Since 1997, over 185.6 million copies of One Piece have been sold. Volume 56, alone, has over 2 million of those sales.

One Piece volume 57 follows Luffy and the White Beard pirates in a battle against the government to save Fire First Ace from public execution.

Yahoo! Japan

That’s a lot of One Piece! With that in mind, Eiichiro Oda, the creator of One Piece, has confirmed that he had originally planned to end the One Piece series in five years, however, at this point in time he feels that the series is only half way finished. Oda has envisioned the final chapter already, but cites the time that it takes to create the episodes has delayed his vision from coming true.

Sources: ANN, Oricon, Asahi,.

The animated version of volume 0 will be released on 3,000 limited-edition DVDs that will be given away in collaboration with the House Foods brand.

Viz Media has published the 22nd volume of the original manga in North America this month, and it is running the latest chapters from Japan in the English Shonen Jump magazine this fall. Funimation has been releasing the television anime version and the eighth film, One Piece: The Desert Princess and The Pirates: Adventure in Alabasta.

Source: Anime News Network

Japanese moviegoers who see this year’s One Piece Film Strong World will receive the “0th volume” of Eichiro Oda’s One Piece pirate manga. Oda launched his manga about the young pirate captain Monkey D. Luffy in Shueisha’s Weekly Shonen Jump magazine 12 years ago in 1997, but the manga in the upcoming “One Piece Kan-Zero” bonus gift will depict the world of One Piece from 20 years ago. Oda was a junior high school student 20 years ago when he conceived of the earliest concepts of the pirate manga that would eventually become One Piece.

13 years ago, Oda had drawn two separate pirate stories called Romance Dawn in Weekly Shonen Jump’s Summer Special issue and 41st issue of 1996 — one year before One Piece officially launched. (The “Romance Dawn” title eventually inspired the name of One Piece’s first manga chapter.) Both Romance Dawn stories have already been republished in Japan in the One Piece Red and Wanted books. Romance Dawn was also animated into a short for last year’s Jump Super Anime Tour.

Munehisa Sakai’s One Piece Film Strong World is the 10th installment in the long-running theatrical franchise based on Eiichiro Oda’s pirate manga. Unlike previous One Piece films, Oda is personally overseeing this film’s production. He created the movie’s story and has drawn over 120 pages of rough drawings for its production. Film actor Naoto Takenaka, television host Aiko Kaitō, and Olympic gold-medal-winning swimmer Kōsuke Kitajima are among the guest voices in the cast. The film will open in Japan on December 12. Over 170 million copies of the One Piece manga volumes have been published.

source: ANN

FUNimation Entertainment and the Japanese consortium of producer Toei Animation Co., Ltd., publisher Shueisha, Inc. and broadcaster Fuji Television Network, Inc. have agreed to continue the U.S. and Canadian online simulcast of the studios’ signature animated series “One Piece”.

Starting Saturday, August 29th at 9:00 p.m. CDT, just one hour after airing in Japan, FUNimation and the consortium will mark the return of “One Piece” online simulcasts with the Amazon Lily Saga story arc beginning with episode 415, via the official One Piece website www.onepieceofficial.com followed soon thereafter by FUNimation partner sites.

Each new episode of the current season will be rolled out weekly as “One Piece” continues its Japanese television run.

In addition, beginning Friday, August 21st FUNimation will stream episodes from the Sabaody Archipelago Saga story arc starting with episode 391. FUNimation will add three episodes at 9:00 pm CDT daily leading up to the simulcast of 415.


ABOUT ONE PIECE
“One Piece” is a story of a time when pirates ruled the seas. With several bands of pirates battling over the great lost treasure called “One Piece” left by the legendary pirate king, Gold Roger. One day, Monkey D. Luffy – a young boy who admired pirates – mistakenly ate the Cursed Fruit turning himself into a rubber man. Ten years later Luffy set out to sea to become King of the Pirates on his own quest to discover the treasure.

After Eiichiro Oda’s original manga debuted in Weekly Shonen Jump in 1997, this monstrous hit has gone on to surpass 50 volumes and has consistently remained a best-seller; the latest volume, Volume 54, sold 2.6 million copies in its first printing. In 1999, Toei Animation created a popular animated version for television which currently airs on Fuji TV affiliates.

In North America, the original manga appears in the Monthly Shonen Jump magazine (www.shonenjump.com) by Viz Media, LLC, which also sells the individual volumes. In addition to this anime simulcast, plans are underway for the latest chapters of the Japanese manga, which are ahead of the anime story, to appear in SHONEN JUMP starting in the fall of 2009.

FUNimation Entertainment will release the next home entertainment volume of the series, “One Piece: Season Two, Second Voyage” on DVD on August 25th.

