What I appreciate about Moria
- His fruit is cool, shadows intercepting and fighting him is really neat.
- Another Shichibukai beaten down by a Yonko cements the theme of the Shichibukai being bronze medalists.
- His laziness and petulance is pretty unique pre-time skip, especially among antagonists.
What I dislike about Moria
- His crew itself isn't very memorable. I tangentially remember them and not because of what they did in the arc but because Zoro has Ryuma's sword and Shiryu has Absolom's fruit. Perona is good, she's a fun character. But as a whole his crew did not leave a big impression on me.
- The theme of his crew & arc itself was so oversaturated. I had similar issues with Tottoland. Oda went too hard on making it a creepy halloween town and it really disconnected me. Maybe because the environment is so alien, whereas an Egyptian Alabasta feels natural even if it's as monotone as an arc theme.
- Zombie Henchman. Separating this from crew, his zombies were just... Designed ugly, useless and boring for me. I like zombies. I like the undead. So it's a tad annoying knowing Oda blew his load on Moria.
My ranking of the Shichibukai (based on liking them, not power)
- Donquixote Doflamingo
- Sir Crocodile
- Trafalgar D. Water Law
- Boa Hancock
- Buggy the Clown
- Dracule Mihawk
- Bartholomew Kuma
- Jinbe
- Moria
- Weevil
- Blackbeard
So within his principle organization, he's pretty far down for me as a character. Not every Shichibukai needs to be a knock out and I think he does serve his role as a pathetic loser pretty well—not bashing but that is what he is. It's interesting that he's one of the more focused on Shichibukai in the time skip and I am not going to write off future Moria plotlines, but I will not be excited for them until I see what Oda's got going on.
