“One Piece,” a hit anime series about a band of misfit pirates, was recently adapted into a live-action show. After premiering Aug. 31, it quickly rose to the number one spot on Netflix in 84 countries, breaking the records of both “Wednesday” and “Stranger Things.”
The story initially follows a group called the Straw Hat Pirates: Luffy, the stretchy captain; Nami, a thief and navigator; Zoro, a skilled swordsman; Sanji, a cook with a knack for martial arts; and Usopp, a timid sniper. The team grows in size throughout later seasons.
The manga, which first came out in 1997, and the anime, which came out in 1999, are both still ongoing. Eiichiro Oda, the creator of “One Piece” and executive director of the live-action show, received several adaptation offers since the series was first released. He turned all of them down for fear that they wouldn’t do the series justice, until now. In an interview with the New York Times, Oda said that once he began to see how advanced visual effects and technology had become, he was finally convinced to start working on a live-action.
Fans have said that Netflix’s “One Piece” has finally broken the curse of disappointing anime-to-live-action adaptations. “Dragonball Evolution” (2009), “Death Note” (2017) and “Cowboy Bebop” (2021) are just a few examples in a long history of unsuccessful adaptations. Netflix heavily involved Oda in the production of the live-action to please not just fans, but also first-time viewers. They only moved forward once he agreed it was satisfactory.
“Live-action adaptations similar to this always miss the mark, so my expectations were really low,” said Roshan Revankar, a second-year business and statistics student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and long-time fan who has finished both the entire manga and anime. “But [this] live-action blew my expectations out of the water.”
Netflix’s “One Piece” differed from the source material in several ways, which comes with condensing the anime’s first season of 61 episodes into eight for the adaptation. Several characters that didn’t play a large role in the beginning of the anime have recurring appearances and significant storylines in the live-action, including Koby, Garp and Helmeppo. Other characters were written out entirely, like Don Krieg, an infamous villain that was replaced by antagonistic fish-man Arlong in the live-action.
As the best-selling manga of all time and an anime with over 1,000 episodes and counting, what makes “One Piece” so popular?
“The level of adventure is unparalleled,” Revankar said.
Similar to other anime series, “One Piece” features several arcs, or storylines, that last multiple episodes within the larger plot. During an arc, a specific event occurs, and new characters or places may be introduced. Some arcs in “One Piece” include Marineford, Enies Lobby and Dressrosa, to name just a few.
The live-action served as an effective introduction to those who aren’t familiar with the series, said Revankar, whose roommate watched the live-action and is now interested in watching the anime.
Exactly two weeks after the show’s debut, Netflix announced on X, formerly known as Twitter, that “One Piece” has been renewed for a second season, with more characters and adventures to come.