One Piece

What would you like to edit?

SynopsisBackgroundAlternative TitlesPictureChapters/VolumesPublishing DatesRelationsTypeExternal Links  

It's very hard for me to rate this. Not just because the manga is so long (I'm just past halfway at the point of this review, so it's subject to change) but because it's a singular, almost historical event. It's something that's been going on for almost thirty years as a global phenomenon and it's all coming from a guy who, despite being a multi-millionaire if not billionaire by now, continues to live a workaholic's life. Even if you genuinely despised One Piece in every way, from its characters to its design, it's difficult not to feel swayed into liking it looking at Oda's sheer ... passion. How can you really be negative towards a guy that's so remarkably driven, talented, and also generous towards his fans?

In fact, I probably would've NEVER read this if not for Oda. I already tried One Piece much earlier in life, about fifteen years prior, and after watching up to WATER-7/Ennies Lobby I decided it was just not for me. I watched hundreds of episodes and not a single moment truly stuck with me except maybe Chopper's backstory. That was it. I genuinely thought it was overrated trash.

Reading it is a completely different experience. The art in these chapters, especially 200-400ish is just on another level. The Questions Corner inbetween chapters also makes the whole thing feel alive. You really get a sense of community and you see One Piece evolving as you go alongside with Oda himself. It's immensely satisfying.

This is not to say that it's without faults. Oda has one major, unignorable flaw, which is that every fucking arc is identical to the next. The crew arrive in some place, they take a look around, then Luffy either gets stuck or knocked out or in any case has some problem that leaves him unable to act. Cue the chapters to follow of the Straw Hats trying to deal with the threat without him until he finally comes back and punches it out of existence. I'm not saying it's bad... but it can get truly egregious in certain arcs. And you have to understand, I'm not even whining about the fact that it's always just Luffy punching a guy's lights out. I LOVE THAT. I just don't get why he has to be disabled in some shitty way every goddamn time. Surely there's workarounds?

And the irony is, the one time Oda tries to fix this, he almost nukes his own manga. Towards the end of the first part, he decides to go all edgy and deliver the most anti-One Piece story ever. I'm sure as a kid I would've loved that but now I found it distasteful and almost experience-ruining. The whole point of this manga is that nothing really matters. The Straw Hats always win, the good guys are always saved, and even the bad guys get to live another day and might even be redeemed. Whatever bad stuff happened that's terrible is all in the past and presented in flashbacks. Mess with that, and you've obliterated the soul of One Piece, which is what Oda almost did until he realized what he was doing, got cold feet, and quickly ran everything back and returned to the old formula. It even feels weird talking about this so vaguely because, well, who hasn't been spoiled by now? Me, actually, I wasn't spoiled somehow... which is why I'm keeping this spoiler-free for everyone!

One thing I've seen complaints about is that the characters don't change. This is a strange complaint. Do these people even get what One Piece is? It's a serialized story running decades. This is supposed to be something that anyone of any age understands and can pick up at any point. It's more like a sitcom, really. It's comfort food. It wouldn't matter if you drop midway during an arc because so long as you get the basics on who everyone is, you know exactly what the dynamic is between the characters. That is the appeal, not a fault. Who on earth is reading HUNDREDS OF CHAPTERS of a story they hate waiting for it to "get good" by which they mean it becoming something else?

Having said that, there are complaints.

Valid ones, in my opinion.

And the real problem for me is the art. At first One Piece's art is rough, though it's obviously still great. Then it gets better, and better, and better... and it becomes AMAZING. I've saved sooooo many panels during my read. But then you get to the point I am now, chapters 600+ and Good lord, it hurts my eyes to read this. Everything is stacked with so many details, so many character reactions, so many text bubbles that it's a nightmare to go through. I used to love it when Oda did a double-page spread because I knew it would be some amazing artwork. Now, when I get to the double-page spread it's like I get a tiny, sharp pain in my brain. Instead of some mood-setting piece of art, it's a bunch of small panels I need to make my way through and make sense of. It's beyond tiresome. To give you an idea, I read the first 600 chapters in about a month. It's been close to two weeks since then and I've read maybe 50 chapters. Probably less. And if I didn't even make an effort in some days to read at least a couple, I'd probably have read less than one.

