'One Piece' Director Hypes Monkey D. Luffy's Battle With Katakuri

Every fan of One Piece knows a good arc cannot finish until Monkey D. Luffy beats the stuffing out of someone. Whether the pirate is facing down Arlong or Doflamingo, the captain cannot sail away from a storyline without challenging an insanely strong opponent. These days, the anime is shaping up that quintessential battle for its current arc, and the show's director wants fans to get excited for the big showdown.

So, if you have been hoping Luffy v Katakuri would be a show-stopper, don't worry. It sounds like the match will live up to expectations.

Recently, the official One Piece magazine published an interview with the anime's director. Toshinori Fukuzawa opened up about the future of the 'Whole Cake Island' arc during his chat, and he made sure to tease fans about its big battle with Katakuri. Fans were quick to summarize the interview online for fans, and one of them shared Fukuzawa's thoughts.

"Fukasawa [sic] is looking forward to Luffy's fight against Katakuri," a summary by Tomorrow D writes.

"The fight embodied the [characters'] masculine spirits and it also showed Luffy's growth. Fukusawa [sic] hopes to put effort into the fight."

It isn't surprising to hear that a lot of effort is being put into Luffy's battle with the Sweet Commander. Big Mom is one of the four Yonko, and her massive fleet is truly terrifying. As he second son, Katakuri is a force to be reckoned with, and his bounty rests at over 1 billion belly. With the power of a Devil Fruit and Observation Haki at his disposal, Katakuri is a formidable opponent for even Luffy, and manga readers know their fated clash gets very, very bloody. So, it's time all you anime fans started taking bets on how many episodes One Piece will take in adapting this long-awaited battle.

Eiichiro Oda's One Piece first began serialization in Shueisha's Weekly Shonen Jump in 1997. It has been collected into 87 volumes, with a few chapters yet to be included. It has been a critical and commercial success worldwide with many of the volumes breaking printing records in Japan. The manga has even set a Guinness World Record for the most copies published for the same comic book by a single author, and is the best selling manga series worldwide with 430 million copies sold worldwide.

Are you ready to see Luffy undertake his next big anime battle? Let me know in the comments or hit me up on Twitter @MeganPetersCB to talk all things comics, k-pop, and anime!