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One Piece, when taking a look at the entire series, is absolutely massive. With well over 1,000 chapters and 1,000 episodes, the series itself has been going on for nearly 30 years. With almost 30 years of content, One Piece may very well be one of the grandest adventures ever told.
However, despite the story itself being so massive, the timeline in the story ofOne Piecehas always left many fans scratching their heads. In the series, despite many chapters and episodes releasing throughout the year, many events last for a far shorter amount of time. In fact, the timeline ofthe entire story ofOne Pieceso far is much shorter than most fans expect. This disparity between the grand adventure ofOne Pieceand the actual timeline of the series still surprises fans to this day.
One Piece Is Way Shorter Than Most Expect
Less Than One Year Long
When looking at the timeline forpre-time skipOne Piece, Luffy’s adventure from being found in the barrel to the end of Marineford only took around 4 months, not even reaching half a year. Many events of this arc, including the Water 7 Saga, Skypiea, and Thriller Bark are all less than 10 days long. With the characters spending so much time on these islands, and with so many events occurring, it’s hard to believe that an entire Saga, like the Water 7 Saga, is only canonically 9 days long.
I have Nakama who are not strong… but I still want them to be with me! - Luffy
Forpost-time skipOne Piece, the Straw Hats’ adventure follows a similar trend with the entirety of post-time skip so far only taking place in a similar 4-month time span. This means that massive events, such as the Dressosa incident and the Egghead Island incident simply took place over a single day, despite being large chunks of content. Additionally, arcs themselves, like the nearly 200-episode-long Wano Arc, which only takes place over 3 weeks, with an entire third of this time being devoted to Luffy resting after the raid.
Straw Hats Time Apart
2 Years
Already, it’s baffling to see just how short the adventure ofOne Piecehas been forLuffy and his crew. To put it into perspective, each Straw Hat member has spent more time with their respective time skip mentors than they actually have with any of the crew members. Additionally, Brook was only a member of the Straw Hats for a couple of days and had only known the group for two days on top of that, before he was separated from the group by Kuma on Sabaody.
One Piece Needs More Travel Time
More Time To Spend With Characters
Firstly, many fans find this timeline of events strange as it doesn’t seem to account for travel time inthe world ofOne Piece. More often than not, rather than spending several days on the open sea, traveling from island to island, most of the time, only takes a couple of days or less. For example, when leaving Fishman Island, the Straw Hats arrive at Punk Hazard on the same day. The events of Punk Hazard all occur on the same day the crew arrives, and the crew leaves, arriving at Dressrosa the next day, the same day as the Dressrosa incident.
Although including all this travel time would makethe timeline ofOne Piecemore realistic, it makes sense why Oda would want to keep things simpler. Firstly, too much travel time between arcs would get to be a bit boring after a while, with too much downtime and too little action. Additionally, cutting out travel time helps the ages of the Straw Hats stay consistent, without needing to constantly change the characters’ ages after months of travel.
In the end, however, the timeline ofthe adventures inOne Piecemakes very little sense in the grand scheme of things.One Pieceis about pirates traveling on the open seas for treasure, though as each arc passes, actual sailing is less and less important. Overall, it’s hard not to miss the simple days of earlyOne Piece, where the Straw Hats would spend time together, hanging out as they sailed the open seas.
