Will Blackbeard Become The Pirate King?

Although Luffy’s primary goal throughout One Piece is to become the Pirate King, he isn’t the only character who has aspirations to fill this position. In fact, when it comes to the Great Pirate Era, many powerful pirates all wish to claim the One Piece and follow in Gol D. Roger’s footsteps. Due to the number of people who want this treasure, overall, One Piece has almost become a race between these pirate groups, mostly consisting of Emperors like Buggy, Luffy, and Blackbeard, to see who will reach Laugh Tale and find the treasure first.

Although it seems fairly obvious that Luffy will at one point in the series achieve his dream of becoming the Pirate King, some fans believe that he may not be the first to do so. There are plenty of theories currently circulating in the One Piece community that suggest that another pirate will briefly claim the title of Pirate King before Luffy has his chance at the end of the series. For some, this potential Pirate King is Blackbeard, a figure that many fans believe will claim the title right before his final battle with Luffy.

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Blackbeard Is Close To Finding Laugh Tale

He Has A Chance To Become The Pirate King

The title of Pirate King, which grants no specific territory or responsibilities, is more of a symbolic title than anything else, simply given to the most prolific pirate of the generation. More definitively, after Roger became the first pirate to conquer the Grand Line completely, and found an ancient treasure on Laugh Tale, becoming the Pirate King doing a similar thing in the Great Pirate Era. Basically, the first pirate to reach Laugh Tale and claim the One Piece treasure will become the next Pirate King.

Of course, as many fans already know, most pirate crews in the Great Pirate Era want to claim the One Piece treasure, thus becoming the Pirate King, even if they don’t directly want the title. Currently, pirates like Buggy, Crocodile, Luffy, Blackbeard, and more are all after the title of the Pirate King for one reason or another. However, when it comes to how close they are, as of now, though Luffy is the closest, possessing three Road Poneglyphs that form the map to Laugh Tale, a character like Blackbeard isn’t far behind, who recently stole Law’s Road Poneglyph copies, making him tied for Shanks in Road Poneglyph possession.

Blackbeard May Claim The Title Of Pirate King Before Luffy

This Would Make Luffy’s Journey Less Straightforward

• Blackbeard Is Close To Becoming The Pirate King
• Luffy’s Journey May Need More Obstacles

Since Shanks has already seen Laugh Tale, and most likely doesn’t want the title of Pirate King, it seems the closest competition that Luffy has in becoming the Pirate King is the Emperor of the Sea, Blackbeard himself. Additionally, although Luffy is ahead now, his adventure shouldn’t be smooth sailing from now until Laugh Tale. From these two factors, it would make sense that sometime in the near future, another pirate will pull ahead on the journey to become the Pirate King. Out of any other pirate, Luffy’s main competition is most likely going to be Blackbeard.

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From here, these fans believe that Blackbeard may potentially reach the island of Laugh Tale first, becoming the second pirate to conquer the Grand Line, and the Pirate King. With Blackbeard’s power and influence, it seems likely that if any character besides Luffy is going to become the Pirate King, it will be Blackbeard. From here, Blackbeard would become the true, “final boss” of One Piece that Luffy will need to defeat in order to truly claim the title as the real Pirate King.

Fans Would Be Disappointed If Blackbeard Steals Luffy’s Dream

It May Be Better If Blackbeard Had The Title Unofficially

However, at the same time, if Blackbeard were to become the Pirate King before Luffy, stealing the latter’s dreams away from him, it would leave many fans disappointed with the ending of the story. Instead, some fans hope that Luffy and Blackbeard will reach Laugh Tale at the same time, leading to a massive battle that will crown the winner the King of the Pirates. While in this scenario Blackbeard wouldn’t reach Laugh Tale before Luffy, there is still the chance that he could temporarily win the fight, possibly through underhanded tactics, briefly becoming the Pirate King in name alone before Luffy returns to defeat him once and for all.

In the end, although it’s a possibility that Blackbeard becomes the King of the Pirates based on his current position in the world of One Piece, it seems fairly unlikely this will happen. Instead, it seems far more likely that Luffy will achieve his dream of finding the One Piece treasure first, though not before a massive encounter with either Blackbeard or Imu. Still, fans will most likely have to wait until after the Elbaf Arc of One Piece before more information on Blackbeard and the race to become the Pirate King is revealed.

One Piece

Release Date

October 20, 1999

Network

Fuji TV

Directors

Hiroaki Miyamoto, Konosuke Uda, Junji Shimizu, Satoshi Itō, Munehisa Sakai, Katsumi Tokoro, Yutaka Nakajima, Yoshihiro Ueda, Kenichi Takeshita, Yoko Ikeda, Ryota Nakamura, Hiroyuki Kakudou, Takahiro Imamura, Toshihiro Maeya, Yûji Endô, Nozomu Shishido, Hidehiko Kadota, Sumio Watanabe, Harume Kosaka, Yasuhiro Tanabe, Yukihiko Nakao, Keisuke Onishi, Junichi Fujise, Hiroyuki Satou

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  Mayumi Tanaka

  Monkey D. Luffy (voice)

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  Kazuya Nakai

  Roronoa Zoro (voice)