The One Piece live-action adaptation of Eiichiro Oda’s globally renowned manga and anime franchise is being hailed as one of the best to hit screens. But fans eager for more will have to wait—season two is being held up by the hubris of Netflix and the AMPTP at large delaying negotiations with the striking WGA and SAG-AFTRA.
“We’ve got scripts ready,” Marty Adelstein, CEO of Tomorrow Studios, told Variety. The production company’s president, Becky Clements, said that as far as season two goes, “somewhere between a year and 18 months, we could be ready for air.” The caveat, of course, is that production will only resume once the strikes end.
Variety detailed that Netflix’s One Piece series has raked in 18.5 million views, and while a season two hasn’t been announced yet, its success and fan love makes the green light all the more likely. “With Netflix’s support of the title, we expected it to be number one and we sensed their research and algorithms probably saw the possibility for that,” Clements told the trade. “But in our subsequent calls post-launch, we have been told that we have exceeded expectations, which is also fantastic.”
While viewers wait for Netflix to confirm a season two, the WGA and SAG-AFTRA must also wait for the AMPTP to resume negotiations. It’s the studios’ loss to not move quickly and value their talent pool’s enrichment of the entertainment industry as seen in One Piece’s breakthrough success.
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