Man the disrespect my boy Smoker has gotten since that damn Punk Hazard arc is just comical at times I swear. Homies out here saying he done for, irrelevant to the story, doesn't matter anymore. Completely forgetting that the guy writing the manga is into long term storytelling. But the time has come to hype this man up properly and start the count for his eventual return into the series.
CHARACTER PROGRESSION:
In order to understand a character's future, we must understand the character's past and their progression throughout the story. So with that in mind, let us take a look at Smoker's role so far in the series as the series has progressed.
Chapter 100: The Legend Begins, two important things happen here that continue to playout throughout the story. First being the introduction of Dragon, then the other being the start of the rivalry between Luffy & Smoker.
After this clash against Luffy, Smoker decides to set sail behind Luffy, after having spent years in the East Blue ignoring promotions and etc, he decides to finally step into the grandline.. and thus also start his journey in the grandline:
Smoker then chases Luffy & co to Alabasta. Where they confront a pirate named Crocodile. Where Smoker is captured and rescued by the strawhat pirates from the prison + then from drowning. Then after that both were about to fight, but their fight is postponed with Smoker saying he'll let them go:
With Alabasta ending for Smoker on him telling Tashigi to get stronger, and all she did was follow her sense of Justice. Then telling the Marine HQ higher ups to fuck off in trying to give the credit to him and Tashigi for Crocodile's downfall.
After the events at Alabasta Smoker was going around taking out various pirates in the grandline
Then after the events of Ennis Lobby Smoker had found himself an objective, which was obtain a higher rank to follow the strawhats into the grandline and crush them.
Then at Marineford Luffy & Smoker confront each other for the 3rd time, this time resulting in Luffy's complete defeat again, with Luffy having absolutely no chance. And Smoker telling Luffy he can't beat him the way his abilities are right now.
After the War he went into the New World, in parallel to the rest of the Worst Generation members into the G5 division of the marines. Believing that Luffy will eventually show up there. Just as how he chased Luffy into the grandline, he continued his chase into the New World.
But before transferring to G5, Smoker got himself promoted to the rank of a Vice-Admiral. (Which imo, he was fairly close to his post-TS strength, already back in pre-TS).
After the events of Fishman Island luffy, he understand that Luffy would choose to go to the riskiest place of them all which would've been Raijin Island, but then when he finds out them being at punk hazard, he decides to chase after Luffy there.
Then during Punk Hazard what happens to him? The first thing happens is Law gives him a L:
Following that up, he takes a L from Caesar:
Following that he proceeds to take a L from Vergo:
Which is only then followed up by him taking a L to Doflamingo:
The last time we saw him, he was in bandages and heading to where Vegapunk is.
Addressing his 4 Ls at punk Hazard:
All of these fights have some built in excuses to justify Smoker's L to a certain extent:
Law - being unaware about the full hax-nature of Law's DF. He was aware that Law could cut anything down in the circle, an ability which did nothing to him. In CQC he pretty much was owning Law. It was the two unknown hax abilities of his DF that ended up getting Smoker. The personality switch & the scalpel, where Law could remove your heart without even touching you (something he did through a rock this time, rather than straight up with his hands visible like he did against Doffy, even though Doffy knows the full abilities of Law's DF, outside of Gamma knife).
Caesar - Samething as Law here, didn't know about the hax nature of his DF, caught off-guard, took a hard L.
Vergo - threw away the fight for his deal with Law. Vergo highlights on Smoker not using his powers properly and fighting like how he normally does. In the very attack that Smoker takes the L, he's able to get Law's heart back from Vergo. To which Law says, "The Deal is done", to which Vergo replies, "So that's what this is about?!" Establishing that Smoker was never fighting against Vergo to win. Law then goes on to ask Smoker, "are you really that unhappy about owing a favor to a pirate?"... to which Smoker replied, "it's a stain on my navy honor". When Law says that Smoker is unhappy about owing a favor to him, he's not talking about his mood, he's talking about the fact that he willingly got his ass kicked by Vergo to such a bloodied state all to retrieve Law's heart and complete their deal.
Some fans always push back with, "if he was strong enough to beat Vergo on his own, then he would've done it and then got the heart back."... I'm sorry, but this is only possible if Smoker could 1-shot Vergo. If Smoker cannot one-shot Vergo and has to go to even a mid-diff fight against Vergo, while Vergo still has Law's heart... guess what's happening when Vergo's about to take the L? Law's heart goes splash, since it would take less than a second for Vergo to do that. However, isn't taking that risk with somebody who he feels is indebted to. Thus his complete focus is on trying to get the heart from Vergo's pocket, which he ends up succeeding in the last attack.
