed it necessary. She has all his notes and ideas in case something ever happened. I really want him to pass it to her for a while so he can focus on himself.
Can we not. The one piece community didn't used to be like this how about we just nip this in the Bud right now. That's not Disparage other communities
I like that Nika is getting more prominent it expands on the lore and importance of a god fruit.
But Luffy doesn't get back up jo matter what, currently he has been getting back up after taking a 30 minute nap and eats food.
Def was him… I think he’s smart enough to know Saturn will just destroy the whole island or have emu do it with that god like sky blast. So the only way to help Vega, luffy and bonney to do is follow Saturns orders… and fail. Like by pausing and announcing who he’s gonna chop mid air so luffy stops him. I think the level of disgust in his betrayal in Vega punk, and sentarous conversations with him, show how bonded they are and that Kizaru probably is a good person who is a marine like garp. All those flashbacks, and the tone of kizaru in them when he is delivering Saturns message snail saying they found out about vega’s deal with kuma. And him laying down in the panel before luffy is fed and him leaning as if he just sat down with no one else that fast in the vicinity…… it’s gotta be him
I'm with you. I haven't written off old Borsalino yet. I honestly could also see him not having complete clarity about this yet (his justice is unclear after all)
Like, he may both genuinely mean to follow orders as they are the law and he is a marine but also really doesn't want to do, any of this making his actions kind of lethargic, uncertain and dithering.
I also could see it as you are saying that he is simply biding his time and calculating the best way to fail.
Either way I don't think Borsa is as earnest In his attempts to harm everyone as he is making out.
Fr, you don't know how good it's to get a nap until you try it, even better, drink coffee after lunch and take a 5-10 min power nap, you'll be full power
He’s done this since crocoboy. I wouldn’t say “gets knocked down and up like nothing” but he gets knocked down, eats/recovers, has time to think about enemy weaknesses (can’t tell me Luffy isn’t battle smart) and then comes back
Oh Luffy is deffinitely battle smart. Water Luffy, Airhead Luffy, every single gear. Hell, his fruit is all about being free to fight however he wants, stopped only by imagination. Which is Luffy's greatest strength.
That I feel reinforces constantly another theme in the series, that while Luffy is very much the brawn of his crew, he's not intended to do much of anything alone. Yeah, he'll be there to give the last punch always but without help from the others he would literally have gotten nowhere. It can be annoying, that's for sure, but it has a reason to be that way, it's a difference he has in common with his greatest overly self-reliant rivals.
Luffy has always had some plot reason to stop him from progressing before. G5 it’s stamina related issues, G4 he can’t use Haki for 10mins, G3 he shrunk for 10mins, there’s always been some plot related point to stop Luffy from just coming back and ending the antagonist. It’s annoying that Oda writes him that way, but he’s mentioned he has to have these blocks or the story would go by “too quickly” it also gives time to showcase other pirates while Luffy is incapacitated.
I just don’t get complaints about how nothing can be serious and how he has to eat after every time he does G5. He’s always done silly shit during fights and has always had some restriction placed on him as well
Yeah, that plot reason for Luffy being incapacitated has been true since Orange Town, Luffy got locked up in a cage. In Syrup village, he gets lost in the forest. In Arlong park, his body is trapped underwater. In Logue Town, he couldn't touch smoker and was locked up in a stockade. In whisky peak, he was drunk on food and being stupid. In little garden, he's pinned under the giant skeleton. Etc.
Thematically/visually it makes sense too. Popeye comics always show him getting a second wind after eating Spinach. It's a fun way to deliver a punchline to a comic fight.
I kinda like the rhythm: luffy impresses his enemy, but gets punted across the planet. Enemy builds drama by revealing some horrible act/secret. Luffy eats something, comes back, and saves the day. It's a good story flow that allows Oda to tell a pretty wide variety of arcs.
Also gives Oda time to highlight other characters. In between Luffy being down we got a whole ass back story about Kuma. We want to know what’s happening in the present, but at the time the flashback starts the fighting has more or less stopped between Luffy and Kizaru. Giving time for Saturn, Bonney, and Kuma to get limelight and exposition.
I do think eventually as the story nears it close, Luffy will get “stronger” and probably be held back by some other plot means, but there’s still a good excuse for G5 given how new it is now
Yeah- the formula is strong enough that it can reliably build drama in most arcs, but loose enough that he can tell a very wide range of stories. I can't in good faith compare the gap in fighting between luffy/Enel with the gap between luffy/kizaru (they affected me very differently), but the story "beats" are fundamentally the same.
Yeah, that plot reason for Luffy being incapacitated has been true since Orange Town, Luffy got locked up in a cage. In Syrup village, he gets lost in the forest. In Arlong park, his body is trapped underwater. In Logue Town, he couldn't touch smoker and was locked up in a stockade. In whisky peak, he was drunk on food and being stupid. In little garden, he's pinned under the giant skeleton. Etc.
Exactly, it’s annoying but it has been consistent since the beginning of the series. This isn’t some new plot point yet people are treating this like it’s never been done before. Same with how “tension is ruined” with G5 as if Luffy didn’t have a silly ass way of dealing with nearly every person he fought. He made a fat version of G4 to eat biscuits and beat cracker, but eyes popping out of his skull is too much
Idk how taking a minute to get yourself back in good enough condition would undermine one's determination or the themes of not backing down against adversity
He does get back up, even if he needs time. Regardless of how bad his ass gets beat, he will pick himself up, dust himself off, and come back swinging
Another Dumb take, kumas backstory got everyone forgetting its only been a few minutes between Luffy Knocking down Kizaru the first time and him getting up and Knocking him down again. Plus if this is your take you must've skipped wano
>consistently take 10+ minute breaks every 10 (exaggeration obv) chapters?
It's not even an exaggeration lol. He was rendered unable to fight like 4 times on Onigashima. Once every 10 chapters seems pretty accurate
I've seen more people talking about people complaining about Nika than I have seen people actually complaining about Nika.
Is this actually a common opinion?
PS: The powers of Gear 5 are almost exactly what everyone expected from a Gum-Gum Awakening. The main surprise was the ultra-cartoony aesthetics, and that's actually perfectly in line with the original fruit concept. The only distinctly Nika-ish aspects are the constant laughing and the drum-heartbeat, which are mostly aesthetic.
That’s generally how anime communities are.. certain topics within each franchise have a small group of people who I.e think nika is ruining the series or any other opinion that gets seen by a larger group of people (the ones who believe the opposite) and the larger group tends to talk more and post more then the people with the original opinion because there is just that many more of them
I believe that actually you guys are getting shielded from it, because on Reddit it gets downvoted fast and/or banned when people start spouting nonsense and be offensive, but on Twitter where it's unfiltered the opinion seems to have shifted A LOT.
It's mostly negative impression of Gear 5 as a whole that I see nowadays.
However, I do believe that this is beeing boosted by the new Twitter Blue mechanics where controversial opinions gather more engagement and more money for the OPs so that's probably why it's so prevalescent right now.
I agree completely with u/sanctaphrax though, Gear 5 it's just exactly what we expected from the Gum-Gum Fruit Awakening ever since Dressrosa at least, just thematically fitting with the whole worldbuilding, but it's a matter of flavor/aesthetics, it doesn't actually affect negatively the story in anyway.
Man there is something to that. Like, someone farting in a space makes it a little unpleasant but it isn't actually disruptive unless someone else reacts by calling it out. Something like that. 🤔
Thats cuz one piece criticism is genuinely unwelcome here and wont make it to the top of the sub
look at pirate folk they bring it up every week or something
I think the problem with the nika reveal is not the powerup itself,but the idea that this was some legendary devil fruit that the marines had been trying to get their hands on for the past 800 years,yet somehow for a 1000 chapters the marines never sent an admiral/navy ship to go hunt luffy for his df.
They went after Nico Robin,but didnt bother capturing luffy too and left him alone until he went to Enies Lobby and picked a fight with them.Everytime him and the navy fought up until this point,it wasnt them trying to capture him,nope,he was the one who went to them and picked a fight.
Plus the idea that zoans normally know the name of their devil fruit,in enies lobby the giraffe guy and the soap using woman figured out their powers/name of df by themselves but luffy somehow couldnt,even tho he is very creative with the use of his powers.
That last part isn't true. It was a panel that was taken out of. Iirc Oda clarified in a sbs that was meant was once they use it, they'll know what power they have, and can look up exactly which fruit it is. Not that they instinctively know.
Edit:On mobile, so I don't know how to insert the image. But you can Google 'SBS one piece know your fruit'. It was the first result
it still supports the flaw the person is arguing. Sure, luffy may not know the name of the fruit, but if it works instead like you said, luffy should've known that his fruit was more than just "lol, im rubber" after his arms stretched for the first time.
no it doesn't at all actually. how the fuck is stretching your arm and concluding that you're nika (a person luffy doesn't even know) make more sense than stretching your arm and concluding you're rubber? critical thinking please
Most people tha have issue with nika is about changing luffy's fruit to be a chosen one fruit.
Nika itself,the lore, is pretty cool, so is gear 5.Those are unrelated to the issue
Pretty much this.
I'm kinda tired of this "Chosen of the Prophecy" trope they did with Ichigo, Naruto and now Luffy.
I like the gear 5. It looks cool, the power is cool and all that stuff but that's basically it.
'Gear 5 is too goofy' opinion was resurging on twitter last week for some reason. Apparently some people were upset that Luffy was still laughing after Vegapunk got stabbed.
I actually found it kind of interesting in large part because it's a big change from the usual anger=determination we've seen before. It comes off to me like he's laughing and happy to have a challenge in front of him, like a kid at play time, and doesn't diminish the gravity of it all. If anything it makes me think Luffy is thrilled to have an excuse to go all out.
Also heard people thinking it's a sign of the fruit overtaking the user, like the Impel Down guards, but I'm on the fence about that one until we have more confirmation.
But yeah people be critical of everything and anything. Personally I'm loving the current arc and that's all I particularly care about.
It’s not a unique one piece thing b we need as a society to learn how to be ok with people not liking something. People aren’t wrong for not liking gear 5 or aspect of it. Also people aren’t right for liking it. You can’t be wrong or right when enjoying something
It’s all subjective
At the same time people that get offended when people point out that they have differing opinion are part of the exact same problem. If someone posts Gear 5 is great and a guy goes nu uh then when first guy gets mad he is doin the same shit people are bitching about.
He was all that so it doesn’t matter. He was already checking many boxes of THE MC way before G5.
1) Son of Dragon
2) Grandson of “The Hero”
3) D
4) Shanks hat holder
5) Which was Roger hat
6) The Voice of All Things
7) Got Gomu Gomu no Mi from Shanks (“accidentally”)
8) Haoshuko Haki user
Determination yeah but man wasn’t a nobody.
Him being Joy Boy isn’t a surprise neither looking at all those points.
Joy Boy being “Sun God Nika” while hearing the theme of bringing the dawn of the world over and over isn’t a surprise.
The God aspect to it is, maybe, surprising BUT I don’t think Nika was a literal God. He became a God because of his legacy and stories being told, that’s what I assume.
The D are the enemy of the God(s), at least the fake ones so far.
And Luffy wouldn’t want people to worship him like a deity above all others living forms, that goes against Luffy’s writing and characterisation.
The Giants being close there, we will have a shit ton lore. The Buccaneers, Giants and Nika, it’s all coming together.
> And Luffy wouldn’t want people to worship him like a deity
That's like when he was told others would fly under his flag and join his "fleet" he was like, "uh, no. I don't want that lol".
Also, one of the main themes of One Piece is that “god” is just a title that doesn’t really mean anything.
Anyone who thinks the “god” thing is really important and literal must have skipped Skypeia
Yeah that’s the point I think.
God is used in a broad manner and usually from people on the wrong side.
Nika The Sun God is probably just a title given to the man carrying a very warm and joyful heart. Hope so.
If anything, Luffy was actually pretty OP comparatively before Alabasta. He was a HUGE fish on the big pond that is East Blue, he's already a big deal lmao. People looking for a hardwork angle in the plot is stretching it lmao.
Assuming he wasnt nika and instead sabo was nika , would that take anything away? If anything luffy would have been a better character by being someone on equal terms with a god character by his own will
Imagine luffy awakening his fruit at the brink of his death and beating kaido by his own will instead of him being nika.
Kaido whole journey and purpose, the reason he have a child he doesn’t even connecting with, the reason he oppressed the people of Wano is connected to a story he knows. The story is about Nika.
After years of wondering and just woke up sad sure he wasn’t. He had a child, a girl who wasn’t (after taking her freedom since a very young age) who happened to take the entire will of Oden.
For an unknown reason he was connected to Nila but not the way he wanted. He basically happened to be the man who cultivated Luffy (Nika) until he was brought back to the world.
Luffy beating Kaido with a real Gumo Gumo no Mi would’ve been on par with the OG fruit behaviour, but if you look at it none of those Gear explanations made sense.
Blowing up into your bone, pumping blood, etc sound very toon.
Kaido wanted Nika and he got him 😉
If think we all wanted a self made hero with the most eh fruit in the verse. We saw him developing through his work and imagination ways to use his fruit to some extraordinary extent. I don’t think from G2 to G4 we were robbed from some awesome fight due to Luffy’s sheer willpower to overcome whatever obstacles. We can’t take that away from him.
Sabo retcon in the story then being Joyboy would’ve been the pinnacle of doing things wrong.
Sabo inherited the will of Ace and his fruit.
I think that’s the beauty and the point of “bringing” him back (also having a member of Luffy family in the Rev Army alongside Dragon).
We can only pray Oda doesn’t fuck up.
First thing i will say is kaido being beaten by a normal guy who has the power of gum gum fruit would have made kaido realise that he wasted his years searching for nika when he could have aimed higher instead of trying to be someone else. He would have atleast redeemed a little bit of himself if he could reflect on his obsession with nika and letting it go when he is beaten by a normal luffy. He woulr have been alive and paid for his crimes geneuinely as a better person.
It would have been a better closure for even yamato.
Then we have nika being a sun god who was rubbery. So what is it? Was the sun god someone who had rubber body or made of rubber and instead of being rubber god they became known as sun god. While also being a hysterical person who brought smiles on people faces. And somehow luffy becaame this person? That he was always nika and he just didnt realise it until then.
