One Piece

One Piece (ワンピース) is a Japanese 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 60th volume released as of November 2010. In 2010, Shueisha announced that they sold over 200 million volumes of One Piece manga so far; volume 60 set a new record for the highest initial print run of any book in Japan in history with 3.4 million copies, being also the first book to sell over two million copies in its opening week on Japan's Oricon book rankings. One Piece follows the adventures of Monkey D. Luffy, a 17-year-old boy who gains elastic abilities after inadvertently eating a mystical fruit, and his diverse crew of pirates, named the Straw Hats. Luffy explores the ocean in search of the world's ultimate treasure known as the One Piece and to become the next Pirate King. On his journey, Luffy battles a wide variety of villains and makes several friends.

The series has been adapted into an original video animation (OVA) produced by Production I.G in 1998, and an anime series produced by Toei Animation, which premiered in Japan in 1999. Since then, the still ongoing series has aired more than four hundred episodes. Additionally, Toei has developed ten animated feature films, an OVA, and five television specials. Several companies have developed various types of merchandising such as a trading card game, and a large number of video games.

The manga series was licensed for an English language release in North America by Viz Media, in the United Kingdom by Gollancz Manga, and in Australia and New Zealand by Madman Entertainment. The anime series was licensed by Funimation Entertainment for an English language release worldwide, although the series has been dubbed previously by 4Kids Entertainment. Since its release, One Piece has become one of the most popular manga series of its time in both Japan and North America. It enjoys a high readership, with over 200 million volumes of the series sold by 2010. Reviewers have praised the art, characterization, and humor of the story.

Plot
The series begins with a boy named Monkey D. Luffy, inspired by his childhood hero "Red-Haired" Shanks, going on a journey to find the One Piece. Along the way, he organizes and leads a crew named the Straw Hat Pirates. The crew consists of a swordsman named Roronoa Zoro; the navigator and thief Nami; the sharpshooter Usopp; the chef Sanji; the doctor Tony Tony Chopper; the archaeologist Nico Robin; the shipwright Franky; and a musician named Brook.

The crew faces diverse villians such as Baroque Works, Eneru, the Seven Warlords of the Sea and the Marines. The marines are the subordinates of the World Government, who 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 Four Emperors, the four most powerful pirates in the world.

After the death of Luffy's adopted brother Portgas D. Ace and one the Four Emperors named Whitebeard, the Straw Hat Crew undergoes rigorous training regiments. Two years later, the crew regroups at Sabaody Archipelago and they set out on a journey to the New World.

Setting
The fictional world of One Piece is covered by two vast oceans, which are divided by a massive mountain range called the Red Line. The Grand Line, a sea that runs perpendicular to the Red Line, further divides them into four seas: North Blue, East Blue, West Blue and South Blue. Surrounding the Grand Line are two regions called Calm Belts, which experience almost no wind and ocean currents and are breeding ground for the huge sea creatures called Sea Kings (renamed "Neptunians" in the English manga). Because of this, the Calm Belts are very effective barriers for those trying to enter the Grand Line. While navy ships, using sea stone to mask their presence, can simply pass through, most have to use the canal system of Reverse Mountain, 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. The second half of the Grand Line, beyond the second intersection with the Red Line, is also known as the New World.

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. What makes it even harder to navigate is the fact that normal compasses do not work there. A special compass called a Log Pose must be used. The Log Pose works by locking on to one island's magnetic field and then locking on to another island's magnetic field. The time for it to set depends on the island. 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.

The world of One Piece is filled with anachronisms, like the transponder snails, snail-like animals that can be attached to electric equipment and function as rotary phones, fax machines, surveillance cameras, and similar devices. Dials, the shells of certain sky-dwelling animals, can be used to store wind, sound, images, heat, and the like and have various applications. A Devil Fruit (renamed "Cursed Fruit" in the edited dub) is a type of fruit which when eaten confers a power on the eater. There are three categories of Devil Fruit. Zoan fruits allow the user to fully and partially transform into a specific animal. Logia fruits give control over and allow the user "to change their living body structure into the powers of nature". Paramecia is a catch-all category for fruits that give the user superhuman abilities. They are said to be incarnations of the Sea Devil himself and as a result, Devil Fruit users cannot swim in sea water as 'they are hated by the sea'. When even partially submerged in sea water, they lose all of their strength and coordination, although some abilities remain, such as Luffy still being able to stretch after being totally submerged. "Moving" water, such as rain or waves, does not have this effect.