Doflamingo - potentially still not healed from Punk Hazard injuries + off-paneled so many unknowns + can't fight against a Warlord of the sea (only threw a punch to stop him from targeting other G5 members and focus on Smoker himself). Smoker never fought against Croc despite what Croc did to him. Smoker still can't do that. Hence we only see that 1 small attack from Smoker to get Doffy's attention, and then they stand and talk. Only ones who could've taken a step against Doffy from the marines would've been the Admirals, that's it. Anybody else would've had to take a beating or face jurisdictional law of attacking a warlord of the seas. So I'm not even sure why some fans expected Smoker to be throwing it down with Doffy or w.e lol.
But even if the results of some of these could've been different if certain contextual points were to be removed. The fact is those things happened within those contextual points because he wasn't strong. If he was strong like a top tier, even in all of those contextual things during those fights, the results would've been him taking a W. Thus these still serving as great motivation for his character's growth in prowess.
___________________
Character progression conclusion:
Now here's where the storytelling for his character comes in. You see in part 1 of the series, Smoker was arrogant essentially, he never faced off against an opponent he couldn't handle, and the one time he had a chance at that with Ace, it got all messed up. Then at Marineford with Hancock, again short confrontation which then stopped, since he can't attack a warlord of the sea. Dragon, who he stood no chance against and didn't fight. So he never had a fight pre-TS where he had to struggle, where he had to grow immensely as an individual. However, the focus of his character pre-TS did have growth involved, and that growth was related to rising in the marine ranks, which he accomplished by becoming a Vice-Admiral sometime early during the timeskip.
Post-TS is the complete opposite for Smoker. It's a struggle after struggle after struggle after struggle. Continuous embarrassments against pirates one after the other all in relatively short time as well. What are all these embarrassments related to?? Not rank, but fighting prowess. Too weak to take care of the pirates (wasn't an issue pre-TS), Too weak to protect his squad (wasn't an issue pre-TS). So what becomes the focus of his character now? Strength Progression. His character now is on the course of gaining strength. This was needed for Smoker if he is to be an ongoing rival of Luffy's generation. Because he's not Blackbeard, Blackbeard while being part of the Worst Generation, is really more so part of Shanks' generation. He's the arch-enemy of Shanks first before Luffy's. That's why Blackbeard can be built up as this big monster without taking any embarrassments. But if we're building a rival for Luffy in his own generation? Then that rival has to be embarrassed as well if Luffy constantly is being embarrassed which fuels him to grow strong, no different than how Whitebeard and etc took embarrassments like Roger did.
This is completely natural character progression and simply long term writing.
If Smoker returns and he's not insanely upgraded and powerful, then yes it's justifiably to write him off. However, it's not justifiable to write him off based on Punk Hazard, because that is something that Smoker's character needed in order for growth as a character if he's to be Luffy's marine rival. It's simply too unrealistic for Luffy's same generation marine rival to keep on getting stronger and stronger without going through a single embarrassment, when pirates from Luffy's generations who're growing alongside Luffy are going through embarrassments.
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Smoker as the Next GARP:
Due to Punk Hazard a lot of people also gave up on the idea of Smoker being the next Garp. Some started rallying after Koby with insane blind wank. Then others started saying he got replaced by Fujitora. And I'm like umm.. nani?
Smoker as a Captain was already renowned throughout by the likes of Warlords like Crocodile, despite spending years over in East Blue not doing much.
His fame reaffirmed post-TS through Law, who addresses him by his epithet White Chase.
Out of all the youngins, he's the most renowned Marine. With X Drake's rep rivaling him, but sadly he's more renowned as a pirate, than as a marine.
He had the anti-authority thing pre-TS:
Still has it post-TS, in fact Oda made sure to bring it up before even getting into Punk Hazard, with straight up ignoring the Law:
-> He's still gonna be aiming to go after Luffy
-> He's still gonna be anti-authority and anti-pirate
-> He's still gonna be to Luffy in terms of character role what Garp was to Roger.
Not to mention him having a DF that can partially mimic Luffy's way of fighting. Throwing multiple smoke punches mimicking attacks like Gatling. long range punches mimicking attacks like pistol and so on.
Luffy himself at Punk Hazard setting up their eventual fight when both are at their best.
