While many are anticipating this arc to be Franky’s for good and obvious reasons, this arc could also cater to Nami. While Franky is the ship’s foremost engineer, Nami is a science lover. She has been able to leverage science to upgrade her climatact from useless contraception to an extremely useful weapon.
In the past, the weather changed the course of history when a “freak storm” altered the outcome of the battle between Roger and Shiki during the Edd War. More recently, it was a weather anomaly that allowed Luffy to cheat death and officially embark on his journey.
My point is that the weather often feels like it is a prominent character in this story, a force that has and continues to dictate the course of history.
The weather’s importance is emphasized in the latest chapter as we’re told that Vegapunk wants to control or tame it. He blames the lack of funding for his inability to achieve this monumental task. Is Nami on her way to achieving what the world’s smartest scientist couldn’t?
Typically, people use the wind and sky to predict the weather. However, Vivi noted that Nami’s ability to predict the weather defied logic. If this were simple observation haki, as many have theorized, I think Oda would’ve revealed this by now. My thesis is that Nami’s natural affinity to the weather has something to do with her ancestry. But that’s a topic for another post.
We learned that the two things that Vega Punk can’t fully tame or control are the “urges of living creatures”, & the weather — both products of nature. Perhaps it was by design that Kuma — someone who’s familiar with Vega Punk — sent Luffy to train in the wild amongst creatures with strong and uncontrollable animalistic urges , while he sent Nami to the heavens (so to speak) to learn how to control the weather.
Throughout the story, Nami has used her understanding of the weather to great effect. She used it to sank a Buggy men’s boat, to get the crew to hard to reach places and out of harm’s way. Nami has also used her knowledge to turn Usopp’s party contraption into a useful and potentially deadly weapon. Most impressively, she was able to leverage a Yonko’s own storm against her army, and her sentient cloud against her.
So far we’ve only scratched the surface of what the combined power of Nami’s knowledge of atmospheric science and Zeus can do. Also, it’s important to remember that Zeus was instrumental in allowing Big Mom to control the weather. I believe that Nami’s knowledge of atmospheric science will allow Zeus to do much more than he was able to under Big Mom. Again, a topic for another post.
My theory is that Nami is being setup to accomplish what Dr. Vegapunk could not. In this arc she will learn how to more effectively leverage Zeus and science to devastating effects. And she will prove that a little girl from the East Blue can accomplish without funding what the world smartest man couldn’t.
*Theory by ZipDaddy_Doo
