The action sequences in One Piece gives an unparalleled thrill to viewers all across the world. And what’s better than watching a full action-packed movie filled with battles of superheroes against the world’s biggest villains. The story of One Piece engages its viewer from the very first scene – it has a relate-ability factor for all. What else could be the possible explanation of its worldwide success. The news is that One Piece has produced a season scheduled to be released on Netflix this very year.
The development was out in the market for quite a long time. But finally killing all rumors and gossip, the producer Edelstein revealed: “I know why I announced the production of this back in 2017, but these things take time. Preparations have been slowly progressing behind the scenes, and it seems that I can finally make the big announcement. Netflix, the world’s most extensive streaming entertainment service, will be leading us with their tremendous support.” Currently we know that they will have one season with 10 episodes running around 25 minutes each.
The executive line:
The public is excited to see how far the story will progress in the ten episodes of season 1. While we still have no clue about the release or timeline on the upcoming movie, we still have some pretty solid other details. Let’s start with this. Stephen Myada, who has quite a number of movies to his credit, is also announced as an executive producer for this series. The producer has given his services in series like “CSI Miami” and “Lie to me.” Myada has written the screenplay for the “X-files.” Sources say that he is not only an executive producer but also is the show runner and writer for the One Piece season. So this man is going to be the call center of creative control, at least for this season. It is challenging to predict what sort of impact he would have in this development of One Piece. It is very encouraging to see that Myada seems to be genuinely excited about bringing One Piece into the live-action realm.
Conversion into live-action:
The producers should go beyond the comic book material. It is the recipe for success in the anime industry. I hope that this live-action One Piece series could be a real blockbuster by making a niche for itself. A unique existence of its own rather than just sticking to the tried and tested story laid out right in front of their eyes. The manga series and its characters should be presented to the world into their unique creation. It is still up in the air on who will be playing the main characters of the series such as Monkey D. Luffy and the other straw hat pirates such as Roronoa Zoro, Nami, Usopp, Sanji, Chopper, Nico Robin, Franky and Brook.
Leaving the language barrier behind:
Taking a cue from the previous disaster, Stephen Myada and Matt Owens have proposed to make this season in the English language. The movie, previously, released in the Korean language caused sheer disappointment to fans all over the world apparently because of the language barrier. In view of making the series global, the producers are all set to present One Piece in English.
Moreover, the live-action adaptation needs to cut off a lot of fat to get into the shape. In this regard, we will see a lot and selective things excluded by minimising or cutting the roles of some places and some characters and pirates or by placing so much focus on the Black Cat Pirates and just presenting it as a solid swap in the Kuru story. I think it will not include the events of the log town because the whole project will get into a long-running movie then. Let’s wait what gets approved and what’s not?
A Darker Side
According to the site Bounding Into Comics, there is recent news that the One Piece will have a darker side compared to the anime series. For example, they will show more gory details of the executive of Gol D. Rogers in order to announce the greatest treasure One Piece hidden. Another update is that Zoro will be crucified on a cross instead of tied to a pole. Since the movie takes a more cinematic approach, I view the action to be much more sophisticated to make up for any lack of special effects compared to how an anime would have. This reminds me of a Pirates of the Carribean type of effect that fans will surely love.
Cinematic locations:
The best thing about One Piece, in my opinion, was the set of locations and settings of the scenes. Every anime episode was packed with different villains, settings, scenes and situations. So it will be quite challenging to portray those locations in the series. Money is also a significant factor when it comes to the graphical representation of a film that is filled with a whole lot of locations. A lot of special effects would be required to bring it up to life, such as Luffy stretching or even the powers of Drake Yume Hawk. The moment it makes waves all across the globe, it won’t be a challenge for the producers to extravagantly finance it.
Just like Death Note, the producers didn’t have to put so much effort because in the first attempt of the anime turned live series aired on Netflix. The people get attached to it because it took place in the real world. The production team did not even have to consider to make it all from scratch, but it still took anyway because it was so horrendously implemented. That film had a 40 million budget.
Words of hope:
Edelstein is the CEO and founder of “Tomorrow studios,” which is producing One Piece alongside Netflix. He said, “I am willing to make everything that I possess and absolutely make the series of One Piece absolutely successful. The work now is the most expensive work on TV drama history and thinking about the attention around the world. It is worth investigating the production costs of his scale.”
These words are incredibly encouraging and also in contrast to all the hurdles. Let us wait for the release and see whether it becomes a super hit or a disaster, but it will surely it will be a net-win for the One Piece community because it will push the One Piece brand out there and sparks people’s curiosity about the original title. Whatever happened, we will be eagerly waiting for the release.