HOW DOES SMOKER GET STRONG?
I don't think it's a mere coincidence that Smoker after taking all those Ls just happens to be going to Vegapunk, the man who's creating a whole thing that's going to rival the Yonko. Like if there's anybody who can help Smoker grow strong in such a short time, it's none other than the man they consider to be 500 years ahead of his time. Creating something to challenge him for Smoker to enhance his haki. Helping Smoker better understand his Devil Fruit. Both of which are going to be much easier for Smoker to accomplish under Vegapunk than any guidance or tool that Luffy has had under him.
So 3 things:
- Vegapunk has Smoker go up against something or puts him through some extreme training to enhance his Haki
- Vegapunk helps Smoker awaken the potential of his Devil Fruit to a further extent, awakening and etc.
- Combination of both.
You see if Smoker wasn't heading to Vegapunk, and then wasn't kept off-panel during the reverie. I would be on board with him not coming back strong. But the fact is this homie is going to Vegapunk, the man who's creating a power to rival the emperors... There is no way in hell he's not coming back without an insane powerup. It's like flat out obvious shit type of writing.
Took many Ls with emphasis on him not being strong + Goes to the smartest man on the planet = Blatant powerup coming.
Conclusion:
Overall, Smoker is the most prominent marine of the upcoming generation of Marines: Sentomaru, Hina, X Drake, Smoker (all in the similar ages). Thus, naturally as the most prominent marine of the generation of marines that parallels the rise of the great Monkey D. Luffy, he will naturally be becoming the strongest marine of his era.. thus the strongest marine down the line. I believe we will see 2-3 more showdowns/confrontations between the two before the series ends.
Just as how Blackbeard has been building up to be Luffy's most prominent pirate enemy since Drum Island, start of the grandline. Smoker has been building up as Luffy's most prominent marine enemy since Loguetown. Smoker & Blackbeard, being different types of characters, thus getting a different type of build up for their eventual big 1on1s against Luffy. With both being Luffy's longest built up enemies.
So y'all best be ready when the BIG DOOG Comes in. Cause the White HUNTAH COMING THAT PIRATE BOOOOTTTAY BAAAYYYYYYYBEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!
#SMOKAHonTheHorizon
#SmokeyComingSoon
#TheWhiteHuntahOnTheMove
#WhereDatPirateBootyAt
#HuntahNeedsHuntin
CHARACTER PROGRESSION:
In order to understand a character's future, we must understand the character's past and their progression throughout the story. So with that in mind, let us take a look at Smoker's role so far in the series as the series has progressed.
Chapter 100: The Legend Begins, two important things happen here that continue to playout throughout the story. First being the introduction of Dragon, then the other being the start of the rivalry between Luffy & Smoker.
After this clash against Luffy, Smoker decides to set sail behind Luffy, after having spent years in the East Blue ignoring promotions and etc, he decides to finally step into the grandline.. and thus also start his journey in the grandline:
Smoker then chases Luffy & co to Alabasta. Where they confront a pirate named Crocodile. Where Smoker is captured and rescued by the strawhat pirates from the prison + then from drowning. Then after that both were about to fight, but their fight is postponed with Smoker saying he'll let them go:
With Alabasta ending for Smoker on him telling Tashigi to get stronger, and all she did was follow her sense of Justice. Then telling the Marine HQ higher ups to fuck off in trying to give the credit to him and Tashigi for Crocodile's downfall.
After the events at Alabasta Smoker was going around taking out various pirates in the grandline
Then after the events of Ennis Lobby Smoker had found himself an objective, which was obtain a higher rank to follow the strawhats into the grandline and crush them.
Then at Marineford Luffy & Smoker confront each other for the 3rd time, this time resulting in Luffy's complete defeat again, with Luffy having absolutely no chance. And Smoker telling Luffy he can't beat him the way his abilities are right now.
After the War he went into the New World, in parallel to the rest of the Worst Generation members into the G5 division of the marines. Believing that Luffy will eventually show up there. Just as how he chased Luffy into the grandline, he continued his chase into the New World.
But before transferring to G5, Smoker got himself promoted to the rank of a Vice-Admiral. (Which imo, he was fairly close to his post-TS strength, already back in pre-TS).
After the events of Fishman Island luffy, he understand that Luffy would choose to go to the riskiest place of them all which would've been Raijin Island, but then when he finds out them being at punk hazard, he decides to chase after Luffy there.
