The live-action adaptation of Eiichiro Oda's One Piece debuted on Netflix on Aug. 28, and IGN sat down with show creator, writer, and co-showrunner Steven Maeda to discuss everything Season 1 (and a little beyond).
Netflix's One Piece so far has just eight episodes, but considering the manga now has more than 1,000 chapters and counting (the anime, in turn, also has more than 1,000 episodes and counting), we wanted to pick Maeda's brain about how he and the team went about condensing that wealth of source material and why certain changes were made.
While Season 2 hasn't been announced yet, Maeda also commented on some potential future inclusions like Chopper and Robin, and also addressed fan theories surrounding some Easter eggs in Season 1.
IGN: Anime and manga adaptions haven't had the best reputation, and you can't get much bigger than One Piece, so did that play on your mind as you approached the show?
Steven Maeda: Yeah, it was daunting to be sure, because of course, we all know about the history of anime and manga adaptations, and there's really no reason that they weren't well received, other than they were not well received.
For whatever reason, people did not spark to those shows. And so definitely there was some heaviness associated with trying to mount something, especially something so beloved as One Piece, because the fan base for One Piece is so, so dedicated and so passionate about the manga and the anime. So yes, it was daunting.
I thought it was a good challenge. There was really no reason, other than lack of resources as to why, and poor choices made, I think, as far as why other things did not get up. Each one of these things you have to take on its own and just sort of figure out: "Hey, this is something I'd really like to see. How would I do it? How can it be done in such a way that really would be exciting for me to watch as a fan?"
How did you take 100 chapters of manga and condense it into an eight-episode show, while still looking to retain the authentic One Piece feeling?
The first choice was to do the first 100 chapters. Huge decisions had to be made about structure, because obviously when Oda wrote the manga, there was no thought to a live-action TV show. He was writing in the confines of the manga space, which are very, very different from what you have to do in television.
There were a lot of very careful decisions made and a lot of gambles as to how much material would be the best to put out there in a single season of television. And so the East Blue arc just seemed like a no-brainer. And as far as setting up those initial five characters, Luffy and his new crew seemed to be a really nice self-contained way to tell a first season.
One Piece is famous, perhaps infamous, for having a thousand-plus episodes now, so how do you comprehend condensing all that down into more manageable seasons of TV?
I can't really talk about any details of that other than to say that yes, there's a lot of source material and you certainly won't run out of story. And it's a challenge. Again, launching a first season, it's a challenge, and I'll let it go with that.
A lot of recent hit adaptations have been more serious or darker shows, like The Last of Us for example, so was it refreshing to take on an incredibly bright and colourful show?
That was a very conscious choice to have the show be fun and sunny and blue skies and open water and to have it feel good in addition to fun and thrilling, and a little traumatic at times when you get into some of those emotional moments and character backstories.
It was definitely a breath of fresh air to be putting something out that felt like it had a sunnier view. And the trick in that is to take that optimism and not have it seem treacly and separate. You don't want it to just be for little kids. You want it to resonate with teens and with adults and people who fell in love with the manga or the anime. We want to bring all those fans in. And then we also want to rope in new fans who have no idea what One Piece is, which was another challenge to find that balance between the fans of the underlying material and new people who had never heard of it before.
As far as tone though, it was always: Let's embrace silly. Let's embrace the over-the-top nature of it. But at the same time, let's try to make the emotion feel real and grounded. And then let's take something like the Love Duck, which is, let's face it, a big pirate ship that fires glittering cannonballs and has hearts on its sails, and could be absolutely ridiculous. But let's take that ship and paint it and do all the things we need to do, build it, and then sand it down and make it look like it's been at sea for 15 years, in order to try and at least bring some level of grit to what is otherwise a sunny and silly look.
One of those silly aspects that could be a tough sell but resonated with fans was the transponder snails. How did you bring those to life?
The transponder snails were something that I always wanted in the show. They're just such a unique take on, how do they communicate in this world? There are no cell phones. There's very little electricity. But there are these transponder snails. And so the snails were definitely something we talked about a great deal with our VFX people, with our prosthetics department that designed the snails.
And we ended up going with a hybrid approach to them, which is, they're puppeted. So there's somebody underneath the table that you digitally erase who is working the snail and having to eat lettuce from Garp and stuff like that. But then also, VFX added in eye blinks and stabilized some of the shaking and stuff like that. And I think the end result is really good.
One of the first things that really drew people to One Piece was a behind-the-scenes look at its gigantic ship sets. Why was it important for so much effort to be put into those?
There are a couple of benefits. One, and the main one was, if you make it real, then actors can actually stand on those sets and interact and the director can actually be on the set and see what it's like to be on a ship and get that feeling. And it's little subtleties that you wouldn't [see otherwise]. I certainly was not aware of, until I stood on the ship, when you stand on the Love Duck, you realize that the deck is not completely flat all the way across it. It's shaped like a banana. And it's higher in the stern and the bow, and it bows in the middle. And it's like: "Oh, I had no idea, not having been on a big sailing ship like that, that was how they were constructed." And it affects the way you walk and it affects the way you get from one part of the ship to another.
