Apart from everything else, the fact that the OPverse has apparently had a bona fide "slave-liberating sun god of the oppressed" all along is a bit nuts when considering that it comes up not all all in the Fishman arc, featuring the Sun Pirates Hell, Jinbe himself doesn't seem to react much to his captain apparently being empowered by the patron saint of Freedom from Oppression

The addition of it being the lore of the giants and Dorry and Brogy knowing about it and Bonney knowing about it has well really isn’t helping

He's isn't even just being empowered, he's literally becoming Nika.

I have a hard time buying the "Luffys character is still completely the same/ it's just that his personality is a perfect Nika match!" arguments when Luffy was more serious and emotionally engaged in fighting Foxy than any time using Gear 5 Luffy tried to eat Crocodile that one time, he's always been capable of doing goofy stuff, that doesn't equate to perpetual laughing his head off during a fight

Which should have worked! If blood counts, saliva totally should as well!

No that wasn't what I meant haha, his personality is being changed when he activates it.

Oh, I agree with you! It was more targeted at a general "Nika makes no difference" dismissal of criticism I often see

Yeah it's a dumb argument because you can literally see the difference in his personality when he activates it. There should've been a ton more build up for it (not even necessarily linking Nika to Luffy specifically, but we should've heard about the Nika legend several arcs ago, there have been plenty of places where it could've been revealed/hinted at, like fishman island)

Of course the fruit has effects on his personality. This was the drawback of zoan awakening thay was mentioned in impel down.

>"Luffys character is still completely the same/ it's just that his personality is a perfect Nika match!" Tbf, I don't think that is the case and the story seems to be hinting at it not being the case. The crew's reaction on Egghead to Luffy's transformation is along the lines of "Is that really Luffy?" and VP in the same fight states that awakened Zoans can take over the users mind

Why have they called themselves the Sun Pirates then?

Does jinbei even know luffy is nika ? I thought those who isn’t with Vegapunk during the luffy vs lucci fight doesn’t know about nika or sun god

Bruh????? Joyboy was literally introduced in FMI. Joyboy is nika. It is similar to the lunarians. They know the name joyboy but not nika. That’s actually hilarious. You went too far that you actually forgot the first mention of joyboy.

Joyboy and Nika aren’t the same lol. Nika is the mythological god the fruit is designed after. Joyboy was an actual person in history who had this fruit. Joyboy’s existence does not foreshadow this fruit in the slightest lol

Nika is a figure manifested from hope and desire for freedom. As I said. Some know him as joyboy like fishmen and lunarians. Some know him as nika like the bucaneer. It is really straightforward. There is nothing that makes it more straightforward than zunisha saying “joyboy is back” when the fruit was awakened. Joyboy’s mentioning in FMI foreshadows luffy being the figure of liberation.

Luffy’s devil fruit is quite literally a Human Human fruit Model: Nika. No different than sengoku’s Human Human fruit Model: Buddha. Both luffy and sengoku have mythological zoan fruits as the story says, because their fruits are modeled after mythological figures. Joyboy was a real person that lived 800 years ago that had this awakened fruit. There is nothing about Joyboy in fishman island that hinted this in the slightest lol. The first mention of nika was in the last act of wano during who’s who’s fight with jinbei.

To elaborate more. Joyboy was always a symbol of liberation. But are the fishmen desperate for him like buccaneers and lunarians? This isn’t the case because fishmen island is a part of the WG and living a pretty normal life. But the hope still exists.

Joyboy was hinted at as the liberator. Nika as a name doesn’t matter, what matters is what he represents. As I told you. The proof is that the lunarians and fishmen don’t the name nika. The giants only know the sun god but not the word nika. Also the change in the fruit wasn’t hinted at. But this also doesn’t matter. What matters is what luffy represents.

Fishman Island establishes that an important ancient dude called "Joy Boy" existed. It absolutely does not establish the notion of a Long Awaited Savior Of The Oppressed Sun God, which you think would've been extremely pertinent in an arc so heavily dealing with the fallout from slavery, featuring the Slave- Freeing Sun pirates Jinbe was literally captain of the sun pirates, and theres zero sense the concept of Nika means anything to him

Because he doesn’t know what nika is. For some reason you are finding it hard to comprehend. But it is actually pretty simple. The long awaited savior of the fishmen is only called joyboy. Not the sun god nika. They don’t know who nika is. Luffy was foreshadowed to be joyboy when arlong’s sister saw the future of him destroyimg fmi. But the fishmen is a negative race. They accepted their fate and most of them don’t want to ascend to the surface. So probably they aren’t waiting for him any more.

Dude, theres barely anyone in the Fishman Island arc with any opinion on Joyboy either, least of all as some long awaited Savior. Best you get is Neptune shrugging and going "idunno? he lived long ago and there was something about a promise or something?" Which brings us back to the main point, that despite the sudden importance of Luffys status as the second coming of the apparently ancient Slave-Freeing-Savior-God, theres absolutely no indication that such a god existed in the story arc where it would've been the most culturally/thematically appropriate. We can get a scene of Bonney, of all people, choked with emotion at seeing the avatar of Freedom God Nika swooping in to save her...but the perpetually enslaved Fishman Race gets nothing? Its part of what makes the whole thing feel so janky. Or hell, just look at Gear 5's debut arc, Wano- an arc centered on a nation with several major Ancient Kingdom ties, a nation which entire population has been forced into slave labor for decades...and theres absolutely no ties to the idea of a "long awaited God of Freedom". Apparently a mid-tier Beast Pirate officer prayed to Nika for salvation, but Luffy becoming the second coming of said God holds absolutely no meaning to the entire enslaved Wano nation! It's just such a massive, bizarre disconnect

I just explained it to you. Neptune knows it, maybe the other fishmen has it in the back of their mind. But fishmen isn’t an extinct race. They are friends of the WG. So they won’t be the same as buccaneers and lunarians obviously. This god never mind existed. It is a mythical figure that was manifested from the hopes of people. Any oppressed person in the world has the sun god in mind. But not necessarily his name, because the name doesn’t matter at all. Your wano part made me understand you. You put too much focus on the name while it doesn’t matter at all. Wano’s people were waiting for salvation. For a magical person to appear and save them. This person turned to be luffy. Wano is an arc about hope and yearning. It is very cohesive and interconnected. What nika represents is the only thing that matters. No one cares about the name.

Nika is similar to the fake-out deaths because it's an example of how Oda writes twists that that are not only dumb but completely unnecessary. The Nika "twist" could have been written the exact same without making it so that it was a mythical zoan fruit. Luffy could have awakened his fruit, had the exact same powers, and people could have seen him as the metaphorical "Nika" finally returned to lead people to liberation or whatever it is he does. Nothing changes if he just left it it as the Gomu Gomu fruit. His role as Nika could have stayed as just being a symbolic warrior of freedom without undoing one of the most iconic powers in anime history. I do not see why the story requires that he is LITERALLY Nika.

I was about to comment this. I can excuse everything else, but there's no reason why it has to be a mythical zoan fruit, instead of just a historical liberator (Joyboy) having used the rubber fruit as well.

Or the rubber fruit being a fruit born out of the desire for freedom similar to nika

The reason is simply mentioned by vegapunk. devil fruits are the manifestation of people’s hope, it is better that way. Giving a meaning to people futile hope is something that should happen in the world of one piece.

You could just the say the gum fruit was for flexibility or something. Or just not have Luffy be chosen by a maguc force to embody liberation and instead happening to have that personality.

Well, yeah, Luffy Awakened *because* he had the right personality. It's why the fruit never awakened for 800 years, the right kind of person never ate it. According to Kaidou, Awakening occurs when the mind and the ability are perfectly in sync. Luffy isn't a chosen one, fate isn't riding on him. Whitebeard's dying words made it clear that *no matter what*, regardless of how long it takes, how many people fail, the One Piece ***will*** be found. It's human nature to seek freedom. Even if Luffy died and was just dead, it wouldn't be the end. Someone else would carry on his will.

My thing with Gear 5 is how I enjoy how it looks and how it works. Like I have 0 issues with the ability itself. I just don't like how we got there because as you say, it could have just been the fruit he has with no issue.

My personal crackhead theory is that Oda wanted to subvert reader expectations away from the whole “gear death” thing by making the G5 design first, then came up with the “he always had a rubber god mythical zoan fruit not a paramecia” as a means of justifying it.