Then during Punk Hazard what happens to him? The first thing happens is Law gives him a L:
Following that up, he takes a L from Caesar:
Following that he proceeds to take a L from Vergo:
Which is only then followed up by him taking a L to Doflamingo:
The last time we saw him, he was in bandages and heading to where Vegapunk is.
Addressing his 4 Ls at punk Hazard:
All of these fights have some built in excuses to justify Smoker's L to a certain extent:
Law - being unaware about the full hax-nature of Law's DF. He was aware that Law could cut anything down in the circle, an ability which did nothing to him. In CQC he pretty much was owning Law. It was the two unknown hax abilities of his DF that ended up getting Smoker. The personality switch & the scalpel, where Law could remove your heart without even touching you (something he did through a rock this time, rather than straight up with his hands visible like he did against Doffy, even though Doffy knows the full abilities of Law's DF, outside of Gamma knife).
Caesar - Samething as Law here, didn't know about the hax nature of his DF, caught off-guard, took a hard L.
Vergo - threw away the fight for his deal with Law. Vergo highlights on Smoker not using his powers properly and fighting like how he normally does. In the very attack that Smoker takes the L, he's able to get Law's heart back from Vergo. To which Law says, "The Deal is done", to which Vergo replies, "So that's what this is about?!" Establishing that Smoker was never fighting against Vergo to win. Law then goes on to ask Smoker, "are you really that unhappy about owing a favor to a pirate?"... to which Smoker replied, "it's a stain on my navy honor". When Law says that Smoker is unhappy about owing a favor to him, he's not talking about his mood, he's talking about the fact that he willingly got his ass kicked by Vergo to such a bloodied state all to retrieve Law's heart and complete their deal.
Some fans always push back with, "if he was strong enough to beat Vergo on his own, then he would've done it and then got the heart back."... I'm sorry, but this is only possible if Smoker could 1-shot Vergo. If Smoker cannot one-shot Vergo and has to go to even a mid-diff fight against Vergo, while Vergo still has Law's heart... guess what's happening when Vergo's about to take the L? Law's heart goes splash, since it would take less than a second for Vergo to do that. However, isn't taking that risk with somebody who he feels is indebted to. Thus his complete focus is on trying to get the heart from Vergo's pocket, which he ends up succeeding in the last attack.
Doflamingo - potentially still not healed from Punk Hazard injuries + off-paneled so many unknowns + can't fight against a Warlord of the sea (only threw a punch to stop him from targeting other G5 members and focus on Smoker himself). Smoker never fought against Croc despite what Croc did to him. Smoker still can't do that. Hence we only see that 1 small attack from Smoker to get Doffy's attention, and then they stand and talk. Only ones who could've taken a step against Doffy from the marines would've been the Admirals, that's it. Anybody else would've had to take a beating or face jurisdictional law of attacking a warlord of the seas. So I'm not even sure why some fans expected Smoker to be throwing it down with Doffy or w.e lol.
But even if the results of some of these could've been different if certain contextual points were to be removed. The fact is those things happened within those contextual points because he wasn't strong. If he was strong like a top tier, even in all of those contextual things during those fights, the results would've been him taking a W. Thus these still serving as great motivation for his character's growth in prowess.
___________________
Character progression conclusion:
Now here's where the storytelling for his character comes in. You see in part 1 of the series, Smoker was arrogant essentially, he never faced off against an opponent he couldn't handle, and the one time he had a chance at that with Ace, it got all messed up. Then at Marineford with Hancock, again short confrontation which then stopped, since he can't attack a warlord of the sea. Dragon, who he stood no chance against and didn't fight. So he never had a fight pre-TS where he had to struggle, where he had to grow immensely as an individual. However, the focus of his character pre-TS did have growth involved, and that growth was related to rising in the marine ranks, which he accomplished by becoming a Vice-Admiral sometime early during the timeskip.
Post-TS is the complete opposite for Smoker. It's a struggle after struggle after struggle after struggle. Continuous embarrassments against pirates one after the other all in relatively short time as well. What are all these embarrassments related to?? Not rank, but fighting prowess. Too weak to take care of the pirates (wasn't an issue pre-TS), Too weak to protect his squad (wasn't an issue pre-TS). So what becomes the focus of his character now? Strength Progression. His character now is on the course of gaining strength. This was needed for Smoker if he is to be an ongoing rival of Luffy's generation. Because he's not Blackbeard, Blackbeard while being part of the Worst Generation, is really more so part of Shanks' generation. He's the arch-enemy of Shanks first before Luffy's. That's why Blackbeard can be built up as this big monster without taking any embarrassments. But if we're building a rival for Luffy in his own generation? Then that rival has to be embarrassed as well if Luffy constantly is being embarrassed which fuels him to grow strong, no different than how Whitebeard and etc took embarrassments like Roger did.
