Luffy: Everything about 5 Luffy’s Gear

Luffy is the captain of the Straw Hat Pirates and one of the Four Emperors of the sea. His goal in life is to become the king of the Pirates, and to do that, you’ll obviously need to be one of the strongest people in the world.

Luffy realized this after his crushing defeat at the hands of Admiral Aokiji. That’s why he created gears. Gears are basically Luffy’s version of Super Saiyan or any other basic Shonen power-up. They increase his speed and power immensely and can give him extra abilities as well.

Luffy’s Gear Second

The first of these gears is Luffy’s Gear Second, which appeared in Chapter 387. To activate this ability, Luffy uses his rubber powers to speed up the blood flow in his body.

This increased blood flow gives him more oxygen and nutrients, which makes him extremely fast and even more powerful. It also causes his body to glow a reddish-pink color and permeate steam. And like many other Shonen power-ups, Gear Second has drawbacks as well. If Luffy uses this form for long periods of time, he could possibly become immobile.

This happened in his fight with Rob Lucci when he pushed himself to the absolute limit to defeat the assassin. Now, pre-timeskip, Luffy took a few seconds to activate this ability, but post-timeskip, he can activate Gear Second instantly, and it takes way less stamina as well.

But one more very dark fact is that Lucci suspected Gear Second could be taking away Luffy’s lifespan every time he uses it, and this theory came from one of the most skilled assassins in the One Piece world, so it could very well be true. Lucci’s statement, among many others, has also contributed to the theory that Luffy will die young. So yeah, I’ll let you sit with that one.

Luffy’s Gear Third

Luffy’s Gear Third is Luffy’s second power-up. It was first seen in Chapter 403, but it was properly shown off in Chapter 421. This technique is activated when Luffy bites into his thumb bones and blows air into them. And since he’s made out of rubber, this causes his arm to expand like a balloon. He can also allocate all of this air into different parts of his body, such as his torso or his legs.

Luffy can distribute all of this air into one piece of his body as well, which will make that limb the size of a giant. As you may have guessed, Gear Third increases Luffy’s strength by leaps and bounds, even more than his Gear Second form. His AOE is also increased significantly, as seen when he punched Luchi through multiple buildings.

The main drawback of this form before the timeskip was that after a couple of minutes, Luffy would shrink down to the size of, I don’t even know what you would call this, a child? Yeah, let’s call it a child. But post-timeskip, this drawback doesn’t even exist because of Luffy’s training.

Now, pre-timeskip, Gear Third’s drawback didn’t really mean all that much because whenever Luffy used it, he would usually win the fight. However, this was changed post-timeskip as Luffy created a new form that can combine both the speed of Gear Second and the power of Gear Third. Gear Fourth was first seen in Chapter 784 during his fight with Doflamingo.

Luffy activates this form by first covering his hand in Armament Haki before biting into it.

Luffy’s Gear Fourth

This time, instead of inflating his bones, he inflates his muscles. This inflation will be distributed differently depending on which version of Gear Fourth is being used. For the main version of Gear Fourth, aka Bounce Man, the air is mostly distributed into Luffy’s upper body.

But as a side effect, he can’t stand on his own two feet, and he has to constantly bounce everywhere like a dumbass. I mean, like a true warrior that he is. The second version of Luffy’s Gear Fourth is called Tank Man, and it’s kind of like a conditional form since Luffy has to eat a whole bunch and become extremely fat to actually use it.

But this allows him to have way more durability at the cost of mobility. The third version of Gear Fourth is called Snake Man. In Snake Man, Luffy inflates his muscles evenly, and he becomes even faster than his Bounce Man form.

But obviously, this is at the expense of power. But regardless, all versions of Gear Fourth are extremely powerful, and for a long time in the series, whenever Luffy activated this form, he would get boosted to the top tiers of the One Piece world.

And now it doesn’t really matter what version of Gear Fourth Luffy starts out with, as in his most recent fight with Kaido, he’s seen swapping between Gear Fourth forms in an instant.

“I bro, I’ve tried to record this line so many times, I cannot.” Gear Fourth also gives Luffy extra perks as well, such as flight, longer attack range, and a major increase to his defense since most of his body is covered in Armament hockey.

And no matter what version of Luffy’s Gear Fourth Luffy is using, the main drawback of this form is the 10-minute recharge time. And by recharge time, I really mean it, as most of his fights where he runs out of energy and Gear Fourth, the only thing he can do is run away. He has absolutely no stamina left.

