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One Piece Film: Red came out in Japan last August amid a great deal of fanfare such as two major clothing brand tie-ins and then went on to be the top-grossing film by a huge margin for nine straight weeks. And sure it still is the number one movie in Japan having earned 15.8 billion yen (US$110M) to date, but as they say, you haven’t really made it until you made it in the Big Apple.

So, One Piece is going to take care of that too this weekend.

On 8 October, New York’s iconic Times Square is going to be completely taken over by One Piece in honor of its upcoming North American release. Making use of the intersection’s many massive digital signboards, from 7 p.m. to 8 p.m. the entire place will be completely draped in images from the long-running manga and anime series.

▼ These images are mock-ups of how Times Square is planned to look that evening

Throughout the hour, animated versions of major characters from the film will appear gigantically on the screens one by one.

▼ Characters scheduled to make an appearance

But before that, a synchronized recap of six arcs will be presented on the screens as montages. The Marineford Arc, Fish-Man Island Arc, Punk Hazard Arc, Dressrosa Arc, Whole Cake Island Arc, and Wano Country Arc will each be given their own mega screen at the same time for a bit of One Piece sensory overload.

▼ Some samples of what you can see

It’s by far the biggest overseas promotional event that One Piece has ever embarked on and sure to be a memorable one. It’s also a great way to gear up for the North American theatrical release on 4 November, about a month after the North American premiere scheduled for 6 October at New York Comic Con.

So anyone in the area ought to head on down and check it out to be a part of One Piece history because as we already know, opportunities like this might not be around for much longer.

Images: © Eiichiro Oda/2022 “One Piece” production committee
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