Future Events Will Oda ruin Dragon next?

#43
The fact that it has been 1000+ chapters and Dragon hasn't done anything should give off alarm bells. And it isn't just Dragon, also Shanks and Blackbeard. Oda does not know what his priorities are. All he has to do is give these characters about 10 chapters each to develop them. 10 chapters isn't a lot at all and yet he refuses to it.... why, I have no idea.
Who will keep on reading OP if he reveal his trump cards?
Wait for another 1-2 years to get Dragon movie and his appearance in manga.
 
#46
I can clearly see Luffy 1 vs 1 Teach but given Xebec was tag teasing and Oda loves repeat Coby or Smoker can be in the party.
I do think of involving Smoker in that war myself, but it'd be related to facing Kuzan in my eyes rather than doing a 2vs1 against Teach with Luffy.

Teach is more important than Akainu in the antagonist ladder.

Teach is the main rival to reach and obtain the One piece. And that guy has two DF and the two most powerful in their category.

Teach power and ambition is hyped to be beyond others. Only Imu will be able to compare. Akainu will be weaker than Teach.

But I’m not sure Luffy will be stronger than Teaxh even after beating him. Luffy wasn’t stronger than Enel, wasn’t stronger than Moria, wasn’t stronger than Doffy, wasn’t stronger than Kata, Cracker or Kaido even at the end of the fight.

Luffy won’t fight Akainu. It’s not his fight.
- I don't believe you're equating the antagonist ladder properly here.

Pirates & Marines (Yonko & Admirals) are at the start of post-TS established as akin when it comes to obstacle in becoming the PK, by Chinjao.
Akainu stands at the top of the Marine ladder, Blackbeard stands at the top of the Pirate ladder.
The Celestial Dragons (Imu & Gorosei) stand above both of those ladders, it's a completely different type of antagonist than the above to.

- Blackbeard's ambition is not anything special that we haven't seen. Xebec had it, Shiki had it, BM & Kaido had it.. which is the ambition to conquer the world/destroy the world. I also don't see what makes his ambition more special than Akainu's ambition to eliminate all evil. Let alone somebody like Dragon, who's fighting in the name of the main theme of One Piece, Freedom.

- Neither of his DFs have ever been called the strongest in their categories. One of the strongest? yea for sure, but never the strongest.

- I agree Luffy won't fight Akainu, but not fighting Akainu doesn't make him inferior, as the people who will fight Akainu will be on the same status as Luffy. (Especially if it's Sabo).


The problem is Akainu isn't the main villain and the main problem of his side : CD, Gorosei and obviously Imu are. Akainu can fall and the WG would still be here. Not saying Akainu isn’t important and powerful. He is both.
The World Government would still be there even if Gorosei, and Imu fall. The War isn't to destroy the World Government, it's to overthrow the CD, as made clear by Koala in her convo with Bello Betty. Since it's the ones who run the World Government that are the issue, not the World Government itself.

Akainu doesn't represent the CD. CD are a whole different side of antagonists. A class above both Akainu & Blackbeard.

But Teach is more important in his own plot line. He is the one who will block Luffy from reaching his goal.
Well yea just as Akainu is more important in his own plotline. But when it comes to the overall plotline of the story their relevance is no more special than the other's. They both represent two different types of antagonist that Luffy has to overcome to be the PK.


Dedicating these two panels at MF for them:

Dedicating a whole chapter dedicated to their progression:

Chapter that focused on how both got higher in power and are upgrading their organizations to be more strong. Akainu's got a whole division dedicated to replacing a top tier + multiple YC level inidividuals. Blackbeard is stacking up his fleet & collecting powerful DFs.

Oda's presentation of them doesn't give any the edge over the other. Even if Luffy doesn't fight one (Akainu) it doesn't mean the other is of greater importance as an antagonist in the overall story of OP. Just simply greater within Luffy's storyline, and by now we already know being an antagonist in directly Luffy's storyline doesn't equate to being superior to others, as his antagonists have been some of the weakest individuals in the world of OP.



