over one thousand chapters and nearly the same amount of episodes the series written by eichiro oda that has been a staple of the shonen jump magazine since 1997 one piece a series the due to its sheer length has put off many people over many years but not me so today join me as we set sail to the grand line in my first ever journey through the one piece anime adaptation before we start we need to set some ground rules to somehow manage this behemoth of a series firstly i am really going in with little to
no knowledge about the manga or the anime and these are all of my first impressions so don't be surprised if i miss a lot of details on my first viewing secondly i'll be exclusively watching the anime and if you're curious why i made the decision to go this route i'll explain that at the end of the video i'll be watching mostly with subtitles but i might switch to dubs if i can't be asked to read for a while so do keep that in mind if there are any some minor discrepancies between the translations also i'll
be using the story arc format listed on the one piece fan wiki to have a clear separation between episodes and lastly just to make this a little more fun we're going to be adding each arc into a tier list format which will be updated continuously obviously this will purely be out of my initial impressions so don't take it too seriously but with that out of the way let's look toward the open sea and set sail into our very first arc romance dawn one piece was always one of those extremely long running shows with decades of
history that i just knew i would never get into i had never gotten around to watching dragon ball or naruto or bleach so it just seemed like something i'd never watch but then one faithful lockdown day however i was browsing through some of the popular shows and that episode count just seemed like a challenge and i clicked it again i want to restate that i went into the show completely blind i did not even know that this series was about pirates thing is i absolutely love anything to do with the golden age of piracy so
my crazy decision of starting to watch an almost 1 000 episode long series was rewarded immediately and i knew i was in for the long haul literally the first few sentences of the intro is just the perfect hook get it because we're on the sea and you know fishing to immediately get you interested in this rush for treasure i mean what is more exciting than a mythical treasure chest that is hidden somewhere and everyone is just trying to find it as i was watching the first episode i started getting the feeling that one piece wasn't
really that serious and was more comedy centric despite the action that was going on this thought was further strengthened when luffy shows up in a barrel and then continues to eat every bit of food he can find though of course that assumption will be changed very shortly we do get some of kobe's inner dialogue which was a little more serious though with luffy's antics i still didn't take it too seriously you know like when kobe is scared out of his mind but luffy asks who's this big chunky lady the first fight ensued and right away
i realized that our protagonist was very overpowered which made me kind of happy because i knew that we'd avoid all the ah i'm losing now i need to enter my next form to win luffy then explains that he's a rubber person and alvida says that he must be one of the people who have eaten a devil's fruit once again this just got me more hyped for the future of the show a show about pirates trying to find legendary treasure while there are select few who possess extraordinary abilities with the same goal awesome he of course
then blasts alvita halfway to mars and that's the end of that one thing that this episode makes very clear is that luffy's intention of going after the one piece is very much set in stone of course before we can start our journey to the grand line we must assemble a crew and so luffy debates adding the mythical swordsman zorro to his crew only problem is zorro is a pirate hunter not a pirate we also meet the infamous marine captain morgan and his super annoying son who is pestering zorro after seeing luffy's rubber abilities we get
some exposition from captain morgan who elaborates on the devil fruit powers and here i was very intrigued as it only showed 15 of them so i was not sure whether they would be extremely rare or not we then hear about the various different powers breathing fire causing tsunamis and so on also once again we hear that it is said that the secret of the devil fruits lies somewhere in the grand line i'll bring this up a little later in this video as well but i was already starting to notice a trend that the grand line
is this mystical place with all of the answers but again more on that later luffy then defeats captain morgan and zorro joins the crew badass swordsman acquired we then meet nami who seems to be snooping around for hidden treasure in the marine headquarters but instead of finding the map she was looking for she finds a wanted poster of buggy the immortal this sounded like a pretty interesting villain to go against as the whole immortal title immediately made me think that he must also be someone with the devil through power but we would get to see
that just a little bit later on we then get some thoughts of kobe's unlike luffy who dreams of becoming a pirate he wants to be a marine zorro explains that he must be in a bit of an iffy situation as he was aboard alvida's ship and would be found out as an ex-pirate but then once the marines show up luffy acts as if selling kobe out but is only acting this way to make his transition to being a marine actually more believable we then see nami set out for the open sea with the wanted scroll
