ONE PIECE CENSORSHIP

I don't know if I'm going to keep this page as-is, but I would like to share this one page as it's not easy to find (there is a YouTube series that covers a similar topic but it's not as complete)--the 4Kids censorship of the Japanese anime One Piece. It's a long-running anime and manga (since the 1990s--pick your poison, over 1000 episodes, over 1000 chapters). It's light-hearted but not the most kid-friendly series around, there are guns, blood, death, and mild language, but generally nothing more than a PG rating (PG-13 at max). When the show first hit the West in 2003, 4Kids Entertainment was the company taking it over, and they screwed it up...to an unusual extent. The dub isn't good--there's lots of puns and one character speaks like Rocky Balboa for some reason, but it was the fact that everything around them got censored, above and beyond what was normal for dubs like this. Guns became water guns or other weapons. Poses were changed to be less threatening. Bruises and blood were removed (and this is a show where people could sustain horrible injuries but be fine in the next scene). Alcohol was removed. Smoking was removed--the aforementioned character got his cigarette changed to a lollipop.

There is a YouTube series that covers the more blatant censorship but this site is better because it actually describes how the story is set up and how the "4Kids version" butchered or simplified it. For instance, in the "Grand Line", a compass is useless and a "Log Pose" is needed (something about magnetic islands). In the sub, there is a small arc where the Straw Hat Pirates (protagonists) find themselves inside of a giant whale, and meet some hoodlums who want to kill the whale for their village. They defeat them and basically steal a Log Pose from them. In the dub that whole arc is cut out and they find a Log Pose rolling around on the ship that another character had been holding onto this whole time. (Plus because it's YouTube, it has the same bad reading and ads and all--and they miss a few things too)

Like how the original website is set up, this website does have minor story spoilers, and some familiarity with the storyline is recommended.

The aforementioned site I linked to is on Archive.org and that means that many of the links no longer work...so this page tries to cover some of what was missing. I've thought about mirroring the site in its entirety but rather than that, but just decided to fill in some of the missing pictures from the site...at least for now.

Dub: Episode 3 - An Unlikely Pair: The Pirate and The Pirate Hunter
Sub: Episode 3 - Morgan vs Luffy! Who's The Mysterious Pretty Girl?

Helmeppo's gun turns into a weird springy hammer thing - [Sub | Dub]

Dub: Episode 34 - The Belle of the Brawl
Sub: Episode 36 - Survive! Mother Bellemere and Nami's Bond!

The Arlong Park arc has some notorious edits and changes (such as the "rubber knife" scene) but this is another notorious edit - "How about a nice room in a dungeon for the rest of your days?" and then changing the scenes afterwards so that Bellemere is still alive after the confrontation. [Sub | Dub] Arlong Park is also where due to cuts (including cutting out full arcs) is where the 4kids version starts to get way ahead of the subbed version.

Dub: Episode 44 - Fantastic Voyage
Sub: Episode 64 - A Pirate-Loving Town? Arrival at Whiskey Peak

- The shot of Igaroppai, the mayor of Whiskey Peak had to be changed to redraw a nun in the background, though because of this, the 4kids version has a frame where you can see the half-finished version. [Sub | Dub]
- Nami is in a drinking contest with a nun (well, a bounty hunter disguised as a nun), but because of the references to alcohol and religion, several things had to be changed. [Sub | Dub]

Dub: Episode 79 - Off the Hook
Sub: Episode 111 - The Miracle Sprint! Arabasta Animal Land

There are a number of visual edits (if you visit the page, they're all broken) but one major change is when Miss Merry Christmas and Mr. 4 have King Cobra tied up. What, the traditional "bandit-style cloth gag" often seen in cartoons couldn't be used? [Sub | Dub]