One Piece Season 2 Faces A Huge Devil Fruit Problem Season 1 Didn't

Summary

• In One Piece Season 2, we will see more Devil Fruit users.
• This presents a visual challenge.
• The Straw Hats will be tackling the Alabasta arc in the new season.

From the beginning, Netflix 's live-action remake of One Piece was always going to face some challenges. Television and anime are very different mediums, and there is always a certain amount of artistic license when adapting the latter for the former.

Most fans would agree that the producers handled this transition quite well. The show scores 85% on the Tomatometer and has a massive 95% rating from RT viewers. But now it faces a new challenge.

Season 2 will see the Straw Hats venture further afield

The upcoming season of the show will see the crew tackle the Alabasta Arc. This means heading out to the Grand Line, a treacherous part of the ocean filled with potential dangers.

As they discover new islands and encounter some pretty nasty pirates, Luffy and his gang will encounter many new Devil Fruit users and a wider range of Devil Fruit abilities. This may be the biggest thing the network has to consider as they look to build on the success of Season 1, which topped the Netflix charts in late August and early September.

It was #1 on the Netflix rankings in 46 countries...

and...

...racked up 37.8 million views in its first 2 weeks of release.

And it was so good that it set the bar pretty high for Season 2.

Writers have to deviate from the source material

The TV show has been a hit with fans of the original anime, with many saying that it feels authentic and portrays the world and characters in a way that is true to the source material. Of course, the writers couldn't just take the story as it was on the page and make it into a show. But there is a consistency and symmetry between the two that is pleasing, with the live-action version still possessing the slightly warped reality of the anime world.

In anime, however, nothing is off limits. Animators can do just about anything they can think of. In a television show, things are a little different. While modern technology and special effects make almost anything possible, production budgets and time constraints don't always agree.

As the crew expands its horizons, it will be nearly impossible for the showrunners to adequately portray the sheer number and variety of Devil Fruit abilities.

So far, the show has been built around the anime's simplest characters

Even with their Devil Fruit abilities, Luffy and Buggy are relatively simple characters (in the context of One Piece). When it comes to them using their powers, the anime has been kind to the production team so far.

But if the Straw Hats think that going into the Grand Line is a step into the unknown for them, the show's producers don't have it any easier.

The Arabasta arc has far more anthropomorphic creatures than have been seen before, adding another layer of complexity for the production team. How do you recreate them while staying true to the show's premise, meeting high expectations, and maintaining an authentic feel?

The world our heroes inhabit is about to become much, much more fantastic. The question is, can this wonderful world of weirdness be accurately portrayed on screen?