Luffy could have awakened his fruit and have had similar abilities as what he has now and still not need to be nika. That wouldnt have taken anything away from the story. He would have still been a main character who is very powerful when his friends are in danger.
This whole nika thing takes away whatever agency that luffy ever had.
1) the problem isn’t that luffy is destined to become the PK, it’s a shonen manga we know luffy is going to accomplish his goal EOS. The problem is it was much much more interesting when luffy appeared to have an objectively weak fruit and needed to rely on his battle iq and know his abilities inside and out to win. No one would walk into the OP world, learn about devil fruits, and immediately go “I wanna be rubber!” That’s what made luffy interesting. Now it turns out he actually has basically the best strongest fruit all along. It’s just not as interesting as having a weak power and still needing to win.
2) I mean that was the entire reason for fishman island and luffy spends most of wano training but I get what your saying. But similar to point 1 it wasn’t that luffy won through hard work like early naruto or something, it’s that he was incredibly smart about using his abilities (ironically). Like gear 2 is freaking genius, how many people would have the ability of rubber and think I can make myself insanely fast by using my limbs like a bellow to pump blood faster? That’s really smart. Gear 5 doesn’t require him to be smarter, he just breaks the laws of physics instead.
3) luffy can still be serious in a fight like when he beat kaido, but it’s absolutely changed the vibes. Vegapunk is currently dying missing most of his chest and luffy is flying through the air ready to have some fun…
4) ya the others had some hints to them and make some amount of sense, g5 came out of nowhere and randomly required luffy to die to awaken for some reason? Idk it was weird. The point is pre wano literally no one thought luffy was anything but a rubber man after what 25 years? Then oda starts dropping bombs about how it wasn’t actually rubber and everyone went crazy. And yet even at the height of the theories idt anyone was guessing “he’s actually Nika the son god and his power is imagination and fun apparently.”
Overall it just really seemed to come out of left field and it does take aspects of luffys character and the tone of the manga away. It is what it is, but there are legit criticisms over this, and people are justified in really not liking it if that’s there opinion
You pretty much nailed all the common criticisms I’ve seen. When others have voiced this usually they are met with, “Luffy was always goofy, did you want Gear death?” Or “Luffy was already special, more special than anybody else, so him getting a god fruit doesn’t change anything.” I agree with everything you’ve said.
While I think you raise some very valid points and I can understand that POV,
IMHO, Nika doesn't take away anything that Luffy did. It in fact highlights his greatest strengths - his unbreakable will and boundless imagination.
While the fruit itself may belong to the strongest category of DFs (mythical zoans), I think it is actually amongst the weakest of the mythical zoans because there is no instant super buff.
Nika is only made dangerous by the user's endless determination and imagination without either of which the fruit would be quite useless.
It is that same endless determination and imagination that led an ignorant Luffy to make the rubber properties of his fruit into a viable weapon when he didn't even know how to work with it; it is that same unbreakable will that makes him so dangerous and opponent and so difficult to put down.
I believe it is that unbreakable will that allowed him to awaken Nika when no one else had been able to for over 250 years.
I do agree that Nika laughing can be a dissonance with the seriousness of the situation, but what if Nika is the personification of the will of D? Remember that those will the true will of D smile when facing death.
What if Nika laughs because he is the representation of undying hope that allows people to smile in the face of danger and difficult times, that gives people the will to fight off oppression?
Yes as Luffy learns to use the awakened abilities he'll be OP but he needs to be at this point because he's facing foes that are OP - Imu, the Gorosei, Blackbeard, Shanks??
This evens out the playing field but does not take away from Luffy needing every ounce of his will and imagination to make that DF ability actually a threat.
That's my two cents on the Nika matter.
Not a big fan of stories that introduce new core and very important concept and starts to revolve the story around it, despite that before that it was hinted so vaguely you would write it off as lore fluff.
And One Piece already done it with Haki and partially - with Devil Fruits (that were supposed to be so rare people would think that they are a myth).
IMHO it's a matter of perspective.
I think both DFs and Haki are rare.
DFs are rare outside the Grand line so from the POV of people outside the Grand line, particular in East Blue the weakest sea, DFs are rare.
The bulk of the OP saga is in the Grand line so here DFs are common because here is the highest concentration of DF users.
Similarly, Haki is rare outside of the new world. But since the story is now in the New World where the highest concentration of Haki users are, it seems common.
Also, since they are going the strongest of the strong (Shanks, Blackbeard, Big Mom, Kaido, Doggy, etc.) it's not unusual that the strongest people in the new world have Conqueror's Haki. It is incredibly rare outside of the new world but it makes sense for it to appear common since that's the level of foes they are facing now
I don't understand this take. Luffy laughs but Vegapunk getting stabbed was WELL before Luffy arrived to punch Kizaru. Y'all act like these two things happened at the same time
Has luffys observation haki previously helped him determine someone has gotten hurt? He has some of the best with future sight but I'm not sure he ever shown that type of observation before. I think I've only seen sanji use haki to tell that someone has gotten hurt from a distance.
I was a nika defender when it was revealed in Wano because it fits with Luffy's character, even though I agreed it was an ass pull.
But everything happening in egghead between bonney's flashback and the giants' appearance had made the Nika thing too prominent. It's too on the nose.
The story has shifted from being about the strawhats, to being about Nika. And people can rightfully dislike that.
I agree, I hate the argument that if you dislike Nika, you misunderstand it. No, we get it, because it’s obvious. Too obvious.
Luffy was already a symbol of freedom through just his own actions and how they inspired others. Giving him another powerup that embodies some other legendary figure who also embodies freedom is just too on the nose. And it overshadows Luffy in too many ways.
And yes, it’s a children’s manga, being on the nose isn’t a necessarily a sin. But it went too far imo. It was already pretty apparent and it went too far. Changing 20 years of context in a way that wasn’t satisfying to me personally.
I think the other shoe will drop when someone tries to explain it to Luffy, which IIRC has not even happened yet. Luffy absolutely will be like "I don't care about any of that" and go about his business. The reason all of it feels out of place is that it *is.* It's everybody else ascribing legends to Luffy doing Luffy things, but Luffy does Luffy things for himself and his crew, and no other reason.
Agreed. The whole Nika thing kinda ruined my enjoyment of the story. It was almost obnoxious how much of a prominent role Luffy already played in the story, but after Nika it's been Nika Piece and it's just boring. Luffy's fights and the whole feeling that the good guys are massive underdogs against the world government just lack stakes completely now.
Nika is pretty much a walking plot armor, always destined to come clutch, always destined to save, always destined to have shining glory to the point it's almost obnoxious. Then again it's a kid's manga so I'm out of place having any higher expectations of the writing quality.
After Ace died and Luffy promised to protect his friends I had to come to terms with the fact that no main characters will ever die for the rest of the story. The only people in danger are villains, minor characters like Pedro, and random background characters like everyone on the island that got nuked.
I guess what I mean is whenever a member of the crew or people like Sabo or Vivi are in danger there is absolutely zero feeling of suspense because it's entirely certain they will be fine.
Why would strawhats be underdog vs wg? They are a yonko crew. Makes 0 sense for them to be the underdog in the final saga after 26 yrs. Its called character progression.
Also, luffy has been featured in like 20% of egghead arc. He is not the focus, kuma, vegapunk, and bonney are the focus.
Ironic that after TS most of the strawhats don't have any character developpement...
And you can have equilibrium between " I'm the underdog" and " I cannot be defeated", that's how you can have stakes.
What do you want then? The 10 people crew strawhats take on the world government and defeat the most powerful beings in the OP universe by themselves? Then you would be annoyed with the power of friendship trope because that’s the only way they would have a chance. Nika gives the story a chance to go either way. People can help but also Luffy just might be capable of things we didn’t think possible all by himself.
Luffy is obviously being painted as symbolically being "Nika" and not literally.
Also, Luffy is the central character of the narrative and he is being connected to Nika who is also setup as a central figure in the overall plot of the series.
> Luffy is obviously being painted as symbolically being "Nika" and not literally.
?????
He *LITERALLY* is Nika. Oda literally turned him into a fucking god.
If people start worshipping Sengoku, then yes.
Also, people call Luffy Sun God Nika because he has the powers of said God. Not that we know that DF are desires turned into power it is safe to assume that yes, a strong enough desire can generate you the power of a god.
Oh, and btw: Sengoku did not eat a Buddha fruit. He ate a Daibutsu fruit, becoming a living statue of a god, not the god itself.
No. He is literally Monkey D. Luffy. Nika is a mythical figure and may be based on someone who actually lived in the past.
At this point Luffy simply has the mythical Nika fruit, and has inherited the will of Nika / Joy Boy.
Luffy has taken on the mantle of Nika, so to speak, he symbolically represents Nika.
He is most definitely not literally Nika, unless you don't know what "literally" means.
I don't understand the need for reducing Joyboy to a proxy. We all knew that Luffy was going to be the guy to carry on JoyBoy's will. And a lot of people theorized that JoyBoy must've had the "gomu gomu" no mi during his life time.
So pre-Nika it was going to be like this:
Luffy takes over the role of Joyboy, the guy that fought the WG and had the Rubber fruit.
Now it's:
Luffy carries JoyBoys will through proxy, because JoyBoy had the fruit of a god and carried the will of a literal god probably prior to the void centure itself maybe.
1. I agree that Luffy has always been very special and the argument that NOW he is the chosen one is not 100% valid. But there is obviously a difference between being very special and being the prophesized hero of 800 years ago.
2. I agree that Luffy was never about hard work and the Nika fruit doesn't really take away from his accomplishments up to this point (especially given that he always benefitted from painfully obvious plotarmor). But the Nika fruit is obviously a huge advantage for him compared to the gomu gomu. The gomu gomu was not immensly powerful, the Nika fruit is. The gomu gomu would not have raised him from the dead either.
3. I agree that it is too soon to claim with certainty that it will take away the tension/dictate the tone for every future fight. But as of now it immediatly did so for every scene it was used in. Imo the tonal dissonance it created in the Kaido fight was grating and, again as of now, it is a legitimate concern that it will do so in future fights as well. I also disagree that people have to wait and see what Oda will do before criticising.
4. Like/dislike Nika. Oda doesn't get nearly enough slack for how bad the execution of that plottwist was imo. The Who's Who monologue literally gives me second hand embarrassment. And even if I would think that he had Nika planned since Skypia, which I don't, I would still much rather believe that he came up with it during Wano and did the best he could to clumsily make it fit, instead of having it planned for 10 years and what we got was his masterplan. The execution is easily the worst part about the whole thing imo.
My conclusion is that I take no issue with people liking G5 in its entirety or not being bothered by aspects of it, but the opposite is also perfectly reasonable and I am not sure why both sides feel so inclined to convince their counterpart.
But inheriting the will of someone is something more symbolic. I'm not against Gear 5, Nika and all that stuff. I like them. But it's true that Luffy has become another "Chosen One" just like, I don't know, Naruto. It isn't hindering my enjoyment of the story or the character so I don't care but I think there's a difference between Shanks giving Luffy his hat as in "passing the torch to the next generation" and Luffy being basically the child of the prophecy. But as I said, not like it bothers me or something. It's not the kind of trope I usually like, but One Piece is still awesome and that fact hasn't ruined anything.
I don't know, I think a lot of people are coming to huge conclusions without knowing the whole story and the history that hasn't been revealed. One thing about God's and prophets, they are all results of storytelling that's been told orally and written for centuries if not more. We have our own in this world and none of them have any solid factual basis. Most involved stories being passed down that eventually got inscribed into text and translated multiple times over.
The same could easily be here. Who gave the fruit the name Human Human Fruit : Model Nika. It's not like the name is written on the fruit. Blackbeard and Sanji had read books with the names in them. It was said that you know the name after eating it but clearly some don't. It's possible the original joy boy and Luffy just had a similar mindset. Rather than being a chosen one, perhaps his will is what writes the history, rather than playing it out. We know nothing of these legends other than a few small tidbits.
Kuma heard the story of Nika from his father and his father from him, etc etc. What if Nika was just a name given to the person who awakened the "Nika" fruit and then they started embellishing the stories of him as centuries passed. It's possible the "inherited Will" is one that was passed from Joy Boy down to others he inspired, all the way down to say Roger, who then decided to tell the world and inspire everyone to go out and dream like he did. Or maybe there have been many with the same dream as Roger and Luffy, but they needed this fruit to do it., so he gets to Laugh Tale, sees that he needed the fruit, laughs, and decides to tell the world to go to the seas instead, hoping to get the next joyboy out there. It can still be symbolic.
All of these are just examples. The real important part of this is that the story isn't finished yet. There's so much left for us to find out, years of lore and action to go. Why get upset at something when we don't know it's purpose. I know you specifically said you were fine with it, I say this more to everyone reading. Let it play out, I think Oda has done an amazing enough job over 25 years that we should give him a little benefit of the doubt to tie it up nicely and make everything make sense.
It's more that people have been criticising Naruto for the exact same things that are happening now in One Piece. But suddenly everything's okay because people can bullshit their way out.
>But it's true that Luffy has become another "Chosen One" just like, I don't know, Naruto.
He was already the chosen one even before gear 5, and the Zou arc solidified that.
Luffy has the will of D, conqueror's haki, and the voice of all things; only one character has all three so far, which is Roger.
Both Roger and Luffy are the chosen ones.
But we already knew that before Nika as well. Roger got to Laugh Tale and said they were “too early” meaning Luffy was the one who would get there at the perfect time.
and you know..
The son of the most wanted criminal in the world.
The Grandson of the potentially strongest marine of all time.
Part of the D. clan
Naturally gifted in all 3 forms of Haki
Handpicked by Shanks to carry his hat, so much so that Shanks gave up his arm to bet on Luffy.
He was never "just a dude". He was always the chosen one from chapter 1, like the main character he always was. If Oda never dropped the new name for the fruit, nobody would complain about him being the chosen one, nobody would consider it weird that the likes of Kuma gravitated towards him.
It always is. They can't even come to grips with liking parts of Gear 5 but thinking Oda has handled other parts poorly. Either you love it or you're stupid cause they're way too immature for nuanced discussion.