Production
One Piece started as three one-shot stories entitled Romance Dawn —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!.

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. 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.

When creating a Devil Fruit, Oda thinks of something that would fulfill a human desire; he added that he does not see why he would draw a Devil Fruit unless the fruit's appearance would entice one to eat it. 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." Nevertheless, Konosuke Uda, the director, said that he believes that the creators "made the anime pretty close to the manga."

Oda was "sensitive" about how it would be translated. 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 both translated as "fshhhhhhh."

Manga
Written and illustrated by Eiichiro Oda, One Piece has been serialized in the manga anthology Weekly Shōnen Jump starting on August 4, 1997. The chapters have been published into tankōbon volumes by Shueisha since December 24, 1997. , the series spans over 600 chapters and 60 tankōbon volumes.

The One Piece series was licensed for an English language release by Viz Media publishes its English-language adaptation of the series, chapterwise in the manga anthology Shonen Jump, since the magazine's launch in November 2002, and in bound volumes since June 2003. , 38 English-language volumes have been published. However, Viz Media released a statement in July 2009 confirming the release of five volumes per month in North America during the first half of 2010, greatly increasing that number. In the United Kingdom, the volumes were published by Gollancz Manga, starting March 2006, until Viz Media replaced it after the fourteenth volume. In Australia and New Zealand, the English volumes have been distributed by Madman Entertainment since November 10, 2008.

Original video animations
Two original video animations (OVAs) have been released in Japan. The first, One Piece: Defeat The Pirate Ganzack!, was produced by Production I.G for the Jump Super Anime Tour of 1998 and directed by Gorō Taniguchi. It is 29 minutes in length and features character designs by Hisashi Kagawa. Luffy, Nami, and Zoro are attacked by a sea monster, that destroys their boat and separates them. Luffy is found on an island beach, where he saves the little girl Medaka, from two pirates. All the villagers, including the Medaka's father, have been taken away by Ganzack and his crew, as forced laborers. After hearing that Ganzak also stole all the food, Luffy and Zoro rush out to get it back. As they fight the Pirates, one of them kidnaps Medaka. A fight starts between Luffy and Ganzack, ending in Luffy's capture. Meanwhile, Zoro is urged into giving up, by threatening to kill the village people. The people from the village rise up against the Ganzack and while the islanders and pirates fight, Nami goes and unlocks the three. Ganzack defeats the rebellion and reveales his armored battleship. Now it is up to the Straw Hats, to "Defeat The Pirate Ganzack!" and prevent him from destroying the island.

The second OVA, One Piece: Romance Dawn Story, was produced by Toei Animation in July 2008 for the Jump Super Anime Tour. It is 34 minutes in length and based on the first version of Romance Dawn, the pilot story for One Piece, but includes the Straw Hat Pirates up to Brook and their second ship, the Thousand Sunny. In search for food for his crew, Luffy arrives at a port town, defeating a pirate named Crescent Moon Gally on the way. He meets a girl named Silk in town, who was abandoned by attacking pirates as a baby and raised by the mayor, which has caused her to value the town as her "treasure". The villagers mistake Luffy for Gally and capture him just as the real Gally returns. Gally throws Luffy in the water and plans to destroy the town, but Silk saves him and Luffy goes after Gally. His crew arrives to help him, and with his help, he recovers the treasure for the town, gets some food, and destroys Gally's ship.

Anime series
Due to the high popularity of the One Piece manga, Toei Animation produced an anime television series based on the manga chapters. The series, also titled One Piece, premiered in Japan on Fuji Television on October 20, 1999. Since then, the still ongoing series has aired more than four hundred seventy episodes and it has been exported to various countries around the world.

