Like I've read so many fics set with the Whitebeard Pirates such as when Ace first joins or when all three ASL brothers are adopted by Whitebeard as children, and many of those stories have most of the crew be like, "That's Teach. He's creepy and we don't trust him so you shouldn't trust him either."

Obviously people can write whatever they want in their fanfiction and it doesn't have to follow canon 100% but I just personally feel like the weight of Teach's betrayal is lighter when the Whitebeards distrust and dislike Teach long before he becomes Blackbeard.

To me, it takes away from the shock and tragedy of Teach killing Thatch. If the crew already didn't like or trust Teach from the start, there is little shock when he kills Thatch.

I think it's far more interesting if the crew genuinely likes Teach as a person, think of him as a brother or friend, and trust him to have their backs. We didn't get to see much of Teach's time with the Whitebeards but I never got the feeling that he was an outcast on the crew.

Take Ace's reaction for example to Teach killing Thatch. Yes, Ace was angry that Thatch was killed but there was a deeper level to that anger because Thatch had been killed by someone on the crew. Someone they were meant to trust. It's the betrayal that made Thatch's already sad death all the more tragic. And betrayal can't come from someone you already don't trust. Betrayal has to come from an ally for it to even meet the definition of betrayal. It's this betrayal that Ace felt from Teach that kicked off such a huge chain of events that ultimately lead to Ace's own death. It doesn't hold as much weight if Thatch and Ace already didn't like Teach from the start.

They desserve the effort, always..

Drawing the batfam as chaotic images I find on Pinterest everyday for 30 days; Day 4