First I want to talk a little bit about Naruto and ask how you evaluated the accelerated release program that you did earlier this year. How are the results of that compared to the previous accelerated release program for Naruto?

We really saw similar results. The retailers were extremely supportive of the speed-up. Obviously we had set a precedent with the prior speed-up. I think the rationale behind it, the motivation was very clear to them, and how the motivation would play to the consumer. We got a lot of support at retail, very broadly. Obviously you see a slight per volume decline but the overall volume is up. We’re very happy to see how consistently the fan base stays with it despite the increase in the need to purchase multiple volumes at once.

Now you’re going to accelerate the release schedule on the One Piece manga; that’s even faster than Naruto was Do you think a weaker property can take an even faster acceleration, requiring people to spend more money?

It’s a great question. ‘We’ll see’ is the answer. There’s a lot behind the motivation on One Piece in terms of the disparity between the success of One Piece in the Japanese market and in the U.S. This really is an effort to bring the narrative full speed ahead, re-enlist the fans that may have dropped off over time and then see how it works going forward. There’s no end in sight to the series in Japan or, obviously, in the U.S. The core fans will be there; I have no question about that. Sustaining that base number that we’ve been doing I don’t particularly worry about. The question is whether we can really grow the audience, whether we can get new buyers to jump in on some of these new narrative arcs. In the process of catching up to the Japan release, there are some pretty distinct stand-alone narrative arcs along the way. We’ll see how many folks can jump in and enjoy those and hopefully go back to the beginning and join the series.

For those who are unaware about One Piece, five volumes per month will be released between January and June 2010 in the United States, with volumes 24 through 53 released in that six-month period.

Naruto in the US, on the other hand, is nearly caught up with Japan. The latest volume release was August 4, 2009 in Japan. This same volume, 47, will be released in the US on December 8, 2009. Kindly support the Naruto manga by purchasing from retailers such as Amazon.com.

Source: ICv2

The movie is the tenth one in the series. As of today, One Piece currently has over 400 anime episodes, 6 specials, and 550 manga chapters. One Piece creator, Eiichiro Oda, has had his series published in Shonen Jump since 1997. To date, One Piece is the highest selling manga in the history of Weekly Shonen Jump!

Unlike previous One Piece movies, Oda has been involved with the latest One Piece movie. On the official One Piece movie web site, Oda notes that he has actually created the movie’s story and has drawn over 120 pages for its production!

One Piece Film Strongest World opens in Japanese theaters on December 12, 2009. You can visit the official web site at OnePiece-Movie.com

San Francisco, CA, JULY 6, 2009 – As first detailed this past weekend at Anime Expo® 2009, VIZ Media, LLC (VIZ Media), one of the entertainment industry’s most innovative and comprehensive publishing, animation and licensing companies, announced a significantly increased publication schedule for the hit pirate manga series – ONE PIECE – delighting fans everywhere. Beginning in January 2010 and continuing through June 2010, five new ONE PIECE manga volumes will be published each month, for a total of 30 new volumes. The new schedule will launch with volumes 24-28.

To further complement these releases, VIZ Media has launched a brand new, dedicated ONE PIECE web site at OnePiece.VIZ.com that will be updated regularly with plot and character information, and will also provide special free manga chapters.

ONE PIECE Rated ‘T’ for Teens takes readers to a world populated by pirates and filled with adventure. As a child, Monkey D. Luffy dreamed of becoming the King of the Pirates. But his life changed when he accidentally gained the power to stretch like rubber…at the cost of never being able to swim again! Now Luffy, with the help of a motley collection of pirate wannabes, is setting off in search of the “One Piece,” said to be the greatest treasure in the world.

The manga ONE PIECE was created by Eichiro Oda, a comic creator and artist, and debuted in Japan’s Weekly Shonen Jump in 1997. One of the most popular comic artists in Japan today, Oda started out by winning the Hop Step Award (a monthly award given by Shonen Jump for amateur artists) as well as the esteemed Tezuka Award. His art style is reminiscent of Akira Toriyama, Sergio Aragones, and the movie Yellow Submarine.

“This will be our most ambitious accelerated manga publishing schedule for any property thus far, and we are confident it will be a huge success, as ONE PIECE is an exciting series that enjoys a large and very dedicated following in North America,” says Gonzalo Ferreyra, Vice President Sales & Marketing for VIZ Media. “Pirate stories are known and loved the world over and ONE PIECE, with its zany cast of characters and high seas action, enjoys more than 177 million copies in-print in Japan alone. We look forward to new and old fans alike exploring these fun adventures as each month Luffy and his cohorts search for the elusive One Piece treasure.”

For more information please visit the dedicated website at www.onepiece.viz.com.