 There's always been a lot of general discussion amongst the One Piece fan base regarding what makes an Emperor of the Sea. Is it personal power? Is it the amount of territory controlled? Is it public perception? Well, to be perfectly frank with all of you, it's much more petty than all of that because in reality it is decided by the number of subscribers that each of these individuals have on their own YouTube channels. So I would implore you to help make this channel an Emperor of the Sea by hitting that gorgeous red button which will also result in regular One Piece content being uploaded straight into your YouTube feeds. When an individual with overwhelming power threatens you, then the future is set in stone. They're the four greatest pirates in the world and they rule their lands with nothing less than an iron grip. This is true power and that is the meaning of the Four Emperors. Hello and welcome to One Piece 101, the series that breaks down everyone and everything within the One Piece world. And today we're going to be getting into an updated video featuring the undisputed most powerful faction within the entire series, the Four Emperors. The Four Emperors also known as the Yonko are a collective of pirates who reign over the section of sea known as the New World, which is the second half of the Grand Line and the most volatile area on the planet. And something I should say right from the get go is despite the fact that the Four Emperors are referred to as a group, these pirates and their crews all operate as individual parties. Meaning that each of the Emperors also see each other as a rival, which is a key idea at play in regards to the world maintaining a sense of balance rather than being plunged into pure anarchy. And as such these individuals are all immensely powerful in their own right, however becoming an emperor of the sea is about so much more than just raw solo ability and it has to do with building up a grand force and intelligence network capable of rivaling that of even the world government. And to put that sort of force into immediate context, quite possibly the greatest fear of the world government is the idea of two of the four emperors forming an alliance because such an existence would immediately usurp them as the most powerful faction within the One Piece world. But who are these fearsome emperors you ask? More over the course of one piece there have been a few changes to their makeup here and there, but when they were first introduced to us they consisted of the following. Edward Newgate, better known as Whitebeard and of course captain of the Whitebeard Pirates, a crew which consisted of a mighty 16 divisions, each of which were a terrifying fighting force of their own, and the combination of which totaled 1617 people. But in addition to that, there are at least 43 other allied pirate crews that do not officially come under the banner of the Whitebeard Pirates, however they may as well be considered as such, and very importantly Whitebeard was the user of the Gorogorinomi, the most destructive Paramecia type fruit ever showcased, and he himself held the title of the world's strongest man, which makes a lot of sense as he was a key rival to the former pirate King Goldie Roger and he presents a very strong start to the four emperors. Next up is Charlotte Linlin aka Big Mom who is captain of the Big Mom Pirates, an absurdly large crew, helmed by three to four sweet commanders, depending on what time frame you're talking about, and sub-commanded by at least 70 other of Big Mom's 85 children. Yeah, you heard that correctly, 85 children. So you could say the Big Mom quite literally gave birth to her own pirate crew, but just as with Whitebeard, there are a wide slew of allied crews and individuals under the banner of Big Mom. As for Linlin herself, she is one of the most formidable combatants to have ever existed in this world, capable of killing giants at the tender age of five years old, and nigh on invincible in the modern day. In addition to this, she is also the user of the Sorusorinomi, the Paramecia type fruit that allows her to quite literally manipulate souls of others, as well as herself actually. Now for our third emperor, we have Hundred Beast Kaido, the Governor-General of the Beast Pirates, which are overseen primarily by a team of three all-stars, being King, Queen and Jack. Each of whom have been shown to be exceptionally powerful figures in their own right, but the Beast Pirates have also been said to have at least 20,000 crew members, 500 of which are artificial devil fruit users, and furthermore this crew has also officially incorporated at least three members of the worst generation, being Basil Hawkins, Scratchmanapoo and Diaz Drake. And Kaido himself brings prestige equal to that of his contemporaries, being known as the world's strongest creature, and he may quite literally be unkillable, as demonstrated by his suicide hobby, which involves Kaido finding new and creative ways to attempt to end his life, one of which was jumping off a sky island and landing 10,000 meters onto the hard, hard ground below, the result of which was a mild headache. Oh and he can also become a super massive overpowered dragon, so he's a bit of a big deal. And finally for our set of originals, we have the delightful Red-Head