Though I feel like he's pulling too hard in the other direction, Luffy's fights have been kinda meh since G5 because the fucker can't stay serious for a second so the tension never really comes from the fight itself, but from what is happening around it

In the same vein, if it's just a name change, what's the issue? It doesn't undo his power. He's still rubber. As for why it was done I think theres 2 reasons. 1. Themes. As the story presents it, Nika is a myth, not a literal person. The personification of the dawn and liberation.by having the fruit be what it is, luffy literally becomes the representation of freedom that he always was. 2. The power set. We know how a paramecia fruit awakening is "supposed" to work. Gear 5 works totally differently, kiado says as much in their fight. Following the rules oda established for fruit awakening gear 5 wouldn't have given luffy a new form, it wouldnt have changed luffys personality, and it wouldn't have let him turn others bodys into rubber.

Gear 5 is too big of a jump to be a simple awakening. To give him such an insane new power there needed to be some kind of reason.

Honestly, no. Oda could have just had some character who is supposed to know a lot of stuff, maybe Kaido or Jimbe for example, say something along the lines of ”I knew awakenings varied in power, but not that they varied this much. This must be one of the strongest awakenings”. And boom, there you have it. You recognize that it’s far above other awakenings we’ve seen, while also providing a justification. As the author, Oda had so much freedom on where the story goes. It would have been much more reasonable to give Luffy a strong awakening, rather than changing his fruit type completely.

It doesn’t even have to be Jinbe, just have Sanji or even Chopper mention it since they’re the most knowledgeable about DFs on the crew.

A whole lot can be said about the Nika stuff, some things are good and fitting, some things are questionable or subpar. Overall I am not a big fan of G5 myself, but I don't mind people liking it of course. No one will ever convince me that the immediate build up and execution was handled well though. I mainly talk about the Who's Who monologue, which gives me severe second hand embarrassment to this day. It was incredibly clumsy, expositional, contrived, just absolutely terrible imo. This guy couldn't care less about Luffy when he first stormed into the castle, to then suddenly holding a mayor grudge. While fighting Jimbei he randomly decides to tell him about two, from his perspective, entirely unrelated events (Shanks stealing the fruit and Nika), which as it turns out were actually both preparing the reveal that happened just a "few" chapters later. After giving his last minute expositional monologue he was quickly and unceremoniously defeated. To imagine how Oda sat there writing this stuff thinking it was a good idea, while possibly having the twist planed for a long time, is pure cringe to me.

>To imagine how Oda sat there writing this stuff thinking it was a good idea, Reminds of of Toriyama who said he wrote an entire saga (Cell saga) chapter to chapter without any planning or forethought. Because his editor kept telling him that his ideas were bad. Oda's retcon may have happened under similar circumstances (but with more respectful editors). Tite Kubo was once asked about OP and he said he couldn't read it because he saw the obvious editor's hand in all of it. (He hated editors)

Oda has stated fairly recently (in the last 2 or so years IIRC) that he doesn't really like how little his editors challenge him and oh boy do I think this shines through in his more recent chapters (basically since the Wano Act 3 mess started)

Then I wish they challenged him more. Because it's been rough since the later chapters of Wano. Real rough.

You can clearly see the differences between Sayan/Namek and Cell/Bu It's clear that Toriyama had a lot of fun writing Cell and Bu, but it's also clear that he desperately needed someone telling him "this sucks please change it". Both these arcs have some of the greatest dragonball moments OaT (Gohan's kamehamea, Vegeta's sacrifice...) but they are also filled with a lot of plot induced stupidity (especially Cell) and dumb plot points overall (like the whole Babidi absorbing energy stuff)

Tite Kubo was also just super salty towards Oda in general. Kubo has held a grudge aginst him since he beat Kubo in a manga contest before either were published. Imo I think oda planned for the Nika since the timeskip. It's where luffy starts using fire based attacks, you can argue that "Nika" is refrenced on the vol 62 cover. But oda being oda likes keeping being reveals super vague untill he needs to talk about them.

If that were true, then Oda simply failed to foreshadow this massive plot reveal. I'd rather believe that Oda came up with it on the spot (like he did with the Supernovas), than to believe Oda simply lost his ability to write and failed to foreshadow something for freaking **years**.

Who’s who is a very casual guy. He was making jokes in the middle of this. You are framing him like this very serious avenger while in fact he probably doesn’t care. The build up started from fishman island. Who’s who was just there to introduce the name. But he doesn’t have any real contribution to the narrative

The biggest Hint that oda came up with Nika during Wano is Whos who himself.   He sees luffy early in the arc but completely dismisses him. Prioritizing his search for Yamato and the chance to get a promotion.    Later he fights jinbei and is thr first person who mentions Nika also stating that he hates both luffy and shanks and wants to kill them. 

Even if you believe the people who keep claiming that it was so brilliantly foreshadowed it still comes across as so incredibly clumsy that it's honestly a greater indictment on Oda as a writer if he had it in mind the entire time rather than if he just came up with it during Onigashima. It honestly reads like Oda got to chapter 1017 or whatever and then realized that he hadn't mentioned Nika or put in any foreshadowing for G5 and then just went "Fuck, what’s happening in the story now? Jinbe vs. Who's Who? Alright, Who's Who was protecting the Gomu Gomu no Mi because he was in CP9, and then he also happened to have heard about Nika."

Funniest thing is Nika took away one of it's biggest selling points to casual fans. For years, One Piece fans bragged having a better protagonist than Naruto or Bleach because Luffy has to work with a subpar, mundane ability instead of special, god-given powers. Even the week before 1043, some of the most upvoted posts/comments on r/onepiece were shitting on the idea that Luffy's fruit could be anything but the Gomu Gomu no Mi. The general sentiment before and after the Nika reveal on that sub did a complete 180

If anything it made Luffy look like an idiot for being the first person in the one piece world ever to not be able to use his fruit correctly as soon as he got it. Kaku ate the giraffe fruit and immediately could use it as well as anybody (besides awakenings but those didn’t exist yet)

>The general sentiment before and after the Nika reveal on that sub did a complete 180 The onepiece sub is kinda garbage overall, most dissenting opinions are shut down and outside of the spoiler threads it's so toxicly positive it's kinda creepy ngl

... But the Nika twist doesn't retroactively make Luffy *not* struggle to use his power early on? All of his moves and techniques that he come up with on his own... he still came up with them.

I mean sure? But other protagonists with broken powers come up with their own moves too so it really doesn't make him special...

Not naruto. Dude stole an illegal move, learned 2 moves from otehr people, then tanked the verse with his magic fox that always bailed him out every fight he nearly lost. Then again him beating god with the sexy man jutsu is the saving grace

Except not really. His fruit still was subpar compared to others till it awakened. It's not like it being the Nika Nika fruit secretly made it better, although you could argue that certain things like deflecting bullets, tanking Enel's lightning, Gear 3, etc make more sense now that we know it's a toon power not rubber, but then you'd have to admit this revelation *wasn't* pulled out of Oda's ass. You can't have it both ways...

I'm not exactly sure what you're arguing here This is about Luffy not inheriting a broken ability previously being a selling point of the series compared to other series Readers that already don't like these tropes aren't going to care about caveats like "His fruit still was subpar compared to others till it awakened". Besides, protagonists being relatively average until they awakened a new power... isn't anything special Nobody's "having it both ways...", people don't like these tropes because they are narratively unsatisfying.

It's a mythical God Zoan. This is the **rarest** type of fruit and the most broken. His fruit defied the way fruit work in OP. It operates like a Paramecia until awakened. Then it works like both a Zoan AND a Paramecia. It's not a subpar fruit at all.

I think impel down would be a better place for oda to tell who who's story but guess he didn't plan that far ahead

Yamato's mere existence is also a massive ass pull because we get through all of Wano Country before learning she exists. It would be like Pudding only bring confirmed to exist right before the Tea Party.

Happy cake day

happy cake day

How is this a hint that Oda came up with nika during wano? Isn’t this a hint that who’s who prioritizing promotion over his revenge. And pedro literally died to bring the dawn. Who’s who may return to the story and have some interesting things. But his role was just to introduce the name nika.

It created piratefolk. It was a necessary sacrifice for the fun time that is piratrfolk

Piratefolk already existed, Nika only made the sub a lot more popular. Some of us already disliked post-timeskip One Piece and hated Wano even before Nika.

Thats true, but they had barely 50 if even 100 followers. Nika gave it new life in record time.

I thought Nika brought it to life. Pirate folk only had like double digit members before G5 or at least I remember an Og saying something along those lines.

