straw hat pirates
One of the great things about the One Piece series is how intricate the world it’s set in is. Loosely based on historical colonial times, it’s familiar enough for readers to feel comfortable with, yet different enough to create a sense of magic and intrigue. Though originally written in Japanese, the manga hints that characters in the series also speak English, Spanish, French, and a handful of other languages.
It might not seem too farfetched, then, that some fans were curious about what nationalities the characters would have been had the story taken place in our world instead, and this is exactly what one reader asked the creator of the series. The answer they received wasn’t quite what some fans had in mind, though…
It’s hard to believe that One Piece, Japan’s best-selling manga series in history, will be celebrating its 18th anniversary this July. With 76 collected volumes of manga, a mega-popular anime television adaptation, an upcoming theme park, and hordes of international fans, the series is stronger than ever after almost two decades.
A recent post by a Japanese internet forum user showed the evolution of series’ creator Eiichiro Oda’s artwork by comparing older pictures of the Straw Hat Pirates with more recent ones side-by-side. While most of the changes are fairly subtle, the slight differences were still enough to spark an online debate about which of the two drawing styles is better. Which is your personal preference?