Movies and TV Shows

Tldr: "To an even greater extent than the Netflix “Cowboy Bebop,” the Netflix “One Piece” feels bland and generic."

Review written by someone not familiar with the originals clearly. Which would be fine if they didn't compare back to it constantly.

The problem with the Bebop adaptation was it needlessly changed pretty core things about the characters, and rewrote the ending entirely. It totally changed a bunch of the themes as a result. So you had something wearing Bebop's skin, but it moved all wrong.

The One Piece adaptation seems to at least get that part right.. But it is ultimately a cartoon plot, a lot of the motivations and story aren't that complex. That doesn't work for everyone, and clearly not for the reviewer. But we'll have to see how the wider audience reacts.

This is the best summary I could come up with:

Texture, composition, sound and movement engage us and trigger our emotions; the moody revenge plot of “Bebop” and the rousingly affirmative coming-of-age story of “One Piece” are just serviceable scaffoldings.

It may satisfy fans of the original who are happy to see events more or less faithfully replicated, but most of the verve and personality of the anime are gone, replaced by busyness, elaborate but uninteresting production design and — a sign of the times — an increased piety regarding the story’s themes of knowing and believing in yourself.

In addition to unnaturally high spirits and an utter refusal to take no for an answer, Luffy is defined by his ability to stretch his limbs across long distances (handy when throwing punches) and to absorb punishment, the results of eating a forbidden fruit that made his body rubberlike.

This bit of comic inspiration by the character’s creator, the Japanese artist Eiichiro Oda, makes Luffy physically and psychologically congruent — he is elastic and indestructible in every way.

But there’s not much beyond that for him to play, and the same goes for the rest of the cast, which includes capable performers like Mackenyu as the swordsman, Roronoa Zoro, and Taz Skylar as the piratical chef, Sanji.

Depth of writing isn’t make or break amid the carnival atmosphere of the anime, delivered in 20-minute dollops of sensation, but the thinness of the characterizations becomes much harder to ignore in the more deliberate, more ordinary Netflix telling, with the story reshaped into hourlong episodes.

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As much as cowboy bebop felt unnecessary, i totally dig one piece. Maybe it's because netflix got all the german voice actors from the anime.