Most feared might be a little bit of a stretch, as those that know who Buggy really is have no fear of him at all. In the world of One Piece though, Buggy the Clown is one of the Four Emperors, untouchable by the Navy, and head of a criminal empire! This sad clown who once sailed under Pirate King Gol D Roger is a classic case of falling upwards in the most comedic ways. Buggy might not be the Emperor most think he is, but he is the one everyone needs right now in One Piece.
Who is Buggy the Clown?
Buggy is a simple pirate with a simple goal- find treasure and get rich. He’s got the name Buggy thanks to his massive red nose, which is totally real and a very sensitive subject for him. When he’s first introduced it’s not so much a clown as a. terror of the East Blue, wreaking havoc on Orange Town. Luffy defeats him after a brief fight, but Buggy doesn’t let that get him down. If there’s one thing he’s known for besides his giant red nose, it’s his stubbornness for revenge.
Eventually, he would team up with Alvida, another pirate that Luffy pissed off when he first started out. Her powers of the Slip-Slip Fruit and his Chop-Chop Fruit combine to make a fearsome combo, but it’s just not quite enough. He’s eventually taken down and captured, sent to Impel Down for imprisonment by the Navy. In just his first of many lucky instances, the guards don’t realize he’s a Devil Fruit user and stick him in the Crimson Hell level. Buggy’s powers allow him to easily avoid the razor leaves and needle grass that line the fields, so he lives a life of luxury in the prison.
What Are Buggy’s Powers?
The infamous jester has two main fighting styles, one involving his Devil Fruit, and the other his love of explosions. In the typical maniacal clown stereotype, Buggy really loves to make things go boom when and wherever possible. The man is constantly tinkering around with his bombs, which he lovingly calls Buggy Balls. Yeah, there are a lot of jokes to be made there, but it’s not good to play with explosives. Still, he’s good at what he does, and makes the most of tampering with the size of his bombs for great effects.
His second ability, and the one that saves him the most, is his Devil Fruit power. Buggy ate the Chop-Chop Fruit when he was a young kid on Roger’s ship, and since then he can separate his body parts at will, and it allows him a somewhat limited range of levitation and flight. It also makes him near impervious to any sort of slicing attacks, which Zoro found out quickly in their first encounter. Buggy often couples the Chop-Chop abilities with his knives, stabbing and slicing anyone within range of his levitating limbs.
How Buggy Saved Luffy
That life of luxury in Impel Down? Brought crashing down around Buggy by none other than Straw Hat Luffy. The poor clown was minding his business when Luffy came storming through, getting Buggy involved along with Bon and Galdino. Despite his lingering hate of Luffy, the deal for Luffy’s armlet is too good for Buggy to pass up. He trades and helps with the jailbreak, becoming a hero of Impel Down prisoners as he gets all the credit.
The same thing even happens in Marineford, as Buggy bumbles into assisting Luffy thanks to lies by Shanks. His clout-chasing ways and stupid fanbase make him out as a hero of Marineford. Somehow, for some reason, the Navy falls for it. They don’t know that the “Genius Jester” is actually a total idiot. He manages to get the job as a Warlord, wasting a load of Navy money, too. Buggy is a hero to the working class.
Buggy the Clown, Emperor
There was barely even a rise to his time as an Emperor. Hell, it was just as much a surprise to Buggy as it was for the Straw Hat crew. The stupid clown was on the run from the Navy through the New World. By all accounts, he should be dead to rights then and there. Yet there’s a miraculous rescue at the last moment by an intervening Sir Crocodile. Of course, Crocodile only wanted the money that Buggy owes. He needs the capital in order to get a new operation going.
This is where the genius came in, thanks to total luck and Buggy’s desire not to die painfully. He doesn’t have the money, so he offers Crocodile the use of his ships and mercenaries from Buggy’s Delivery Service. They run by Hawkeye Mihawk, and establish themselves as a new threat in the New World, Cross Guild. Buggy’s people, in love with the dumbass they follow, put Buggy’s picture above Crocodile and Mihawk. The Navy sees that as a threat to power and influence, so Buggy becomes the new Emperor of the Sea.
Cross Guild
Mihawk and Crocodile obviously aren’t too happy that Buggy is being plays lead for their organization. They come very close to killing Buggy when he spins it in his favor. He becomes the face of the operation, recruiting new followers while taking heat from the Navy. Meanwhile, Mihawk and Croc run things from the shadows and accomplish their goal, to take the One Piece. Nobody knows what Mihawk is getting out of the arrangement, or if he’s just curious. Crocodile is once again hoping to reach his goal of a utopian country.
Cross Guild make themselves a threat from the very start too, thanks to their own version of bounties. Cross Guild makes wanted posters for Navy officers, both elite and minor. These bounties work on a star system, with more stars meaning a higher payout. The tradeoff, of course, is that those with higher star ratings are typically much, much harder to take down. That’s why they give the option of dead or alive though, because oftentimes it ends up with only one walking away alive.
The Chop-Chop Fruit
We all know that Buggy has the Chop-Chop Fruit, but everyone thought Luffy has the Gum-Gum Fruit in the anime for a long time. Assuming this can happen for more than one Devil Fruit, it’s totally possible that Buggy could have a different Fruit than advertised once it hits an Awakened state. This is all theory, but what if Buggy’s Devil Fruit was actually something to do with luck or survival? Perhaps he got the power of a fruit that enables luck, which allows him to make it through the worst situations relatively unscathed. Maybe it’s a Fruit that ensures he always comes out on top of his foes in some form or another. Hell, maybe it’s just the Joke-Joke Fruit since he’s actually a joke character in every sense of the word.
The possibilities are endless, and it would be just the kind of stupid gag to really send Buggy through the end of the series.
Will Buggy Become King of the Pirates?
Doubtful, but he’ll likely succeed in some other way that benefits him even more. Obviously, the big leadup in One Piece is to Luffy taking his spot as King of the Pirates. Buggy already had a chance to see the One Piece too, and missed out on it due to an illness that Shanks stayed behind to help with. There’s a high likelihood that Buggy never even reaches Laughtale, but instead finally finds the treasure of Captain John that he’s been after all these years.
There’s also that slim, minuscule possibility that Buggy somehow slips his way up to becoming Pirate King though. If that happens, expect plenty of stupid gags and a very quick dethroning. He’ll be back before, and gain fame publicly as the one that finds the One Piece. That’s not how it happens, of course. This will probably make him a likely target for the World Government, and Buggy can do what he always knew he had to. He’ll go out in a blaze of glory, as a real hero to all pirates.
Absolutely none of that will happen, but it’s nice to dream isn’t it? One Piece still has a few years left to the story, but Buggy has made his move to claim the One Piece finally in the most recent arc. Racing against him are his old crewmate Shanks, frenemy Straw Hat Luffy, and Blackbeard, so his odds don’t look great. That said, Buggy always finds a way to come out on top, and will stop at nothing to become King of the Pirates. Or rich, whichever comes first.
One Piece is available to stream on Funimation, Crunchyroll and Netflix in the United States. Crunchyroll airs new episodes of One Piece weekly on Sundays.