just as luffy and zorro also embark on their own ship in the closing shots we get a brief flashback of luffy getting the straw hats and that this pirate dream was actually a promise to someone and that brings us the end of romance dawn the shortest arc at only three episodes there's not really too much to delve into here aside from the fact that since while we're here it is evident that it made me want to see more as for raiding it i think it works as a very good introduction to the series showcasing both
luffy's abilities as well as hinting what's to come particularly with the devil fruit powers because of this i'll rank it as an 8 here for now but we'll see where it ends up later but with the very short romance donna out of the way let's get into orangetown we open the arc with a brief look at where nami is and see that she tricks a bunch of pirates and gets herself a ship we then get into the meat of the episode get it cause luffy is always hungry it's funny and see a flashback for luffy
we are introduced to shanks who is constantly pestering young luffy and we see that this is the person that has seemingly made luffy obsessed with being a pirate as well the rest of the crew of course says that he is just a kid and is no pirate just yet a different crew then enters the bar and are generally just a bunch of douches smashing a bottle and soaking shanks they then decide they're apparently too good for this place and storm outs to which everyone in the bar responds to by bursting out in laughter once they
left unlike everyone else who's laughing the incident off luffy gets incredibly angry that shanks and the other guys did not fight back again this is one of those moments that just further drove home that he is serious about becoming the pirate king later on especially as he says it doesn't matter how strong they may look or how many of them there are you have to fight back this will obviously come up many times later on but anyway shanks tells luffy that it's not a big deal and that he should just chill out to which luffy
responds by turning around and eating a large fruit that of course being the devil fruits now shanks is the worried one turning luffy upside down and trying to make him spit it out but alas it is too late as luffy simply extends down to the floor after eating the gumgum fruits he would never be able to swim again and his body has been turned to rubber of course with luffy being luffy he's still salty about the pirate that drenched shanks before so he goes to get revenge obviously he has no chance and is quickly taken
care of but just in time shanks's crew shows up and these next scenes immediately made shanks one of my favorite characters we've seen so far with him explaining that he doesn't care whether he's doused in beer or covered in food hell he'll just laugh it off but when one of his crewmates is hurt that's when things get real and this transition from a seemingly super chill dude laughing at luffy's antics over wanting to be a pirate to this cold and serious captain was really awesome to see and after the dude smoke bombs and runs with
luffy we get a great scene of that switch right back to the less serious shanks worrying what will happen to luffy we then come back to the man throwing luffy in the sea with the intention to drown him and here of course we see the curse of the devil fruits luffy has completely lost the ability to swim and is barely staying afloat though i originally thought that he'd literally just sink to the bottom which would of course been a lot more terrifying anyway a huge sea monster then shows up but luffy is saved by shanks
just in time but we find out that in the process shanks has lost his arm we then get a really touching scene of luffy bawling his eyes out as shanks is once again back to that calm and caring mindset telling him that he shouldn't worry as he's just got another one anyway and that he's just glad luffy's alright a brief timeskip happens and shanks is getting ready to set off on another adventure and once again makes fun of luffy that he'll never be a pirate which of course sets him off on another rant that he
will make an even better crew than shanks's and he'll be the king of the pirates and finally we get the story of the hat and why luffy values it so much it was a gift from shanks saying that he better take good care of it as it's the most important thing to him in the world and that he should bring it back later before we move any further i just want to say that this was an absolutely amazing episode and i really enjoyed every second of it it just opened up so many doors as to
where shanks is now whether they'd meet back up again and so on overall it really was a brilliant flashback episode the next few episodes are kind of her first proper villain that being buggy and his crew we of course see nami strickery as she calls luffy her boss which immediately makes the pirates turn to him rather than her and then a bit later we see buggy himself who is of course also someone with the devil through power and in short this guy is absolutely nuts buggy makes nami a proposal if she fires a cannon at
luffy she'll get off scot-free and be able to join the crew she of course rejects the offer and a battle ensues during the fight buggy cuts shanks's straw hat which makes luffy go completely berserk and the fight is over soon thereafter we do get a brief glimpse at buggy's backstory and that he knows shanks but there's not really too much else there after the fight is won despite hating pirates and all that nami joins the crew as well which of course means that a navigator has been acquired and that's the end of another very short