It's stopped being fun. I even considered switching to the anime but that's so slow that it's unbearable. Plus, I do miss the art. It's not like Oda got less talented. His art is better than ever. But that doesn't make it easier to read. It feels like there's no more use of dramatic tones for contrast, nothing... It's just this huge bland mix with a million details and speech bubbles I need to wade through to get the story, and try to separate the pointless bullshit empty-of-meaning lines of text from the ones that are actually relevant to the story going forward.

At the same time, it's hard to judge. Really hard. Because what I want is to keep reading. But maybe if I'd be waiting two weeks for a new issue, I'd be happy it has this much detail. This is why it's extremely difficult to rate this as mixed because I feel the only person who can truly rate One Piece fairly is one who has read from the beginning and who has a lot of exposure to serialized fiction at this scale. Personally, all I can say is that it's really good for the most part, that I love the art style as well as Oda and the community he's built, but that I'm struggling a lot with the latter half of the story and its presentation. Still, I'll keep going and probably in a few months or year I'll rewrite this altogether.

Coming from someone who read this two times, it's still the worst out of the Big 3. Most of the best moments have happened 10-25 years ago, and the quality has dropped off after the timeskip. It really doesn't feel Oda knows how to write all the straw hats into the story, the past 3 arcs I honestly can't remember what most of the crew has done besides react to a flashy attack. The Dripfeeding of information Oda does is also incredibly annoying, it really shouldn't have taken almost 30 years just to see a silhouette of the main villain. Besides that, a lot of ... the pre timeskip content is still very peak Shonen, sagas such as Alabasta, Water 7 and Summit war are incredibly good, and mainly carries my review score. Overall, it's still good, but I wouldn't recommend it to most people.

People will always ask "when does this get good?" and answers will vary. My answer to that is around 450 chapters in. I don't understand how people can claim that One Piece is a god-sent masterwork from Romance Dawn. It's slow, obnoxious, repetitive, predictable, and unbelievably annoying. The identity of the series is also steeped in juvenile misogyny that gets gross pretty quickly. Dragon Ball did it for a couple volumes. One Piece did it for 20 years.

The Story is basic but fine. Clear motivations, clear goals. Nothing wrong with that. The art style is sometimes overwhelming. You get used to it and it's ... definitely a key aspect to the identity of OP but sometimes less is more. The characters are pretty hit and miss, with one half being really endearing and sympathetic and the other half being detestable. There are so many characters that I despise (including some of the main cast), which does not help me enjoy the series. I didn't like a lot of the humour but there were some laugh out loud moments. The world building is phenomenal. This is my favourite part of One Piece. The problem I found with this is that the cool stuff was metered out way too slowly. I was always thinking "when are we going to get to the cool stuff, why are we wasting time with some stupid shit when there's so much potential for more interesting stories?" Maybe that's a "me" problem.

The fights are always good, that's one area where OP shines, although a lot of the villains suck. Over-the-top evil, obnoxiously arrogant, usually over-confident. And it's the same end result every time. Luffy gives the guy a big punch. Wow! He got what he deserved! Who could have seen that coming?? It's painfully transparent. I don't understand how a person can watch this happen 4 or 5 times and clap and cheer every single time. Also no one ever dies ever (I can count like 4 significant deaths in over 600 chapters). It really takes the tension away. How am I supposed to care about a fight if I no that there are no real stakes because the writing is predictable? Suspension of disbelief only goes so far.

I'm happy for everyone who loves OP and gives it a 10. I don't get it but I'm happy for you. Clearly this series just isn't for me. And don't get me wrong, OP has some really great moments. There's a lot of good stuff to find. The only problem is that those gems are buried in an ocean of tedious mediocrity. I did not enjoy the journey. The destination was okay. An overall unpleasant experience.