Nami (One Piece)

Nami (ナミ) is a fictional character in the One Piece franchise created by Eiichiro Oda. She is based on Ann and Silk, two characters from Oda's previous manga Romance Dawn. She is introduced as a thief and pickpocket who possesses skills to tell the climate and draw sea charts. At first, she is a subordinate of the fishman Arlong, but she is eventually freed of this service and permanently joins Monkey D. Luffy for her dream to write the complete map of the Grand Line.

In the series, Nami is the straw hat Pirates' navigator who dreams of drawing maps of the entire world. Despite her initial distrust of pirates, Nami eventually changes her mind after being around Luffy and the rest of the crew. Nami is depicted as an intelligent girl who has an obsession of obtaining money. Nami is able to use her three-sectioned staff and use her climate skills to create powerful attacks; the most prominent of these staff weapons is the Clima-Tact, in which she manipulates the climate to create weather-based attacks.

Appearances
Nami first appears in the manga chapter "Nami" (ナミ登場), first published in Japan's Weekly Shōnen Jump magazine on September 22, 1997. She first appears as a thief stealing treasure, befriending Luffy in the process along with Zoro and Usopp. However, she eventually returns to Cocoyashi Village, her hometown, to meet up with Arlong, a racist fishman, when Sanji joins his crew. Luffy and the others learn of her past from her sister Nojiko. Nami and Nojiko are adopted on a war zone by the Marine officer Bellemere and taken to the village, raising them as her own. However, when Arlong arrives at the village, he kills Bellemere and forces Nami to become his cartographer. Nami harbors a deep resentment against Arlong for this. Realizing that Arlong is working for the Marines to cover his tracks, Nami turns on the fishman. Luffy and the others successfully defeat Arlong, freeing the village as a result. Nami rejoins the crew as they sail off to the Grand Line to pursue her dream of writing sea charts.

During the crew's journey, she meets Nefertari Vivi and becomes a close friend. However, after Nami falls ill, she is healed at Drum Island; there, she meets Chopper, who joins his crew. While visiting Alabasta, she confronts Miss Doublefinger and defeats her before Nico Robin joins the crew. When the Straw Hats rescues Robin at Enies Lobby, Nami gets a bounty on her head with the rest of the crew. When the Straw Hats travels to Thriller Bark, Nami is kidnapped by the zombie Absalom and forced to marry him, but Sanji eventually rescues her. At Sabaody Archipelago, Nami forgives Hatchan, a former member of Arlong's crew, while eating his takoyaki.

After being separated from the crew by Bartholomew Kuma, Nami ends up on Weatheria, another sky island. Two years later, Nami reunites with Luffy and the others and they head to Fishman Island, but get separated again. Nami regroups with the Straw Hats and meet up with Jimbei in the Sea Forest. After learning that Jimbei sent Arlong into the East Blue, Nami reveals that - apart from her resentment towards Arlong - she has no resentment towards fishmen. She uses her Mirage Tempo technique to help the Straw Hats and Jimbei to defeat the New Fishman Pirates while using her techniques she acquired from Weatheria to defeat some of them. After sending Luffy, Zoro and Sanji to retrieve stolen treasure from Caribou, she is outraged to learn that the three has taken the treasure to Big Mom, the island's protector. When the crew travels to Punk Hazard, Nami is captured and says that she will save the captive children and look for the beheaded samurai's son.

When Nami escapes with Sanji, Franky, and Chopper with the children, Tralfagar Law uses his devil fruit powers to swap the bodies of the four crew members. Nami is in Franky's body with Sanji in her own. Nami is later captured by Caesar Clown.

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

Design
Nami is recognized by her fashion styles, which 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, Nami is commonly seen wearing a shirt or bikini top, a skirt and high-heeled sandals. Nami often wears blue tattoos throughout the course of the series; the first is a symbol of Arlong's crew which is later removed and replaced with a symbol of a tangerine and pinwheel. Eventually Nami starts wearing earrings and has her hair grown down her back.

Voice actresses
In the Japanese version of the entire One Piece anime series, and later spin-offs, 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 first five story arcs of One Piece, Nami was voiced by Kerry Williams. In Funimation Entertainment's dub of the One Piece franchise, Nami is consistently voiced by Luci Christian.

Abilities
Nami possesses several abilities. She can tell climate changes and draw sea charts. She is also 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）), 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）), using Dials to increase her attacks. As with her original staff, the clima-tacts are tri-sectional.

Appearances in other media
Nami has made several appearances in other media, including, but not limited to, every One Piece licensed electronic video game to date, including Jump Super Stars and Jump Ultimate Stars. In 2006, she is featured in the Dragon Ball/One Piece/Naruto crossover game Battle Stadium D.O.N.. In addition to her in-game appearances, Nami has also been featured and mentioned in some songs. "Music" features Nami singing about herself listening to music while chasing her dreams. "Between the Wind" features Nami singing about weather and drawing sea charts.

Reception
Nami ranked in the Top 10 of all three Shōnen Jump character popularity polls. Her backstory has been found to be a "touching story" as it "unfolds with a lot of emotion" by Mania Entertainment writer, Jarred Pine. Pine also mentioned Nami was his favorite character from the series, and satisfied with how the manga showed her past. While reviewing the eighth DVD from Viz Media, Activeanime mentioned Nami is one of the best characters from the series as "She’s got guts, smarts, and can heft a mean punch when needed". Like Pined, Activeanime liked Nami's background and added that his "itty bitty heart went out to her". Nami was ranked as #28 in a survey conducted by Newtype Japan for Favorite Anime Heroine in 2002. In the SPJA 2008, Nami was nominated in the category "Best Female Character".