I finally understand why I don't like Ace.
Spoiler alert for Marineford!
I've been reading One Piece for decades now (it's really weird to realize this) and I've never understood why people were obsessed with Ace. I never liked him. When he died, I was shocked and sad for Luffy and all the Whitebeard Pirates, but not for myself. Today, I watched a short about Garp and Ace at Marineford and I finally understood my problem with Ace.
TL;DR: Ace is held back by his pride, which hurts everyone around him.
People love Ace because he's fun, cool, and confident. He's also a great fighter and a really good older brother. He is one of the most complex characters in One Piece and he is written very well. I want to make this clear: He's a great character and Oda did a great job of writing a flawed character. I just personally don't like him.
My problem with Ace is his pride. After Thatch's death, Ace makes it his personal quest to bring down. Whitebeard didn't want him to do it, but his pride made him do it anyway. This decision was massively harmful to the Whitebeard Pirates. When he was captured by Blackbeard, the crew supported him and were willing to die for him. Ace, on the other hand, didn't accept their help. He saw himself as unworthy of their sacrifice because of his lineage and because he got into this situation all on his own. That's why he doesn't attempt to free himself at all during his imprisonment and at Marineford. At his execution, he has many opportunities to choose life. Garp asks him what he wants him to do, but he says nothing. I am convinced that, in this situation, Garp was ready to throw everything away for Ace. Ace only had to speak up and have his Robin moment. He doesn't though and just stays there. Garp accepts his decision to not be saved.
When Luffy finally frees him, he goes with Luffy because he doesn't actively want to be executed. However, at the first opportunity to destroy all the progress that was made for him, he seizes it. Every pirate present at Marineford risked their life for him and many died. Whitebeard died and his final orders to his crew were to live and escape. This order applied to Ace as well, but it only took a few slanderous words from Akainu for Ace's pride to kick in.
Whitebeard wouldn't have cared that Akainu insulted him. He wanted Ace to live. Ace didn't want to live. Defending the name of a dead man who gave his life to save Ace was more important to him than protecting his own life.
Ace's last words were ones of regret. He realized that he couldn't let go of his pride, so he asked Luffy to do the one thing he couldn't: live.
It's heartbreaking and well-written. I just can't feel any love for him, though. I pity him, but at the end of the day, he rejected every attempt to save him from despair and he didn't allow the people in his life to help him. He had the means to overcome his pain but he didn't want to.
I've struggled with depression and self-hatred my whole life. Sometimes it feels like nothing can pull me out of this hole but, like Ace, I have the people and resources to help me. When I don't use them, it's my fault, not the world's. That's why I try to let people help me. Otherwise I'm only hurting myself and others for no reason.
If you read all of this, thank you. I didn't realize where this text was going when I started writing it. Ace is a great character and I know Oda didn't create him for me. This is just how I see Ace and you will definitely see him differently. I just realized that, to me, Ace is what I don't want to be.