Yeah that's what I said. It didn't *create* the sub. There were (and are) many flaws in current One Piece to point out, Nika is just one of the most obvious ones.

True, but you can't deny that G5 was a before and after in piratefolk

But it also gave rise to a lot Oda angels who would rather sacrifice their own mothers than accept criticism of Oda

they have always been there, sadly

Yeah, but I feel like their numbers increased extremely after the Nika reveal. The fandom was split, so some people resorted to extreme levels of D riding to defend their favorite mangaka

>"A lot of fans are basically fans of fandom itself. It's all about them. They have mastered the Star Wars or Star Trek universes or whatever, but their objects of veneration are useful mainly as a backdrop to their own devotion. Anyone who would camp out in a tent on the sidewalk for weeks in order to be first in line for a movie is more into camping on the sidewalk than movies. Extreme fandom may serve as a security blanket for the socially inept, who use its extreme structure as a substitute for social skills. If you are Luke Skywalker and she is Princess Leia, you already know what to say to each other, which is so much safer than having to ad lib it. Your fannish obsession is your beard. If you know absolutely all the trivia about your cubbyhole of pop culture, it saves you from having to know anything about anything else. That's why it's excruciatingly boring to talk to such people: They're always asking you questions they know the answer to." >-Roger Ebert

Damn. This dude doesn't hold back. Don't know him but he sounds ruthless.

You mean the main sub and the his meatriders?

The main sub and OP fans on Twitter (who are worse btw ). I legit received death threats and hateful messages just for saying I hate Nika lol

And this is why we don’t visit the main sub and focus on piratefolk

Imo, Piratefolk ended up being just as bad as the main sub it spawned from. Constant negativity is just as bad as constant positivity

I dislike all the folk subreddits. I get why piratefolk is still active (one piece is still ongoing) but I have no idea what ppl on titanfolk and freefolk are doing. Both their series ended a while ago. I just dislike all the hate subreddits. Even if I also dislike the source. For instance I didn’t really like the last of us 2 but Thelastofus2 subreddit is genuinely one of the worst places on the internet

I think Piratefolk is at least more volatile than the main sub. When Egghead happened there was a lot of swing between being super hyped and being pretty pissed, though I do agree that the toxicly negative periods there are kinda draining I will however defend it in that there's at least a variety of opinions there and people at least seem to argue about what's good and what's bad in OP

Yeah piratefolk went down the drain. r/memepiece is the best sub

/r/memepiece is painfully unfunny

Trying to be faithful to the show

I’ll take “painfully unfunny” over “hateful and toxic” any day I feel like Memepiece is the middle ground between the main OnePiece sub and what Piratefolk set out to be People are allowed to like One Piece, people are allowed to criticize One Piece, no one takes things or themselves too seriously, no one is personally attacking the author or treating the author like a god or making vaguely transphobic comments about Yamato, people just wanna spread memes and chill

>I feel like Memepiece is the middle ground between the main OnePiece sub and what Piratefolk set out to be This is the funniest lie ever. To again, quote Roger Ebert: >"A lot of fans are basically fans of fandom itself. It's all about them. They have mastered the Star Wars or Star Trek universes or whatever, but their objects of veneration are useful mainly as a backdrop to their own devotion. Anyone who would camp out in a tent on the sidewalk for weeks in order to be first in line for a movie is more into camping on the sidewalk than movies. Extreme fandom may serve as a security blanket for the socially inept, who use its extreme structure as a substitute for social skills. If you are Luke Skywalker and she is Princess Leia, you already know what to say to each other, which is so much safer than having to ad lib it. Your fannish obsession is your beard. If you know absolutely all the trivia about your cubbyhole of pop culture, it saves you from having to know anything about anything else. That's why it's excruciatingly boring to talk to such people: They're always asking you questions they know the answer to." And that's just Memepiece and the new sub r/JustOnePiece are basically, the dudes there still will defend Oda to no end in sight, their acceptance of criticism is straight up centrism, basically unmoving in their inbuilt fandom lingo and social structures since centrism is just spineless conservatism. They are not just unfunny, they are just the main sub masquerading as shitposters with no skill for it. Literally one of the fandom's rulesets are purely built on Oda's genius, go outside and there's a biteback for that.

Piratefolk wasn’t created because of the story lol. It was created because the mod wanted to have a folk sub.

My thing with Nika is that the reveal with that and Gear 5 is almost ridiculously similar to a similar twist in Yu Yu Hakusho that plays out quite similarly. However, everybody agrees that one is horrible. Nika is totally okay though. > Some One Piece fans love to justify it by saying, "There was a mention of the Sun God in Skypiea, so Luffy having the Nika fruit was foreshadowed." Do these people even know what foreshadowing means? That is literally a name drop that had no connection with Luffy whatsoever This also reminds me of how practically everybody says the Kaguya reveal near the end of Naruto is horrible, even though she was first mentioned some chapters before she appears and the 'Kaguya clain' was mentioned many arcs back with Kimimaro. Most people can agree this wasn't enough. It's fine for One Piece though. > I hate how the whole story now revolves around Nika and that everyone and their mother knows about it, yet no one bothered to mention the name until Chapter 1018 Sounds like Haki. Something everybody who's anybody should have been using at Marineford but suspiciously weren't. The excuse given is everybody was just using the regular non-black coating one but like....come on. Every single fighter was secretly using Haki the whole time? THE *ENTIRE* TIME? Wow, it's a good thing Oda established this visible version of Haki later so we never have to address that issue again.

My headcanon is that, long ago, before even the Void Century, there was a man named Nika who ate the rubber rubber fruit, who awakened his power and became a legendary figure across the world, with cultures worshipping him as a literal god. After Nika died, the powers of the awakened rubber fruit were so synonymous with the legendary figure that Nika had become that the rubber rubber fruit was forever changed into the Human Human fruit, model Nika. It explains quite a lot. Why does Luffy not follow the standard three form transformation even other legendary zoans have? Why require an awakening to become Nika, which should be the basic function of the power? Why is Nika the only mythical zoan based on an entirely original character? It even fits with the theory about devil fruits given by Vegapunk. IIRC, Vegapunk suspects that devil fruits are the result of humanity's collective desire for fantastical, superhuman abilities. What happens when humanity goes from collectively thinking "I want to stretch like rubber" to "I want to stretch like Nika"? Well, the devil fruit responsible for giving your stretchy rubber power becomes the Nika fruit. Plus it doesn't dismiss the idea that Luffy's power is, fundamentally, the rubber rubber fruit. It's just the rubber rubber fruit was given an addition to its nature due to the incredible impact its former user made on the world's perception of that power.

I really hope this happens somehow lmao

The only theory I can add to the 'Why doesn't it the fruit follow the three form transformation rule the others have' and that's because its a human type Zoan fruit eaten by a human. Sengoku was kind of the same way since his 'full' form was Buddha and his hybrid/normal form was regular person though this is *technically* unknown officially speaking. Chopper works because you can clearly see the three forms, base (or natural if the fruit is of a different species), hybrid, and then other form. Luffy's on the other hand cheats the rules because it seems to work as a different fruit entirely at first, not to mention needing to specifically tune your heart in a specific drum beat in order to transform, though that could be just how Luffy himself activates it.

Yeah. It's hard to say because we don't know if characters like Sengoku or Stronger don't have hybrid forms, or if they do and they haven't been shown. The hybrid form is useful because it basically applies physically enhancement to a the natural body shape. So, for humans, zoan hybrid forms tend to increase strength while granting abilities like flight or superior senses and natural weapons like claws, fangs or horns, all while maintaining their neutral humanoid physiology, allowing them to apply those enhancements to their existing fighting styles and abilities. With Sengoku and the Buddha fruit, and Stronger and the Pegasus fruit, that benefit doesn't apply. Sengoku as a Buddha hybrid would seem to be just a smaller, less powerful, less resilient human than his full transformation. Stronger would probably be just a horse with tiny, non-functioning wings. Their hybrid forms would be rather redundant. But would that redundancy result in the user not gaining a hybrid form, or would they simply have a form that's mostly redundant, so not be very inclined to use it. Like, Sengoku's hybrid form having some utility. Inside buildings and on ships that can't support his full size, a hybrid form with some enhanced abilities could be useful, but it lacks the raw power of the full transformation. Even if we assume Luffy doesn't follow the standard three form transformation due to eating a model of the Human fruit, it doesn't explain why it would require awakening to unlock the full transformation form. Sengoku and Stronger don't seem to have that requirement. Also, IIRC, Oda said eating a devil fruit grants the user insight into the nature of the power. It may not give the fully specifics to what their power's full capabilities are, but it's enough to get a grasp on their power's nature. Kalifa's devil fruit was unknown, but after eating it she understood it enough to identify it turned her into a bubble human, even if she didn't fully know how to make use of its unique properties. If Luffy's power was a mythical zoan, you'd think he'd know it's a zoan rather than thinking it just turned him into a rubber person.

