 Hello and welcome to the Grand Line Review, your source for everything one piece. And today I'd just like to have a bit of a discussion regarding one of the most iconic villains in the series, a certain heavenly demon, and more specifically, how effective he was in that role. The desire to embark on this discussion stems from a video that I made an awfully long time ago now, where I selected what I believed to be the top five best villains in the series, and well, Dolphemingo did not appear on that list. Ever since then, almost every second comment that appears on that video has either been asking why Dolphemingo wasn't selected or directly questioning my sanity. So let's get into how Mr. Sunglasses fits into all of this and how I feel about him as a villain as a whole. And first of all, I would like to start by saying that Dolphemingo was one of my all-time favorite characters in the series. His design, his abilities, his backstory, pretty much everything about him hits me strongly. But does that feeling alone make him one of the top five best villains in the series? Yeah, not necessarily, because I mean, someone can tell me all they want that Hody Jones is their favorite character, but not even in the darkest timeline will he be considered one of the best villains in one piece. But let's take a quick look at what Dolphemingo has going for him in that regard. Throughout the large majority of the series, Dolphemingo represented a very enigmatic and menacing presence. His character was essentially epitomized by two features, the first of which being a position of great power as a warlord of the sea and the second being one hell of a smile. And these two features created a solid fear of the unknown because in the pre-times skip era, as much as we knew next to nothing about this man, what we did know was that if Luffy and the Straw Hats ever crossed paths with him, it would almost certainly be the end of them. And that feeling was well-founded because when Dolphemingo's time did come, he did not disappoint in terms of sheer overwhelming power. He was the strongest combatant that Luffy had taken on to date, while excluding skirmishes against admirals and other such beings, and overcoming Dolphemingo took an entire nation rising up in rebellion against him. In addition to that, he wasn't just evil for the sake of evil either, not really anyway, because Dolphemingo did have an understandable past. I mean, I can't identify or empathize with his upbringing as a celestial dragon, but I do certainly understand how he ended up the way he did, which is an integral element in a strong antagonist. Plus, he was poised to be pretty damn intelligent as well, having positioned himself at the center of an extensive underground network, specializing in the trade of slaves and weapons, with many massive clients, all the while blackmailing the world government to attain a position as a wallet of the sea. This dude really did have it all going for him, and with a fascinating and quirky crew to complement it all. But for a quick recap, Dolphemingo was an enigmatic, powerful, intelligent, and depth-filled figure. He's what I would call a good or rounder, a jack of all trades, if you will, but not necessarily a master of any. And to break this down, let's begin with our first key feature, being his enigma or mystery. Now, this is problematic with any villain, because in order to actually explore them, you need to abandon this feature entirely. And after being told the story behind Dolphemingo and viewing his abilities in detail, this layer has all but disappeared from him. Well, well, except for what his eyes look like behind those sunglasses, and I would be very happy to never find out what they look like in order to preserve that teeny, tiny bit of mystery. But the thing is, though, even when we put the mystery of Dolphemingo into context, I still don't think it presents more than what other villains have been able to make from this feature. Because at the height of enigma, all Dolphemingo really was, was a big old question mark looming over the One Piece world, which I loved, but there was no fanatic desire to unravel that enigma. Whereas you look at a villain like, say, Blackbeard, and the mystery surrounding him have fueled the One Piece fan base ever since his introduction. There is a lust for knowledge that he demands, whether it be how he was able to consume multiple devil fruits, or how he can be a member of the D-Clan when he shows such unusual behavior for a D-Wielder. It doesn't matter what it is, mystery isn't thralling, and I don't just say that because we haven't solved them yet. They're just stronger conundrums to be presented to the audience than what Dolphemingo represented. And it's certainly one of the reasons why I placed Blackbeard in my top five best villains list, but certainly not the only reason. But this video is not about Mr. Teach, so let's move on with the next factor for Dolphemingo, which is strength. Now this one is problematic because you can't judge a character be they good, bad, or neutral via power alone. And you know what? If you did, then Dolphemingo would stand even less of a chance of making the top five best villains list with some of the absolute monsters in the series. But that said, strength is