The Elbaf arc has finally started opening up some of the biggest locked doors in One Piece history, and Shanks is right in the middle of it. Eiichiro Oda has spent a long time keeping certain parts of the world’s past frustratingly vague, but the recent flashbacks have changed that. We’ve seen more of Rocks D. Xebec, learned about Loki’s miserable childhood and why he was banished to the Underworld, and, perhaps most importantly, gotten a much closer look at the God Valley Incident. Along with all of that came some major information about where Shanks actually came from.
That’s pretty wild when you think about it, because Shanks has been one of the most important characters in the story since the very beginning. He’s the pirate who inspired Luffy to leave Foosha Village, one of the Four Emperors, an absurdly powerful Haki user, and someone who once sailed under Gol D. Roger. Yet for a character who has been around for this long, there’s still a ridiculous amount we don’t know about him. We know he’s strong. We know he has connections to some very powerful people. But what exactly happened before Roger found him, what does he really want, and just how dangerous is Shanks when he actually decides to fight?
Shanks’ Family Is Somehow Even More Complicated
The revelations about Shanks’ childhood have made his character a lot stranger than he first appeared. It was confirmed that he has ties to the Figarland family and, by extension, the Celestial Dragons of Mary Geoise. Even more surprising, Shanks has an identical twin brother, Figarland Shamrock. While Roger discovered baby Shanks inside a treasure chest after the chaos surrounding God Valley and eventually raised him on the seas, Shamrock stayed in the Holy Land and went in the completely opposite direction. He eventually became the Supreme Commander of the Holy Knights, serving the World Government and the Celestial Dragons directly.
It’s a pretty bizarre contrast between two brothers who apparently started from the same place. Shanks grew up around pirates and eventually became one of the biggest symbols of freedom in the series, while Shamrock became one of the people enforcing the authority of the World Government. It also makes some of Shanks’ past behavior look a little less random. His ability to walk into incredibly sensitive situations and speak with powerful figures without immediately being attacked has always been strange, especially his private meeting with the Five Elders. His family background may finally explain at least part of that.
We Know Shanks Is Ridiculously Strong. But We Still Haven’t Seen Everything.
For someone who has held the title of Yonko for so long, Shanks has actually fought surprisingly little on-panel. Oda keeps giving us these short glimpses of what he can do, and then moves on before we get the full picture. The problem for everyone fighting him is that those little glimpses are already terrifying.
His use of Kamusari, or Divine Departure, against Eustass Kid is probably the clearest example. Shanks basically ended the fight before it could properly become a fight, taking out Kid and his crew near Elbaf with a single devastating attack. It’s the same technique associated with Roger, which makes the connection between Shanks and his former captain even more obvious. And then there’s his Conqueror’s Haki, which was powerful enough to reach Ryokugyu from a huge distance away and force the Admiral to back off from Wano.
There’s another particularly nasty ability that doesn’t get talked about quite as much: Observation Killer. Shanks is said to be capable of interfering with an opponent’s ability to see the future through Observation Haki, which could be a massive advantage against another high-level fighter. And that’s really the frustrating thing about Shanks. We’ve seen enough to know that he belongs among the strongest characters in the series, but we still haven’t seen him pushed into a long, brutal fight where he has to use absolutely everything he has. Until that happens, it’s hard to know where his ceiling actually is.
The Biggest Questions About Shanks Are Still Unanswered
His family and strength are only part of the mystery. There’s also the question of why Shanks stole the Hito Hito no Mi, Model: Nika, which was being transported by CP9 and was known at the time as the Gomu Gomu no Mi. The fruit eventually became the key to Luffy’s transformation and his connection to Joy Boy, so Shanks’ involvement in its history feels way too important to be a coincidence. Did Shanks already know what the fruit really was? Was he acting on something Roger had discovered? Or was there another reason entirely? Oda still hasn’t given us a clear answer.
Then there’s Blackbeard. Shanks has carried the scars across his face for years, and we know Marshall D. Teach was responsible for them, despite Shanks being one of the strongest pirates alive. Whatever happened between them clearly wasn’t something Shanks has forgotten, either. He has repeatedly treated Blackbeard as a serious threat, which makes their eventual confrontation feel like one of those fights the series has been quietly building toward for years.
With Kaido and Big Mom gone, Shanks is now openly moving toward the One Piece, and that changes his position in the story quite a bit. He could end up being a rival to Luffy, a final test for him, or perhaps even someone who plays a completely different role once the truth about the world comes out. And with Shamrock and the Holy Knights now tied into his story, Shanks’ past may end up being just as important as whatever he does next.
That’s probably what makes him so interesting this late in One Piece. We’ve known Shanks since Chapter 1, but somehow, after all these years, it still feels like we’ve only met the version of him he wants everyone else to see.
Primary References
- One Piece Manga (Elbaf Arc & God Valley Flashbacks)
- One Piece Manga Chapter 1059 (Wano Coast Haki Display)
- One Piece Manga Chapter 1079 (Shanks vs. Eustass Kid)