arc as you're probably able to tell the highlight for me was absolutely the luffy and shanks flashback episode it really defined this arc for me honestly i wasn't really a fan of buggy here maybe because he didn't get enough time to be a lot more developed or something like that but i didn't really enjoy him as a villain though i do think that the little sneak peak of his backstory was interesting and i hope that we'll hear from him again sometime with all of that being said let's bring up the tier list and rank orangetown
with everything i've said so far there will only be a c for me though a high c because of the awesome flashback episode we'll see how these rankings shift around later but with that done let's move on to syrup village this is what i view as the first proper arc in the series with it being longer than the two previous arcs combined we start off with the trio arriving at a village in search of a ship we are also introduced to usopp a seemingly pretty wimpy dude with a very long nose we learned that usopp
has been meeting with a girl named kaya and telling her made up stories of his adventures as a noble pirate clawhador kaia servants claims that usopp does not have kaia's best interest in mind and makes him leave immediately though we start to find out that there may be a little more to the seemingly overprotective caretaker we find out that he does indeed have ulterior motives and is actually only here to inherit kaia's family's wealth meanwhile another sketchy man appears the hypnotist chongo along with his crew now that a real battle is actually going to take
place usopp works up the courage to fight against these pirates and so the final battle of syrup village begins jongo hypnotizes luffy making him fall asleep as well as many of his crewmates giving them highly enhanced physical abilities now that luffy is out of the picture even zorro is having a hard time fighting off the entirety of their crew but just as he nears victory the real villain appears clawhador or better known as the terrifying captain kuro his fighting abilities are so infamous that each and every pirate is deathly afraid of him and we even
get an explanation about one of his signature moves how he pushes up his glasses it's always been out of instinct as to not poke himself with one of his claws nami then manages to wake luffy and so he is also back in the fight while zoro is dealing with the hypnotized pirates luffy engages captain kuro who is holding his own against the rubber man quite well during this fight we also get a flashback about kuro's plan faking his own capturing and taking on a new identity as the caretaker of kaya with as mentioned the intention
to get her family's riches the fight carries on as kuro uses one of his most infamous and deadliest techniques hitting both luffy as well as most of the other pirates ultimately though both kuro and jongo are defeated and the battle is over captain kuro more like captain huro as a form of thanking luffy and the gang kaia surprises them with a present their very own ship there's also this great scene of usopp rolling down the hill with his packed backpack but just like that another crewmate has been acquired now that the crew is back on
the open seas they developed their own flag the straw hat pirates and so the going mary is complete the final episode of this arc takes us to the legendary treasure island a mystical place surrounded by just as mystical legends as it turns out this island is actually occupied by a single ex-pirate named guymon he's been stuck in a treasure chest and was left behind by a screw 20 years ago some shenanigans and treasure finding occurs but overall this was a really short one-off story and honestly gaimon was a really cool character though unlike previous characters
gaimon doesn't join the crew and decides to continue living out his days alongside his new animal friends on the island and so the crew heads off and that's syrup village as i mentioned before i kind of view this as somewhat the first complete arc and so comparing them is quite difficult since it just had that much more run time though summing up kuro was an absolutely awesome villain and i really enjoyed seeing his backstory explaining how he tried to escape his past i like how his fighting style was so ruthless and infamous that even people
who were working under him were terrified that they'd get caught in the crossfire all in all i think he was just a really good baddie though with that being said i still think this is only a b-tier arc i'm not exactly sure why but i only really got into it by the time it was almost over so the highlight was very much the final standoff and that combined with the one-off episode on treasure island makes this a very high b but not quite an a so with three arcs tackled it's time to move on to
the final one we'll be looking at this video baratier once again we open with the crew on the open seas and luffy is wanting to get some target practice with the cannons while this is going on zoro is taking a much deserved nap and we drift into a flashback we see a young zorro wanting to challenge anyone from a dojo to a sword fight though the opponent he gets is unexpected a girl named queena despite using about eight swords he gets absolutely destroyed though despite this he gets back up and once again rushes her with
two swords saying that this is the first time he's even held a bamboo sword of course he gets one shot again and the fight is done after being defeated he says that he wishes to train which he does a lot more than any of the other students though despite the intense training he is still no match for queena with 2 000 losses and zero wins against her we then learn of the master's intent he does not plan for cowina to be his successor he wishes for it to be zorro and this is where i really