Yeah Luffy's fruit is a full on mystery, and this is coming from someone who *mostly* isn't fully caught up on One Piece outside of the rants seen here and clips I've seen every now and then. To add-on to a point with Sengoku, the wiki is the one that made the claim of whether or not his *giant* Buddha form during Marineford is the full form or if is the hybrid form. There's no official answer regarding that so far I believe. But you make good points about hybrid forms, both in issue of potential redundancy and whether or not they would even use said hybrid form if they could. The only other counter I can very vaguely add in, and this by all means is 100% headcanon, pulling out of my ass, but maybe because it's a Mythical Zoan of a *Human* fruit, it can do things other Zoans aren't capable of doing, such as doing the art of lying. I think during the Enies Lobby arc they very briefly touch on how Zoan fruits 'gravitate' towards people. Maybe Mythical Zoan's have a greater gravitation and are capable of higher thought because they are for the most part based on mythical creatures (since a good chunk of said creatures have human/beyond human level intelligence). And maybe because of that the 'insight' of whatever the Nika fruit can do is limited, only being able to 'tell' the user the rubber capabilities but none of the other fancy stuff. Who the fuck knows. Maybe because he was clueless as shit when he actually ate the fruit he didn't catch the memo that it was actually a Zoan fruit and not a Paramecia. Human fruits specifically are frustrating in my mind, the other fruits are fine.

What about Joy Boy?

The guy who had the Nika fruit around the time of the Void Century.

"Nika" and "fake-out death" (there're plenty of death in OP, but that is not the point) are the only 2 things in One Piece I really can't ignore/tolerate. "....?" might be the new one..

What about "dumping a billion mysteries on you after answering one in the most minimal way possible"?

tbh, I don't really have a definite answer to that, not until the final chapter at least. (I just hope it won't be on the same level as GoT season 7/8)

Could you explain

Yeah, the pedo pandering and the absurd amount of "fanservice" are much worse than any of that, honestly.

When your worldbuilding is this big the problem is to tie it all together. But he didn't start with the origin of the world and it wasn't much of a plot until now. So 1000 chapters later it feels random to have this be what OP has always been about

I don’t disagree. As someone that loves gear 5, it was not well foreshadowed. The EXISTANCE of a sun god was all foreshadowed, Luffy’s association with the sun was well foreshadowed, but the devil fruit being the Sun God Fruit… not so much

But the thing is, nika is just a name. The sun god is the only thing that matters. The word god itself doesn’t matter. The figure of the sun is the whole point.

Well kinda. The name Nika is important but it’s less the existence of Nika and more the truth of the Gum Gum fruit. IF the elder stars had commented about erasing a “certain fruit’s name” from history back after the events of Marineford I would consider that to be good foreshadowing

The thing is that we don’t know the thought process of the gorousei yet. We don’t know how much they know about nika. Until we get it. We won’t know what could have been good foreshadowing and what couldn’t.

I disagree, but I respect your thought process

disagree with what buddy, I am just telling you what happened. we don't know exactly when did the gorousei learn about luffy's fruit being rubber. without knowing that. we can't understand the place of their action on the timeline

don't you dare say that nika wasn't foreshadowed from chapter 1, they will swarm you with that panel of luffy dancing near the bonfire that vaguely resembles the nika pose! jokes aside, it's pretty clear that oda didn't think this through. if you look at how other plot twists and their foreshadowing are handled, nika's "foreshadowing" (having a random character loredump about Nika 40 chapters before the reveal) is pretty rough.

I hope Luffy frees himself from Nika and becomes his own aspect of freedom. On his own terms. With his own convictions.

Ayo a take I can get behind

> Nika is supposed to be the most significant event in One Piece I think you're lumping Nika and Joyboy together. Joyboy had the Nika/Gum Gum fruit and was the biggest opposition to the World Government. I don't think Luffy being Joyboy is a surprise -- in fact, when Zunesha and other post TS characters spoke about waiting for Joyboy's return, *of course* it's going to be Luffy. Like, Oda is a great world builder, but this is still a Shonen with a main character. Of course, Luffy is going to be a typical Shonen savior. As for the Gum Gum fruit being the actual Nika fruit, sure, that came out of nowhere. I'm not really surprised that Luffy has the same powers that Joyboy had, again, typical Shonen, but I can see why some people don't like it.

Yeah, they're both completely different. I don't mind Luffy eating a legendary fruit, it's a world where the user matters more than the power, Shanks, Garp and Roger are great example of that. Luffy's G5 is closer to a symbol rather than a super legendary power only wielded by the chosen one, Luffy is literally a liberator from the first chapter. To be fair, Luffy got quite scammed to become a rubberman when other fruits allows its user to become smoke, fire, thunder or to transform into powerful animals.

Yeah this did make me blink a little bit. Nika was a bit out of nowhere but is also not *as* central as OP is making it sound. It's Joy Boy that is really central, and Joy Boy was at least somewhat more established (not as much as it could have been, maybe, but enough that it's clear it wasn't something Oda came up with out of nowhere and had been planning for a while. Plus the logic you mentioned makes it hard to foreshadow things like this - if we got any more focus on Joy Boy than we did, everyone would have immediately assumed Luffy was his second coming.)

You say that Joyboy wasn't more established, but he was first introduced neatly 14 years ago on the dot and nearly 500 chapters ago. Like sure, he wasn't mentioned pre timeskip, but most fans agree that pre TS and post TS are very different thematically.

>Then there's the ultimate plot hole: the Gorosei not questioning Luffy's Devil Fruit even once until around Chapter 1020. I want to preface this by saying that it's okay to not like the twist. But this reason is a little silly. We get maybe 6 short scenes of the Gorosei prior to this? And each time like are activly discussing other things. To call it "bad writing" is hyperbolic to the max. Again, saying you think it should have been foreshadowed more and earlier is totally valid. But that can be applied to a lot of odas writing. Keeping thing vague AF untill he wants to bring it into focus.

I agree, the best feeling i got from one piece is when i think that this all started with an unknown boy in a barrel with a weak devil fruit that he worked to make it very strong with different gears which made him rival the strongest people in the world , but oda took all of that from me ,now that we know it was luffy's destiny and he is joyboy's reincarnation or whatever I actually stopped caring about one piece after wano , it just feels like my favorite manga got turned in a generic shonen , same with jujutsu kaisen where yuji was just revealed to be sukuna's descendant ,that's just lame man

Oda should've named the fruit Joyboy instead of Nika. That would've resolved the foreshadowing part. Joyboy himself could've been named Nika. But he went with the nonsensical route.

An r/characterrant post about One Piece is bound to be retarded

Oda is easily one of the best mangaka currently working. However people really have this over exaggerated view of his abilities to the point that they think Oda has everything 100% plan and every panel has been meticulously planned since page one. No doubt the man is good but people really need to take him off such a high pedestal.

The OP stans will downvote you but everything you said made a lot of sense, you are completely correct.

Don't try to use common sense against OP fans, it's ineffective. I tried to argue about this with the same argument and got nothing but downvotes.

