did you know most one piece story lines begin with this Trio as Oda has stated Luffy Zoro and Nami are the main components of one piece and so this Central Trio is what the story always goes back to at the onset of any major Saga be that East blue the Baro work Saga The skypia Saga any Lobby and so on even as the cast grows larger and larger these three characters Remain the central core of the narrative that Oda always falls back on to launch the drama of any significant Arc and this is a pattern
that we're seeing yet again here in elath thereby signifying the dawn of yet another of one piece's most important story arcs but why is this what is it about this Trio that makes them so fundamental to how Oda writes one piece well really it's because these two characters in particular Zoro and Nami are essential to framing the character journey of one piece's protagonist Luffy in a way that no other characters can ultimately while all the straw hats matter and certainly some matter more than others none are more important than Zoro and Nami as these are
the two foils to Luffy the pirate king the king's right hand and the King's guide as well as the two representations of Luffy's contrasting values as Captain strength and heart see Luffy as a character fundamentally does not work without these two specific complimentary pieces which is why this Trio can be considered the sacred Trio of One Piece it is this Dynamic that makes the whole story work but before we get into it make sure to subscribe and if you want to eat really good food every day without ever having to to cook or get takeout
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initial visions of the series he always conceived of these three characters first and foremost Luffy is a given but every version of romance Dawn that Oda wrote also featured a Nami analog character as Luffy's companion piece and even before Roman Dawn in oda's earlier one-hot monsters we see an early prototype of Zoro that Oda already had in mind ryuma the samurai while a lot of the other crew Concepts seem to have taken shape and solidified later in the story it's clear that Luffy Zoro and Nami were the protagonists that Oda conceived and incorporated into his
one shots much earlier it's no surprise that Oda considers them to be the main components of One Piece as he essentially built the series with these three protagonists in mind first now as the crew in general cast of One Piece expanded over the years Oda has toned down the emphasis on these three to make sure the straw hats as a whole feel like the main characters in particular you could say that the East Blue 5 with Sanji and Usopp included are overall the most prominent straw hats but the subtle emphasis on this Trio has always
persisted and is interestingly reflected even among fans with Luffy Zoro and Nami being the most popular characters in the story and even with the addition of so many more characters one thing that has not changed even 1100 chapters in is how Oda tends to begin the drama of major storylines specifically with Luffy Zoro and Nami let's quickly look back through the decades the East blue Saga obviously begins with these three as the origin of the straw hat crew and the first iconic color spread of the straw hats is of course this Trio when the grand
line Begins the first St that really launches the major Saga to defeat crocodile and Baroque works is whiskey Peak even though we now have additional crew members at this point Oda leaves them asleep out of the action for the night to once again Center The Narrative around Luffy Zoro and Nami they are the ones ones that learn of the plot surrounding Alabaster Kingdom who make the deal with Viv and who resolve to begin the journey to take on crocodile and Baroque works the drama of The Saga launches with them in the sky Pia Saga yet
again we see just Luffy Zoro Nami specifically separated from the rest of the group as everyone else is Left Behind on the ship while just this Trio disembark on Gia and experience this pivotal sequence of events that establish the drama of the Ark the themes of The Saga and the most important ongoing Conflict for the rest of the story in water 7 The Arc Act begins with the whole crew fractured with Robin leaving Usopp leaving and Sanji going on a solo Mission leaving the trio of Luffy Zoro and Nami yet again as the central focus
of the drama the rest of the water 7 Arc is the most extended segment of their dynamic in the story with Luffy zoron Nami having to work together through high stakes decision after high stakes decision what are they going to decide to do about Robin what are they going to decide to do once they learn the truth and what is going to be the future of the crew technically Chopper is also present for this segment of the story line but he is written as basically a prop in the background while you can read that all
the actual dialogue and deliberation throughout the segment of the story is between Luffy Zoro and Nami and of course the pivotal moments for deciding the future of the crew are centered around the trio now in post times Skip One Piece we began to see this Dynamic a little less prominently largely because the dynamic's core strength is when it comes to launching story lines with drama and the reality is that we didn't really get as many intra crew dramatic deliberations and conflicts for many hundreds of chapters in the New World that is until we got to
