One Piece (1999)

One Piece raises the one major question on everyone's mind: "Whose D?"

What would happen if someone took every single conspiracy theory in the book and made a story out of it? And you will say, "duh! Of course Naoki Urasawa's Billy Bat!" And you would be right in that assessment. However, One Piece is moving right up there in the same alleyway as well. Just in this case, it's masking itself as an adventure story about pirates, which in itself is a reference to the Skull and Bones Society.

We follow the story of Luffy, whose name is a very commonly used wordplay in anime to represent the phoenetic shortcut Lucy for Lucifer. Our protagonist seeks freedom, making him the perfect spitting image of pirate values in the vast world of One Piece, where a grand pirate age is in the center of the story, and is meticulously, magninomously decorated with details of world building - one of the major strong points of this manga that we will get into first.

World Building
When you hear about One Piece, what will happen E-V-E-R-Y S-I-N-G-L-E T-I-M-E is the following: You will watch the first few episodes, you'll either, from the get-go, take joy in the childlike over-the-top charm of shounen simplicity cause you like zoro's face, nami's smile or luffy's attitude or all of these, OR you'll feel your stomach rumbling with the aches of having wasted your time - BIG time.
Then, the person who recommended it to you will utter the magical words of witchcraft
"it gets better later, trust me! Watch till episode X"
This widespread phemonenon that we in the industry refer to as shit-taste buildup syndrome, does not come by chance. It is a systemic, coldly calculated design pattern applied to One Piece as a piece of writing and illustration.
And that is because One Piece is not primarily story or character centered, but rather invests immense amounts of time to convey atmosphere, lore and details into text and artwork that makes up and puts into context the background the characters are standing in aka the world that the story takes place in, and in the Manga even the covers and the side story panels get extra effort worked into them.
To build up a fantasy world, however, it takes time. And that is precisely why the aforementioned phenomenon occurs.

There are also other reasons the anime gets better over time, namely the animation, the action and the fights, the scale of the action and the stakes being raised, as well as the drama and characterizations just topping themselves. But they all add into the world building so much that the world of One Piece eventually ends up becoming this huge fantasy land to let your imagination and predictions run wild. It becomes a big, lasting factor that carries the viewer throughout the whole journey as an entertainment in its own right, converting all the temporary awesomeness of the character background stories, and the many iconic scenes that bring the hype and adrenaline rush spikes into a long-term investment of one's attention.

The world of One Piece itself is best described as a metaphor for and criticism of the real world that can only be told in such a way that disproportionate body sizes, high fantasy elements, mythological and fairy tail themes need to be mixed up in a gimmicky pirate setting, so as to avoid being censored or banned outright.

Characters
The story you're introduced to in the Intro is crisp, but everything that happens in every episode of One Piece after the Intro passes is all about the characters and their stories. Even the overarching red line, that you follow along figuratively and literally, is nothing but Luffy's personal character quest to become free as king of the pirates and wherein the personal character quests for each of the main crew members is embedded in.

Named characters in One Piece rarely die because they still have parts to play. They will still come up time and again, to play a role on the world stage and to push through with character growth to defy expectations.

Each story arc in One Piece has multiple tearjerker character stories, it introduces new bitches - yes, you heard right - and new mind-boggling ways to show off various male characters' abs and coolness.

The master questions asked in the character section is:
- Is the main character a badass?
- Does the main character go through some crazy-ass character development?
- Are the characters likeable?

But let's be real, just look at the character designs and YOU tell me if it's cool or not. It isn't. It's very original, but it's also a simple case of 'you gotta get over it' to watch.
The main character is a badass, but in a very unique, sometimes really odd, way because the coolness factor that the story tries to attach to the MC often times comes off as forced. This is particularly pronounced in the earlier arcs, where characters sentiments, character quirks and emotional outbursts and reactions rarely feel appropriate and when they do they are expressed through actions that feel awkward and the characters themselves often are defined solely around their quirks.
For example, Sanji, who - like all crew members - gets introduced with a heartbreaking, short background story, but whose entire character for the longest time of the story can be concisely described in one sentence, as a one-dimensional image of the gentleman. He cares about proper etiquette (don't waste food, be proper to ladies etc.). Or with Luffy, who is constantly highlighted as the character with the strongest willpower, but in order to highlight him in such a way, they have to first contrast that, like with Nami as damsel in distress or Usopp's cowardice or antagonists who are more defined by their greed, intellect, resourcefulness, strength or any other defining trait that can be eventually surpassed through Luffy's sheer force of will.

