In Chapter 995 Marco clashes with Big Mom as she demands he stay out of her way. I think Marco was the objective winner of this exchange and I’m going to explain why in detail below.
I’ve always thought Marco was a very underrated character, and I’ve always ranked him either towards the upper end of the First Mates or even as the strongest First Mate, I don’t think anything Marco has ever said or done has given anyone any reason to rank him as weak as most of the fan base ranks him.
I’ll also say that Big Mom’s portrayal here is not bad. Marco is objectively one of the strongest characters in the One Piece world even if you think of him as the weakest First Mate, and even though I don’t believe Big Mom was portrayed as being above him here (we’ll get into it), that’s just not bad portrayal, objectively. It’s just not. So let’s do it.
A couple of things to note here:
1. This is a completely equal clash in terms of physical power exerted by each character, similar to when Gear 4 Luffy and Big Mom clashed. This is to be expected as Marco is a Mythical Zoan and his physical abilities should be very high because of this. Big Mom even seems to be the one at the disadvantage here in the bottom right panel.
2. There is no indication, visually or otherwise, that either of these two characters is actually using Haki. Interesting to note, there are indications that Marco has Advanced Haki, while we have only ever seen “Flame Koka” from Big Mom. I won’t elaborate on either for now.
3. This is the first time we’ve seen Marco actually punch someone, but I’m not really sure what conclusions we can draw from this lol.
However, Marco was the clear winner of this one clash thanks to this moment here:
Marco and Big Mom clash as physical equals, but Marco had the Devil Fruit advantage. Marco points this out while smiling at Big Mom and showing no fear of her. Objectively speaking, advantage Marco.
This next part is where things get really weird for me.
Firstly, obviously note that Marco shows concern for Perospero, not Big Mom.
Second, I’ve seen people say that Big Mom choking Marco in and of itself shows an enormous power gap between the two. But this is wrong:
Luffy one shot Hajrudin but was helpless when Hajrudin grabbed him, showing that Big Mom grabbing Marco proves nothing about her power level. Oda does not write power levels in such a basic way.
Third, I just find it really uncharacteristic of Big Mom to ask Perospero to intervene here, especially when she chided Katakuri at the Wedding for doing something similar.
I’ve always subscribed the belief that Big Mom feels threatened by Katakuri and chided him to “keep him in his place”, so maybe this is a testament to how Big Mom trusts Perospero to know his place as well? He is her firstborn as well, it’s possible they share a deeper level of trust than she and the rest of her children.
The point I’m trying to make is that I think it’s simultaneously impossible to think that Big Mom would’ve defeated Marco here while she simultaneously asks Perospero to intervene in the fight. Marco has up until this point showed no fear of Big Mom whatsoever, and his concern for Perospero is very real:
The next thing that I think is interesting to note is that there is no clear indication of how Marco got out of Big Mom’s chokehold. She is holding him here:
But then he is mysteriously free here:
Does this mean that Marco escaped her chokehold? It’s inconclusive, but the thing is that whether or not Marco escaped her is irrelevant.
The fact is, I’ve seen a lot of Yonko fans saying Big Mom was going to defeat Marco when she had him in her grasp, but this flies in the face of the fact that Big Mom actively wanted and needed Perospero to intervene in one of her fights. You cannot say Big Mom could’ve beaten Marco when she uncharacteristically asks for help from one of her children. The meaning is clear, Big Mom could not defeat Marco on her own. At least, not quickly and easily.
And then of course Big Mom tries to save face:
Yeah yeah, I know, “Sengoku ordered her off of the ice!!” Or whatever Yonko fans will tell themselves to sleep at night.
This is exactly what we should expect from a character who asks her son to help her with a fight, and then her son is defeated, taking her only advantage away. Big Mom is an ego-driven character (she’s literally only in Wano due to her bruised ego), so let her say whatever she wants to save face.
Three final takeaways before I end this post:
First, I’ve seen people comparing Marco to Bound Man in terms of his AP because of this clash, but I actually think Marco’s AP is slightly weaker because Bound Man rattled Big Mom’s arm and Marco didn’t.
Second, this clash does not indicate that Marco is stronger than Big Mom. And while there is an argument that proves Marco is in fact stronger than Big Mom:
The only thing this clash tells us, is that Big Mom and Marco are a lot closer in power than most of the fandom believes, which is consistent with what I and other serious power scaling posters have been long time.
*Theory by Admiral Lee Hung
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