Summary
Quick Links
One Piece, through excellent writing and planning by its author Eiichiro Oda, has some of the best world-building of any anime out there. At times, with its intricate systems, governments, and characters, the world feels like a living, breathing place. Due to this, outside of Luffy’s adventures inOne Piece, plenty of important events still occur, sometimes with Luffy never knowing about what happened.
While this is great overall for creating a complex story, one negative aspect is that sometimes events that are hugely important to the overall story happen off-screen, with various characters only mentioning these earth-shattering occurrences. From massive historical battles featuring Gol D. Roger himself to off-screen battles that still haven’t received any sort of further elaboration,theOne Piececommunityis hungry to see just what happened during these important off-screen events. With the sheer amount of important fight scenes that happen off-screen, many fans are often left wondering; doesOne Piecehave too many off-screen battles?
One Piece Has Plenty Of Off-Screen Moments
Battles And More
So far, the off-screen fight scenes ofOne Piececan be split into two distinct categories; those that occurred before the events of the series, and those that occurred sometime during the events of the series. The events that took place before the series are often looked at as massive historical incidents, often being touted as massive world-changing battles. These off-screen events includethe Rocks Pirates versus Roger and Garp, or the initial fight between Blackbeard and Shanks that left the latter with his scar.
The battle raged for ten whole days and the world waited on tenterhooks for the outcome. - Jinbe on the battle between Aokiji and Akainu
On the other hand, battles that occurred duringOne Piece’stimeline but were never given a full animation, although they seem to lack the same aura that the historical fights ofOne Piecehave, still have plenty of fans who want to see them fully animated. This includes fights likeAkainu and Aokiji’s battlefor the position of Fleet Admiral or Marco leading the Whitebeard Pirates to fight against Blackbeard and his crew. At times, since these moments took place in the timeline of the show, some fans felt cheated out of seeing these potentially amazing fight scenes.
One Piece Off-Screen Battles Are A Consequence Of Luffy’s Perspective
Luffy’s Limited View
Firstly, as a whole, the sheer number of off-screen battles could be written off as a natural consequence ofOne Piece’sstyle of world-building. The audience experiencesthe story ofOne Piecemainly through Luffy’s eyes. Many of these off-screen battles aren’t fully revealed to the audience until Luffy himself learns more about them. Although this isn’t true for many of the other battles in the show, important moments, like Roger and Garp’s battle with the Rocks Pirates, may be saved until Luffy learns the details of the incident.
On top of this, many times when it comes to off-screen battles, the hype and imagined scenario oftheOne Piecefightis often better than anything that could be delivered. These off-screen battles, if fully revealed, may only be met by disappointment, with the hype far exceeding the fight itself. For example, if the revealed fight between Akainu and Aokiji is much worse than fans expected, it’ll ruin something that once was considered a great element of lore for the series.
One Piece Probably Has Too Many Off-Screen Fights
Fans Want To See These Fights Realized
Despite this, overall,One Piecemay have a few too many off-screen battles. While it’s nice to see the world mainly throughthe protagonist, Luffy’s perspective, seeing a few of these epic clashes between characters wouldn’t hurt the series. However, of course,One Pieceis still going on and will be for the foreseeable future. This means there’s plenty of time to see these epic confrontations find their way into the main story ofOne Piece.
The wound I got from that guy [Blackbeard], aches whenever I look at your face. - Shanks to Whitebeard
In the end, althoughthe world ofOne Piecemay have a bit too many off-screen battles, these moments despite never playing out in the story, are still held in high regard by fans. In a way, the mystery surrounding these events has led to fans loving these moments even more. In a way, the very fact that these battles occurred off-screen has made them all the more mysterious and tantalizing toOne Piecefans.