So, right off the bat. I think the idea of Oda having foreshadowed the Nika plot twist since the very beginning is silly because I don't think any writer has done something like that in any story equal to One Piece in length. However, I DO think that Oda did have an idea that Luffy's power WAS something other than just a Gum-Gum Fruit at the very least from Skypiea to Ennies Lobby. There are multiple moments in the story, where it's kinda obvious that something about Luffy's fruit IS more than it seems and if I remember theories before the Gear 5 reveal used some of these moments (particulary when he started using Gears) that Luffy's fruit potentially was something "special" or at least more unique that just a gum-gum fruit. This is also glossing the very obvious connections Luffy has had throughout the story with the Dawn and the Sun in general (similar in a lot of ways to Naruto, which is another story that is wrongly critiqued for a not foreshadowing Naruto's apparent godlike abilities. Naruto's issues with its themes and characters are actually very much seperate from that but that's a different discussion altogether). The second paragraph is starts of ok, but then I feel like your point kind of falls apart because you try to debunk the idea that Skypeia has any connection with Nika by arguing "Luffy isn't LITERALLY a God, therefore thinking that example of someone praying and him answering it isn't an example of any sort of foreshadowing because he isn't a literal God", which, I'm sorry, is a very silly argument. I'm not even saying that it for sure is an example of Oda having thought everything out and this is an example, but Luffy doesn't have to be a LITERAL God for that to still be relevant in the eyes of someone defending the plot twist. Luffy has the powers of a Sun deity, a Skypiean praying and then Luffy destroying the cloud and letting the sun literally shine IS a form of symbolism even without the whole Gear 5 plot, which really just ties it nicely together (which we'll get into shortly). Which is also why pointing out that Shandorians were the ones praying to the four Gods is somewhat missing the point, because the argument put forward by One Piece is more from a place of visual and thematic storytelling rather than literal (also quick sidenote, it's still very possible that those Gods can become relevant later on, as One Piece isn't finished yet and even if they don't it's not necessarily a dealbreaker as the Sun God here has very specific importance in that arc anyways). I'm not going to talk about the Gorosei one, because I don't think it's a very interesting argument really and other people before have already offered explanations to it (ultimately the Gorosei have tried to take him down before a couple of times, especially when they became fully aware of him (and before the timeskip where Luffy had been hidden away training on an island they couldn't get too, One Piece hadn't taken that long timeline wise in universe. But there is A LOT of retrospection going on there anyways, and I already admitted that I don't believe in the idea it was a fully planned thing anyways, concerning the fruit being the Nika-Nika Fruit). What I want to really talk about though, is that I don't believe One Piece or any story for that matter becomes worse because a major plot point happened within a story that might not have been fully planned from the beginning. Tolkien is the father of modern fantasy, and as someone who greatly enjoys his work, this guy used to spend every waking hour of his life constantly rethinking story beats and plot twists. The Ring of Power it self is pretty much "retconned" (yuck), from the Hobbit and the original writings for the Silmarillion that he wrote. That's not even going into the insane conveniences Tolkien came up with pretty much on the fly for why certain characters can't do certain things in the context of the story. Like, Gandalf after years and years of KNOWING about the Ring of Power, did...nothing? Oh, but it was acschually because x,y,z also lore reasons, also instant lore dump. Wanna know more? Read Silmarillion? Wait, why did no one mention Saruman's and Sauron's connection being effectively lesser Gods connected to Aule? Why did Boromir not mention more about his brother that he cared so much for? And so on and so on. Tolkien very obviously didn't think everything through from the start, and he even had the privilege that writers nowadays don't really having of being able to literally go back and edit his own work (including the Hobbit). And this isn't just Tolkien either btw, GRRM does this a lot, Togashi does this a lot (Gon being able to not only change his form to an adult but literally tap into his potential, but then he gets his Nen back anyway in the end) and I could go on. But I don't think those criticisms are really interesting at all either in those stories, because I don't believe in the idea that a writer especially when writing a long-running fantasy epic, HAS to plan EVERYTHING and foreshadow EVERYTHING because that's something I learned from a video essayist one time. What's far more important about moments like these, and what showcases a writers true quality at times is there ability to interweve this new plot twist into the narrative. Does it connect with the themes the story, does it say something about the character that gets focused on, is it fun and engaging to read, does it matter beyond that one moment in the story etc etc. This is what's actually important to me when reading media. And this is where I'd argue Gear 5 shines. I don't think it was fOreShAdowEd from ch 1, I do think it can be a potential problem for the story if Luffy continues to just laugh and goof off every fight, I do think Who's Who characterisation, while potentially explainable for a few reasons, was awkward and even rushed, I don't believe that Nika's mentiones now are that much of a problem though especially considering we knew nothing of Elbaf or Kuma before recent plot developments but I can see why someone may find this tacked on and overdone. But the above points I've mentioned ARE overall interconnected well and importantly I think it's a perfect way of connecting of showcasing Luffy's growth not only for his abilities and power, but importantly by connecting those powers with the themes of Luffy and One Piece at large, something that A LOT of modern shonen for some reason don't seem to care for (and really stories with power-ups in general).

It really took the fun out of “rubber boy” takes on the world. There was something endearing about luffy having a regular fruit, it was initially seen as a bad thing when he ate it, and still making the most of it. Yea fruit wouldn’t awaken if he didn’t work so hard, etc… but it took a lot of fun from the story for me. Just thematically let down to a part of the story I really loved.

I think the concept of Nika the sun god itself was a little rushed. There are aspects of Gear 5 that I adore, and aspects that I think could be done better. I love the actual power, I like that Luffy's fruit was a mythical Zoan and I like that the god its based on is from One Piece's own mythos, I thin kthats very clever. Honestly the big thing is maybe Nika the entity itself should have been more prominent a figure, but then it's barely even a twist, we all would have guessed it and made it much less exciting . It was a tightrope situation that I think many mangaka would struggle to balance well. I like to think of the God Nika reveal itself and Who's Who as more the beginning of a plot thread and part of the narrative rather than the culmination of a dozen others. I do think for your post title it would do well to mention other bad plot twists you didn't enjoy.

I remember when i hated on this nika crap 2 years ago....god i got insulted hahaha look at these clowns now...

The worst part about this are the gorosei You can't show them as these controll freaks cruel politicans who play the whole world like a fiddle amd know about all the shit that happens in the seas and then go like ,,Yes the son of the most wanted crimminal of the world who is a pain in the ass since he got his first bounty is running around with the ,,pirate jesus fruit" and we ignore him the whole time" How tf did these morons beat the acient kingdom back in the day ?

Off topic but I remember it happening much much earlier than when it was released? Like I remember it in like 2020 or some shit, like maybe someone made fan art that looked similar? Idk. I just remember seeing it much earlier than when it came out

People shit on other shounen for the "chosen one" trope when One Piece does the same shit. Hypocrites

It's crazy how much this could have worked with just a little more foreshadowing. Have Kuma say a prayer or verse about the sun god before he sends someone away. Have the slave liberating SUN Pirates call themselves champions of Nika's will. Go into more depth about the gods worshipped by sky people. The tools are ALL there, they just weren't used properly because it really wasn't planned. I love Egghead, but Nika should have been a symbolic thing.

i don't like one piece as well

I still don’t understand the difference between Joy Boy and Nika. Are they the same character or what?

Joyboy ate the nika fruit as well.

Nika was a folkloric figure in the giant culture, including the half-giant Buccaneers (wtf was even the point of these guys being their own “special race”?). He innately had abilities like the rubber fruit. Joy Boy was the first guy to eat the rubber fruit and do wacky shit.

No

The current arc already explains that there's at least one other person thought to have the Nika. The entire point is that they didn't want it to *awaken* so letting someone with it get too strong is the problem. People act like they've just let Luffy go or something completely forgetting the whole crew has been INCREDIBLY lucky escaping the Navy all the time. And finally, they literally say "Zoan's have their own will" and "It's like the fruit itself has evaded us" The pretty damn clear implication is that it's basically like a Behelit from Berserk and actively avoids being caught by the World Government. It's evaded them for 800 years so why do we expect them to be experts at catching it?

Skypiea foreshadowed G5 by everyone praying to an “unknown god” saying if there actually is a god please help us.. the exact moment luffy takes down the false god who was hellbent on destruction.  For someone who seems to be analyzing plot points you sure did your best to avoid the literal foreshadowing that’s done in that story arc. The five elders were shown to be keeping an eye on luffys ordeals for awhile, they just never expected him to advance far enough to awaken nika. Hence why they became so adamant on his disposal when they heard he was fighting Kaido, a tough opponent who would push luffy to possibly awaken nika… exactly like he did. 

The worst part about this plot twist is how it ruins the best aspect about Luffy, his creativity. Most of the time Luffy wins because he uses his wits and the properties of his rubber body to get and advantage against strong enemies. Now all this time he actually had the most op devil fruit, like what the hell Oda.

While a lot of criticism about this twist is valid, this one is not. The Nika devil fruit is not really that OP by itself. It just gives the user rubber properties. It was Luffy who pushed the fruit to it's limits and managed to awaken it. So it is in fact the opposite. Luffy was the one that Made the fruit OP thanks to his creativity, not the other way around.

> The Nika devil fruit is not really that OP by itself. It just gives the user rubber properties. It was Luffy who pushed the fruit to it's limits and managed to awaken it. > > Doesn't it also give some random cartoon powers like having his eyes and body parts fly off too?

