After months and months of waiting, season 2 production for Netflix’s “One Piece” has just been announced and has just begun.
“One Piece” first premiered as a Japanese manga on December 24, 1997, created by Eiichiro Oda. Later, “One Piece” was made into a Japanese anime in 1999. Since then, “One Piece” has grown into one of the most famous, successful, and recognizable anime in the world. “One Piece” got enough recognition to have its own live action adaptation.
“One Piece” is set during the Great Pirate Era and is about a young aspiring pirate, Monkey D. Luffy (Iñaki Godoy). Season 1 of “One Piece” covers Luffy’s background and his first adventure as a pirate. Luffy grew up as an orphan surrounded by great pirates, like his hero Red Haired Shanks (Peter Gadiot). Because of Shanks, the pirate lifestyle and the adventures out on the high sea greatly excited Luffy.
Luffy made it his goal to go to the Grand Line, a gigantic ocean current that circles around the planet where pirates make their mark, find the One Piece, the hidden treasure from the former King of the Pirates, Gold Roger (Michael Dorman), and become the new King of the Pirates. In a bar with Shanks, Luffy unintentionally ate the gum-gum fruit that turned him into a rubber human, which gave him the power to do anything rubber can do. However, because of his new power, Luffy had become an enemy of the sea and was no longer able to swim or be in seawater overall, or else his strength would be drained. Nonetheless, Luffy set out to sea to create his pirate crew and begin his new life.
During his first adventure to find his first crew members, Luffy faces troubling pirates, like Alvida (Ilia Isorelýs) and Buggy (Jeff Ward), and also faces the Marines. The Marines are the main sea military forces of the World Government that are in charge of enforcing maritime law, operating naval warfare, and hunting down pirates. Luckily, Luffy meets and befriends Koby (Morgan Davies), an aspiring Marine, and meets his first crew members, famed pirate hunter Roronoa Zoro (Mackenyu Arata) and master thief Nami (Emily Rudd). Later on in his journey, Luffy meets his new crew members, aspiring pirate Usopp (Jacob Romero Gibson) and pro chef Sanji (Taz Skylar). All of them have pretty similar reasons for joining up with Luffy: they admire Luffy’s earnestness and belief in others’ dreams, and they want to make their own mark on the Grand Line.
Unlike its other anime live action adaptations, Netflix’s “One Piece” has been a huge success since its debut on August 31, 2023. Although Netflix’s “One Piece” is slightly altered from the original anime, what makes “One Piece” different from other anime live action adaptations is that it puts a lot of effort into conveying Oda’s unique aesthetic sense into its design. It fills scenes with quirky and unusual backgrounds and fills characters with profound personalities, pasts, and ideals that make them feel alive. Netflix’s “One Piece” transports you into a living, breathing place with history and wildness. It helps you truly understand Luffy’s development as a person. One Piece’s world intensifies as more and more unique characters begin to come into Luffy’s life. It is filled with fantastically choreographed fight scenes and colorful and interesting visuals.
With such a great first season, the second season of “One Piece” can be expected to be even better. Netflix’s “One Piece” will definitely last a long time .