This is completely natural character progression and simply long term writing.
If Smoker returns and he's not insanely upgraded and powerful, then yes it's justifiably to write him off. However, it's not justifiable to write him off based on Punk Hazard, because that is something that Smoker's character needed in order for growth as a character if he's to be Luffy's marine rival. It's simply too unrealistic for Luffy's same generation marine rival to keep on getting stronger and stronger without going through a single embarrassment, when pirates from Luffy's generations who're growing alongside Luffy are going through embarrassments.
____________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________
Smoker as the Next GARP:
Due to Punk Hazard a lot of people also gave up on the idea of Smoker being the next Garp. Some started rallying after Koby with insane blind wank. Then others started saying he got replaced by Fujitora. And I'm like umm.. nani?
Smoker as a Captain was already renowned throughout by the likes of Warlords like Crocodile, despite spending years over in East Blue not doing much.
His fame reaffirmed post-TS through Law, who addresses him by his epithet White Chase.
Out of all the youngins, he's the most renowned Marine. With X Drake's rep rivaling him, but sadly he's more renowned as a pirate, than as a marine.
He had the anti-authority thing pre-TS:
Still has it post-TS, in fact Oda made sure to bring it up before even getting into Punk Hazard, with straight up ignoring the Law:
-> He's still gonna be aiming to go after Luffy
-> He's still gonna be anti-authority and anti-pirate
-> He's still gonna be to Luffy in terms of character role what Garp was to Roger.
Not to mention him having a DF that can partially mimic Luffy's way of fighting. Throwing multiple smoke punches mimicking attacks like Gatling. long range punches mimicking attacks like pistol and so on.
Luffy himself at Punk Hazard setting up their eventual fight when both are at their best.
HOW DOES SMOKER GET STRONG?
I don't think it's a mere coincidence that Smoker after taking all those Ls just happens to be going to Vegapunk, the man who's creating a whole thing that's going to rival the Yonko. Like if there's anybody who can help Smoker grow strong in such a short time, it's none other than the man they consider to be 500 years ahead of his time. Creating something to challenge him for Smoker to enhance his haki. Helping Smoker better understand his Devil Fruit. Both of which are going to be much easier for Smoker to accomplish under Vegapunk than any guidance or tool that Luffy has had under him.
So 3 things:
- Vegapunk has Smoker go up against something or puts him through some extreme training to enhance his Haki
- Vegapunk helps Smoker awaken the potential of his Devil Fruit to a further extent, awakening and etc.
- Combination of both.
You see if Smoker wasn't heading to Vegapunk, and then wasn't kept off-panel during the reverie. I would be on board with him not coming back strong. But the fact is this homie is going to Vegapunk, the man who's creating a power to rival the emperors... There is no way in hell he's not coming back without an insane powerup. It's like flat out obvious shit type of writing.
Took many Ls with emphasis on him not being strong + Goes to the smartest man on the planet = Blatant powerup coming.
Conclusion:
Overall, Smoker is the most prominent marine of the upcoming generation of Marines: Sentomaru, Hina, X Drake, Smoker (all in the similar ages). Thus, naturally as the most prominent marine of the generation of marines that parallels the rise of the great Monkey D. Luffy, he will naturally be becoming the strongest marine of his era.. thus the strongest marine down the line. I believe we will see 2-3 more showdowns/confrontations between the two before the series ends.
Just as how Blackbeard has been building up to be Luffy's most prominent pirate enemy since Drum Island, start of the grandline. Smoker has been building up as Luffy's most prominent marine enemy since Loguetown. Smoker & Blackbeard, being different types of characters, thus getting a different type of build up for their eventual big 1on1s against Luffy. With both being Luffy's longest built up enemies.
So y'all best be ready when the BIG DOOG Comes in. Cause the White HUNTAH COMING THAT PIRATE BOOOOTTTAY BAAAYYYYYYYBEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!
#SMOKAHonTheHorizon
#SmokeyComingSoon
#TheWhiteHuntahOnTheMove
#WhereDatPirateBootyAt
#HuntahNeedsHuntin
