One Piece is one of my favourite manga. I was genuinely flabbergasted when I heard that there was going to be a live-action adaptation of this. One Piece is a very weird and wacky world that I just don’t believe could be brought accurately into live-action. Additionally, Netflix was going to make it and they have failed miserably with manga/anime live-action adaptations. Death Note completely butchered the characters and was not a faithful story. Cowboy Bebop had none of the charm of the anime with terrible writing and also not a faithful story. My expectations for this were at an all-time low but the creator of One Piece, Oda, was involved in this project. So maybe 3rd time is the charm?
The first thing I noticed from the first couple of episodes, was the stunning set designs and costumes. I was surprised at the amount of practical sets that felt like great replications of places in the source material. The iconic ship, The Going Merry, looks 1 to 1 exactly like it does in the manga and it looks beautiful! CGI is implemented to further bring the world to life but it is never overused or bad to look at. The characters look exactly like the source material from their clothes to their hair. They use practical make-up and prosthetics for non-human characters and they look great! The action scenes are also very well choreographed while having no shaky camera which is awesome! Nami, Zoro and Sanji have such terrific fight scenes. I was worried about how they would do Luffy’s rubber powers in live action but it is done very well. The music score by Sonya and Giona is terrific. They created a score that really gives off the adventure and pirate feeling. They also do an awesome cover of the iconic opening “We Are” as well.
On that note, the casting of the Straw Hats is perfect. Inaki Godoy captures the optimism and silliness of Luffy without feeling cringy. Emily Rudd, Mackenyu, Jacob Romero Gibson and Taz Skylar manage to bring the core personalities of their characters Nami, Zoro, Usopp and Sanji to live action respectfully. For example, Nami still has her flirty scenes to trick people and Sanji still has the flirty treatment with women albeit no longer bothering them which is an understandable change. The villains are also well cast with each of them pulling off the character in live action phenomenally. The great highlight is Jeff Ward as Buggy who somehow manages to be incredibly scary yet silly which is exactly who Buggy is.
One of the biggest reasons for the failure of previous adaptations by Netflix is the butchering of the story. I can thankfully say that this is not the case in One Piece (2023). The main core of each story is still here and the iconic moments are replicated here as well. It was awesome seeing the moments I loved in the anime being done here in the same manner. The adventurous and fun yet violent nature of One Piece is still retained here. There are changes to the story which is understandable because they need to put the story in an 8-hour series. For example, they removed side characters like Johnny, Yosaku and Jango or changed how fights are resolved and how arcs end. Nonetheless, these changes don’t hurt the series and it is quite impressive that they managed to still tell the same story. The tone of the show is a bit more serious than the source material but this is also understandable. Manga and Anime are different types of media than a live-action TV show. Not everything can be brought to live-action without coming off as weird but the showrunners understood that and struck a good balance between serious and wacky fun without leaning too hard in either direction.
There are some bigger changes in the story such as introducing the character of Garp very early and having Arlong as the villain in Baratie arc instead of Kreig. I am kind of mixed on these changes as I do understand why but they also create some problems. The introduction of Garp who is chasing Luffy is done to create some tension and stakes for the characters that would be present for the whole series. It was also done to give perspective for the Marines in the form of Koby who has a bigger role in this series compared to the source material. Garp comes off as more scary than he normally is, to the point that he almost feels nothing like Garp should be at times. His character has weird tantrums that feel a bit odd as well. The subplot of the marines also ends up taking a lot of screen time from the main plot which leads to the main story feeling short at times. Arlong’s early introduction was also done to hype him up as the big bad of the series. The problem is that the Baratie arc is meant to be focused on Sanji but he ends up feeling overshadowed in his arc by Zoro and Nami who are now more focused. Sanji’s decision to leave and join Luffy isn’t as well built up because of this change. The creators did very well with the 2 episode limit per arc but the Baratie arc suffered the most.
Overall, I honestly can’t believe that the one I thought would be the most unadaptable, ended up being the best adaptation Netflix has done so far. They managed to accurately bring the world of One Piece to live action, which is quite an achievement. It seems Netflix has finally learnt from their mistakes and started respecting the source material. Them bringing in the creator to be more involved seems to have also paid off. I’m not sure how many seasons can be made for this considering how long-running this series is but I certainly want a season 2 if this is the quality of the show!
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