SaNami theory: The power of love
SPOILERS UP UNTIL CHAPTER 1030.
After recent chapters with Sanji awakening his powers and his reactions to it I am very curious to see how Oda is going to solve this. He is going to need to address it in some way and give a good resolution for Sanji’s current inner turmoil. My idea is that if Sanji figures out that his powers come from his emotions, and he realizes that he is nothing at all like his brothers, he might accept his powers and be willing to use them moving forward despite his hate for Germa. I think Nami could be used as the trigger for Sanji to understand his powers and then also feel comfortable with who he is even with the powers.
I have little faith in this theory actually happening, mostly because it’s too shippy for Oda. But I couldn’t get it out of my head and felt it worked fairly well, so I ended up writing it down.
What we know at this point is that Sanji is awakening his Germa powers and that he doesn’t want them. This means that Oda will likely have to deal with it in some way so that Sanji accepts them. It also needs to work with what we saw happen in WCI and be done in a way that feels like it makes sense for Sanji’s character.
Sanji doesn’t want to use the Germa powers, but he already has, so he seems open to change his mind if the reasons are good enough. Of course it’s very different if his whole body changes, and I totally understand Sanji’s worrry and fear of turning into something like his brothers.
He doesn’t want to “be a moster like them”, which means he might need to see the difference between himself and his brothers and come to understand his powers as something good. (Unless Oda actually goes down the route of Sanji losing his emotions, but that would mean a whole lot more drama and inner conflict for Oda to solve.)
The thing is that here Sanji says that he doesn’t want to lose his emotions, and that is likely his biggest fear. So, if instead he doesn’t lose his emotions, but understand that his emotions is what awakened his powers it could make him accept them. Oda writes out “I need to figure out what caused this” so it’s likely Oda has a specific reason for why it happened, and will show Sanji figure it out.
At the moment it seems Usopp and Nami got separated, and also that Sanji is moving away from his initial fighting spot, this makes it possible for them to cross paths during Sanji’s fight with Queen and while he tries to understand his current powers.
But now I want to go into a bit more small things that make me think this could work and that Oda might have foreshadowed it.
To start off, I think that if there is one person Sanji could consider becoming a “monster” for to begin with it’s Nami and he’s said as much before.
The first time Sanji meets Nami he says that he is willing to become a devil for her. Later in Skypiea he repeats a similar sentiment about becoming the devil of the blue sea if Enel hurts Nami.
Then again we have Sanji in Thriller Bark catching on fire when he learns about Nami being kidnapped and that Absalom wants to marry her. We’ve in other words seen Sanji being prepared to go very far for Nami’s sake and him already seemingly getting powered up by his feelings.
We also know that Sanji’s feelings have made him stronger before in other examples, perhaps most notably with his attack “Hell’s memories” which is literally fueled by anger.
But also the fact that his fire powers are described to be because his “passion burns hotter than flames”.
Basically, Sanji’s fire power at least seems to stem from his emotions. If his new awakening is also because of emotions I think that would work in line with Sanji’s character and be something he can accept rather than if it’s the opposite, that his Germa powers will remove his feelings (which is of course another possibility). Still, at least to some extent Sanji already seems to gain power from his emotions.
You have other small examples of this, for example the cigarette burning more when Sanji is speaking to Capone about his family, or even something as silly as Sanji getting a speed boost after touching Nami’s breast in Punk Hazard.
“What kind of source of power do you call that?” It’s possible these small moments with Nami have been foreshadowing for something that’s about to come.
Now looking at what seems to have triggered the awakening of Sanji’s powers he specifically says he has felt strange since the second time he wore the Raid suit.
If I am not mistaken he wore it the second time when he saw Nami naked in the bath (the first being when he fought Page 1 and third being when he saved Momo), and it’s possible his strong reaction might have triggered his powers in some way. I just wonder why it would be so specific as Sanji feeling off after the second time in particular.
It might sound silly, but it wouldn’t be too odd for Oda to make Sanji’s pervertedness/love into a source of power. The thing I think speaks the most against this is why the Raidsuit would react to feelings when Judge clearly never meant for his children to have feelings at all. Still, it’s possible Sanji’s feelings have always been the thing to power him, and now with the raidsuit on these Germa powers get more easily dragged out of him so to speak.
Looking at the current situation it’s possible that if Sanji realizes that 1. the second time he wore the suit he saw Nami naked, and 2. he gets a second moment with Nami now that somehow makes him feel different he could connect the two and figure out it was Nami and his emotions that triggered it when he wore the raid suit in the bathhouse.
I also think that out of anyone Nami might be one of few Sanji is willing to change for. Again, he has basically already expressed it a few times, how far he is willing to go for her. So if he gets put in a situation where Nami needs him to use his powers, he might put her above anything. It’s also possible that Nami could be used as a way for Sanji to understand the source of his powers, if it’s true that feelings are triggering them.
Nami was there in WCI and has even mentioned Sanji being different from his brothers. If Sanji realizes that feelings is in fact what makes him stronger and has triggered the latent powers it will still work with Sora’s wish and show how Sanji is both different and in a way better than his siblings specifically because of his love.
If Nami can help Sanji realize that it’s not what he has in common with his brothers, but what makes them different is what’s important, then he might be able to overcome his problem with changing. We know he already is changing and it’s likely going to be permanent, so in the end Oda will have to solve this in some way for Sanji to move forward. If we are lucky Oda might use Nami in regards to Sanji finally accepting himself as he is and help him change his perspective.
It also matches with Sanji’s theme of “Love is a hurricane” and cheesy as it might be the “power of love” being a source of strength for Sanji. Which we have seen expressed before by Sanji’s zombie in Thriller Bark as he jumped in to save Nami.
In the end I just felt it could all match up rather neatly.
Sanji can come to understand that his powers come from his feelings. Not that he will lose them and become like his brothers.
Considering the timing it’s possible that what triggered the awakening was when he saw Nami naked while wearing the raid suit.
Sanji can start to accept that his kindness and emotions is what matters and makes him very different from his family, just like Sora already expressed.
Sanji’s powerup will be related to his love and want to protect.
Nami is one person that knows about Sanji’s family and has seen the difference between him and them.
Nami is someone Sanji has been willing to become a devil for before and it could have been foreshadowing from Oda.
So that’s it. The power of love (or perhaps lust?) could be a trigger for Sanji’s powers and Nami might be part in how Sanji realizes this and also accepts the powers as a part of himself.
Thank you for reading, and let me know what you think. Any possibility at all of this happening or am I just dreaming up shippy scenarios?
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