We’re in foreign waters now, folks. You’re probably like, this is a bad pun, or what do you mean by that? Well, we’re in a good live-action Anime adaptation world. With getting that out of the way, adapting anime is a hard thing to do. First of all, most of the time, the dialogue is about Western anime fans because most of the time, we’re not talking about all the Japanese live-action Anime adaptations, and we never get to see stage plays and the like. The thing is that the Western companies have a terrible track record in doing it, getting people worried about seeing someone even try. Many Anime adaptations to me felt like how superhero comic adaptations were before Blade (not talking about Batman and Superman). I’m talking like those old Captain America movies bad. All this just bred more and more fear in seeing companies trying to make the classic Anime shows and films into something live-action with people who have no idea or connection to the property. The thing with good adaptations of superheroes and even games now is that the people involved respect and are fans of the material, so they care about it in some way. That fear reached high levels when people heard that Netflix was adapting One Piece, the world’s highest-selling sequential art/comic/manga series. Netflix stumbled very publically with their adaptation of the classic and beloved Cowboy Bebop. As a fan of One Piece – a proud member of the Straw Hat Pirate Grand Fleet I really had some considerable apprehension on this.
So what is One Piece for the people who are reading this but know nothing of this juggernaut of a story – One Piece is an expansive story about a young man named Monkey D. Luffy (Eastern naming convention Family Name then First name) and his dream to be The King of Pirates. To become this, he must find the One Piece, a treasure left by Gol D. Roger, who, before his execution by the law, told the world that whoever finds his treasure would be the new King of Pirates. Luffy begins his journey looking for a crew because you can’t be a great pirate captain without a great pirate crew. Through meeting many people, he’s able to meet four others who become the start of his crew and his journey across this big ocean world to make his dream come true. Oh yeah, I forgot he’s a rubber man; see, Luffy can stretch like rubber; for superhero folks, think Mister Fantastic or Plastic Man; for others, think Stretch Armstrong. There are plenty of other weird powers and creatures you’re going to see in this.
Iñaki Godoy steps into the large shoes of playing Luffy and does so amazingly well. He’s able to bring the spirit of Luffy to live action very well. He does his upbeat attitude to the screen and adds a bit of wisdom to his luffy that, at times, isn’t noticeable, especially in the earlier chapters/episodes of the One Piece manga or anime. Godoy, you can tell, took great lengths in portraying Luffy’s body language as well. He does very well being the lead of this show. It’s him and his performance as the main character and hero, Luffy, that the show is anchored on; for me, he killed it. Mackenyu plays Roronoa Zoro, the first person to join the crew, and is the cool, badass straight man to Luffy, an optimistic showboat-type character. Mackenyu sold me that this show could be good back when I saw the first trailer on look alone. Again, much like Godoy goes the extra length to sound and feels like Zoro while also being his own take, he also does fantastic in the action scenes he’s in. The fight choreography is very good, and you can see him doing his own fight work. He does the same as Godoy by carrying over the character’s body language from the anime adaptation; it’s subtle, but I think for fans, that detail will endear it to them.
Emily Rudd plays Nami, and honestly, for me, she had a pretty challenging hill to climb in playing this character. This character is a “cat burglar” in the Manga, and anime has a Catwoman-like energy or even a Fujiko from Lupin III as part of the group but also could turn on them. I worried if they could pull that off and in a way that didn’t need to use sexiness to do so. Here, Rudd plays up her organizational skills, being the one with some sense and being the reasonable girl character that keeps these boys in like Wendy does in Peter Pan stories. She also does quite well in the fight scenes, bringing Nami’s weapon to life well on screen. Jacob Romero is playing Usopp, the character that is most like Luffy in personality and is at the same maturity level. While he doesn’t look exactly like how the character is drawn with his weird long nose, he does bring him to life well, and even if he seems a bit cooler than Usopp is at this point of the story, he does carry that feeling of Usopp who is a little bit loose with the truth. I really liked him on screen, as you can see a lot of empathy in his portrayal, and while he’s on only half the episodes, I can’t wait to see him in the next season, where Usopp should have a lot more to do.
Taz Skylar plays Sanji, the chef and kick master of the group. I also worried about it because, you know, the look was kind of off to me at first, but after watching the season, he really came through here. They have his relationship with Chef Zeff spot on, and the cooking scenes feel right and not just put together. He has a similar yet different type of charm from Sanji, who in the Manga and Anime falls into a particular Japanese trope to that medium of the kind of girl-crazy nature of the character. He’s calm down and feels a bit better for a character his age for an audience that isn’t as young as the original audience for One Piece back when he debuted. I was also impressed with Morgan Davies as Koby, one of the first characters Luffy meets and, is expanded upon in this version earlier on. They bring the right amount of heart and feeling, especially as this character that needs a bit of saving in the beginning and becomes a bit of a central character to the overall season. Jeff Ward, as Buggy the Clown, captures Buggy well. He is quite funny in this while McKinley Belcher III is having a ball as Arlong, captain of Arlong Pirates, the most formidable foe and antagonist they face this season. Playing a character in so much makeup up, Belcher III really got into it playing a great bad guy you want to see taken down. Now Vincent Regan plays Vice Admiral Garp, one of my favorite characters. He really plays it Garp like a classic seaman with some help thanks to the accent, and he also feels like Tommy Lee Jones in The Fugitive. He’s the law and always after our favorite crew; he’s the right amount of over the top that every time you see him, he’s enjoyable.
Besides the cast, the real stars here are those responsible for the production design, visual effects, stunts, costumes, and hair/makeup. The way this show brought the world of One Piece alive is astounding. I honestly didn’t expect it to be that good. I saw the early pics leaked of the ship and stuff, but to see it in the show and the other ships on the water, along with the towns with people moving and living in these spaces. For me, it was like the first time you watched The Lord of the Rings and saw they made the Shire with all those Hobbit houses, the town center, and Gandalf’s cart. Maybe for some, like watching those Harry Potter movies and how they realized Hogwarts, but those were movies, and this is a show, and you can definitely see they spent money on this show.
Along with that, you can tell that the people making this show care but also that Oda himself is involved just by how close this is to his original work. This show really works, I feel, for people who know nothing of the property and even some folks who are relatively new to it all. Yet for those who’ve been on these seas for many years, there is stuff that perfectly folds in little easter eggs and things that we know now that weren’t there back when Oda first started. The foreshadowing they can do here from all the SBSs he’s done or the cover page stories over the years and things from the added anime are here. Even with what’s in this season, you can also see why certain things have been happening lately in the Manga (yes, this Manga is still going on with over 1090 chapters) was also very interesting to see and helped to round out things on both sides even more. For what it’s worth, the show is just damn good and a very successful adaptation. I’m legitimately surprised at how well they pulled it off, and the changes they made don’t change the enjoyment of the story at all. One Piece is a great new addition to the Netflix library and should grow the Straw Hat Grand Fleet to even more significant numbers.
Score: B+
RIOTUS 