sorry to have zoro thoughts again but i’m having zoro thoughts again. anyways. zoro's dynamic with the crew has seemed off to me since wano and i want to explore it a bit. i'll go through egghead in this post since it felt really off in egghead, but i might make a post for elbaf too.
zoro always gets clowned on by the crew, but in egghead it felt a bit… much. and the clowning felt less like silly banter and more like everyone was trying to babysit him. a lot of people raised eyebrows at sanji calling him a liability (which was definitely a Moment) but we also had:
1) nami sending sanji to go help zoro when he and brook are facing cp0 and the seraphim, and sanji complaining about it like it’s a chore he has to do. plus a dig about zoro dying before they even make it to the one piece, which. maybe i'm reading too deep into this, but that feels uncharacteristic of their typical banter. (chapter 1072)
2) sanji, chopper, and robin telling him to sit down so he doesn’t get lost. what interests me here is that zoro doesn’t argue back — he complains a bit to luffy, but he does what they say without a fight. this is not typical for him. in the past he always fought back when people got on him for getting lost. also, i don't remember the crew ever having really stopped him from wandering off before (i.e. in sabaody.) they clown him a lot but they usually don't expressly tell him not to move. (chapter 1074)
3) luffy, kaku, and lucci yelling at him for not noticing the connection between king and the seraphim earlier. which is a silly gag moment, yes, but: zoro had already berated himself for "wasting their stamina" a moment earlier, so hearing it again probably doubles down on his insecurity. also, he once again doesn't argue back. (chapter 1077)
4) luffy assigning kaku to look after him so he doesn’t get lost. which is kind of funny coming from luffy of all people, considering he has the second-worst sense of direction on the crew and gets lost pretty frequently himself. (chapter 1078)
5) luffy offering to help zoro with his fight, to which zoro responds that he should focus on his fight with kizaru. this has got to sting for roronoa "leave it to me" zoro. (chapter 1093)
6) jinbe criticizing zoro, presuming that zoro is fighting lucci for the sake of fighting. the thing is, that assumption is wrong. zoro does not have one panel in his lucci fight where he grins, the way he typically does when he’s enjoying a fight. i know different people have different opinions on the zoro v. lucci fight, but my personal opinion is that zoro was taking the fight seriously the whole time and wasn't trying to draw it out; it's just that lucci is a powerful foe and zoro doesn't really have control over his conquerors haki yet. plus i think it’s a bit weird that jinbe gets on zoro specifically for this, considering luffy is also busy fighting at the same moment. (chapter 1107)
7) jinbe grabbing zoro by the scruff of the neck and talking to him like he's a misbehaving child. and again, zoro doesn't really push back on it. (chapter 1111)
by the way, i don't think either jinbe or zoro are in the wrong here. jinbe is right that they need to hurry and regroup, but zoro is also right that the fight with lucci wasn't entirely over with lucci still standing. because on the very next page, we have lucci giving a full report of the situation to st. marcus mars, including telling him about the whereabouts and plans of the strawhats — something he wouldn't have been able to do if zoro had finished the fight fully.
what strikes me about all of these moments is that... there is no back-and-forth. these moments either happen behind zoro's back without him there to respond, or if they happen in front of him he mostly doesn't respond — he kind of just accepts it. that feels atypical to me. zoro usually argues back, and he gives as good as he gets when it comes to getting clowned on. also, there doesn't really seem to be any goofy zoro v. sanji banter in egghead. the last of it happens in chapter 1060, right before they approach the island and the arc kicks off properly.
plus, the sheer number of strawhats who take part in the "babysitting" is wild. sanji, luffy, chopper, nami, robin, and jinbe — that's six people, over half the crew. these moments read fairly comedic in isolation and none of them feel glaringly out of the ordinary when it comes to the strawhats' dynamic with zoro; it's just that there are so many of these moments in a relatively short span of chapters, especially if you consider that a lot of egghead chapters don't even feature the strawhats. this is all on top of the moment where sanji says zoro is putting the entire crew in danger and calls him a liability (chapter 1110). plus lucci saying that zoro is the "deadweight" holding the crew back (chapter 1107).
this post isn't me suggesting that the crew is being mean to zoro (besides sanji calling zoro a liability, which was pretty mean, but i think sanji also has some stuff going on with his character). the situation on egghead was stressful, and none of these moments are very serious by themselves. but zoro feels off in egghead, and that means his relationship with the rest of the crew feels off too. to me, the biggest indicator of this is that zoro isn't arguing back or poking fun at his crewmates himself. i get the sense that there's a bit of distance between zoro and the rest of the crew throughout the arc.
will one piece explore this further in any way? i don't know, though i hope it will. i do agree with the theories that a zoro crashout is coming, but i have no idea how it will play out. i just really hope it's given the space to breath that it deserves.
