Hi.
Retcons are narrative tools. They are not good or bad by nature.
And I want this to be very clear:
Technically, Gear 5 was an amazing retcon.
A bad retcon, in this context, would be something that contradicts the story. But the gear 5 does not do that.
Everyone who will tell you that gear 5 does not make sense, missed key points in the worldbuilding. Especially, the logic of time and space related to the nature of the hunt of the devil fruit by the World Government. They are also missing or ignoring many fundamental clues all over the story, be it in the form of thematics, battles or visual hints.
Foreshadowing are usefull to make the audience expect something, but the goal of a retcon is for the audience to be oblivious until the very end while making sure that the logic of the story is respected.
This is why, there is no foreshadowing of Vader in Star Wars A new hope for what happens in the Empire, but only a very subtle clues and preparations as such revelation can only be created through something very subtle that fans must absolutely not expect.
(you could call them sub-forshadowings, but it's really not the best place to debate about the different forms of this tool here)
Anyway about the fruit, I hesitated for a long time to call this a retcon in the context of this fanbase, but this must be done, this myth of the "bad retcon" must end. Most retcon are actually positive ones and you only remember the bad.
This is one of the problems of the fanbase, but overall of all the fans of the current pop-culture.
Medias are all over the place, simply a click away. This relative abundance also creates the false belief that we know more about storytelling because we consume more. While this can be true when the consumption is related to a creation mindset, this is not the case when you simply absorb media without real thoughts.
Social network popularized the access to storytelling related information and, like science, this allowed for the spreading of misinformation about narration as a whole. One Piece being a very big and complex story, the fanbase heavily participated in this misinformation.
Nowadays, people and trope sites will throw narrative terms such as "foreshadowings", "retcon", "hints", "plot holes" all over without really understanding that some of these terms have nuanced usage, receptions, contextual importance and natures. For ex, there are multiple forms of foreshadowing, a retcon can be good and bad, hints are different from little wink, plot holes are often not what most people think.
All of this usually end up as fairly mediocre analysis and - sadly - the creation of an atmosphere of bad comprehension that eventually ends in trash talk (you know full well what I'm talking about).
Of course, this is nuanced, this requires discussions and the information needs to be shared. But the issue is real. We tend, as pop-culture audiences, toward a simplicity of analysis that harms our comprehension and enjoyment of the different stories that we consume.
This is why we need to be more careful and nuanced in our analysis, in good or bad. Gear 5 was a narrative success. It's ok not to like it on a personal level, but to call it incoherent is an objective error.
I don't expect people here to look at this thread and do something more than laugh in a ridicule spectacle of sarcasm and disdain.. but who knows..
Please, stop consuming stories to trash talk. Think beyond.
Retcons are narrative tools. They are not good or bad by nature.
And I want this to be very clear:
Technically, Gear 5 was an amazing retcon.
A bad retcon, in this context, would be something that contradicts the story. But the gear 5 does not do that.
Everyone who will tell you that gear 5 does not make sense, missed key points in the worldbuilding. Especially, the logic of time and space related to the nature of the hunt of the devil fruit by the World Government. They are also missing or ignoring many fundamental clues all over the story, be it in the form of thematics, battles or visual hints.
Foreshadowing are usefull to make the audience expect something, but the goal of a retcon is for the audience to be oblivious until the very end while making sure that the logic of the story is respected.
This is why, there is no foreshadowing of Vader in Star Wars A new hope for what happens in the Empire, but only a very subtle clues and preparations as such revelation can only be created through something very subtle that fans must absolutely not expect.
(you could call them sub-forshadowings, but it's really not the best place to debate about the different forms of this tool here)
Anyway about the fruit, I hesitated for a long time to call this a retcon in the context of this fanbase, but this must be done, this myth of the "bad retcon" must end. Most retcon are actually positive ones and you only remember the bad.
This is one of the problems of the fanbase, but overall of all the fans of the current pop-culture.
Medias are all over the place, simply a click away. This relative abundance also creates the false belief that we know more about storytelling because we consume more. While this can be true when the consumption is related to a creation mindset, this is not the case when you simply absorb media without real thoughts.
Social network popularized the access to storytelling related information and, like science, this allowed for the spreading of misinformation about narration as a whole. One Piece being a very big and complex story, the fanbase heavily participated in this misinformation.
Nowadays, people and trope sites will throw narrative terms such as "foreshadowings", "retcon", "hints", "plot holes" all over without really understanding that some of these terms have nuanced usage, receptions, contextual importance and natures. For ex, there are multiple forms of foreshadowing, a retcon can be good and bad, hints are different from little wink, plot holes are often not what most people think.
All of this usually end up as fairly mediocre analysis and - sadly - the creation of an atmosphere of bad comprehension that eventually ends in trash talk (you know full well what I'm talking about).
Of course, this is nuanced, this requires discussions and the information needs to be shared. But the issue is real. We tend, as pop-culture audiences, toward a simplicity of analysis that harms our comprehension and enjoyment of the different stories that we consume.
This is why we need to be more careful and nuanced in our analysis, in good or bad. Gear 5 was a narrative success. It's ok not to like it on a personal level, but to call it incoherent is an objective error.
I don't expect people here to look at this thread and do something more than laugh in a ridicule spectacle of sarcasm and disdain.. but who knows..
Please, stop consuming stories to trash talk. Think beyond.