Luffy’s Gear Fifth

So despite the immense power of Luffy’s Gear Fourth, Luffy could still not defeat his strongest opponent, Kaido. It actually took two Zenkai boosts, dying, and awakening his devil fruit to actually accomplish that. And in Chapter 1044, Luffy’s Gum Gum fruit was actually revealed to be a mythical zoan called the Human-Human fruit, model Nika.

Quote, “Possessing a body with the properties of rubber and fighting in whatever way he fancies, bringing smiles to the faces of the people, the warrior of Liberation, also known as Mika the Sun God.” I don’t know about y’all, but reading these two chapters back to back was the most hyped I’ve ever experienced in the series. But anyways, this Awakening is considered Luffy’s Gear Fifth, and it is bananas.

Of course, you would expect Luffy to become vastly more powerful, and yeah, that is the case. But it goes way beyond that. Like seriously, when the five Elders said that the user fights in whatever way he fancies, they were not kidding.

So let’s just run down some of the abilities that Luffy has shown in Gear Fifth. One of the first actions that Luffy does in Gear Fifth is block Kaido’s attack by pulling up the ground as if it were rubber. And this is actually pretty essential for a Paramecia Awakening, which is why you can actually classify Luffy’s fruit as both the Zoan and the Paramecia. But that’s not even the craziest part about Luffy’s Gear Fifth.

Moments after this, Kaido proceeds to eat Luffy and straight up swallow him, pause, in which Luffy literally just pushes through Kaido’s eyes, uses his nose as a slingshot, and launches out of his mouth. And this wasn’t like an insta-kill move or anything like that. This was like a Looney Tunes-esque attack or animation or whatever.

This cartoonish fighting is seen multiple times throughout the fight as well, such as when Luffy runs back to the stage on some Super Smash Bros type, or when he punches through Kaido’s head. Again, this was not an insta-kill move. Some other abilities of Luffy’s Gear Fifth that we’ve seen Luffy use include turning his entire body to the size of a giant, becoming extremely malleable, catching lightning bolts in midair, and restarting his own heart. T

he main drawback of Luffy’s Gear Fifth is its stamina usage. This is seen in his fight with Kaido when Luffy literally almost dies from exhaustion and is seen visibly aging. However, it’s important to mention that after Luffy defeated Kaido, this did not affect him at all, which may imply that if Luffy doesn’t succeed in his task of Liberation while he’s in Gear Fifth, he might just die. That’s just a little theory that I have. In my opinion, Gear Fifth is an extremely unique and interesting form.

I think that my favorite thing about it is that it’s not just your average badass-looking Shonen power-up. It’s goofy and entertaining while also being awesome. It’s also a good example of how Oda just continues to subvert expectations in a good way. Like seriously, before chapter 1044, everybody thought Luffy’s Gear Fifth was just gonna be some epic-looking battle-hardened soldier, but nobody expected this goofy-ass childlike person. And when you think about it, this is the best form for Luffy as a character.

Luffy’s dream in life is to become free from any rules or limitations. Pirate King is just kind of like the easiest way to get to that, and it’s most fitting for him to have a form that allows him to fight in whatever way he wants. Gear Fifth also ties in with the narrative of Luffy bringing smiles to everybody that he meets everywhere he goes, even his worst enemies.

It helps reinforce the ideas of inherited will from Roger and Joy Boy as well because multiple times throughout the fight with Kaido, Luffy is literally stated and implied to be Joy Boy or at least his reincarnation. These three themes that I brought up make Gear Fifth feel more deserved and less of like a plotty Shonen power-up because Luffy is just the chosen one or whatever.

Now, the only thing I don’t really like about Luffy’s Gear Fifth is that it just kind of takes away from Gear Fourth. You know, Luffy’s Gear Second and Gear Third had two different purposes, and Gear Fourth was the combination of those two, but if Gear Fifth is just better, then you know, what’s the point of Gear Fourth?

But we don’t know about Luffy’s Gear Fifth right now, so for all we know, this form could have a serious side effect on Luffy. But that was all of Luffy’s gears, so I hope you guys enjoyed. Leave a comment down below: What’s your favorite form of Luffy’s?

Mine would have to be snake man, that form just looks absolutely amazing, and the fight with Katakuri even better. But that’s pretty much it for this one, thank you.

Andreea Blaga

That’s me, Andreea Blaga, author of the blog https://anime-everything.com. I work as a content creator in the US. I am also passionate about Japanese Anime.