What to expect from the upcoming TV anime “One Piece”
Other things are to be expected about the change in the broadcast time of the TV anime ” ONE PIECE.” It’s like a future production policy. Until now, “ONE PIECE” has been produced as a TV anime in parallel with the weekly serialization. Thirty minutes of the anime is equivalent to about three episodes of the original manga, so the problem of catching up with the original is always there.
Therefore, it was natural for the anime to have original developments that were not in the original, commonly known as “ani-ori.” Sometimes, there were only a few cuts, and sometimes, an entire episode was an anime-origin story. And anime-origin stories have always divided fans’ opinions. Looking back at the history of the TV anime “ONE PIECE” so far, we can see that in the beginning, after the end of a significant episode, there was often a pattern of an anime-origin short series. This gradually became less common, and spin-offs such as “One Piece Historical Drama” and ” Chopperman ” began to be included. In recent years, anime-origin stories have been linked to the movie version.
These are like side episodes of the movie version and have no connection to the stories before or after. Recently, they have maintained a certain distance from the original work by using a summary in which the characters give commentary or adding extra time after the main story ends. Currently, “ONE PIECE” is broadcasting a re-edited version of the “Fishman Island Arc” as a “SPECIAL EDITED VERSION” for six months.
After the time change, it is scheduled to start with the continuation of the “Egghead Arc.” Many fans imagine the future of the TV anime “ONE PIECE” from this lineup. It is the introduction of a split-season system. In other words, from now on, they will move away from adding original content to the original manga and instead try to reproduce it faithfully. It is likely that after the TV anime is made up to the end of the “Egghead Arc,” production will be temporarily put on hold to maintain a certain distance from the original work. In the meantime, instead of doing a completely different job, they will probably broadcast an edited version of the past series, like the “Fishman Island Arc” this time. There are several advantages to this.
The most significant advantage is that it keeps the distance from the original work constant. Another benefit is that it will be a relief for people who have forgotten the past series because it has become a long-running series. Some people around me said that the story connected, and they remembered something after watching the current “Fishman Island Arc.”
I have heard that a certain number of “One Piece refugees” don’t understand the story because “ONE PIECE” has many plot twists that have been going on for years, and it has become a long-running work. If you think of it as a relief for that, a compilation of the past series may be the perfect solution. Also, the method of inserting a compilation may have the meaning of maintaining a certain level of freshness. In the regular split-season system, fans may leave when there is no broadcast; to avoid this, it was necessary to continue sending something.
This is precisely why collaborations between popular works with split-season systems have become prominent in recent years. If a product is not a collaboration but a TV broadcast for a certain period, the effect may not be comparable to a partnership.
This is just my imagination. However, judging from what I have heard, it is not unlikely. Will “ONE PIECE,” which has been serialized weekly for over a quarter of a century and has been adapted into a TV anime from time to time, continue to be a work that renews the common sense of TV anime? I can’t wait for it to start airing in April.