Top 10 Worst Changes 4Kids Made to One Piece

This entry will contain One Piece spoilers.

4Kids Entertainment is hardly the most popular company for many reasons, and is especially notorious for its treatment of anime. Not only are the voice actors rather poor, but the company frequently edits out anything that is overly violent, sexual or Japanese for their tastes. (The latter is not an exaggeration; rice balls get turned into jelly donuts for whatever reason). One Piece suffered at 4Kids' hands, and the rather infamously butchered dub still taints the series' reputation in the eyes of some people. This is my list of the top 10 worst changes, inspired by a video series that YouTuber Tsukento made years ago, but never competed.

Before I begin, the list will consist of specific examples, not general trends, although each entry will often be a shining example of a certain trend.

#10: Sanji's Lollipops

This is fairly low on the list because I can understand why 4Kids doesn't want kids to see one of their favorite heroes smoking(or Smoker, a Marine officer who's portrayed sympathetically despite being the Straw Hats' enemy). In fact, the original anime removed a scene from a manga that showed that Sanji first tried smoking when he was a young boy.

This isn't to say that it doesn't cause problems from time to time. For example, when Gin has Sanji pinned down, Sanji spits out his cigarette into Gin's forehead, causing him to recoil in pain long enough for Sanji to break free. Replacing his cigarette with a lollipop doesn't have nearly the same effect.

That said, the 4Kids dub has its fun with this. During the Rainbow Mist arc (the last arc before Funimation took over), a shot of Zoro(or Zolo, as 4Kids calls him) using a cotton swab on his sword instead had him steal Sanji's lollipop to see what he's always sucking, an act that almost seems to be in character for Zoro.

#9: Helmeppo's Hammer Gun

Most guns in One Piece get censored in various ways, such as being turned into squirt guns, but one act of censorship stands out as by far the most unintentionally hilarious.

At the climax of the first story arc, Luffy is fighting Captain Morgan, the Marine(or rather, Navy) officer who rules the town as a tyrant, while his new ally Zoro deals with Morgan's men. Morgan's son Helmeppo, noticing that his father is losing, takes Luffy's friend Coby(a young boy) hostage by pointing a gun at his head. The Marines are shocked, although it's somewhat ambiguous as to whether they're horrified Helmeppo would stoop that low, or believe he's making an empty threat.

Coby isn't afraid, however, and insists that Luffy continue fighting no matter what happens to him. Luffy then strides toward Helmeppo, who weakly threatens to shoot Coby if Luffy doesn't stop. Since Helmeppo had refused to execute the girl who gave Zoro a rice ball, it's implied that Helmeppo isn't evil enough to shoot an innocent in cold blood, but Coby doesn't know this for certain. Morgan then rises to cut Luffy down, while Helmeppo tries to use Coby as a human shield. Luffy punches Helmeppo out, while Zoro slashes Morgan with Oni Giri, winning the battle.

In the dub, the tension of the hostage situation is ruined by Helmeppo's choice of weapon- what looks like a spring-loaded hammer. It gets even worse when Helmeppo threatens to make Coby's head "flatter than the shape of the Earth." One plot point is that the world is round, with the Grand Line starting at Reverse Mountain and going around the world, with Laugh Tale at the end of the Grand Line, on the other side of Reverse Mountain. That piece of dialogue made Helmeppo sound rather ignorant, and made the scene all the more ridiculous.

#8: The Pirate Rap

You've probably at least heard of this, but here's a link if you're interested in hearing it.

Apart from being a song that is, at best, laughably bad, the lyrics seem like standard Saturday morning cartoon faire that describes the purpose of the show. Most of the anime's openings are mainly about the thrill of adventure, friendship and being willing to take risks to achieve your dreams, all major themes of One Piece. The anime's songs do a better job of showing what the series is about without telling us.

There are a few problems with the rap's lyrics and the editing, since it seems to be intended as a rough equivalent of the first anime opening.

• The opening narration says that "they hung (Roger) from the gallows," even though he's kneeling with two blades crossed beneath him, and it's implied that he was decapitated (especially since Ace's executioners are about to cut off his head before Luffy knocks them out with Haki).
• Roger says that he "left everything (he) own(s) in one piece." Apparently, they're trying to pass off the title as a lame pun (which wouldn't be the first one they used), but the One Piece is the official name of Roger's treasure. When Whitebeard confirms that the One Piece exists, the world is thrown into an uproar.
• The shot of treasure that's supposed to represent the One Piece is a somewhat less impressive hoard of treasure from early on in the show. The exact nature of the One Piece is ambiguous, but Whitebeard seems to know that it actually exists.

