User blog comment:LuffyPirateKing/Villains/@comment-124.13.52.244-20110709164049

With Blackbeard, he's done awful things to characters we care about, so I empathize with the reaction of some people for hating him, but eh, he's not a favorite but I don't really hate him for it. (the characters definitely do, of course) Looking at what he's contributed to the story and thus how much I enjoyed following it, his actions were what lead to that epic rescue Ace arc and the great points in the story that came from it: all those epic character moments/fights, the emotional scenes with Luffy about his relationship with Ace and all that character development, the start of a new era and that feeling you get of things having impact. His character was necessary for all those stuff to happen and make OP such a great story. Also, isn't managing to leave scars on Shanks before he got his powers a testament to how strong/skilled he is or make you wonder that there is more to him?

He's designed to be the kind of asshole character for readers/watchers to hate, but Oda is not so single-minded that he didn't also make him more complicated than that (contrast with the World Nobles, who are just flat out evil and despicable), which I like because it makes One Piece all the more interesting. Blackbeard is like a darker version of Luffy, an exploration different types of characters with the Will of D, which I think was cool of Oda to do. Adds more variety to the concept and makes it look less black and white in that not all Ds have to be good people. He knows what is important to him, has his own dreams and is willing to do what he needs to get it and is has shown to be extremely capable and competent at it too. He has no sympathy for people who get in his way or with Tatch, Ace and Luffy, people he needs to hurt to accomplish his goals. To him it's nothing personal; those people don't mean anything to him. He's definitely not good in that he doesn't care about other people, but that doesn't mean he doesn't have some sort of integrity for what he believes in. His page on this wiki under "personality" does a good job covering it.

I didn't mind Enel but found him a bit typical and was slightly disappointed that Oda didn't do more with his character. He felt like another narcissistic type guy with a god complex with not much new. His powers were also inconsistent in places. He was insanely powerful sometimes, other times he wasn’t or didn’t use his power when he easily could have. Wanna say more but I’m getting lazy and this comment has turned into a blog post on its own. Thanks if you actually read through all that. Voted for Crocodile, he’s awesome. ~Zae(not bothered to get an account)