A person Piece Film: Crimson is a bold musical swerve for the anime franchise

It is variety of interesting that most of the much more than 1,100 people introduced in the A person Piece franchise drop into two teams. The Entire world Governing administration — the tyrannical, repressive world regime that dominates the franchise’s environment — in a natural way leads to most of the figures to drop on a person facet of the line or one more. Some folks support it, like its navy and the untouchable, despotic aristocracy of the Earth Nobles. Other individuals are its enemies, like the pirates who selection between the series’ protagonists. It is a defining division operating via One particular Piece, and it’s these types of a straightforward break up that it doesn’t audio like plenty of to maintain a story likely for 25 many years, across 103 manga volumes (and counting!), and a lot more than 1,000 anime episodes.

But there is so considerably variation amid all those two groups. The pro-World Authorities figures include the mystery government assassination and intelligence corporations CP9 and CP0, the sellout pirates recognised as the 7 Warlords of the Sea, the Navy, and substantially a lot more. On the other conclusion of the spectrum are pirates of all creeds and inclinations. Some want to rule the earth. Others want liberty for by themselves and their picked out families. Some men and women just want to see the earth melt away.

Finally, though, the globe of One Piece does seem to be to be divided into two tribes — until now. The hottest addition to the series, the attribute film A single Piece Film: Pink, which opens in American theaters on Nov. 4, introduces a third, similarly sophisticated camp that is opposed to equally the Globe Authorities and piracy. That faction has enough ability to influence individuals on the two sides that it’s a force to be reckoned with.

What is most fascinating about that group, however, is that it is made up of 1 human being.

Uta, a woman with half-pink, half white hair, dressed in elaborate fluffy pink-and-white robes and gold arm gauntlets, draws a line in the air with one extended finger and leaves ribbon-like traceries hanging in space in One Piece Film: Red

The new arrival, Uta, is the daughter of Shanks, a person of Just one Piece’s most effective, greatest-identified pirates. She’s also a lifelong good friend of series protagonist Luffy. She happens to be the most well-liked singer in the globe. And we’re just discovering of her existence for the initially time in Pink. Offered all that, and the truth that her title is basically the Japanese phrase for “song,” followers fed up with shonen tropes could be forgiven for dismissing Uta from the get-go.

But the character is truly a little something supporters have hardly ever found in advance of on such a scale in the OP-verse: another person who acts and fights on behalf of standard, non-superpowered persons. The Revolutionary Army launched and led by Luffy’s father, Monkey D. Dragon, may seem like they’re about generally the same issue, but opposing the slavery-supporting World Nobles and actively battling for the very little people are two unique points. Uta’s mission is to no cost individuals from suffering. Her travel to assurance their happiness, and her nominal ethical qualms about how she does it, helps give her a interesting id of her own.

Via Uta, it also gets to be distinct how dystopian the planet of One particular Piece can come to feel for anybody without a Satan Fruit superpower, instruction in the non secular electricity of Haki, or just their individual pirate crew. Civilians all around the environment are killed all the time by pirates, Marines acting monstrously in just the law, or World Nobles who are lawfully authorized to make standard individuals their slaves on a whim. Uta sets out to preserve individuals men and women with the electric power of new music.

Pop star Uta, dressed in a frilly white blouse, sings and transparent flowers form in front of her as cartoonish figures cringe or grimace in the background in One Piece Film: Red

Musicals are not universally well known, especially when a non-musical franchise checks the musical waters. But the tunes in 1 Piece Film: Pink really don’t experience shoehorned in, since Uta is a singer with music-centered powers. This makes it possible for the tale to develop fans’ comprehending of the OP-verse, when also the natural way weaving in some gorgeous musical figures that take entire benefit of the medium of animation. Just about every song is a gigantic spectacle, whether or not a offered quantity is J-pop or R&B.

The music are all done by musical wunderkind Ado, a 20-year-outdated who debuted in 2020 with the youth-rebellion music “Usseewa,” which approximately translates to “Shuddup.” That song’s release set off a bit of pearl-clutching in Japan, with parents worrying about how these “provocative” lyrics would have an affect on their kids. Pink could possibly just change those people’s opinion of Ado, given its large variety of non-explicit, touching, and beautifully performed musical centerpieces.

The greatest way to explain Ado’s singing is “unbelievable.” It’s literally really hard to feel a person so young can have these an amazing musical and psychological vary. She can so obviously convey pleasure and hope in uplifting songs like “New Genesis,” or provide throughout visceral ache and despair in the melodic really hard-rock piece “Tot Musica.”

Ado’s general performance is a major rationale why Uta may go down in anime record as the finest One Piece motion picture character ever. But equivalent praise goes to director Goro Taniguchi and writer Tsutomu Kuroiwa, who’ve produced a beautifully complex character. In the starting, Uta seems like a regular hero style who fights for what she believes is correct, related to Luffy. In point, Purple is incredibly significantly an Uta-and-Luffy escapade, with the rest of the Straw Hat Pirates getting relegated to little extra than cameos. But there is a sinister streak to the way Uta goes about her mission.

Uta has her have idea of how to heal the entire world, and she pursues it relentlessly with no any regard for her perfectly-getting, or other people’s consent. Her steps are eerily reminiscent of those of CP9/CP0 agent Rob Lucci, who will make a temporary overall look in Purple as if to remind us that we have noticed this sort of actions in advance of, from one of Uta’s intended enemies. Uta never ever does anything at all as horrific as massacring 500 hostages to eliminate a pirate crew’s leverage, but her insistence that she is in the ideal and other individuals just need to go along with her is not that far off from Lucci’s devotion to “absolute justice.”

Luffy, a black-haired pirate boy in a straw hat, grins in the foreground as Uta, a diva singer with long, half-pink, half-red hair, smiles in the background in One Piece Film: Red

But for all these nods to One Piece’s previous, A single Piece Movie: Crimson is entirely accessible to newcomers. Even people today who’ve under no circumstances found a solitary episode of the exhibit or read through any of the manga can however observe and love Pink. Some of the specifics will fly over their heads, but the energetic tale and partaking tracks must maintain them entertained. (Even if we under no circumstances do get to hear Luffy sing.)

Longtime A single Piece followers, though, are in for a little something magical. Uta likely signifies a massive shift in the stability of electric power across A person Piece. Although the movie’s functions haven’t been confirmed as series canon, Uta herself appears in chapter 1055 of the manga, meaning that she is portion of the most important plot. If her character and enthusiasm are carried above to the story’s official continuum, it could mean that the most fascinating Just one Piece tales are still ahead of us.

Just one Piece Movie: Red debuts in U.S. theaters on Nov. 4.