Right?! There's too much ambiguity for my liking. Kanjuro had better "foreshadowing" or setup, he was predicted much more easily/sooner and I wonder if Oda is aware of it and purposely making things more discreet in response to that this time?
Watching others meticulously analyse this and try to solve it painfully with no concrete, singular answer for who it could be despite their efforts, just makes this all the more frustrating too. It really makes me worried about who it's going to turn out to be and thus the justification of it.
I like the idea of Punk Records itself, the seperated brain of Vegapunk going rogue after getting too much knowledge and maybe seperated sentience or something? Others have mentioned there's more to Vegapunk than meets the idea and he's definitely not as "virtuous/innocent" as he proclaims himself to be and Oda is trying to depict him now too.
He was shown or at least implied to be more neutral or even amoral since he was first mentioned and even the reveal of him letting Kuma protect the Sunny for 2 years was a huge shock for us, knowing what he did to Kuma and we were expecting him to be this truly science/knowledge/innovation etc triumphs everything else type person, as in its even more important than morality/ethics/humanity and such. A science/tech supremacist or w/e.
I mean you look at who he chose to work with and currently works for and that speaks VOLUMES about him regardless of how he likes to see himself and portray himself to others too. I thought he would be the biggest monster as a scientist in OP so far. And imo he is regardless via his actions. Hell, Lilith remorselessly destroyed one of their own creations, which showed its own sentience too, she murdered a living being effectively, even though it was purely a robot only? Not a cyborg or w/e but still?
There's been this on-going argument about humans playing God with creating new life via technology, with robots, AI and such and what rights they should have and such. The story I-Robot is all about this IIRC? Not to mention Oda casually dropping articial organ growth at Egghead recently and I'm sure there will be attempts at artifical reproduction/insemination or whatever too? Test tube babies as we've seen with the Germa clones at least? Idk if the Punk clones were living people before, random people like Lilith for example, the humanoid ones, I expected them to be like the Vinsmoke children but they are more androids than cyborgs by the looks of it? Like the Androids of Dragonball? (My head hurts now lmao)
We've not had AI tech appear in OP yet and I heavily expected it to appear and play a role with Vegapunk, with even VP himself being an AI, having lost his original body or choosing to abandon it but Oda did his own version of the 6 paths of Pain from Naruto but with science instead lmfao, how original! (And yes, its all part of the Hive Mind trope or w/e, I know lol)