Dragon can witness Luffy power during the final war against imu.
True, but witnessing his power imo isn't really the same as witnessing your son surpass you in front of your eyes. Which is something I believe will be happening from Sabo (as Luffy's still treated as his lil bro, IE, marines treating the Flame emperor as a bigger ordeal than Luffy being an emperor), and with Dragon himself near the end.
 
#48
With recent events, I feel like this thread is relevant.

Another arc ended and yet again, Dragon was little more than an office worker.

Even Akainu got up from his chair to face Kuma. Shanks beat Kid, Teach beat Law, Buggy formed Cross Guild, yet Dragon is still sitting on his ass.

The kuma chapter makes him look even worse. Bro let Ginny get raped, Iva get imprisoned, and Kuma get lobotimized. He literally failed all of his friends and for what? Dude didn’t even attack a single CD.

Kuma legit had more faith in Dragon’s 17 year old son than he had in him.

I know Oda doesn’t intend to write dragon as a bum, but honestly it’s kinda sad what he’s been doing. Dude could have at least shown him clash with Teach to hype him up. Maybe even stand his ground against the BBP. Instead he runs.
 
#49
For all intents and purposes, Dragon is already ruined. His lack of action in the Reverie arc and for the whole series for that matter was what did him in as a character. That to go along with the writing surrounding his character in recent events was the nail in the coffin. I don’t remember all the details but the way he didn’t even know about Sabo’s whereabouts was written very poorly for the world’s most dangerous man spearheading a worldwide revolution. Some stuff happened recently too I think tho I ain’t keeping up with it.

I mean before the Reverie people were really expecting Dragon himself to throw hands with the Admirals and was expected to play an active role in declaring war but we don’t even see him do none of that. He’s pretty much confirmed going to play second fiddle to Luffy in the last arc.
 
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CensoredbyWG

#50
With recent events, I feel like this thread is relevant.

Another arc ended and yet again, Dragon was little more than an office worker.

Even Akainu got up from his chair to face Kuma. Shanks beat Kid, Teach beat Law, Buggy formed Cross Guild, yet Dragon is still sitting on his ass.

The kuma chapter makes him look even worse. Bro let Ginny get raped, Iva get imprisoned, and Kuma get lobotimized. He literally failed all of his friends and for what? Dude didn’t even attack a single CD.

Kuma legit had more faith in Dragon’s 17 year old son than he had in him.

I know Oda doesn’t intend to write dragon as a bum, but honestly it’s kinda sad what he’s been doing. Dude could have at least shown him clash with Teach to hype him up. Maybe even stand his ground against the BBP. Instead he runs.
Oda knows that EoS characters and the mysteries are what keep OP famous and his pockets full so it will still take a while after we see a full fledged fight between top tiers.

Shanks one shotted kid, law got offscreened, akainu was a one shot aswell.

Oda will either do it at the end of egghead or leave it to elbaf.
 
#51
The fact that it has been 1000+ chapters and Dragon hasn't done anything should give off alarm bells. And it isn't just Dragon, also Shanks and Blackbeard. Oda does not know what his priorities are. All he has to do is give these characters about 10 chapters each to develop them. 10 chapters isn't a lot at all and yet he refuses to it.... why, I have no idea.
Because then how will he ever have the time to showcase useless fodder characters and introduce 20 new people per story arc? Don't you know that each arc needs a dedication of at least 15 chapters where the content is of no real consequence to the bigger picture? Don't you know that the side characters with terrible designs are ten times more important than the Straw Hats (other than Luffy) and their character development over time?

It's at the point now where I don't think it really matters to Oda whether Sanji finds the All Blue, Nami becomes the best navigator, Robin finds the truth of the world, Usopp becomes a real man, or Zoro becomes the WSS. How many weekly readers even remember that these are the main character's dreams? (other than Zoro becoming the best of course) When was the last time they were even brought up? And if we do get all of that at the end (which we will), none of it will be as fleshed out or as developed as it should be. There's no continuous progression towards it. No real conversations are being had between the crew members. It'll be done in one panel or off-screened in a b-roll where there is narration in the background.

