Yes, Starting One Piece Is a Daunting Journey—and a Hugely Worthwhile Adventure

When we think about massive fictional universes, the first examples that likely come to mind are things like Middle-earth and a Galaxy Far, Far Away. These are settings that don’t just span immense areas but massive chunks of time, bolstered by sequels, spinoffs, tie-ins and, in the case of Tolkien’s go-to kingdom, an obsessive interest in history and language. However, there is a place that one could argue has grown to rival both in its scope: the world of Eiichiro Oda’s One Piece. Now with over a thousand episodes, based on the 1000+ manga chapters it uses as its source material (That’s not even counting the extra “filler” material and the animated films), One Piece has been expanding in both steady and explosive fashion since the first few minutes of its first episode. And it shows no sign of stopping.
Now, with its latest film, One Piece Film: Red (hitting theaters in the US on Nov. 4th 2022), it might seem like a fine time to become acquainted with what Oda has been building for over 25 years. The story of Monkey D Luffy and his misfit Straw Hat Crew’s attempts to find the fabled One Piece treasure blends magnificent emotional poignancy with escalating adventures in a way that’s honestly awe-inspiring. One might expect this kind of story to become exhaustingly cyclical, as many of its ilk have: Heroes get stronger, while new, more powerful villains appear in revolving door fashion. But One Piece has, for the most part, managed to stay vibrant, and the sense of discovery that leads people to first engage with the series remains just as potent as it did in 1997.
But how do you get people to garner the courage to set sail and try it out? At the time of this writing, there are 1,038 episodes to catch up on (available to watch, at least in part, on Hulu, Crunchyroll, Netflix, and Prime Video). So if each episode is roughly around 24 minutes, that means you would have to watch 24,912 minutes to be up to date. And that’s not even counting the new episodes coming out as you attempt to familiarize yourself with the first 415 hours of One Piece. If you skipped sleeping, eating, going to the bathroom and literally every obligation you could, that’s over 17 straight days of anime. And considering the show’s heavy level of detail and nonstop serialization, it can’t be rendered as background TV. When you watch One Piece, you gotta watch One Piece.
But viewing over half a month’s duration of a show just to have watched it is a pretty miserable way to engage with art. So let’s look at it from another angle: One Piece’s world is vast and its mythology has grown deep, so deep that even the most dedicated fans will likely have to check the One Piece Wiki from time to time. But one thing that has remained deeply approachable is the central cast of characters, where no matter how much backstory is layered on or how many new powers they achieve, the same emotional core has been kept true since the beginning: The strength of found family.