But the bottom line is without Judge‘s experiments, Sanji dies to Queen. I can’t get behind that, not when there was the potential for the much stronger story of Sanji prevailing over Judge and his siblings using only what people like Zeff taught him. Even if his fire powers had been tied to his mother’s side, or even just make all the Vinsmokes of Lunarian descent and able to make fire, none of that would bother me. It’s specifically Sanji’s successes now relying on Judge’s extremely unethical experiments, coupled with how Judge then treated Sanji for being a failure, that rankles. This is a vindication of what Judge did.
We now actually have to say, “boy, it’s a good thing Sanji was experimented on by Judge”, which is nuts when that led to Sanji’s mothers death and his shit childhood.
It would be like it we were suddenly being told that Caeser’s experiments on the kids of Punk Hazard were a positive thing, just because Vegapunk (presumably) is going to stop them from dying because of it.
As for the natural advantage question, it’s the difference between someone being a naturally gifted runner and someone taking a ton of steroids to get to the same speed. Life isn’t fair, some people are born better than others, doesn’t mean mad science experiments on children is the way to combat that. There’s a reason no one likes Lance Armstrong anymore.