I'm not expecting much from Dragon. His DF/power will be underwhelming and he won't be fighting anyone of major importance. He's not the badass Revolutionary leader that Oda led us to believe he was. The guy hasn't done anything. He'll get a couple of cool moments in Elbaf or in the final war though as Oda goes on to prioritize fodder "reactions" over fully fleshing out Dragon's past, present, and future relationship with Luffy, his true goal being a revolutionary, and the deeper nuances of his character.

I'm honestly surprised that Kuma got as much as he did in his flashback. It'll probably be a long while before we see character development like that again. I doubt we get anything like that for Dragon. Oda kind of plays favorites. And he can do that because its his story. It's just annoying because OP will probably be ending in the next 5-10 years (that includes Oda's bi-monthly breaks and holidays) and there's still a shitload to cover. And this is why Shanks and Blackbeard's arcs will certainly feel mostly rushed when the time comes.

But man, like if 1/2 of Wano was cut out and repurposed/re-written to focus on Zoro/Ryuma/badass samurai, Kidd's backstory, King and Kaido's extended backstory, a Rocks D. Xebec flashback appearance, Nico Robin & the poneglyph lore in Wano, with a flashback of Kaido's battle with Shanks before Marineford, it would have been 20 times better for the story and the reader. But no, we need 20 chapters of Luffy breaking rocks in Udon and Otama crying, while dedicating another 20 chapters to Oden flashbacks and useless samurai retainers & smile users w/ shit character designs.

I will say though that the Egghead arc for the most part has been going well (other than questionable Dragon panels and Law/BB being off-screened), so maybe Oda is finding the right priorities again. But he's going to have to keep this pace if he wants to end OP in the next 10 years & take as many breaks as he wants, all while giving readers a satisfying conclusion that covers everything. It's a hard task though given how many characters he keeps introducing every few chapters.
 
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#52
For all intents and purposes, Dragon is already ruined. His lack of action in the Reverie arc and for the whole series for that matter was what did him in as a character. That to go along with the writing surrounding his character in recent events was the nail in the coffin. I don’t remember all the details but the way he didn’t even know about Sabo’s whereabouts was written very poorly for the world’s most dangerous man spearheading a worldwide revolution. Some stuff happened recently too I think tho I ain’t keeping up with it.

I mean before the Reverie people were really expecting Dragon himself to throw hands with the Admirals and was expected to play an active role in declaring war but we don’t even see him do none of that. He’s pretty much confirmed going to play second fiddle to Luffy in the last arc.
I don’t know what Oda is doing


Oda is putting him on the track to be the kinemon of the final war. Which is fine, but I think everyone expected more.
 
#54
Because then how will he ever have the time to showcase useless fodder characters and introduce 20 new people per story arc? Don't you know that each arc needs a dedication of at least 15 chapters where the content is of no real consequence to the bigger picture? Don't you know that the side characters with terrible designs are ten times more important than the Straw Hats (other than Luffy) and their character development over time?

...

But man, like if 1/2 of Wano was cut out and repurposed/re-written to focus on Zoro/Ryuma/badass samurai, Kidd's backstory, King and Kaido's extended backstory, a Rocks D. Xebec flashback appearance, Nico Robin & the poneglyph lore in Wano, with a flashback of Kaido's battle with Shanks before Marineford, it would have been 20 times better for the story and the reader. But no, we need 20 chapters of Luffy breaking rocks in Udon and Otama crying, while dedicating another 20 chapters to Oden flashbacks and useless samurai retainers & smile users w/ shit character designs.

I will say though that the Egghead arc for the most part has been going well (other than questionable Dragon panels and Law/BB being off-screened), so maybe Oda is finding the right priorities again. But he's going to have to keep this pace if he wants to end OP in the next 10 years & take as many breaks as he wants, all while giving readers a satisfying conclusion that covers everything. It's a hard task though given how many characters he keeps introducing every few chapters.
But it's pretty obvious at this point that Oda can't write good payoffs. Ironically the story structure of One Piece: new island, new villain masks Oda's inability at creating a coherent long term plot. Oda's payoffs are limited lore drops and Luffy punches bad guy that made someone cry (in the past).
 
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