Another problem is that the opening changes very little over the course of the show, something that may warrant a bit of explanation for those who don't like anime. Most anime series have opening and ending theme songs, just like Western cartoons and TV shows, but it works a little differently. A Japanese band that's hot at the moment usually gives the studio about a minute and thirty seconds of their song, which is used to make an opening that introduces the characters and shows events in the current storyline. A few examples follow

1. The first opening of One Piece, "We are!" covers the entire East Blue saga, displaying the first five Straw Hats- Luffy, Zoro, Nami, Usopp and Sanji- and the first few arc villains- Buggy, Kuro, Krieg, Arlong and Alvida. It also features brief shots of Smoker and Dragon, neither of whom are villains. It's one of the more iconic One Piece songs and ended up being reused at a few points.
2. The second opening, "Believe," begins with a montage of all the allies and enemies from the East Blue saga, then shows brief glimpses of characters from the Apis, Laboon and Little Garden arcs.
3. The third opening, "Hikari E"(Toward the Light), adds Chopper and Robin, the latter of whom is shown several episodes before she even joins the crew. Unlike the others, it doesn't show anything from the Alabasta, Jaya or Skypiea arcs.
4. The fourth opening, "Bon Voyage," still has seven Straw Hats, and features some of the characters who'd recently been introduced, like Ace, Whitebeard, Blackbeard and the Five Elder Stars. It shows clips from each Straw Hat's backstory in lieu of current events.
5. The fifth opening, "Kokoro no Chizu" (Map of the Heart) shows the Going Merry falling from Skypiea, and several scenes from the Davy Back Fight and Water Seven arcs, including Luffy's fight with Usopp.

There are more than 22 anime openings as of this writing, but this should give you some idea of what to expect from them.

The 4Kids opening lasts until well into the third opening's run, but the only changes are adding Usopp and Sanji, and later Chopper, into the part describing each crew member's roles. The latter three members don't get added into the "Don't give it up Luffy! Don't give it up Zolo! Don't give it up Nami!" portion, and Robin is even less lucky- she isn't included in any shape or form.

As you can see, the rap opening is inferior to each of the original openings in terms of quality, faithfulness to the show and relevance to the current storyline.

#7: Don Krieg's Poison Suction Cups

Around the time Luffy's fight with Don Krieg officially begins, Krieg whips out his shield and begins rapidly firing poison stakes at Luffy. Initially, Luffy is forced on the defensive and is unable to get close to Krieg, but he soon decides to throw caution to the wind and go on the offensive. Despite taking a few hits, he keeps on going, and when Krieg tries to shield himself with a spike-covered cape, Luffy simply punches Krieg in the face. As Krieg lays on the deck of his ruined ship, Luffy takes a moment to pull out the poisoned stakes before the poison can spread, while declaring that this place won't be his grave.

This scene ties into the major theme expressed in Luffy's fight with Krieg- the importance of courage and determination. Krieg is a powerful combatant who has durable armor and hidden weapons, but Luffy's refusal to give up ultimately wins the battle.

Now let's look at the 4Kids version. Luffy gets shot with poison suction cups, and struggles to pull them out despite the process not being nearly as painful. It's an understandable edit, but one that completely falls flat in practice. 

#6: Lucky Roux's Cap Gun

During Luffy's introductory episode, some bandits under the leadership of Higuma the Bear walk into the local bar and start causing trouble, breaking bottles and dumping beer all over Shanks, who simply sits there and takes it despite being a pirate captain. Luffy isn't nearly as tolerant, however, and picks a fight with the bandits, who are about to kill him when Shanks arrives. One of the bandits points a gun at Shanks' head, and Shanks cheerfully warns the bandit that he's the one risking his life by pointing a gun at him. Moments later, Lucky Roux appears next to the bandit, shoots the bandit in the head at point-blank range and kills him.

This scene conveys two important points. The first is that Shanks and his men might have enjoyed making fun of Luffy, but they also consider him a friend, and while they're willing to tolerate being insulted, they can't forgive those who hurt their friends. The second is that they're pirates, first and foremost, and aren't the kind who show mercy to their enemies. The bandits underestimated Shanks and his crew, so they end up paying the price.

The 4kids version instead has Lucky Roux make the shot, but apparently with a cap gun, which somehow makes the bandit fall unconscious. Not only does this defeat the purpose of the scene, but it's one of the laziest cases of 4Kids censorship, especially since they don't censor the Lord of the Coast eating Higuma and Shanks' arm.

Considering that all this- from shooting someone dead at point blank range to a major character having an arm bitten off- happened in the first chapter of One Piece (the anime changed things around to make it the fourth episode), this should have been a red flag for how poorly suited a company like 4Kids was for this series.

