Idk...part of me wishes Oda just kills Shanks offscreen before he can ruin the character because he held Shanks for far too long and there's no way he lives up to the hype.
Same with Dragon.
I did fear he might ruin Shanks and Dragon, same with the Admirals and even Blackbeard. But at the saem time, all these characters have been around for HUNDREDS of chapters literally, its not like Kaido and Big Mom who were only mentioned pre TS and shown post TS. They feel more like last minute additions even. I don't think Oda really planned the story with them originally , if he has, then he really has fucked up big time.
I know for a fact Oda loves the Admirals especially Akainu and the actor who inspired his design especially, Oda ADORES Bunta the actor that Akainu is based on. So the Admirals will definitely be safe and Oda'amazing handling of Fujitora imo just solidifes that too.
Dragon I would say is safe because he is Luffy's father but given the recent incident with him not going to the Reverie for some reason and sending Sabo and letting him "get killed", I'll give you that one actually. I would say Shanks is safe too but he did make a deal with the Gorosei, trying to plead with them so again I'll give you that too. Oda can still ruin them, it is possible but I still have hope, same with Mihawk. Hell, Koby going to Boa right now has me worried he's gonna ruin Boa.
I really don't want to see Shanks die but I agree that he may not be able to live up to almost 25 years of hype so far now. But if we don't get to see Shanks going all out, then him dying offscreen will still be a far greater insult and downplay imo. Hell, if Dragon gets taken down offscreen too, it would be the same imo. (Not necessarily death but just defeated)
Right now, Shanks, Mihawk, Vegapunk , Garp, Blackbeard are the main reasons why I still keep reading OP and won't drop it. I've wanted to drop it so many times and give up on it before it ages even worse than Bleach/Naruto/Fairy Tail but at the rate Oda is going, we're getting extremely close to that now and OP will soon surpass them if this keeps up. At that point, maybe what you wish for will be best if not dropping the series before that point, before it's "too late" and seeing those characters get "ruined".
The world building and lore is also whats really interesting me in OP too but I'm seeing a lot of signs of prophecies, the chosen one, reincarnation and such and I really don't like that either but I guess it was unavoidable given Japan loves that kind of stuff.
Things would be so much better if Oda wasn't constantly blue balling us and only giving us glimpses of the most important characters after such a LONG time and giving us more questions than answers, whilst giving us immense screentime for the most vapid, annoying, ridiculous, unnecessary, stealing spolight from the main characters and (ones who need it side characters) instead too.
Oda has become such a victim of his own grandiose ,uncontrolled ambitions and addiction to oversaturation, overcomplicating his own story.
Maybe you're right, maybe I'm just on copium tbh and we should prepare for the worst as Oda is probably gonna ruin Shanks and Dragon the same way he's ruined Kaido and Big Mom, who he hyped up amazingly when they did debut and have such interesting and epic intros too.
Mayeb that's why Oda is stalling so much too, because he's realised how much he's fucked things up and he can never deliver on the hype he kept delaying and setting up, the hype he kept promising.
If I'm being truly honest, moments like this Kinemon thing and Kanjuro and Kiku (as much as I love Kiku) still being alive are just completely ridiculous ass pulls, especially Kinemons. Oda is either trolling us or and he's lost his mind, I swear. I thought Kishimoto and Mashima had made death meaningless in their series but I was yet to see the worst was yet to come ofc lol.
At this point, I don't even know if Oda will actually kill off Kaido. He might even make us think he's killed Shanks offscreen like he's just done to Sabo, but both will turn out to be completely fine later somehow, through some BS or another.
Shanks fans are the Yonko version of Zorofans, they pretty much think he solos the verse(looking at you Kol)
Maybe other ones but not myself at least, I'm not that delusional.