important to analyzing context. Because for example, Kaido was such a revered presence in this world, not so much because we know anything surrounding his character, but simply because of the God-like power that he has access to. But on the other end of that spectrum, a good villain certainly does not need that level of power to operate. And I'll be using Arlong as an example of this. Lots of people went absolutely mad when I ranked Arlong over Dolphemingo, and many of them cited Arlong's physical weakness as some sort of reasoning behind that. But Arlong was exactly as strong as he needed to be for the time period, just as Dolphemingo was an appropriate level of power to be perceived as a legitimate threat against Luffy in his era. So the question of strength becomes pretty irrelevant. Well, not irrelevant so much as the question shifts to, okay, so what does a villain do with that strength? And in Dolphemingo's case, as crazy as the events of Dressroser were, I don't think he did quite enough with what he had to work with, which was an absurd based strength, agility and durability, as well as one of the most broken devil fruit abilities awakened devil fruit abilities I should add. And when I look back at how he used the power he had, I generally can't see myself ranking those deeds anywhere near something like Arlong, who used what little power he had to put an army through a truly horrific childhood, or say Sakazuki using his incredible strength to kill Ace. And yes, Dolphemingo did put Trafalgar Lore and King Ruku and an entire nation through a horrendous ordeal, but it just doesn't have anywhere near the same overall effect, not on me anyway. And I don't know why their disconnect is there, but I just don't feel the fear of Dolphemingo's power as much as I do Sakazuki, or you know what, even Arlong, oddly enough, they were both far more effective in commanding fear, whilst Dolphemingo was just kind of cool. And that had a very detrimental effect on him as a primary antagonist. As much as I love the character, I can't legitimately say I was ever truly threatened by him during the Dressrosa saga, not in the same way that I felt threatened by anyone else I've compared him to. And you know what, I'll even throw another name into this mix, which is Crocodile, a significantly weaker existence than Dolphemingo, but his presence was overwhelming due to him using what he had, be it strength, intelligence, and devil fruit abilities, to a much higher antagonistic level. And speaking of the eye word, intelligence is a questionable area when it comes to Dolphemingo. Everything about where his character is in the series would suggest that he has a high degree of it, and that's part of what built him up to be this amazing antagonist. However, almost every decision he made during the Dressrosa arc very much undermines that idea and lessens his potency as a villain to me as a result. Things like casually deciding that he was going to try and kill a marine admiral, or even more puzzlingly deciding not to kill Trafalgar Law, for no reason on multiple occasions, as well as being so arrogant that he actually allowed the Merimerinomy to be put in a chest as a prize in the Corridor Colosseum when he had no intention of losing it. And the thing with that last one is it just doesn't make sense whatever way you look at it. Even if we took Dolphemingo's view that Diamante had a 100% chance of winning the contest, then there is still no point in putting the actual devil fruit in that chest. And should there be a less than 100% chance of Diamante's victory, then it is a wildly unnecessary risk that resulted in a super-powered sabre becoming heavily involved in the events that culminated in Dolphemingo's downfall. And the generally accepted reason for all of this is of course, Dolphemingo's wild arrogance, which is a fatal flaw. All characters have at least one of these and arguably need one, which is fine. I just personally don't feel like a lot of his decision-making is consistent with the character as presented in his position of importance in the world. But none of that is to say that Dolphemingo is a weak villain because of that. He is incredible and he was capable of helming an entire saga by giving us just enough of everything to provide a really solid presence. However, to me, that just is not enough, not in a series like One Piece anyway, to label him as one of the top five best villains. I mean, he's up there, probably quite close to the top five even, maybe like seventh or eighth, but there is so much more that this world has to offer and a whole slew of antagonists out there who deserve that recognition more. But that pretty much does it for whatever this rambling business was. 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You know what? I take it back. Don't have a good day. You don't get a good day. If you wanted a bad day, you don't deserve to have a good day. So, no. You know what? Just, it's night time now. It's night. No, it's not. It's night. You don't even get a day. You just came in here for an umbrella. I came in for an umbrella and you know what? I'm laying down the law. It's not daytime. It's night time now and you only get night. Eternal night. You forgot the dog. Eternal night. Well, you all just got told.