This list contains spoilers
There's certainly nothing wrong with having a story arc that is easy to follow and straightforward, but it's also fun to mix things up every now and again by having a section of the story that encourages fans to think a little deeper about what's going on. When it comes to One Piece, there are several story arcs that suit this description, featuring a few complex ideas, plot threads, and even characters that fans will need to pick up on to fully understand the events that take place.
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The cover story arcs aren't part of the main One Piece story, but many of them tie into it or offer more detail on the manga's world.
That's not to say these story arcs are necessarily bad, just that they are packed full of so many things to keep track of that it means fans always need to be fully focused to get a decent grasp of what is being shown and said. These are the most complex story arcs in One Piece, which will have fans scratching their heads on more than a few occasions while watching or reading them.
7 Impel Down
The World's Most Robust Prison Has Many, Many Layers
- Episodes: 422-456
On the surface, the Impel Down arc might just seem like a simple prison escape, but it wouldn't be One Piece if the prison in question wasn't the most bizarre and wacky jail ever created. Rather than simply running out the front door and making his way to Ace, Luffy, along with a ragtime group of other escapees, is forced to go through many of Impel Down's dangerous prison layers, which are all drastically different in terms of the enemies guarding them, but also their environments.
As a result, fans need to quickly learn the basic structure of Impel Down to understand where Luffy will be headed next, but things start to get a little more complicated once Ivankov enters the mix. After this Revolutionary decides to ally with Luffy, plenty of other random characters also end up partaking in the escape mission, making for a fun, but also mildly complex story arc overall.
6 Thriller Bark
Thriller Bark Introduces Some Rather Complex Devil Fruit Powers To The Series
- Episodes: 337-381
Before the Straw Hats reached the spooky island ship of Thriller Bark, the Devil Fruits they had been exposed to along their adventure had tended to be pretty simple and easy to understand. This arc, in particular, however, would start to introduce abilities that are often seen to be a little harder to understand, a prime example of which is the Shadow Shadow fruit owned by Gecko Moria. This enables the dangerous Warlord to extract people's shadows to then create his own army of zombies, but there are plenty of smaller caveats and finer details that fans need to know about to fully understand how it works in practice. This also applies to a lesser degree to other new characters in the arc, such as Perona, who also has a rather bizarre Devil Fruit, which is not always easy to understand right off the bat.
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There's also just a lot that goes on near the end of this arc, which fans will need to wrap their heads around. This includes Luffy's brand new Nightmare mode transformation, which seemingly comes out of nowhere, and also the random appearance of Kuma, who shows off his devastating Devil Fruit ability for the very first time.
5 Dressrosa
New Characters, Concepts, And Abilities Were Being Added To Dressrosa All The Time
- Episodes: 629-746
Dressrosa is far from a bad story arc, and it honestly contains some pretty epic moments that have gone down as iconic, but one criticism that always gets thrown its way is the length. To put it simply, the arc is clearly too long for its own good, and as a result of this, it feels as though it's constantly adding in new elements for fans to keep track of every few chapters and episode, which can start to become a little overwhelming. For example, the introduction of Sugar, who is able to turn people into toys to erase them from other people's memories, was already a neat idea, but then there's the introduction of the Tontattas, who have an entire kingdom built under Dressrosa itself.
Alongside that, there's also a tournament for Ace's Flame Flame fruit, which a bunch of characters, including Sabo, who was believed to be dead, partake in. This is just the tip of the iceberg of how messy this arc starts to become during its second stage, and that's not even mentioning all the flashbacks that fans also need to be paying attention to in order to understand many of the new characters introduced to the story.
4 Marineford
A Chaotic Battle Full Of Characters, All With Their Own Unique Abilities And Fighting Styles
- Episodes: 457-489
The Marineford arc is quite unique, as it doesn't exactly play out like a lot of the story arcs seen in One Piece. Rather than Luffy and the Straw Hats being given the time to explore a new island, this story arc entirely centers around a gigantic war taking place between the Marines and pirates, which has come about because of the capture of the legendary Fire-Fist Ace. As a result, there's a staggering number of characters, some of whom are familiar faces, others completely brand new, who all jump into the fray, resulting in a chaotic blood path that is difficult to keep up with by design.
There's also a plethora of unique Devil Fruit abilities being thrown out left, right, and center, alongside characters betraying each other at a moment's notice. It's honestly a lot to keep track of, but this was a purposeful decision by Oder to make the conflict seem as over the top and unpredictable as possible, since it is one of the biggest wars in recorded history, at the end of the day.
