One Piece Creator Reveals His Favorite Villain

There are a lot of iconic villains in the world of anime. Dragon Ball Z has the likes of Freeza while other anime titles such as Bleach have Aizen. For One Piece fans, there are all sorts of baddies to choose from since the franchise has run for so long. From Akainu to Marshall D. Teach, Captain Luffy and his Straw Hat pirates have had plenty of villains to go up against.

Of course, fans each have their favorite henchmen that they've marked as their go-to. However, the creator of One Piece has a rather surprising choice when it comes to series' best baddie. In past interviews, Eiichiro Oda has spoken at length about his favorite pirates of One Piece, and the creator has consistently said his top villain is none other than Buggy the Star Clown.

You weren't expecting that, were you?

If you need a refresher on Buggy, then you should know the colorful character is the captain of the Buggy Pirates. The pirate is the main antagonist of the 'Orange Town' arc and has dipped in-and-out of One Piece for years now. A former apprentice of the Roger Pirates, Buggy left the crew to start up his own merry band of sea-faring thieves.

Fans can easily recognize Buggy by his untamed blue hair and red button nose. While the pirate is a dangerous one, the character does try to boast an intelligence he doesn't quite have, and Buggy is a genius with gag jokes. His run-ins with Luffy see Buggy nursing loss time and again, but the villain does somewhat soften after he encounters the rubbery hero. Buggy is still driven by his desire to beat Luffy just once, and his use of the Bara Bara no Mi fruit gives him enough edge to make himself a threat.

You can check out a description of One Piece from Viz Media below:

As a child, Monkey D. Luffy dreamed of becoming King of the Pirates. But his life changed when he accidentally gained the power to stretch like rubber—at the cost of never being able to swim again! Years later, Luffy sets off in search of the One Piece, said to be the greatest treasure in the world…

Eiichiro Oda began his manga career in 1992 at the age of 17, when his one-shot cowboy manga Wanted! won second place in the coveted Tezuka manga awards. Oda went on to work as an assistant to some of the biggest manga artists in the industry, including Nobuhiro Watsuki, before winning the Hop Step Award for new artists. His pirate adventure One Piece, which debuted in Weekly Shonen Jump magazine in 1997, quickly became one of the most popular manga in Japan.