The One Piece: A Remake That Makes Little Sense But Has Already Made History?
Netflix’s announcement of The One Piece anime remake makes us reflect on the meaning of an unexpected and surprising operation. Yes, at Jump Festa 2024 Netflix dropped the bomb: One Piece will have a new animated adaptation produced by WIT Studio. The title? The One Piece, with the article. And yes, it is probably the first time that a franchise has delved into the production of a remake of an original anime that is still in progress, and the sensational announcement is one of the divisive ones and shakes up a bit everyone, both the instant detractors and those who have had the time to say they are optimistic. It’s up to us to find our way around and dissect the reasons for an operation that surprises us at first glance, but which is only the latest consequence of the dizzying growth that the franchise is experiencing.
The One Piece: The Fruits of A Record-Breaking Success
Let’s start by reeling off some data that leaves no room for misunderstanding: the live action of One Piece, debuted on August 31, 2023, and already renewed for a second season, it is the most watched Netflix series in 84 countries in the first two weeks of streaming (absolute record), it recorded a mind-boggling figure of 18.5 million views 4 days after release. In short, the series with Luffy and the crew in the flesh has achieved considerable success and has inevitably contributed to raising One Piece to the rank of a new entity in the pantheon of pop culture, breaking through the barriers of the “niche” product aimed exclusively at fans of Japanese animation just as the anime par excellence had previously done, the one most imprinted in the common imagination which necessarily attaches an image of Goku: Dragon to the Japanese cartoon entry Ball.
It is the effect of a work that translates its contents into a more accessible form, in the common language of live action, which opens the doors to transmediality at an opportune moment. It does so first of all by choosing well to rely on an increasingly ambitious and far-sighted Netflix, and it does so, above all, in a historical period in which streaming platforms are navigating with more vigor in the production of original anime, aiming at the distribution of flagship titles and , in general, contribute to their diffusion in channels no longer exclusively dedicated to the medium in question (such as Crunchyroll), ensuring the sector a first important approach from of a more general audience. That of live action is a choice linked to self-promotion that takes place in two directions.
Long-time fans of the anime and manga realize their dream of seeing their beloved crew personified and viewing is a must (even for the defeatists of the Netflix adaptations and for those who still have the 39; nightmare of Death Note); the new entries in the universe of Eiichiro Oda, for the first time face to face with the Straw Hat Pirates, open a window on an expanded vision, which convinces to start the reference work and the directly derived one, the anime. And here comes the remake announced on the occasion of the Jump Festa: the idea of giving brand new users the opportunity to begin the adventure with a renewed visual look and in step with the times is appetizing and if on the one hand Netflix seizes the opportunity of a mine that has turned out to be gold, on the other Shueisha and Eiichiro Oda rub their hands at the idea of ensuring a long life for their creature which, at this point, could really be about to end.
Why yes, it is difficult not to associate the announcement of the new adaptation with the implicit declaration that the manga is about to end and the possibility of extending the life span of the work. But if nothing else the TV series finds its own meaning precisely in the complementarity of the versions and in the choices of a narrative that condenses the events and deviates from the matrix, which adapts to the medium by returning something different, but which does not step on the toes of the paper version and to the animated.
A Remake To Set Sail For The First Time
With The One Piece, tracing the meaning is decidedly less immediate and even looking at similar operations it is problematic to compare the maneuvers. Let’s think about the most famous case, Dragon Ball Kai, a celebratory remake of the anime by Akira Toriyama which readjusts (or rather reduces) the Z saga (which consists of 291 episodes) into 159 episodes, streamlining the story, removing any delays and redundancies, eliminating fillers. For Kai it is perhaps more correct to talk about remastered, given that the changes made to the animations concern a simple HD update of the source material and the real additions are limited to the opening and ending, with some graphic remakes only during the most iconic scenes of the opera.
Nothing to do with “the unprecedented experience” so Netflix promises “cutting-edge technologies will be used to reinvent Luffy’s adventures”, and not just because of the scale of the #39; actual remake but also because at the time of the announcement of Dragon Ball Kai the historical series had already ended 13 years ago. There is little doubt that WIT Studio will also focus its efforts on better-framed pacing and avoid unnecessary excesses, but the meaning of the new adaptation will obviously depend on the period that the production will choose as the launch window: will it do so while the historical anime is still underway, or will it wait for its conclusion? In the first case, the decision would perhaps be forced: a possible overlap would divide fans between two series broadcasts in parallel, dispersing them in visions whose compatibility it is difficult to intercept. The One Piece would then be delivered only to new users and would not belong to rewatchers, to those who have been following it since 1999.
Not to mention the alienating effect that would be produced by placing alongside the excellent animation work of the anime in progress (with the technical peaks that it is capable of achieving) to the equally excellent interpretation of WIT Studio (little doubt about it, given the studio’s “curriculum”) which is precisely the one that aims to replace it. In this sense, a remake limited to the more technically obsolete sagas would be more congenial, given that a remake is by its very nature a restyling operation that aims at modernization and updating, but Netflix’s statements clearly reveal the #39; intend to readjust the manga in its entirety. And it is impressive to think that such a long-lived series, so crystallized in a form and style that has continued to reiterate for twenty-six years for more than a thousand episodes, can start from scratch leaving the inevitable sensation of nullifying something that still unfolds its own sails, which is still in progress and is waiting to legitimize itself in one of the most anticipated finales ever.
What remains then, in addition to the market logic to which the author, producer and distributor are attentive, ready to ride the wave of success in a now established partnership (and this is also demonstrated by the #39;announcement by Netflix of the adaptation of an Oda one-shot published by Shueisha in 1994 which will be titled Monsters: 103 Mercies Dragon Damnation), is the hope of those who have long wanted a more faithful adaptation to the paper counterpart; the satisfaction of those who, having removed nostalgia and sentimentality, know how to give up that slightly dull patina vintage a little cult of the first episodes in favor of an improvement in the animations that the new techniques ensure.
The opportunity, above all, of those who will be able to have dreamy eyes jumping aboard the Going Merry for the first time without crashing into the obstacle of an aesthetic that they would consider old-fashioned, far from their habits of vision made of fluidity and high resolution. This is the profound meaning of The One Piece, in its ability to be a generational glue, in that article that gives the impression that whoever pronounces it is about to tell the story of something unrepeatable which he has already witnessed, which he has lived to the end, to the point of seeing the treasure with his own eyes, and which he now wants to pass on to whoever takes up the witness.