thought that the series is way ahead of its time tackling gender discrimination in a show like this is something that i certainly did not expect and this is further expanded on later as quina confides in zorro that she can never be a true master just because she's a woman zorro cuts back saying that she's wrong and that she can become a true master and so they make each other a promise to become the best swordsman zorro continues to train even harder but then we find out that kowina has tragically died and i won't lie this
really hit me in the feels and i think this just speaks how well these mini arcs are written even knowing these characters for a mere 10 minutes managed to really get me invested into their story on top of the commentary of gender stereotypes and despite koino obviously being a master in combat already never getting the recognition she truly deserves really made this an impactful scene in an attempt to keep his promise zorro keeps training for years with kawina's sword we then skip to a much older zorro who is finally ready to set off on his
own adventure and fulfill his mission of becoming the greatest swordsman only to be woken up by luffy and who stops cannon firing well that is an opening episode to remember and we haven't even reached bharatiya yet the crew meets johnny and yosuku two pretty interesting characters who already know zoro from their bounty hunting days after being on the sea for a while yosuku has pretty intense scurvy and nami says that they need to understand the type of nutrients they need and so the mission for a cook begins and we're on our way to baratier some
shenanigans ensue a part of the ship is destroyed and chef zeph makes luffy work aboard the ship to repay his debt meanwhile sanji the sous chef also makes his debut and gets in a conflict with this full of himself guy full body this is then interrupted by another crew of starving pirates including the ruthless captain don krieg though this time he is not nearly as intimidating as he's barely holding himself together and begging for any food although no one is willing to help saying that everyone will be better off with him no longer around sanji
steps up saying that the restaurant feeds everyone no matter who they are this kindness is not repaid at all however as doncry gets up and sends sanji flying across the room jin the pirate who had brought his starving captain here says that this was not the agreements and that they should just leave pointing out that this man saved their lives don creek however ignores him and demands the ship furthermore saying that the restaurants serve each and every one of their crew as well sanji says once again that it's his job to feed everyone and everything
else comes second finally chef zeph makes an appearance only for don cree to recognize him as a red foot zeph we don't yet find out exactly who and what zeph was before but don creek takes the prepared meals and goes off to feed his crew just as things start to calm down somewhat we get some commentary from jyn as he talks about what happened during the time they spent in the grand line explaining that a single man destroyed their entire fleet and this is something i am really growing to love we are constantly getting these
little hints and clues as to how dangerous the grand line really is needless to say i couldn't wait to hear more and of course it didn't take long until i did as hawkeyes the legendary swordsman zorro had been looking for appears during this craziness nami tricks yosuku and johnny and goes off on her own more on this later but after hawkeyes and zorro meets it is time for a duel to find out who really is the best swordsman and holy hell was this an intense fight zorro was clearly no match for him and i'll be
honest i really thought zoro died for a hot minute though of course hawkeyes then explains that zorro is truly an honorable fighter and that he should seek him out once more once he is ready and then this scene here hit me right in the feels as zoro is on the brink of death he cries out to luffy that he is sorry for letting him down and that he swears he will never lose again calling him the king of the pirates zorro is really becoming one of my favorite characters i'm not gonna lie the fight is
nowhere near over of course as don krieg now begins fighting the restaurant crew with zeph being taken hostage and sanji once again standing up to the fight after taking a massive blow to the face sanji is once again sent flying and we drift into a flashback we see a young sanji as he's working in a restaurant and the older cooks are pestering about him believing the stories of the all blue the place where fish of all four seas live and i'll be honest at this point i was starting to get the suspicion that the grand
line was more of a metaphor as each of our characters seemingly has their own completely unrelated goal to achieve there but you know just a thought but anyway redford zeph and the cook pirates appear and capture this smaller ship of cooks sanji being the hot-headed child that he is runs into combat only to be kicked around by zeph himself as sanji is lying on the floor he mutters that he will not draw his last breath until he sees the all blue and then suddenly a wave crashes over the ship and sends sanji flying into the
open waters despite kicking him around like a piece of trash earlier zeph does not hesitate for a moment as he leaps into the water to save the young boy as the ships smash against each other zeph's leg is caught and instead of worrying about himself he ties a chain around it ripping it off and continues to swim to sanji once the storm passes sanji wakes up on a small stone island with their ships gone and only zeph by his side who claims to be splitting up the food they have and encouraging him to ration it