In 2004, 4Kids Entertainment began production on an English language release of One Piece in North America, and sub-licensed home video distribution with Viz Media. This dub of One Piece was heavily edited for content and length, reducing the first 143 episodes to 104. Sanji's cigarettes, for example, were turned into lollipops, and "the skin of a black pirate was changed to a tan mulatto / white color." 4Kids originally created an English version of the original opening theme; however, the music was replaced with an alternate score. The series premiered in the United States on September 18, 2004 on the Fox network as part of the Fox Box block, and later aired on the Cartoon Network in the Toonami block in April 2005. However, 4Kids released a statement in December 2006 confirming that they have canceled production of their dubbed version. In July 2010, an interview was conducted between Anime News Network and Mark Kirk, the Vice President of Digital Media for 4Kids Entertainment. In this interview, Kirk explained that 4Kids acquired One Piece as part of a package deal with other animes, and that the company did not actually watch much—if any—of the series before acquiring it. However, once it became clear to the company how One Piece would not work with their intended demographic, they decided to edit it into a more kid-friendly show until they had an opportunity to legally drop the license. Kirk said the experience "ruined [the] company's reputation." Ever since that incident, 4Kids have established a more strict set of guidelines, checks, and balances to determine what anime the company acquires.

In April 2007, Funimation Entertainment acquired the license from 4Kids. After producing a new English voice dub, the company released its first unedited, bilingual DVD box set, containing 13 episodes, on May 27, 2008. Similarly sized sets followed with fourteen sets released as of October 26, 2010. The Funimation dubbed episodes premiered on the Cartoon Network on September 29, 2007 and aired until its cancellation on March 22, 2008. 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 Total Drama Island. Funimation, Toei Animation, Shueisha, and Fuji TV released a statement in May 2009 confirming that they would simulcast stream the series within an hour of the weekly Japanese broadcast. This free, English-subtitled simulcast is available at www.onepieceofficial.com. Originally scheduled to begin on May 30, 2009 with episode 403, a lack of security resulted in a leak of the episode. As a result, Funimation delayed the offer until August 29, 2009 at which point it began with a simulcast of episode #415. One Piece episodes are also available for streaming at Hulu.com, in both subtitled and dubbed formats (with the dub being the unedited dub found on the DVD releases).

Anime films
Ten animated films based on the One Piece series have been released in Japan. The films are traditionally released during the Japanese school spring break since 2000. Although the first three films were less than an hour long and played as part of a double-bill with other anime movies. The films feature self-contained, completely original plots with animation of higher quality than what the weekly anime allows for. Funimation Entertainment has licensed the eighth film for release in North America.

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''.

The first, third, and ninth films were directed by Junji 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. The tenth film was directed by Munehisa Sakai.

Video games
The One Piece franchise has been adapted into multiple 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!. 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.

Music
Myriad soundtracks were released to the anime, films and the games. The music for the One Piece anime series and most of its films were directed by Kohei Tanaka and Shiro Hamaguchi. Various theme songs and character songs were released on a total of 49 singles. Most of the songs are also featured on six compilation albums and on 16 soundtrack CDs.

Light novels
A series of light novels was published based on the first OVA, certain episodes of the TV anime, and all but the first feature film. They featured art work by Oda and are written by Tatsuya Hamasaki. The first of these novels, One Piece: Defeat The Pirate Ganzak!, based on the OVA, was released on June 3, 1999. On July 17, 2000, followed One Piece: Logue Town Chapter, a light novel adaptation of the TV anime's Logue Town story arc. The first feature film to be adapted was Clockwork Island Adventure. The book was released on March 19, 2001. On December 25, 2001, followed the second and so far last light novel adaptation of a TV anime arc in One Piece: Thousand-year Dragon Legend. The adaptation of Chopper's Kingdom on the Island of Strange Animals was released on March 22, 2002, and that of Dead End Adventure on March 10, 2003. Curse of the Sacred Sword followed on March 22, 2004, and Baron Omatsuri and the Secret Island on March 14, 2005. The light novel of The Giant Mechanical Soldier of Karakuri Castle was released on March 6, 2006 and that of The Desert Princess and the Pirates: Adventures in Alabasta on March 7, 2007. The newest novel adapts Episode of Chopper Plus: Bloom in the Winter, Miracle Cherry Blossom and was released on February 25, 2008.

