All an act. Well, not completely. Kizaru rn is still on the fence. He's still trying to justify killing all his friends under the guise of "under orders" "necessary" "they did bad shit" "i'm just a cog" etc.
Soon, something will happen between saturn and Kizaru's friends, Bonney, Kuma, Sento and the punks. (My guess is, some more punk's will get killed maybe while trying to shield kuma and Bonney. Atlas is a big target for this)
And that will force kizaru down from the fence and into the side of his friends.
egghead marines going back to ships wasn't a plan by kizaru. But it is an opportunity that he will utilize later.
Either Kumas or Stellas death IF they happen ofc should be the breaking point imo. I don't see Sento dying but he would be valid reason for Kizaru to snap and turn against Saturn (lmao turn against Saturn, that pun), losing his "beloved nephew" to a heartless monster like Saturn ofc.
I don't wanna see Atlas die, already suffering the loss of Shaka too much too but if Atlas or Lilith die too, I'll legit be angry lol.
Something will definitely provoke Kizaru to turn though, his expressions and tone are giving it away heavily, hes in severe emotional and moral conflict, this is the most serious hes probably had to be in decades if not years at least, the most he's been challenged as an individual and thus on a personal level. "Mr laissez-faire" at times, the guy who seemed unpredictable, uncaring, truly neutral is now finally being force to pick a side, an allegiance truly and stop fence sitting.
All the more reason to see his backstory and see why and how he joined the Marines and why serve the WG. Whats his true motivations? Who is he really? His bond with Vegapunk, Sentomaru, Kuma etc are the closest to he has felt to being human I imagine, not just a mindless soldier and thus slave/cog to the system.
Kizaru is gonna break character soon once and for all and its gonna be shocking, the facade will drop and ironically enough, he will see a "spot of light in the darkness", light at the end of the metaphorical tunnel and see the light of hope and all those other metaphors and w/e lol. A beacon of hope/truth and all that.
Diehard Admiral fans/loyalists generally wont like that at all but Oda has been setting up the pieces for him in this arc especially but Film Z also explored his and Kuzans psyche pretty well in regards to their former mentor Zephyr too and thus their allegiances to the Marines and WG.
