One Piece: When Should The Netflix Series End?

One Piece’s anime series is currently over eleven hundred episodes long and counting. When you compare this to the anime, Netflix is only on the events of a storyline that is taking place around the forty-fifth installment of the television series. Considering that it might be years between each season, it seems unlikely that the live-action adaptation will be able to follow the source material to a tee. Keeping this in mind, now seems like a good time to think about when and how Netflix’s One Piece should bring its story to an end while still remaining true to Eiichiro Oda’s work.

To start, we need to explore how One Piece will end. At present, Eiichiro Oda hasn’t hinted at just when the final chapter will be released, though the mangaka has confirmed that this will be the last saga focusing on Monkey D. Luffy and the Straw Hat Pirates. Typically, story arcs have continued for years after their beginnings and even with what manga readers and anime fans have seen so far in the final saga, it doesn’t appear as though it is looking to shut down anytime soon. With the live-action adaptation still having quite the long road ahead of it, let’s break down what’s still on the forefront of the Netflix series and how to give a satisfactory ending to Luffy and the crew before all the actors are eighty years old, still in the roles.

[RELATED: One Piece Season 2 Wraps Production With New Preview]

The Live-Action End

To start, let’s do a rundown of some of the biggest storylines that Netflix still has to tackle. Season two won’t even cover the Alabasta arc, meaning that will most likely be the focus of season three. Following the desert locale, the shonen franchise then proceeds to cover Skypiea, Water 7, Thriller Bark, Marineford Arc, Fish-Man Island, Dressrosa, Whole Cake Island, Wano Country, and finally, the Final Saga. Each of these arcs are typically broken down into sub-arcs that are united by the specific locale but this gives us a good idea of what each season could potentially cover should the showrunners want to continue sticking close to the source material.

In 2023, the producers of the series, Marty Adelstein and Becky Clements revealed that they are crossing their fingers for a lofty twelve seasons to tell the entire story of One Piece. Even with a dozen, this might not be enough to fit in all of these arcs so we’ll need to mull over how to compress storylines where necessary and when to let the live-action series truly breathe.

Marineford Might Be The Best Finale

Ultimately, delivering twelve seasons would be a radical, amazing stretch for any series, let alone for this live-action One Piece though we have to admit, we’re a tad iffy on that prospect. Six seasons would seem far more likely in our opinion and keeping this in mind, what we would propose, is to follow the source material to the letter up until the final, sixth season that would take elements from Marineford and onward. Piecing all the story bits into one final epic season would work well and it would also help avoid the live-action Straw Hats from taking on their roles in their senior years.

The Marineford Arc is one that struck at the very heart of the Straw Hats, gathering nearly all of the characters together onto one battlefield. Injecting characters from Whole Cake, Wano, and beyond could work out here, as fans of the source material still consider this to be one of, if not the, best arc in the franchise. Since the live-action series might still be running by the time that the final manga chapter is released, Eiichiro Oda himself might be able to spend all his time working directly on the live-action series as the Executive Producer. Now let’s all speculate on how on Earth they’ll bring Luffy’s Gear Fifth to the live-action world.

Do you want to see how the live-action One Piece series will come to an end on Netflix? Follow Team Anime on ComicBook.com for the latest updates on the Straw Hat Pirates and hit me up directly @EVComedy to talk all things comics and anime.