And then we also had a couple of the ships on gimbals, which means they could rock and move, by the side and back and forth. And what that allowed us to do was have the sails and the rigging creak and sway, which is an impossible thing to do. It would be so expensive if we tried to do that in VFX, and if we didn't have them move, you'd notice. So very early on, we made a decision to do the actual physical construction of those sets as opposed to having a CG, VFX environment. And it helped, I think, hugely just to be able to stand there and say: "Oh, wow. Okay, look. There are all these wonderful angles." And the actors really appreciate the idea of being right there on set. And the construction crews and our production designer in South Africa made that all possible. They really are tremendous craftsmen out there who built those ships and got them into shape for us.
The casting of One Piece has also been widely praised, but how difficult was it to find the live-action Straw Hat pirates?
First, we had two tremendous casting directors who really scoured the world for us. We wanted to go international, because Oda had been kind enough to make suggestions several years ago about what nationalities the characters might be, were they from our world. And so that was the starting point. It was like: "Okay, Zoro's Japanese. Luffy is Brazilian," which we expanded to Latin and Central America, rather, and South America. We took those basic instructions and said: "Alright, let's run in those directions." And we wanted to cast very diverse. Obviously the manga, the characters are drawn very diverse, so let's own that and have some fun with it.
And then truly, we scoured the world. We looked at casting thousands of tapes from all over the place of people who... most of them figured out that we were doing One Piece, even though we tried to hide it because we're trying to prevent leaks from coming out. But it was about finding those people who embodied the parts, not just physically, but also acting wise and emotionally. And then also chemistry between people. And the key, of course, was Iñaki Godoy, who played Luffy. Because without Luffy, if you don't have a Luffy that you believe, the show fails, I believe. Without Iñaki, I don't know who else we would've gotten to play that role. He really is a Luffy in so many ways. He's just a wonderful young man, and really very much like Luffy.
What other parts of the show did Oda have influence over and what was working with him like?
He was involved everywhere. He got a look at everything before it went out and went into the final cut. And sometimes that's for changes, and often we were able to make those changes.
As far as working with Oda, first, it was wonderful to be able to play in his sandbox. It is really his world that he created, and it's such a wonderful thing to be able to play in that world. It's his world, and he knows it inside and out better than anybody else. So it was tremendously challenging to try and add things or take away things from the manga in order to make a better season of television with not deviating too far in his eyes. And so that was always a discussion. He was a tough partner, but kept us honest as far as things that we could get away with and not get away with in the adaptation.
Was it difficult for you as the creator of the Netflix show to balance your own creativity with someone else's?
Yeah, tremendously challenging. But at the same time, it's not my world. And so I really had to check myself and say: "You know what? Let's think about why Oda wants to do this. Let's come up with a way to try and do this. Let's try to find a way to get more toward the middle of what he wants and what we want. And ultimately, we'll find that place, the sweet spot, where it feels like, okay, this is a good addition or a good subtraction or a modification of the show that he approves of, but also is something that helps us tell those eight episodes."
Stuff like bringing in Garp and Koby and Helmeppo earlier than the manga was a big change. That was something that was a lot of discussion because Garp is not in the first 100 chapters of the manga. And likewise, bringing Arlong up. Or not having Usopp's long nose and Sanji's curly eyebrow. Those were all very, very intense discussions as far as what we were doing and why we were doing it. And ultimately, I think we came to a really nice middle ground.
How did you decide which of those elements ultimately made it into the final cut and which didn't?
A lot of different versions of the show were discussed. Some that were a little further away from the manga, some that were closer. We ended up going a lot closer, which I'm really glad we were able to do. And it really was a discussion about why we were doing what we were doing. And so for example, with Arlong, the idea was, in an eight-episode television season, you want to have the sense that there is some big obstacle standing at the end of your journey. And so to introduce Arlong in Episode 7 and 8 only would've felt like: "Well, wait, who is this guy? Okay, yeah. He's really ferocious, but I don't really know him yet. I've got to get to know him."
And so we said: "Hey, let's move him up. Let's introduce him in an early episode as a big bad threat that would return later in the season. And then rather than Krieg, who is a standalone antagonist who doesn't take us really anywhere new, let's introduce Arlong there instead." And we still got Krieg in the show. But let's try something a little bit different so the new audience gets the sense that there is something big and forbidding out there waiting for us.
A lot of time was also spent on each Straw Hat's backstory, but was that something you considered cutting?
There was discussion about it, and it was something I very strongly believe that in order to understand who these characters were in the present day, you had to do some version of the backstories. And I'm really, really glad that we were able to do the longer version of most of the backstories and really tell the story about how they became who they are. Because without that, you will get the characters, I think you'd still enjoy them, but you won't really understand where they're coming from.
Nami in particular, why is she so cold-blooded about stealing, and doesn't seem to really care about anybody, and betrays Luffy and the crew? And then when you find out her story, it's heartbreaking, because you're like: "Oh, okay, I understand why she did that now. What a horrible thing to put on a little girl to have to make that kind of decision."
