If you were on One Piece‘s slice of the internet in March 2022, your feed undoubtedly became flooded with images of an all-white Luffy. Hell, this was probably true even if you were on general anime Twitter. It was everywhere. Along with that image, the words “Gear 5” were probably buzzing right around these posts. I certainly saw them. And as someone who was stilling catching up on the manga at the time, I was thrown into despair. “Damn it,” I thought, “I just had a major plot point spoiled.”

Since then, images of Gear 5 have only gotten more common. But, in a gigantic twist of expectation, it’s been official One Piece media that’s been throwing the image out left and right. The cover of Volume 103 (pictured above) features Luffy in Gear 5. I went to a One Piece pop-up event in Japan that had large replications of the post-Wano Wanted Posters—which includes an image of Luffy in Gear 5. Hell, Gear 5 is even in One Piece Film: Red if you watch real closely. “I understand it’s a big deal, but it’s not like no one only watches the anime! Hot damn, they’re really throwing this out there!” I thought.