I choose to based my first sorting on seven rule. I had only one principle: to be the most objective and functionnal possible. Meaning that those 7 rules where made in a way that they were a ABSOLUTE necessity to be recruited from a storytelling standpoint:
1. Being alive.
This rule speaks for itself, and I think we all agree that ghost don't exist in One Piece. The only way to come back would be through a devil fruit.. meaning that the character would be alive EVEN while being dead. Meaning in short that it could interact with the word of living.
Simple, efficient. With that rule you can already scratch a lot of character from Whitebeard to Hiluluk.
2. Being relevant to the story.
This parameters was made to scratch out any background characters like the mayers of Windmill village for exemple. This rule states that the character needs to:
- Have already been presented in the story
- Have had some emotional relevancy to the story
- Have had a good amount of paneltime/dialogue
- Have had at least one interaction with one member of the crew
THe reason why a strawhat can be a background character is because a future strawhats needs to be narratively relevant by essence, after all, they are bound to become one of the main protagonist. Same.. Simple. I can't do more objective than that.
And with that, a lot of characters are out. Background one. And yes Carrot passes this test easily narratively, only a blind mind would say the opposite.
3. The character must be unique and have a unique ability.
Here, the rule is NOT that the character must be unique in the entirerity of the story. It means that
AMONG the strawhats, the character must stands out from a desgin standpoint and from an ability stand point.
Why this rule ?
The strawhats are all build different as the Sunny represent a shiop of diversity. Because of that, each one of them must be able to shine on his own and there must be no repeat. If it was the case,said strawhat would be less relevant.
The principle is simple: A unique design and a unique ability.
With this, you can scratch a lot of background AND main characters. For example Mihawk is too close to Zoro, there is no fundamental difference in the ability. At the difference of Brook where the skeletton is not fighting only with a sword, but with his devil fruit.
This parameter might seem less important, but it is fundamental.
4. The character must be free from faction duty and/or independant
With that parameters we are entering a little deeper into the recrutment. A cahracter must be ABLE to go on an adventure. This is imperative.
So it means that the character must be able to leave their faction without to much of a consequences. That's why captains like Law or Bonnie or Kid, who never expressed the need to go on an adventure are NOT good candidate and never will be (until they express at least a glimps of self questionning about their position)
5.
The character must be a friend or a false adversary
I explained clearly why this rule was necessary on my blog.Let me copy paste that:
The crew is the representation of a family, or at least, this is Luffy's one. Because of that, each strawhats are and need to be relatable. Luffy can't accept someone he can't trust or can't forgive. That's why the future recruit must be at least a false adversary on the verge of betraying the ennemy and must have never done something unforgivable.
That is also why characters like Ceasar or Enel are definitely not good candidate to join the crew. Here are some argument people tends to make to defend the chances of those two:
- "Oda said that an ennemy will probably join the crew". At jump festa 2009, Oda supposedly made this statement : "They will make a former boss a comrade and head to the new world". Well, the story was heading toward Impel Down at the time so it safe to say that Oda was most likely talking about Jinbe.
- "Redemption can always happen" Hm, yes it can. But there are rules to make a good redemption arc arc work in a story:
A. The importance of the redemption must be relative to the narrative gravity of the sins. For example, in Dragon ball Z, death is just a path that can be cross with the help of the Dragon Ball. That's why it's okay if Vegeta or Picollo were maniac people in the past. Their deeds can be undone and so, can be at least in the story forgiven. The same can not be said for One Piece, where death carries a lot of weight. So murdering psychopath can't have the same redemption arc.
But there is another parameter that can be juxtaposed to death: Suffering. In some cases, suffering can be seen as something even more serious than death. Suffering makes people cry, suffering - in One Piece - can be traumatizing. That is why a character who willingly made a lot of people suffer can't have a complete redemption arc
B. There is another rule in storytelling, for a redemption arc to happen, it must have been shadowed first! That is why people like Franky and Robin weren't portrayed as complete antagonist. For a good redemption arc to happen, we needed to have at least doubts about them.
The third argument often come with the mention of Crocodile. People tends to think that because Crocodile allowed himself to follow Luffy for a while, an antagonist could follow Luffy on the Sunny. but there is a catch to this argument, it doesn't take into consideration the fact that the arrangement between the two protagonist was nothing but alliance, never friendship and it ignores the most important thing : Luffy never trusted Crocodile. Why should he ? The man made Vivi and his friends suffer.
So, after all that, there is but one conclusion : Ceasar and Enel will never be forgiven by Luffy. After all, both made his friends and allies suffer to an unforgivable point. And all of this without the fact that adding to the crew a genocidal maniac and slave owner or a guy who abused children by giving them drugs.. would be an horrible stand from Oda as a writer.
