One Pace Watched:

After downloading One Pace, the edited to fit the manga version of the One Piece anime, I resolved to rewatch the entire series from the beginning and see how much of a difference the editing made.

I realized I was experiencing something special when I preferred the One Pace edited thriller bark arc over the still unedited One Piece Enies Lobby arc.  Enies Lobby is one of the manga's high points, and thriller bark is one of its low points, so for the editing to make this much of a difference was nothing short of miraculous.

This trend continued throughout.  I found myself loving the Whole Cake Island arc, an arc I had hated in its One Piece incarnation.  The story suddenly was about Sanji's emotions, instead of meaningless fights with chess pieces.  It became an entirely different entity.

One Pace is currently four episodes past the end of Whole Cake Island.  Three episodes of Reverie and one of Wano.  To give you a sense of how condensed the material has become via editing, the Whole Cake Island arc ended in One Piece on March 24th.  It's been five months and One Pace has condensed all that material into four episodes.  Or in other words, in the past five months One Piece has actually only released four episodes.

If you try to watch One Piece directly, instead of the edited One Pace, that's what you get.  Endless filler and nonsense that ruins the most beloved, best-selling manga in history.

I won't be content until all of One Piece is edited into its true-to-manga One Pace form.  The difference is monumental and instantly noticeable.  The fight with Katakuri, in One Pace's version, is always clipping along.  There is no interminable, mindless action.  Either the fighting is accompanied by characterizing dialogue or the opponents are switching to new moves and trying out new strategies that might be effective. (or both).  This is what an action-packed fight feels like.  You're always gripping the edge of your seat because new, momentous stuff is always going down.

The new, One Pace version of One Piece, eminently deserves its ranking as the 4th best anime series ever.  Before One Pace, I was thinking about downranking it below Dragon Ball, Pretty Cure and the like, but no longer.  The only series that can hold a candle to One Pace are the similarly Naruto-cut-to-manga fan edited anime, the no-filler-to-begin-with Fairy Tail and perhaps SAO.  As SAO lacks an ending, it really depends on whether they announce another anime season or not, whether it can stay on as #1.  SAO without an ending is no match for Fairy Tail, Naruto-cut-to-manga and One Pace, all of which do have endings or are planning to have endings.

The ending to the Alicization arc is disappointing for the most part.  It doesn't resolve anything.  Laughing Coffin is still out there, Kirito still hasn't married Asuna, artificial intelligence still hasn't been given human rights, etc.  The author left everything up in the air and then started a new arc, Unital Ring.  Maybe that arc will resolve something.  Or maybe the author intends to expand the story indefinitely.  But in any case, having Alicization animated isn't good enough.  It's just one more step in the process.

Even Fairy Tail and Naruto are at risk of losing out to One Pace.  This is because Fairy Tail is ending in a few episodes and Naruto ended years ago, but One Pace will keep expanding and improving for another decade.  With all that additional material, it's hard to see how these older series can keep up.  If Clover Works had agreed to animate Fairy Tail 100 Years Quest instead of grumpily titleing the current season of Fairy Tail as 'Fairy Tail Final,' the outlook would be more optimistic, but as it is. . .

If the One Piece manga really does reach a satisfactory conclusion, the One Piece anime animates it all, and the One Pace editors edit it all, I suspect One Pace will be the #1 anime of all time.  That's a lot of 'if's though.  So we'll just have to wait and see.

I encourage everyone to switch to watching One Pace post-haste.  I also encourage anyone who didn't like One Piece or hasn't tried it yet to give it another try, this time watching One Pace.  They'll be amazed at the difference.