Anime that returns hope

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One Piece is a drawn story about the Pirato team: K, wandering in search of the legendary treasure. Behind the external cartoon of their world, inequality and dictatorship are hidden, which heroes: neither One Piece contrasts the desire for freedom. Mark Rybakov in the Doxa column figured out how One Piece revives his fan: kah is forgotten that the best world is possible. And why this is not just a flight from reality.

Caution, the text contains spoilers for 1100+ manga chapters. The One Piece manga is not yet over, so part of the text is based on the consensus of Fanato: to the upcoming events of the plot.

If you are familiar with the plot of One Piece, you can start reading immediately with the section "Hope or flight from reality." The whole reading time is entirely 15–20 minutes.

What is One Piece?

One Piece is Shenen Sönen is a type of manga focused on teenage guys. Such a path is characteristic of him: the main character strives for his goals, gaining friends and defeating enemies. -Manga of authorship of Eiitiro Oda. It has been released weekly from 1997 to today. Almost every year One Piece becomes the best -selling manga in Japan. Anime-adaptation even after 25 years from the beginning of the broadcast is recognized as the best weekly series, and the prime minister of important episodes “ collapses ” striming services due to the influx of the audience: NIC.

One Piece tells about the adventures of Manki D. Luffy, a young pirate in a straw hat. With his team, he will plow the course of the Grand Line in search of the mysterious treasure of Van-Pis, which gives the title of King Pirates. For Luffy, this title is a symbol of absolute freedom. But what kind of treasure is this is still unknown.

Each: in the crew of Luffy’s ship also has his own pipe dream: for example, Coca Sanji wants to find a sea where fish lives from around the world. In the team of pirates of a straw hat, many found a house that they did not have or which they lost.

Luffy goes to the sea. One Piece. Chapter 001.

World government, revolutionary: ki and pirates

In the first ten years of publication, Eiitiro Oda supplemented the adventure form with elements of a political thriller. The world One Piece is in the power of the world government . Around him, the central conflict of manga unfolds. Combining 170 countries under its control, it retains external symbols of federalism and freedom. At the same time, the government encourages the slave trade and inequality: for example, it replaced the fishing lines into the underwater ghetto, and the dwarfs of Tonatta put into operation one of the noble families. LGBT+ people are sitting in prisons, and to know the poor. The top of the government lives at the top of the rocky continent Red Line, called only "Holy Earth."

The leaders of the world government “five oldest stars”. One Piece. Chapter 233.

In addition to the main hero: Yin, in the world One Piece has many other pirato: K. Most of them fight for spheres of influence. Under the pretext of protecting citizens: OK from Pirato: to sea patrols, the largest militarized organization, protects the power of the world government.

The government opposes the revolutionary army of Manki D. Dragon, the father of the protagonist. For more than twenty years, Dragon has been increasing large -scale armed resistance. The army is a revolutionary: Ks are included: nits of different social groups, races, castes, classes, genders, religions, cultures and worldviews. The images of the revolutionary army are sent The Dragon ship is named after the yacht Fidel Castro, the form of the revolutionary army is similar to the form of Cuban revolutionaries, and the image of Sabo, one of its leaders of the revolutionary army, has become a replicated symbol of protest, like a photograph of Che. To the history of socialist revolutions.

The main character’s team is a pirate: ki, but they act as a revolutionary: ki. Having sailed to the next island, the “straw hats” unite with his resident: in the struggle in the struggle against local tyranny, whether it is governmental or pirate. The closer the Luffy team to the Van-Pis Treasure, the more it threatens the world government:-Apparently, the treasure is able to shake his power.

Hope or flight from reality?

The influence of One Piece is noticeable around the world. The protagonist of the franchise was quoted by the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine. In Indonesia, the USA and the UK, the One Piece flag was waved to protesters against the war in Gaza. Recently, the same flag was noticed at the Munich protests against the ultra -right.

Indonesian protests against the war in gas
https://www.tiktok.com/@tunguntungterus/video/728932591684344510

The franchise inspires its fans: C, striving for the world without dictatorship and inequality. The arrangement of the world government is called “the best anti -utopia”, and the tiktok is full of video with the message: “I sat down to watch a cartoon about the pirates - I got the history of the pro (sexualized) slavery, racism, Eugenika, experiments on children and censorship.” The socialist and popular Twich-Stemer Hassan Parker calls One Piece “The most politicized anime”, and in the Leftypiece fan’s subredredite: Ki is analyzing how one Piece criticizes the state and capitalism.

At the same time, One Piece is one of the most profitable Japanese media brands. The condition of its author is estimated at 200 million dollars, and although Hassan Parker calls the ode a “socialist”, it is not known whether he tried to change the difficult working conditions in the manga-industry. One PIES inconsistently shows Quir-loves: these are important positive character: Ki (which is extremely rare for the Shenen), and homophobic caricatures. The saga is criticized for an ambiguous attitude to the monarchy: while the world government is unambiguously shown as a dictatorship, kings and queens in the manga are bad and good, that is, they are evaluated morally, and not politically.

So, One Piece is no more than a product of mass culture, which gave comfort in the world of growing inequality and lack of freedom? One could agree with this, but people who go under the flags of the pirates of a straw hat on the square come against such a conclusion. Why is One Piece lifted to flags? The franchise twice successfully fell into a public context - first in Japan, and then in the world.

