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The sheer size ofOne Piecemight rival the amount of characters it has involved within the story. Eiichiro Oda is known for making well-written and fleshed-out characters in terms of personality and backstories. However, where the mangaka has his strengths, he lacks in aesthetics. Oda doesn’t seem to put enough creativity into the looks ofOne Piece’sfemale characters. While the pre-time skip women looked pretty distinct from one another, their post-time skip appearances made them look too similar.
There’s actually a meme behind this phenomenon where Oda has just modelled every woman after Nami, the navigator of the Straw Hats. It’s a same-face syndrome that many animators and mangaka make the mistake of doing. However,One Piecemight be the worst offender of it if you can just edit any woman in orange hair and you get Nami. The worst of Oda’s lack of creativity is also the unrealistic body proportions. How did it come to this?
Style Over Substance: Oda’s Glaring Flaw with Women inOne Piece
Let’s take the most disappointing example of how style over substance ruined the female characters ofOne Piece.Nico Robin’s introduction inOne Piecewas iconic. It’s very rare for an anime character to have tanned skin without having any racist stereotypes attached to them and the archaeologist was one of them. Her sharp features and cowboy-inspired outfits were distinct to her. However, in the post-time skip jump, she lost her tanned skin, her proportions were mismatched and her features were softened. It was a disappointment to see such a unique design become more generic and pandering to unrealistic standards.
“Oda is an egalitarian”: Eiichiro Oda Might Have a Nami Bias Because of His Wife But One Piece Fans Refuse to Believe That He Can Only Draw ‘Scantily Clad’ Women
Now comes the oddest quirk evenOne Piecefans have noticed aboutEiichiro Oda’sdesigns. The same-face syndrome he gives to his female characters modelled on Nami is confusing and strips the other women of their individuality. While their personalities are very different, it gets hard to unsee Nami on every character.
Is it because Nami’s face is easy to repeat? Perhaps so. However, the bizarre body proportions are the most glaring flaw Oda has. To have that big a bust and small of a waist is a guaranteed backache for every woman inOne Piece.The mangaka and Toei Animation certainly do this for fan service and profit off of lonely male anime fans. While the fan service isn’t as bad as the likes ofK-Project,it does promotean unnatural image of what women’s bodiesshould look like.
Are AllOne PieceWomen Really The Same?
It would be good to remember that the female characters ofOne Piecedon’t end at Nami or Robin and sometimes Boa Hancock. There are figures like Charlotte Linlin, or Big Mom, who definitely doesn’t have the proportions or Nami-face problems and yet she’s one of the strongest characters. Moreover, the backstories of all the women are incredible and triumph over their problematic aesthetics.
“The heroine existed just to be rescued”: Eiichiro Oda Created Nami and Robin to Serve a Very Important Purpose in One Piece After Getting Tired of an Overused Trope
While the body proportions are definitely a valid problem with Oda’s illustrations ofOne Piece,it doesn’t diminish theirstrong personalities. However, it’s also disappointing when the male characters get much more diversity in this realm as compared to the women. The women may not be the same at their core but they certainly deserve the physical diversity that the men get.
One Pieceis available on Crunchyroll.
Bidisha Mitra
Articles Published :802
Bidisha is an Anime Content Writer at FandomWire with over 700 published articles. With over 7 years of writing experience, she’s versatile and adept. When she’s not writing, she’s also a voice actor on the side.Bidisha is currently continuing to learn Japanese and gets more fluent everyday. Her expertise is One Piece, Bungo Stray Dogs, and Haikyuu, but has been watching anime for over a decade. She was previously a Content Writer reviewing the latest Kpop music.
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Eiichiro OdaNamiNico RobinOne Piece
