Tropes A to B (Adaptation-Induced Plot Hole, Arc Villain, Berserk Button, Beware the Silly Ones, Big Brother Instinct, Bowdlerise, Break the Cutie) | Tropes C to D (Call-Back, Chekhov's Gun, Cliffhanger, Combat Pragmatist, Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass, Curb-Stomp Battle, Dark and Troubled Past, Deconstructed Character Archetype) | Tropes E to F (Early Installment Weirdness, Famous Last Words, Foreshadowing) | Tropes G to J (Heart is an Awesome Power, Hypocrite) | Tropes K to M (Laser-Guided Karma, Logical Weakness, Mass "Oh, Crap!", Moral Myopia, Muscles Are Meaningless) | Tropes N to P (Nice Job Fixing It, Villain, Oh, Crap!, O.O.C. Is Serious Business) | Tropes Q to S (The Reveal, Shout-Out, Spanner in the Works, Superpower Lottery) | Tropes T to Z (Wham Episode, Wham Line)
Deconstructed Character Archetypes in this series.
- Badass in Distress is deconstructed with Portgas D. Ace during the Paramount War arc. The moment this badass was rescued after a long time as a Distressed Dude, he fought alongside his savior Luffy... and all of a sudden, Ace died protecting Luffy from the enemy, sending the poor dude into an Heroic BSoD. It goes to show that even if a badass is saved at first, there's no guarantee they'll make it out alive of ensuing conflict.
- From the above, the Whitebeard War Saga deconstructs Luffy's Determinator traits. To save his brother Ace, Luffy has to go to the deepest level of Impel Down, and he gets heavily poisoned by the Chief Warden Magellan in the way. Even though Luffy's determination helped him to heal faster than normal when he got some healing hormones from Ivankov, he got some lifespan loss from doing so. And then Luffy and company have to go all the way back up, because Ace has been taken to Marineford for execution, meaning it was All for Nothing. And it doesn't stop there - fast forward when Luffy finally saved Ace, Admiral Akainu kills him. As mentioned, Luffy has an epic Heroic BSoD that lasts for about a week.
- The Zombie Oars from the Thriller Bark arc, being animated by Luffy's shadow, is a Decon-Recon Switch of the Implacable Man. His inability to feel pain, along with being later supported by Gecko Moria's Devil Fruit powers, allowed him to overwhelm the Straw Hats while tanking through their attacks. But the Straw Hats eventually exploit the disadvantage of a zombie's lack of a pain threshold to gradually damage Oars' body parts before shattering his spine, rendering him paralyzed to his confusion.
- From the above, the Whitebeard War Saga deconstructs Luffy's Determinator traits. To save his brother Ace, Luffy has to go to the deepest level of Impel Down, and he gets heavily poisoned by the Chief Warden Magellan in the way. Even though Luffy's determination helped him to heal faster than normal when he got some healing hormones from Ivankov, he got some lifespan loss from doing so. And then Luffy and company have to go all the way back up, because Ace has been taken to Marineford for execution, meaning it was All for Nothing. And it doesn't stop there - fast forward when Luffy finally saved Ace, Admiral Akainu kills him. As mentioned, Luffy has an epic Heroic BSoD that lasts for about a week.
- The Enies Lobby arc deconstructs Welcome Back, Traitor with one of the Straw Hat Pirates. The argument between Luffy and Usopp about the Going Merry, results in Usopp challenging Luffy to a duel and leaving the Straw Hats, with the winner getting to decide what happens with the Going Merry. Luffy wins, but gives Merry over to Usopp and says they're getting a new ship, and that's final. Later in the arc, the traitor wishes to come back to the Straw Hats, to which Luffy is initially enthusiastic. But Zoro tells Luffy to back off, and that he should wait until the traitor has apologized to Luffy before letting them rejoin the Straw Hats. The traitor not only left, but undermined Luffy's authority as captain of the ship when they did by refusing to follow Luffy's orders. Zoro argues that regardless of how Luffy personally feels about his crewmates, he can't have his crew questioning his decisions or trying to disobey his orders, because that will mean trouble down the line. Luffy can't find fault with Zoro's argument, even though Zoro is being harsh about it. Even Sanji, who frequently butts heads with Zoro, says that he doesn't like what he's hearing but admits that Zoro is absolutely right. It's only after the traitor formally apologizes and admits they made a mistake that they're allowed back onto the crew.
- Tashigi is a Plucky Girl, but this attitude gives her the terrible habit of picking fights with people that are way out of her league, especially ones such as Robin or Law, who have powers that easily render Tashigi's own abilities useless.
- The Vinsmoke family deconstructs a few tropes:
- Token Good Teammate is deconstructed through Reiju, Sanji's older sister. She is actually a nice and decent person, but the Vinsmokes' very low opinion of kindness and empathy has made Reiju terrified for her own life, only performing acts of kindness when her family isn't around. The constant pretending to support her family's actions and behavior has left Reiju with deep self-loathing, to the point she wants her family and herself to die as the only way to atone for their actions.
- Similarly, Lack of Empathy is deconstructed through the Vinsmoke brothers not named Sanji. As it turns out, their father experimented on them in-utero to make them unfeeling monsters who can lead his armies to win back the North Blue, without 'morality' getting in their way. As a result, they are unable to understand why their brother was cooking for the rats, and even their mother, and constantly beat him up due to showing 'weakness'. They could not even visit their ailing mother due to just not feeling anything for her.