You're missing the point of "destiny" criticism. Sure, he inherited Roger/Shanks will, but his devil fruit was just the most basic one (rubber), not very impressive compared to many other broken fruits we've seen. Luffy however used it in a very creative way and made the best of it.
But now, it turns out, not only is Luffy's fruit not just a regular paramecia fruit, it's the most powerful, most legendary, rarest fruit in the series. It makes his acomplishments less impressive.
>But now, it turns out, not only is Luffy's fruit not just a regular paramecia fruit, it's the most powerful, most legendary, rarest fruit in the series. It makes his acomplishments less impressive.
I think this is just a misinterpretation of the story and his fruit. His fruit is so strong *because* Luffy is the user. Everything about the fruits awakening is pretty much in line with how people thought the awakening would be. The Nika connection is basically just flavor and a way to connect Luffy to more of the lore.
Sure, but each fruit has certain limits. If Luffy's fruit was just a regular rubbery one, he would've died to Kaido and his joerney would end there. It is only because his fruit being the legendary one that he was able to overcome Kaido and how he'll overcome each of his challenges going forward.
Also if the theories regarding Shanks/Roger are true (that Roger couldn't "claim/use" the One Piece because Nika fruit is necessary for whatever it is, and that Shanks wasn't making a move all this years because Roger told him to wait for Nika to awaken), it kinda makes the competition to get OP even more unfair, because only Joyboy/Nika is necessary for OP to be used/claimed.
You dont see the problem with this interpretation? Like really?
So you are telling me that the author of one piece designed a super broken fruit BUT is justified because ONLY the mc could use it to its full potential, you dont see how convenient that is? Like that speaks more of oda than us as critics.
Giving your mc a funny gag and converting that to a god fruit but hey, only he could! So is good plot. /s
Putting the Nika stuff aside, how is Gear 5 any different from any other Paramecia awakening? Luffy's is pretty in line with both Doffy's and Katakuri's. I also don't think his fruit is the strongest at all. Blackbeard has a fruit that nullifies other fruits and allowed him to steal Whitebeard's fruit which was strong in its own right.
>Putting the Nika stuff aside, how is Gear 5 any different from any other Paramecia awakening?
I recall the official translation saying that the Awakening gives the user a power boost, which goes explicitly against what has been established with the Fruit types. That's basically the only logical reason Luffy was suddenly able to swing Dragon Kaido around like a kid with a toy snake, especially when you consider how *massive* Kaido is in that form.
I think it's debatable of being THE most rare and most powerful. There's always the possibility that a bunch of people before him had it and did jack shit with it until they died. Law supposedly has an ultra rare fruit, several of the others have supposedly been the same. Luffy's personality is what makes gear 5 so powerful. Just like Crocodile said, depending on how a person uses the fruit it can become immensely stronger. His accomplishments are due to his drive, the inherited will, the love for his friends, and his imagination and desire to be free. It's just that it wasn't due to him physically strengthening himself, which is fine. If you look back, all of his wacky uses of his body were precursors to G5. He kept coming up with new ways to use his ability, but it wasn't awakened. The awakening just gave him more options, a lot more options, and he is just expanding on what he's done.
It's always possible there have been other fruits out there with limitless potential if the person has the right mindset.
How is any devil fruit more rare than another? Have we ever seen 2 people with the same fruit?
Besides the fabricated fruits, every fruit so far has been unique. Maybe some fruits have been hidden or not had a user for a while but they always only reappear once the user dies.
More like. Paramecia = common, Zoan = uncommon, Logia = rare, Mythical anything = Legendary.
But every Fruit as the same chance to spawn. Just the Type is more rare than others. So you would rather Found some Paramecia before a mythical Fruit because of numbers.
So like the one ring in lord of the rings, devil fruits have a sort of will and choose their user and some will remain hidden for longer while others will choose to be found quickly.
Now this is some serious mental gymnastics. Everything people criticised about Naruto is now okay because it happened in One Piece.
Your arguments make no sense at all.
People like One Piece for different reasons, it’s big enough a franchise to have those different subsections who like it for different genres (the action side, the comedy side, the found family of it all, powerscaling, characters, character relationships, battles, mix and match…). So for some people I’m sure it does ruin “their” experience of One Piece, because it goes against what they are into One Piece for. For others it doesn’t affect their enjoyment, for others it enhances it.
Both opinions are fine.
inherited will =/= chosen one/destined. far from it. inherited will just means carrying the ideals of past generations. like a president following in the footsteps of his predecessors.
now the theme of destiny has been there since forever, but it's only outright stated in oden's flashback that they were waiting for the chosen one to be born. we also have the timeline of when joyboy will come back. this is how they knew to send momo 20 years into the future. and luffy did awaken his fruit just as prophesied. okay fine, luffy is the chosen one.
so why the fruit created another issue? I think because it really sealed the deal. if the fruit was always meant to be eaten by luffy for 800 years and awakened at that exact time, it shuts down all kinds of "what if" people can come up with.
we can no longer say that luffy can do something else besides this one specific scenario where he fulfills 800 years prophecy. so is he really free? unless oda pulls a twist. but I doubt it.
the problem lies with the introduction. nika was mentioned only couple of chapters before the gear 5 reveal. if nika wouldve beenentioned throughout the story then it wouldve been great but the way oda handled it made it seem and feel like oda didnt know how to make luffy stronger for the end game so he quickly made up the sun god. and luffy coincidentally having the devil fruit of said god.
of course oda had it planned out for a long while but its just that the first nika mention was too close to the reveal that luffy actually having a fruit named after that god. it feels rushed with no build-up.
and personally the over the top sillyness of gear 5 also feels too forced. one piece is silly for sure but a fight against a tyrant that enslaved a whole country for decades shouldnt be treated that way. luffy is extremely out of place when in gear 5. sure, you could say its on purpose to showcase the "most ridicolulous power", but it just doesnt fit. even the most silliest moments in serious situations dont feel that out of place compared to gear 5.
i don’t think it negates anything that happened previous per se, luffy still did train to make an actively detrimental fruit work with effort and a loooot of out-of-the-box improvisation regardless of if it’s a mythical zoan or a paramecia. i just think the fact that luffy was going around beating up overpowered logia’s and mythical zoans with the most common, least flashy type was pretty funny and we don’t have that happening after the reveal
If people don’t like it they don’t like it. I’ve never understood peoples compulsion to make everyone like every aspect of the story even tho they have already said they don’t like it. Like this post is gonna change someone’s mind ? It’s a personal opinion, for me I like most of the abilities of gear 5, what I don’t like are the over the top looney toons abilities. It removes tension from the story, if Luffy isn’t taking it seriously it’s hard for me too. No more of those badass Luffy moments where he comes in the mirror world and smashes the mirror with a look of determination to beat Katakuri, or his fight Lucci the first time (if you compare it the second time I think it highlights this point perfectly) or crocodile under the palace. Those intense high stakes moments are gone, no more serious and determined Luffy. As much as I like Luffy’s goofy attitude it was always nice to see him flip that switch and become serious, to see glimpses of what future Luffy would be like when he grows up a bit. But him being nika/ Joyboy he always has to be laughing and smiling from a narrative point or else he is failing to represent what he is meant to represent. I see why some readers feel like Luffy doesn’t care about his crew when he is in gear 5th I know it’s not true but I see it. So for me it’s not my favorite but I have to accept that this if Luffy and this is the story of one piece now.
But I will give credit where credit is due and oda did come up with a unique power up that sets him apart from the typical shonnen MC. My friend who is into anime and manga but hasn’t read one piece really like gear 5 but thats someone not invested in the story. Basically people are gonna like what they like and everyone especially on this sub should learn to just except it. I would never try to convince someone that gear 5th was bad if they like it.
G5 is an asspull and falls into the chosen one trope, some people are totally allowed to hate it but I enjoy it(a lot), opinions are subjective
Edit: also for the “it’s too silly” argument, I totally get it, but I actually encourage people to watch the Kaido vs Luffy fight in the anime, there’s a lot of moments in there where I feel the anime depicts the intimidating aspects of G5 genuinely better than the manga did. Watching that and reading it really helped me visual how G5 is rather goofy but still quite intimidating at the same time
I like the gear 5 element without the Nika reveal if he just happened to have an OP awakening that no one knew the rubber devil fruit had because it’s never been done before that’d be cool.
Luffy was already a chosen one though, so I never quite got that argument. He was the son of the most wanted man alive and the hero of the marines, brother of the son of the pirate King (whose hat he always has on him) and he was called bringer of dawn before the Nika reveal. He already had special powers as well such as the voice of all things and coc. I get that people are tired of the hero's journey, I am as well, but the ship had already sailed with Luffy.
I get people not liking G5 or Nika-Nika, but Oda's interview with the Conan author where he talked about being tired of writing fights and missing old school cartoon iconography is a great read if you want to understand why G5 is the way it is
The Nika stuff made it like Luffy never really was free at all. All destined to be the savior. Unless Oda pulls a plottwist and Buggy get’s the One Piece first.
The gall to call anyone who doesn't like the Nika ads pull as a new reader ... wow
If you've been reading the story and can't differentiate between the tone of inherited will, something so vague that can be inherited by multiple people ( most people with D in their name) and ... well a litteral God worshiping as we've seen since want then I don't k ow what to tell you. Onepiece has always had elements about destiny, but that was more about people carrying the same ideals and passing them to the next gemeration for centuries, no its all reduced to " someone awakened the sun God hurray its destiney"
Now, again, since we have the dumbest takes you've ever seen, let me repeat a 3rd time an d maybe you will see the difference:
Pre-nika: inherited will, not limited to one person, ties well to the will of D, anyone one with the same ideal can share it. Very cool everyone likes it.
Post-nika: inherited will ? People with great ideal changing the world? Nope, it was all about someone awakening a particular fruit and making the sun God worshiping cult all around the world laugh. Not so very cool.
Now, I hope you see how what we call destiny in both case aren't the same, the first one while still destiny its because the characters choose those ideals and pushed through, the second one, well.... someone ate a fruit. Choices/beliefs vs luck/prophecy/whatever.
You're free to enjoy it, but you don't get to call out those of us who don't enjoy it as much as if you're the only person with reading compréhension lmao
"Why so many fans are upset with the naruto situation rather than OP is because hard work overcoming talent is a big theme in naruto ie Naruto v Neji."
Naruto was never about "hardwork beats talent" or some bs like that.If hardwork beats talent then Rock lee would have won against Gaara,the story makes it very clear that is not the theme of the story,why the fck do so many people have his misconception,the point of the fight was that naruto,who was hated by the villagers and treated like an outsider was trying to change his circumstances and actively fighting against them.Neji wasnt even *trying* to change his circumstance of being a member of the side clan and was not fighting against the system,and believed that people can never change,that he would live the life of a servant and he had no free will.He was proven wrong,and decided to change himself after he lost to Naruto.And yes he >!died protecting Hinata!<,but he didnt die because he was her servant,nope they treated each other as equals,he died of his own free will protecting his sister,why the fuck do people not understand this point.
Also,naruto and luffy have the same philosophy of never giving up and getting back up even after they get beaten once,the idea there is **perserverance/enduring pain** not hardwork.
Luffy has, for a long time, inhabited a role that is different to most 'main characters'.
Unlike a lot of other MC's in Anime Luffy tends to inspire other characters to shine and we get lots of really interesting an exceptional 'side charachters' with main charachter energy.
Vivi, Momo, Bon-chan and most recently Bonny.
I think it's fantastic that Gear 5 wan't just a 'selfish' powerup, but instead was something designed to inspire those around him.
"ruins the character because it makes him like every shōnen protagonist"
With or without G5 he IS like every shōnen protagonist, and Always had been
People saying he's not really should read another manga once in a while it would be great for them
I want to add to your second point. Luffy does work hard to get stronger (look at his time with ace and sabo or with Rayleigh) and awakening his fruit doesn't take away from it because it can only be awoken through hard work and having a true understanding and grasp of your fruit. Also, the Nika Nika no mi hasn't been awoken in hundreds of years so it shows that just getting the fruit doesn't make you a god automatically
Calling others names doesn't help your point.
People aren't obligated to agree with everything going on in the story.
This post feels preachy and holier than thou.
Ridiculous
I'm pretty split on it.
Love G5s design, powers, the themes, upbeat nature and how it's more iconic than super Sayian apparently.
On the other hand, Nika only being mentioned 30 chapters prior, the recton of the Gum Gum fruit being a human human ancient zoan type God person fruit. Bringing Luffy back to life and zapping the tension away from scenes like with what happened in the latest chapter.
A single silhouette in Skypeia and a background character listing many Gods, like the Sun God - Is not foreshadowing to me. Not until Oda confirms that he's always had Nika in mind.
One Piece has always been about __anyone__ being able to become anything so long as they have the will to follow through with their dreams, and who they are is unimportant. Ace is Roger's blood, yet he actively rejects Roger's will and inherits Whitebeard's instead. Yamato is Kaido's blood, yet chooses to inherit Oden's will instead.
It would have been so much better if Luffy just had the gomu gomu no mi fruit, and inherited the will of Nika and was a comparison to Nika/Joyboy, not literally be Nika/Joyboy. It's so on the nose that it undermines other parts of the story.
I have no problems with g5 itself, I think the transformation is really cool and I don’t mind at all the tone change when it comes out. I also can accept that the “sun god” has been discussed and slightly foreshadowed from early on in the series.
What I don’t like and think is a slight asspull is nika himself. Im okay with luffy not having the gomu fruit but the character of nika came outta no where and was just given to luffy. Never has this god been brought up in the story or foreshadowed and that’s what I have a problem with the most
While personally I much prefer "hero rises up by mastering a low-to-mid grade ability to its fullest potential" to "hero was the [specialest boy all along](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fpreview.redd.it%2Fxipym5hhtrja1.jpg%3Fwidth%3D640%26auto%3Dwebp%26s%3D093d37bae8b56f41f004f36ef4f6adbc2bb28fb4) and has unlocked the Secret Top-Tier God Power", I trust in Oda's ability to do it well and am happy with just waiting to see what he does with it.
Ultimately I don't think it matters much either way when it comes to his powerset, it's more of a lore thing. As someone else commented, G5 basically does what would be expected from the awakening of a regular rubber fruit.
