Along with the announcement that Funimation would begin streaming the One Piece anime simultaneously with the Japanese showing, waaaaayyyy down at the bottom of the announcement, tucked in the About One Piece section, it was also announced that the US edition of Shonen Jump would start running the manga in line with the Japanese releases. Just like Naruto.
Huh? How are they going to do that?
Naruto‘s catching up seems to be doing well for Viz and Shueisha, if the Japanese publisher has agreed to this. But, Narutotook two years and a mass release of 22 volumes in order to get caught up with the Japanese releases. One Piece, which missed it’s bus thanks to 4Kids raping it and it taking a few years for Funimation to do a proper anime release of it, has a lot further to go. Volume 53 was just published in Japan, and volume 21 will be released here in June. That’s a 32 volume jump. And Viz plans to have the new chapters start in Shonen Jump in the fall of this year!
There is no way they will be able to publish and sell 32 One Piece volumes! Not unless they plan to release nothing else! Or are they going to release a special volume of Shonen Jump to “catch up” to the current chapters? I just don’t see any way they can do this in a minmum of 4 months. Even going with a BIG format, that 11 of those to get out.
While I loveOne Piece, and I’m all for catching manga up to current releases in Japan, this is just insane! This is not the way to stop scanalations, because there is NO WAY a normal person could catch up to this. Not with this economy, and especially not in California! I thought Viz was nuts to do another Naruto wave in February. I’ve can’t wait to see how they think they are going to manage this.
When I read the press release I assumed that the new chapters would be running in Shonen Jump here but the graphic novels would remain on the same schedule. I see the simultaneous releases as an illegal scans deterrant more than a goal for the graphic novels to reach. That was my initial understanding anyway. A 32 volume jump would be pretty epic by any standards, wow o.O I’m not a One Piece fan and never knew the series was that long in Japan currently.
I initially thought that too, but that’s just stupid. I mean, I listened to an audiobook that was 16 volumes ahead of the last one I’d read. I didn’t know it at the time I got it, but I was completely lost through most of the story, wondering who the characters were and what was going on. The same is going to happen with One Piece if they try do that. It will ruin the reading experience of the paying readers just to try and get some of the non-paying readers to stop. And it won’t work. DRM/deterrents aren’t supposed to punish the people doing things legally, but that’s just what they end up doing, which is why I’m against DRM, or stunts like this.
If this is the direction they wanted to go with One Piece, then they should have done a jump with it like they did Naruto. This won’t fix anything.
Agreed with the previous commentors, they shouldn’t ruin the manga reading pleasure by cramming it into us (us English readers, that is) just so people can watch One Piece nonchalantly via anime… show a little respect, eh?
I agree, even for One Piece fans, 21 volumes over just a few months is asking a lot. Let’s just hope the readers still enjoy the series…
Naruto‘s catching up seems to be doing well for Viz and Shueisha, if the Japanese publisher has agreed to this. But, Naruto 
3 Comments
When I read the press release I assumed that the new chapters would be running in Shonen Jump here but the graphic novels would remain on the same schedule. I see the simultaneous releases as an illegal scans deterrant more than a goal for the graphic novels to reach. That was my initial understanding anyway. A 32 volume jump would be pretty epic by any standards, wow o.O I’m not a One Piece fan and never knew the series was that long in Japan currently.
I initially thought that too, but that’s just stupid. I mean, I listened to an audiobook that was 16 volumes ahead of the last one I’d read. I didn’t know it at the time I got it, but I was completely lost through most of the story, wondering who the characters were and what was going on. The same is going to happen with One Piece if they try do that. It will ruin the reading experience of the paying readers just to try and get some of the non-paying readers to stop. And it won’t work. DRM/deterrents aren’t supposed to punish the people doing things legally, but that’s just what they end up doing, which is why I’m against DRM, or stunts like this.
If this is the direction they wanted to go with One Piece, then they should have done a jump with it like they did Naruto. This won’t fix anything.
Agreed with the previous commentors, they shouldn’t ruin the manga reading pleasure by cramming it into us (us English readers, that is) just so people can watch One Piece nonchalantly via anime… show a little respect, eh?
I agree, even for One Piece fans, 21 volumes over just a few months is asking a lot. Let’s just hope the readers still enjoy the series…