Have you ever had a cloud hanging over your head when it comes to shows or movies? That one that you keep telling yourself “I’ll get to it eventually” but the longer you put it off, the more it bites at you?
THAT…….was One Piece for me.
So to tip my age a bit, One Piece is something I have been aware of since I was a kid. I was still in elementary school when anime first crossed the Pacific and began airing with English dubbing on TV in the States. Despite my exposure to anime thanks to Cartoon Network’s original Toonami blocks, I ended up missing One Piece at the time.
Anime would weave in and out of my life, with it coming back in recent years thanks in small part to the Covid-19 pandemic. I would binge what was available of Attack on Titan, Seven Deadly Sins, one of Gundam’s many series, and revisiting childhood classics like Dragon Ball Z and Cowboy Bebop. I eventually started One Piece, getting well over 100 episodes in before just falling off as the world opened back up.
Then came Netflix’s live action adaptation of One Piece in 2023, a series that was already being met with skepticism in the wake of the live action Cowboy Bebop series’ poor reception. Fan concerns ended up being proven wrong as 2023’s One Piece was a huge hit with fans and critics who applauded the work in bringing such a vibrant and crazy world to life. Despite this, I still wouldn’t pick the anime back up.
Cut to early 2025 and I finally decide to pick One Piece back up and continue my journey with the Straw Hat pirates. I knew it would likely take a good amount of time to catch up on well over 1100 episodes. Two months and almost nothing but One Piece later, I was fully caught up and felt stupid for waiting so long to watch this series.
I finally understood the hype around this incredible world of pirates, devil fruits, and so much more created by Eiichiro Oda. It led me down a rabbit hole in the following months as I dug further and further into One Piece, from the state of the Straw Hats’ journey to massive revelations about Rocks D. Xebec and just how big his impact on the world actually was. The more I learned, the more I needed to know.
The hardest thing to believe is that this sprawling story was originally envisioned as a five-year project that would lead to the Straw Hats battling the Yonko, or Four Emperors, who were intended to be the series’ original main villains. Considering how long it took to even get out of the East Blue at the start of One Piece, I don’t know if there was ever a possibility of that happening.
Outside of the world, itself, One Piece also shows how far anime has come artistically since it premiered in 1999. The series has always followed Oda’s vision faithfully, but it is like night and day watching clips of a fights from those first 100 to visual feasts that were the fights on Egghead between Gear 5 Luffy against Admiral Kizaru or Zoro’s duel with Rob Lucci. It is hard to believe it is the same series, even more so with special projects like Fan Letter or the work put into one of the films.
At the very least, I was happy to finally give One Piece my time when I did because it now means I’ll be able to enjoy its run to the end with everyone else. Oda has already confirmed One Piece has entered its Final Saga and fans will get to see what fate has in store for Luffy and his crew. And with everything already going on in the manga, Oda isn’t playing subtle when it comes to telling fans just how much more insane the state of One Piece will get as it nears the end.
Minimum Wage Nerd 