Race, Hatred, and Why Fishman Arlong Is a Man of the People
When I first started watching the One Piece anime over a decade ago, I remember being very interested in what everybody’s race would be. Obviously, I had to look it up and saw that the creator and writer, “God” Eiichiro Oda had this to say about it:
Luffy is Brazilian.
Zoro is Japanese.
Nami is an orange-haired Swedish woman.
Sanji is French.
Usopp is from “Africa.”
It’s obviously funny that our great liar character is “from Africa” and not a particular country, but to be fair to Oda-san, Africa has managed to produce some great liar characters over the last 5,000 years. Anansi is probably lying to your Grandmama right now, plus they made Usopp black as hell on the live-action show and I am absolutely here for all of it.
On One Piece (2023), they kept it pretty consistent with how the creator of the series saw everyone. They have mostly tuned out to be what he said originally save for Sanji. His meals may be French, but he sounds like he’s going to break you off with a gang of kicks before hitting up the pub with his mates to watch Ted Lasso win a game of football.
Still, Zoro is Japanese and great with swords, Nami is Swedish and great with YOUR money, and Luffy is definitely Brazilian. Like… Luffy is so Brazilian that I’m literally amazed to see it. They honestly could have gotten away with NOT doing that, but they followed their instincts and now fake and live-action Luffy can beat me football.
They could have easily gotten a white actor to play the up-and-coming captain who will one day become King of the Pirates. In fact, had Oda chased the money and not his vision, a live-action One Piece could have come out 10 years earlier and who knows what we could have ended up watching?
White Luffy and the Joyboys?
Creamy Monkey and the Cottons?
Pasty D. and the Going Merries
No, I wouldn’t want any of that and I am completely in love with what we’re getting so far.
Making a live-action version of anything seems exceptionally difficult. Make the changes you need without ruining its connection to the original property. This is especially true for a show as vast as One Piece. We go from the bar young Luffy hung around at in Windmill Village all the way to the Grand Line hitting up every interesting piece of real estate in the East Blue. Along the way, we meet a bunch of characters of different ethnicities that don’t quite match what they were in the manga or anime.
Alvida is played by Dominican actress Ilia Isorelys Paulino, and somehow I missed it watching the show, but she stands at a beauteous 6'2".
Nojiko is Nami’s beautiful Black sister played by Chioma Umeala who also sports a very British and a series of cool “in-show” tattoos that come up later in the episodes she’s in.
So these are the characters I know got race-swapped and there could be others, but I think it’s time we talked about the Black guys in the room.
You know it in the manga or anime as soon as you get to learn about the past of this pirate world. The fishmen are creatures of struggle. In the live-action version of the show you get to meet the great and powerful Arlong of the Arlong Pirates so early, that you get to say to yourself, “He’s evil and fishy looking, but did the humans really treat him and his people this way?”
Then you remember all the history of your own world and think to yourself, “Of course they did!”
That’s when it hits you. These fishmen aren’t just Fishmen. You see them at their party with their cool neon lights and Hawaiian shirts partying like you do at your local Black… I mean Block party and you know…
These Fishmen are Black as hell!
Arlong is played by McKinley Belcher III and you know as soon as you see him that he sounds Black, he looks Black, and when left to his own devices he acts pretty Black the whole time. Arlong starts talking about the discrimination he’s faced at the hands of humans. He speaks on the hatred with which the Fishmen have been treated in the past and you start to understand. Arlong is intimidating, but ultimately Arlong is a man of the people! He does such a good job explaining his grievances to the Marine Captain he’s paying to excuse all of his crimes that the Captain gives Arlong 50% of his berries back.
Arlong, that was cold.
Unfortunately, Arlong was pretty mean to Nami so you know he’s about to get his ass kicked. You can’t chain a child to a table to make maps for you for nine years though a true revolutionary has to make difficult choices sometimes. So while Arlong most assuredly has it coming, I still must say…
“Arlong was right.”
I am built with a strong desire to watch more live-action One Piece. I think we will be getting another season of the show pretty soon. Hell, it might make Netflix use its clout to end this strike. “Come on guys! Pay these guys what they’re worth! We gotta start on this new season of hot new show, One Piece!” It makes me very curious how we’ll be seeing the rest of the crew. What will become of Nico Robin who Oda said was Russian and Franky who he said was American, but is also a cola-loving cyborg?
Chopper is an adorable Canadian reindeer with a blue nose that ate a Human-Human fruit while Brook is an Austrian musician that is a literal skeleton man. A skeleton man! What in the hell is One Piece (2023) going to do with those two in live-action? It’s one thing to not make Usopp’s nose super long, but are we really going to be watching a skeleton play sea shanties?
Honestly, I really hope so!
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