How Many Seasons of Live-Action ‘One Piece’ Run For Realistically?

With a third season of One Piece Live Action on the horizon, and with Netflix yet to renew the series for a fourth season, it’s time to revisit the question of how many seasons of OPLA we will realistically see on Netflix.

One Piece, a global powerhouse, is one of the most popular exports in Japanese history. From the manga, anime, and live-action series, millions of fans from around the world consume One Piece content. Over 600 million volumes of the One Piece manga are now in circulation, making it the best-selling comic book of all time.

Tomorrow Studios is responsible for the incredible Netflix live-action adaptation of One Piece, and so far, it has proven to be incredibly popular. As one of the most expensive shows on Netflix, and not to mention the grand size of the One Piece story, there are plenty of obstacles that OPLA will need to overcome as fans, critics, and journalists question how far into the story OPLA will realistically adapt.

Below, we’ll be breaking down the size and scale of the One Piece story, and what several seasons of OPLA could look like on Netflix.

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How is the One Piece live-action pacing so far?

Fans of both the One Piece manga and anime know the monumental task ahead for Tomorrow Studios and its adaptation. The manga has been in publication for nearly 30 years, with new chapters published almost every week, and at the time of writing, there are 1179 published chapters, 88 more than when the first season of OPLA debuted on Netflix.

Across the two seasons of television, we’ve seen 16 episodes totaling 1032 minutes (17.2 hours). With over 17 hours of television under its belt, OPLA has only covered the first 91 chapters of the manga. This equates to 13.06% of the manga at the time of writing.

Live Action Episode Title	Manga Arc	Chapters	Volumes	Anime Episodes
Romance Dawn	Romance Dawn	1-7	1-3	1-3
The Man in the Straw Hat	Orange Town	8-21	1-3	4-8
Tell No Tales	Syrup Village	22-41	3-5	9-18
The Pirates are Coming	Syrup Village	22-41	3-5	9-18
Eat at Baratie!	Baratie	42-68	5-8	19-30
The Chef and the Chore Boy	Baratie	42-68	5-8	19-30
The Girl With The Sawfish Tattoo	Arlong Park	69-95	8-11	31-44
Worst in the East	Arlong Park / Logue Town	69-95	8-11	31-44
The Beginning of the End	Loguetown Arc	96-100	11-12	48-53
Good Whale Hunting	Reverse Mountain Arc	101-105	12	62-63
Whiskey Business	Whiskey Peak Arc	106-114	12-13	64-67
Big Trouble in Little Garden	Little Garden Arc	115-129	13-15	70-77
Nami Deerest	Little Garden Arc	115-129	13-15	70-77
Reindeer Shames	Drum Island Arc	130-154	15-17	78-91
Deer and Loathing in Drum Kingdom	Drum Island Arc	130-154	15-17	78-91

As far as pacing goes, the first season was as expected, with the majority of the East Blue Saga covered. The saga concluded in the very first episode of OPLA season 2, titled “The Beginning of the End.”

What was surprising during the production of the second season was learning that it would not cover the entirety of the Alabasta Saga, but would instead end at the end of the Drum Island Arc. This decision was ultimately best for the story. Rather than going at a rip-roaring pace to cover as much story as possible, the decision to adapt up to the Drum Island Arc allowed the story to breathe, and gave audiences further insight into the characters they’d already fallen in love with, and allowed us to fall in love with new characters such as Vivi, Tony Tony Chopper, Dr. Hireluk, and more.

It’s best if Tomorrow Studios continues to follow the One Piece story at its own pace, so that each character and story receives the care and attention it deserves. 

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How much of the manga will season 3 adapt?

We’ve covered this in more detail here, but we’ll go over briefly how much of the manga we expect season 3 to cover.

With the announcement that the official title for the third season is The Battle of Alabasta, we now have confirmation that the third season will cover what remains of the Alabasta Saga.

Arc	Manga Chapters	Anime Episodes
Alabasta Arc	155-217	92-130

There are discussions amongst the fanbase that not only will the third season cover the events of the Alabasta Arc, but may also cover the Jaya Arc, which is part of the Sky Island Saga.

Arc	Manga Chapters	Anime Episodes
Jaya Arc	218-236	144-152

We won’t learn for some time if this will happen. However, it will certainly improve the show’s pacing.

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How many more seasons can we expect of OPLA on Netflix?

How many more seasons can we expect of OPLA on Netflix? This isn’t as complicated a question as many might think, especially given the showrunners’ and producers’ vocal statements about the series’ future.

Jokingly, a 20-season series has been ruled out by Becky Clements, the President of Tomorrow Studios, who recently discussed the subject with IGN:

No, we are not prepared for 20 because if I’m Zooming with you in 20 years, something’s wrong. [laughs] We have multiple years beyond this. We have plans, and it depends on who you talk to. I just love it so much. So I’m going to want to do 10, 12, 15, 20. I think there are certain parts of it that, just from a live action construction, there are certain moments where it makes sense to get to them. Others, it doesn’t make quite so much sense. But you want to see that story. So we have many years ahead. – Becky Clements

The interview also brought up a historical conversation Clements had previously, where she was quoted about OPLA going for 16 seasons:

“Well, that is again, me being the most aggressive and most optimistic. I think we almost feel like we’ve already broken through season eight, and then we can figure it out from there.”

Her comment about “we’ve already broken through season eight” is extremely important, and justifies our thoughts, and many of the OPLA fanbase, that Tomorrow Studios is aiming to adapt all of One Piece pre-time skip. 