So I have to thank the powers that be for spending the money on those flashbacks because they were expensive; they were big sets. Windmill Village was built for the Luffy and Shanks' backstory. And then torn down after that, which breaks my heart. That was the part of the deal, and I think it's part of the reason why people are really hanging onto those characters.
Were the various Easter eggs and teases added to the show for similar reasons?
Certainly. I mean, a lot of thought was put into the Easter eggs. And some of it is future planning, and a lot of it was: "Hey, wouldn't it be cool if we saw this character?" We know that character was there in the background of, particularly Loguetown at Gold Roger's execution. So a lot of thought was put into bounty posters and seeing characters in the crowd.
And then also our art department and production designers did a lot of the signage and things that are stencilled onto barrels and shop names and things like that. There was a lot of love and care put into pulling stuff forward so that for fans, they could go: "Oh, hey, that's really cool." And some of it is with thought toward the future. Others of it is just a fun thing to do that fans are really going to enjoy.
One of those Loguetown characters has caused a stir, with fans thinking one woman who appears is Crocodile from the Arabasta arc. Can you say anything about that?
I have heard that. I've been approached about that issue before, and all I have to say is, read into it what you like.
Anime / Live Action#OnePieceNetflix pic.twitter.com/UUbknxH578
— One Piece Tweets (@onepiecedaiIys) September 1, 2023
Which characters were the most exciting to play around with?
It was so much fun with all of them to see them spring to life. I would say for me, Luffy for sure. I knew that if we got that right it would be wonderful and if we got it wrong it would be awful. But it was really wonderful to see Iñaki bring Luffy to life.
I think Mackenyu just killed it as Zoro, and brought so much of his own persona to the character, which was perfect. And then also his fighting skill. He's so, so good in those fights that he and the stunt team collaborated on, but he was the guy doing a lot of it, most of it. So that was really wonderful to see.
And then on the antagonist side, I would say Buggy was a real treat, just because Jeff Ward did such a wonderful job embodying that character, and just to take Buggy and expand him a little bit. And let him go with the Straw Hats on the later adventure part was a really, really fun thing that wasn't necessarily in the manga, but felt like it was in keeping with the spirit of who Buggy is.
Buggy has emerged as a fan favourite, especially the darker aspects portrayed in the show that aren't necessarily obvious in the manga, so where did those come from?
We just wanted Buggy to be a viable threat. Buggy is kind of insane in the manga, and so it was really fun to be able to run with that a little bit and let him go darker. The show has elements of darkness in it, and that's one of the things that I've always loved about it.
The thing that initially got me sitting up was, in reading the manga for the first time, the scene where Luffy stabbed himself in the face. And I was like: "Whoa, wait, what just happened here? This little boy stabbed himself in the face so he can prove himself to Shanks." That's dark. That is some dark, dark stuff going on there. So I think with One Piece, it's always about finding the fun and the sunniness and the joy, but also interlacing it with those moments of darkness.
The show didn't lean away from darker moments, even with things like blood and swearing, so how did you include those while retaining the bright and colourful atmosphere?
We had so many discussions about the amount of blood, because you don't want it to be Game of Thrones, spraying everywhere. And you don't want it to be bloodless. And so yes, many, many discussions about the appropriate amount of blood, how much is going to be too much, and trying to find that middle ground.
How did you similarly approach including some of the wild effects like Buggy breaking apart or Luffy stretching while retaining realism?
Buggy was a real tough one because we knew that we wanted him to break into pieces, but what do those pieces do? How do they fly around? Do they tumble? Do they spin? What does it look like inside the slices of buggy? Do we want to see gristle and bone and blood? I don't think so. We definitely decided not to do that. But is it dark inside? Is it flesh coloured inside?
There are all sorts of those types of logistical decisions. And then just, what is the coolest version of the scene? What can we do, and how do we shoot it in such a way as to make that scene exciting and to feel like something that maybe you haven't seen before? Or in the case of Luffy's stretchy power, which is definitely something people have seen before in other movies and TV shows, how do we do the best version of that? Knowing that we're going to have great CG, but that even great CG with stretchy powers can look really awful.
We made a decision to... I was really keen on this, which is number one: don't ever linger on Luffy's stretchy arms. They're fast, and they're like rubber bands snapping. And they move with speed and it feels very visceral. And then two, don't have Luffy stretch across this axis going [horizonal or vertical across the screen], but have it coming right at you or away from you so that you get... It just gives you a sense of motion and your eye can't really linger on the VFX part of it because you're caught up in the motion and the action.
Are there any characters or abilities coming in potential future seasons you think will be similarly tricky?
I can't really speak of it, but one of my favourite powers is Nico Robin's. And so I'm very much looking to see what that's going to look like.
Fans are similarly talking about Chopper. Have you thought about how he would work?
Look, all I know about Chopper is he's my favourite character in the show, and so I love Chopper. It's a challenge for sure.
Would you like to take on One Piece for the long haul and go forward to what could be ten more seasons?
I will say that I love the show and I love the world that Oda has created, and it's a lot of fun to play in it.
Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He'll talk about The Witcher all day.
source https://www.ign.com/articles/netflixs-one-piece-showrunner-delves-deep-into-finding-the-cast-changes-from-the-manga-and-more