 Hello and welcome to the Grand Line Review, your source for everything one piece, and today we are here to dwell again on Mr. Ze-ha-ha himself, the sickeningly charismatic Blackbeard. And more specifically, the ever-curious topic of how powerful is martial-de-teach. And this is a very difficult subject to tackle in a series, filled with a slew of inconsistent pieces of evidence regarding Blackbeard, and as such, in the fanbase you can encounter those who believe that Blackbeard is on par with the original Four Emperors, or those who will claim that he is quite probably weaker than our modern-day Luffy, and also everything in between, lots of things in between, and that's because Blackbeard is just so challenging to pin down. Right now he does more or less function a bit like Schrodinger's Emperor, both insanely powerful and ridiculously weak at the exact same time. And we won't really know which it is until we eventually open the box, and we're going to attempt to peek into said box here today. But before we do, it is Ze-ha-ha quiz time. Here's how it works, I'm going to give you a question about Blackbeard, followed by one multiple choice answer for every missing tooth Blackbeard has, which is usually three, sometimes more, sometimes less, when no one forgets. And you will be charged with picking the right answer, and if you don't, then your punishment will be to subscribe to the Grand Line Review for regular One Piece content, uploaded straight until you should be. I don't really consider it a punishment myself, but some of you too, so we'll go with that. And here is your question. Which of these is not officially listed as one of Blackbeard's hobbies? Is it A. Gambling, B. Researching History, or C. Playing Board Games? It's a pretty tough one actually, and I was quite surprised to discover this myself, but please do comment with your choice below and we shall reveal the answer shortly. But to begin with Blackbeard's power discussion, we need to dive into the incredibly inconsistent manner in which he's been portrayed, almost certainly purposely mind you, but one of the pieces of evidence you will hear cited most often from the Blackbeard is Sky Splitter Level Camp, would be the fact that he is responsible for giving Shanks his iconic scar. In addition to this, you'll also hear Blackbeard being credited as having defeated Marco the Phoenix during the Payback War, and of course Blackbeard defeated Ace on Benaro Island, and actually why not, let's throw Thatch in there as well. Blackbeard killed Thatch, another commander of the Whitebeard Pirates, meaning that Blackbeard actually has quite an impressive win streak against this particular crew, and all of those feats are pretty damn impressive. However, on the Blackbeard-is-scrug-tear side of the argument, we have situations such as pre-times get Pre-Haki Luffy, delivering a solid shot of pain Blackbeard's way during Impel Down, the fact that Blackbeard then proceeded to be effectively one shot by Magellan's powers, as well as the idea that he and his entire crew fled at the mere mention of the name, Saka-Zuki during the post-war events, it's a very scary name to be fair. But let's also not get too far ahead of ourselves, because Blackbeard also proved incapable of defeating an old man on the verge of death, with his brains quite literally spilling out of his head, meaning it was Whitebeard, but still, Blackbeard proved woefully inefficient there, and if not for his crew stepping in and Whitebeard's general sense of mercy, we wouldn't even be talking about Teach right now. That's how far he was from emperatic power pre-timeskip. Or was he? Because Shanks' scar was well and truly delivered pre-timeskip, in fact it was done pre-pre-timeskip, because there was a timeskip at the end of chapter one, technically, so that's why that works. But there is a mighty disconnect of facts to reckon with here, which we are now going to attempt to make some sense of. And speaking of sense, prepare for very little of that, as we reveal the answer to the coveted Zaha Quiz. So which of these was not officially listed as one of Blackbeard's hobbies, the answer is C, playing board games. And if you did not select C, then you know the go, hit the amazing red button and welcome to the Grand Fleet. And just as a fun fact, playing board games is actually the hobby of Capone Gang Beige, but I was fascinated to discover that Blackbeard research his history as a hobby. It's something that I suppose he and Robin could probably bond over, and it makes me wonder if he might have some ability to read the ancient language himself from his various research mint. Hmm, intriguing. But here's another interesting and relevant to this video point. Shanks' scar, Thatcher's murder, and Marco's defeat. Three of Blackbeard's greatest achievements all occurred offscreen. And in one piece, that should always give you pause for thought, especially with a character like Blackbeard. If there was any singular person in this world