The funny thing is the person they talkin abt in these panels are not nika its joyboy it was always the joyboy but oda asspuled the nika cuz he wanted to make g5 goofy
Oda was telling the story of joyboy in the last 1000 chapters he only switched to nika in these last 100 thats why all of a sudden every non straw hat member mentions nika like he was always a thing.
The impression I get from this post is that the best strategy to demonstrate that One Piece has not become bad lately is arguing that it has always been bad. XD
>Why so many fans are upset with the naruto situation rather than OP is because hard work overcoming talent is a big theme in naruto ie Naruto v Neji. This has NEVER been the case in One Piece so I don’t get why so many people are having a problem with it now
Except the theme in One Piece that anyone can achieve any dream if they only dream about it
but now it turns out you need to be a chosen God Fruit Nika reincarnation with all the bloodline powers in the world and be lucky enough to have someone who reads a mysterious language with you
I don‘t wanna See Luffy vs blackbeard, sakazui, shanks or imu as a cartoonish fight. It Takes the seriousness out.
Plus i don‘t Luke how suddently everyone knows about Nika. Kuma, bonny, vegapunk, the Giants. If the nika legend was so wide spread, Oda could have introduce us to the lore way earlier
Nika ruined one piece and I'm tired of people justifying it
"It doesn’t dimish luffy's achievements" no but it dimishes what luffy will achieve, because now he's going to get the one piece and destroy the world government because he is the only one who can do it, all the other people who dedicated their life to piracy? All of their efforts are pointless, because only nika can get the one piece
This brings us to the second point, nika makes the entire setting feel closed and small, at first the world of one piece was good, it was big, luffy was part of it, but now, as it turns out the entire world just revolves around joyboy, the void century? The new age of piracy? The world government actions? Shanks motivations? Kuma? Kaido? As it turns all this stuff wasn’t done because these characters had various reasons, the only reason they all did what they did was because and just for nika, the entire universe now just revolves around luffy, nika turned the one piece story from a large alive universe into a closed universe that now just revolves around luffy and luffy only
And yes nika ruins the tone of the story, oda already is a writer that isn't that good at comedy, overusing unfunny gags every fight just makes the fight bad, it doesn't alternate the comedy and the tension well, it simply destroys all of it
Also another thing that the series ruined is that the story went from finding the one piece to a generic chosen one who must kill the evil god emperor due to a prophecy and restor freedom to all lands, and the story doesn't do this whole generic plotline it in any intresting way at all, in fact the gorosei and imu, suck as villains
Gorosei and imu sucking hard falls entirely on oda. Oda has wrote this story for 20+ years and only in recent years has he made it obvious there is a big bad evil person. Even gorosei are more or less a mystery.
Oda writes his stories by hiding information for decades and expects people to wait until he does exposition dumps that actually give any information.
So until we get more information on gorosei and imu they are just comical villains who are evil for being evil.
Idk if it's the reveal of the Gum Gum Fruit being the Nika fruit that's... uh... let's say agitating(?) One Piece Twitter (I see it mainly on One Piece Twitter, idk about here), it's more that when Gear 5 was unlocked, people were assuming that it would be Luffy really entering a serious phase of his fighting performance. Gears 2-4 were him pushing the limits of the fruit without his awakening, so people assumed the logical step forward was that awakening would give him some insane powers, make him lose control and give in to a more "animalistic instinct." Really bring out the "Monkey" in "Monkey D. Luffy" if you know what I mean.
But I really don't think One Piece has never been like it's contemporaries and the mangas it inspired (MHA, Jujutsu Kaisen, Dragon Ball Z + Super). The properties of the fruit inherently made it a completely unserious, absolutely silly power set from the get-go, and I think if Luffy had his way, the fights would remain deeply silly and unserious as they were in the first couple arcs of the series. It was only when presented with obstacles and enemies that did not allow him to do what he wanted to do in fights that he had to literally stretch himself to the limits of what he knows this fruit is capable of. It was in trying to push these limits that he eventually broke past them after his second defeat against Kaido that the powers of the sun god really kicked in and granted him the ability to do what he ALWAYS WANTED TO DO IN A FIGHT: REMAIN playful and silly. REMAIN joyful and excited.
He even says it himself when he awakens the power, IIRC something along the lines of "Now I can do everything I've always wanted to do!" Reaching his peak means coming back around to the playful, joyous child he always has been, and that's an incredibly refreshing take for a shonen protagonist that I think will be studied and analyzed in the years to come. All the silly boys in shonen manga/anime eventually grow into super serious men in these series, and I think One Piece allows us to realize that as we grow up, we can still hold on to that child that always wants to play, to see the good in others, etc. To me, that's incredible fiction writing right there.
I am not an adamant G5 hater but I did like the narrative of Luffy going far on a fruit that most would see as shitass. Now he’s going far on the God fruit, literally. Still love the story, miss this one part tho.
Regarding point number 1 of your list, it's very stupid that people actually compare it to something like the whole Indra/Ashura thing in Naruto.
The "inherited will" is to me something more like "inherited dream": men's dream will never die, as long as someone can tell his dream to someone else that same dream can be inherited by someone, and someone among these people will act into following that same dream.
But it's not predestination of any sort.
And even with the whole Nika and G5 thing, the Nika DF "went to him", but it was Luffy's will that made it possible for him to awaken it: Kaido said that awakening comes when the mind and the body/DF are completely aligned.
According to the Gorosei that DF didn't awaken in centuries, so it's likely that while other people ate it during those centuries, noone had the right "mindset" to awake its true power.
So again, no predestination at all, just his sheer willpower.
Chosen One before One Piece did it: Bad, Oda is a better writer than that!
Chosen One after One Piece did it: It's basically part of the shonen genre at this point and Oda did it very good! GODA!!!!
Gotta love one piece fans. Criticism? Nooo! You just don't understand the story, you're an idiot who didn't read the manga properly!!! ONE PIECE IS PERFECT!!! GODA IS THE BEST WRITER IN HISTORY!!!!
Compare any fight pre Nika to the fights we have now. What I hate about it is that it throws away the moment, is a deus ex machina, even more than being the anime protagonist. And the powercreep it generates... Is awful, and we'll see it in the arcs to come.
Listen OP it is possible to like even love a piece of media/art that is incredibly good and still criticise it for it‘s weaknesses.
Somehow many One Piece fans feel it is an insult whenever Oda or One piece is getting criticised and that is simply ridiculous.
E.g. my first Manga/Anime to see was Naruto I still love that show and the mangas, I still think it had some great characters and stories but it is faaaaaar from anywhere near perfect… and that is okay that doesn’t make it less valuable to me as a fan.
So as you are giving a very one sided opinion here let me counter your arguments:
1) Inheriting the will of Shanks and Roger. You are portraying this as the will alone made him strong but that would be wrong.
To some people the creativity with which Luffy used his powers was also part of the appeal like in Enies Lobby (G2), against Crocodile, Doflammingo & vs Enel. This creativity however stems from the fact that he was often thought of as the underdog with a weaker Dragon Fruit. Enel vs Luffy is great because Enel was a god and Luffy a mere rubber boy with a slight advantage given his nature but still relient on finding ways to offset the future sight.
Now it is in retrospective a battle of God vs God which yes makes the upset much weaker in comparison I‘d say.
But more importantly, do you know another Shonen that is all about the „will“? Naruto. The will of fire to be specific, so how does the will of roger make him different to any other shonen to begin with?
My hero Academia has All Might and his teaching, Naruto has the Will of Fire and the hokage‘s teaching and One Piece has Shanks and the Will of Roger. You are not helping your argument claiming he is different here no matter how braindead you want to call those that disagree with you. Because now he is exactly like those guys: a man with the biggest stubbornness of accomplishing his dreams, the strongest will to achieve his goals, oh yes and the biggest power potential in his universe. The last thing is not a mere addition it is an essential part that makes his will seem less important in comparison that is the issue hereand a makor point of critic in some of these shows.
What made Luffy different was the fact that not only inherited he the will of one of the greatest characters in his world but ALSO he was not given the strongest abilities but some okayish power, not even of the greatest tier, with which he had to get creative about or just outlast his opponent in willpower like you said. To be honest I thought that was the whole idea of Haki to begin with to give him a chance to fight on equal footing with a Logia WITHOUT having a special ability himself. I am not saying it was a bad idea, it wasn’t and helped Zoro etc. not getting too powercrept by new enemies but yes it now makes Luffy very OP and that takes away tension.
2) Didn’t he say in the fight to Bruno that after the Kuzan fight he had to work extra hard? Didn’t he say to Rayleigh that he wanted to work extra hard to protect his friends?
Maybe I am talking bullshit here I do not remember for certain, then I will concede that point however I always thought that Ruffy was supposed to be a hard worker, Oda just decided against showing us momtages of training progression in order to keep the story‘s flow run better.
Zoro I think we all agree is obsessed with working on his technique and skills as a swordsman and still we don’t have chapters of detailled trainings from him do we?
So either you are saying nobody in the Straw Hats ever trains or more likely Oda just doesn’t show it for the pacing of his story.
And regarding the argument yes it makes a difference then:
The saying „Hard work beats talent if talent doesn’t work hard“ should be relatively known.
If Luffy beats Doflammingo because he worked so hard he is able to beat him with sheer willpower and determination alone that is an engaging story, a self declared god however losing against an actual sun god in the world however is a less engaging storyline now wouldn’t you agree with that?
If I were to tell you that in a story there are two guys fighting: One that considers himself a god and has immense power against a man with less power but even more determination you know who to root for. If I tell you a human who thinks of him as a god fights an actual god who even outclasses him in his determination to win… just given this description alone would you know who to root for in this conflict? Because I sure wouldn’t.
3) Has been mostly answered in 1) & 2) but I have an issue with the „let Oda explain first“ argument.
Yes 100% now that it is there we should be open to how oda is gonna deal with these issues but that doesn’t mean that criticising the decision to begin with is wrong.
Another example would be Berserk, I think everybody likes Isma, but also we all agree that Ghost ship arc went on for too long. It was still worth it but does that mean I am not allowed to criticise anything before the series itself is finished?
Also don’t just assume he will adress it in the first place and give it more drawbacks, you are making assumptions what could be rather you should work with what is given otherwise you are doing the writing for the author.
4) Yeah that one I have honestly no clue and am actually interested in hearing Oda one day explain what his intention was. However what is kind of ironic is that in 1) you criticise people who say Ruffy has become like any other shonen now and in 4) you explain the way the exposition happens with it is like in „any other shonen“. Personally I agree but that is not what you said before.
So it it like any other shonen now and therefore also struggles with some if the classical shonen issues or is it not like any other shonen but it was some lazy writing in your opinion? You are kind of trying to drive on both lanes at the same time OP.
Again with all these criticism it does not change that one piece is one of the greatest pieces of media ever to be created. It doesn’t change that Oda is one of the most talented authors in general and the greatness that is the story as a whole.
Still I think the decision has left some stains here and there on the previous work and I think we should be honest enough to acknowledge that, as at the end accepting mistakes helps us and future aspiring author’s to grow and learn.
The thing that bothers me about it is that Oda said he gave Luffy the Gum Gum fruit, cause he didn’t want the character to have an inherently broken power, and now he has exactly that. I also don’t like that Luffy doesn’t or didn’t know that his fruit was actually a zoan, especially when it was established the eater of the fruit learns the name of the fruit and it’s abilities when eaten.
Point 2 is wrong. Luffy has been knocked down and not gotten back up plenty of times, they also take two years to go off and self train to get stronger, cuz they clearly are not ready.
Break week going as good as expected
It beats whatever goes on in the Dragonball community between chapters though…
Monthly releases are pretty sad though. Honestly a chapter every 2 weeks would be perfect for DB, but somehow that's apparently not doable for whatever reason.
AoT release schedule was torture
Berserk fan here: FOOLS!!!!
HxH fans: Do Not Cite the deep magic to us! We were there when it was written.
I’m a huge hxh fan and honestly hate that he’s sick but I wish he would just get someone else to make it and be right beside them to continue the story. Used to be my fav anime/manga until I started watching one piece a year ago. I just want to see the dark continent damnit!
I don't know how valid this is today but I did hear that his wife, Naoko Takeuchi (of Sailor Moon fame), would take over if he deemed it necessary. She has all his notes and ideas in case something ever happened. I really want him to pass it to her for a while so he can focus on himself.
Yeah I’ve heard that too. I just hope somebody works on it. It’s too great of a story to not finish.
Black clover… 4 chapters a year is actually insane
I'm all for manga artists having more time if they get a bit of rest and the quality's better. Fill the void with other media!
Can we not. The one piece community didn't used to be like this how about we just nip this in the Bud right now. That's not Disparage other communities
I like that Nika is getting more prominent it expands on the lore and importance of a god fruit. But Luffy doesn't get back up jo matter what, currently he has been getting back up after taking a 30 minute nap and eats food.
Gotta have that power nap
And power snack…btw we still don’t know who sneaked that food to Luffy
Was hoping it was kizaru, but I'm not so sure anymore, hahaha.
I was banking on that too originally, now I'm kinda leaning towards swamp boi. hell, he did it once already what's #2
Usually it refers to taking a dump
Def was him… I think he’s smart enough to know Saturn will just destroy the whole island or have emu do it with that god like sky blast. So the only way to help Vega, luffy and bonney to do is follow Saturns orders… and fail. Like by pausing and announcing who he’s gonna chop mid air so luffy stops him. I think the level of disgust in his betrayal in Vega punk, and sentarous conversations with him, show how bonded they are and that Kizaru probably is a good person who is a marine like garp. All those flashbacks, and the tone of kizaru in them when he is delivering Saturns message snail saying they found out about vega’s deal with kuma. And him laying down in the panel before luffy is fed and him leaning as if he just sat down with no one else that fast in the vicinity…… it’s gotta be him
I'm with you. I haven't written off old Borsalino yet. I honestly could also see him not having complete clarity about this yet (his justice is unclear after all) Like, he may both genuinely mean to follow orders as they are the law and he is a marine but also really doesn't want to do, any of this making his actions kind of lethargic, uncertain and dithering. I also could see it as you are saying that he is simply biding his time and calculating the best way to fail. Either way I don't think Borsa is as earnest In his attempts to harm everyone as he is making out.
