4kids Edits

In producing a version of One Piece for the North American market, 4Kids considerably changed the animation. These alterations include:


 * Cutting longer scenes for time, editing episodes together, and skipping entire story arcs. As of June 2006, the equivalent of 32 episodes of material had been cut from what were originally 102 episodes. Among the removed was the Warship Island arc, the Laboon arc and the entire Little Garden arc. All removed episodes and arcs were written around, sometimes contradicting the continuity established by the dub. For example, in order to explain Mr. 3's presence after the Little Garden arc, it was told that he followed the Straw Hats since Roguetown, when Baroque Works didn't even know about them at that point. Also, how 4KIDS will write around Little Garden's role in Enies Lobby, where it has an important role in, remains to be seen.
 * Removing the original symphonic score and replacing it with music produced on a synthesizer.
 * Replacing the opening theme (originally a succession of upbeat pop songs) with a "rap" theme (though an English version of the original theme was used in an early promo)
 * Altering some dialogue to utilize different types of humor, often pun-based, sometimes even during scenes meant to be entirely serious.
 * Many firearms were changed to look less realistic, and some were edited into other objects. Most often, Navy guns are turned into water guns while the others are simply colored green.
 * Renaming many locations and attack names. Many attack names in other non-English languages (i.e. French, Italian, etc.) are given English names. These are often not proper translations of the name, and are sometimes different names completely (for example, most of Sanji's attacks, which were originally French cooking terms, are changed to food-based puns).
 * Toning down violence and other extreme situations
 * Removing almost all text, and replacing the word "MARINE" on Navy members' clothing with the word "NAVY".
 * Changing the skin colors of characters to avoid potential racial insensitivity
 * Toning down of emotional scenes, often due to bad voice direction, lines, and inappropriate music.
 * Removal of all kanji.
 * Changing of Japanese references to something more "American" (i.e. onigiri was changed to chocolate chip cookies). However, more Japanese references have started to slip in recently, such as an onigiri being kept.
 * Altering many character names. Some names that were originally English were changed to apparently make them sound more exotic. Examples include Portgas D. Ace (Portgaz D. Trace) and Edward Newgate (Ward Newgate). In addition to this, several other names are changed for content, like Captain Smoker (Captain Chaser) and possibly Cobra (Nebra), while others use uncommon romanizations of names, like Zoro (Zolo), Nefertari Vivi/Cobra (Nefeltari), and others.
 * Removal of all religious references (Mihawk's cross dagger was changed to something else, and Mrs. Merrychristmas's Christmas tree was colored purple, and her name changed to Mrs. Groundhog's Day).
 * Virtually no death scenes are shown, regardless of their importance to the plot. However, death has been referred to more often in the recent episodes.
 * The removal of all blood, even when significant to the plot, such as in the third Luffy vs. Crocodile fight. In this fight it was changed to a line saying"Without air my rubber skin sweats alot."

Despite edits, One Piece is one of 4Kids' more violent properties as the producers have left in some blood, appendages being ripped off (such as Shanks' arm and Zeff's leg), and a character being killed by gunfire. Errors are occasionally made in scene edits. Since the dubbed version of the Drum Island arc began, more violence and references to death have been included.