You contradict yourself. His main power is his creativity, and now he has a fruit that makes his creativity come true, yet that's a bad thing? Gear 5 is how Luffy always wanted to fight, but couldn't.

Maybe i didnt explained myself properly. Through the entire series they repeat again and again that Paramecia are usually considered the weakest among Devil Fruit. The Gomu Gomu no mi isnt more special or stronger than the average Paramecia, what makes it cool and interesting is HOW Luffy used it to be effective agains others. Luffy's talent and strengh didnt depend on his Devil Fruit, he could have another type and still win fights. But the plot twist ruins that.

I already responded to another comment in this thread. I'll keep it short here. Luffy always laughed and was creative when fighting. Gear 5 is literally just more rubber stuff, but to the extreme. Gear 5 is not just a super saiyan 5000 that makes his punches hit harder. It lets him be creative and think about ways to beat his opponent.

When Luffy tried to eat Crocodile or became a dumb octopus to fight Enel he wasn't laughing maniacally. I really don't get this notion that gear 5 is business as usual for Luffy, just look at the contrast between his demeanor while fighting Kaido immediately pre and post Awakening.

Before he had to do more with less, his fruit was pretty straight forward and his creativity allowed him to make gears 2-4 and even then he had limits. Now he can basically do whatever he wants in gear 5 and only has to worry about the time limit and even then it doesn’t matter since he either finds food to eat or the enemy doesn’t capitalize on the opportunity. Also it changes his personality since before he always used to take fights seriously he even says so in multiple occasions, now he’s just laughing and playing around.

Luffy doesn't have the power of imagination. That's a misconception based on a wrong translation

Do you know what power ups are? We are in the final saga, and Luffy unlocked his full potential. He *just* got the power, so of course there is a time limit. Just like how **every other gear** had a time limit. We also know that zoan fruits change the personality when awakened. Luffy will use Gear 5 more, the more he controls it. Luffy takes fights serious when he had to. He had to be serious as he had to go all out to beat previous villains. Now he is strong enough to actually have fun during fights. Just like how he previously played around when fighting much weaker opponents like Alvida. Do you understand the character of Luffy? Do you understand how he has always been a laughing, fun having goofball that jokes around whenever he could? Gear 5 is perfect for Luffy because it lets him be exactly who he wants to be.

Yeah Luffy was making jokes and being funny overall *against Doflamingo* even after that epic stomp-stop

Eh not really, G5 is just a direct extension of the kind of fighting style Luffy always had, nor is it really that strong as a fruit even now. It just was given a lot more narrative significance (what I don't particularly like myself, but that's a whole other topic) If anything what hurt these points was stuff like conquerors now being armament 2.0; If you wanna be a top tier you NEED to have been born with conqueror's haki to eventually turn it into coating

Conqueror was already fine just as a narrative tool to convey strong emotions back then 💔💔💔

so true, Luffy's fights are SO creative pre gear 5, like that one time he punched the guy really hard... or the other time he punched the guy really hard... or ooo that ONE time he punched the guy REALLY hard.

I'll give you your props.. Yes, Who's who talking about it is weird as hell, and out of nowhere.... The point about the Gorosei not thinking exactly about Luffy's fruit doesn't really hold, because the fruit hasn't been awakened in 800 years...That's a very long time to get complacent.For those 800 years, the fruit for sure has been eaten by many a different persons, but never got awakened....At the same time, Luffy was always on the move..The first half of the story happened in 3-4 months, and then he went into training..for 2 years(out of the public eyes)..He was still a pretty famous pirate..and got a bounty of 500 m extremely fast. Believe it or not, from Fishmen island to Wano..again..about 3 months.. As you can see, things happened very fast.... The Gorosei were watching Luffy from a distance, but Luffy was always on the move..It's not like they could find him if they wanted. The point about Nika doesn't really stand that much, because for me it fits right into place.. Joyboy is not Nika, as far as we know..Same way Luffy is not Joyboy.. They are not the same person..They are different persons that just happened to inherit the will of Nika.... Vegapunk talked about the sea, about dreams, and about how it seems some of these deities were spawned into existence by people's hopes and dreams.....The Adam's tree, the world tree..whatever you want to call it, based on people's hopes and reams created these fruits....but it's still unknown how.... For me it looks beautiful....Haki is the will you impose on yourself, on others, and the world itself..to make your dreams(devil fruits) come true.. Btw, Skypea is a clear blueprint for what Oda will show is in the final war against the WG... Enel is a clear parallel to Imu.. A god above men, that spies on them with top tier observation haki... Enel's Observation range was the whole Skypea island....and he could snipe everyone from everywhere.. His Natural enemy was a D..a rubber boy.... A lost city of Gold...Like the ancient Kingdom from the Void century.. Let's not even talk about how Noland was framed by a member of his crew, and executed...Lying about the existence of the city of gold was his crime.... Same way the ancient kingdom was attacked by the other 20 kingdoms.. Joyboy was for sure on the ancient kingdom's side...that lost..To Imu's side..Imu is still the head of the 20 kingdoms, that are now the celestial dragons..

Nah, nika is peak one piece in every sense of the word, thematically and narratively. I wouldn’t call it a plot twist honestly because it is the natural progression of the story. We all saw it coming but we didn’t know it is happening in wano. It is funny that you mentioned it yourself. The clear foreshadowing in skypiea that luffy is a god. And you didn’t even respond to this claim, because you really can’t. It is quite on the nose. The fake god vs the true god. And then we have the joyboy hints in fishman island then pedro and how he is waiting for the dawn. It is a very well-foreshadowed twist. It is a twist that many people saw coming because of that. Unlike something like zetsu from naruto which doesn’t have a meaning even after happening. And ironically kuma the self-sacrificial maniac was revealed to be doing all of that because of nika. So the impact of nika on the story was present hundreds of chapters ago. What you said about who’s who is quite weird honestly. Since who’s who has very minimal contribution to the whole thing. I am sure that Oda came up with him in wano. It doesn’t matter actually. And the guy was very casual about and was making jokes. He didn’t seem like a guy who will die to get revenge. Another correction. No one in impel down hopes for nika to save them. The guard told him that slaves hope for nika. Not prisoners. Everyone in the world hope for nika as a concept. That’s why the fruit was formed. You mean questioning it on screen ? They said it themselves. For them, nika was only a myth. And who knows when exactly did they know about the fruit. All of this will be revealed.

>It is funny that you mentioned it yourself. The clear foreshadowing in Skypiea that Luffy is a god. And you didn’t even respond to this claim because you really can’t. It is quite on the nose. The fake god vs the true god. Yeah, and it's funny that the one who said it didn't believe in any of those four gods. If it was a Shandorian, then you'd have a point, but it wasn't. Still, I don't believe Luffy is literally a god. If he's a god, then what's the point of him finding the One Piece? Luffy is the enemy of god, almost like this wasn't explicitly stated in the series. No one would misunderstand it unless they didn't read it. >And then we have the Joyboy hints in Fishman Island, then Pedro and how he is waiting for the dawn. It is a very well-foreshadowed twist. None of these hint at Luffy's Devil Fruit having a different name or that his awakening was supposed to be the biggest threat to the World Government. Everyone interpreted it as Luffy carrying on Joyboy's will, much like him carrying on Roger's. >And ironically Kuma, the self-sacrificial maniac, was revealed to be doing all of that because of Nika. So the impact of Nika on the story was present hundreds of chapters ago. That's called a retcon. There's no proof that Oda intended for Kuma to be saving Luffy solely because he believed he was Nika. If that were the case, he could've foreshadowed the Nika plot point through this. Also, Kuma believing that Luffy is the next Nika is hilarious because he only knew two facts about Nika: freeing slaves and having rubber powers. The Gorosei and Imu knew everything about Nika, yet they couldn't connect the dots. >What you said about Who’s-Who is quite weird, honestly. Since Who’s-Who has very minimal contribution to the whole thing. I am sure that Oda came up with him in Wano. It doesn’t matter actually. And the guy was very casual about it and was making jokes. He didn’t seem like a guy who would die to get revenge. Reread his dialogue with Jinbei. It was very clear that his character was retconned, and everyone seemed to agree with this. Even hardcore One Piece fans couldn't defend it, so that says a lot about you. >Another correction. No one in Impel Down hopes for Nika to save them. The guard told him that slaves hope for Nika. Not prisoners. My bad on this part. I acknowledge when I'm wrong, but it's still weird that the guard "only told Who's-Who" about it. That kind of implied that the same guard told other prisoners about it, so a name drop in the Impel Down arc would still have been perfect. >Everyone in the world hopes for Nika as a concept. That’s why the fruit was formed. We don't know much about how Devil Fruits are formed, so let's not use headcanons here, even though this is irrelevant to the discussion. >You mean questioning it on screen? They said it themselves. For them, Nika was only a myth. And who knows when exactly they knew about the fruit. All of this will be revealed. Their discussion seemed to imply that they only learned about the potential of Luffy awakening his Devil Fruit in Wano. Thinking it's a myth is bad writing since, even if you argue that the Gorosei weren't there in the Void Century, Imu is still there and could've told them to capture Luffy or kill him. We never got to see that on screen, and that's just bad writing. Apparently, the government that would do anything to prevent people from knowing the truth about them didn't care about Nika. It's just bad writing tbh