Art and guidebooks
Five art books and five guidebooks for the One Piece series have been released. The first art book, One Piece: Color Walk 1, released June 2001, has also been released in English on November 8, 2005. The second art book, One Piece: Color Walk 2, was released on November 4, 2003, the third, One Piece: Color Walk 3 – Lion, was released January 5, 2006, and the fourth art book, subtitled Eagle, was released on March 4, 2010. The fifth art book, subtitled Shark, was released on December 3, 2010. The first guidebook, One Piece: Red – Grand Characters was released on March 2, 2002. The second guidebook, One Piece: Blue – Grand Data File, was released on August 2, 2002. The third guidebook, One Piece: Yellow – Grand Elements, was released on April 4, 2007, and the fourth guidebook, One Piece: Green - Secret Pieces, was released on November 4, 2010. An anime guidebook, One Piece: RAINBOW!, was released on May 1, 2007, and covers the first 8 years of the TV show.

Other media
Other One Piece media include a trading card game by Bandai named One Piece CCG and a drama CD centering around the character of Nefertari Vivi released by Avex Trax on December 26, 2002.

Manga
One Piece is the highest-selling manga in the history of Weekly Shōnen Jump in Japan and the first manga to increase the magazine's sales in eleven years. Volume 60 holds a manga publishing record in Japan, with 3.4 million copies published in its first printing alone, breaking its own previous records established by volumes 57 and 59 (at 3.0 and 3.2 million copies respectively). In addition to that, it also broke Japan's all time first print publishing record of all books, passing the previous record of 2.9 million copies, held by Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. Overall, the series has re-written Japanese record for first print manga publication 8 times with Volumes 24, 25, 26, 27, 56, 57, 59 and 60. The first week sales of volume 60, at 2,094,123 copies, also break the Japanese all-time sales record for all books in its debut week, and is currently the only book to reach the 2 million mark in its first week. It is also currently the highest selling manga series of all time in Japan with over 200 million copies sold, and the fastest manga series to reach sales of 100 million.

One Piece was the best-selling manga series during 2008 in Japan with 5,956,540 volumes sold. Volumes 50, 51 and 49 placed first, second, and fourth, respectively, on Oricon's list of best selling manga volumes, with sales of 1,678,208, 1,646,978, and 1,544,000 copies sold respectively. Additionally, Oricon conducted a popularity survey with Japanese male and female readers between with ages ranging from ten to forty to determine the "Most Interesting Manga of 2008". In that survey, the four One Piece volumes published that year, volumes 49, 50, 51, and 52, placed first with an approval rating of 45.9%. In ICv2's list of "Top 25 Manga Properties Fall 2008", One Piece made a 15th place. In 2010 One Piece had improved to 2nd in ICv2's list of "Top 25 Manga Properties--Q3 2010".

According to Anime News Network, which gathers its rankings for Oricon, One Piece maintained its top spot in 2009 with 14,721,241 copies sold, more than second [Naruto] and third place [Bleach] combined. The four volumes released during that time frame 53, 54, 52, 55 ranked 1–4 respectively for single volume sales.

ANN comments that the art style of the One Piece manga requires "time to get used to" with its "very simple" artwork and its designs, which appear "very cartoonish" at first. They also note that the influence of Akira Toriyama (Dragon Ball) shines through in Oda's style of writing with its "huge [sic] epic battles punctuated by a lot of humor" and that, in One Piece, he creates a "rich tale" without focusing too much on plot. Active Anime describes the art work in One Piece as "wonderfully quirky and full of expression". Splashcomics comments that Oda's "pleasantly bright and dynamic" ("angenehm hell und dynamisch") art style suits the story's "funny and exciting" (German: "witzigen und ... spannenden") atmosphere.

