I don't remember any Big Mom fans trying to drag other characters down to her level unless I'm forgetting.
Oda failed hard with plenty of female characters not just only Big Mom it's just that since Big Mom is a Yonko and was hyped up is why some people are more focused on her, Oda is just not very great when it comes to writing female characters. The WCI arc introduced so many interesting female characters yet Oda barely gave them any focus, and those that did got focus didn't get treated very well.
Big Mom was a very good antagonist during the first half of the arc but in the second half that went downhill the moment she went on her food rampage, Brûlée was another good antagonist in the beginning of the arc until Oda decided to use her as a plot device, Pudding went from pretending to be this cute nice girl helping out the SHs to this evil bitch that tricked the SHs and I liked it when Pudding was evil however Oda decided to suddenly redeem her in a way that felt forced. As for the others Smoothie who is a Sweet General barley got any focus and Compote got no focus at all, you also have some other female characters like Rebecca who ended up being a crybaby that could only defend herself instead of a female gladiator that would fight back, and then you have Robin who was been completely sidelined. The only female character Oda seems to care about and is very bias towards is Nami, to me it's very annoying how much focus he would give Nami compared to some other female characters and giving Zeus to her imo is more proof of how bias Oda is towards her character.
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Well that did not take long. Last time I had this discussion it was antagonists in general being thrown under the metaphorical bus. Now it is female characters in general that are the unfortunate sacrifice in the “Linlin won’t look as bad if everyone else looks bad” defence.
I will agree that Oda’s portrayal of female characters, especially combat oriented ones, is utterly mediocre but that just adds fuel to the multitude of reasons as to why Linlin is an undeniably objectively bad character.
The failures of others are not the successes of Linlin.
Yeah Big Mom getting outshined by her subordinates in the second half of the WCI arc wasn't that great, but at least she got some decent character focus during the first half. Kaido imo is even worse, he has barely gotten any focus in his own arc and Orochi who is the secondary antagonist has outshined him both as a character and as a villain.
I like both Big Mom and Kaido but something feels wrong when you have characters like Katakuri, Perospero, and Oven outshining Big Mom in the second half of the WCI arc, and Orochi so far outshining Kaido during the Wano arc. Also I get what you're saying with Kaido, I'm just saying that some people thought that Kaido was going to be this perfect villain during the Wano arc that was not going to be made fun of.
Linlin was looking promising at the beginning of the arc, I will agree with that (which was why I was ultimately disappointed by her portrayal) but by the end, Oda had completely deconstructed her.
Take her initial rampage. She was portrayed as an insane berserker that could not recognise anyone, not even her own family. It was literally impossible to reason with her. All this resulted in Moscato’s death at the hands of his own berserk mother as witnessed by his horrified siblings, which was honestly one of the most terrifying moments of One Piece to witness. It was a great scene.
Then we have her recognising Pudding and Perospero, Perospero successfully bargaining with her and worst of all, Moscato actually showing up alive at the last chapter of the arc as a rotten cherry atop a puke pie.
So now when I look at that scene where Moscato “dies” and his siblings are crying over his “corpse”, I no longer feel that shock and awe that I first felt when I saw that scene, I just feel cheated.
Oda did not just handle her poorly or did not use her to her full potential, he actually went out of the way to completely deconstruct her character. Any positive portrayal she had in the first half of WCI is voided by how Oda deliberately sabotaged her in the second half.
As for Kaido, well I should really wait until Wano Arc is over what with the possibility of backstory and future portrayal etc. etc. but he does not look that promising a character to me.
Kaido currently feels more like a generic video game boss at the end of the play through than an actual character. He is big, he is mean, he is evil, he is intimidating etc. etc. but he is not interesting in the slightest.
He has the all the presence of an obstacle to be stepped over by the protagonist than an actual antagonistic character that directly opposes the character in any meaningful way.
I could be wrong, Oda could subvert my incredibly low expectations of Kaido being more than a talking punching bag but I am not going to get my hopes up.