"One piece" redirects here. For the clothing, see Swimsuit.
| One Piece |
First volume of One Piece, released in Japan by Shueisha on December 24, 1997 |
ワンピース
(Wan Pīsu) |
| Genre |
Action, Adventure, Comedy-drama |
| Manga |
| Author |
Eiichiro Oda |
| Publisher |
 Shueisha |
| English publisher |
  Viz Media
 Gollancz Manga
  Madman Entertainment |
|
|
| Demographic |
Shōnen |
| Magazine |
Weekly Shōnen Jump
Shonen Jump |
| Original run |
August 4, 1997 – ongoing |
| Volumes |
50 |
| TV anime |
| Director |
Konosuke Uda
Munehisa Sakai |
| Studio |
Toei Animation |
| Licensor |
4Kids Entertainment (former)
Funimation Entertainment |
| Network |
Fuji TV |
| English network |
Toonami
YTV
Cartoon Network
Cartoon Network and Network Ten |
| Other networks: |
 Cartoon Network
 Animax, RTL II, Tele 5, PPA Films
 Cartoon Network
 RCTI. Global TV
 Italia 1
 GMA 7
 SIC, SIC Radical
 K3 Jetix
 TVG
 Canal 5 and XHGC
 NT1
 Jetix Mangas
 KBS 2TV, Tooniverse, Champ TV, Anione, Animax
 TITV (Stop Aired Now),Modern Nine TV (2008-Present)
 TTV, STAR Chinese Channel |
|
| Original run |
October 20, 1999 – ongoing |
| Episodes |
363 |
| Movies |
|
|
One Piece (ワンピース, Wan Pīsu?) is a Japanese shōnen manga written and illustrated by Eiichiro Oda, that has been serialized in Weekly Shōnen Jump magazine since August 4th, 1997. The individual chapters are being published in tankōbon volumes by Shueisha, with the first released on December 24, 1997 and 50 volumes released as of July 2008. One Piece follows the adventures of Monkey D. Luffy, a 17 year old boy, who gained supernatural abilities by eating a magical fruit, and his ragtag crew of heroic pirates, named the Straw Hats. Luffy's greatest ambition is to obtain the world's ultimate treasure, One Piece and thereby become the next Pirate King. When creating the series, Oda was heavily influenced by the manga Dragon Ball.
One Piece is licensed for an English language release in North America by Viz Media. The individual chapters are being serialized in Viz's Shonen Jump manga anthology and being published in tankōbon volumes. In the United Kingdom, the series is being released by Gollancz Manga. Madman Entertainment is releasing the series in Australia and New Zealand.
The series was adapted into an original video animation produced in 1998 by Production I.G. It was later adapted into a full anime series by Toei Animation that premiered in Japan on Fuji Television on October 20, 1999. As of July 20, 2008 363 episodes of the series have aired. The anime series was licensed for a heavily edited English dubbed broadcast in North America by 4Kids Entertainment. It has since been licensed for a full Region 1 DVD release and broadcast by Funimation Entertainment. In addition to the anime series and OVA, One Piece has been adapted into nine feature films by Toei, and multiple video games based on the series have been released.
With over 140 million copies sold, One Piece is the third highest selling manga in the history of Weekly Shōnen Jump, and it is considered their most acclaimed and all-time third-best-selling title in Japan.
Plot
A boy named Monkey D. Luffy, inspired by his childhood hero "Red Haired" Shanks, sets out on a journey to find the legendary One Piece, to become the new Pirate King. To accomplish this, he must reach the end of the most deadly and dangerous ocean: The Grand Line.
Luffy captains the Straw Hat Pirates first through the sea of East Blue and then through the Grand Line. He follows the path of the deceased Pirate King, Gold Roger, from island to island on his way to the great treasure One Piece. On his way his crew grows to have a first mate, a navigator, a sniper, a cook, a doctor, an archaeologist, a shipwright, and a musician.
Characters
-
Monkey D. Luffy (モンキー・D・ルフィ, Monkī D. Rufi?): The main character. He is the captain of the Straw Hat Pirates. He is portrayed as a carefree and sometimes airheaded character. He generally has a huge appetite, for meat in particular. By accidentally eating a Devil Fruit, a fruit that grants special abilities to those who eat them, his body gained the properties of rubber. Luffy's dream is to become the Pirate King.
Roronoa Zoro (ロロノア・ゾロ, Roronoa Zoro?): The first to join the crew. He is a skilled swordsman, who uses up to three swords at once, clutching the third into his mouth. He is extremely poor at understanding geographical directions and gets lost very easily. He also sleeps a great deal and likes to drink. His goal is to become the greatest swordsman in the world.