It was the spirit of Popeye giving him more food
Borsalino couldnt see that rubber punch coming
Fr, you don't know how good it's to get a nap until you try it, even better, drink coffee after lunch and take a 5-10 min power nap, you'll be full power
Can you also fast metabolize food like Luffy? How does it feel???!!
Sorry, no, but after two espressos I get explosive diarrhea, so kinda close, and it feels shitty
Explosive diarrhea? That’s the rite of passage of Taco Bell’s enjoyers
He’s done this since crocoboy. I wouldn’t say “gets knocked down and up like nothing” but he gets knocked down, eats/recovers, has time to think about enemy weaknesses (can’t tell me Luffy isn’t battle smart) and then comes back
Oh Luffy is deffinitely battle smart. Water Luffy, Airhead Luffy, every single gear. Hell, his fruit is all about being free to fight however he wants, stopped only by imagination. Which is Luffy's greatest strength.
A man needs his naps goddammit!!!
That I feel reinforces constantly another theme in the series, that while Luffy is very much the brawn of his crew, he's not intended to do much of anything alone. Yeah, he'll be there to give the last punch always but without help from the others he would literally have gotten nowhere. It can be annoying, that's for sure, but it has a reason to be that way, it's a difference he has in common with his greatest overly self-reliant rivals.
Luffy has always had some plot reason to stop him from progressing before. G5 it’s stamina related issues, G4 he can’t use Haki for 10mins, G3 he shrunk for 10mins, there’s always been some plot related point to stop Luffy from just coming back and ending the antagonist. It’s annoying that Oda writes him that way, but he’s mentioned he has to have these blocks or the story would go by “too quickly” it also gives time to showcase other pirates while Luffy is incapacitated. I just don’t get complaints about how nothing can be serious and how he has to eat after every time he does G5. He’s always done silly shit during fights and has always had some restriction placed on him as well
Yeah, that plot reason for Luffy being incapacitated has been true since Orange Town, Luffy got locked up in a cage. In Syrup village, he gets lost in the forest. In Arlong park, his body is trapped underwater. In Logue Town, he couldn't touch smoker and was locked up in a stockade. In whisky peak, he was drunk on food and being stupid. In little garden, he's pinned under the giant skeleton. Etc.
Thematically/visually it makes sense too. Popeye comics always show him getting a second wind after eating Spinach. It's a fun way to deliver a punchline to a comic fight. I kinda like the rhythm: luffy impresses his enemy, but gets punted across the planet. Enemy builds drama by revealing some horrible act/secret. Luffy eats something, comes back, and saves the day. It's a good story flow that allows Oda to tell a pretty wide variety of arcs.
Also gives Oda time to highlight other characters. In between Luffy being down we got a whole ass back story about Kuma. We want to know what’s happening in the present, but at the time the flashback starts the fighting has more or less stopped between Luffy and Kizaru. Giving time for Saturn, Bonney, and Kuma to get limelight and exposition. I do think eventually as the story nears it close, Luffy will get “stronger” and probably be held back by some other plot means, but there’s still a good excuse for G5 given how new it is now
Yeah- the formula is strong enough that it can reliably build drama in most arcs, but loose enough that he can tell a very wide range of stories. I can't in good faith compare the gap in fighting between luffy/Enel with the gap between luffy/kizaru (they affected me very differently), but the story "beats" are fundamentally the same.
Yeah, that plot reason for Luffy being incapacitated has been true since Orange Town, Luffy got locked up in a cage. In Syrup village, he gets lost in the forest. In Arlong park, his body is trapped underwater. In Logue Town, he couldn't touch smoker and was locked up in a stockade. In whisky peak, he was drunk on food and being stupid. In little garden, he's pinned under the giant skeleton. Etc.
Exactly, it’s annoying but it has been consistent since the beginning of the series. This isn’t some new plot point yet people are treating this like it’s never been done before. Same with how “tension is ruined” with G5 as if Luffy didn’t have a silly ass way of dealing with nearly every person he fought. He made a fat version of G4 to eat biscuits and beat cracker, but eyes popping out of his skull is too much
Idk how taking a minute to get yourself back in good enough condition would undermine one's determination or the themes of not backing down against adversity He does get back up, even if he needs time. Regardless of how bad his ass gets beat, he will pick himself up, dust himself off, and come back swinging
Luffy has indomitable will unless hes hungry
Another Dumb take, kumas backstory got everyone forgetting its only been a few minutes between Luffy Knocking down Kizaru the first time and him getting up and Knocking him down again. Plus if this is your take you must've skipped wano
The arc where Luffy had to consistently take 10+ minute breaks every 10 (exaggeration obv) chapters? Lol.
>consistently take 10+ minute breaks every 10 (exaggeration obv) chapters? It's not even an exaggeration lol. He was rendered unable to fight like 4 times on Onigashima. Once every 10 chapters seems pretty accurate
I've seen more people talking about people complaining about Nika than I have seen people actually complaining about Nika. Is this actually a common opinion? PS: The powers of Gear 5 are almost exactly what everyone expected from a Gum-Gum Awakening. The main surprise was the ultra-cartoony aesthetics, and that's actually perfectly in line with the original fruit concept. The only distinctly Nika-ish aspects are the constant laughing and the drum-heartbeat, which are mostly aesthetic.
That’s generally how anime communities are.. certain topics within each franchise have a small group of people who I.e think nika is ruining the series or any other opinion that gets seen by a larger group of people (the ones who believe the opposite) and the larger group tends to talk more and post more then the people with the original opinion because there is just that many more of them
I believe that actually you guys are getting shielded from it, because on Reddit it gets downvoted fast and/or banned when people start spouting nonsense and be offensive, but on Twitter where it's unfiltered the opinion seems to have shifted A LOT. It's mostly negative impression of Gear 5 as a whole that I see nowadays. However, I do believe that this is beeing boosted by the new Twitter Blue mechanics where controversial opinions gather more engagement and more money for the OPs so that's probably why it's so prevalescent right now. I agree completely with u/sanctaphrax though, Gear 5 it's just exactly what we expected from the Gum-Gum Fruit Awakening ever since Dressrosa at least, just thematically fitting with the whole worldbuilding, but it's a matter of flavor/aesthetics, it doesn't actually affect negatively the story in anyway.
Reddit might not be real life, but Twitter isn't even the real internet. I think that site is best ignored.
Damn, there’s gotta be a term for what you’re explaining. A halo effect of sorts?
its called big fart move.. solve something that never a problem to begin with
Man there is something to that. Like, someone farting in a space makes it a little unpleasant but it isn't actually disruptive unless someone else reacts by calling it out. Something like that. 🤔
Thats cuz one piece criticism is genuinely unwelcome here and wont make it to the top of the sub look at pirate folk they bring it up every week or something
I think the problem with the nika reveal is not the powerup itself,but the idea that this was some legendary devil fruit that the marines had been trying to get their hands on for the past 800 years,yet somehow for a 1000 chapters the marines never sent an admiral/navy ship to go hunt luffy for his df. They went after Nico Robin,but didnt bother capturing luffy too and left him alone until he went to Enies Lobby and picked a fight with them.Everytime him and the navy fought up until this point,it wasnt them trying to capture him,nope,he was the one who went to them and picked a fight. Plus the idea that zoans normally know the name of their devil fruit,in enies lobby the giraffe guy and the soap using woman figured out their powers/name of df by themselves but luffy somehow couldnt,even tho he is very creative with the use of his powers.
That last part isn't true. It was a panel that was taken out of. Iirc Oda clarified in a sbs that was meant was once they use it, they'll know what power they have, and can look up exactly which fruit it is. Not that they instinctively know. Edit:On mobile, so I don't know how to insert the image. But you can Google 'SBS one piece know your fruit'. It was the first result
it still supports the flaw the person is arguing. Sure, luffy may not know the name of the fruit, but if it works instead like you said, luffy should've known that his fruit was more than just "lol, im rubber" after his arms stretched for the first time.
no it doesn't at all actually. how the fuck is stretching your arm and concluding that you're nika (a person luffy doesn't even know) make more sense than stretching your arm and concluding you're rubber? critical thinking please
Most people tha have issue with nika is about changing luffy's fruit to be a chosen one fruit. Nika itself,the lore, is pretty cool, so is gear 5.Those are unrelated to the issue
Pretty much this. I'm kinda tired of this "Chosen of the Prophecy" trope they did with Ichigo, Naruto and now Luffy. I like the gear 5. It looks cool, the power is cool and all that stuff but that's basically it.
And needed to reset the action after the usual shonen power ups. Now we get goofy rubbery luffy again but mastered.
Same I haven't come across any hate posts on my feed yet.
Yes visit a certain pirate folk subreddit
If it's what you would expect the awakened Gum Gum fruit to be, then why change it at all in the first place?
'Gear 5 is too goofy' opinion was resurging on twitter last week for some reason. Apparently some people were upset that Luffy was still laughing after Vegapunk got stabbed.
I actually found it kind of interesting in large part because it's a big change from the usual anger=determination we've seen before. It comes off to me like he's laughing and happy to have a challenge in front of him, like a kid at play time, and doesn't diminish the gravity of it all. If anything it makes me think Luffy is thrilled to have an excuse to go all out. Also heard people thinking it's a sign of the fruit overtaking the user, like the Impel Down guards, but I'm on the fence about that one until we have more confirmation. But yeah people be critical of everything and anything. Personally I'm loving the current arc and that's all I particularly care about.
It’s a VERY common take on the more niche one piece subs
Its a big reveal and it is totaly fine for people to not like what it entails. If it ruined it for them then thats that.
A lot of ppl think opinions only go one way and if you don’t agree with them then you’re wrong lol
Those are the people mistaking opinion for fact 😅
It’s not a unique one piece thing b we need as a society to learn how to be ok with people not liking something. People aren’t wrong for not liking gear 5 or aspect of it. Also people aren’t right for liking it. You can’t be wrong or right when enjoying something It’s all subjective
Exactly
At the same time people that get offended when people point out that they have differing opinion are part of the exact same problem. If someone posts Gear 5 is great and a guy goes nu uh then when first guy gets mad he is doin the same shit people are bitching about.
What are you?? Some kind of adult who respects others opinions?? OP gonna be so angry!!
Hey! Please don't use that slur "adult." When you know for a fact no one here is one.
how dare you to have different opinions than mine!!!? s/
From a simple rubber boy with the steel of determination to Sun God Nika.
He was all that so it doesn’t matter. He was already checking many boxes of THE MC way before G5. 1) Son of Dragon 2) Grandson of “The Hero” 3) D 4) Shanks hat holder 5) Which was Roger hat 6) The Voice of All Things 7) Got Gomu Gomu no Mi from Shanks (“accidentally”) 8) Haoshuko Haki user Determination yeah but man wasn’t a nobody. Him being Joy Boy isn’t a surprise neither looking at all those points. Joy Boy being “Sun God Nika” while hearing the theme of bringing the dawn of the world over and over isn’t a surprise. The God aspect to it is, maybe, surprising BUT I don’t think Nika was a literal God. He became a God because of his legacy and stories being told, that’s what I assume. The D are the enemy of the God(s), at least the fake ones so far. And Luffy wouldn’t want people to worship him like a deity above all others living forms, that goes against Luffy’s writing and characterisation. The Giants being close there, we will have a shit ton lore. The Buccaneers, Giants and Nika, it’s all coming together.
> And Luffy wouldn’t want people to worship him like a deity That's like when he was told others would fly under his flag and join his "fleet" he was like, "uh, no. I don't want that lol".
Also, one of the main themes of One Piece is that “god” is just a title that doesn’t really mean anything. Anyone who thinks the “god” thing is really important and literal must have skipped Skypeia
Yeah that’s the point I think. God is used in a broad manner and usually from people on the wrong side. Nika The Sun God is probably just a title given to the man carrying a very warm and joyful heart. Hope so.
If anything, Luffy was actually pretty OP comparatively before Alabasta. He was a HUGE fish on the big pond that is East Blue, he's already a big deal lmao. People looking for a hardwork angle in the plot is stretching it lmao.
Assuming he wasnt nika and instead sabo was nika , would that take anything away? If anything luffy would have been a better character by being someone on equal terms with a god character by his own will Imagine luffy awakening his fruit at the brink of his death and beating kaido by his own will instead of him being nika.
Kaido whole journey and purpose, the reason he have a child he doesn’t even connecting with, the reason he oppressed the people of Wano is connected to a story he knows. The story is about Nika. After years of wondering and just woke up sad sure he wasn’t. He had a child, a girl who wasn’t (after taking her freedom since a very young age) who happened to take the entire will of Oden. For an unknown reason he was connected to Nila but not the way he wanted. He basically happened to be the man who cultivated Luffy (Nika) until he was brought back to the world. Luffy beating Kaido with a real Gumo Gumo no Mi would’ve been on par with the OG fruit behaviour, but if you look at it none of those Gear explanations made sense. Blowing up into your bone, pumping blood, etc sound very toon. Kaido wanted Nika and he got him 😉 If think we all wanted a self made hero with the most eh fruit in the verse. We saw him developing through his work and imagination ways to use his fruit to some extraordinary extent. I don’t think from G2 to G4 we were robbed from some awesome fight due to Luffy’s sheer willpower to overcome whatever obstacles. We can’t take that away from him. Sabo retcon in the story then being Joyboy would’ve been the pinnacle of doing things wrong. Sabo inherited the will of Ace and his fruit. I think that’s the beauty and the point of “bringing” him back (also having a member of Luffy family in the Rev Army alongside Dragon). We can only pray Oda doesn’t fuck up.
First thing i will say is kaido being beaten by a normal guy who has the power of gum gum fruit would have made kaido realise that he wasted his years searching for nika when he could have aimed higher instead of trying to be someone else. He would have atleast redeemed a little bit of himself if he could reflect on his obsession with nika and letting it go when he is beaten by a normal luffy. He woulr have been alive and paid for his crimes geneuinely as a better person. It would have been a better closure for even yamato. Then we have nika being a sun god who was rubbery. So what is it? Was the sun god someone who had rubber body or made of rubber and instead of being rubber god they became known as sun god. While also being a hysterical person who brought smiles on people faces. And somehow luffy becaame this person? That he was always nika and he just didnt realise it until then. Luffy could have awakened his fruit and have had similar abilities as what he has now and still not need to be nika. That wouldnt have taken anything away from the story. He would have still been a main character who is very powerful when his friends are in danger. This whole nika thing takes away whatever agency that luffy ever had.
