WHY Imu Wants Shuri!!

So, in a recent live stream, we got to discussing how the Elbaf arc will pan out for Shiri. What's going to happen to her by the end of the Elbaf arc? What are some future scenarios? And this is what we, or at least I, landed on. Future scenario number one, Imu regains control of Shiri and she is taken away for a future confrontation or battle with Brook and the Straw Hats in another arc. Number two, Brook and the Straw Hats save her and she becomes one of the Straw Hats. Number three, Brook and the Straw Hats save her, but she remains on Elbaf, you know, with Bonnie and Lilith and the other Elbafian giants. But one thing that was noted in the case of future scenarios two and three, is that once Gunko is reverted back to Shiri and taken from Imu's grasp and control, Imu's likely to take away his powers and life force, similar to what we saw happen with Saint Jaygarcia Saturn at the end of the Egghead Island arc. And in Saint Saturn's case, I'm sure you all remember, this rendered him completely lifeless. And it's not exactly clear how it all works, but it's likely that Saint Saturn's demise was because Saturn, along with most of the other Gorosei, seem to only be alive because of Imu's life force. We know that Saint Saturn must be at least over 200 years old because we saw him back alive during that flashback when Emmet was discovered and he still looked very much the same age as in the near present. And given Saint Saturn isn't or wasn't a giant who are known to live for hundreds of years and we haven't received any other explanation as to why he has such a long lifespan, the most straightforward, the most probable answer that we've all concluded is that that's because Imu has been sustaining Saint Saturn alongside the other Gorosei, giving him immortality or at least greatly elongating his life. So, when that gift was taken away, Saturn became a shriveled up corpse, rendered to a state that he would have been or should have been without Imus life force. So then when it comes to Shuri, well we know or we at least suspect that she too must be a recipient of Imus life prolonging abilities because according to Brooke if Gunko really is Shuri then she should be an older lady by now. But Shuri still very much looks like she is in her teens or early 20s. So the question is if Imu takes away his life force what then happens to Shuri? Will she die all shriveled up like Saint Saturn? Is it then in her interest to remain under Imus control so that she doesn't meet her death? Well then that becomes a bit more of a personal philosophical question of whether it's better to live forever enslaved or to die free which is also a false dichotomy in this case because in my opinion I don't think Shuri would necessarily die just because Imu takes away his immortality or life prolonging gift. I think the more likely scenario is that Shuri would turn into an old woman, a very very old woman because I think she would just revert to what her age would be if not for Imus powers. So basically 77 years old. Now an argument could be made and has been made during the stream that the impact of the trauma of having lived the majority of your life under captivity compounded with sudden aging might actually be too much for her to handle and this could very well cause her unfortunate death or possibly cause her to at least go comatose which sidebar is actually what seems to have happened currently as she appears unconscious in that block of ice ever since Imu left her body. But without this added layer of complexity then I think it's very very well possible that Shuri could just be turned back into an elderly lady or should I say returned to what her age should be if not for Imu. And in the world of One Piece 77 is not that old even amongst humans non giants. There are plenty of very spry almost 80 year olds and Shuri is clearly fit has kept up good athletic health, has been training since a very young age, so I think she will be fine. That being said, I don't know if she'll actually become a Straw Hat. Firstly, as far as we know, Shuri doesn't have a goal or a dream, which has become one of the core requirements of becoming a Straw Hat, a dream to fulfill. Of course, we may very well discover that Shuri does indeed have a dream, because we are only at the precipice of her character development. But secondly, to me, Shuri feels very much like yet another arc princess who needs saving or helping, but won't actually join the crew. You know, other classic examples are Shirahoshi or Rebecca. And Oda does vary this dynamic every now and then with the arc princess to make sure the trope doesn't feel too repetitive. For example, in Wano, although a princess did exist in Hiyori, our emotional anchor was really Momonosuke, a prince. And then Oda later also introduced Yamato as another princess-type archetype. But very interestingly, Yamato was the child of the antagonist and yet sided with the case of Elbaf, there are again layers to this trope. Loki is somewhat the princess, or I guess I should say the prince, but clearly isn't a damsel in distress. He will be doing a lot of the heavy lifting himself. And then Oda has now also brought in a second flashback as we traverse the happenings of another kingdom, Esperia, and the plight of the princess of this other kingdom, enter Shuri. In any case, I do very much feel like Shuri will be yet another Yamato or Momonosuke or Carrot, someone who chooses to stay behind or needs to stay behind. In this case, most likely because Lilith will try and figure out a way to reverse some of the damage that Shuri sustained. Or maybe Shuri