I've written before about how Ace's story has so many goddamn biblical allusions/parallels with the New Testament (conceived of by a miracle, survived a state-sanctioned mass infanticide/femicide, handed over for execution by a traitor, biblical resurrection kinda fulfilled through Luffy and Sabo inheriting his will) that I sometimes wonder if it's kind of intentional. That being said, if Ace is a Christ figure, he's a very interesting take on one: he's not dying voluntarily, but because the Navy and the World Government are hoping to set an example, reaffirm their power, and (theoretically, although this is a far less convincing motivation than punitive cruelty for the sake of it) discourage people from participating in the search for Roger's legacy and "end the great pirate era". He's not perfectly wise or selfless or divinely blessed by his parentage, nor does he ever identify with his semi-divine father; he's a twenty-year-old who rejects Roger and spends his whole life trying to find some agency and freedom from that legacy, living with the perpetual excruciating terror of being discovered until it finally happens and he's doomed both by the narrative and by the terrible destiny of being born a D and Roger's child. His execution isn't framed as a predestined moment of divine sacrifice and absolution, it's a frantic nightmare that ends in tragedy, surrounded by constant reminders of the hollow, twisted "justice" and false promises of a new dawn espoused by the oppressor. And when he does end up sacrificing himself, he doesn't do it for a greater purpose, or for the good of mankind: he dies fighting for himself and his family, he dies turning around to confront the tormentors who have taken his and his loved one's lives and freedom and mocked their sacrifice, and, most importantly, he dies for Luffy. He dies in defiance of these grand narratives ascribed to him: not to save the world or bring about a new era but in the name of defending the people he loves and finds his purpose in loving.
TLDR: Oda’s take on the Christ Figure isn’t a prophet or all-knowing son of God, but a young person born with a terrible fate, who tries to live and find love in his friends and brothers and family only to have it stolen from him by the powers that be for a cruel birthright he had no say in, whose execution and its symbolic purposes are forced on him from outside. He's a child who deserves the world and is killed for the "sins" of others, but instead of dying on the cross, instead of being sacrificed on the altar of state control for an ostensible end to an era, he manages to die fighting on his own terms for something that truly matters to him, and the ripple effects caused by his death/sacrifice are slated to eventually bring about the downfall of the system that murdered him.
i need all of you to be invested in carloscar (?) carcar (?) as i am right now and imagine a world where they are teammates because their dynamic would be so funny.
Having read the Masquerade series multiple times, I thought I knew roughly what to expect from Exorida.
But Exordia does not read like Baru Cormorant.
Exordia reads like Douglas Adams and Scott Alexander had a teleporter mishap The Fly style, and then the resulting chimera was given a low dose of acid, locked in a padded cell with only a laptop, and told to write a scifi novel before they could come out.
Whether this is a good thing or not, I could not say.
genuinely idk whats wrong with joel smallishbeans all i know is that i want him to get worse i wanna say look at my mcyt he has every disease and have no one doubt me
Kind of gay to be doomed to die for a boy who’s incapable of even smiling at you, let alone loving you back
[ID: digital painting of Fakir kissing Mytho's neck. Mytho is looking away with an absent expression. Behind him is a stylistic gold circle haloing him and loosely resembling a crown. Fakir wears his knight outfit while Mytho wears a plain white shirt. Fakir holds Mytho's hand but Mytho's fingers don't clasp around his. End ID]
Please click for better quality. reference under cut:
so much cool tma art on my timeline and i keep remembering i haven't finished it because i literally, physically, can't stand the thought of everyone thinking my scrungly bastard is a murderer