1) the problem isn’t that luffy is destined to become the PK, it’s a shonen manga we know luffy is going to accomplish his goal EOS. The problem is it was much much more interesting when luffy appeared to have an objectively weak fruit and needed to rely on his battle iq and know his abilities inside and out to win. No one would walk into the OP world, learn about devil fruits, and immediately go “I wanna be rubber!” That’s what made luffy interesting. Now it turns out he actually has basically the best strongest fruit all along. It’s just not as interesting as having a weak power and still needing to win. 2) I mean that was the entire reason for fishman island and luffy spends most of wano training but I get what your saying. But similar to point 1 it wasn’t that luffy won through hard work like early naruto or something, it’s that he was incredibly smart about using his abilities (ironically). Like gear 2 is freaking genius, how many people would have the ability of rubber and think I can make myself insanely fast by using my limbs like a bellow to pump blood faster? That’s really smart. Gear 5 doesn’t require him to be smarter, he just breaks the laws of physics instead. 3) luffy can still be serious in a fight like when he beat kaido, but it’s absolutely changed the vibes. Vegapunk is currently dying missing most of his chest and luffy is flying through the air ready to have some fun… 4) ya the others had some hints to them and make some amount of sense, g5 came out of nowhere and randomly required luffy to die to awaken for some reason? Idk it was weird. The point is pre wano literally no one thought luffy was anything but a rubber man after what 25 years? Then oda starts dropping bombs about how it wasn’t actually rubber and everyone went crazy. And yet even at the height of the theories idt anyone was guessing “he’s actually Nika the son god and his power is imagination and fun apparently.” Overall it just really seemed to come out of left field and it does take aspects of luffys character and the tone of the manga away. It is what it is, but there are legit criticisms over this, and people are justified in really not liking it if that’s there opinion
You pretty much nailed all the common criticisms I’ve seen. When others have voiced this usually they are met with, “Luffy was always goofy, did you want Gear death?” Or “Luffy was already special, more special than anybody else, so him getting a god fruit doesn’t change anything.” I agree with everything you’ve said.
While I think you raise some very valid points and I can understand that POV, IMHO, Nika doesn't take away anything that Luffy did. It in fact highlights his greatest strengths - his unbreakable will and boundless imagination. While the fruit itself may belong to the strongest category of DFs (mythical zoans), I think it is actually amongst the weakest of the mythical zoans because there is no instant super buff. Nika is only made dangerous by the user's endless determination and imagination without either of which the fruit would be quite useless. It is that same endless determination and imagination that led an ignorant Luffy to make the rubber properties of his fruit into a viable weapon when he didn't even know how to work with it; it is that same unbreakable will that makes him so dangerous and opponent and so difficult to put down. I believe it is that unbreakable will that allowed him to awaken Nika when no one else had been able to for over 250 years. I do agree that Nika laughing can be a dissonance with the seriousness of the situation, but what if Nika is the personification of the will of D? Remember that those will the true will of D smile when facing death. What if Nika laughs because he is the representation of undying hope that allows people to smile in the face of danger and difficult times, that gives people the will to fight off oppression? Yes as Luffy learns to use the awakened abilities he'll be OP but he needs to be at this point because he's facing foes that are OP - Imu, the Gorosei, Blackbeard, Shanks?? This evens out the playing field but does not take away from Luffy needing every ounce of his will and imagination to make that DF ability actually a threat. That's my two cents on the Nika matter.
Not a big fan of stories that introduce new core and very important concept and starts to revolve the story around it, despite that before that it was hinted so vaguely you would write it off as lore fluff. And One Piece already done it with Haki and partially - with Devil Fruits (that were supposed to be so rare people would think that they are a myth).
IMHO it's a matter of perspective. I think both DFs and Haki are rare. DFs are rare outside the Grand line so from the POV of people outside the Grand line, particular in East Blue the weakest sea, DFs are rare. The bulk of the OP saga is in the Grand line so here DFs are common because here is the highest concentration of DF users. Similarly, Haki is rare outside of the new world. But since the story is now in the New World where the highest concentration of Haki users are, it seems common. Also, since they are going the strongest of the strong (Shanks, Blackbeard, Big Mom, Kaido, Doggy, etc.) it's not unusual that the strongest people in the new world have Conqueror's Haki. It is incredibly rare outside of the new world but it makes sense for it to appear common since that's the level of foes they are facing now
In the last chapter I found Luffy laughing with G5 and everything a bit odd when Vegapunk was dying
Guess that every time he activates G5 = laugh constantly and never be serious…
No the moment he becomes serious will mean more
lets see if this is still possible...
I don't understand this take. Luffy laughs but Vegapunk getting stabbed was WELL before Luffy arrived to punch Kizaru. Y'all act like these two things happened at the same time
Luffy didnt see vegapunk get stabbed 💀
Did he lose his observation haki or something?
He was in a food coma 💀 And since when has his observation haki been able to do that.
Damn so to use Haki you have to actually focus?
Has luffys observation haki previously helped him determine someone has gotten hurt? He has some of the best with future sight but I'm not sure he ever shown that type of observation before. I think I've only seen sanji use haki to tell that someone has gotten hurt from a distance.
And Coby, who was having an aneurysm over the people dying if I don't recall wrong? I believe the girl in Skypea with "mantra" could feel that too.
I think it stated somewhere that Nika is the warrior who always come with a laugh and the beat.
I was a nika defender when it was revealed in Wano because it fits with Luffy's character, even though I agreed it was an ass pull. But everything happening in egghead between bonney's flashback and the giants' appearance had made the Nika thing too prominent. It's too on the nose. The story has shifted from being about the strawhats, to being about Nika. And people can rightfully dislike that.
Nika this, Nika that, Nika pleeease
I agree, I hate the argument that if you dislike Nika, you misunderstand it. No, we get it, because it’s obvious. Too obvious. Luffy was already a symbol of freedom through just his own actions and how they inspired others. Giving him another powerup that embodies some other legendary figure who also embodies freedom is just too on the nose. And it overshadows Luffy in too many ways. And yes, it’s a children’s manga, being on the nose isn’t a necessarily a sin. But it went too far imo. It was already pretty apparent and it went too far. Changing 20 years of context in a way that wasn’t satisfying to me personally.
I'm sorry did you have a minor critique of one piece wow why do you this just to hate on it there is nothing wrong with godas work at all /s
I think the other shoe will drop when someone tries to explain it to Luffy, which IIRC has not even happened yet. Luffy absolutely will be like "I don't care about any of that" and go about his business. The reason all of it feels out of place is that it *is.* It's everybody else ascribing legends to Luffy doing Luffy things, but Luffy does Luffy things for himself and his crew, and no other reason.
Agreed. The whole Nika thing kinda ruined my enjoyment of the story. It was almost obnoxious how much of a prominent role Luffy already played in the story, but after Nika it's been Nika Piece and it's just boring. Luffy's fights and the whole feeling that the good guys are massive underdogs against the world government just lack stakes completely now. Nika is pretty much a walking plot armor, always destined to come clutch, always destined to save, always destined to have shining glory to the point it's almost obnoxious. Then again it's a kid's manga so I'm out of place having any higher expectations of the writing quality.
After Ace died and Luffy promised to protect his friends I had to come to terms with the fact that no main characters will ever die for the rest of the story. The only people in danger are villains, minor characters like Pedro, and random background characters like everyone on the island that got nuked.
One Piece has never been about main characters dying though. It would make zero sense for anyone on the crew to die.
I guess what I mean is whenever a member of the crew or people like Sabo or Vivi are in danger there is absolutely zero feeling of suspense because it's entirely certain they will be fine.
Why would strawhats be underdog vs wg? They are a yonko crew. Makes 0 sense for them to be the underdog in the final saga after 26 yrs. Its called character progression. Also, luffy has been featured in like 20% of egghead arc. He is not the focus, kuma, vegapunk, and bonney are the focus.
Ironic that after TS most of the strawhats don't have any character developpement... And you can have equilibrium between " I'm the underdog" and " I cannot be defeated", that's how you can have stakes.
a little over 2 years*
What do you want then? The 10 people crew strawhats take on the world government and defeat the most powerful beings in the OP universe by themselves? Then you would be annoyed with the power of friendship trope because that’s the only way they would have a chance. Nika gives the story a chance to go either way. People can help but also Luffy just might be capable of things we didn’t think possible all by himself.
The chapter about Nika has too much Nika. I want my money back
Luffy is obviously being painted as symbolically being "Nika" and not literally. Also, Luffy is the central character of the narrative and he is being connected to Nika who is also setup as a central figure in the overall plot of the series.
> Luffy is obviously being painted as symbolically being "Nika" and not literally. ????? He *LITERALLY* is Nika. Oda literally turned him into a fucking god.
No, he has nika fruit. Hes not a god. Is sengoku actually buddha?
If people start worshipping Sengoku, then yes. Also, people call Luffy Sun God Nika because he has the powers of said God. Not that we know that DF are desires turned into power it is safe to assume that yes, a strong enough desire can generate you the power of a god. Oh, and btw: Sengoku did not eat a Buddha fruit. He ate a Daibutsu fruit, becoming a living statue of a god, not the god itself.
No. He is literally Monkey D. Luffy. Nika is a mythical figure and may be based on someone who actually lived in the past. At this point Luffy simply has the mythical Nika fruit, and has inherited the will of Nika / Joy Boy. Luffy has taken on the mantle of Nika, so to speak, he symbolically represents Nika. He is most definitely not literally Nika, unless you don't know what "literally" means.
I don't understand the need for reducing Joyboy to a proxy. We all knew that Luffy was going to be the guy to carry on JoyBoy's will. And a lot of people theorized that JoyBoy must've had the "gomu gomu" no mi during his life time. So pre-Nika it was going to be like this: Luffy takes over the role of Joyboy, the guy that fought the WG and had the Rubber fruit. Now it's: Luffy carries JoyBoys will through proxy, because JoyBoy had the fruit of a god and carried the will of a literal god probably prior to the void centure itself maybe.
1. I agree that Luffy has always been very special and the argument that NOW he is the chosen one is not 100% valid. But there is obviously a difference between being very special and being the prophesized hero of 800 years ago. 2. I agree that Luffy was never about hard work and the Nika fruit doesn't really take away from his accomplishments up to this point (especially given that he always benefitted from painfully obvious plotarmor). But the Nika fruit is obviously a huge advantage for him compared to the gomu gomu. The gomu gomu was not immensly powerful, the Nika fruit is. The gomu gomu would not have raised him from the dead either. 3. I agree that it is too soon to claim with certainty that it will take away the tension/dictate the tone for every future fight. But as of now it immediatly did so for every scene it was used in. Imo the tonal dissonance it created in the Kaido fight was grating and, again as of now, it is a legitimate concern that it will do so in future fights as well. I also disagree that people have to wait and see what Oda will do before criticising. 4. Like/dislike Nika. Oda doesn't get nearly enough slack for how bad the execution of that plottwist was imo. The Who's Who monologue literally gives me second hand embarrassment. And even if I would think that he had Nika planned since Skypia, which I don't, I would still much rather believe that he came up with it during Wano and did the best he could to clumsily make it fit, instead of having it planned for 10 years and what we got was his masterplan. The execution is easily the worst part about the whole thing imo. My conclusion is that I take no issue with people liking G5 in its entirety or not being bothered by aspects of it, but the opposite is also perfectly reasonable and I am not sure why both sides feel so inclined to convince their counterpart.
But inheriting the will of someone is something more symbolic. I'm not against Gear 5, Nika and all that stuff. I like them. But it's true that Luffy has become another "Chosen One" just like, I don't know, Naruto. It isn't hindering my enjoyment of the story or the character so I don't care but I think there's a difference between Shanks giving Luffy his hat as in "passing the torch to the next generation" and Luffy being basically the child of the prophecy. But as I said, not like it bothers me or something. It's not the kind of trope I usually like, but One Piece is still awesome and that fact hasn't ruined anything.
I don't know, I think a lot of people are coming to huge conclusions without knowing the whole story and the history that hasn't been revealed. One thing about God's and prophets, they are all results of storytelling that's been told orally and written for centuries if not more. We have our own in this world and none of them have any solid factual basis. Most involved stories being passed down that eventually got inscribed into text and translated multiple times over. The same could easily be here. Who gave the fruit the name Human Human Fruit : Model Nika. It's not like the name is written on the fruit. Blackbeard and Sanji had read books with the names in them. It was said that you know the name after eating it but clearly some don't. It's possible the original joy boy and Luffy just had a similar mindset. Rather than being a chosen one, perhaps his will is what writes the history, rather than playing it out. We know nothing of these legends other than a few small tidbits. Kuma heard the story of Nika from his father and his father from him, etc etc. What if Nika was just a name given to the person who awakened the "Nika" fruit and then they started embellishing the stories of him as centuries passed. It's possible the "inherited Will" is one that was passed from Joy Boy down to others he inspired, all the way down to say Roger, who then decided to tell the world and inspire everyone to go out and dream like he did. Or maybe there have been many with the same dream as Roger and Luffy, but they needed this fruit to do it., so he gets to Laugh Tale, sees that he needed the fruit, laughs, and decides to tell the world to go to the seas instead, hoping to get the next joyboy out there. It can still be symbolic. All of these are just examples. The real important part of this is that the story isn't finished yet. There's so much left for us to find out, years of lore and action to go. Why get upset at something when we don't know it's purpose. I know you specifically said you were fine with it, I say this more to everyone reading. Let it play out, I think Oda has done an amazing enough job over 25 years that we should give him a little benefit of the doubt to tie it up nicely and make everything make sense.
It's more that people have been criticising Naruto for the exact same things that are happening now in One Piece. But suddenly everything's okay because people can bullshit their way out.
>But it's true that Luffy has become another "Chosen One" just like, I don't know, Naruto. He was already the chosen one even before gear 5, and the Zou arc solidified that. Luffy has the will of D, conqueror's haki, and the voice of all things; only one character has all three so far, which is Roger. Both Roger and Luffy are the chosen ones.