Nami (ナミ, Nami?): The crew's navigator and the second to join. Her navigation skills are excellent and she has the ability to recognize and analyze even the slightest changes in the weather through sheer intuition. She is also an excellent thief and pickpocket. Her dream is to draw a complete map of the world.
Usopp (ウソップ, Usoppu?): The crew's marksman and the third to join. He is a chronical liar, talented inventor and has notable artistic talent, shown in his painting of the Straw Hat's Jolly Roger and crafting of detailed snow sculptures. Usopp's dream is to become a "brave warrior of the sea".
Sanji (サンジ, Sanji?): The crew's chain-smoking chef and the fourth to join. He knows how it feels to starve from first hand experience. Therefore he will never refuse someone a meal and becomes easily agitated when food is wasted. He is obsessed with women and has a strong sense of chivalry. He will never harm a woman, no matter what. His dream is to find the All Blue, a legendary sea, containing every kind of fish in the world.
Tony Tony Chopper (トニートニー・チョッパー, Tonī Tonī Choppā?): The crew's doctor and the fifth to join. He is a blue-nosed reindeer, who gained human properties by eating a Devil Fruit. He is capable of conversing with humans and animals alike. He is also very naïve and has a tendency to believe anything told to him. His dream is to create a cure for all the world's diseases.
Nico Robin (ニコ・ロビン, Niko Robin?): The crew's archaeologist and the sixth to join. She ate a Devil Fruit and gained the ability to create copies of any part of her body on surfaces in her proximity. She is extremely intelligent, having taught herself archeology at a very young age. Her dream is to find and decipher the Rio Poneglyph, an ancient stone telling a long lost part of history.
Franky (フランキー, Furankī?): The crew's shipwright and seventh to join. He is a cola-powered cyborg. His artificial body grants him incredible strength, as well as making him practically invulnerable to most frontal attacks. It is equipped with countless weapons. His dream is to build a dream ship, and sail it around the world, something he is now doing aboard the Thousand Sunny.
Brook (ブルック, Burukku?): The crew's musician and eighth to join. He is a living skeleton, resurrected by means of a Devil Fruit. He has a strange personality, being a combination of a gentlemanly persona and a perverted, crude sort. He speaks in a dignified, educated manner at most times, while having amazingly bad manners. His goal is to circle the "Grand Line" and return to Reverse Mountain, fulfilling a 50 year old promise.
Production
The One Piece manga began its run in issue #34 of Shueisha's Shōnen Jump magazine on August 4, 1997. Its debut was preceded by two earlier one-shot stories, both entitled Romance Dawn; each featured Luffy, as well as elements that would find their way into the series.
Eiichiro Oda originally planned One Piece to last five years, and he had already planned out the ending, but he found himself enjoying the story too much to end it in that amount of time and now has no idea how long it will take to reach that point.[1] Nevertheless, the author states (as of July 2007) that the ending will still be the one he had decided on from the beginning, and he is committed to seeing it through to the end, no matter how many years it takes.[2]
Produced by Toei Animation, an anime adaptation of One Piece premiered on Fuji TV on October 20, 1999. However, the first animated production of One Piece was an OVA produced in 1998 by Production I.G, known as One Piece: Defeat The Pirate Ganzak!. Konosuke Uda, the director, said that the he believes that the creators "made the anime pretty close to the manga."[3]
The names of many special attacks and certain terminology in the manga consist of a form of punning, in which phrases written in kanji are paired with an idiosyncratic reading. For example the names of Luffy, Sanji, Chopper, Robin and Franky's techniques are often mixed with other languages and a number of names of Zoro's sword techniques possibly involve a joke, for example, are fearsome when read by sight but sound like kinds of food when read aloud. Eisaku Inoue, the animation director, has said that the creators did not use these kanji readings in the anime since they "might have cut down the laughs by about half."[3]
Media
Manga
-
The One Piece manga, written and illustrated by Oda, is originally published by Shueisha in Japanese-language for sale in Japan. In the west, the English-language adaptation is published and distributed for sale in North America and Australia by Viz Media in both the form of the American Shonen Jump magazine and graphic novels. There are currently 50 volumes of the One Piece manga.
Anime
-
The anime debuted in 1999 in Japan on Fuji TV. It was localized into English and brought over the Pacific in 2004, where it debuted on 4Kids TV. The series migrated to Cartoon Network's Toonami block, helmed by Funimation.
As of July 20, 2008, One Piece has had a total of 363 TV episodes. Episodes from 207 onwards have been broadcast in high-definition at 1080i resolution, in addition to standard definition. One Piece episodes air at an average of four episodes a month or, in some cases, air as several back-to-back episodes followed by a break of several weeks.
