I approached One Piece optimistically. A friend was eager for me to get into it. There's no shortage of rave reviews for it online. I heard time and time again that Oda was an exceptional world-builder. I don't read all of the big shonen mangas, but I know I love a couple of series within the genre, so I had no reservations about the format. I was excited to see what all the hype was about. After reading 500+ chapters, I've dropped the series. I likely would have dropped it earlier if my friend hadn't urged me to make it to later arcs where it
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"gets good." Needless to say, I'm not a fan.
The story kicks off well enough. Characters are colorful, the tone is light, there's a charm to its old-timey seaside aesthetic, and the fantastical elements are intriguing. I imagine most readers would be propelled to read further as they're promised a grand adventure in distant lands, where great dangers, unfathomable sights, and the ultimate treasures await the crew.
From that point on, I'd sum up my experience as slowly realizing that the story has no real intentions of progressing beyond its initial setup. The formula of OP's arcs described in others' reviews is accurate. It's reused again and again without any real twists or turns in the major plot. I know it's technically a serialized manga, but I find OP's story most comparable to episodes of a show like Scooby Doo. In a Scooby Doo episode, you know what you're getting: The gang visits a new town, investigates clues, confronts the monster, and solves the mystery. They get split up at some point, Shaggy gets scared, Velma loses her glasses, etc. Reusing a formula isn't necessarily a bad thing, but I found that OP's characters and the dynamics between them weren't strong enough to entertain me for hundreds of chapters and dozens of repetitive arcs. Their shticks grew stale. Nothing they do is exceptionally funny, badass, or touching. It's all serviceable until it isn't.
The big difference between OP and something like Scooby Doo is that OP props up the illusion that a larger plot is progressing. Yes, certain things in OP change permanently, but almost never in a way that changes the course of the crew's adventure. There's a reliance on manufactured milestones (e.g., Grand Line, Shichibukai, the crew's bounty). At the end of arcs, Oda will maybe drip feed the audience some lore or give a character a new power. This is the illusion of change. It's all a carrot on a stick—an RPG grind. It crosses the line between keeping the audience hooked and stringing them along, intentionally tricking them. It truly felt cynical.
The praise for OP's world-building genuinely confuses me. Yes, there's a lot of stuff in its world—a lot of characters, species, apparel, tech, etc. Still, most additions to the world aren't pieces of a larger puzzle. The inclusion of giants, sentient frogs, and zombies are all inconsequential. Non-human species simply act like humans. A big, mountable duck is functionally just a horse. These aren't bad things; they're just not really examples of world-building. It's set dressing. I bring this all up because the praise of OP's world-building was what convinced me to check it out. 1000+ chapters was nearly flipped into a selling point—imagine how rich, complex, and interconnected a world could be built in a series with that chapter count! In reality, the world is very simple. There's some factions, some history, some key locations—nothing I couldn't explain to someone in a couple of minutes. That gargantuan chapter count is instead largely spent telling the same, self-isolated story on one-off islands.
As I've seen other reviewers criticize, characters never die in OP. It's not that characters need to die for a story to be good. What's bothersome about OP is that it constantly sets up "life and death" stakes as its source of tension. Once a reader catches on to the fact that Oda is not willing to kill a character, subsequent battles are understood as simply going through the motions, getting from A to B (sometimes I could at least appreciate the fight choreography or some visual spectacle, but OP doesn't excel in these categories). There's no worry that a character will be lost, devastating those close to them and changing the course of the crew's plans. That brings me to another issue with OP's stakes. I've seen some people point out that there's no romance in OP. I think, more generally, the problem is that no characters share close bonds. Part of what's exciting about strong relationships between characters is that something stands to be lost. The OP crew, on the other hand, feels sterile—their character sheets would state that they'd do anything for each other, but I never felt that that connection was earned or believable. There's a distance between them. They each do their own thing and are never truly changed by one another. I can't imagine the death of one crew member affecting the rest of the crew in any significant, long-term way. Without real stakes, tension and excitement were elusive feelings throughout my reading of OP.
I don't knock any points off for OP's art. I think Oda is a good artist. He's not a master, but I'm not expecting that from everything I read. My most negative opinion surrounding the subject has to do with his character design sensibilities. I think OP was visually strongest in the beginning. Oda kept characters looking simple, which there's a charm and memorability to. As the crew gets farther in their adventures, they come across wackier or more powerful characters. Oda often misses the mark in portraying these characters as bizarre, godly, fashionable, badass, or whatever else. Their body types and/or outfits can be described as garish. So, I wasn't liking where that trend was headed at the time I stopped reading.
Ultimately, I feel burned by this series. I don't believe it has respect for the reader's time. It's artificially lengthened: In a later arc, Luffy is offered the location of the One Piece (the ultimate treasure), and he declines because "What's the fun in that?!" At some point, it's all too evident that OP does not continue because it needs more time to express certain messages, wrap up a complex plot, illustrate a strong character arc, etc. It continues because it makes money. I'm usually not the person to bring that up, but the thought became hard to ignore while reading something so bloated and meandering.
Ironically, OP is devoid of adventure—something it claims to be all about. Its arcs are predictable. There are no real stakes or sacrifices. There aren't strong bonds made. The plot doesn't take surprising turns. I can't describe OP as a story with real heart, joy, or impact.
If you love the OP crew and like seeing them do their thing on playfully themed islands, then I understand having a positive opinion of the series. I would just disagree with claims that the appeal of OP amounts to much more than that. I know I've only read about half of the series, but I think I've given it more than enough chances to prove itself. Thanks for reading.
Feb 4, 2024 Not Recommended Funny  Well-written  Preliminary
(513/? chp)
I approached One Piece optimistically. A friend was eager for me to get into it. There's no shortage of rave reviews for it online. I heard time and time again that Oda was an exceptional world-builder. I don't read all of the big shonen mangas, but I know I love a couple of series within the genre, so I had no reservations about the format. I was excited to see what all the hype was about. After reading 500+ chapters, I've dropped the series. I likely would have dropped it earlier if my friend hadn't urged me to make it to later arcs where it
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