The One Piece live action series had a nigh impossible task of adapting the seemingly unadaptable, yet for its first showing the series knocked it out of the park. From pitch perfect casting to a execution of the aesthetic of the One Piece world, season one was strong showing out of the gate. But season one was only the introduction, adapting the series’ first aga, the East Blue. Compared to everything that has come afterwards a self-disassembling clown, cat cosplaying pirates and a swordfish-nosed villain terrorizing provincial townscapes is relatively humble. Season two had to up the ante; bigger cast, bigger set pieces, bigger finishing attacks (that Zoro still refuses to name). The question remains, does this season live up to the high bar set with season one?
Welcome to the Grand Line, where everything gets bigger, zanier and more dangerous. In the Grand Line a quaint looking town can actually be a den of assassins, people can turn into animals and animals can turn into people. But first, the Straw Hats must brave Loguetown, which marks our farewell to the comparatively tame waters of the East Blue. In the manga, Loguetown was a brief but chaotic stopping point for the Straw Hats before they crossed into the Grand Line. Series creator Eiichiro Oda has gone on record about rushing through Loguetown in a few chapters to the Straw Hats could arrive at the Grand Line for the milestone of chapter 100. The anime and other auxiliary materials later expanded on Loguetown.
The live action, similarly does expand the events of Loguetown, in ways that are both similar as what was done before and entirely new and unique to this adaption. It still hits all the same beats and its wonderful to see these versions of the characters get these moments, like when Zoro (Mackenyu) gets his new swords and tests himself against a cursed blade. Buggy (Jeff Ward) and Alvia (Ilia Isorelýs Paulino) return with delightful scene stealing performances, leading into a tremendously fun action sequence that gives each of the Straw Hats a moment to shine, capped off with the iconic moment where Luffy (Iñaki Godoy) laughs in the face of his own death. The live action goes just a bit further, introducing a character who originally does not appear until hundreds of chapters into the story.
Bartolomeo’s (Nahum Hughes) inclusion here is the live action leaning on its biggest strength, there being the almost three decades of content to pull from. Although originally Bartolomeo’s first appearance is much later on, it is revealed then that he was present at Loguetown while the Straw Hats were there and was inspired to become a pirate after witnessing Luffy’s declaration to become the pirate king. It feels natural for this adaption to not only pay homage to that fact but also allow Luffy and Bartolomeo to interact.
Luffy is a catalyst of change wherever he goes. He brings liberation hope. In Loguetown, Bartolomeo is the person Luffy liberates. While not as overt a liberation as we’ve seen him do before or afterwards, its no less important. It was Roger’s words and laughter in the face of death that launched the great pirate era and lead to Luffy taking to the seas. Now, here in the same place as Roger, Luffy inspires another young man towards the sea, sharing with him the freedom that only a pirate can know in this world. Luffy will reap the benefits of this moment when Bartolomeo one day comes to his aid, but that is well into the future and right now the Straw Hats have much more pressing matters.
A Bold New Dangerous World
If season one was the introduction, here is where the world really begins to grow and not just in the literal sense of there being more islands to explore. The story is truly beginning to develop the larger power systems of the world. With Warlords, the Marines and many more nefarious entities at play, the Straw Hat’s journey is not without peril.
Majority of the marines our pirate crew encountered in the East Blue were more nuisances than actual threats. Cartoonishly evil and corrupted by power, neither Axe-hand Morgan nor Nezumi posed a real challenge for Luffy. The live action does introduce Garp (Vincent Regan) much earlier as a constantly looming threat. In comparison to the other marines we encountered, Garp was everything a marine should be; a bastion of justice for the people. Garp is unquestionably good, but still an antagonist for the Straw Hats.
In the manga canon Garp does not encounter Luffy until later in the story and the marines who were the audience’s first real introduction to marines that upheld justice were Smoker (Callum Kerr) and Tashigi (Julia Rehwald). Garp in season is actually similar to Smoker and Tashigi when they first appear in the manga, following the Straw Hats with goal of arresting them. The difference being their motivations. Garp wanted to stop Luffy from being a pirates. Smoker and Tashigi on the other hand are fueled by a conviction that all pirates must be evil and need to be stopped.