Shanks, who you may remember as the man who inspired our protagonist Monkey D. Luffy to become a pirate in the first place. Although despite his rich history of all of the emperors, Shanks's faction is the one we know least about. I mean yes, we know he does command the Red-Head Pirates, which contains its own abundance of world-renowned names like Ben Beckman, Yasopp and Lucky Roo. It is highly likely that Shanks' forces are much more expansive than just his own core band of Red-Head Pirates, because it has been shown in the manga that this force does hold territories of their own in the world, just as with the other emperors. And as for Shanks, this is a big statement, but he is quite possibly the most impressive of the emperors we've explored thus far. I mean, he was a former member of the Roger Pirates, a sparring partner to the world's greatest swordsmen, and when he showed up at Marineford to say that the paramount war was over, you'd better believe that that war ended right then and there. Now for the most part these characters and their associated groups try to steer clear from one another, because generally there is no real advantage to engaging in combat, with a force equal to or perhaps even greater than that of your own. The end result would be leaving both parties in an incredibly weak state and easily engulfed by the remaining powers, potentially even including that of the world government. However, that is not to say that the four emperors will not take action against each other if necessary, and in fact, for pretty much the entire fabric of one piece as we know it, the greater politics of the emperors has been an ongoing meta-narrative that has informed and shaped the world. And for the pre-timeski para, that narrative focused on two particular emperors being Whitebeard and Shanks. But this great story was actually catalyzed by a then much smaller known figure who had become known as Blackbeard. And essentially, he is a lurking danger in the one piece world, one that Shanks was very very wary of, and when Teach murdered a member of the Whitebeard pirates, Shanks went out of his way to meet Whitebeard and warn him against the pursuit of Blackbeard, which was being conducted by 2nd Division Commander, Podcaste Ace. And this was the first time in the series that we had seen two of the four emperors meet face to face, and it showed exactly how volatile such an encounter could be, even a seemingly friendly and reasonable one which ended with Whitebeard and Shanks clashing and producing a phenomenon whereby the very sky above them was split open. In any case, by this point, a chain of events had been set into motion that would not be stopped, as Blackbeard defeated Ace and handed him over to the world government, which prompted Whitebeard to launch an all-round attack on Marineford in order to save him. And at the time of this recording, this remains the largest conflict ever showcased in One Piece, and quite possibly Manga in general, which saw the full force of the Marines, as well as the remaining Seven Wallops of the Sea, gathered together to combat one of the four emperors. And despite a hard fought battle which would result in the death of not only Ace, but the Emperor Whitebeard himself, who was ultimately killed by a very sneaky last-minute Blackbeard, before the war was put to an abrupt halt by Shanks and the Red Hair Pirates, making an appearance. But Whitebeard's death would go on to have a profound impact on the world as it left a gigantic power vacuum, showing just how important the balance of the four emperors had been in maintaining a sense of order. And this vacuum would need to be filled immediately, which brings us to the character who would take Whitebeard's place as one of the four emperors, being of course Blackbeard. Now just to break him down a bit, Blackbeard is now an incredible force in the world who post-time skip commands a mighty armada with his 10 titanic captains, as well as being known as the first character in the series to hold two devil fruit abilities, those being the Yami Yami Nomi and the Gura Gura Nomi, which he acquired in an event that I can only describe as somehow from the corpse of Whitebeard. And most notably, Blackbeard was also able to consolidate his position as one of the four emperors through the Payback War, whereby his legion faced off against the remnants of the Whitebeard Pirates, led by their first Division Commander Marco. And after convincingly defeating them, Blackbeard acquired a large amount of Whitebeard's former territory as a result. So cool, we now have some form of balance again with our new set of emperors. That status quo would not last too long in the grand scheme of things though, thanks to a certain straw-hat-clad boy who following the events of the Hulkic Island arc would be awarded a bounty of 1.5 billion berries, as well as the title of the fifth Emperor of the Sea. Now to be completely fair to the naysayers for a second, this title was not a completely natural development and it was something that was effectively bestowed upon Luffy by Big News Morgans, who was the owner of the largest newspaper chain in the One Piece world. However at the same time, regardless of how it came about, Luffy is indeed the fifth Emperor of this world, despite what anyone will try to say, be