About Komatsu's Growth!

[Shadoguardian]

Everybody has their own personal opinion about every character and how they'll grow. However the one that causes the most controversy is Komatsu. He's small, he's weak, he's naive, and, after taking a brief peak at the Gourmet World, completely out of his league. Everyone agree's he has talent and potential that rivals the world's top chef's, but without Toriko (and a great deal of luck) he'll be easy pickings in the Gourmet World. Conclusion, Komatsu needs to get stronger. But how does he become stronger without destroying his character?

Personal Opinion:
Most people may say that he needs to get Gourmet Cells and become a superman, but personally, I think that would ruin his character. Being weak also has it's advantages, as shown with the Shining Gourami. Also, much like how Usopp in One Piece will always remain as a person of average strength, to show a comparision between normal and the abnormal, I personally believe that Komatsu will share the same purpose in this manga. But the Gourmet World is a place filled with natural and, now with the Bishokukai and the Jidar king, man-made dangers.

So what's Komatsu to do? Personally, I see two options for him:

* Option #1: Become a weapons expert. Rather than personally engaging a beast or opponent, Komatsu learns to fight using tools, or more specifically, his cooking utensils. If Komatsu got his hands on other items, and learned to use them properly along with his Derous Knife, he can become a force to be reckoned with similar to Chiyo. As long as he can view beasts and his oponents as ingredients, he might stand a chance. Furthermore, if he gets his hands on adaptive climate gear, he might stand a chance against the rapidly changing Gourmet World weather. However this may still alter Komatsu's character.

* Option #2: Become a strategist. Again, rather than engaging his opponents, he will stay far away from the action and direct Toriko and his comrades in how to take down an ingredient or opponent. If he combines his Food Luck, Food Honour, and the ability to Hear the "Voice" of the Ingredients, he can probably pick out weak points, direct his allies to them, and guide them in preparing the ingredient, similar to when they captured the Mellow Cola. Also, with a third person point of view, he can observe things differently and see the easiest and most efficient way through a terrain, like with the Troll Kong's in the Rainbow Fruit arc. However, this method will probably glue him to Toriko's back.

There are probably loads of other options that I haven't thought of, so feel free to put in your own personal opinion regarding this matter.

[nyamonyamo]

I agree. Komatsu dont need gourmet cells and become superman like the rest. People like Setsuno and Chiyo and the other chef they dont posses beef up stature like the guys who have gourmet cells in them. They hone their skills using cooking utensils like Chiyo uses her knife and cutting board as weapon. So i guess they will learn how to adapt to the environment. We have seen that komatsu even tho he is weak, he always does things on his own and only rely on Toriko in extreme situation.

1. He climbs sky vegy on his own until it get extreme
2. He climbc Melk mountain all the way up
3. Gets shining gourami on hiw own
4. learn food honor along side Toriko
5. Rely on his cooking skill and knowledge in casino
6. manage to hold himself in pyramid

And he is always prepared! He knows his weakness and compensates with equipment. He is more like the support type and hes not naive at all. I think after this we will see him skillfully use his Derous knife to full extent now that he can control its power with food honor.
But even with all his growth i hope we can still see him bulging his eyes in shock at something =P i like that comic relief

[Junaid_Sennin]

I agree with Shadoguardian but I think Komatsu will become a combination of both of what you said: using cooking utensils as weapons and treating opponents as ingredients, and also using strategy and the voice. But I think Komatsu will always have his pacifist, non-violent personality that will make him unsuitable for battle, especially against human opponents, whom Komatsu will not be able to treat as ingredients.

[Shadoguardian]

You know, I realise that this is contradictory from what I said earlier, but chapter 191 got me thinking that Komatsu might actually request for an injection of Gourmet Cells. I'm not saying that he'll actually get it, but I think that it's a possibility he'll want to take shortcut after seeing the difference between himself and Ootake. Most likely, something might happen to change his mind before the procedure.

[nyamonyamo]

The only skill that take show is his jumping ability. I doubt hes any better in cooking. Take might have food luck but his luck might be different than matsu's.

[Zoro #1]

You know I have been thinking the book that komatsu got from the Mellow Cola arc, maybe it will help komatsu to gain some power(knowledge) and we know that in the gourmet world knowledge is just as important to survive. I am thinking that a lot of cooking tech. that are in the book would help them in finding and defeating their opponents (ingredients), and their might also be some reference to getting and cooking God.

Also Komatsu has already seen the work of Melk the sharpener and has worked a little bit on sharpening, maybe will would become a knife expert.