This makes for absolutely bonkers moments of catharsis when Luffy finally gives a lesson on character to those who you've seen behave wilfully harmful to others in buildups of "please hate me" scumbaggery, but it also means you have to let go (of your brain) and let the story take you along with the sentiments that appeal to your emotions, that otherwise you'd not ride along with. In other words, there's a lot of shit you just have to roll with by shutting off your brain - pertaining to the characters, but also the story itself.

Character development is big in One Piece...just not for the main crew. While all of the characters go through immense development in terms of power, and thus even formerly helpless members increasingly step into action, the overall naive and stereotypical simplicity remains constant.
Meanwhile, the tone of the story, which is primarily carried by the relevant characters of each arc, takes itself crazily more and more serious, while the main characters arguably get less and less so for the story itself.
Luffy, who starts out with a down-to-earth ability that requires finesse to make the most out of, increasingly "just" bends reality to his will, expressed through various concepts that get introduced or revealed throughout the series, such as haki or aspects of his powers.
Chopper, who started out as a primary participant of the ongoing fights, eventually decides to just take a seat in the back. Nami, Robin, Sanji and Zoro drive forward much of the story, and action.

It's amazing to see all the side characters they introduce to play important roles on the stage. When you see Buggy or Koby who were introduced from the beginning as absolute pushovers, to show what they made out of themselves over time. Or when you see members of the different factions, the Marines, Pirates, Revolutionaries, or the World Government to switch sides for their ideals.

Which is to say, the main appeal of the characters in One Piece is really just their stereotypical, predictable behavior. So when you can get behind the characters, you're all set for the journey and if you just don't feel them, that's not going to change along the ride, only the tone of the series does so over time.

Action

It's crazy. Tons of cinematic bombs and tensely inscinated fights with high stakes. The animation mostly lingers around in the mortal realms of mediocre Midgard, before soaring up into the sky out of the blue, melting animation spheres of different dimensions in mid-air somewhere between animation grades of "Dragon Ball Super: Broly", "Fate/Stay Night: Heaven's Feel III" and Bugs Bunny Disney cartoons.

The fights are mostly tactical, where non-stop action is not a staple, but when it comes around, it hits hard.
The combat mechanics slowly introduced over time make these fights captivating experiences, originally making fights fascinating analytics to unravel the powers of the devil fruits, wrapped around the One Piece laws of physics. And later your mind can't even process and break down what's going on amidst the fireworks on the screen anymore and if to assign anything of what's going on remotely to any of their corresponding concepts. What would be a simple throwing of a fist in any other story, then becomes a synaptic gym workout session between the Rokushikis and the Rokuogans, acronyms may fly inside your head shooting at each other like spaceships in a dramatic Star Wars showdown battle, the CoAs and ACoAs shoot at each other with Tekkais while ACoCs fire missiles.
While the mechanics are not nearly as complex as those of Hunter x Hunter's Nen system, it still becomes an entire discussion field on its own.


Final Words

It's a very solid anime, for pretty much all ages. Just like other successful fantasy worlds, like Harry Potter and what not, One Piece has multiple layers of semantics going on, so that when you have parts of the information to understand the meaning, you'll end up with entirely different stories of what One Piece is about, such that it becomes enjoyable for different age groups.
For some it'll be the story of the coming of Jesus, for others it'll be a statement on the government, or a tribute to Odin aka Shanks, and for some it'll simply be an epic adventure, exciting fights or a commentary on how not to be a D.

I rate this anime around 100-, no, 200 bitches out of immeasurable amounts of ill-gotten gains.