1/4/2024 0 Comments Oda mangakaAsking Luffy for help is a moment of genuine character growth for a woman who has been forced to see everyone but herself as a mark. She’s had to go it alone for years, and can’t trust anyone on her path of freeing herself from a tyrant. Nami spends the first several arcs backstabbing and double-crossing Luffy & Co. Nami’s backstory, as played out at Arlong Park, is one of the most emotionally affecting parts of the East Blue Saga. The thing is, though, Oda is a good enough writer that he complicates any simple reading of Nami as a sexist caricature. It feels like many female villains are only created to give Nami something to do during climactic battles. While these battles may be compelling narrative, in One Piece they’re not treated as serious battles compared to the “real” fights, which are Luffy or Zoro or Sanji fighting against the big bad of the arc. Women versus women is a trope in long running shounen of this era – watch Naruto and count how many times a woman beats a man head-on. When Nami’s engagements in combat don’t end in defeat, it’s usually because she’s fighting against other women. Nami has her baton, but she uses it rarely and usually in last-ditch scenarios that end in defeat. While Chopper may primarily be a physician (and reindeer), he can still turn into a bulked-up version of himself in a pinch. Usopp may run at the first hint of a fight, but his skills lie in long-range combat as a sniper. While Nami’s not the only member of the Straw Hats whose primary abilities aren’t physical combat, compare her company. Robin also fits this stereotype–she’s just better at it. Nami is also a money-grubbing thief, a role that paints the only major female character before Robin’s introduction as a duplicitous femme fatale in blue and white stripes instead of slinky dresses. Her role is that of the navigator, which occupies a tremendously important position however, her combat abilities lag far behind the others’ from the very beginning. This is most clearly seen in Nami, the first (and for years, the only) female member of Luffy’s crew, the Straw Hats. It’s unnecessary-he is, after all, creating a fantasy universe where a boy made of rubber fights bad guys, so why should he need to justify female characters existing-but shows that Oda’s done his research and believes female pirates belong in his universe. Oda is citing his sources and giving reasons why women belong in the One Piece world. By the way, my character Alvida was based on a female pirate named Awilda (or Alvida) who formed a pirate crew comprised entirely of women. There were two woman pirates, Mary Read and Anne Bonny, who were said to have fought more bravely than any man. But it was considered bad luck to bring a woman on board a ship in those days, and so many of them disguised themselves as men. As the series went on, however, he began punishing female fans demanding better representation by diminishing women’s roles.Įxamples of his attitude near the beginning of One Piece’s run are present in the SBS, the long-running Q&A section featured in most One Piece volumes featuring Oda’s often unfiltered sentiments. While no character design in One Piece can truly be called “realistic,” its women were complex people with believable proportions. In the beginning, Oda’s women are positive, if flawed, examples of female characters. Oda’s relationship to gender isn’t static, and his early work in One Piece is quite different from what he’s producing now.
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