In Singapore, the anime is licensed by Odex, who produced an English dub which lasted 104 episodes. It was produced in two 52 episode seasons, with some of the original actors leaving in between seasons.
The anime was adapted by 4Kids Entertainment and previously shown on Cartoon Network's Toonami, and reruns were airing on Cartoon Network's online broadband service Toonami Jetstream in the United States and on networks in many other English-speaking countries around the world. The 4Kids version debuted in the US on the Fox network as part of the Fox Box block on September 18, 2004. This version of the show varied considerably from the original Japanese series.[1] In an attempt to appeal to their target audience, 4Kids severely edited the series to make it more appropriate for children's television. 4Kids announced in December 2006 that they had canceled production of their dub.
As of September 2007, 104 English-dubbed episodes have been produced from the first 143 Japanese episodes.[2] 4Kids dropped the license afterwards.[4] The dub's naming conventions were used in One Piece-related media in North America, such as the English version of the fighting game One Piece Grand Battle for the PlayStation 2 and Nintendo Gamecube. The TV version of the Funimation dub continues to use most of these names to date.
On April 12, 2007, Funimation announced it had acquired the license of One Piece and is currently producing the English version from episodes 144 to 167, which premiered on Cartoon Network on September 29, 2007, though is currently on hiatus, replaced as of March 22, 2008.[5]
Funimation will also distribute the series in unedited, bilingual DVD box sets, containing 13 episodes each. The first DVD was released May 27, 2008,[6] and the 2nd DVD is schedule to be released September 23, 2008.[7]
Movies
Since the debut of the series on television, Toei Animation has also produced nine One Piece feature films, released each spring since the year 2000. Although the first three films were less than an hour long and played as part of a double-bill with other anime movies. In typical fashion for movies based on serialized manga, the films feature self-contained, completely original plots with animation of higher quality than what the weekly anime allows for. Additionally, three of these movies have had special featurette shorts, showcasing the characters engaged in various activities unrelated to the series, specifically dancing, playing soccer, and playing baseball.
- One Piece: The Movie (ワンピース, Wanpīsu?, 2000) - There once was a pirate named Woonan. He was known as the Great Gold Pirate, who obtained almost a third of the world's gold. Over the course of a few years, that pirate's existence faded and a legend grew, that he disappeared with his gold to a remote island. An island pirates continue to search for. Aboard the Going Merry, Luffy and his crew, starved and reckless, are robbed of their treasure. In an attempt to get it back Luffy wrecks the getaway ship, freeing a young boy named Tobio, who was a captive of El Drago's pirate crew. El Drago's love for gold has driven him to look for Woonan's island and thanks to Woonan's treasure map, he finds it. Meanwhile Luffy's crew split up and despite their own circumstances, they must find a way to stop El Drago from obtaining Woonan's gold.
- Clockwork Island Adventure (ねじまき島の冒険, Nejimaki-shima no bōken?, 2001) - After their ship is stolen, Luffy’s crew is adrift for over a week, leaving plenty of time to lament the loss. They come across a thief duo that claims it was stolen by the Trump Pirates, who have taken over Clockwork Island. To make things even worse, Nami is kidnaped. Now, the gang must travel to Clockwork Island to, not only reclaim their vessel, but also to potentially find the world famous treasure, the Diamond Clock, and to save Nami, before she has to marry the Trump Pirates' leader.
- Chopper's Kingdom on the Island of Strange Animals (珍獣島のチョッパー王国, Chinjū-tō no Choppā-ōkoku?, 2002) - The crew searches for the Crowning Treasure, but as they approach the island it is said to be on, they are sent into the air, separating Chopper from the group. On the island, the animals and Mobambi, a young boy living among them, declare Chopper their king. The remaining Straw Hats, searching for him, encouter the treasure hunter Bulter, and his hencemen. After escaping from his hord of Horn Eaters, an armored kind of animal, the size of a cow, they succeed in finding Chopper. But when Buttler notices the reindeer to be the new animal king he summons his Horn Eaters after him and the fighting starts. In an attempt to save Chopper, Mobambi loses the Crowning Treasure to Butler. Strengthened by it's power, he now poses a significant threat to the Straw Hats and every animal on the island.
- Dead End Adventure (デッドエンドの冒険, Deddo endo no bōken?, 2003) - In order to gain money, the crew enters the Dead End Race, a dangerous anything goes sailing competition. On the starting island of the crew is introduced to that year's favorite, General Gasparde, a former navy general who deserted after killing his men. The race proceeds and after lots of fighting and Gasparde's treachery, it all comes down to him and Luffy, one on one.
- Curse of the Sacred Sword (呪われた聖剣, Norowareta seiken?, 2004) - An old friend of Zoro's is possessed by an evil sword, and due to a favor Zoro owes him, he joins his side. The Straw Hats will have to find a way to seal the sword before its true power is unleashed.
