Kita ze Inbou! - キタぜ陰謀!

It was a dark and stormy night.

The Going Merry was tossed and turned in the rolling waves, and the Straw-Hat pirates were thrown back and forth. One Piece, the anime phenomenon in Japan – whose original manga by Eiichiro Oda broke sales records, whose TV series is among Japan’s best rated, and whose made billions in merchandise – was sinking in America. Licensed by 4Kids Entertainment, it was transformed from a teen show to a series safe for 7-year-olds – any scene with a hint of violence was removed, as well as several full episodes (so that 4Kids turned 143 episodes of the Japanese version into 104); dialogue was totally rewritten; characters – main characters – were given wacky, horrible accents. And then 4Kids announced they were no longer creating their version of One Piece, and the Going Merry seemed lost at sea.

Land ahoy.

FUNimation has exclusively confirmed to animeOnline that they are taking charge of Luffy and his crew, and sailing them to newer, less troubled waters. In this feature, FUNimation reveals their plans for the new TV version of One Piece, along with the fate of the long-hoped-for uncensored DVDs. So fans of the Straw-Hat pirates can breathe easy – this treasure won’t be buried for much longer.

Click here for more information and an interview with FUNimation Marketing Director, Lance Heiskell.

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Thank God One Piece is going into capable hands now. I really do hope they re-dub episodes 1-143 whenever they can because I’d hate to not have the uncut versions of those episodes. It’s good to know they’ll be using a new cast as well so that means no more horrible sounding Strawhats (hopefully). It’ll be so nice to see English One Piece without those ridiculous censors and thank goodness they received the license in time, otherwise the Skypeia arc would’ve been ruthlessly censor-raped.