Based on what’s been revealed about Netflix’s live-action One Piece so far, it’s very likely that season 1 will have a big villain problem. Netflix’s One Piece is still in development, so as of right now, it’s unknown how the first season is going to play out. Based on the information that’s been released, however, season 1 is set to at least adapt One Piece through the end of the East Blue saga, with any future stories likely being reserved for potential sequel seasons.
A big part of that idea comes from the villains who have been confirmed to appear in Netflix’s One Piece. Most of the major and minor antagonists of One Piece's East Blue saga have already been confirmed to appear in the series, and the fact that so many of them will be appearing is a good sign of how much respect the series will show the source material. That being said, it’s also more than a bit worrisome, as there are a lot of problems that can arise from having such a large cast in this specific medium.
Every Villain In One Piece Season 1
Before discussing the pros and cons of Netflix’s One Piece season 1 having so many villains, the villains, themselves, need to be laid out. At the time of writing, major villains Alvida, Morgan, Buggy, Kuro, and Arlong have all been cast, as have some of their associates like Helmeppo, Cabaji, Sham, and Choo. Don Krieg and Smoker can also be assumed to appear in season 1, and while he was largely just an antagonist instead of a villain, One Piece's Dracule Mihawk is also set to appear in season 1.
Other minor villains like Higuma and Fullbody are also set to appear, and while only some associates of the major villains have been announced, it can be assumed that characters like Mohji, Jango, and Hatchan will also appear in One Piece season 1. Altogether, that’s a dozen villains confirmed for the show at this point, and many more can be expected based on the material being covered in season 1, alone. That’s rather impressive on its own, but having so many villains in the show does come with its own share of issues.
One Piece Has A Major Villain Challenge
The biggest problem with the villains in Netflix’s One Piece stems from how many are going to be in the show. Season 1 is only going to have ten episodes, and the runtime of each episode will likely only be about an hour at most. Just from that, it’s clear that the show will have to rush through a lot of the source material to adapt all the East Blue saga, and with so many villains appearing in season 1, they could easily be affected by that and receive little to no development by the end of the season.
The structure of the East Blue saga doesn’t help matters, either. Unlike later sagas of the One Piece manga that largely followed a single overarching story, the East Blue saga was largely episodic, with its individual stories having little to no connection to one another. Because of that, most of the villains didn’t receive much in the way of development, and with how constrained the Netflix series will have to be, there will likely be even less time for it in live-action, making it even harder for the series to properly adapt them.
Why One Piece’s Season 1 Villains Are A Good Sign
The sheer number of villains set to appear in Netflix’s One Piece season 1 is a problem due to how hard it will be to adapt them, but it can still be viewed as a good sign for the show, overall. The fact that so many villains are set to appear in season 1 means that the show is making a clear commitment to authenticity towards the One Piece anime and manga, so someone can go into it expecting most of the key elements to be maintained. Granted, that runs the risk of fanservice being prioritized over quality, but that sort of faithfulness is still a good thing, regardless.
That idea of faithfulness is especially relevant with some of Netflix’s recent shows. Netflix’s Cowboy Bebop and Resident Evil adaptations were two of the latest live-action adaptations of Japanese media, and both were criticized for, among other reasons, heavily diverging from the source material. Both shows reinforced the idea that live-action adaptations of Japanese media are always bad, so Netflix’s One Piece going against that idea with the faithfulness of its cast, in addition to its set pieces, is great to see. There’s no way of knowing if the rest of Netflix's live-action One Piece adaptation will follow suit, but as of now, things certainly look good for it.