who really embodied piracy in the classical sense, it is Blackbeard. He will lie, he will cheat, he will trap, he will wait, and he is the epitome of opportunistic. And we've seen this in the series on multiple occasions. In fact, pretty much every occasion he appears. Going back to the Marine, for example, imagine that you heard Blackbeard and his crew were the ones responsible for killing Whitebeard. You don't get any further context of the situation, just that one line summary, which would give you the impression that this band of misfits took down the strongest man in the world. And it would be a highly inaccurate representation of Blackbeard and his abilities. Now apply that to one of the aforementioned situations, like say the Payback War. All we know about this event is the result. We don't know how the Whitebeard pirate remnants were defeated, and we can't even say for a fact that it was Blackbeard who beat Marco. There's even a very intriguing line in the official translation where Robin gives us the TLDR breakdown of the Payback War where she states, it was quite a large battle with each side bringing in plenty of help. In the end, Marco's group was obliterated. It was only after this major confrontation that Blackbeard was first included among the list of the four emperors. And the greater emphasis here is on the scale of the battle and the fact that both sides amassed a huge slew of great forces. This wasn't Blackbeard himself. This was an event where the tides of greater power and fate went in his favor. Now as for Shank's scar, something that is often neglected with this bit of evidence is that it was delivered at least 12 years before the current timeline because Shank's did have it in chapter one, which was him prior to becoming an emperor of the sea, but also after the time of his great rivalry with Meahawk. So it's hard to pin down Shank's here, harder than it is Blackbeard actually, but in regards to Blackbeard, what we do have to go on are Shank's words to Whitebeard. I fought countless battles and received countless scars, but the only one that aches right now is this one. He then proceeds to state that he did not receive the scar because he was being careless either. And I think the image concocted from that line paints the picture of some sort of epic one-on-one battle between Shank's and Blackbeard. I do have to pull the same card though. We didn't see it, so we don't know. We have no idea how Blackbeard managed to pull this off or how many people were fighting at the time or kind of situation Shank's was in or how powerful Shank's was himself back then over 12 years ago. So I do think it's a mistake to try and judge Blackbeard based on this. And of course I'll say the same for Thatch. He is a commander whose power is a complete unknown and probably irrelevant because Blackbeard appears to have murdered him without a fight even having taken place. It looks like it was just a stab in the back from someone Thatch let his guard down around and then bam, gone. And with all of that in mind, I really do want to underscore the theme of Blackbeard. Basically every time we hear about Blackbeard, it is some sort of great world-shaking feat. Meanwhile, every time we actually see Blackbeard in action, it's more of a great world-shaking disappointment. The evidence of his actions do not live up to the tales told of off-screen events. However, there does exist one exception to this formula which is the fight against Ace. This is probably the only battle we can say with a degree of certainty that Blackbeard won legitimately because he did tell his crew to stay out of it or at least he told Orga to hold off. And while it's not impossible to see a situation where the Blackbeard Pirates stepped into overwhelm Ace, it's a lot less likely with the physical evidence presented which shows Ace and Blackbeard clashing on more or less equal footing. And that is currently out only something close to solid metric. However powerful you believe Ace was, pre-times get Blackbeard was probably around there. Maybe slightly more powerful, maybe even slightly less. And it was just a bad devil fruit matchup for Ace because the Ami-Ami no Mi is a hard counter to those who rely heavily on low-gear powers or even devil fruits in general. And actually having said that, I'm now just sort of convincing myself that Blackbeard could have been much, much weaker, but the Ami-Ami is what made the difference. So once again, it's so hard to place Blackbeard himself but I will say that his broad swath of accomplishments do not currently add up to our personal experiences of him. And whilst that might sound strange, there is actually strong precedence for this in the Luffy situation. This rubber lad is a creature capable of doing the impossible, but not through standard means. He requires all of the right conditions concerning fate to go his way. But as a result, the world knows him as the man who destroyed any slobby inside of the first mass breakout of