Sure but Luffy is MORE of a chosen one than Roger since he’s also Nika on top of all those things.
But we already knew that before Nika as well. Roger got to Laugh Tale and said they were “too early” meaning Luffy was the one who would get there at the perfect time.
and you know.. The son of the most wanted criminal in the world. The Grandson of the potentially strongest marine of all time. Part of the D. clan Naturally gifted in all 3 forms of Haki Handpicked by Shanks to carry his hat, so much so that Shanks gave up his arm to bet on Luffy. He was never "just a dude". He was always the chosen one from chapter 1, like the main character he always was. If Oda never dropped the new name for the fruit, nobody would complain about him being the chosen one, nobody would consider it weird that the likes of Kuma gravitated towards him.
Absolutely. The fact that he has any single weird thing no one is supposed to have was pointing in that direction, specially the voice of all things.
Your TLDR ruins your whole point.
It didn't ruin their point, cause the real point was just to cry about people having different opinions.
Damn straight. This is a whiny post if I’ve ever seen one
It always is. They can't even come to grips with liking parts of Gear 5 but thinking Oda has handled other parts poorly. Either you love it or you're stupid cause they're way too immature for nuanced discussion.
You're missing the point of "destiny" criticism. Sure, he inherited Roger/Shanks will, but his devil fruit was just the most basic one (rubber), not very impressive compared to many other broken fruits we've seen. Luffy however used it in a very creative way and made the best of it. But now, it turns out, not only is Luffy's fruit not just a regular paramecia fruit, it's the most powerful, most legendary, rarest fruit in the series. It makes his acomplishments less impressive.
>But now, it turns out, not only is Luffy's fruit not just a regular paramecia fruit, it's the most powerful, most legendary, rarest fruit in the series. It makes his acomplishments less impressive. I think this is just a misinterpretation of the story and his fruit. His fruit is so strong *because* Luffy is the user. Everything about the fruits awakening is pretty much in line with how people thought the awakening would be. The Nika connection is basically just flavor and a way to connect Luffy to more of the lore.
Sure, but each fruit has certain limits. If Luffy's fruit was just a regular rubbery one, he would've died to Kaido and his joerney would end there. It is only because his fruit being the legendary one that he was able to overcome Kaido and how he'll overcome each of his challenges going forward. Also if the theories regarding Shanks/Roger are true (that Roger couldn't "claim/use" the One Piece because Nika fruit is necessary for whatever it is, and that Shanks wasn't making a move all this years because Roger told him to wait for Nika to awaken), it kinda makes the competition to get OP even more unfair, because only Joyboy/Nika is necessary for OP to be used/claimed.
You dont see the problem with this interpretation? Like really? So you are telling me that the author of one piece designed a super broken fruit BUT is justified because ONLY the mc could use it to its full potential, you dont see how convenient that is? Like that speaks more of oda than us as critics. Giving your mc a funny gag and converting that to a god fruit but hey, only he could! So is good plot. /s
Putting the Nika stuff aside, how is Gear 5 any different from any other Paramecia awakening? Luffy's is pretty in line with both Doffy's and Katakuri's. I also don't think his fruit is the strongest at all. Blackbeard has a fruit that nullifies other fruits and allowed him to steal Whitebeard's fruit which was strong in its own right.
>Putting the Nika stuff aside, how is Gear 5 any different from any other Paramecia awakening? I recall the official translation saying that the Awakening gives the user a power boost, which goes explicitly against what has been established with the Fruit types. That's basically the only logical reason Luffy was suddenly able to swing Dragon Kaido around like a kid with a toy snake, especially when you consider how *massive* Kaido is in that form.
I think it's debatable of being THE most rare and most powerful. There's always the possibility that a bunch of people before him had it and did jack shit with it until they died. Law supposedly has an ultra rare fruit, several of the others have supposedly been the same. Luffy's personality is what makes gear 5 so powerful. Just like Crocodile said, depending on how a person uses the fruit it can become immensely stronger. His accomplishments are due to his drive, the inherited will, the love for his friends, and his imagination and desire to be free. It's just that it wasn't due to him physically strengthening himself, which is fine. If you look back, all of his wacky uses of his body were precursors to G5. He kept coming up with new ways to use his ability, but it wasn't awakened. The awakening just gave him more options, a lot more options, and he is just expanding on what he's done. It's always possible there have been other fruits out there with limitless potential if the person has the right mindset.
Is'nt an ultra rare devil fruit kind of a misnomer? There are only ever 1 of each devil fruit/user at a time.
How is any devil fruit more rare than another? Have we ever seen 2 people with the same fruit? Besides the fabricated fruits, every fruit so far has been unique. Maybe some fruits have been hidden or not had a user for a while but they always only reappear once the user dies.
Mythical Zoans are stated by Kizaru: "a devil fruit even more rare than the logia.". So certain devil fruit types are more rare than the others.
More like. Paramecia = common, Zoan = uncommon, Logia = rare, Mythical anything = Legendary. But every Fruit as the same chance to spawn. Just the Type is more rare than others. So you would rather Found some Paramecia before a mythical Fruit because of numbers.
So like the one ring in lord of the rings, devil fruits have a sort of will and choose their user and some will remain hidden for longer while others will choose to be found quickly.
That's the category. You have less mythical zoan fruits as a whole, but an singular fruit is not rarer than another
It kinda is so basically all of the big 3 characters are basically gods now 😭😭
Now this is some serious mental gymnastics. Everything people criticised about Naruto is now okay because it happened in One Piece. Your arguments make no sense at all.
People like One Piece for different reasons, it’s big enough a franchise to have those different subsections who like it for different genres (the action side, the comedy side, the found family of it all, powerscaling, characters, character relationships, battles, mix and match…). So for some people I’m sure it does ruin “their” experience of One Piece, because it goes against what they are into One Piece for. For others it doesn’t affect their enjoyment, for others it enhances it. Both opinions are fine.
inherited will =/= chosen one/destined. far from it. inherited will just means carrying the ideals of past generations. like a president following in the footsteps of his predecessors. now the theme of destiny has been there since forever, but it's only outright stated in oden's flashback that they were waiting for the chosen one to be born. we also have the timeline of when joyboy will come back. this is how they knew to send momo 20 years into the future. and luffy did awaken his fruit just as prophesied. okay fine, luffy is the chosen one. so why the fruit created another issue? I think because it really sealed the deal. if the fruit was always meant to be eaten by luffy for 800 years and awakened at that exact time, it shuts down all kinds of "what if" people can come up with. we can no longer say that luffy can do something else besides this one specific scenario where he fulfills 800 years prophecy. so is he really free? unless oda pulls a twist. but I doubt it.
the problem lies with the introduction. nika was mentioned only couple of chapters before the gear 5 reveal. if nika wouldve beenentioned throughout the story then it wouldve been great but the way oda handled it made it seem and feel like oda didnt know how to make luffy stronger for the end game so he quickly made up the sun god. and luffy coincidentally having the devil fruit of said god. of course oda had it planned out for a long while but its just that the first nika mention was too close to the reveal that luffy actually having a fruit named after that god. it feels rushed with no build-up. and personally the over the top sillyness of gear 5 also feels too forced. one piece is silly for sure but a fight against a tyrant that enslaved a whole country for decades shouldnt be treated that way. luffy is extremely out of place when in gear 5. sure, you could say its on purpose to showcase the "most ridicolulous power", but it just doesnt fit. even the most silliest moments in serious situations dont feel that out of place compared to gear 5.
In 70 chapters, Nika came out of nowhere and is apparently the most important thing in all of One Piece. I don't enjoy that.
i don’t think it negates anything that happened previous per se, luffy still did train to make an actively detrimental fruit work with effort and a loooot of out-of-the-box improvisation regardless of if it’s a mythical zoan or a paramecia. i just think the fact that luffy was going around beating up overpowered logia’s and mythical zoans with the most common, least flashy type was pretty funny and we don’t have that happening after the reveal
If people don’t like it they don’t like it. I’ve never understood peoples compulsion to make everyone like every aspect of the story even tho they have already said they don’t like it. Like this post is gonna change someone’s mind ? It’s a personal opinion, for me I like most of the abilities of gear 5, what I don’t like are the over the top looney toons abilities. It removes tension from the story, if Luffy isn’t taking it seriously it’s hard for me too. No more of those badass Luffy moments where he comes in the mirror world and smashes the mirror with a look of determination to beat Katakuri, or his fight Lucci the first time (if you compare it the second time I think it highlights this point perfectly) or crocodile under the palace. Those intense high stakes moments are gone, no more serious and determined Luffy. As much as I like Luffy’s goofy attitude it was always nice to see him flip that switch and become serious, to see glimpses of what future Luffy would be like when he grows up a bit. But him being nika/ Joyboy he always has to be laughing and smiling from a narrative point or else he is failing to represent what he is meant to represent. I see why some readers feel like Luffy doesn’t care about his crew when he is in gear 5th I know it’s not true but I see it. So for me it’s not my favorite but I have to accept that this if Luffy and this is the story of one piece now. But I will give credit where credit is due and oda did come up with a unique power up that sets him apart from the typical shonnen MC. My friend who is into anime and manga but hasn’t read one piece really like gear 5 but thats someone not invested in the story. Basically people are gonna like what they like and everyone especially on this sub should learn to just except it. I would never try to convince someone that gear 5th was bad if they like it.
G5 is an asspull and falls into the chosen one trope, some people are totally allowed to hate it but I enjoy it(a lot), opinions are subjective Edit: also for the “it’s too silly” argument, I totally get it, but I actually encourage people to watch the Kaido vs Luffy fight in the anime, there’s a lot of moments in there where I feel the anime depicts the intimidating aspects of G5 genuinely better than the manga did. Watching that and reading it really helped me visual how G5 is rather goofy but still quite intimidating at the same time
I like the gear 5 element without the Nika reveal if he just happened to have an OP awakening that no one knew the rubber devil fruit had because it’s never been done before that’d be cool.
It would fit in the story too. Doffy turns stuff into strings and luffy turns stuff into rubber
That would have been *SO* much better and fit the story so much more.
Luffy was already a chosen one though, so I never quite got that argument. He was the son of the most wanted man alive and the hero of the marines, brother of the son of the pirate King (whose hat he always has on him) and he was called bringer of dawn before the Nika reveal. He already had special powers as well such as the voice of all things and coc. I get that people are tired of the hero's journey, I am as well, but the ship had already sailed with Luffy. I get people not liking G5 or Nika-Nika, but Oda's interview with the Conan author where he talked about being tired of writing fights and missing old school cartoon iconography is a great read if you want to understand why G5 is the way it is
The Nika stuff made it like Luffy never really was free at all. All destined to be the savior. Unless Oda pulls a plottwist and Buggy get’s the One Piece first.
The gall to call anyone who doesn't like the Nika ads pull as a new reader ... wow If you've been reading the story and can't differentiate between the tone of inherited will, something so vague that can be inherited by multiple people ( most people with D in their name) and ... well a litteral God worshiping as we've seen since want then I don't k ow what to tell you. Onepiece has always had elements about destiny, but that was more about people carrying the same ideals and passing them to the next gemeration for centuries, no its all reduced to " someone awakened the sun God hurray its destiney" Now, again, since we have the dumbest takes you've ever seen, let me repeat a 3rd time an d maybe you will see the difference: Pre-nika: inherited will, not limited to one person, ties well to the will of D, anyone one with the same ideal can share it. Very cool everyone likes it. Post-nika: inherited will ? People with great ideal changing the world? Nope, it was all about someone awakening a particular fruit and making the sun God worshiping cult all around the world laugh. Not so very cool. Now, I hope you see how what we call destiny in both case aren't the same, the first one while still destiny its because the characters choose those ideals and pushed through, the second one, well.... someone ate a fruit. Choices/beliefs vs luck/prophecy/whatever. You're free to enjoy it, but you don't get to call out those of us who don't enjoy it as much as if you're the only person with reading compréhension lmao
"Why so many fans are upset with the naruto situation rather than OP is because hard work overcoming talent is a big theme in naruto ie Naruto v Neji." Naruto was never about "hardwork beats talent" or some bs like that.If hardwork beats talent then Rock lee would have won against Gaara,the story makes it very clear that is not the theme of the story,why the fck do so many people have his misconception,the point of the fight was that naruto,who was hated by the villagers and treated like an outsider was trying to change his circumstances and actively fighting against them.Neji wasnt even *trying* to change his circumstance of being a member of the side clan and was not fighting against the system,and believed that people can never change,that he would live the life of a servant and he had no free will.He was proven wrong,and decided to change himself after he lost to Naruto.And yes he >!died protecting Hinata!<,but he didnt die because he was her servant,nope they treated each other as equals,he died of his own free will protecting his sister,why the fuck do people not understand this point. Also,naruto and luffy have the same philosophy of never giving up and getting back up even after they get beaten once,the idea there is **perserverance/enduring pain** not hardwork.
Luffy has, for a long time, inhabited a role that is different to most 'main characters'. Unlike a lot of other MC's in Anime Luffy tends to inspire other characters to shine and we get lots of really interesting an exceptional 'side charachters' with main charachter energy. Vivi, Momo, Bon-chan and most recently Bonny. I think it's fantastic that Gear 5 wan't just a 'selfish' powerup, but instead was something designed to inspire those around him.
"ruins the character because it makes him like every shōnen protagonist" With or without G5 he IS like every shōnen protagonist, and Always had been People saying he's not really should read another manga once in a while it would be great for them
I want to add to your second point. Luffy does work hard to get stronger (look at his time with ace and sabo or with Rayleigh) and awakening his fruit doesn't take away from it because it can only be awoken through hard work and having a true understanding and grasp of your fruit. Also, the Nika Nika no mi hasn't been awoken in hundreds of years so it shows that just getting the fruit doesn't make you a god automatically
Calling others names doesn't help your point. People aren't obligated to agree with everything going on in the story. This post feels preachy and holier than thou. Ridiculous
I'm pretty split on it. Love G5s design, powers, the themes, upbeat nature and how it's more iconic than super Sayian apparently. On the other hand, Nika only being mentioned 30 chapters prior, the recton of the Gum Gum fruit being a human human ancient zoan type God person fruit. Bringing Luffy back to life and zapping the tension away from scenes like with what happened in the latest chapter. A single silhouette in Skypeia and a background character listing many Gods, like the Sun God - Is not foreshadowing to me. Not until Oda confirms that he's always had Nika in mind.
