One Piece (ワンピース, Wan Pīsu?) is a long-running shōnen manga series written and illustrated by Eiichiro Oda, that has been serialized in Weekly Shōnen Jump since August 4, 1997. The individual chapters are being published in tankōbon volumes by Shueisha, with the first released on December 24, 1997 and the 55th volume released as of September 2009. In 2009, Shueisha announced that they sold 170 million volumes of One Piece manga so far, making it the highest selling manga in history.[1] 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 King of the Pirates. 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 was being released by Gollancz Manga, it is now released by Viz Media along with all of their other manga previously released by Gollancz Manga. Madman Entertainment is releasing the series in Australia and New Zealand.
The series was adapted into an original video animation (OVA) 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. Since then, the still ongoing series has aired more than four hundred episodes. 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 its original and uncut form. 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 havePlot
A boy named Demetrio D. Luffy, inspired by his childhood hero "Red-Haired" Shanks, sets out on a journey to find One Piece, the legendary treasure of the King of the Pirates, Gold Roger. 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 King of the Pirates, Gol D. Roger, from island to island on his way to the great treasure One Piece. On his way his crew grows to have a swordsman, a navigator, a sniper, a cook, a doctor, an archaeologist, a shipwright, and a musician.
During the course of the story, the crew contend with both other less moral pirate crews and the Marines. The latter are the subordinates of the corrupt World Government, who apparently seek justice by ending the Golden Age of Pirates. Many background story elements involve the delicate balance of power between the World Government and the world's most powerful pirate crews, especially the yonkou, the four most powerful pirates in the world.
Setting
The fictional world of One Piece is covered by two vast oceans, which are divided by a massive mountain range called Red Line (レッドライン?).[2] The Grand Line (偉大なる航路, Gurando Rain?), a sea that runs perpendicular to the Red Line, further divides them into four seas: North Blue, East Blue, West Blue and South Blue.[3] Surrounding the Grand line are two regions called calm belts (カームベルト?), which experience almost no wind and ocean currents and are breeding ground for the huge sea creatures called sea kings ("neptunians" in the English manga), because of which the calm belts are very effective barriers for those trying to enter the Grand Line.[4] While the navy ships, using sea stone to mask their presence, can simply pass through,[5] most have to use the canal system of Reverse Mountain (リヴァースマウンテン?), a mountain at the first intersection of the Grand Line and the Red Line. Sea water from each of the four seas runs up that mountain and merges at the top to flow down a fifth canal and into the first half of the Grand Line.[6] The second half of the Grand Line, beyond the second intersection with the Red Line, is also known as the New World.[7]
The currents and weather on the Grand Line's open sea are extremely unpredictable, while as in the vicinity of islands the climate is stable.[8] What makes it even harder to navigate is the fact that normal compasses do not work there.[9] A special compass called a log pose must be used.[10] The log pose works by locking on to one island's magnetic field and then locking on to another island's magnetic field.[11] The time for it to set depends on the island.[12] This process can be bypassed by obtaining an eternal pose, a log pose variation that is permanently set to a specific island and never changes.[13]
The world of One Piece is filled with anachronisms, like the transponder snails (電伝虫, den den mushi?, lit. electric transmission bug), snail-like animals that can be attached to electric equipment and function as rotary phones, fax machines, surveillance cameras, and similar devices.[citation needed] Dials (ダイアル), the shells of certain sky-dwelling animals can be used to store wind, sound, images, heat, and the like and have various applications.[14]