zo and finally again we get a genuinely dramatic storyline with Sanji having left the crew in the middle of the straw Hat's journey to taking down the Yon COC kaido and so yet again the drama to launch the versus for Emperor Saga Begins With Luffy Zoro and Nami debating how to approach this conflict with two Emperors this Saga is a Revival of the dynamic with hul Island's First Act being an exclusive Luffy Nami adventure and wano's First Act being an exclusive Luffy Zoro adventure and finally here we are in the final Saga with all signs
pointing to the final war being set to begin here in the albf arc and all signs pointing to this Arc being more straw headcentric than any new world Arc before and so fittingly we are back again with the classic starting point for any juicy drama Luffy Zoro and Nami note that even if Luffy Zoro and Nami themselves aren't going to be the most important straw hats in this Arc that's not the point the point is again that this is just odas core Dynamic for launching the drama of any major narrative now the fact that this
Trio is being brought together again again has huge implications for the albath arc but we will get to that shortly first we need to answer the question why is this why is this Trio so important to the story does Oda just like Zoro and Nami a lot and so he pairs them with Luffy frequently no this is writing 101 Zoro and Nami are of course fantastic independent characters but they were crafted first and foremost specifically to be the perfectly fitting counterparts to the protagonist Luffy these are two absolutely necessary partners for the hero of the
story as they are designed to play to Luffy's character needs who is Luffy and what is his journey Luffy is a boy on a journey to becoming pirate king he is a hero who is extremely bold driven strong willed and ambitious someone with the disposition of a king Luffy is written in a grand manner he has a fundamentally different approach to the world to challenges to how he sees reality than most everyone else even other members of his crew do not understand him in many ways as Luffy is simply written to be a larger than
life character in a way that the rest of them are not but you do need at least one you do need someone in Luffy's crew who can truly understand this side of him who can think like him who can walk a genuinely similar path to him and come to the same conclusions that Luffy comes to in certain key situations this is why Luffy needs a Zoro otherwise outside of when Luffy is having fun and goofing around he would simply be too fundamentally different from the rest of his crew you need someone who is written in
a similar Larger than Life manner to him who similarly embodies the ideals of extreme Drive ambition and strength of will the one companion who can truly be on the same wavelength as Luffy when it comes to their fundamental perspective on the world and the path that must be walked to reach the top only a king can truly understand a king and so only Zoro can play to this side of Luffy in a way that no one else can that's why Zoro was Luffy's first companion however on the total opposite end of the spectrum you have
Nami if Luffy and Zora are often portrayed as Mythic Larger than Life figures Nami is by far the most grounded realistic and pragmatic of the crew and this is because if you have a hero with such Transcendent ambition who approaches the world with a level of abandon and daring necessary to becoming King while having a second character feed into that is great but at the same time you now also need someone to balance that energy out as this is simply too romantic and Reckless of a way to live on its own dreams and ambition must
be tempered with practicality and realism in order to actually achieve them if Luffy is surging towards the top and Zoro is pushing right at his side to get him there then you also now need to actually solve the how do we make this happen Luffy would go nowhere without a proper guide which is why Nami is the Navigator both literally and symbolically she is the necessary polar opposite to Luffy in that she actually thinks things through she can actually Point his dreams in the right direction she prevents him from going off the rails she is
the one who constantly has to talk sense into him who has to provide a voice of reason to bring him to Earth from his overflowing imagination Nami is all on board to make Luffy's dreams come to life but she knows that she needs to be the actual brains to rein him in and help him follow the logical route to get what he wants and not get them all killed in the process interestingly what most people miss about zoro's gag of having no sense of direction is that it's symbolic he is the opposite of Nami in
every sense zoro's worst skill is nami's best skill just as nami's worst skill is zoro's best skill because they both provide the exact opposite value for Luffy in his journey essentially for a hero who is a grand dreaming King you need these two characters on either side one who thinks much as he does and can actually exist on the same wavelength as him and one who thinks the opposite of how he does and can actually ground his thinking to provide the logic and rationale that he lacks one amplifies who he is one provides what he
