Summary
Various sources, including the officialOne PieceInstagram account, have revealed a brand-new anime created byOne Pieceauthor Eiichiro Oda. The series is a spin-off set in theOne Pieceuniverse, based on a one-shot Oda created titledMONSTERS: 103 Mercies Dragon Damnationand it will follow a character who hails from the land of Wano. The announcement of the anime adaptation ofMONSTERS: 103 Mercies Dragon Damnationcomes not long afterthe conclusion of the parent story’s Wano Arc.
The upcoming series is a surprise anime project that will stream globally, mainly through Netflix and Amazon’s Prime Video service. In conjunction with the announcement, various visuals have been revealed, and the series is set to premiere on the aforementioned streaming services in January 2024.
Among the visuals released forMONSTERS:103 Mercies Dragon Damnation, the character visuals depict series protagonist Ryuma, a girl who is the sole survivor of a dragon attack that razed her entire hometown seven years ago, as well as Freya and the swordsman known as Cyrano, who is searching for a stolen Dragonborn.
WhileOne Pieceis the parent story in this case,MONSTERS: 103 Mercies Dragon Damnationis actually based on a one-shot that series author Eiichiro Oda worked on before the serialization ofOne Piece. The one-shot was published in Weekly Shōnen Jump magazine’s extra issue 1994 Autumn Special in 1994, when Oda was just 19 years old. The story follows the legendary samurai known as Ryuma, who features in theThriller Bark Arc ofOne Piece.
Staff revealed to be working onMONSTERS: 103 Mercies Dragon Damnationinclude the director of theJUJUTSU KAISEN 0film and the first season of the anime series, Sunghoo Park, at E&H Production; character designer Takashi Kojima (character designer,The Heike Story); while the composer of the score inJUJUTSU KAISEN, Hiroaki Tsutsumi, is responsible for the music. No cast members have been announced forMONSTERS: 103 Mercies Dragon Damnationas yet.
The announcement is huge for fans ofOne Piece, but it also bears significance as the current climate in anime and manga sees various classic series revivified, and many older works by several manga legends are finally getting their time on the small screen, including Akira Toriyama’sSAND LAND,a brilliant adaptation of Naoki Urasawa’sPluto, and Nakaba Suzuki’sRising Impact, to name a few.MONSTERS: 103 Mercies Dragon Damnationis set for worldwide broadcast in January 2024, forming part of the Winter 2024 broadcast schedule.