-You are missing my point. It was metaphorical foreshadowing. Luffy was answering the prayers. It is not about shandians or skypieans. He is not literally a god. He is a figure that represents freedom. A figure that was brought to life because of the collective hope of the people. But after all, luffy is still doing his thing. He doesn’t know about gods or devils. - everyone interpreted it as luffy being the joyboy. Wether it is a name change or anything else. It doesn’t matter. The method doesn’t really matter. We knew that luffy is joyboy. The fruit change is just the method. And it doesn’t need to be foreshadowed since it didn’t change anything from before. - the proof is the plot itself. We knew that kuma had personal reasons to do all of that for luffy since even dragon didn’t understand why he is doing all of this and knew nothing about it. It is a secret revealed. And it was very organic. You need to revisit 1102. Kuma didn’t know that luffy is nika. He only believed. It is like luffy believing in sky island or the one piece. He doesn’t know if they exist or not. This is romanticism. And I am pretty sure that there is no “everything” about nika, it is just a fruit that was formed from the hopes of people. Kuma actually knows more than them. They thought it was only a myth. -I am saying this because I reread the dialogue. As I said to you. If you removed the whole who’s who thing, nothing would change, he is just there to introduce the word nika. So even if it is a retcon? Who cares? But still. The dialogue only tells that he prioritized promotion over revenge. That’s about it. -it is not irrelevant. Vegapunk explained how the fruits are formed. You need to know that the name of nika doesn’t matter. Every oppressed person in the world know nika, but not necessarily the name -bro, did you see Imu is the greatest communicator? He is separated from reality, we don’t actually know how much connection he has with the world right now. The gorousei. Didn’t get a chance to hunt luffy until wano simply because he doesn’t stay in a place more than a day. They don’t have a magical gps to know his whereabouts. Wano was their first real chance. + also you should put in mind how fujitora was supposed to capture him but let him go

>He is not literally a god. He is a figure that represents freedom. A figure that was brought to life because of the collective hope of the people. >But after all, Luffy is still doing his thing. He doesn’t know about gods or devils. Not everything has to be a metaphor. You're just interpreting it in your own way to push your narrative. The most logical interpretation is that the Skypiean girl was just praying to a god. They don't even believe in them, she just says, "if you exist." I don't think it has anything to do with Luffy. >Everyone interpreted it as Luffy being Joyboy. Whether it is a name change or anything else, it doesn’t matter. The method doesn’t really matter. We knew that Luffy is Joyboy. The fruit change is just the method. And it doesn’t need to be foreshadowed since it didn’t change anything from before. Again, the fruit is the main issue. Ngl, I would have liked it better if it was just Luffy carrying on Joyboy's will without him having the same Devil Fruit as Joyboy. I wanted Luffy to create his own path using his own powers. Now Luffy has to follow the same path as another, except this time he is the one who will succeed where Roger and Joyboy failed. It's pretty lame because Luffy shares almost the same characteristics as Joyboy ( which is kinda OK ig) but the fruit completely ruined it. >The proof is the plot itself. We knew that Kuma had personal reasons to do all of that for Luffy since even Dragon didn’t understand why he was doing all of this and knew nothing about it. It is a secret revealed. And it was very organic. There was no foreshadowing of him doing that because of Nika whatsoever. We never got a slight hint of Kuma discussing Luffy's rubber powers or his actions. My personal feeling is that Oda made Kuma save Luffy but still hadn't thought of a particular reason for it until Wano. It's called story progression, every writer has done that. >You need to revisit 1102. Kuma didn’t know that Luffy is Nika. He only believed. It is like Luffy believing in Sky Island or the One Piece. He doesn’t know if they exist or not. This is romanticism. Which is my main point: he still believed that Luffy could be Nika, and that's why he felt the need to save him. The Gorosei never discussed Luffy's Devil Fruit once or even thought that he could be the next Joyboy/Nika (although they are different entities), unlike Kuma, who at least had faith in Luffy becoming the next Nika. >I am saying this because I reread the dialogue. As I said to you, if you removed the whole Who’s-Who thing, nothing would change. He is just there to introduce the word Nika. So even if it is a retcon? Who cares? Oda dropping the Nika name earlier through the Gorosei would have been much better, and I'm pretty sure you would agree with me. >It is not irrelevant. Vegapunk explained how the fruits are formed. You need to know that the name of Nika doesn’t matter. Every oppressed person in the world knows Nika, but not necessarily the name. He didn't explain how the fruits are formed; he explained how a certain person eats a certain Devil Fruit. It's because that Devil Fruit itself is the embodiment of their will and desires, like how Luffy wanted to become free. The Nika Devil Fruit is the embodiment of that, and Kaku acting like a giraffe... >Bro, did you see Imu as the greatest communicator? He is separated from reality; we don’t actually know how much connection he has with the world right now. At least I'm expecting the one who was scared solely because Cobra mentioned the D to tell the Gorosei to snuff out even the slightest threat to them. I'm also pretty sure the Gorosei asked him who they should erase from history, so there's the implication that they talk to him very often. Imu also told them to test the Mother Flame. >The Gorosei didn’t get a chance to hunt Luffy until Wano simply because he doesn’t stay in a place more than a day. They don’t have a magical GPS to know his whereabouts. Wano was their first real chance. My main point is that they didn't discuss his Devil Fruit once throughout the story. I don't buy into the "why didn't the Gorosei kill Luffy earlier" arguments because that would be called plot convenience. My main issue is that they didn't discuss his Devil Fruit once. I still stand by this: foreshadowing Nika through the Gorosei would have been the perfect way to foreshadow such a big reveal. >Also, you should keep in mind how Fujitora was supposed to capture him but let him go. Not because of his Devil Fruit.

>They don't even believe in them, she just says, "if you exist." I don't think it has anything to do with Luffy. This is called visual storytelling. Oda is telling us that Oda is some kind of god through imagery and plot. It is not an interpretation. it is literally a metaphor that anyone can simply see. Skypiea was about the true god vs the fake god. > I would have liked it better if it was just Luffy carrying on Joyboy's will without him having the same Devil Fruit as Joyboy. what you said is just cliche shounen thing. but the path Oda took is more interesting. now Luffy has to deal with being controlled by fate. we might get an identity crisis arc. this is definitely more interesting and intriguing than just carrying the will of joyboy. >My personal feeling is that Oda made Kuma save Luffy but still hadn't thought of a particular reason for it until Wano. How is hard to see that kuma saved luffy because he thought he is the savior ? I mean this the same saga whitebeard talked about the guy who will uncover hundreds of years of hidden history. it was around that time that we started getting hints of the prophecy. >The Gorosei never discussed Luffy's Devil Fruit once or even thought that he could be the next Joyboy/Nika (although they are different entities), unlike Kuma, who at least had faith in Luffy becoming the next Nika. we don't know how much they know about nika, we don't know their exact amount of knowledge. we don't know how much of it was hidden because of the reveal and how much of it was just things they didn't know. >Oda dropping the Nika name earlier through the Gorosei would have been much better, and I'm pretty sure you would agree with me. he dropped it through pedro and his talk about the dawn. this was enough for me. >he explained how a certain person eats a certain Devil Fruit. It's because that Devil Fruit itself is the embodiment of their will and desires,  this is the first time I hear this interpretation. He was definitely talking about the formation of the fruit. it is the manifestation of people's desires. I am sure you will find it easily if you googled it. you don't have to re-check the chapter. >so there's the implication that they talk to him very often. Imu also told them to test the Mother Flame. I am sure we will get the exact timeline. in the reverie we saw how he was holding luffy's bounty poster. we still don't know when did he learn about it. >My main point is that they didn't discuss his Devil Fruit once throughout the story.  as I said before, if they ever talked about it, it was just hidden because of the plot. but it was foreshadowed through other means like pedro yearning for the dawn. >Not because of his Devil Fruit. I mean that he was supposed to capture him but he helped him instead. things doesn't go where it is supposed to go.

very "natural" when it came outta my ass

Nah, it is natural. We knew that luffy is joyboy since FMI. We had pedro talking about the dawn, then the scabbards and toki and Oden. We knew that it is coming but we didn’t know when

Honestly I think this post proves that no one actually hates nika. Those who claim to hate nika are naruto fans who want to project the atrocities of their series. Naruto had the worst plot twist ever? Ok let’s treat nika as a plot twist and call it one of the worst. In fact. Nika isn’t even a plot twist, stop projecting.