- Baron Omatsuri and the Secret Island (オマツリ男爵と秘密の島, Omatsuri danshaku to himitsu no shima?, 2005) - The crew lands at a resort owned by Baron Omatsuri, who challenges them to a series of games. However, there is more to Omatsuri and his friends than meets the eye.
- The Giant Mechanical Soldier of Karakuri Castle (カラクリ城のメカ巨兵, Karakuri-jō no meka kyohei?, 2006) - The crew searches for the Golden Crown, a treasure said to be hidden on Mecha Island, a technologically advanced island, that is filled with machines, and ruled by a man named Ratchet.
- Episode of Alabasta: The Desert Princess and the Pirates (エピソードオブアラバスタ 砂漠の王女と海賊たち, Episōdo obu Arabasuta Sabaku no ōjo to kaizoku-tachi?, 2007) - A retelling of the Alabasta storyline with new animation. Funimation released the film to selected theaters across the United States on February 7, 2008 and to DVD on February 19, 2008.
- Episode of Chopper: Bloom in the Winter, Miracle Sakura (エピソードオブチョッパー＋ 冬に咲く、奇跡の桜, Episōdo Obu Choppā Purasu: Fuyu ni Saku, Kiseki no Sakura?, 2008) - A retelling of the Drum Island storyline featuring Franky, Nico Robin, and the Thousand Sunny. The movie has grossed $8,619,115 dollars in Japanese box office,citation needed and is currently at number 15 in the year-end chart.citation needed Eiichiro Oda himself participated in the writing.citation needed
Art books
Three art books for the series have been released in Japan. The first art book, Color Walk 1, released June, 2001 under ISBN 978-4-08-859217-6, has also been released in English. The second and third books, Color Walk 2, released November 4, 2003 under ISBN 978-4-08-859376-0 and Color Walk 3~LION, released January 5, 2006 under ISBN 978-4-08-859538-2, respectively, have yet to be released in North America.
Data books
Three One Piece data books have been released in Japan. Red Grand Characters was released in Japan on March 2, 2002.
Released on August 2, 2002, One Piece BLUE: Grand Data File not only included various character and series information, but it also included eight new four-panel manga side stories, the Luffy Pirates 4-Panel Theater (ルフィ海賊団四コマ劇場, Rufi Kaizokudan Yon-Koma Gekijõ?). Each of the shorts featured one of the Straw Hat Pirates in absurd situations.
The third data book, Yellow Grand Data File, was released April 4, 2007.
Reception
One Piece is the third highest selling manga in the history of Weekly Shōnen Jump,[8] (behind Kochikame and Dragon Ball) and is currently their most acclaimed and all-time third-best-selling title in Japan. The manga is the first to increase the sales of Weekly Shōnen Jump in eleven years.[9] Volume 27 of One Piece holds a manga sales record in Japan, with 2,630,000 units sold in its first printing alone;[2] as of volume 46, the series has sold over 140,000,000 copies domestically,[2] and is the fastest manga to reach sales of 100,000,000.[2]
The One Piece TV show was the most downloaded TV torrent for the week ending July 7, 2008.[10]
References
- ^ Oda, Eiichiro [2006-07-09]. Pirates vs. CP9 (海賊 VS CP9, Kaizoku VS CP9?), One Piece (in Japanese). Tokyo: Shueisha, 126. ISBN 4088741277.
- ^ a b c d Kanta Ishida (2007-07-25). "One Piece Q&A with Eiichiro Oda (「ONE PIECE」尾田栄一郎さんに聞く, One Piece Q&A with Eiichiro Oda?)" (in Japanese). Yomiuri Shimbun. Retrieved on 2007-07-25.
- ^ a b Shonen Jump Volume 5, Issue 12. December 2007. VIZ Media. 198.
- ^ Newtype USA February 2007 edition page 118 confirmation of the end of One Piece, status of uncut version and overall status of anime at the time of announcement.
- ^ "Cartoon Network Has No Plans for One Piece's Return (Updated)" (2008-03-29). Retrieved on 2008-03-31.
- ^ "Anime on DVD Reviews – One Piece: Season 1 Part 1". Retrieved on 2008-02-16.
- ^ "Amazon.com: One Piece: Season 1, Second Voyage". Retrieved on 2008-07-23.
- ^ "Shōnen Jump Manga Circulation Numbers". ComiPress (2007-05-06). Retrieved on 2007-07-25.
- ^ "Weekly Shōnen Magazine Circulation Drops Below 2,000,000". ComiPress (2007-04-17). Retrieved on 2007-04-17.
- ^ 'One Piece' Most Downloaded TV Series Via BitTorrent
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