is missing this is the perfect pair of compliments for the hero this is especially why in the early moments of the series when it was just this Trio we saw this dynamic perfectly distilled and developed in East blue see while Kobe was a nice temporary initial starting companion his timidity cowardice and pragmatism also represented what Luffy was currently missing to get the journey actually started Luffy needed someone who could actually think like him act like him and understand him someone who would genuinely want to charge out into the grand line to Take On The World
Together that is where an Adventure Starts it starts when Luffy leaves Kobe behind and gets a companion like Zoro that's why Luffy and Zoro are just so absurdly in sync throughout all of East blue and at the same time it's why when Nami was then added to the trio she initially stuck out as being so totally different from these two every Instinct she had was the complete opposite of what they had but guess what at the end of the day that was also what was now needed someone to fill the gaps that they had they
were Fighters she was a navigator they had the spirit she had the logic once we had these three they were essentially Unstoppable and the straw hat crew could begin from there Oda could go about adding all the other complimentary pieces as I expand upon in this video but these first two complete what Luffy needs right off the bat to begin telling his journey of becoming pirate king and we can see this Dynamic at its core in so many of one piece's best story lines one of the best arcs that encapsulates this is water 7 where
it's Luffy and Zoro fighting side by side throughout the ark Zoro is the right hand for Luffy all throughout standing shoulder-to-shoulder with him against Luchi against the aqual luga and throughout the sea train battles but at the same time Nami is the one who takes care of what these two lack when they fight blindly and fall she is the one who learns the truth and organizes the search party the rescue mission and who points them in the direction that they now have to go any slobby and she's even the one who prepares them with a
stockpile of food and drink to get their strength back to fight this scene of Luffy and Zoro the captain and his right hand stuck and defeated completely lost as to what to do next with nami then finding them explaining what needs to be done and putting them back on course as they explode back into action rejuvenated and ready to fight again thanks to her is just peak one piece writing because it's the core Dynamic at the heart of the story in a nutshell it features Luffy our hero Rising back up from the dead thanks to
the guidance of his Navigator and with the support of his right hand at his back but first we have the most beautiful travel posters we've ever made for you all this January this month you can get a fantastic watercolor imagining of Fishman Island as well as sabot archipelago weria and elath Village from the Sun realm the posters are printed on matte paper hand cut by the artist himself and you can get all four together for 50% off each poster you can also still get the deluxe package if you want to appear on my streams and
in that case you can choose any poster from 2024 as well so if you want fisherman island sabot with area and elath Village for your walls just hit the link in the description below all posters from 2024 will also be available in the complete original set bundle but here's what I especially love about this trios Dynamic where it's really at its strongest is how it plays into not just Luffy's journey to becoming pirate king but in his burden as a captain which is a subtle but significant difference Luffy's best character writing is always when he
has to actually act as the captain of the straw hat Pirates these are the moments when the journey stops being a fun adventure and actually turns into a serious character-driven conflict and so when Luffy actually has to play Captain and make crucial decisions Zoro and Nami are also Luffy's fundamental compliments and exact contrast to one another but interestingly in these scenarios they actually play very different roles than before in these scenarios Zoro represents strength whereas Nami represents heart what do I mean by that well while Luffy and Zoro are often on the same wavelength due
to having transcendental Wills Ambitions and generally being written as kings Zoro is fundamentally different to Luffy in that he's not this widey dreamer like Luffy he's a lot harsher and more stoic similarly while Nami is much more grounded realistic and pragmatic than Luffy often bringing down his romantic visions and bringing logic to the equation as his guide she is not a hardass cold character at her core she is very soft loving and kind-hearted and so when it comes to decision-making as a captain for Luffy these are the two voices that are in his ear the
harsher voice that represents the strength that a captain must uphold and the softer voice that speaks to Luffy's heart I also find that this dichotomy is what makes Zoro and Nami very multi-dimensional characters as their meant to represents something very different for Luffy depending on the context when it comes to the journey to pirate king Zoro can be very Carefree romantic and illogical like Luffy whereas Nami is the voice of reason logic and Direction but when it comes to Luffy's duties as a captain Zoro is often the harsh logical voice that speaks cold truths while