that, well Luffy is actually not strong enough to be an Emperor, or no, Luffy is actually an unofficial Emperor. Because both of those statements are completely false and I don't want to go too deeply into it, because I have made an entire video on this topic, but strength is not the primary factor in determining an Emperor. It has much more to do with their influence on the world and there is also no such thing as an official Emperor title, because it is not granted by any organization. It's not like becoming a wall of the sea where some world government power has the jurisdiction to make that decision, and in fact all one really needs to do to gain the Emperor title is to have that be the prevailing public opinion. It doesn't matter what the world government thinks or what the other emperors think, all that matters is public perception. And to be frank again this didn't exactly come out of nowhere, because Luffy is currently the only man in the world to have let an attack on all three primary world government institutions, and he has also defeated three of the wall of the sea, as well as made allies or acquaintances of six, one of which has become his direct subordinate, and furthermore Luffy serves as the figurehead of the Straw Hat Grand Fleet, which comprises over 5,000 members, of four significantly larger than that of the former Whitebeard pirates and their Allied crews combined. And this is naming a minuscule amount of the impact that Luffy has had in this world, but just in case there was any doubt remaining in people's minds, it has literally been stated in the manga by the narrator, so no, it was not quoting the newspaper article, it was just a blatant statement that Luffy is now considered the Fifth Emperor. And I'm sorry for going on that tangent, but I always get a barrage of upset comments whenever I commit the heinous act of calling Luffy the Fifth Emperor. In any case, our Emperor action does not end here, because the New World Era, just as with the pre-time skip era, has chosen to focus on two of our former emperors, in this case being Big Mom and Kaido, with every major post-time skip arc having some sort of connective tissue to one of, if not both of them. And that has brought us to the land of Wano, the base of the Beast Pirates commanded by Kaido, whom Luffy and his Allied forces plan on taking down right here and now. But alas, this is where we need to throw up a bit of the old spoiler warning for the events of late Act 2 of Wano, as well as the intermission between Acts 2 and 3. And this is a much more serious warning than usual, because what I'm about to delve into is big, big stuff, and if you're an anime-only watcher who does not want to be spoiled, then please do skip to this time. However, for everyone else, here we go. As time went on, it became apparent that Wano will not be Kaido-centric alone, as Big Mom also appeared on the island, seeking revenge against Luffy for his actions on Hawkeek Island. And after some amnesia-related shenaniganry, Big Mom would then come face-to-face with Kaido, a meeting that would mirror that of shanks and whitebeard, with the two immediately starting a fight and performing the same sky-splitting phenomenon that we had previously seen in the series. And while it wasn't shown to us, these two would continue their fight throughout the night, although ultimately they came to an agreement to form an alliance, thus bringing all of the world government's worst fears into a cold, hard reality. With that one decision instantly forming the most formidable power that this world has ever seen. However, the marines are currently left in a bit of an awkward position, as they have started their own crusade against the now abolished wallets of the sea. However, they are taking the threat with the utmost caution, leading to the revelation of the bounties of all of the emperors, including whitebeard, with blackbeard sitting at over 2 billion berries, which we already knew. However, Big Mom, Kaido, and shanks were revealed to be worth over 4 billion berries, whilst whitebeard himself once commanded a mighty number of over 5 billion. Some more fun facts about the four, I mean 5 emperors. In one of the ace novels, the original four emperors were stated to each have a particular condition under which they were most fearsome, with shanks as being when he was enraged, whitebeard when someone performs a dishonorable or inhumane action, Big Mom when she is in a bad mood, and Kaido is rather simply perpetually terrifying. Of every emperor, including Luffy actually, right now blackbeard is the only one who has not been confirmed as a user of conquerous haki, which is another nice unique feature in his unkempt cap. And finally, a truly useless fact, of every character who has held the title of emperor in the series, Kaido is currently the only one never to have worn a trademark hat. And that pretty much does it for the five emperors. But what do you guys think? Please do leave your thoughts in the comments below or even join my Discord server. And if you'd like to see more videos like this then please do check out some of my other content or even subscribe to the channel for more glorious one piece business uploaded straight into YouTube feeds. But for now, this has been the Grand Line Review and I'll see you next time.