One Piece villains are great, because they’re mostly just assholes. We got to see Doflamingo’s tragic childhood, except we also saw that he was a child psychopath. Granted, you could argue that his privileged early upbringing caused that...but whatever.
Hody Jones was asked explicitly what humans did to cause him to hate them so much, and the reader was primed to expect a backstory of enslavement and abuse, but he just replied “nothing”. It was awesome, sometimes a story just needs a monster, and sometimes that’s what reality produces.
I mean Hody Jones was radicalized as a child no? The only people he had to look up to were people like Arlong. Yeah he an asshole. but idk rings close to home of how shooters come about. To say they were just assholes I think takes blame off of the society that made them in Hody Jones and Doflamingo's case being Arlong's crew and the celestial dragons. Doflamingo I would say never had his psychopathic tendencies challenged and never learned empathy.
Big Mom could be another tragic figure in that she never grew up and was only encouraged to be a child by her adoptive mother who really was just a trafficker.
Sure, but other people came out of those same upbringings to become good people; Corazon most notably. I think the implication was that power and subjugation are not ultimately determinative of whether you’re a good person, but they do shape and foster evil. I’m still undecided on just how evil Big Mom is.
I think those are the exception rather than the rule though. I lot of things have to go right so peeps can have have control over their lives. Not saying a lot of these villains need to retain power but that under better circumstances then they wouldn't exist. Carazon had Law to look after which I think really helped him learn to live for someone else. Admittedly I might not have as much knowledge as you but just mulling things over. We talk about anime but as a means to think about our own world.
Certainly. I don’t think Oda meant to suggest that it’s nature over nurture as a rule, definitely not as a political commentary—he seems pretty conscious of the oppressive nature of hierarchy. But I do think he’s comfortable in writing a story with villains that are just plain bad, without worrying about making the audience feel sorry for them (though he sometimes does) or analyzing the origins of their personality. And that’s refreshing; it makes for fun storytelling and isn’t necessarily inaccurate. There are some individuals who, through some combination of nature and nurture, are just antisocial.
I think he has interesting concepts showing things are neither good or bad. Like selfishness in the series. Luffy and Big Mom are both very child like and do want they want. With Luffy he comes off as good because he happens to do a lot of good by befriending others and helping them while Big Mom puts herself above her children through her tantrums even though she has a wrap view of equality. Luffy helps not because it's the right thing to do but because he wants to.
I still want the villains to go down but also the government too if that makes sense. Too often it's the villain fault for everything and taking them down means everything is fixed. Know the circumstances of Domflamingo helps so another one doesn't pop up again later. Knowing why he does the things he does also helps to not just defeat him as a person but what he represents vs what the straw hats represent. Battle of ideas are my favorite over just fights that look cool. The villains were shaped and rewarded by society so they act they way they do.
Absolutely. A story that’s all about overcoming abstract oppressive systems isn’t really a story, that’s just history. You need characters driving a narrative. But yes, a purely personal conflict doesn’t have nearly the weight of a clash of ideals and organizations. One Piece builds enough of that stuff to be endlessly interesting, but is still principally a story about a group of good guys going on an adventure beating up bad guys, which is just way more fun than anything that is mostly concerned with making some point.
One Piece villains are great, because they’re mostly just assholes. We got to see Doflamingo’s tragic childhood, except we also saw that he was a child psychopath. Granted, you could argue that his privileged early upbringing caused that...but whatever.
Hody Jones was asked explicitly what humans did to cause him to hate them so much, and the reader was primed to expect a backstory of enslavement and abuse, but he just replied “nothing”. It was awesome, sometimes a story just needs a monster, and sometimes that’s what reality produces.
I mean Hody Jones was radicalized as a child no? The only people he had to look up to were people like Arlong. Yeah he an asshole. but idk rings close to home of how shooters come about. To say they were just assholes I think takes blame off of the society that made them in Hody Jones and Doflamingo's case being Arlong's crew and the celestial dragons. Doflamingo I would say never had his psychopathic tendencies challenged and never learned empathy.
Big Mom could be another tragic figure in that she never grew up and was only encouraged to be a child by her adoptive mother who really was just a trafficker.
Sure, but other people came out of those same upbringings to become good people; Corazon most notably. I think the implication was that power and subjugation are not ultimately determinative of whether you’re a good person, but they do shape and foster evil. I’m still undecided on just how evil Big Mom is.
I think those are the exception rather than the rule though. I lot of things have to go right so peeps can have have control over their lives. Not saying a lot of these villains need to retain power but that under better circumstances then they wouldn't exist. Carazon had Law to look after which I think really helped him learn to live for someone else. Admittedly I might not have as much knowledge as you but just mulling things over. We talk about anime but as a means to think about our own world.
Certainly. I don’t think Oda meant to suggest that it’s nature over nurture as a rule, definitely not as a political commentary—he seems pretty conscious of the oppressive nature of hierarchy. But I do think he’s comfortable in writing a story with villains that are just plain bad, without worrying about making the audience feel sorry for them (though he sometimes does) or analyzing the origins of their personality. And that’s refreshing; it makes for fun storytelling and isn’t necessarily inaccurate. There are some individuals who, through some combination of nature and nurture, are just antisocial.
I think he has interesting concepts showing things are neither good or bad. Like selfishness in the series. Luffy and Big Mom are both very child like and do want they want. With Luffy he comes off as good because he happens to do a lot of good by befriending others and helping them while Big Mom puts herself above her children through her tantrums even though she has a wrap view of equality. Luffy helps not because it's the right thing to do but because he wants to.
I still want the villains to go down but also the government too if that makes sense. Too often it's the villain fault for everything and taking them down means everything is fixed. Know the circumstances of Domflamingo helps so another one doesn't pop up again later. Knowing why he does the things he does also helps to not just defeat him as a person but what he represents vs what the straw hats represent. Battle of ideas are my favorite over just fights that look cool. The villains were shaped and rewarded by society so they act they way they do.
Absolutely. A story that’s all about overcoming abstract oppressive systems isn’t really a story, that’s just history. You need characters driving a narrative. But yes, a purely personal conflict doesn’t have nearly the weight of a clash of ideals and organizations. One Piece builds enough of that stuff to be endlessly interesting, but is still principally a story about a group of good guys going on an adventure beating up bad guys, which is just way more fun than anything that is mostly concerned with making some point.