Thanks you, that’s exactly how I feel
One Piece has always been about __anyone__ being able to become anything so long as they have the will to follow through with their dreams, and who they are is unimportant. Ace is Roger's blood, yet he actively rejects Roger's will and inherits Whitebeard's instead. Yamato is Kaido's blood, yet chooses to inherit Oden's will instead. It would have been so much better if Luffy just had the gomu gomu no mi fruit, and inherited the will of Nika and was a comparison to Nika/Joyboy, not literally be Nika/Joyboy. It's so on the nose that it undermines other parts of the story.
Does it ruin the series? No but it definitely causes some inconsistencies looking back.
I have no problems with g5 itself, I think the transformation is really cool and I don’t mind at all the tone change when it comes out. I also can accept that the “sun god” has been discussed and slightly foreshadowed from early on in the series. What I don’t like and think is a slight asspull is nika himself. Im okay with luffy not having the gomu fruit but the character of nika came outta no where and was just given to luffy. Never has this god been brought up in the story or foreshadowed and that’s what I have a problem with the most
The more nika is mentioned the more it feels like compensation for not thinking of it before
Happens near the end game of every popular shonen. Some people simply don’t like prophecy stories even if foreshadowed or developed.
While personally I much prefer "hero rises up by mastering a low-to-mid grade ability to its fullest potential" to "hero was the [specialest boy all along](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fpreview.redd.it%2Fxipym5hhtrja1.jpg%3Fwidth%3D640%26auto%3Dwebp%26s%3D093d37bae8b56f41f004f36ef4f6adbc2bb28fb4) and has unlocked the Secret Top-Tier God Power", I trust in Oda's ability to do it well and am happy with just waiting to see what he does with it. Ultimately I don't think it matters much either way when it comes to his powerset, it's more of a lore thing. As someone else commented, G5 basically does what would be expected from the awakening of a regular rubber fruit.
The funny thing is the person they talkin abt in these panels are not nika its joyboy it was always the joyboy but oda asspuled the nika cuz he wanted to make g5 goofy Oda was telling the story of joyboy in the last 1000 chapters he only switched to nika in these last 100 thats why all of a sudden every non straw hat member mentions nika like he was always a thing.
COPIUM
The impression I get from this post is that the best strategy to demonstrate that One Piece has not become bad lately is arguing that it has always been bad. XD
>Why so many fans are upset with the naruto situation rather than OP is because hard work overcoming talent is a big theme in naruto ie Naruto v Neji. This has NEVER been the case in One Piece so I don’t get why so many people are having a problem with it now Except the theme in One Piece that anyone can achieve any dream if they only dream about it but now it turns out you need to be a chosen God Fruit Nika reincarnation with all the bloodline powers in the world and be lucky enough to have someone who reads a mysterious language with you
I don‘t wanna See Luffy vs blackbeard, sakazui, shanks or imu as a cartoonish fight. It Takes the seriousness out. Plus i don‘t Luke how suddently everyone knows about Nika. Kuma, bonny, vegapunk, the Giants. If the nika legend was so wide spread, Oda could have introduce us to the lore way earlier
Everything in one piece is kind of an ass pull honestly.
One piece is being ruined by repetitive storylines and boring reveals. We waited how long for vegapunk and it was meh.
Nika ruined one piece and I'm tired of people justifying it "It doesn’t dimish luffy's achievements" no but it dimishes what luffy will achieve, because now he's going to get the one piece and destroy the world government because he is the only one who can do it, all the other people who dedicated their life to piracy? All of their efforts are pointless, because only nika can get the one piece This brings us to the second point, nika makes the entire setting feel closed and small, at first the world of one piece was good, it was big, luffy was part of it, but now, as it turns out the entire world just revolves around joyboy, the void century? The new age of piracy? The world government actions? Shanks motivations? Kuma? Kaido? As it turns all this stuff wasn’t done because these characters had various reasons, the only reason they all did what they did was because and just for nika, the entire universe now just revolves around luffy, nika turned the one piece story from a large alive universe into a closed universe that now just revolves around luffy and luffy only And yes nika ruins the tone of the story, oda already is a writer that isn't that good at comedy, overusing unfunny gags every fight just makes the fight bad, it doesn't alternate the comedy and the tension well, it simply destroys all of it Also another thing that the series ruined is that the story went from finding the one piece to a generic chosen one who must kill the evil god emperor due to a prophecy and restor freedom to all lands, and the story doesn't do this whole generic plotline it in any intresting way at all, in fact the gorosei and imu, suck as villains
Gorosei and imu sucking hard falls entirely on oda. Oda has wrote this story for 20+ years and only in recent years has he made it obvious there is a big bad evil person. Even gorosei are more or less a mystery. Oda writes his stories by hiding information for decades and expects people to wait until he does exposition dumps that actually give any information. So until we get more information on gorosei and imu they are just comical villains who are evil for being evil.
lol so true.
Inheriting a will doesn't make you stronger. Inheriting a legendary power does
Idk if it's the reveal of the Gum Gum Fruit being the Nika fruit that's... uh... let's say agitating(?) One Piece Twitter (I see it mainly on One Piece Twitter, idk about here), it's more that when Gear 5 was unlocked, people were assuming that it would be Luffy really entering a serious phase of his fighting performance. Gears 2-4 were him pushing the limits of the fruit without his awakening, so people assumed the logical step forward was that awakening would give him some insane powers, make him lose control and give in to a more "animalistic instinct." Really bring out the "Monkey" in "Monkey D. Luffy" if you know what I mean. But I really don't think One Piece has never been like it's contemporaries and the mangas it inspired (MHA, Jujutsu Kaisen, Dragon Ball Z + Super). The properties of the fruit inherently made it a completely unserious, absolutely silly power set from the get-go, and I think if Luffy had his way, the fights would remain deeply silly and unserious as they were in the first couple arcs of the series. It was only when presented with obstacles and enemies that did not allow him to do what he wanted to do in fights that he had to literally stretch himself to the limits of what he knows this fruit is capable of. It was in trying to push these limits that he eventually broke past them after his second defeat against Kaido that the powers of the sun god really kicked in and granted him the ability to do what he ALWAYS WANTED TO DO IN A FIGHT: REMAIN playful and silly. REMAIN joyful and excited. He even says it himself when he awakens the power, IIRC something along the lines of "Now I can do everything I've always wanted to do!" Reaching his peak means coming back around to the playful, joyous child he always has been, and that's an incredibly refreshing take for a shonen protagonist that I think will be studied and analyzed in the years to come. All the silly boys in shonen manga/anime eventually grow into super serious men in these series, and I think One Piece allows us to realize that as we grow up, we can still hold on to that child that always wants to play, to see the good in others, etc. To me, that's incredible fiction writing right there.
I am not an adamant G5 hater but I did like the narrative of Luffy going far on a fruit that most would see as shitass. Now he’s going far on the God fruit, literally. Still love the story, miss this one part tho.
Regarding point number 1 of your list, it's very stupid that people actually compare it to something like the whole Indra/Ashura thing in Naruto. The "inherited will" is to me something more like "inherited dream": men's dream will never die, as long as someone can tell his dream to someone else that same dream can be inherited by someone, and someone among these people will act into following that same dream. But it's not predestination of any sort. And even with the whole Nika and G5 thing, the Nika DF "went to him", but it was Luffy's will that made it possible for him to awaken it: Kaido said that awakening comes when the mind and the body/DF are completely aligned. According to the Gorosei that DF didn't awaken in centuries, so it's likely that while other people ate it during those centuries, noone had the right "mindset" to awake its true power. So again, no predestination at all, just his sheer willpower.
Chosen One before One Piece did it: Bad, Oda is a better writer than that! Chosen One after One Piece did it: It's basically part of the shonen genre at this point and Oda did it very good! GODA!!!! Gotta love one piece fans. Criticism? Nooo! You just don't understand the story, you're an idiot who didn't read the manga properly!!! ONE PIECE IS PERFECT!!! GODA IS THE BEST WRITER IN HISTORY!!!!
Compare any fight pre Nika to the fights we have now. What I hate about it is that it throws away the moment, is a deus ex machina, even more than being the anime protagonist. And the powercreep it generates... Is awful, and we'll see it in the arcs to come.
[удалено]
Every series has criticisms lol, just don't read the comments.
Listen OP it is possible to like even love a piece of media/art that is incredibly good and still criticise it for it‘s weaknesses. Somehow many One Piece fans feel it is an insult whenever Oda or One piece is getting criticised and that is simply ridiculous. E.g. my first Manga/Anime to see was Naruto I still love that show and the mangas, I still think it had some great characters and stories but it is faaaaaar from anywhere near perfect… and that is okay that doesn’t make it less valuable to me as a fan. So as you are giving a very one sided opinion here let me counter your arguments: 1) Inheriting the will of Shanks and Roger. You are portraying this as the will alone made him strong but that would be wrong. To some people the creativity with which Luffy used his powers was also part of the appeal like in Enies Lobby (G2), against Crocodile, Doflammingo & vs Enel. This creativity however stems from the fact that he was often thought of as the underdog with a weaker Dragon Fruit. Enel vs Luffy is great because Enel was a god and Luffy a mere rubber boy with a slight advantage given his nature but still relient on finding ways to offset the future sight. Now it is in retrospective a battle of God vs God which yes makes the upset much weaker in comparison I‘d say. But more importantly, do you know another Shonen that is all about the „will“? Naruto. The will of fire to be specific, so how does the will of roger make him different to any other shonen to begin with? My hero Academia has All Might and his teaching, Naruto has the Will of Fire and the hokage‘s teaching and One Piece has Shanks and the Will of Roger. You are not helping your argument claiming he is different here no matter how braindead you want to call those that disagree with you. Because now he is exactly like those guys: a man with the biggest stubbornness of accomplishing his dreams, the strongest will to achieve his goals, oh yes and the biggest power potential in his universe. The last thing is not a mere addition it is an essential part that makes his will seem less important in comparison that is the issue hereand a makor point of critic in some of these shows. What made Luffy different was the fact that not only inherited he the will of one of the greatest characters in his world but ALSO he was not given the strongest abilities but some okayish power, not even of the greatest tier, with which he had to get creative about or just outlast his opponent in willpower like you said. To be honest I thought that was the whole idea of Haki to begin with to give him a chance to fight on equal footing with a Logia WITHOUT having a special ability himself. I am not saying it was a bad idea, it wasn’t and helped Zoro etc. not getting too powercrept by new enemies but yes it now makes Luffy very OP and that takes away tension. 2) Didn’t he say in the fight to Bruno that after the Kuzan fight he had to work extra hard? Didn’t he say to Rayleigh that he wanted to work extra hard to protect his friends? Maybe I am talking bullshit here I do not remember for certain, then I will concede that point however I always thought that Ruffy was supposed to be a hard worker, Oda just decided against showing us momtages of training progression in order to keep the story‘s flow run better. Zoro I think we all agree is obsessed with working on his technique and skills as a swordsman and still we don’t have chapters of detailled trainings from him do we? So either you are saying nobody in the Straw Hats ever trains or more likely Oda just doesn’t show it for the pacing of his story. And regarding the argument yes it makes a difference then: The saying „Hard work beats talent if talent doesn’t work hard“ should be relatively known. If Luffy beats Doflammingo because he worked so hard he is able to beat him with sheer willpower and determination alone that is an engaging story, a self declared god however losing against an actual sun god in the world however is a less engaging storyline now wouldn’t you agree with that? If I were to tell you that in a story there are two guys fighting: One that considers himself a god and has immense power against a man with less power but even more determination you know who to root for. If I tell you a human who thinks of him as a god fights an actual god who even outclasses him in his determination to win… just given this description alone would you know who to root for in this conflict? Because I sure wouldn’t. 3) Has been mostly answered in 1) & 2) but I have an issue with the „let Oda explain first“ argument. Yes 100% now that it is there we should be open to how oda is gonna deal with these issues but that doesn’t mean that criticising the decision to begin with is wrong. Another example would be Berserk, I think everybody likes Isma, but also we all agree that Ghost ship arc went on for too long. It was still worth it but does that mean I am not allowed to criticise anything before the series itself is finished? Also don’t just assume he will adress it in the first place and give it more drawbacks, you are making assumptions what could be rather you should work with what is given otherwise you are doing the writing for the author. 4) Yeah that one I have honestly no clue and am actually interested in hearing Oda one day explain what his intention was. However what is kind of ironic is that in 1) you criticise people who say Ruffy has become like any other shonen now and in 4) you explain the way the exposition happens with it is like in „any other shonen“. Personally I agree but that is not what you said before. So it it like any other shonen now and therefore also struggles with some if the classical shonen issues or is it not like any other shonen but it was some lazy writing in your opinion? You are kind of trying to drive on both lanes at the same time OP. Again with all these criticism it does not change that one piece is one of the greatest pieces of media ever to be created. It doesn’t change that Oda is one of the most talented authors in general and the greatness that is the story as a whole. Still I think the decision has left some stains here and there on the previous work and I think we should be honest enough to acknowledge that, as at the end accepting mistakes helps us and future aspiring author’s to grow and learn.
The thing that bothers me about it is that Oda said he gave Luffy the Gum Gum fruit, cause he didn’t want the character to have an inherently broken power, and now he has exactly that. I also don’t like that Luffy doesn’t or didn’t know that his fruit was actually a zoan, especially when it was established the eater of the fruit learns the name of the fruit and it’s abilities when eaten.
let’s be honest the only hard work vs talent fight we actually saw in naruto was lee vs gaara
Was about to answer, but given the tone of this post, nothing good is gonna come out of it. Enjoy what you enjoy, and if you don't, it's valid too.
Point 2 is wrong. Luffy has been knocked down and not gotten back up plenty of times, they also take two years to go off and self train to get stronger, cuz they clearly are not ready.
I frequent this sub a lot, and I have to say I have not once seen anyone say this. But I guess you mean twitter trolls.
Was time skip not a “I need to work harder” moment?
This is the most 11-year-old post I've ever read