EX lauds Oda's art for its "crispy" monochrome pictures, "great use of subtle shade changes" on color pages, "sometimes exquisite" use of angles, and for its consistency. Shaenon K. Garrity, who at some point edited the series for Shonen Jump, said that, while doing so, her amazement over Oda's craft grew increasingly. She states that "he has a natural, playful mastery of the often restrictive weekly-manga format", notes that "interesting things [are] going on deep in the narrative structure", and recommends "sticking through to the later volumes to see just how crazy and Peter Max-y the art gets." Mania Entertainment writer Jarred Pine comments that "One Piece is a fun adventure story, with an ensemble cast that is continuing to develop, with great action and character drama." He lauds Oda's artwork as "imaginative and creative" and comments that "Oda's imagination just oozes all of the panels". He also comments that "Oda's panel work [...] features a lot of interesting perspectives and direction, especially during the explosive action sequences which are always a blast", though he complains that the panels can sometimes get "a little chaotic".

The North American releases of the English translation of volumes 39-43 debuted at #5-9 on the New York Times Best Seller Manga list.

Awards
The manga was a finalist for the Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize three times in a row from 2000 to 2002,  with the highest number of fan nominations in the first two years.

The German translation of its 44th volume won the Sondermann audience award for international mangacategory, a yearly comic award given for 7 categories by the Frankfurt Book Fair, the Frankfurter Rundschau, Spiegel Online and Comicforum since 2004, on the Frankfurt Book Fair Comics Centre in 2005.

In a 2008 poll by Oricon, Japanese teenagers elected it the most interesting manga.

Anime
The first opening of the TV anime, "We Are!", won the Animation Kobe Theme Song Award of the year 2000. In February 2001, One Piece placed 9th among TV anime in Japan. In 2001, the readers of Animage, a popular Japanese anime magazine, voted the TV anime in 5th place of "The Readers' Picks for the Anime that should be remembered in the 21st Century". In June 2002, the Animage readers voted One Piece to be the 16th best new anime of the year 2001, and gave it another 16th place in 2004 in the category "Favorite Anime Series". In a 2005 web poll by Japanese television network TV Asahi One Piece was voted 6th "most popular animated TV series". Before the poll, Asahi TV broadcast another list based on a nation-wide survey in which One Piece placed 4th among teenagers. In 2006, it was elected 32nd of the Top 100 Japanese anime by TV Asahi and 21st by its viewers. [114 ] In September of the same year the Newtype magazine placed it 5th. Funimation's first DVD release of the series "One Piece: Season 1 First Voyage" was nominated for the Fifth Annual TV DVD Awards.

In Indonesia, Global TV was reprimanded by the Indonesian Broadcasting Commission (KPI) for airing the TV anime. Nina Armando, member of the KPI and lecturer at the University of Indonesia, said the show should not be aired at times when children are likely to watch.

In a review of the second DVD release of 4Kids Entertainment's dub, Todd Douglass, Jr. of DVD talk called its adaptation a "shabby treatment" resulting in an "arguably less enjoyable rendition". Douglass said that the 4Kids original opening was "a crappy rap song" and that the removal of whole scenes leaves a "feeling that something is missing". He later went on to say that "Fans of the 'real' One Piece will want to skip picking [...] up [4Kids Entertainment's One Piece DVDs] until an uncut release is announced", and also stated that "kids may get into this version because it's what they have seen on TV." Margaret Veira of Active Anime praised the TV series' "great" animation, stating that "It gives life and stays true to the style and characters of the manga." and noting the fight scenes in particular as having "a lot of energy to them". Patrick King of Animefringe comments that the art style of One Piece is "very distinctive and fresh". In a review of the first Funimation DVD release for Mania Entertainment, Bryce Coulter comments that One Piece is "not your typical pirate adventure" and that mixed with "the right amount of random fun along with a shonen style storyline" it becomes "an appealing and fun romp". In a review of Funimation Entertainment's second DVD release for Mania Entertainment, Bryce Coulter comments that "You can tell that they are giving One Piece the attention that was neglected by 4Kids" and that "One Piece is a great tale of high-seas fun that will leave you wanting more!"