[Shadoguardian]

Further New Personal Prediction.:
* Komatsu learns how to use the Revitilization Kitchen Knife technique using his Derous Knife, though whether he can do it sometime soon or later is the question.
* Komatsu will try, and successfully prepare the Bubble Fruit.
* It is also possibe that Chiru might volunteer to teach Komatsu how to prepare the ingredients of Disappearance Cuisine or Komatsu might choose to cook them himself, after he manages to cook the Bubble Fruit.
* Komatsu, in later arcs, will meet the two other chefs who heard Ichiryuu's Full Course voice, in chapter 158, and learn other cool, secret cooking techniques.

[Impossibility]

Komatsu's cooking skills are undoubtedly going to grow immensely, and during this he will attain techniques that are useful in situations beyond simply cooking. I believe the Revitalizing Knife would likely be one of them. His combat abilities are also likely to increase significantly, whether or not he uses it frequently is the only thing left to be seen. We saw during the Mellow Cola Arc what Komatsu was capable of doing with the Derous Knife. After Food Honour has vastly improved his stats, there is no reason why a few swings of his knife swings shouldn't be able to eviscerate most of the beasts Toriko & Komatsu have come up against so far. This is unlikely to measure up to the beasts likely to be faced in the Gourmet World, but it won't change the fact that against most foes in the Human World he may be considered a match. He is always going to lag significantly behind Toriko, and so it may seem as though he has achieved little growth in his combat abilities, but I don't see how he avoids becoming a much more capable fighter.

[Jorge D. Dragon]

I don't think that just by having his Derous Knife and mastering Food Honour he will become a fighter who will be a match to the most opponents in Human World. The huy is literary a useless weakling in terms of fighting abilities. He is also always pissing his pants when he sees any relevant beast. Also he has no actual battle experience like Toriko or other Bishokuyas or Bishokukai. Of course if he gets a bit of actual training in Human World, then he might be able to at least protect himself to a certain degree at least against some opponents in Human World and only against mostly weaklings and beasts not higher than 20-25 Capture Level. The thing is that the higher the level, the higher abilities the beast has. Be it physical strength or speed or something else, but still it won't be easy to take it just by swinging a knife. But as I said I hope Matsu undergoes at least a bit of training to be able to defend himself at least a bit as he won't be able to protect himself at all in GW if he can't even protect himself to some degree in the Human World. Also if Take will want to fight Matsu in the future, he will need to get better as a fighter as Take isn't only a Chef, but also seems to be a bit of a fighter and has Gourmet Cells and seems to be quite strong as he wasn't much impressed by Toriko, so it might be that Take's current powerlevel might be somewhere around Toriko's.

About Komatsu's cooking skills... well, he needs to improve greatly as it's obvious that he will become the best cook after Acacia's partner or maybe even stronger. So at least for now he needs to train and learn how to prepare Bubble Fruit, how to use revitalising knifes and also get some other knives to make his equipment a bit more diverse. Also he needs to train to prepare Ichiryu's Full Course.

[Motivated]

I don't see Option 1 ruining komatsu's character at all .

[Shadoguardian]

Option 1 indicates that the charcter will get stronger, and when they do, they tend to become more confident and more reckless. When that happens, I can't help but feel like the charcter might end up like the main character from Linebarrels of Iron, and end up being overconfident and a jerk. Ofcourse this is the most extreme case and a little confidence wouldn't hurt Komatsu, but, like I said, too much may ruin his character.

[Jorge D. Dragon]

I think he should get Gourmet Cells and get a bit of training with his knife to actually be able to fight wild beasts and through this he will gain a bit of confidence as now he seems like a child and I won't buy him going in his current state to Gourmet World and travelling in it as for Toriko it was quite extreme to go there and he was quite a monster compared not only to Komatsu, but for most of Bishokuya and still he wasn't capable of going there on his own, so Komatsu needs Gourmet Cells and also eat several high class ingridients to develop himself physically a bit.

P.S. I know that most of people will dissagree with me saying that it will ruin Komatsu's character, but I don't think so. He will remain the same as it won't change his way of thinking and acting. He will be the same coward as always. It's like a parallel with Usopp from One Piece. After timeskip he powered up both in terms of abilities and physically, but he still remained a coward, so it didn't ruin his character.

[Bowser]

Maybe he could learn some knocking from Jirou...

[lunacat]

interesting points of view, without Toriko, he could be in great danger. Even the environement is going to be hard on him, mayeb Toriko should teach him how to use that Melk kitchen knife, it's quite strong

[sabret00the]

Komatsu will always be useless on the battlefield and that's fine, no one brings him out there for his ability to back them up. They just like sharing the experience with him. Just like how he's going to be out there and giving everyone energy to fight the four beast.