Devil fruit (悪魔の実, akuma no mi?, "cursed fruit" in the 4Kids dub) are a type of fruit which when eaten confer a power on the eater.[15] There are three categories of devil fruit.[16] Zoan fruits allow the user to fully and partially transform into a specific animal.[17] Logia fruits give control over and allow the user "to change their living body structure into the powers of nature".[16] Paramecia (called "Paramythia" in the 4Kids dub) is a catch-all category for fruits that give the user superhuman abilities.[18] Devil fruit users cannot swim.[19] When even partially submerged in water, they lose all of their strength and powers.[20]
Production
One Piece started as two one-shot stories entitled Romance Dawn[21]—which would later be used as the title for One Piece's first chapter and volume. The two one-shots featured the character of Luffy, and included elements that would later appear in the main series. The first of these short stories was published in August 1996 in a special issue of Shōnen Jump and later in One Piece Red. The second was published in the 41st issue of Shōnen Jump in 1996 and reprinted 1998 in Oda's short story collection, Wanted!.[22]
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.[23] 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.[24]
The names of many special attacks and other concepts in the manga consist of a form of punning, in which phrases written in kanji are paired with an idiosyncratic reading. The names of Luffy, Sanji, Chopper, Robin, and Franky's techniques are often mixed with other languages, and the names of a number of Zoro's sword techniques are designed as jokes; for example, some of them look 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."[25] Nevertheless, Konosuke Uda, the director, said that he believes that the creators "made the anime pretty close to the manga."[25]
Media
Manga
Written and illustrated by Eiichirō Oda, One Piece premiered in the August 4, 1997 issue Weekly Shōnen Jump, where it continues serialization. In total, 559 chapters have been released in Japan as of October 1, 2009. As of June 7, 2009, the first 532 of those chapters have been compiled into 55 tankōbon volumes in Japan by Shueisha,[26] with the first volume released December 24, 1997.[27]
The series is licensed for an English language release in North America by Viz Media.[28] The creator of One Piece was "sensitive" about how it would be translated.[29] On July 8, 2002 ICv2 reported that One Piece would be in the opening line-up of the Shonen Jump magazine.[30] When its first issue was released in November 2002, so was the first chapter of One Piece.[31] The magazine has been publishing successive chapters ever since. The first volume was released by Viz in June 2003.[32] As of February 3, 2009, 20 volumes have been published.[33] And an upcoming 21st volume is scheduled for June 3, 2009.[34] On July 3, 2009, Viz announced that it would release volumes 24 to 53 between January and June 2010, at a rate of five volumes per month.[35] The English version of the One Piece manga in many instances uses one onomatopoeia for multiple onomatopoeia used in the Japanese version. For instance "saaa" (the sound of light rain, close to a mist) and "zaaa" (the sound of pouring rain) are translated into "fshhhhhhh."[36]
The English volumes are also being distributed in Australia and New Zealand by Madman Entertainment, with the first volume to be released on November 10, 2008.[37] In the United Kingdom it was published by Gollancz Manga.[38] Currently it is published there by Viz.[39] One Piece is published in Denmark and Germany by Carlsen Comics[40][41] and by Bonnier Carlsen in Sweden.[42] In Germany, the manga was also serialized in Carlsen Verlag's Banzai!.[43] Elex Media Komputindo publishes the manga in Indonesia.[44] Kim Dong Publishing House is responsible for publishing One Piece in Vietnam.[45] In Argentina, the manga is published by Larp Editores.[46] Tong Li Publishing publishes the manga in the Republic of China.[47] In Thailand, it is published by Siam Inter Comics.[48] In Hong Kong, it is published by Jonesky.[49] In Finland, it is published by Sangatsu Manga.[50] Conrad Editora publishes the manga in Brazil.[51] In South Korea, the manga is published in bound form as well as serialized in Comic Champ by Daiwon C.I.[52][53] Star Comics publishes the manga in Italy.[54] A Chinese language version is being published in Singapore by Chuang Yi.[55] In Spain, the manga is published by Planeta DeAgostini.[56] In France and the Netherlands, it is published by Glénat.[57][58] The series' publisher in Mexico is Editorial Toukan.[citation needed]
Anime
Produced by Toei Animation, the One Piece anime series debuted in Japan on Fuji Television on October 20, 1999. Since then, the still ongoing series has aired more than four hundred episodes.
