One Piece Live Action Teaser trailer - excitement!

Screenshot from the Netflix teaser trailer for One Piece live action

Introduction

One Piece by Eiichiro Oda has kept me company for more than two decades and, ever since I watched the first episode (yes, I was exposed to the anime before the manga), I fell in love with this story. It was a story about pirates, ships, high stakes and camaraderie and these are all themes and tropes I enjoy. When I started watching the anime, I was also sailing (and there wasn’t a lot of content revolving around water and sails) and I always felt this as an additional connection to this story.

When I first heard of the live action version of One Piece, I was not on the band wagon. I do not recall a live action adaptation that was successful (or, more to the point, that I liked) therefore, I felt that this adaptation was going to disappoint me. I thought this was going to be a disaster, without giving it a chance.

And then the trailer came out and I started hearing - really reading online - that the trailer was not half bad. And so I watched it.

Teaser trailer reaction

And I loved it! Yes, there are a few things that need improvement but the overall vibes and the visuals felt absolutely spot on, not to mention that the music was perfect, uplifting, adventurous and heroic (the perfect adjectives to describe One Piece).

I loved all the characters as introduced; Luffy seems an absolute delight (probably a bit less dumb than in the manga), Zoro has the same stern approach to life as in the manga (and that piercing look, just spot on), Nami reeks of conning and condescension for the others. Usopp and Sanji got too little time on the screen to pop but we see them in their traditional fighting styles for brief seconds and this makes me excited.

In essence, I loved the overall vibe of this teaser: we are going on an adventure in the seas. There is absolutely nothing else that I want to experience right now.

The trailer actually shows quite a lot of world building, with scenes here and there and in the background. And, for the first time in my life, I feel confident I could do a trailer breakdown providing more context (soon to come!)!

Things that might cause concern

Visual effects seem a bit poor; now, this could also be a choice. Better said, the visual effects seemed goofy. It is something to look out for; yet, there is also the argument that visual effects should be secondary to a great adaptation (as we already know that the story is legendary). Yet, Netflix has not dropped the ball on visual effects in the shows I have been watching, and this makes me think that the goofy visual effects might be a choice. Let’s see if this will actually bother me or if I will just be excited about the story and the characters that I will not even notice.

Another thing that bothered me - and it might only be that scene’s problem rather than the entire series - is Nami’s fighting style. In fact, she has none. While she does not have to be a skilled fighter, being her brain the strongest weapon she has, in the manga I remember her quite proficient. So I am hoping that this was just problematic, to my eyes, because of the cut or the angle.

Unknowns with an important impact

On Wikipedia, the list of episodes (and we only got the title for the first, Romance Dawn as it is in the manga!) is eight. Apparently they are all going to be dropped at the same time (in typical Netflix fashion, although recently Netflix switched to a two part drop model - and this is something that gives me pause and makes me wonder if Netflix believes in this series; yet, I do not recall if they do it also have the same approach for first season in a series).

How long are these episodes going to be? Are we really going to go through the entire East Blue content in one series? I think it is possible to cover East Blue in one season (it is 12 volumes after all, including Luffy’s origin story which could be condensed in a flashback and the chapter dedicated to the character stuck in the treasure chest), although I would not want the episodes to be short; possibly 45 minutes to one hour would hit the spot to cover more than a volume at at time!

I just got myself hyped for the series again!

What else can I expect?

First and foremost, the entire season drops on the 31st of August 2023 and I cannot wait to experience it.

Other things that I am expecting are changes from the manga and anime format: and I am truly looking forward to having the first great example of live action adaptation for manga and anime. It is a tough one; manga and anime are almost self-contained media. While we have seen a lot of proficiency in adapting comics in the last decade (the MCU, as long as they stop dropping the ball); and I am hoping this pushes producers and writers into great manga adaptation too. I was going to list a few things that are unique to manga (but really comics have too): onomatopoeic sounds, naming moves is essential to the genre (at least in the shōnen space), over the top attires (the characters, whether they appear in one panel or for an entire arc, need to be unique), catch phrases, etc. these are all key parts of manga that translate well into anime but have not done too well in live action adaptations. So I am looking forward to understanding what comes next because I felt that the vibes of the story were done correctly!

What else do I want to actually see in the story?

First and foremost, Gold Roger’s introduction (after all, he is the one who kicks off the entire story and gives the name to the entire series!); I am also expecting to get a pretty close look to Shanks, his personality and his powers.

Final thoughts

I have hopes that this could be one of the first examples of live action adaptation I enjoy; the story is fantastic, the characters are relatable. It is now a question of whether this can be portrayed in this media giving One Piece, the manga, the right format! Only time will tell!

Have you watched the trailer? Did it get your fan motors moving? What are the things you enjoyed? Comment down below!

One Piece Live Action Teaser trailer - excitement!

One Piece LIve Action Teaser tRailer breakdown

June MBR