#5: Usopp vs. Chu

First, the context. At the start of the raid on Arlong Park, Usopp antagonizes Chu the Fishman, who proceeds to chase him far out of the park, onto the roads near the coast, until he finally catches Usopp and beats him up. Convinced that he's won, Chu then decides to return to Arlong Park, presumably to fight the other enemies.

Usopp, who's always been a coward, is relieved that his attempt at feigning death worked, and considers making an excuse that he'd tried hard, before remembering how hard everyone fought. He then realizes that he'd be cowardly, and engages Chu in battle, dousing him with alcohol. Shortly thereafter, he sets the alcohol ablaze, and then bludgeons Chu into unconsciousness with a hammer. It's not only a victory for the Straw Hats, but a significant step forward for Usopp.

The 4Kids version not only changed the bottle of sake to a non-alcoholic (and presumably non-flammable) soda, but worse, it removed Usopp's character development from the battle, making it seem as though he randomly decided to fight Chu, while still being rather cowardly. 

While the 4Kids dub changes a lot for no good reason, it mostly gets the essence of the characters right, so it's disheartening to see a powerful moment from Usopps' character arc butchered so badly.

#4:Bellemere Being Imprisoned

There's a saying that no one ever dies in One Piece, with the disclaimer that this only applies outside of flashbacks.

Nami and Nojiko's flashbacks in the Arlong arc include the death of their forster mother Bellemere at Arlong's hands. To sum it up, she only had enough money to either pay for her life or her children's, and she chose the latter, even if it meant her death. Arlong summarily executed her with a pistol shot at point blank range, as a warning to everyone else, before abducting Nami to use her mapmaking skills.

This doesn't happen in the 4Kids dub. Instead, Arlong points at Bellemere and tells her that he plans on throwing her in a dungeon "for the rest of (her) days," to which she responds by telling him to spare her daughters. Arlong then turns to the crew and delivers the same gloating that he did after killing Bellemere in the original, but this leads to a severe plot hole. The villagers his men beat up before the execution are laying on the ground, defeated, despite no fight having taken place in this version.

Arlong then abducts Nami, and for some reason, the dub includes a shot of Bellemere demanding that he not lay a hand on her daughter. Since Bellemere is dead by this point in canon, they edit a shot of her yelling at Nami (in a scene that had been cut from the dub) with blue skies in the background. Chu, who's wielding a sword for some reason instead of Fishman Karate, cuts up Genzo without drawing any blood, the knocks him out.

In the original canon, this is one of the more tragic scenes of the early story, but in the 4Kids dub, this is one of the most clumsily edited ones. Despite that, this doesn't impact the story as much as the top three entries on this list.

#3:Usopp's Rubber Knife

This one's the third entry from the Arlong arc, and it's not really an accident. The Arlong arc is probably the darkest and most violent storyline of the entire East Blue saga.

To establish context, Usopp has been captured and brought before Arlong, not long after Zoro escaped with Nami's help. Meanwhile, some of Arlong's men, including Kuroobi, are beginning to doubt Nami's loyalty.

Nami then menacingly tells Usopp that she's planning on killing him, but he, despite being scared, refuses to believe it and lays down a smoke cover to try to escape. Nami catches up to Usopp in the smoke and seemingly stabs him, causing him to fall into the pool and drown. Johnny watches in horror from safety, convinced Nami killed Usopp.

In reality, Nami stabbed her own hand and put it on Usopp's chest, getting blood on him, and caused him to fall into the water to fake his own death. Nami is forced to bandage her own hand and hide the injury under a glove in order to avoid suspicion. While Johnny and Zoro suspect Nami betrayed them, Usopp realizes that Nami is really on their side.

The 4Kids dub makes it seem like a pre-planned strategy, not to mention implying Usopp happened to have a rubber knife in his pouch for a situation like this. Usopp has quite an arsenal of gadgets, but it seems improbable that he'd think of this.

#2:Removing the Little Garden Arc

The choices for the top two spots are relatively obvious- entire story arcs that got removed for various. reasons. The first of the two is Little Garden, most likely because during the climax, Zoro tries to cut off his own legs to escape from Mr. 3's candle trap.

To begin with, let's briefly explain the significance of the arc.

