Arlong

Arlong the Saw (ノコギリのアーロン) is the pirate captain of the all fishman crew, the Arlong Pirates, and a former member of the Sunny Pirates. He is known for being the main villain in the Arlong arc.

Appearance
Arlong is a large, muscular, and light blue sawshark fishman whose most distinctive trait is his saw-nose. He has long, black hair sprouting on the back of his neck, reaching down to his shoulders, from under what appears to be a brown ushanka, covering his head. He has a fin on his nape, surrounded by his hair, and the gills are located on both the sides of his neck. His Sunny Pirates tattoo is on the left side of his chest, while his own Jolly Roger is on his lower left arm.

Arlong's attire is composed of fashionable, light clothes, reflecting his rich status. He wears a sleeveless, unbuttoned yellow shirt decorated by many black lightning-like spots, bermuda shorts which are brown in the manga and green in the anime, a purple sash around the waist and simple sandals. He also sports a lot of jewels: he has a golden chain bracelet around his left wrist and two golden bracelets around each ankle, with straw-like decorations hanging from them. On his hands are what appear to be rings, decorated by colorful gems. However, according to Oda in response to a fan about these rings, these aren't rings at all but more like piercings that go straight through Arlong's fingers, as his hands are webbed and are incapable of wearing rings.

During his first raid on the Konomi Islands, he had a long, light green scarf hanging from his shoulders, and wore a dark green coat and a pair of beige bermuda shorts with a chain-like pattern on them paired with a green sash around his waist. Also, instead of the ushanka he currently wears, he had a simple, dark grey hat on his head.

Personality
Arlong considers humans to be inferior beings and is very cruel to them. He is keen to separate his race from humans and constantly stuck by this mentality that his people are superior to humans in every way. He thinks nothing of killing a town full of humans, although he seems to prefer controlling people with money and deals (like Nami and Nezumi.)

Money is the best, you can trust it more than the human.

Despite (or probably because of) his love for money and his ideology of money making the world spin, he is known to be very cheap, as Hyozo refused to join his crew because Arlong refused to pay for his service.

He does not seem frightened by anything, and his fishman strength has made him extremely confident that he and his crew are virtually invincible. After Nezumi told Arlong that he as a Marine wouldn't stay for fear of being seen in Arlong Park, at this point Arlong invited the Marine to a meal and offered to kill anyone who dared report him.

He has an eye for spotting exploitable talent that he can use for his goals and is an excellent planner. He spent eight years using Nami and her maps to plan his takeover of the East Blue. Nevertheless, any promise about money he makes, he keeps. The best example is when his crew urged him to keep Nami even if she brings the 100,000,000. However, even though Arlong states he can't go back on his word, he has no qualms about exploiting loopholes in his deals to unfairly get his way.

He is rather easy to anger, going berserk after he was attacked by Usopp and having to be dragged back to his base by his crew to prevent him from destroying the whole town. During his fight with Luffy, the boy's constant fighting back made Arlong mad, to the point where it drove him into a deep anger. Arlong himself had expected Luffy to die quickly, but his anger made him become reckless and destructive, even seriously damaging his own HQ building while attacking Luffy.

Crew
Do you know how upset I am? You will give up and die. I am so upset my beloved crew mates were beaten by a bunch of worthless insects! He cares for his own crew (shown when he apologizes for accidentally biting them and becoming enraged at Luffy for using one as a fishman shield), while many of his crew share his ideals. They would call him "Arlong-san" while Arlong would call his crew his "brethren". He can be very angry when someone hurts his crew rather similarly to Luffy's feelings towards his crew. However, this is exclusive to fishmen.



Of humans, the only one he ever had respect for was Nami. In particular, he cut away from his normal human discrimination to humans for her, since her navigation skills were superior to any fishman's. After he mentioned fishmen and their superiority over humans, Nami responded how tired she was of hearing it, leading Arlong to acknowledge her skills and in the only witnessed incident in his appearance. He then apologized saying that she simply couldn't help what species she was. However, this was simply because of her skill to draw maps and mistreated her constantly while she was on his crew. Despite his treatment, Arlong considered her as one of his brethren and always celebrated her return to Arlong Park. He would even have his crew celebrate when Nami 'came home' as greeting their returning sister.

Nami was expected to act how he wanted her to. However, this led him to misjudge her character. This was mostly because of his own ideals based on materialistic values. He could not see how she wouldn't be happy unless she had clothes, money and a place to sleep. He also didn't see her betrayal happening until it was too late. Even at the final stages of his fight against Luffy, he still stated that he considered her a nakama.

Enemies
As a pirate with a bounty, he is the enemy of the Marines and had the highest bounty in the East Blue until the Straw Hat Pirates were announced to the world. As he had been paying off the Marines to keep quiet, it's likely that his bounty did not fully reflect neither all of his crimes nor his true power/threat level. His cruelty against Nami and her village has assured him an enemy in all of them, as well as in the Straw Hats, who defeated him.

