One Piece Director Goro Taniguchi Isn't Worried About Anime's Globalization

The Straw Hat Pirates' popularity is continuing to grow, and a One Piece director comments on the Grand Line's success

By Evan Valentine

The Straw Hat Pirates' popularity has only grown in recent years. Thanks to One Piece receiving its own live-action series on Netflix, Luffy and his crew have been able to grow exponentially in North America outside of the anime and manga stories themselves. The Grand Line isn't the only anime environment that has seen a major boost in the present, as anime as a whole has shattered records and expanded its grip on the world at large. In a new interview, a major director in the franchise's history, Goro Tanaguchi, commented on whether or not the growth might be happening too fast to be sustainable.

In a new interview with CBR, One Piece anime director Goro Tanaguchi wasn't concerned with how big the shonen franchise was becoming. In fact, Tanaguchi was excited at the prospect that Luffy and the Straw Hats were inching their way toward becoming household names, "Something that I'm anxious about?! Not at all! Even from my first work, I've never thought that I was creating my work only for the Japanese market. So that's not something I ever limited myself to. So I don't think about that at all."

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(Photo: Toei Animation)

One Piece's Future

If you're unfamiliar with Goro Tanaguchi's work on One Piece doesn't just include the latest film in the franchise, One Piece Film: Red, but the director was the first ever to tackle a One Piece film. One Piece: Defeat The Pirate Ganzack wasn't just the movie of the shonen series, but was in fact the first ever animated adaptation of Eiichiro Oda's beloved series. On top of his work on Luffy and the Straw Hats, Goro has also worked on other anime heavy hitters including Mobile Suit Gundam, Yu-Gi-Oh, Ghost in The Shell: SAC_2045, and Code Geass. 

Following the release of the fifteenth film of the franchise, One Piece Film: Red, the shonen franchise has been tight-lipped regarding a new film that would continue the Straw Hats' journey on the silver screen. This might change next month however as One Piece Day is set to take place on August 10th and 11th, promising to supply anime fans with quite a few updates on the franchise.

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Want to see what the future holds for One Piece on the big screen? Follow along with Team Anime on ComicBook for all the latest updates on the Grand Line. 

Via CBR

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