One Piece Reimagines Vivi and Alabasta Arc in New Cup Noodle Promo

Nissin has always gone above and beyond when promotion its Cup Noodles brand in Japan, and one the coolest efforts is the "Hungry Days" campaign. This campaign usually has a fun anime promo for each of these ads ranging from an apocalyptic romantic comedy to remixed takes on famous anime projects like Kiki's Delivery Service, Sazae-san, and most recently, One Piece. These ads often focus on characters in their youth, and for One Piece, the campaign actually had a huge makeover for the series in mind as it imagines a fun alternate universe where the series was set in a high school instead.

Previous promos in this fun commercial series focused on Zoro and Nami, and the latest promo puts a new spin on Princess Vivi's time with the Straw Hats and their emotional farewell following the events of the Alabasta arc.

Produced by Studio SHAFT and music backing from BUMP OF CHICKEN, the Nissin take on One Piece features characters designed from Carole & Tuesday artist Eisaku Kubonouchi. This most recent ad puts a new spin on the Alabasta arc and the few moments before that as Vivi (who's no longer a princess in this version) tells Nami and the other Straw Hats that she's moving and will be transferred to a new school.

But even though it's set in a different universe, it still has a way to bring in many of the franchise's most famous moments of Vivi's time with the Straw Hats such as Nami's illness (with a cameo from Dr. Kureha), and most impressively, a modern take on the Straw Hats' iconic silent farewell to Vivi.

This moment cemented their friendship forever, and this modern take has them sending her a video while they all hold the Cup Noodles in their hand which they made their vows over in the first place. It's impressive to see Nissin strongly represent its brand while still making One Piece shine.

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.