Impel Down, casually strolled into Holkeke Island, destroyed Big Mom Chateau and then casually strolled on out. And so, so much more. So my question would be, why can't Blackbeard's achievements have been performed in the exact same manner? There is a very clear parallel between Luffy and Blackbeard which has been present ever since Jaya. They are shockingly similar characters. You essentially just need to flip their preferences and you'll end up with the other one. They both believe profoundly in dreams. They both seem to possess the inherited will of their previous generational rivals. They're both dees and as such, both heavily subject to fate. I personally do not believe that Blackbeard is as powerful as many will give him credit for. I also don't believe he's as weak as many will also try to claim. I think Blackbeard is smack bang in the same situation as Luffy. He has enough power to make his way in the world, but he mostly relies on that extra super special ability that nobody else possesses in order to rise to prominence. You know, in Luffy's case, that would be his charisma to draw others to him which makes up for his grand impatience. Meanwhile, Blackbeard very unsurprisingly is very much the opposite. He has the patience to wait for the stars to align and carry him to victory. And whilst we do know annoyingly little about Blackbeard's journey, we do have an example of him being saved by fate, very Luffy-esque, which is of course impelled down. Blackbeard and his crew should have died after being doused with poison by Magellan. However, the grand hand of fate stepped in to save their lives just as it does in each and every single awkward Luffy. However, there is one, I guess, two important differences that Blackbeard needs to be granted, which are his double fruit abilities. I already touched on the army army previously, but the utility of this fruit has the potential to bring supremely powerful enemies down to teacher's level because it nullifies fruit abilities in an even greater way than Arm and Taki or Seastone is capable of. It doesn't so much make Blackbeard himself powerful. In fact, it makes him a lot weaker than your standalone gear user, but it reduces the power of double fruit-based opponents. The Guru Guru and Ami, however, is completely inarguable. This adds an absurd level of raw force to Blackbeard, given that it is considered the strongest of the Paramesia class. And this is something that Marco very much stated in chapter 909 when he was referring to the payback war. But with Pops's power at his command, we couldn't overcome teach anymore. He took everything. Oh, how I wanted to make that in great pay. Which is, you know, another one of those lines which appears to focus on an external factor. It's not so much that Blackbeard himself is powerful. It's the devil fruit that made all the difference. With the Guru Guru and Ami under his command, Marco and the remnants could not overcome teach anymore, implying that without this fruit, that would certainly not be the case. I think that's very telling and a super strong reason as to why we should never even come close to equating Blackbeard to the pinnacle of one piece power in regards to characters like the whitebeards, Kidos and big mothers of the world. Each of whom could have their devil fruit stripped and still retain their status as emperors through raw strength alone. And I don't think there's anyone who could reasonably make the same argument with Blackbeard. And one other issue to address is that of final boss syndrome. That being the idea that Blackbeard is set up to be the ultimate foe of the one piece series. And because of that, that automatically means that he will need to be the strongest of all of the enemies as well, which he really doesn't and he almost certainly won't be. He and Luffy have very special roles in the history of this planet. Ones that don't require either of them to force their way through this landscape with power alone. They both have a very handy ally in fate and the two are no doubt destined to clash in a battle that will decide the future for centuries to come. And when that time comes, they're both going to be incredibly strong in their own right. But the final enemy does not necessarily mean the most powerful one. And I personally think it would be a very, very tall ask to make Blackbeard's abilities trump that of Kaido and then expecting Luffy to bring him down one-on-one. You'd be getting into incredibly crazy and lazy shounen power jumping there. And one piece has more or less been able to avoid that for 23 years now. So I don't see it falling into that trap at the very end. It's more likely that Luffy will bring down Kaido as part of some sort of team effort and then meet a final opponent closer to his level of strength in Blackbeard for a more even and satisfying one-on-one clash. That's my thinking anyway. 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 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.