#shirohige

One Piece Episode 1003 | 1010 | 1013

These three scenes from the recent episodes on Wano struck me as similar at first because of the way Marco, Corazon and Yamato say the word “Free”. But as always with One Piece, there are other common threads woven in here - of Fathers, Fate, Loss, and Inherited Will.

Yamato has no freedom because he is the son of Kaido. Marco and Law, on the other hand, were both put on the path to freedom by their adoptive fathers.

Marco, the first son of Whitebeard, is no longer bound by his father’s voice, or his will. He is free to do as he chooses. Yamato, who felt bound to remain on Onigashima by his father’s will, is finally able to express his true desire with the help of Whitebeard’s other son, Ace.

Ace helps Yamato break free – metaphorically – from the shackles of Kaido, and realize his desire to follow in the footsteps of Oden; the same way that Ace himself sought to break free from the shackles of Roger, and would go on to follow Whitebeard, picking up the mantle previously held by Oden.

Law’s situation is a bit more nuanced; Corazon’s words still have a hold over him, but not in a way that takes away his free will. Sengoku ensures that Rosinante’s will, for Law to be free, is carried forward – by telling him that Corazon’s love for him, that the act of saving him, is not tied to Law’s status as a bearer of the Will of D. Where Law might have felt compelled to seek the true history in repayment of Corazon’s sacrifice, he now chooses to do so of his own volition. This freedom is a recent development – for all that Corazon willed him to be free, Law never truly escaped the shackles of Doflamingo until the man was defeated – by Ace’s little brother, Luffy.

Yamato rejects the hand dealt to him by fate in order to start on his path to freedom, whereas Law, upon finally gaining his freedom, sets out to find the meaning behind his fate. Their actions on Onigashima are driven by the will they inherited from another – Law by Corazon’s will, and Yamato by Oden’s – just as Marco’s very presence on Onigashima is driven by the will he inherited from Ace.

Law lost the father that nudged him towards freedom, Yamato lost Ace, and Marco… Marco lost them both. Yet of the three it is Marco – who carries in him a bit of Whitebeard, a bit of Ace, and a bit of Oden – that experiences freedom in the truest sense.

one piece heights