The Big Picture
- The live-action One Piece series will be filled with manga and anime Easter eggs for fans to discover, created through attention to detail and little hidden elements.
- The mansion of Kaya in the series features Trompe-l’œil murals in the hallway depicting ships for people to order, and every can of food in the kitchen has unique labels related to the One Piece world.
- The level of attention to detail in the series not only adds to the immersive world of One Piece, but also helps the actors feel completely immersed in their roles.
As we gear up to binge the highly anticipated live-action One Piece series, it’s safe to say that fans will keep their eyes peeled for manga and anime Easter eggs throughout all eight episodes. And the show with be chock-full of them, as production designer Richard Bridgland told Collider’s Mike Thomas in an interview.
During the interview, Bridgland singled out a location that will certainly have fans overwhelmed with its elements: The unforgettably huge mansion of Kaya (Celeste Loots). The production designer also revealed that the team “really went to town” when coming up with this set in particular, and “put in those little details” that you’ll need to watch multiple times and freeze-frame to find.
“We did a lot of stuff there where, obviously, we had the snail phones that our wonderful creature department built, but in the hallway, I created a hallway that was all Trompe-l’œil murals. The idea behind that was that this was the place where it was the showroom where people would come in when they wanted to buy a ship, and they would have loads of the ships that they built previously for other pirates and characters actually painted on the walls so that you could see the kind of ships that you could order. When you go into the kitchen, every can of food has its own unique labels that all relate back to things in the ‘One Piece’ world. I can’t even remember, there were so, so many, but we never had a generic food label or drink label or anything like that. So it went down to that kind of granular detail.”
Attention to Detail Seems to Be a Rule of Thumb in One Piece Live-Action Series
Even though the amount of references and Easter eggs are fun to put in place, Bridgland also underscores that there is an important aspect to this level of attention to detail. According to him, “not only do all those details go to make the world feel very One Piece, but also made the actors feel completely immersed in the world.”
From what we know so far, Netflix brought One Piece to life in every possible way, with life sized ships like the Going Merry and the Baratie built on Cape Town and a commitment to make it all look as real as possible within its own fantasy setting. The cherry on top was, of course, Eiichiro Oda’s participation as executive producer: The franchise creator approved everything that we see on the screen throughout the series’ eight episodes.
Netflix premieres One Piece this Thursday, August 31. You can watch the latest trailer below:
