 Hello and welcome to the Grand Line review or source for everything One Piece and more specifically welcome to One Piece 101, the series that breaks down everyone and everything in the One Piece world. And today we are moving on to the iconic green-haired three-sworded demonic powerhouse of the Straw Hat Pirates, Roa Noa Zoro. Roa Noa Zoro is a stoic outwardly cold yet profoundly driven personality who was first introduced all the way back in chapter three as part of the romance Dorn Ark. Zoro is the swordsman of the Straw Hat Pirates and quite notably one of the more quiet members of our protagonistic band. And really he spends a fair chunk of time in the series doing one of two things, either training or sleeping. Actually, one more thing, drinking. Zoro loves himself a good old drink and in that respect he serves as a very classic alcoholic pirate. So classic that one day he got wildly intoxicated and found himself pressing the subscribe button for the Grand Line review, which I must say was a fantastic move, granting Zoro regular One Piece content uploaded straight into his YouTube V. Something which you, dear listener, could do right now completely sober and still receive the same wondrous effect. Go on, treat yourself. However, when Zoro does kick into gear, he makes his presence well and truly known in a grand and sometimes rather terrifying way, positioning himself as an unwavering warrior, full of untapped and, for all intents and purposes, infinite potential. He's very similar to his Captain Luffy in that regard, which makes a lot of sense because both of these figures have a singular goal to achieve that drives the very core of their being. And in Zoro's case, his ultimate dream is to become the world's greatest swordsman. And if you're not familiar with One Piece, that might seem a bit arbitrary and kind of standard shonen, but Zoro has a pretty profound force pushing him towards his title, which to flesh out, we need to travel back in time to a quaint little location in East Blue known as Shemotsuki Village. Now currently, we have no idea how Zoro ended up here as a child. The anime, though, rather notably did add to his backstory, making Zoro a bit of a rogue agent who had a hobby of making his way around somehow and defeating powerful dojos in order to claim their signs. This is not canon, though, and the earliest known information we have regarding Zoro is that he was already studying at the Ishin Dojo. Even as a child, Zoro had already achieved an exceptional level of power and skill, and he was touted by his fellow students as being the strongest member of the dojo, even when compared to the adults. And that may very well be true. It is entirely possible that Zoro was the strongest of the students, however, he was far from the most skilled. That title would belong to Kuina, the daughter of the dojo master Koshiro. And we're not talking a minimal difference in skill here either. Kuina was on a completely different level to Zoro. In fact, in their 2,000 matches together, Zoro was never once able to defeat her. But being the ever relentless existence he is, Zoro would challenge Kuina to yet another match, this time using real swords. Not that it would turn out any differently, though, with Kuina rather swiftly achieving her 2001st victory against a young Zoro. After this, though, the two kids would have something of a heart to heart where Kuina revealed her dream to become the world's greatest swordsman, as well as her frustration at the fact that it would never happen because she was a girl, or at least that's what her father had told her. Meanwhile, Zoro are far from prepared to accept such reasoning, encourage Kuina, and the two made a promise that someday, one of them would become the world's greatest swordsman. And of course, this would be where a sudden tragedy would occur, as the very next day after this promise was made, Kuina would pass away after accidentally falling down some stairs. And I honestly don't know how to say that without making it funny ever, because it is one of the strangest and most questionable events that has ever occurred in one piece. Personally, I still don't buy it, but whatever the case, Kuina's departure from this world would only leave Zoro to fulfill their promise. And as such, Zoro asked the dojo master if he could take Kuina's blade, the Wadawichi Monji, and use it to achieve their shared dream. And very interestingly, this would mark a big change for Zoro. As up until now, he had been a practitioner of Nitoriu, also known as two-sword style. And in fact, he was even known as two-sword Zoro by the other students. However, after inheriting the Wadawichi Monji, Zoro would innovate his own form known as San Toriu or three-sword style. And after reaching a certain age, Zoro equipped with three swords and his formidable, yet unpredictable skill would embark on his journey to become the world's greatest swordsman. However, there were some problems with this. One major problem in particular being that Zoro's greatest flaw is that he has no internal compass or sense of direction whatsoever. And as such, he very quickly became lost in East Blue and accidentally fell into the career of bounty hunting in order to pay for his very existence. An occupation that he was very well suited to, mind you, and he became a very infamous name of East Blue, very quickly even being given his current epithet of pirate hunter Zoro. And he actually became so well known that Zoro caught the attention of Baroque works at a very early stage and was even invited to join their ranks. Although Zoro refused to do so unless he became their boss and proceeded to kill the agent who approached him because sometimes one piece can be kind of dark like that. And speaking of more killing, Zoro would eventually find himself in Shelstown where he killed a wolf after it attacked a young girl named Rika. Unfortunately, this wolf just so happened to be the pet of a pompous prick. And even more unfortunately, said prick, happened to be the pet, I mean son, of a marine captain in charge of the island. And as punishment for this Zoro would be tied to a bit of wood for a month which would lead to an encounter that would forever change his life, where on the ninth day of Zoro's punishment, he would be approached by one monkey D. Luffy who was looking for individuals to become part of his pirate crew. An offer that Zoro obviously refused at first being a well-known pirate hunter and all. However, when it became clear that the Marines had no intention of releasing Zoro, instead rather sneakily planning to execute him, Luffy struck a bargain, returning Zoro's swords in exchange for him becoming the first member of the Straw Hat Pirates. And together this fearsome duo would defeat the Marines of Shelstown as well as their corrupt captain, thus beginning one of the most powerful partnerships this world has ever known. And despite being so outwardly different, Luffy and Zoro are scarily identical in many ways. Quite specifically in that neither one of them tends to favor conventional logic or sometimes even logic at all. And due to this, they have a sort of compound effect on one another, continuously pushing the other to be stronger and more ambitious, leaving nothing short of complete chaos wherever the two set foot. But you know something we have not discussed yet is Zoro's dream itself. How exactly does one become the world's greatest swordsman? Well, it's surprisingly simple. All you really need to do is defeat the currently accepted world's greatest swordsman, and so it's much more straightforward than most dreams in the series. But that would make Zoro's target a man by the name of Dracul Mihawk and Zoro would receive an unprecedented opportunity to achieve his dream very, very early on in the series during the Baratier Arc. When Mihawk made his presence known, Zoro challenged him immediately, although what followed was less of a fight and more of a complete and utter slaughter. Quite similarly to his bouts against Queener, Zoro was outclassed by several orders of magnitude, unable to even push Mihawk into using his primary weapon. With that said, Zoro did manage to impress Mr. Mihawk during their battle by displaying the core honor and tenets of a swordsman. As such, Mihawk then issued Zoro a challenge to become stronger and stated that he would be waiting for Zoro at the top, at which point Zoro tearfully renewed his desire and vowed never to lose again. And his achievements since that day very much back the statement up. Going forward with the straw hat pirate, Zoro demonstrated nothing less than a primal drive to be the best, dispatching any opponent who dared stand in his path. And to this day, one of the best examples of this determination would occur during the Alabaster Arc, where Zoro was matched against Star's Bones, a man whose devil fruitability allowed him to turn his body into steel blades, which made it impossible for Zoro to cut him. And despite inflicting no damage whatsoever for 99% of the fight, Zoro kept striving forward as his body was cut, sliced, drilled. Whatever, you name it, Zoro suffered it. This was certainly not a pleasant encounter for the swordsman. However, at the very apex of the bout, Zoro on the verge of unconsciousness finally heard what he was looking for. The fabled breath of all things that his sensei had once told him about. And in this moment of, I guess, what we could describe as enlightenment, Zoro had a newfound mastery of the world. And amongst other things was able to quite literally hear the breath of the steely body of Das Bones, using this sensation to end the fight in a single strike whereby Das Bones was finally cut and immediately defeated. And this encounter is a pretty great summary of all that is Zoro. He actually has a pretty brilliant quote earlier on in One Piece, where he stated that he forfeit his life the moment he decided to become the world's greatest swordsman. And due to this belief, Zoro doesn't particularly fear death and he will keep pushing any encounter until one of two conclusions is reached. Either he finds a way to clean victory or he dies. And thankfully, that second one hasn't quite happened as of yet, hopefully never, although there have certainly been some very close calls. With that said, there would come a time where Zoro would realize that there was only so far he could go on his own. And as it would turn out, the world of One Piece was much larger and significantly more dangerous than any of the straw hats could have anticipated. A message which was crushingly delivered to them on Sabadear Capelligo, where the crew as a whole was defeated and forcibly separated by the powers of Bartholomew Kuma. And in Zoro's case, he would be sent to Corrigana Island, where he would encounter the old, too familiar face of his ultimate obstacle, Drake Kill Mihawk. Although this time around, Zoro had been significantly humbled since their first meeting. And on this occasion, understanding his shocking weakness in comparison to the world at large, Zoro begged Mihawk to train him. Very importantly though, Zoro was not doing this simply for the sake of his dream. Rather, this action was taken for Luffy's sake. Zoro needed to become more powerful in order to ensure that Luffy could become the pirate king. A feeling that came to Trump, even his own personal desire and inherited will. And sensing this, Mihawk quite surprisingly agreed, thus leading to Zoro spending the better part of the next two years studying directly under the man that he would one day ultimately need to defeat. But after reuniting with the crew two years later, Zoro now held a completely new aura surrounding him. Like if he could be described as demonic pre-time skip, then this Zoro was now hell itself. And in the post-time skip era, every figure who has met Zoro in serious combat has suffered the consequences of that foolish act. And currently at the time of this recording, we are unaware of the true extent of Zoro's newfound power. Even after a decade of publication in the new world, there has not been an opponent who has managed to push Zoro to the edge that we so consistently saw him arrive at during the pre-time skip events. However, Wano looks quite poised to change that. And here is where I'm going to put up a brief spoiler warning for the events of late act two. And you know what, let's say only act three of Wano. If you're an anime only watcher or not caught up at the manga, then please do skip to this time here. I promise I won't be long, but there is a fairly significant development to cover. But for everyone else, here we go. During the Wano arc, Zoro has now inherited another particularly special blade known as Enma. This was one of the dual swords used by the now legendary Cozukiyoden and is even the weapon responsible for delivering Kaido's trademark scar. However, Enma is quite an unruly force, holding the innate trait of involuntarily drawing out bursts of armament hockey. That's making it nigh on impossible for even some of the greatest sword masters to wield. A challenge that Zoro took up immediately of course and one that I am quite anxious to see the results of. Some more fun facts about Zoro. Following the time skip, Zoro has become a user of both observation and armament hockey. Although quite notably, he is a much more proficient user of the latter. And speaking of hockey in retrospect, it has been heavily implied that Zoro's ability to cut steel as well as the breathable things is also an application of hockey that Zoro found very, very early on in the grand scheme of things. Zoro is one of two people in this world to be considered a member of the worst generation and not to be the captain of his own crew. The only other figure who can claim this would be Killer, who serves under Eustace Kid. Although just on this topic, Zoro is more often than not mistaken as the captain of the Straw Hat Pirates due to the sheer force of will and dominance he displays in everyday encounters, which also leads many people to wondering just how terrifying Luffy must be to have a man like Zoro serving under him. Zoro first received a bounty after defeating Darsbones on Alabaster, totaling 60 million berries, which is the highest starter known bounty held by anyone who originates from East Blue. Although currently Zoro is worth a much more bigger 320 million berries. After gaining global notoriety, Zoro's trademark Santorio style would gain quite a bit of popularity with an entire legion of new students of the Ishin Dojo choosing to imitate Zoro, not only by studying his form, but also by taping their left eye shut to mimic his scar, all of which is to the eternal frustration of the Dojo master Koshiro. And finally, a truly useless fact, as one of the most consistently popular characters in the entire series, Zoro is a prime target for cosplay with one of the more interesting figures to do so being Homer Simpson, who was seen here donning the outfit of a post time skip Zoro during the Treehouse of Horror 25. But that pretty much does it for Roro no Azoro. And what do you guys think? Please 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 go and check out some of my other content or even subscribe to the channel for more glorious one piece business uploaded straight into your YouTube feeds. But for now, this has been the Grand Line Review and I'll see you next time.