Eiichiro Oda’s Monsters Reveals New Images For Netflix Release

Eiichiro Oda is well known for his work on Monkey D. Luffy and his crew known as the Straw Hat Pirates in One Piece, but this wasn’t the first manga work that the artist created. Monsters was a one-shot that first hit the scene in 1994, before the arrival of the Grand Line in Weekly Shonen Jump. Set to land on Netflix next month, a new poster and new character visuals have arrived to help get fans hyped for the anime adaptation of Oda’s lesser-known work.

The one-shot special focused on the story of Ryuma, a samurai who is attempting to fight off a dragon and gain allies along the way. Monsters, for those who might not know, actually takes place in the world of One Piece, as the lead hails from the land of Wano Country and has some major ties to one particular Straw Hat. Surprisingly enough, Ryuma does make an appearance in One Piece proper, though he looks far worse for wear considering he arrives as a zombie. The samurai is an ancestor to Roronoa Zoro, making it all the more tragic when the green-haired swordsman is forced to fight the star of Monsters during the Thriller Bark Arc. 

Monsters Is Coming To Netflix

While Monsters doesn’t have a specific release date on the streaming service, Netflix has confirmed that the Eiichiro Oda anime special will arrive in January. The upcoming anime special won’t just be titled “Monsters”, but will have quite the subtitle attached, dubbed as MONSTERS: 103 Mercies Dragon Damnation. Since the work predates the introduction of the Straw Hats, keen-eyed fans can see how the design of these characters influenced Luffy and his crew.

View on X

If this is your first experience with Monsters, the official breakdown of the upcoming series reads as such, “MONSTERS takes us back in time to the story of the samurai Ryûma. Years before, a dragon horn with magical powers was stolen, and the samurai finds himself caught up in the catastrophe around that dragon’s horn, and the devastating appearance of a dragon in town…”

Are you hyped to catch the anime adaptation of this “One Piece prequel”? What other characters from the Grand Line’s past might deserve their own story? Feel free to let us know in the comments or hit me up directly @EVComedy to talk all things comics, anime, and the world of the Grand Line.