Nami appeals to emotion empathy and kindheartedness note I think a lot of people incorrectly believe that Zoro is always written to give Luffy the correct advice on how to act as a captain but that's fundamentally not true and would require completely ignoring the entire point that the captain's decision making requires Nuance while zoro's moments tend to make for particularly memorable scenes because they are badass readers tend to forget that he's only supposed to represent one side of the coin a side that is only correct about 50% of the time for example in the Usopp situation
it was of course Zoro and Nami at odds throughout the conflict with nami representing the soft side of forgiving Usopp and moving on and Zoro maintaining that Luffy must show strength and be firm as a captain this was what they both argued during the initial falling out and this is also why the final debate on whether or not Usopp should come back was entirely centered around these two Zoro and Nami as the two opposing voices in Luffy's ear with contrasting ideologies and yes in this situation Zoro was portrayed as correct however at the same time
you can look at the other situation in this Arc which was Robin again reread the debate regarding Robin where you have Luffy unsure of what to do Zoro arguing that they must prepare for betrayal and Nami continuing to believe in Robin while Zoro was right that they need to be careful ultimately the one whose faith is rewarded was Nami and that's why the entire sequence that follows features Nami as the heart of the crew realigning them all together telling Luffy that it's time for him to fight for the straw hats similarly you have the Sanji
situation Post Time skip Zoro harshly lays out the reality of the difficulty of pursuing Sanji and why Luffy should take the tough approach of letting Sanji go and instead focus on their goals while Nami angrily maintains that the Humane thing to do would be to pursue Sanji yet again this argument is settled between the trio of only these three characters despite the rest of the crew being present because Oda is very very consistent with what the golden Trio represents Zoro and are the two contrasting voices that Luffy needs to hear in these situations but in
this case Luffy actually sides with nami despite zoro's protest Luffy chooses the empathetic approach and this is ultimately communicated as being the correct route in this scenario valuing one's crewmates is What mattered more in the grand scheme of things so yes while Zoro is badass it is a very very flawed interpretation to conclude that just because Zoro sometimes correctly pushes Luffy to be tough that Oda is saying that Zoro is always correct to push Luffy to be tough I've even seen some people argue that zoro's comments that Luffy shouldn't feel emotions over Vega Punk's death
because Luffy's a Yono now are deserved which is comical considering that's the exact opposite of the message an actual yongo communicated to us I really don't know where the a yonos don't cry rule was ever written in the story thinking this claim makes any sense is only possible if you genuinely believe that literally everything Zoro says is supposed to be correct meaning you've misunderstood the character and have also missed so so much of the messaging of the story and you're ignoring zoro's own actions and reactions ultimately Luffy is the captain of the ship precisely because
he is a balanced leader he can be both strong and soft-hearted when necessary sometimes he needs a voice in his ear to nudge him in the right direction and that's why Zoro and Nami serve to Center him and ultimately give him the right balance but neither of them are ever supposed to be portrayed as always correct sometimes it's one sometimes it's the other and finally that brings us to elath so as you may have noticed we had a large section of the story post times skip where Oda didn't really rely on the Luffy zoron Nami
Dynamic and guess what this whole chunk of the story also had remarkably weak writing for the straw hats and really no character progression for Luffy that's not a coincidence this Dynamic is perfect for launching strong dramatic storylines that are character Centric and particularly when it comes to Luffy's decisions and his character Journey but there is something soft that's been happening so far in elb a promising sign for the future the straw hats are all slowly one by one getting actual story setups Robin with Saul and the remnants of Ohara Frankie with the adom tree Usopp
with his dream and now finally to top it all off we are once again getting the golden Trio Luffy Zoro and Nami all together this is the ultimate green flag for another dramatic character Centric storyline to kick off this Arc one that actually focuses on progressing Luffy's character journey and gives us another genuinely emotionally compelling storyline for the straw hat crew anytime in the story that we see these three together you know that peak writing is around the corner so let me know what you're looking forward to with Luffy zoron Nami and elbaff in the
comments below and if you enjoyed this video then definitely like And subscribe and you can get my extended thoughts on what I believe the story lines for Luffy Zoro and Nami will be in the elbaf arc on my weekly podcast by becoming a member or supporting me on patreon link in the description below h