will volunteer herself to be experimented upon to find out the secrets behind Im's powers, why Im's able to control her, how the covenant works, how to break his control. Anyways, the question that I am more interested in is what did Imu want with Shuri? Hence today's discussion. And if you enjoy discussing One Piece, then make sure to subscribe to the channel so that you don't miss out on any future videos. And please also, just to help out a fellow fan, reach 100,000 subscribers. Okay, so let's set the scene. Brook mentioned that the last time he saw Shuri, she was leaving for Mary Geoise a long, long time ago. But not before he witnesses the bloody scene of his benefactor, King Luven, dead at the hands of Princess Shuri. Shuri herself coldly remarking that the World Government war with Esperia is already over and supposedly happy at this fact. But as we continue to see in this Elbaf arc, a strong recurring theme is that you cannot believe everything you hear or see. For example, we found out during this Elbaf arc that Rocks, despite having previously been said to have represented a great evil that caused even enemies in Garp and Roger to team up to defeat, that was far from the case. Or Loki, known as the Accursed Prince, who killed his own father in cold blood in an act of unfettered ambition, again, far from the case. And of course, in both cases, Imu's devilish abilities and control of both Rocks and Harold was the core factor that resulted in their untimely deaths. And as of chapter 1,185, this is what also seems to be the case of Shuri's tragic past as well. Shuri seems to be under Imu's control, most likely the Domi Reverse Sea, when she killed her father. As to why Oda seems to be repeating the same plot thread, I'm not too sure. Maybe he thinks we haven't quite understood Imu's powers yet and he really wants to hammer this in. Interestingly, in this scenario, it seems that both Shuri and her father were under Imu's control because we see the horns on King Luven, too. So this scenario may be that Luven managed to resist Imu's control even after being Domi Reverse Sea, or even after being turned, much like Rocks and Harold, but for whatever reason, Shuri was not. You know, that could be because of her a age, or it could be some other reasons that we are going to get to later about the susceptibility of Shuri to Im's powers. Cough cough, the suspicious heterochromia. Either way, that might be why she killed her father, or supposedly killed her father, and seems to show no remorse at the end of chapter 1185. Perhaps the two were forced to kill each other, but Luven let Shuri win, or maybe even begged for Shuri to kill him. And just a side thought here, I guess a fourth alternative for Shuri's future is that she asks Brook and the Straw Hats to kill her because she'd rather die than to continue to live and commit crimes against her wishes. You know, just to continue that pattern of those falling under Im's control die at the hands of their loved one as an act of mercy. But then, of course, the Straw Hats aren't going to kill her, which then also rounds out this theme that Luffy truly is the Sun God Nika and liberates the oppressed, even those who have fallen under the spell of the devil. Look, I don't want to dwell too long on what happened and how it all played out because we're probably going to find out exactly what happened in the very next chapter or so. In fact, if the spoilers are out by the time I release this discussion, then you may already be commenting that I'm right or way wrong. But please refrain from doing either of those because I very much enjoy reading comments and don't want to get spoiled. More importantly, my interest is in why Im has chosen Shuri and has continued to keep her by his side. Because Im has clearly elevated Shuri to a person of great importance. While we have known for a while that Celestial Dragons do take humans up to usually to treat as wives or maids or slaves, Shuri seems to be a special case where she appears to have been adopted into one of the noble families, now being known as Saint Manma Gunko. And that's a very different scenario to say someone like Ginny, for example, who was taken in as the eighth wife of one of the Celestial Dragons, and then abandoned once she contracted a disease as a result of the experimentation forced upon her. Compare that to Shuri who has reached the status of the Holy Knights, an elite squad that hold authority over the Celestial Dragons. And that's a big deal. Think about the elitist scummery of the Celestial Dragons. They view and regard regular humans and all other species for that matter as trash, as below them. So, to allow one of these lowly humans to reach a rank that gives her authority to pass judgment over their royal world nobleness? I would say that is a huge deal. Not to mention that Shuri has also been chosen to be the personal attendant of Imu himself as we saw during the Rocks flashback. And then, what's even more, Imu has seemingly gifted her with immortality. Not just regenerative powers, but immortality or life prolonging. And again, this means Gungnir stands out. As far as we can tell from the other Holy Knights who have been gifted the regenerative powers, meaning that even if they sustain damage to their bodies, they heal. But, they haven't necessarily been granted immortality. As seen through Figarland Garling, the Holy Knights, even those who reach the top commander spot, they still age. However, the Gorosei, who are Imu's closest advisers and sit just underneath Imu in terms of world authority, they have or they seem to have been granted this