Nami

Lore & Background

Nami was based on two of Eiichiro Oda's earlier characters named Silk and Ann, from his one-shot manga Romance Dawn. In those stories, Silk and Ann were parentless and had tragic pasts. Oda designed Nami as a human girl. Initially, Oda wanted Nami to use a large axe, but he replaced it with a pole-based weapon.

In an early concept of the Straw Hats, Nami was the only woman on the crew. Nami is fashionable and her style changes throughout One Piece. She was first introduced wearing a white-and-blue striped shirt, an orange mini-skirt and orange boots. Throughout the series, she is commonly seen wearing a shirt or bikini top, a skirt and high-heeled sandals.

She often wears blue tattoos; the first is a symbol of Arlong's crew which is later removed and replaced with a symbol of a tangerine and pinwheel on her left bicep. Eventually, she starts wearing earrings and has her hair, once just barely shoulder-length, grown down to the middle of her back, while usually wearing bikini tops with blue jeans. Concerning her ethnic appearance, Oda revealed that he imagines Nami to be of Swedish nationality, albeit in a real-world context.

In the Japanese version of the One Piece anime series, Nami has been voiced by Akemi Okamura. In 2001, Okamura temporarily left the series due to her pregnancy; Wakana Yamazaki acted as a substitute for episodes 70–78. In the OVA Defeat the Pirate Ganzack!, Nami was voiced by Megumi Toyoguchi. In 4Kids Entertainment’s dub of the anime, Nami is voiced by Kerry Williams.

In Funimation Entertainment's dub of the anime, Nami is voiced by Luci Christian. Nami is portrayed by Emily Rudd in the live action adaptation of One Piece, while Lily Fisher portrays her at age ten and Sophie Ellenbogen portrays her as a toddler.

Reader's Guide

Nami is the Straw Hat Pirates' navigator, who dreams of drawing a map of the entire world. She can tell climate changes and draw sea charts. She is also proficient as a pickpocket. During the early part of the series, Nami possesses a three-sectioned bo staff until Usopp creates a variation of her staff, known as the Clima-Tact (天候棒（クリマ・タクト）, Kuraima Takuto; renamed "Climate Baton" in Viz Media's manga translation and "Weather Forcer" in 4Kids' anime dub), which can control the weather at will.

Later, Usopp upgrades her weapon to the Perfect Clima-Tact (完全版 "天候棒"（パーフェクト･クリマ･タクト）, Pāfekuto Kurima Takuto; renamed "Perfected Climate Baton" in the Viz Media manga translation and "Complete Clima-Tact" in Funimation's anime dub), using Dials to increase her attacks. Eventually, Nami adds the Sorcery Clima-Tact (Sorcery Climate Baton in the Viz manga and Funimation subs) with Weatheria's technology, which not only has improved abilities, but can also be used for other uses such as producing Milky Clouds for riding across.

As with her original staff, these three weapons are also tri-sectional. Later, Usopp gives Nami an improved Sorcery Clima-Tact model she wanted him to make (which he had Franky help him a little bit). Using the knowledge he acquired over the time-skip with the plant-based Pop Greens, Usopp combined this with the Weatheria technology Nami provided him and designed the new Sorcery Clima-Tact to be smaller and more compact than the previous models. Instead, it uses the Pop Greens' growth abilities for the staff to extend and contract, through the use of squeezing or releasing the handle.

This improvement also allows Nami to now be able to directly attack with her staff from a distance. Nami later teamed up with Big Mom's thundercloud-based accomplice Zeus, eventually forcing him to become her servant, and he is currently part of her arsenal, now living inside her Clima-Tact. Though Zeus' body was later destroyed by his former master, his soul was able to survive and has now completely merged with the Clima-Tact, improving its capabilities and giving it shape-changing abilities, such as transforming it into a mace.