Just get it, Eiichiro Oda, the guy behind One Piece, once talked about why he doesn’t like drawing people saying goodbye to this life in the manga. This happened in an interview in 2018 that a user translated and posted on X (which used to be Twitter).
Oda actually said that he prefers to focus on partying after the fights. Like, if someone dies, you can’t have a nice party, you know? And for him, a party is like the ultimate symbol of friendship. He wants to end One Piece with a bang.
But hey, that doesn’t mean that One Piece is free from notable deaths, right? There was that loss of Nami’s adoptive mother and the death of Luffy’s brother, Portgas D. Ace, which was so shocking that Oda even thought twice before doing it. But if you compare it to other Shonen Jump series, like Jujutsu Kaisen, the people of One Piece are generally more “defeated” than “dead”.
The One Piece live-action series on Netflix even changed that a little, killing off some less important characters. Like, Captain Kuro ended up with Merry, who was Kaya’s butler.
Typically, One Piece shows death in flashbacks. If the plan is to end each arc with a bang, it makes sense for the deaths to be more in the past, before the grand finale. In the “Wano Country” arc, for example, there was the execution of Shimotsuki Yasuie, but it all ended with Luffy defeating Kaido and everyone celebrating.
For those who want to watch, One Piece is available on several streaming services, such as Crunchyroll and Netflix. And Viz Media distributes the manga in English. The Netflix live-action series has been renewed for a second season and there is an anime remake called The One Piece in development as well.
Source: @sandman_AP