Other
It is unclear about any feelings between him and his former comrade Jinbe as of the current storyline. The precise circumstances that led to Jinbe's decision to leave and become a Shichibukai while Arlong took over islands in the East Blue are also unknown. It is possible that since his (former) captain, Fisher Tiger, also hated humans, that trait might have rubbed off on Arlong.

It is also possible to assume that earlier before he became a pirate, he might have been one of the many fishmen slaves that Fisher Tiger had set free from the Tenryuubito that later became part of the Sunny Pirates. However, while it's possible to confirm he was a Sunny Pirate due to the mark on his chest, it's unclear as of now if he was a slave or not as all members of the Sunny Pirates bore that mark regardless of their pasts.

When dealing with Nezumi, Arlong tells him that he doesn't like humans, with the exceptions of Nami and those who understand how to do business like Nezumi.

Abilities and Powers
Arlong is one of the fishmen, massive humanoids that are taller and stronger than any normal human. Arlong, however, is a giant even among fishmen. His power was remarked to be greater then Don Krieg, the strongest (military) force in the East Blue. He possesses amazing physical strength: he was seen lifting a house with his bare hands in pursuit of Usopp, and his powerful shark-like jaws are capable of rending metal, stone and flesh alike.

He also has incredible endurance to pain: during his fight with Luffy, he ripped off many sets of his rapidly re-growing teeth, and he put back in place his broken nose without a grimace.

Arlong also has some kind of beserk mode when he gets angry. This is shown by his eyes changing to eyes similar to a sea king.

Weapons
Arlong's weapons are mostly natural features of his sawshark fishman body. With his great strength, something as harmless as a handful of water can strike as hard as a bullet.

Even his nose is a weapon. It is over a foot long and lined with razor-sharp points, and more than sturdy enough to use as a melee weapon. Swinging his head back and forth, Arlong defeated even Zoro (who was weakened by the massive wound given to him by Mihawk previously and his fight with Hatchan) in a swordfight with this natural blade. He is very proud of his nose and claims his nose is unbreakable. However, Luffy managed to twist his nose in another direction during the fight with pure physical strength.



He can remove his massive, needle-like teeth and use them as hand-held weapons, snapping them at opponents like castanets. The teeth are replaced by a new set in mere moments, each regrown mouthful stronger than the one before. Luffy demonstrated, however, that these teeth can also be used against Arlong, either by holding them in his hands or as he chose, fitting them in his mouth and biting his opponent with them. However, Arlong states that only a fishman can fully utilize the strength of the teeth as he possesses much stronger jaws than a human. Also, fishmen are apparently ten times stronger than men from birth.

He was seen killing Bellemere with a flintlock, and in the last phases of his fight with Luffy he used a giant sawlike sword, the Kiribachi, with great proficiency, as he was able to cut even a building with it. Predictably, as formidable an opponent as Arlong is on land, in the water he is nearly invincible.

Attacks

 * Shark on Darts (鮫・ON DARTS（シャーク・オン・ダーツ）): Arlong shoots at his opponent like a torpedo with his apparently unbreakable nose. This attack is simply called Shark Darts in the Viz Manga and FUNimation dub and Shark and Awe in the 4Kids dub.


 * Tooth Gum (歯ガム（トゥースガム）): Arlong pulls out his own teeth and puts them in his hand to use them as a weapon, immediately growing another pair in his mouth. He usually uses one set of teeth in each hand. In the Viz Manga and FUNimation dub, this is called Tooth Attack.


 * Shark on Tooth (鮫・ON 歯車（シャーク・オン・トゥース）): Arlong opens his mouth and starts spinning towards the opponent and bites down on them. The kanji used for Tooth is that of Haguruma which means "gear" in Japanese in the manga. This is called Shark Tooth Drill in the Viz Manga and FUNimation dub and Shark and Destroy in the 4Kids dub.

Past History
In exchange for becoming one of the Shichibukai, Jinbe unleashed some monsters in the East Blue. The sawshark fishman was once a member of the Sunny Pirates, of which Fisher Tiger was captain. But following Tiger's death and the recruitment of Jinbe into the Shichibukai, the group split into pieces and Arlong formed his own "Arlong Pirates". Around this time he attempted to recruit Vander Decken IX and Hyozo into his crew, but the former disliked the idea of working for others, while Arlong was too cheap to pay the fee for the latter's services. Jinbe then turned them loose in East Blue, although this was a decision that the Shichibukai would later regret.

Arlong set up his domain on one of the larger islands in East Blue, with a number of smaller villages in the vicinity under his control. Arlong dismantled his original galleon and used the materials to build Arlong Park, an eight-story building that served as his headquarters. From Arlong Park, Arlong hoped to conquer all of East Blue using superior underwater tactics through maps drawn by Nami that charted underwater terrain.