In other words. Oda can't recruit a bad guy, this is not DragonBall Z. Bad actions have consequences. But he can recruit someone who APPEARS like a bad guy. This is why the next recruit must AT LEAST be a false adversary. In narrative term it means that the characters must have shown sign/friendship acts. (Like Robin saving Luffy from the sandpool)
6. The character must be looking and acting towards adventure
Vivi proved one thing narratively: It's that if your hearth is not turned toward adventure or free... you can't become a strawhat.
For that reason it is ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY that a strawhat must be able to go on an adventure before being recruted.
With that, you can scratch out characters like Katakuri, Chopper and Puddings.
Characters that have expressed the need to change their environment, but from the inside. Not the outside and therefore are not ready for departure.
7. The character must have a moral Pillar.
Finally the last rule I choosed is that the character must have someone to rely on in case of moral needs. This character will become the "PILLAR" of the conscience of our future strawhat.
Now why is this rule so important ?
Because inherited will is one of the most IMPORTANT theme of One Piece. Oda is hammering every arc that if you can move, it's because another personn pushed you first and is still in your hearth when you need them.
So, when the character is in difficulty.. the moral pillar becomes
imperative. Their NEEDS to be someone behind each strawhats.
Now... I will be honest.
At the first prototype of that rule, I thought that I needed to stay true to what a real moral pillar is in One Piece, inother word, I was thinking about a character who pushed PERSONNALLY the future strawhat, but also lost something in the process (you can check, it happens everytime)
The problem..
At this step of my sorting.. only TWO characters fitted that rule : Carrot and Momonosuke.
So in order to be extra fair with Yamato and in order to put a little more challenge:
I scratched that factor. Leaving the moral Pillar only as someone who pushed the character and is remembered for it.
So here you go. Seven rule. ALL imperative to the narrative. There is no "your headcanon" in this. This is what an objectif sorting really looks like.
At the end (and you can check for yourself with every characters in One Piece) only 5 characters remained:
- Yamato
- Carrot
- Momonosuke
- Tama
- Marco
Now, it's time to sort THOSE out.
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To do that. I wondered.. What is the best way to see which character is the closest to the recruitment while being as fair as possible.
I choosed to do that with a point system. Those point would be given to each characters without any bias on fundamental parameters that each strawhat are sharing. Now.. why those parameters specifically ?
Because EACH ONE OF THEM is
imperative for Oda to have a good narration and good storylines for different reasons. I called those "
the 10 pillars" (in fact there is 11 but I wanted a round number, more catchy.
Here is a link to my blog to follow this explanations (I won't detail everything here). Let's see that:
I - THE QUIRK
This first parameter is very basic. It's based on the fact that One Piece is an action comedy shonen and so each characters have some kind of comedy to them. Sometimes it's really low, but others it's very pronounced. If we look at the strawhats, we can see that each of them have what we can call a "Quirk" a specific running gag associated to their character.
Like I said, this parameters is essential for Oda, it's what brings comedy to the strawhat crew. A future recruit MUST have a quirk.
I gave it one point because it's quite common and it's only 1 parameter.
II - THE FIGHTING SKILL
This one is obvious too. A future strawhat needs to be able to defend themself. It's imperative in a situation of war. When we analyse the fightings abilities of the strawhats, we can see that there is a pattern. each one of them have a special capacity/fighting skill and each one of them have multiple combos. (named attacks). One Piece is a shonen, that gender has codes, writting a character with those two parameters is therefore essential.
I gave it 2 points because there are 2 parameters
III - THE ANTAGONISTIC INTRODUCTION
This is not something as obvious as the two previous parameters, but again, this is an essential part of the storytelling of the strawhats. An antagonistic introduction doesn't mean that the strawhat must look like an ennemy in his introduction. It means that Oda is putting an extra care to make the future strawhats look more charismatic than the average and most of the time it's result in a panel or more where said character is in the shadow, in a dark place, or just sometimes a real ennemy.
This is essential to the narration because a future strawhat must impact the reader
at first sight. Every strawhat introduction or encounter with the crew
must be very memorable. This is where the antagonistic introduction comes into play.
Again, you will find example on the article of the same name on my blog.
I gave it two points because we are entering the realm of storytelling. It's becoming a little bit more important.
IV - THE MULTI LAYERED CHARACTERIZATION
This is basically "a good characterization" . The multilayered characterization is not a "needed" parameter it's a parameter that is a symptome of the writing from Oda on a character. In other words, Oda will ALWAYS puts a little bit more focus on an important character, strawhats included.
Therefore, because of the multi layered characterization, we can see in the future strawhat a very LARGE range of emotion and/or development that we can see in other characters (some main arc characters included)
I choose to take this one as a parameters because it's a must have for a strawhat. A strawhat can't become relevant if he has just one range of emotion.
Because we are entering foundamental parameters here, I ajusted the points with 3 points for that category.
V - SYMBOLIC REACH
Here, we are entering deeper into the analysis of the story.
