Gasparde

General Gasparde (将軍ガスパーデ) is the main antagonist of the fourth movie. He is a former Marine turned pirate with a bounty of 95,000,000, mostly due to his betrayal to the World Government.

Appearance
Gasparde is a tall and muscular man, with dark-blonde hair that is neatly combed to the sides, but with the back somewhat flowing outwardly, similar to Crocodile's hairstyle. He has strong cheekbones, a heavy chin, and squinted eyes.

In terms of clothing, Gasparde wears an elaborate Marine jacket that is similar in design to Vice Admiral Doberman's. Gasparde wears the jacket normally, with brown shirt underneath, leaving his chest bare, and with the Marine insignia on the back crossed out. He also wears black pants with a belt that has two buckles on the side, a purple scarf, brown gloves, and steel boots.

Like a few other non-canon characters, he was designed by Oda personally.

Personality
Typical for most villains in the series, Gasparde does not think much of his crew, referring to them as underlings, while forcing surviving victims of his pillages to join his crew as laborers. Gasparde also claimed that power was everything and seemed to enjoy cheating and deceiving others in order to win, while defecting from the Marines simply to satisfy his hunger for power.

Gasparde claimed that he hated the sea, but with power he could rule it all. He scoffs at the idea of One Piece and dreams in general, similar to those of the Bellamy Pirates. He also seems to have no sense of adventure, as he participated in the rigged Dead End Race several times in order to cure his boredom. In fact, as Luffy points out near the end of their fight he is basically a person playing pirate, using the word in title only and having no idea what the true meaning of being a real pirate is.

He also seems to have knowledge of Shanks as he recognized Luffy's straw hat, which he stabbed through, in order to mock Luffy.

Abilities and Powers
Gasparde and his crew were strong enough to defeat the fishman Willy (a former rival of Arlong) and his crew, but it's unknown if he used his Devil Fruit powers during that confrontation. However, Gasparde did show immense physical strength as he pummeled Luffy with enough force to hurt the rubber man, and threw him a great distance.

Devil Fruit


Gasparde has eaten the Ame Ame no Mi, a peculiar paramecia-class Devil Fruit giving him the ability to turn any part of his body into candy syrup. It also allows him to make weapons on his own body from the parts turned to candy syrup as well as imitate the Gomu Gomu no Mi's power of elasticity. This fruit's power is unique among Logia class, as it allows Gasparde to control the element in both semi-liquid and solid form.

While flour negates Gasparde's powers, he also apparently has not completely mastered the power of his Devil Fruit, as when Luffy threw a mast of the Salamander through his back, he claimed that it hurt.

Past
Gasparde was once a Marine officer, but then he eventually defected to become a pirate, with the intent of ruling the entire sea that he hated so much. He stole his own Marine ship and modified it to become a pirate ship, and gathered a crew to serve him. He also raided several villages, and in one of them killed the parents of Shuraiya and Adelle Bascùd, as well as forcing Biera and several other people to serve him. Gasparde eventually entered the Dead End Race program and won it a few times after rigging it, claiming it as a way to cure his boredom on the high seas.

Dead End Adventure
Gasparde first appears alongside his first mate, Needless, in the underground pirate lounge and of course comes on bad terms with the series' protagonist, Monkey D. Luffy, with Luffy calling him "trash" on their first encounter. Gasparde had ordered Needless to literally throw one of his subordinates away for being useless.

During the Dead End Race, he defeated the pirate fishman Willy and his crew off-screen. He also tried to dispose of the rest of his opponents by rigging the Race, successfully eliminating every contestant, save the Straw Hat Pirates. When Luffy finds this out he tracks Gasparde down and confronts him once again just as he is about to finish off a weakened Shuraiya.



In the tumultuous fight between the two near end of the movie, Gasparde used his Ame Ame no Mi powers to absorb all the blows that Luffy threw at him, as well as trap his fists while giving Luffy a brutal beating, and pierces his straw hat in mockery, up until Sanji provided Luffy with Gasparde's weakness: bags of flour. Luffy used these bags of flour in order to exploit Gasparde's weakness and land a series of physical blows to Gasparde, and claiming that Gasparde was merely "playing pirate", with no understanding of the true meaning of the word. After being launched into the air by Luffy's Gomu Gomu no Bow Gun, Gasparde tried one last attack on Luffy by trying to impale him with a series of spikes emitted from his body. He failed, and was launched into a nearby cyclone by Luffy's Gomu Gomu no Bazooka. His fate afterward is unknown.

Major Battles

 * Gasparde vs. Shuraiya Bascùd
 * Gasparde vs. Monkey D. Luffy

Trivia

 * His name might be a reference to the Spanish pirate José Gaspar and/or the Chinese pirate Zheng Zhilong (a.k.a. Nicholas Iquan Gaspard).
 * In many ways, Gasparde is similar to Crocodile: they both have once worked for the World Government (Marines and Shickibukai, respectively), have zero respect or care for their subordinates, seeing them as mere "underlings," have little sense in honor, both have Logia Devil Fruit powers (Ame Ame no Mi and Suna Suna no Mi, respectively), and the only way Luffy could defeat them was by exploiting their weaknesses (flour and moisture, respectively).
 * It is of note that according to the revealed rank listings of the Marines, the rank of "General" does not exist in the One Piece Marines. However, the term "General" may simply be Gasparde's personal title, rather than his actual rank in the Marines.
 * He is similar to a canon character in the series, X Drake, both high-ranking marines (although Gasparde's rank is non-existent, assuming it's not just a nickname) with a rare Devil Fruit (Logia and rare Ancient Zoan, respectively) who turned to piracy, created a crew that is named after themselves, and thus earning a high bounty (though Drake's bounty is far higher), as well as both doing so out of boredom.