ONE PIECE boasts the biggest roster of extremely punchable villains out of any anime/manga franchise. Not only because of its insane length, but it's also because Oda takes the time to make us really hate the enemies of Luffy.
So I'm categorizing in this article the One Piece villains into three types: The Hate-Sink, The Comic Relief, and The Worthy Opponent type. Of course, a villain or antagonist can fit into more than one category...
The Hate-sink
These are the villains everyone hates. The ones that show no redeeming qualities in any of their scenes. The villains that make you question the humanity of the world. These guys abuse their power in the most unthinkable ways. Killing their underlings for mistakes. Extra points if they're actually weak.
Examples: Akainu, Celestial Dragons, Spandam, Hody Jones, Orochi.
These are the villains who are hard to take seriously in spite of their powers. Fights with them usually don't have high stakes or have their stakes minimized because we know the type of villain we're dealing with. A lot of villains in early One Piece arcs fall into this category.
Examples: Buggy, Ceaser Clown, Gecko Moria, Big Mom.
I would also put Enel in this category. While he's a perfect villain, he's used in comedic fashion a lot. Even his most iconic scene is a comedic one.
Most of the villains of this type can also be categorized in the Hate-Sink above. What makes these different is that they have the strength to back-up everything they say. When the villain of the arc is also the villain of the Saga, it's most likely going to be of this type.
Sometimes you think these kinds of villains aren't so different from Luffy, but their methods are always unquestionably on the darker side of morality. The only antagonist that fits this type but I won't call evil would be Katakuri.
Examples: Crocodile, Katakuri, Blackbeard, Doflamingo, Rob Lucci, Kaido.
A lot of villains in One Piece fit more than one category, but they lean towards one of them. Oda is good at not having the morally-good characters being on the antagonist side of the story...
In my opinion, Big Mom falls into all three categories: She's so cruel and evil you'd hate her, but also respect her powers and want to have a fair fight with her. She's used in the story in many comedic scenes. Because of that, Big Mom's reputation isn't consistent among the fans, with some accusing Oda of not giving her the respect as a Yonko. I don't mind that. GrandLineReview's video explains my opinion on this completely.
Do you agree with my typings of ONE PIECE villains/antagonists? Disagree with anything I said? Please put your opinion in the comments.
Image is taken from Google. This article is also on Hive's Ecency.
Hehe, my favorite villains in One piece will always be Doflamingo, and Katakuri, they are the best!
Yes. Both are very charismatic aren't they? My favorite villain in ONE PIECE is still Doflamingo, but Luffy vs Katakuri is my favorite fight.
I actually haven't seen one piece but I think I understand the three category of villains, just like naruto there are villains like pain, madara and orochimaru
Naruto is full of tragic villains, while those exist, it's hard to not hate any of ONE PIECE villains, they're designed to be hated. In Naruto, it's easy to agree with them or loves their ideals/goals, so most Naruto (Shippuden) villains for me will fall into a fourth category "Tragic Ant-villain."
Oh! Really my favorite good one villains in one piece always be doflaningo is the beast one