When we look closer at the work of Oda, we witness something exceptionnal. A lot of characters have multiple layers of inspirations and symbolic reach. This is because Oda loves to search for inspirations in pop or ancient cultures but there is another reason:
A good "symbolic reach" propels the story into a legendary hight and the same times it can make the character VERY memorable. This is therefore an essential parameter that each future strawhat must have.
There is 4 parameters in this category so I gave this Pillar 4 points.
VI - A STRONG CHARACTER ARC
Here is one very important parameters. A strong character arc is IMPERATIVE for a strawhat to be recruited (
not to join the crew), because this is what created the basis for everything the character will fight for and against during the rest of the story.
A character arc is created by two main things:
- A strong challenge that will make the future strawhat struggle on a mental level
- A choice. This is the choice that will put the strawhat on the traks of the crew and Luffy. For example it's Robinscreaming "I want to live"
Again, a character arc is essential so it also gets 4 points.
VII - THE HINT OF A RECRUTMENT
This parameter might be the less obvious one. This is in short, the bond created between the crew and Luffy. With an analysis of each strawhat's story, we see that ALL OF THEM share a special bond with them in four different category:
- A great time spent with the crew
- A great help to the crew and Luffy
- A LOT of interactions with the crew and Luffy
- A meaningfull interaction with Luffy (in other word a emotionnal and strong interaction with him, a discussion doesn't count), it's for example the blood share between Luffy and Jinbe.
Those 4 parameters are essential to make the future strawhat feel "integrated" to the crew and they are always developped during an entire arc or more.
Because there is 4 parameters here, this pillar gets 4 points.
VIII - THE HINT OF THREE DRIVING FORCES
This parameter is the most difficult to understand because this parameters is the one reason behind the statetment that Backstories are only necessary when they are needed.
I can't explain in detail this parameters here, you will find it on my blog. But you have to understand that without 3 driving forces a strawhat is not a good character, it's a shallow one. So it's IMPERATIVE that EACH future strawhat needs to have at least
HINTS that these driving forces are gonna be developped.
Because of the importance of the parameter (you will understand by reading CAREFULLY the article on my blog) this parameters gets 5 points. And yes.. both Carrot and yamato have FULL points on this one.
IX - THE POST
Here, I will avoid the disrespect consisting in explaning why having a post in the strawhat crew is essential from a character standpoint. You should understand that by yourself.
This parameter - for obvious - reason is primordial to see if a cahracter is hinted to be a future strawhat, so it will get 5 point also. (in fact this is not surprising that people here are trying undermine Carrot as a look out, because when we look at it.. Carrot is the only one who will get points here and she will also be the only one to get points in the next parameter as it is related to the post.. and you guyz know that)
X - THE SHINING NAKAMA ACTION
Here is the parameter that people are fighting the most. According to this forum, I invented something here. The thing is.. this can't be farthest from the truth and a quick analysis of the story can prove that.
During the entire story, we can see that there are very specific moment when the character shine brightly. But they do not shine only because of their action, but also because this action is related to their post.
You can check in the story, this kind of "amazing action" is only reserved to the strawhats. Usually it take one or two pages max, but can sometimes take an entire chapter.
This action will be decisive and will usually save one or more strawhat from death.
This is the cherry on top. This parameter is ESSENTIAL for Oda as it ciment the character not only as a strong protagonist, but as an amazing worker in the post.
Because this is mostly a deal breaker, I gave that Pillar 6 points.
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Now.. with all of that.. I could easily conclude on a victory for Carrot. But at the end.. I wanted to be as fair as possible. And even if the aspect of the following parameter is debatable in the storyline, I choosed to put it anyway:
XI - THE RESCUE
In the story. Luffy saved in one form or another, ALL the strawhat from an oppressor. This can be seen as essential as Luffy will create a life changing dept in the mind of the future strawhat and will change his life forever.
Because I wanted to be as fair as possible. And because this is a very important parameter. I gave this pillar..
10 points.
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IN CONCLUSION
Everything I talked about were ESSENTIAL parameters for either the story or the characters. Without the seven rules or the 11 pillars.. A strawhat is not a "real" strawhat, he will always appear shallow. (and this is one of the reason why Carrot feels shallow to most of you: her strong character didn't happened yet, but you have to understand that it was hinted so it WILL) Those rules and Pillars are what make the strawhat crew so unique. They are non negociable.
They are a necessity !
But..
The pillar are only a necessity for a recrutment not for the character to simply join the crew. This is why I used the point system. To give each characters a chance despite their place in the story.
The result might be surprising for you, but it's really the most objective things we can do if we analyse the story correctely.
Carrot is closer to the thrown. Does it mean that she will stay that way ? No. In fact Momo wasn't always at second place, he was first behind Yamato.. then had a strong development in Onigashima..
You need to understand that until wano is over...
ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN.
So even if I think that Yamato will not become a strawhat, I will keep updating that point system if she is - for exemple - introduced with the capacities of a post or has a strong character arc with a strong choice to make.