out sanji gets incredibly mad that his share is much smaller than zeph's to which he responds that sanji himself is also much smaller ultimately sanji heads off to the other side of the island and just stares into the sea praying for a ship to sail by weeks pass and the rations have ran out on the brink of starvation instincts take over and sanji goes to steal some of zev's food he cuts open the bag only to find out that it never had any food at all just gold and other riches and then there's this brilliant
scene as sanji pieces it together we cut to zeff who is also barely alive and only now sanji notices that he has lost a part of his leg sanji breaks down asking why he did this to which zeph responds that his only goal in life was to find the all blue and because sanji had been the only one to share that dream he just had to save him and even on the brink of death he still laughs and says the phrase we have all this money yet we're going to starve luckily a ship does appear
and both sanji and zeph are saved and that's yet another amazing flashback episode in this arc and i'll be honest this one hit me in the feels even harder than zorro's it really is crazy how fast this show gets me attached to these characters finally sanji recovers from the strike and the battle continues and there's one thing i want to mention here i suppose my original understanding of the devil fruit curse was right because luffy now just sang straight to the bottom but anyway i really like it as a counter measure to his incredible strength
and near-invulnerability in a power sense as well sanji saves luffy and the fight is finally over the last episode of this incredible arc is about sanji's decision whether he should join luffy's crew or stay at the restaurant and once again they tried to get me right in the feels with everyone on the ship lying to sanji that his cooking is terrible just to get him to go and pursue his dream of finding the all blue and joined luffy obviously he finds out that they were all indeed just lying and for the first time since he
was rescued as a small boy sanji shows humility thanking zeph for everything he has done for him and even the old man sheds a tear saying that real men should part without saying a word let alone tears and so a cook has been acquired the final shot of the episode sees the return of nami as she's headed to a yet unknown location seemingly with a clear mission and that's the bharatiya arc as you've probably gathered by now this is one i absolutely loved with two brilliant flashback episodes interesting characters and substantial development for the ones
we already know not only did we get a massive battle with don krieg but we also had the duel between zorro and hawkeyes further building up and hinting at just how dangerous the grand line really is and so i am happy to announce that this is without a doubt our very first s tier arc i really enjoyed every moment of this one and i can't wait to find out what happens next where is nami headed how will the crew reunite with her and so on as for just some closing thoughts on these first few arcs
one thing i noticed is that i feel like one piece does a decent job of keeping luffy's power in check as i mentioned before he is obviously insanely powerful compared to most characters that we've seen so far though that is balanced by the curse of the devil fruits in a series where the characters are most often either on the sea or by a body of water he can be taken out of the fight fairly quickly furthermore in these fights everyone is given the opportunity to shine for instance the zoro vs hawkeye's fight was an entirely
one-on-one and then sanji vs don krieg was also only a duel for the most part of course luffy does come in at the end but we still see that the rest of the crew are very much capable of fending for themselves and lastly as i promised why am i watching the anime instead of reading the manga honestly there are a few reasons firstly it's as simple as just me wanting a super long running series that i can watch while eating breakfast or something like that just a show that i know i can watch and consistently
enjoy secondly it is a production thing i don't know how much the manga differs from the anime but i'd much rather have everyone on the same page and know that is not a pun about reading and using the anime footage to illustrate what i'm saying is just much easier than using manga panels speaking of which i've always preferred reading a physical book and simply due to where i live getting a hold of the manga would firstly just be difficult and secondly absolutely break the bank i could of course read it online but again it's not
something i enjoy doing and with there being over 1 000 chapters that would be a very big commitment which i may or may not enjoy to the fullest and that's pretty much the reasoning seeing how the story goes i may or may not revisit the manga at a later date but i'm really enjoying this completely blind approach at the moment and it's what i plan on doing for the foreseeable future but that finally brings us to the end of this very long video these ones really take a lot of time to put together especially with
university work so i'd really appreciate any feedback if you have any or drop a like to help with the algorithm overlords and so on as usual all the social media links are below but other than that i want to say thank you very much for watching i hope you have a great day and hopefully i'll see you in the next one bye bye [Music]
