One Piece has become one of the world’s biggest franchises, and it is all thanks to Eiichiro Oda. The artist never imagined his tale of Monkey D. Luffy would become so big, but it has nearly amassed a thousand chapters. But as it turns out, it seems the manga’s on-going arc is a bit of a wild card for the creator.
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Recently, Oda sat down to do an interview with Yuzu, a Japanese band, to talk about his career. It was there the artist talked about the Wano arc, and fan-translators were quick to summarizes his notes on the arc.
So far, it looks like the Wano arc has not gone in the direction Oda expected.
“Oda has already decided most of what will happen in the future. That being said, [the] recent story of Wano arc is heading for what he didn’t imagine. So, Oda doesn’t want to talk about the story toward the final chapter,” Twitter user Sandman AP shared.
For fans, this admission will be an odd one. Oda is well-known for planning his stories way out in advanced, and he drops teasers for upcoming arcs dozens of chapters early. In fact, the Wano arc has been tease since the first days of One Piece, so fans are surprised to learn the story has even surprised Oda. That means just about anything could happen in this long-awaited story, and the manga has yet to disappoint so far. Up until now, the Wano arc has included everything from corrupt leaders, Kaido, and even a bold execution. Now, fans know Oda is willing to shake things up with the arc, so their wildest theories about the story might just come true.
So, how do you think this arc should end? Let me know in the comments or hit me up on Twitter @MeganPetersCB to talk all things comics and anime!
Eiichiro Oda’s One Piece first began serialization in Shueisha’s Weekly Shonen Jump in 1997. It has since been collected into over 80 volumes, and 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 over 430 million copies sold. The series still ranked number one in manga sales in 2018, which surprised fans of major new entries.