Smoker is the first time Luffy is unable to punch his way out of situation. It is an immediate skill check to let the Straw Hats know the enemies ahead of them are going to much more difficult than anything they’ve faced thus far. Here in season two, Smoker and Tashigi take the reins from Garp, Koby and Helmeppo as the ‘b-plot’ marines who we occasionally cut away to and follow their story. In small change from their original reasoning to head into the Grand Line, they’re tasked by Garp to track down Baroque Works.
The still want to pursue the Straw Hats, to the point that when they first stumble into something suspicious they immediately assume the Straw Hats are involved. Instead they find two Baroque Works agents, Mr. 11 and Miss Thursday. An important element of this scene is Tashigi being the one to defeat Mr. 11 and take his sword from him. Tashigi has an additional goal beyond being a marine, she wants to collect the rare swords that exist in the world. Specifically, she wants to remove them from the possession of pirates and criminals. In the manga, Mr. 11’s defeat and capture happened off screen and its unclear if Smoker or Tashigi was the one to defeat him there. Its an important beat for her character that she have this moment claiming sword from a criminal and that she does it without assistance.
Smoker and Tashigi in the larger story of One Piece are fundamental to helping the audience understand that the Marines are not a force for good in this world, even when the individual person is. Garp’s involvement in season one did transfer some of that on to him, but Garp is already someone willing to eschew orders to help the innocent and by the end of season one that is a quality we see Koby and Helmeppo begin to adopt themselves when they refuse to capture the Straw Hats, after Luffy and company helped a village when the Marines did not.
The scene where Smoker gives a little girl money to by ice cream after she accidently runs into him is such an important moment to show the audience the kind of person he is. If the live action had not included that scene, I would have been worried. Smoker and Tashigi are fundamentally good people who have not yet realized the constrains of the organization they belong to. They still see the world in black and white. Marines good. Pirates bad. The breadcrumbs are there for the moment they realize their world view is flawed, and I look forward to seeing the culmination of that realization in season three.
The Marines, however are just one of the many looming dangers the Straw Hats find themselves up against this season. The likes of Baroque Works is certainly the more immediate danger to them, with our pirate crew facing off against several of their agents. There’s the fantastic set piece where Zoro faces down one hundred Baroque Work agents alone and coming out the other side with only a few bruises (all while a Mihawk hallucination negs him about not being good enough). Whiskey Peak is impeccably designed with this action sequence at the heart of it. Its easily one of the highlights of the season. But those one hundred assassins were like picking daises compared to the headliners of Mr. 3 (David Dastmalchian), Miss Golden Week (Sophia Anne Caruso), Mr. 5 (Camrus Johnson), Miss Valentine (Jazzara Jaslyn) and of course, Miss All-Sunday (Lera Abova).
Its outstanding how these characters look like they were ripped off the manga page. Even more impressive than that is being to have them be this intimidating while also keeping their power sets as ridiculous as they are. Mr. 5 uses his boogers as projective explosives. The unluckiest are an otter and a vulture. Miss Golden Week uses emotion altering paints. Mr. 3 has the power to control wax. It could have been all too easy for any of these elements to come across as too silly in the live action setting, and yet there is a genuine sense of danger any time the Straw Hats have to face off against them.
Most dangerous of them all being Miss All-Sunday, the second in command of Baroque Works. Choosing to open the season with her assault of the Marine base in Shellstown was an excellent way to establish how dangerous she is. It also adds layers to her actions later on that create questions about her motives. She was able to single handedly dispatch a platoon of soldiers, so why wouldn’t she do the same to the Straw Hats when she snuck aboard their ship. Why offer them safe passage to an island when her organization so clearly wants them dead? Why approach a marine petty officer potentially leaving Baroque Works open to discovery? Every scene she’s in, she sweeps in with this enigma cloaking her actions and leaves with only more questions left in her wake. Its all pointing to her having her own goals outside of Baroque Works and Mr. 0, but that is a payoff we’ll have to wait for in the next season.