1. At the end of Whiskey Peak, Miss All Sunday, having supposedly destroyed Igaram's decoy ship (which took the Eternal Pose to Alabasta to get Baroque Works off Vivi's trail) offers the group an Eternal Pose that points the way to Naninomai Island near Alabasta, but Luffy doesn't trust her.  They're then forced to take the long and dangerous route through Little Garden.
2. While on the island, Usopp meets Dorry and Broggy, two giants who have been fighting each other for the last 100 years to settle their duel despite not remembering the cause. Usopp finds that admirable, and resolves to become a true warrior of the sea just like them. The fact that he met Dorry and Broggy becomes relevant later on, and helps him recruit two of their men after he helps them realize they were tricked.
3. Sanji stumbles onto Mr. 3's wax house, impersonates him on a phone call with Crocodile and lets Crocodile think that the Straw Hats are dead. He also manages to get an Eternal Pose to Alabata while he's at it. Later on in Alabasta, Mr. 3 shows up in Rain Dinners and tells Crocodile that he hadn't killed the Straw Hats. Mr. 2 then realizes that he'd met the Straw Hats(except Sanji) en route to Alabasta.
4. Unfortunately, Nami gets bitten by a Kestia bug while on the island, causing her to come down with a life-threatening illness and forcing the group to seek a doctor, which leads to the Drum Island arc.

Now, let's see how the 4Kids dub handled each point.

1. Immediately after Miss Sunday leaves, Vivi reveals that she had a spare Eternal Pose, rendering the entire conversation with Miss Sunday and question of whether to trust her meaningless.
2. The show doesn't get anywhere near Enies Lobby, so the consequences of this point aren't shown in any detail. The writers could have changed a few lines around, but that would likely have caused problems for a flashback in the Totto Land arc, and possibly when the Straw Hats finally reach Elbaf (which hasn't even been shown),
3. As shown in point 1, Vivi already had another Eternal Pose. The Rain Dinners scene basically had Mr. 3 irritate Crocodile by telling bad jokes until Mr. Crocodile drained him of moisture.
4. Nami gets a "Grand Line Fever" that could have affected any member of the crew. Vivi says that mysterious diseases exist on the Grand Line, but this version seems rather contrived.

While most changes to the show come off as laughable or don't make sense, this one causes plot holes, but it isn't as bad as...

#1: Removing the Laboon Arc

At the time, this didn't seem like such a bad idea by 4Kids' standards. The arc mainly seemed to welcome the Straw Hats to the Grand Line and introduce them to Crocus, Mr. 9 and Miss Valentine. The former two seem unimportant in the grand scheme of things, and the latter, while important later, seems almost out of character in her initial appearance, even considering that she's undercover. The arc does, however, feature Luffy attacking a whale (albeit for good reason), which 4Kids clearly didn't approve of. Instead, the crew encounters an iceberg on the way in, blasts it out of the way, and heads on to Whiskey Peak.

Of course, removing this arc caused problems, even at the time. The tragic story of Laboon's crew, which failed to return to Reverse Mountain due to perishing on the first half of the Grand Line underscores how dangerous that part of the world is, and how not everyone's dreams come true. Since Crocus assumes that the crew disappeared, it's not as though 4Kids would have had to rewrite any lines of dialogue about their being dead.

Another problem is that this is where the Log Pose is introduced. Basically, compasses don't work in the Grand Line, so the only way to find the way from one island to the next is to use a Log Pose. Surprisingly enough, Nami, despite being the group's navigator and the most intelligent member of the crew at the time, never even thought of the need for the Log Pose, prompting Crocus to scold her for her carelessness. The Straw Hats securing a Log Pose in advance would make more sense, at least in theory.

In practice, however, it doesn't. The group just so happens to find a Log Pose that Zeff had given them, which Sanji had forgotten about. It makes sense to ask Zeff for a Log Pose, as the only acquaintance of the Straw Hats who's been to the Grand Line before, but since no one thought to do so at the time, 4Kids having Zeff give them a Log Pose comes off as a plot device.

But this isn't even the worst part. Hundreds of chapters later, the Straw Hats meet a strange skeleton named Brook who endured decades of loneliness to reunite with a friend- Laboon. It turns out that Brook's captain fell ill and was forced to flee the Grand Line (an attempt that likely failed), and the rest of the crew fell in battle, Brook included. Brook was brought back as a skeleton due to his Devil Fruit power, leaving him the only one able to fulfill their promise. By removing the Laboon arc, the writers remove Brook's entire motivation.

In all fairness, 4Kids couldn't have foreseen this, since Brook's backstory was revealed around the time they lost their license to One Piece, and their dub ended just before Jaya, long before Thriller Bark. In fact, Tsukento moved the removal of Laboon from the middle of his list to just below the top after learning about Brook and the impact this change would have on the story. Of course, making such significant changes to a work being localized should never be done lightly, if at all, which is one part of the reason why 4Kids was a poor steward of One Piece.

Conclusion

While 4Kids had made many questionable changes to the works they dubbed, One Piece was the shining example of all their shortcomings. As a long and still ongoing work with a complex storyline and no shortage of violence, any changes would invariably impact the quality of the work as a whole, so making the changes 4Kids did had many unfortunate consequences, more than they had expected. Essentially, if you have to make this many changes to make a show acceptable viewing for children, you should find another show for them to watch.