After the Alabasta Saga, there are four major Sagas left to adapt from the pre-time-skip story:

Saga	Manga Chapters	Anime Episodes
Sky Island Saga	218-302	136-206
Water 7 Saga	303-441	207-325
Thriller Bark Saga	442-489	326-384
Summit War Saga	490-597	385-516

If Tomorrow Studios adapted one saga per season, this would take us up to only 7 seasons. But as we’ve seen with the second and third seasons, the studio is willing to split seasons when it feels necessary.

An eight-season adaptation could look like the following when broken down arc by arc:

Season	Arc	Manga Chapters	Anime Episodes
4	Jaya Arc	218-236	144-152
4	Sky Island Arc	237-302	153-195
5	Long Ring Long Land Arc	303-321	207-219
5	Water 7	322-374	229-263
6	Enies Lobby	375-430	264-312
6	Post-Enies Lobby Arc	431-441	313-325
7	Thriller Bark	442-489	337-381
7	Sabaody Archipelago Arc	490-513	385-405
8 (Part 1)	Amazon Lily Arc	514-524	408-421
8 (Part 1)	Impel Down Arc	525-549	422-452
8 (Part 1 & 2)	Marineford Arc	550-580	457-489
8 (Part 2)	Post-War Arc	581-597	490-516
8 (Part 2)	Return to Sabaody Arc	598-602	517-522

We’re confident that the Jaya Island Arc and the Sky Island Arc will be covered in their entirety in season 4. However, it’s up for debate on how OPLA will tackle the Water 7 Saga, one of the most beloved sagas of the entire story. It’s possible that all of the events of Long Ring Long Land Arc, Water 7 Arc, and Enies Lobby are covered in one season, but in order to give this saga justice and the adaptation it deserves, it should be split into two seasons.

A seventh season would make sense to cover all the events of Thriller Bark and the Sabaody Archipelago Arc, setting up a climactic eighth and possibly final season of OPLA. As you may have noticed, we’ve packed a lot in season 8, which could cover five arcs, including the entirety of the Summit War Saga. To make this season happen, we’d expect the final season to be split into two parts. Netflix is no stranger to splitting final seasons into parts, as we’ve seen with Cobra Kai and Stranger Things.

Will OPLA adapt the post-time skip story?

We’re many years away from having this question answered, and even if the series adapts the pre-time-skip story in its entirety, there is no guarantee we’ll see any post-time-skip content. The post-time-skip story features some of the biggest fights, the longest sagas, and accounts for more than 50% of the One Piece manga.

By the time OPLA could reach the post-time-skip content, we’d be looking at a ninth season. Outside of procedural dramas, it’s practically unheard of for a series, especially one as costly as OPLA, to reach a ninth season. Even at the height of their powers, shows such as Breaking Bad and Stranger Things reached five seasons, and Game of Thrones reached eight. While we understand these shows reached their natural conclusions, and One Piece would still have several hundred chapters of content to adapt, it would likely require OPLA to reach the same heights of popularity for Netflix and Tomorrow Studios to consider committing to several more seasons.

The post-time-skip story, as broken down by sagas, is the following:

Saga	Manga Chapters	Anime Episodes
Fish-Man Island Saga	598-653	517-574
Dressrosa Saga	654-801	575-746
Whole Cake Island Saga	802-908	747-889
Wano Country Saga	909-1057	890-1085
Final Saga	1058 – Ongoing	1086 – Ongoing

 There’s also the question of recasting: Thanks to the time it takes to produce each season, most of the actors currently involved will have aged significantly by the time they reach the events of the Egghead Island Arc or the Elbaf Island Arc.

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What does the data say about the future of OPLA?

The first season of OPLA got off to an extremely strong start to life on Netflix, amassing over 60 million views in the first 40 days of release. 

The two-and-a-half-year wait for the second season, not to mention its Tuesday release, has affected the show’s performance. The second season is lagging behind the first by 33.7% in viewing data, but this also means the show has retained 66.3% of its season 1 audience.

It must be noted that retaining 66.3% of the first season’s audience is still an impressive feat. But it remains to be seen when Netflix will renew OPLA beyond season 3, and it is possible Netflix is waiting for the third season’s release before committing to future seasons.

We bring up audience retention because it plays a major role in how Netflix decides which shows to keep and which to cancel (among other factors, such as completion rate). Our point is that if season 3 sees another drop in audience retention, the economics to keep the show going for many more seasons become harder. 

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Will we see any filler from the anime in OPLA?

Recently, co-showrunner Joe Tracz also took part in the interview with IGN. In the discussion, Tracz confirmed that Tomorrow Studios only has the rights to the manga. This means any content that is exclusive to the anime, such as filler, won’t be seen in OPLA.

“I see a lot of people talk about our show as an anime adaptation. In fact, we’re adapting the manga. And so, you know, I love watching the anime, but on one hand, you got to put that aside and say, if you’re just looking at the anime, you’re doing an adaptation of an adaptation, whereas the manga is the original source material, that’s the Bible. So sometimes the anime does things differently. Obviously, the anime has stories that are not canonically in the manga so sometimes we find some ways to nod to [them], but by and large, we’re adapting the manga. We’re treating it as if this is something that’s being adapted right on page to the screen for the first time.” – Joe Tracz

The One Piece filler is a very divisive subject amongst the fanbase. While many hate it, there are plenty of fans who love it, particularly the G-8 Arc. What both sides can agree on is that adapting the filler would only prolong the story and serve no purpose beyond that. It’s in OPLA’s best interests to leave any filler to references and easter eggs.

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How many seasons of One Piece do you think OPLA will adapt? Let us know in the comments below!