What do you get when you cross an extremely popular manga series that frequently goes on hiatus with its rabid theory-making fanbase? Chaos, anarchy, and confusion are some words that come to mind, as was the case with a recent One Piece manga hoax involving Blackbeard and a fan-favorite member of the Worst Generation.
As One Piece continues into its Final Saga, the long-running manga and anime continues to amass more and more fans; with a popular Netflix series and even more One Piece to come, the franchise’s fanbase is poised to continue growing at a massive rate. A larger fandom is hardly a problem, though it does make it more likely for misinformation to spread.
A TikTok uploaded early this year by user wbsolos caused a commotion thanks to a realistically drawn panel of the villainous Blackbeard. You might wonder how a single panel could cause an impact among One Piece readers — especially one you could easily verify as fake — but if you were online at all when Gear Five made its debut, you’d never doubt the power of a single panel. What event could shake up the One Piece community so badly?
Blackbeard defeating Law would be bad. Good thing he didn’t, right? Right?
The TikTok, shared in Jan. 2023, has been viewed over 800,000 times and shows a panel of Blackbeard grinning his trademark grin as he says the word, “Room.” This is instantly recognizable as what Trafalgar D. Law says when he activates his Op-Op Fruit’s signature ability which creates a sphere where everything within that area becomes part of an “operating table” he can manipulate. Using Room drains Law’s stamina but in return, he has access to abilities like severing body parts without hurting his “patients” and levitating objects however he wishes. It’s an incredibly powerful Devil Fruit, and not one you’d want in the hands of someone like Teach.
One Piece readers who are caught up on the manga will immediately clock this for the fake it is, but when it first made the rounds, it was completely plausible Blackbeard could defeat Law as easily as Shanks defeated Kid; and since we know Blackbeard was able to consume at least one more Devil Fruit than should be humanly possible, who’s to say he couldn’t absorb Law’s?
The TikTok originally claimed the panel was from Chapter 1072 which would release the following week at the time. Killing a fan-favorite like Law off screen would have been a big deal in the One Piece community, but thankfully, Law survived his encounter with Blackbeard with Devil Fruit intact.