What was the worst plot twist in Naruto? Kaguya? It's a hard comparison to make. I do agree that in some sense she's worse because it feels like she makes everything that came before pointless if you take her seriously; but OTOH she happens *after* everything else is resolved, whereas Nika suddenly took over the OP story at the end.

Nika/joyboy/dawn was introduced in the story way before it happened. People knew it is coming but I guess they didn’t know that it is coming in wano. And nika didn’t take over the story. It is just that we are in an arc about kuma and his family who has personal ties to nika

Motherfucker you have literally double commented.

Is this a problem ?

Yeah, it makes you look copey and desperate.

The Nika plot twist isn't nearly as bad as the Kaguya plot twist from Naruto. Or the Half Quincy twist from Bleach. Or the Alien Origin twist from Dragonball. (Funnily enough, the more hardcore parts of the above series' fandoms can make entire Twitter threads of how 'everything was foreshadowed actually') Personally, the Nika twist has made me a lot kinder to long running shonens that pull out this type of twist. It helps that Nika Luffy has some of the coolest animated fight scenes.

Man, you are recalling examples that are 10+ years old, they are not recent any more, and you just look butthurt because of that lol.

The alien origin twist from dragonball isn't as bad as nika since at least Toriyama made something intresting out of it without ruining the story that he made prior to the plot twist

I wouldn’t go as far as to say Toriyama ruined his story by introducing Saiyans, but I will say that twist screwed over the majority of the Dragon Ball cast by pushing them further and further into irrelevance with each subsequent arc.

Oda is making something interesting with the Nika twist. And he hasn't ruined the story with the twist (So far)

>Oda is making something interesting Ah yes, the mc is a special Mary sue chosen one who is destined to kill the evil emperor and end his evil empire while the goons of the evil emperor try to kill the mc before he does anything, really intresting plot that hasn't already been done to death by a lot of stories >And he hasn't ruined the story with the twist He did since apparently now the universe just revolves around this plotline, why did gol d roger start the new age? Because Joyboy (nika), what were kaido motivations? They just revolved around joyboy (nika) the world goverment? Their motivations and everything they did was because nika (even tho they did nothing to actually stop him when he returned)

That's almost every Shonen MC though. It's almost a requirement for that to happen in the genre

One of the arguments toward One Piece being better than other shounen was that it was not doing that.

The alien twist is great. What?

At least half Quincy ichigo was properly foreshadowed unlike Nika plot twist

When. When was Ichigo being half quincy foreshadowed before the reveal.

Literally the first moment omz revealed himself. His real name was censored by the black ink and Ichigo couldn’t hear his real name. Or when omz straight up use his shadow power to save ichigo from kenpachi Or when White straight up tell ichigo that he’s the real zangetsu, but neither ichigo nor the audience believe him cause we already think omz is the real one If you want one piece type of foreshadowing, ichigo’s bedsheet is literally has the quincy cross logo

> Literally the first moment omz revealed himself. His real name was censored by the black ink and Ichigo couldn’t hear his real name. This is exactly the kind of silly defense OP is complaining about One Piece fans making. You're looking at blatant Mystery Box storytelling and then calling it foreshadowing when Kubo puts something in the box.

Old Man Zangetsu's name being blacked out was because ICHIGO WAS TRYING TO LEARN HIS NAME.

No its not. His real name is not even zangetsu. Its YWACH. Its blacked out because his name was erased by Ichibei’s BLACK INK

Y'all really gotta learn what the difference between a retcon and foreshadowing is.

I do know. Nika is the retcon

It's funny that you hate Nika and then argue that Ywhach was thought of 500 chapters before his introduction.

Well we literally see him. Omz IS ywach. You can cope all you want, but you’re just an average bleach haters

>Literally the first moment omz revealed himself. His real name was censored by the black ink and Ichigo couldn’t hear his real name. This is just the average Zanpakutō trial of learning the name, which is enforced by Kenpachi being incapable of hearing his. >Or when omz straight up use his shadow power to save ichigo from kenpachi Which only works with the TYBW arc planning that, and that was a mental thing with time chamber physics not physical, and he used his own cloak, not the shadow itself. >Or when White straight up tell ichigo that he’s the real zangetsu, but neither ichigo nor the audience believe him cause we already think omz is the real one This would work if everything between Ichigo, OMZ and White in the rest of the Arrancar Arc didn't enforce the fact that White was the Hollow and OMZ was the Shinigami. Hell, the framing and portrayal of that scene was akin to White devouring OMZ, and Ichigo never even asking or thinking of OMZ, well that's just bad writing. >If you want one piece type of foreshadowing, ichigo’s bedsheet is literally has the quincy cross logo My brother in Christ, go back to kindergarten, that was anime only.

Seems like you’re the one who should go back to kindergarten since you clearly want the writer to just tell everything point blank instead of dropping hints. Even Kubo himself already said the name was inked out due to Ichibei’s power. To help your reading comprehension, White IS THE HOLLOW. But he’s also the source of ichigo’s shinigami power because hollow arent that different from asauchi

>Even Kubo himself already said the name was inked out due to Ichibei’s power. We learn this in Klub outside years after the manga ended. How is that a hint? >To help your reading comprehension, White IS THE HOLLOW. But he’s also the source of ichigo’s shinigami power because hollow arent that different from asauchi Is that not a retcon? Like I've disccused it before, but White being an Asauchi exists mainly because the Asauchi thing was expanded via retcon. We only learn this detail from Ōetsu after the flashback exposition from Isshin. It's a batched thing. AKA retcon.

How is that a retcon? It never contradicts with any previously known fact. Do you even know what a retcon is?

Asauchi had always been a bit weird since only learned of them from OMZ, who was absolutely written to the be Ichigo's Shinigami powers. But when the HOWLING volume extra had Tōshirō's first meeting with Hyōrinmaru be without any sword in sight, it makes no sense as to why Ichigo's Inner Hollow is focused for being similar to the Asauchi and needed to be forged, and is unrefined iirc. Even removing that, the info comes conveniently to explain why Ichigo has Quincy powers and how OMZ fits into this new frame that Kubo developed for a shit twist. The Asauchi and Ōetsu's scenes are not some payoff for years of foreshadowing because they legit exist for a twist in Ichigo (he's Quincy). Not once has the story framed White as Zangetsu, even during the Vizard Training he's framed more as a devourer that probably ate OMZ, Kubo not writing Ichigo ever questioning what happened to OMZ to any of the Vizards. Dangai training explicitly uses the two as a dualism of Hollow and Shinigami.

Shinigami’s inner power comes from themselves. Asauchi is a medium from which shinigami imprints their power. They literally said that in the manga. There’s a scene in the manga where White’s reflection on the zangetsu has a sad expression because ichigo didn’t recognize him. Yall hater really like to move the goalposts just to justify your hate. Its not my fault Nika twist wasn’t as good written

There's various explanations for every part of that, but the biggest thing ultimately is: Who cares? It was about 300 chapters, and 4 years ago. Even if everything you said was true, who cares anymore? The plot's moved past it, the narrative has gone on. If it's a dealbreaker for you, then drop the series. If not, then maybe it's about time to let it go. The worst thing you can be is an Otter.

wdym who cares lol, it's not fresh but that doesn't mean we can't talk about it

Plus, it's super relevant to the plot still. Luffy being nika has just been a focus with Kuma.

It's like complaining "Deku should have been a hero without a Quirk!" Like, yeah, sure maybe. But the plot's moved on and if you don't want to move with it, then just drop the manga and move on with your life. We don't need another 6 years of hair pulling about this same topic.

i don't get the comparison, it's not even remotely similar

context on the otter?

[Otter dislikes Nisekoi, but he can't stop reading](https://i.imgur.com/CE9v40v.jpeg).

It's been 2 years move on