4Kids Entertainment licensed the series for an English language dubbed broadcast and release in North America. The 4Kids episodes aired in the United States on the Fox network as part of the Fox Box block, premiering on September 18, 2004. The first 143 episodes of the original were cut down to 104 in the dubbed version. The remaining content was subject to heavy editing. Sanji's cigarettes for example were turned into lollipops,[59] and "the skin of a black pirate was changed to a tan mulatto / white color."[60] In December 2006, 4Kids cancelled production of the dubbed version.[61]
On April 12, 2007, Funimation Entertainment announced it acquired the license for the series. After producing a new English voice dub, the company released its first unedited, bilingual DVD box set, containing 13 episodes, on May 27, 2008.[62] Similarly sized sets followed with six sets released as of August 25, 2009.[63] The Funimation English dubbed episodes premiered on the Cartoon Network on September 29, 2007 and aired until it was cancelled on March 29, 2008.[64] The remainder of Funimation's dubbed episodes continued being aired on Australia's Cartoon Network, and then shifted into reruns of the Funimation dub before being replaced by Dragon Ball Z. Funimation began streaming English dubbed episodes as well as subbed episodes on their website, onepieceofficial.com. New episodes were to be streamed an hour after their original airing in Japan on May 30, though were delayed until August 29 in order to resolve security issues.[65] [66] One Piece episodes are also available for streaming at Hulu.com.
In Singapore, the anime is sub-licensed (not exclusive license) by Odex, who produced an English VCD dub which lasted 104 episodes. It was produced in two 52-episode seasons, with some of the original actors leaving in between seasons.[citation needed]
In the July 2008 issue of Weekly Shōnen Jump, it was announced that the prototype one-shot that preceded One Piece, Romance Dawn, is being adapted into an anime OVA as part of the Jump Super Anime Tour.[22][67][68]
The North American anime distributor Funimation, the Japanese studio Toei Animation, the Japanese publisher Shueisha, and the Japanese broadcaster Fuji Television Network had announced that they would simulcast stream the One Piece pirate anime series within an hour of the weekly Japanese broadcast. This free, English-subtitled simulcast is now available at www.onepieceofficial.com[69] - Originally set to air on Saturday, May 30 at 9:00 p.m. CDT with episode #403, a security breach resulted in a leak of the episode which lead to FUNimation delaying the offer until August 29, 2009 - where it resumed the simulcast with episode #415. [70] [71]
Films
Since the debut of the series on television, Toei Animation has also produced nine One Piece feature films, traditionally released during the Japanese school spring break since 2000.[72]. Although the first three films were less than an hour long and played as part of a double-bill with other anime movies.[citation needed] 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. They were shown dancing in Jango's Dance Carnival with Clockwork Island Adventure; playing soccer in Dream Soccer King! with Chopper's Kingdom on the Island of Strange Animals; and playing baseball in Take Aim! The Pirate Baseball King with Curse of the Sacred Sword.[citation needed]
The first, third, and ninth films were directed by Atsuji Shimizu. The fourth and seventh films were directed by Kōnosuke Uda. The fifth film was directed by Kazuhisa Takenouchi. The sixth film was directed by Mamoru Hosoda. The eighth film was directed by Takahiro Imamura.[citation needed]
Music
A number of musical CDs have been created. Various theme songs and character songs were released on a total of 49 singles. Many of them were also released in collected form on the six compilation albums or the 16 soundtrack CDs, along with background music from the TV anime, the series' feature films, and video games.
Video games
One Piece has been adapted into a whole series of video games published by subsidiaries of Namco Bandai Holdings. The games have been released on a variety of video game and handheld consoles. The series features various genres, mostly role-playing games—the predominant type in the series' early years—and fighting games, such as the titles of the Grand Battle! sub-series.
The series debuted in Japan on July 19, 2000 with One Piece: Mezase Kaizoku Ou!.[73] At the moment, the series contains 27 games, not counting Battle Stadium D.O.N, the title One Piece shares with its related anime series Dragon Ball Z and Naruto. Furthermore, two unnamed titles have been announced for the Nintendo DS and PlayStation Portable handheld consoles.