immortality. Again, we talked about Saint Saturn at the very beginning of this video. Whereas Gungnir, despite only being a Holy Knight, not one of the Gorosei, she seems to be a benefactor of this immortality because she looks around the same age as she did 56 years ago. All of which is to say, Imu seems to have a soft spot for Gungnir. And my question is, why? Or maybe a more apt way to put it is that he has a much more sinister plan and control over Gungnir. Is it because of her blue hair? Maybe Shuri reminds Imu of Nefertari Lily, whom we know Imu to be incredibly obsessed with? Or a really left field idea. What if Shuri was conceived while either Luven or Kendal was under Imus control? And so in a weird way, Shuri is of Imus blood/lineage, and that's why he wants her back. Maybe that's also why Shuri has heterochromia, and that explaining why her right red eye looks suspiciously similar to Imus ringed red eyes. Which look, I don't really believe is the case, and as jokey as the idea sounds, this would actually be a case of sexual assault. And while Oda has shown, or at least alluded to sexual assault before in the series, this would really take things to a weird and uncomfortably distressing body control territory. But I do think that the heterochromia part of the theory has legs, in that I do think that Shuri's unique eyes may be what attracted Imu to Shuri, and why he has chosen her out of all people to be style special privileges. Because special eyes is a real thing in One Piece already, and it's not just simply a design choice. Think of Pudding in the three-eye tribe. We know that their awakening of their special third eye allows them to hear the voice of all things. And while all the secrets behind all the special or unique eyes in One Piece has yet to be revealed, and some hold more speculative importance than others, I am convinced that Shuri's heterochromia does have some significance. It's certainly a most unique design choice, because it made Gung-ho stand out immediately upon her introduction. And I think as we found out more about her characterization, especially the hints that she has been indoctrinated against her will, and the fact that she's vulnerable to possession by Imu, many of us probably assumed that her heterochromia may be linked to her falling under Imu's control. That's certainly what I thought. But interestingly, more recently via Brook's flashback, we found out that this condition was actually present even before Shuri was corrupted by Imu, possibly since birth. And I was quite surprised to see that her condition hasn't been mentioned in this flashback yet. The citizens of Esperia or family don't seem to make a big deal about her heterochromia at all, which is a very different scenario to other characters who have had unique eyes. You know, both Pudding and Loki have been ostracized even by their own families because of their eyes. But regardless of whether the people of Esperia have any opinions of Shiryu's heterochromia or not, again, we're very early into this flashback. I think Imu certainly does. When you think about it from real-world myths and beliefs across lots of different cultures in the world, heterochromia has been believed to be a sign of otherworldlyness. In Japanese culture, also, it was believed that a person with heterochromia has some connection to the spirit realm. And if it's true that heterochromia is linked to the spirit realm in One Piece, then this could mean that Shiryu is more susceptible to control by Imu and his devil forces. Imu may have sensed or known that Shiryu would be an easy target for control. And this is why Shiryu in particular has been chosen not only to be taken against her will to Mary Geoise, but treated a lot more specially than other humans that have been taken by the Celestial Dragons. Why she's granted special authority to not only join the ranks of the Holy Knights, but to serve Imu personally. If she is more susceptible to control, maybe Imu can be assured that there is a low chance, a lower risk of Gunko betraying him. Which is also why he might have been so personally offended when that seemed to be not the case and Shiryu temporarily regained control of her own mind trying to save Brook. Of course, a much more straightforward explanation is that the mismatched eye colors is simply a visual representation of the character's split personality or duality. It's supposed to be much more symbolic rather than having actual any real-world explanation or in-world explanation. Which does fit perfectly with Gunko, who does indeed have layers to her personality due to her tragic past. Something that Brooke explicitly commented on saying that she seems to have three distinct personalities. And then another idea I have is that rather than Shuri herself being special, there's also a great chance that her kingdom Esperia is a lot more significant than we realize. And Shuri, well, she just happens to be the icing on the cake. But the significance of Esperia is another discussion for another time. So, if you want to hear my thoughts on that then make sure to subscribe so that you don't miss out on any future One Piece videos. Please like and share the video if you've enjoyed today's discussion. Comment below your thoughts on Shuri, her specialness, or even the specialness of Esperia. I'd love to know what you think. You can also help support the channel further by becoming a patron or channel member like these are wonderful, wonderful people. And as always, thank you so, so much for listening to another one of my crazy One Piece ramblings. This is Joey Girl and I'll see you again soon.