Answers One Piece to time challenges

Oda’s manga was released in 1997, in a decade, known in Japan as “lost”. The country was in a protracted economic crisis . Labor rights were limited, companies switched to short -term contracts. This contradicted the usual for Japan: Ok working ethics: hard work has ceased to be a guarantor of well -being. Increasingly, people began to tell themselves and each other that "it is time to quit dreams" and "look into the face of reality."

The theoretician of media culture Baba Nobhikhiko says : “Even children could feel the feeling of lost hope, not to mention adults.” One Piece proposed to this society a hero who triumphantly claiming his right to a dream. According to Professor Nobhiko, Manga Eyitiro Oda became an oxygen mask for Japanese society.

Outside of Japan, One Piece became more popular in the late 2010s, finding himself in a number of works that criticize inequality. Such films and TV shows as “Playing in Kalmar”, “Joker” and “Boys” reflected the dissatisfaction of the society superbore. Among these tapes, One Piece stood out by the fact that he was not limited to criticism alone, but offered hope.

One Piece. Chapter 877. Pedro says that straw hats will lead the world to new dawn

Why do we need a dream?

The idea of a dream occupies an important place in the narrative. At first, she was just part of the canon of Syonan, but then Oda politized this concept. For example, in the Flashback of the Sabo character, the author makes it clear that not all people have equal opportunities to realize dreams, contrary to the consuming in the Syunen, that "patience and work will grind everything."

Luffy's desire to become the king of pirates is actually a step on the way to a real dream. Its content remains a mystery so far. Many fans: Ki connect it with the " dawn of the world " - a utopian idea of political reconstruction, creating a new order, free from tyranny.

The past is an abolished future

In the manga there is a pirate of Javerley Bonnie, whose strength is based on the ability to represent different options for the future. In one of the last chapters of Bonnie, she fought with one of the leaders of the world government. He was able to convince the pirate that the world is unchanged. Bonnie lost. This is similar to how the authorities suppress the revolutionary potential with conversations that " there is no alternative ."

Today we have largely lost the ability to see the image of the future. Late capitalism seems natural and inevitable. Vera in an alternative greatly undermined the policy of memory. For example, Margaret Thatcher actively destroyed the memory of the 60s as an era of “new left”. And Vladimir Putin still erases Marxism from the history of the Soviet project, replacing the memory of the revolution longing for the collapsed empire.

One Piece has an example of such a policy of memory: the world government imposed a ban on studying the history of 900 years ago. But partisan archeology found that in ancient times there was a powerful kingdom that threatened to establish the power of the world government. So, since 2004, Oda has introduced the idea of politicizing memory into the plot. In 2023, she received an unexpected development: apparently, the technological development of the ancient kingdom significantly ahead of not only its time, but also modernity. So the history of the ancient kingdom coincided with the project of the utopian future.

Many fans: TSE One Piece suggest that the ancient kingdom was not only technology, but also had a utopian ideology. That is why the memory of him was erased. Real pirate mythology also inclines such an interpretation, in particular, the legend of Libertaly -the utopian pirate state, which, according to an anarchist anthropologist David Greber, was a prototype of socialism.

The past is an abolished future. It is important to remember it not for returning to the mythical “Golden Age” (as calls, for example, the slogan Make America Great Again), and for the revival of the once popular idea that the future is possible . The revival of the ideas of the ancient kingdom is occupied by many forces fighting the world government. A similar task - the revival of utopia - is facing us today.

How does One Piece learn to dream of dreaming?

On the one hand, in modern mass culture, deprived of hope, One Piece is an anomaly. On the other hand, this is a symptom: any shortage generates longing.

Cinema Richard Dyer writes In the book Only Entertainment. : “Entertainment does not offer [...] models of utopian worlds. Rather, it offers to feel utopia, unequivocally makes it possible to feel how utopia would be experienced, and not how it would be organized . ”

The utopia that One Piece offers is really abstract (in any case, for now). The army has a revolutionary: to no a clear political program. How was the ancient kingdom arranged? What will happen during the "Dawn of the World"? The reader: Nitsa still do not know all this.

One Piece does not give a training manual to create the best world, but allows you to survive what to go on the way to this world and what it will be in it. Perhaps the fan: Ki One Piece really flee from the cruel world to the world, at least no less cruel, but capable of updating. Nevertheless, returning to us the dream of utopia, One Piece again gives the ability to see the future not as an unlocked element, but as a result of human will.

Does it work?

How many find political meanings in One Piece? Palace community: C to this manga is known to compose theories that it will replace the world government. For 20 years now, a fan: Ki ONE Piece is collectively inventing the image of the future. After this, it is by no means strange to protest against the war and the ultra -right flag of the pirato: to a straw hat.

The need for political imagination and hope is also felt in modern Russia. This is noticeable in comments on the recent video version of KinoPoisk about the political sense of One Piece:

In the manga, an almost radical idea today sounds: life can and should bring joy . No wonder the return of the mythical character with the speaking name of Joyboy is one of the main fears of the government.

Ayitiro Oda politicizes a dream and joy. He shows them as ways to fight forces striving to reduce life to survival. The utopian charge of manga is so contagious, because it exists in the work itself contrary to, and not thanks to the political situation: the world One Piece is cruel, but it can become better .