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Review

by Grant Jones,

One Piece Fan Letter

Anime Special Review

Synopsis:
One Piece Fan Letter Anime Special Review

A young girl idolizes Nami and writes her a fan letter in the hopes that she will read it. Meanwhile, two brothers in the Marines struggle to survive the major battles of Marineford and daily life on the seas.

One Piece Fan Letter is a one-episode special currently streaming on Netflix and Crunchyroll.

Review:

One Piece Fan Letter is precisely what its title describes in the best possible way.

What a breath of fresh air this was. It's hard to encapsulate all my feelings in a single review, but suffice it to say I thought this was a triumph. One Piece is many things to many people, yet it will always be a story where ordinary people save one another and change the world in extraordinary ways. Fan Letter captures this essence and distills it into twenty-four minutes of delightful animation, all the while setting up and executing the character arcs of a whole cast of side characters far removed from the main narrative.

I think the appeal here is just how low to the ground this all is. The young girl and two marine brothers are literally and metaphorically watching world events from the sidelines, some in the distant past of the narrative and others much closer to now. They do not have exceptional powers or fated prospects but are scrambling beneath cannon bombardments and shoved aside in the press of the crowds. We see major battles through their eyes – distant laser beams visible only from the sparks of light and titanic punches that can be felt miles away as they shake the earth – and realize what it means to be an average person in these times.

But through it all, they keep striving. Like us, they are inspired by Luffy, Nami, Brook, and the other Straw Hats. Like us, they wait eagerly for updates on the happenings of pirate crews around the world. And like us, they think Chopper is simply too precious for this world.

All of this is presented in an utterly charming visual language. The characters are buoyant and fluid. The backgrounds and interior locations are familiar yet new, densely detailed, and well-populated. It all sings for twenty-four glorious minutes without skipping a beat. Throw in the surprise cameos from Straw Hat members, genuinely funny dialogue, and just-complex-enough a plot, and it's a total home run. It reminds me a lot of the BUMP OF CHICKEN noodle commercial from a few years back, eliciting a lot of the same deep emotions and themes that run through the series in a disarming and surprising package. I think this is not only a must-watch for One Piece fans, but it might also help those who don't know the series well understand the heart that makes all this tick.

Grade:
Overall : A
Overall (sub) : A
Story : A
Art : A+
Music : A-

+ Heartfelt and meaningful portrayal of average people in the One Piece Universe, nails the core of the series
None really except that only one episode simply isn't enough

Mild violence

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Production Info:
Director: Megumi Ishitani
Script: Momoka Toyoda
Storyboard:
Megumi Ishitani
Keisuke Mori
Unit Director:
Megumi Ishitani
Nanami Michibata
Music:
Shiroh Hamaguchi
Kōhei Tanaka
Masahiro Tokuda
Original creator:
Eiichiro Oda
Tomohito Ōsaki
Character Design: Keisuke Mori
Art Director: Nagisa Nishida
Animation Director:
Yuki Hayashi
Keisuke Mori
Director of Photography:
Hideki Chiba
Takeshi Ishizu
Producer: Satoshi Teramoto

Full encyclopedia details about
One Piece Fan Letter (special)

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