Okay so I’m not in a trolling mood today so this post will be as objective as possible. I’m not trying to downplay either character here, and in this thread is more in the spirit of
@Bogard ’s thread
here. I think Marco was the objective winner of this exchange and I’m going to explain why in detail below.
I’ve always thought Marco was a very underrated character, and I’ve always ranked him either towards the upper end of the First Mates or even as the strongest First Mate, I don’t think anything Marco has ever said or done has given anyone any reason to rank him as weak as most of the fan base on here ranks him lol.
I’ll also say that Big Mom’s portrayal here is not bad. Marco is objectively one of the strongest characters in the OP world even if you think of him as the weakest First Mate, and even though I don’t believe Big Mom was portrayed as being above him here (we’ll get into it), that’s just not bad portrayal, objectively. It’s just not.
So let’s do it.
So, the clash:
A couple of things to note here:
1. This is a completely equal clash in terms of physical power exerted by each character, similar to when Gear 4 and Big Mom clashed. This is to be expected as Marco is a Mythical Zoan and his physical abilities should be very high because of this.
Big Mom even seems to be the one at the disadvantage here in the bottom right panel.
2. There is no indication, visually or otherwise, that either of these two characters is actually using Haki. Interesting to note, there are indications that Marco has advanced Haki, while we have only ever seen “Flame Koka” from Big Mom. I won’t elaborate on either for now.
3. This is the first time we’ve seen Marco actually
punch someone, but I’m not really sure what conclusions we can draw from this lol.
However, Marco was the clear winner of this one clash thanks to this moment here:
Marco and Big Mom clash as
physical equals, but Marco had the
Devil Fruit advantage. Marco points this out while
smiling at Big Mom and showing no fear of her. Objectively speaking,
advantage Marco.
This next part is where things get really weird for me.
Firstly, obviously note that Marco shows concern for
Perospero, not Big Mom.
Second, I just find it really uncharacteristic of Big Mom to ask Perospero to intervene here, especially when she chided Katakuri at the Wedding for doing something similar.
I’ve always subscribed to the same belief that
@Celestial D. Dragon brought up yesterday, that Big Mom feels threatened by Katakuri and chided him to “keep him in his place”, so maybe this is a testament to how Big Mom trusts Perospero to know his place as well? He is her firstborn as well, it’s possible they share a deeper level of trust than she and the rest of her children.
The point I’m trying to make is that I think it’s simultaneously
impossible to think that Big Mom would’ve defeated Marco here while she simultaneously
asks Perospero to intervene in the fight. Marco has up until this point showed no fear of Big Mom whatsoever, and his concern for Perospero is very real:
Now sure, would Perospero stand a chance against Marco if Big Mom wasn’t holding him in place? Probably not, but the overall takeaway is this:
-Big Mom actively asks Perospero to intervene in her fight against Marco
-Marco showed no concern or fear of Big Mom whatsoever, only showing concern when Perospero arrives on the scene.
The people who downplay Mihawk for postponing his fight with Vista, are
massive hypocrites if they think Big Mom could’ve defeated Marco here easily when we have her asking Perospero for an intervention.
The next thing that I think is interesting to note is that there is no clear indication of how Marco got out of Big Mom’s chokehold. She is holding him here:
But then he is mysteriously free here:
Does this mean that Marco escaped her chokehold? It’s inconclusive, but the thing is that whether or not Marco escaped her is
irrelevant.
The fact is, I’ve seen a lot of Yonko fans on here saying Big Mom was going to defeat Marco when she had him in her grasp, but this flies in the face of the fact that
Big Mom actively wanted and needed Perospero to intervene in one of her fights. You cannot say Big Mom could’ve beaten Marco when she
uncharacteristically asks for help from one of her children. The meaning is clear, Big Mom
could not defeat Marco on her own. At least, not quickly and easily.
And then of course Big Mom tries to save face:
Yeah yeah, I know, “Sengoku ordered her off of the ice!!” Or whatever Yonko fans will tell themselves to sleep at night.
This is exactly what we should expect from a character who asks her son to help her with a fight, and then her son is defeated, taking her only advantage away. Big Mom is an
ego-driven character (she’s literally only in Wano due to her bruised ego), so let her say whatever she wants to save face.
Three final takeaways before I end this post:
First, I’ve seen people comparing Marco to bound man in terms of his AP because of this clash, but I actually think Marco’s AP is
slightly weaker because Bound Man rattled Big Mom’s arm and Marco didn’t,
Which fun fact, from those of you who i used to have a lot of power scaling discussions with on discord, this is exactly consistent with how strong I predicted Marco would be
@ShishioIsBack @Albino 👑 @LANJI CUCKSMOKE @Shuyaku @Mr. Anderson etc, though of course Marco has advanced Haki which I’m pretty positive he isn’t using here.
Second,
this clash does not indicate that Marco is stronger than Big Mom. In fact it doesn’t indicate anything about who is stronger between the two. The only thing this clash tells us, is that Big Mom and Marco are a lot closer in power than most of the fandom believes, which is consistent with what I and other serious power scaling posters have been saying for a long time. And on that subject,
The third takeaway is that this scene is exactly consistent with what myself and a lot of other “Yonko downplayers” have said about the Yonko for a long time. I just think it’s interesting that my interpretations of the Yonko’s power level is consistently reinforced chapter-by-chapter while the crowd who thinks the Yonko are about to “destroy everyone!!” Next chapter are still sitting on the edge of their seats waiting for anything they say and think to even be remotely implied by Oda lol. These people need to re-evaluate their interpretation of the manga as a whole.
Anyway, enough of that for now. Marco won this clash and their is no denying that.
@Light D Lamperouge @Owl Ki @MarineHQ62 @silverfire @TheAncientCenturion @MarineHQ62 @Van @playa4321 @Sentinel @Seth @Dragomir @Van @Jiihad @comrade @Veku @critical mindset