- The Vinsmoke brothers also deconstruct Face Death with Dignity due to the above example, as when the Vinsmoke Family was rounded up for execution, while Judge was begging to be spared like the Dirty Coward that he is, the brothers laugh at him and just dare the Big Mom Pirates to shoot them already. Despite wishing her and their family dead for their crimes, even Reiju realizes the brothers can't realize the concept of death and would be saying different words had they been born normal, and blames their father for robbing them of the concept due to his blind ambition for power. Overall, the point is they are facing death with dignity with no true idea what's about to befall them, which shows how mentally disturbed each brother is.
- The Vinsmoke children as a whole deconstruct the Tyke-Bomb archetype. All of them (including Sanji) were groomed by Judge to be Super Soldiers and commanders who will lead Germa 66 to greatness, with the Vinsmoke brothers having their empathy outright removed by Judge in-utero. While it made the Vinsmoke children 'stronger' as Judge intended, removing their empathy contributed to their family's extreme dysfunction and ruined their ability to live normal lives. The Vinsmoke brothers can only be cruel, sociopathic assholes because they were made that way, while Reiju is a self-loathing Death Seeker who utterly hates her family and wants to die to atone for her sins as a Vinsmoke. And had the Vinsmoke children's mother not sacrificed herself to preserve their empathy, Sanji would have shared the same fate as his siblings, which would have wiped out the entire family.
- Vinsmoke Judge deconstructs the Emperor Scientist. A former research colleague of Dr. Vegapunk, he fled when the World Government came after his team for performing Lineage Factor experiments, abandoning Vegapunk and most of their peers to their fates. As King of Germa 66, he created most of Germa's technology, such as the Raid Suits, cloning, and gene modification. However, instead of using his talents/creations for good, Judge instead uses it for conquest, breeding clones specifically for cannon fodder and meat shields, and experimenting on his own children to turn them into powerful Super Soldiers, all in the name of reconquering North Blue, the land of the Vinsmokes' ancestors. This leads to his family breaking apart - his wife Sora killed herself trying to save her children, and while Reiju and Sanji retained their empathy, the Vinsmoke brothers did not. Sanji ran away to escape the abuse he suffered, his brothers grow up to be cruel sociopaths because of their psychological alterations, and Reiju is a self-loathing wreck who wishes to die. And because of Judge's choices, his family nearly gets wiped out by the Charlotte family, and they lose their royal privileges once news of their former alliance with Big Mom gets out. It's made clear that everything the Vinsmokes suffered is pretty much his own fault, and now his family name is irreparably ruined.
- Similarly, Bellamy deconstructs Undying Loyalty. He was given a Curb-Stomp Battle by Donquixote Doflamingo during the aftermath of Jaya Arc, but Doflamingo took him back anyways, which Bellamy was immensely grateful for. After the Time Skip, it's revealed Doflamingo only cares about his higher executives, and anyone below is fair game. Doflamingo ordered Bellamy to assassinate Luffy, heavily conflicting him because he grew to have respect for him. Not satisfied, Doflamingo put an assassination order on Bellamy himself even if Bellamy succeeded, which broke Bellamy due to how much he respected the man. After he decides to confront Doflamingo about this, he basically admits he just wants to destroy the world. Doflamingo performs a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown on Bellamy and then puppeteers him to fight Luffy when he and Law approached Doflamingo. When Doflamingo releases Bellamy, he still decided to fight Luffy just because he couldn't turn his back despite all of the cruel treatment Doflamingo made him endure, even when the pedestal finally breaks for him, which angers Luffy when he finally defeats Bellamy. Eventually, Bellamy forsakes all connections with Doflamingo and his crew after the former's defeat, and even quits being a pirate (which was an inspiration from Doflamingo).
- The residents of Ebisu Town are all Perpetual Smilers because Orochi was tired of all the sorrow and tears from the citizens in poverty, so he sent them dud SMILE fruits that came with no powers to rob these citizens of the ability to do anything but smile. So now, the citizens are unable to express any emotions or facial expressions except for smiling and laughing, meaning they are unable to show their sadness, anger and pain while their family and friends suffer and starve to death around them.
- The Seven Warlords of the Sea show why Recruiting the Criminal has many, many problems. Despite allying with the Marines, the majority of them displayed utter contempt for them or outright blatantly betrayed them. Most of the things they do—running an illegal slave ring, never listening to proper authority, attacking innocent people and other Marines, taking over countries—are constantly brushed under the rug by the Marines. But even the corrupt Government are finally realizing the problem with how many losses the Warlords suffered (thus, losing their fearsome reputation) and the several public betrayals that the Warlord system is more trouble than it's worth. And after the Reverie, and with Vegapunk developing the Seraphims (Pacifista which are modified clones of the Warlords and can be controlled), the Warlord system is abolished completely and their former "allies" are quick to arrest them.
- Charlotte "Big Mom" Linlin acts like she's a Family-Values Villain, having a large family and wanting to have the many races of One Piece live together in harmony. In practice, however, most of her children are loyal out of fear rather than love due to her hunger tantrums, which leads them to cover up any mistakes out of fear of punishment. Even outside her hunger cravings, she's an Abusive Parent to any children that "wrongs" her, such as beating up Chiffon just for looking like her twin Lola, who ran away to avoid an Arranged Marriage. Even her dream of equal coexistence came from a pretend saint that was going to sell a 6-years-old Linlin to the marines if she and the other children weren't eaten by Linlin in one of her craving states. This lad to Linlin wanting to bring every race to her "Totto Land" like a collector. When she failed to win over the giants, she decided to make her own by funding an amoral scientist to share his gigantification research.