Friends Old and New
As complimentary as this season has been for the adversaries, the show is still about the Straw Hats. If the core characters did not land, it would not matter how well executed everything else was. Which is why its good to be able to say season two surpasses season one with its portrayal of the Straw Hats, particularly in their interactions with one another. There is such a palpable chemistry between this cast. No matter who’s in the scene the characters just bounce off one another. Where the live action excels the most at this is the small moments between the characters. Giving Nami (Emily Rudd) and Sanji (Taz Skylar) a scene where he shares a story about his mother. Luffy and Zoro having a moment where the swordsman admits his defeat to Mihawk still affects and Luffy reassures him that’s okay that he couldn’t defeat before because he will be ready one day. These moments aren’t big or flashy, but do so much in showing us what these characters are about. Which is not to say when it’s time for things to get flashy those moments don’t hit as hard, because they do. Little Garden particularly has well-crafted character moments embedded within the action, like Usopp (Jacob Romero) stepping forward for a battle that he knows he can’t win and positioning himself where the blows he takes will cause his friends to be freed is such a good moment for the character.
Season two does add new members to our crew, Vivi (Charithra Chandran), the Princess who’s on a desperate mission to save her country, and Tony Tony Chopper (Mikaela Hoover), the little reindeer with a big heart and even bigger medical knowledge. Both characters were so important to get right. Vivi is our emotional through line to this arc and the upcoming one in season three. The audience needs to care about her and we need to believe the Straw Hats care about her.
Vivi fits in so well with the crew, especially her connection with Nami and Luffy. With Nami, she’s another girl she can finally interact with. Similar to Nami, she’s not someone who’s used to relying on others so when Luffy appears before her with his ‘shut up and let us help you’ attitude’ Nami’s the one the first there to let her know its okay to let those walls down because it’s a lesson she just learnt herself. As for Luffy and Vivi there is a kinship of leadership between the two. Luffy might be a good fighter and have an unwavering moral compass, but he still has some growing to do when it comes to being someone other people rely on as a leader. An important lesson Luffy learns this season is that a captain has to think about the needs of his crew above his own impulses. It’s a lesson he learns from Vivi when she bows her head and asks for help when Nami is sick even after being shot. Similarly, there are lessons Luffy imparts to her. They’re both helping one another become better leaders and it is a crucial part of Luffy’s journey.
The newest addition to the crew is the reindeer with a bright blue nose. We don’t have as much time with Chopper as we do Vivi, but the season still lands the perfect emotional punch with his backstory. Chopper is a someone with a wealth of empathy. Someone who’s been abandoned and hurt but still chooses to be kind despite that, which does seem to be commonality between the Straw Hats.
The second season of One Piece live action is not a perfect adaptation. Some elements had to be altered, some story beats had to be left on the cutting room floor. Despite that is so obviously that everyone involved has such a deep appreciation for this series and what to do their best to bring the series to life. This series is a labor of love. Look no further than all the easter eggs and moments included this season for proof that the team behind this series is as excited to bring this world to life as the audience is to see it come to life. A non-comprehensive list of said easter eggs being:
- Sabo being at Loguetown with Dragon.
- The Rumbar Pirates and Brook appear in Laboon’s flashback.
- Luffy dancing the Nika dance while singing Bink’s Brew.
- Dorry having cravings that resembles Nika and Loki as he first appears in the manga in silhouette.
- The hold music for the den den mushi in Sanji’s conversation with Mr. 0 being ‘Believe’ the song One Piece opening theme.
- Chopper humming his own theme song.
One Piece is series that delights in itself. It’s a joy to watch even when its pulling at the heart strings. Season three promises even more grand adventure as the Going Merry sets course to Alabasta.
Images courtesy of Netflix.
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