When Arlong and his crew (consisting of Hatchan, Chew, and Kuroobi), first arrived on the island that would someday become Arlong Park, the first village he encountered was Cocoyashi Village (Coco Village in the English version), the home of Nami. Arlong then proceeded to extort money out of the residents of Cocoyashi Village. Adults would have to pay 100,000, children would pay 50,000 or be executed by Arlong's men. Bellemere (Nami's adoptive mother) only had 100,000 so she decided to pay for Nami and Nojiko and sacrifice herself. Arlong shot her in front of her children as an example of disobedience and then kidnapped Nami.

He forced Nami to become a part of his crew as a map maker, and told her that if she brought him 100,000,000 he would free her village and everyone in it, including her adoptive sister Nojiko.

Destruction of Arlong Park
Years later, when Nami was about to fulfill her end of the bargain using money she stole from Monkey D. Luffy, Arlong arranged to have a corrupt Marine captain confiscate the money from her so she would be forever under his control.



Luffy, who followed Nami after being robbed by her, saw Nami brutally stabbing Arlong's tattoo on her arm in desperation. Angered by the obvious suffering Arlong had wrought against her, Luffy stopped her from hurting herself and unquestioningly accepted her plea for help. A long and arduous battle ensued between Luffy, Arlong, and the elites of their crews. While Zoro, Sanji and Usopp were able to defeat their opponents, in their tired and injured states they were absolutely no match for Arlong, although they helped save Luffy from a pool of water, enabling him to challenge Arlong.



By the end of the fight, only Luffy and Arlong were left standing and Luffy was taking a beating from Arlong's high-speed diving attack Shark On Darts and his sword Kiribachi (Saw Shaped Sword), which resembled a long steel saw with teeth shaped like a shark's. Luffy seemed to be on the verge of defeat until the battle moved into the top of Arlong Park, where Nami slavishly made her maps for Arlong as a child.

After feeling the turmoil and desperation that had seeped into the room over the years, Luffy became enraged and the tables turned dramatically.

Using the full power of his attack Gomu Gomu no Ono, Luffy managed to send the full force of Arlong's attack: Shark On Haguruma attack through to the bottom of Arlong Park, destroying the building in the process.

Later, Arlong and the rest of his crew are arrested imprisoned by the Marines. Hachi was the only one to escape.

Fishman Island Arc
Arlong was often referred to when the Straw Hat Pirates arrived at Fishman Island. Hammond identifies Luffy as the one who put an end to Arlong's ambition, and it seems that Arlong is considered a hero among the New Fishman Pirates, who share his symbol and his hatred toward humans.

Hordy Jones mentions that he shared the same ideals as Arlong and at the time when the Straw Hat Pirates defeated the Arlong Pirates he was gathering strength at Fishman Island in order to be his right hand man. Hordy Jones claims to have learned from his hero's mistakes, referring to Arlong as a classless barbarian.

Major Battles

 * Arlong vs. Bellemere
 * Arlong vs. Sanji and Roronoa Zoro
 * Arlong vs. Monkey D. Luffy

Translation and Dub Issues
Arlong's brutality was censored in the 4kids dub, as seen when threatened to imprison Bellemere instead of murdering her for not paying her tribute. He does not offer to spare everyone except the other Straw Hats if Nami rejoins, or threaten to kill everyone in Cocoyashi if she leaves. During the climax of the battle, scenes of him slamming Nami's head against a desk for drawing a picture of Bellemere instead of a map, and threatening to kill someone from Cocoyashi Village if she disobeyed him, as well as Luffy destroying the maps, are removed.

He was also given a gargly sound to his voice in the 4Kids dub, and he refers to humans as "Pew-mans".

In the FUNimation dub, Arlong's dialogue was made much more believable and accurate to the original translation. However, Arlong's unique laugh "Shahahaha" is not kept. According to a spokesman from FUNi when they took over, the reason for the loss is that in many cases the unique laughters of some characters were hard to convey over from the orginal Japanese version and were simply lost in the translation and dubbing process.

Trivia

 * Many of One Piece's characters are given an distinct laugh. Arlong starts his laughs with either "Sha" or "She" (i.e Shahahahaha!/Shehehehe!). At one point when fighting against Luffy, Luffy mocked Arlong using his own laugh. This is missing from the English dub.
 * In a panel containing a small flashback scene of Hatchan's, Arlong's silhouette is seen alongside Hatchan's, Kuroobi's, and Chew's as they look upon Sabaody Park in a distance from the water.
 * Coincidentally "Ah-long", which has the same pronunciation as "Arlong", means Loan Shark in Singapore Chinese-Hokkien Dialect.
 * In the 4th Japanese fan poll, Arlong is ranked the 48th most popular character in One Piece.
 * In the fourth movie, Arlong was given a former rival: Willy.

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