3 Egghead Island
Just Like Vegapunk Himself, Egghead Island Is A Lot More Complicated Beneath The Surface
- Episodes: 1089-Current
When reading or watching the Egghead Island arc, it quickly becomes evident that Oda had an absolute blast conjuring up this weird and wacky island, which is influenced by the wonders of science. Since the island is home to Vegapunk, the smartest man in the entire series, the arc itself is also designed to be a little more complex and technical than many of the others to feed into Vegapunk's aesthetic. In fact, the technicalities come into effect right away once it's revealed that Vegapunk has actually split himself into multiple different bodies called Satellites, all of which contain different aspects and emotions of his original self.
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Then there's the Punk Records, a section of the island that essentially gathers all the information collected by the other Vegapunks into one neat database. This arc also introduces some brand-new concepts to the series, such as the Seraphims, which are designed to be mechanical equivalents of the Warlords, who were recently disbanded. Experiencing the Egghead Island arc can often feel like taking a science class with the wackiest professor ever, and that's ultimately what makes it such a joy to watch and read.
2 Reverie
A Story Arc Packed Full Of Mind-Bending Twists And Reveals
- Episodes: 878-889
The Reverie itself, which is a meeting that takes place between the most powerful leaders in the world every few years, isn't that difficult to understand, but the events that took place at the most recent Reverie were honestly a lot to register. This was the story arc that first introduced Imu, an all-powerful being who is highly suggested to be the supreme ruler of the entire world, considering even the Gorosei were pledging their loyalty to him. This was already baffling enough, but what made the arc even more complicated was the inclusion of a giant straw hat, which sparked countless theories and debates online when it was first shown.
That's not all, though, as Imu could also be shown taking a particular interest in specific wanted posters, specifically one of Vivi, which was suggested to be the villain's latest target. All of this was going on while the Revolutionaries were also gearing up to attack Mary Geois in order to declare war on the World Government, so needless to say, there was an abundance of revelations and shocking twists that had many fans scratching their heads long after the arc ended.
1 Wano
It's Mind-Blowing Just How Many Things Are Happening At Once In Wano
- Episodes: 890-1088
Considering Wano is a story arc that had been built up for almost a decade, it makes sense why Oda wanted to make it so big and grandiose, but it does feel as though he started to get a little carried away by Act 2, considering just how much was going on at once. This arc doesn't just focus on the Straw Hats and their mission to take down Kaido, as it will constantly jump to other groups such as the Minks, the Red Scabbards, and even other pirate crews, in order to keep fans up-to-date with what everyone is getting up to while on the island.
Once the raid on Onigashima finally begins, there's a ton of battles going on at the exact same time, which makes it a bit difficult to keep up with, especially when watching or reading on a week-to-week basis. There are also some mind-blowing revelations that add to the chaos, the biggest being the reveal of the Sun God Nikka, who is directly related to Luffy through his Devil Fruit. Wano has become somewhat of a controversial arc in the fan base, as while it does have some incredible character moments, it can also get very complicated, considering how much Oda tried to pack into it, resulting in it also being by far the longest arc in the series.
- Release Date
- October 20, 1999
- Network
- Fuji TV
- Directors
- Hiroaki Miyamoto, Konosuke Uda, Junji Shimizu, Satoshi Itō, Munehisa Sakai, Katsumi Tokoro, Yutaka Nakajima, Yoshihiro Ueda, Kenichi Takeshita, Yoko Ikeda, Ryota Nakamura, Hiroyuki Kakudou, Takahiro Imamura, Toshihiro Maeya, Yûji Endô, Nozomu Shishido, Hidehiko Kadota, Sumio Watanabe, Harume Kosaka, Yasuhiro Tanabe, Yukihiko Nakao, Keisuke Onishi, Junichi Fujise, Hiroyuki Satou
Cast
-
Mayumi TanakaMonkey D. Luffy (voice) -
Kazuya NakaiRoronoa Zoro (voice)
WHERE TO WATCH
- Writers
- Jin Tanaka, Akiko Inoue, Junki Takegami, Shinzo Fujita, Shouji Yonemura, Yoshiyuki Suga, Atsuhiro Tomioka, Hirohiko Uesaka, Michiru Shimada, Isao Murayama, Takuya Masumoto, Yoichi Takahashi, Momoka Toyoda
- Franchise(s)
- One Piece
- Creator(s)
- Eiichiro Oda
