One Piece in France

One Piece is the best-selling manga in France. More than one million volumes are sold there each year.

Because of legal issues with the former translator, a reprint of the manga has been published and is available since July 3, 2013.

Edition
In France, the manga is translated by Glénat, a traditional Bande dessinée (Franco-Belgian comic books) publisher which has successfully diversified into manga by obtaining the rights to major shonen such as Dragon Ball and Bleach (Naruto is edited by Kana, another big manga publisher.)

Glénat started the translation in 1997 and has nearly caught up to the Japanese release, releasing Volume 52 at the start of 2010 (Japan had released up to Volume 56 at that time). One Piece is now in the top 10 of the publisher sales and the most popular manga.

Alteration
As for every other country, character names and attacks have been changed so as to keep the puns or ease the understanding of the audience. Many character names also differ from the English version due to differences in romanizations (Alvida becomes Arbyda, Buggy becomes Baggy, etc.) Another reason names differ is that the name is translated rather than kept in the original Japanese.

One of the most notable alterations is the changing of Usopp to Pipo (from the word pipoter, meaning "to lie") His alias of Sogeking (meaning "king of snipers") is changed to Le Roi Dutir (pun on Le Roi Du Tir, meaning "king of shooting")


 * List of name changes

Characters
 * Koby becomes Kobby (romanization)
 * Helmeppo becomes Hermep (romanization)
 * Axe-Hand Morgan becomes Morgan le bûcheron (meaning: Morgan the Lumberjack)
 * Buggy the Clown becomes Baggy le Clown (romanization)
 * Mohji and Richie become Morge and Richy
 * Chew becomes Smack (translation)
 * Hachi becomes Octy (translation)
 * Momoo becomes Meuh-Meuh (romanization)
 * Bellemere becomes Belmer (In order to prevent the pun from being too obvious for French readers)
 * Enel becomes Ener (romanization)
 * Gan Fall becomes Gan Forr (romanization)
 * Jaguar D. Saul becomes Haguar D. Sauro
 * Inuppe becomes Chiengouin (A combination of the words for dog (chien) and penguin (pingouin)). His name is changed to Clebs (a slang word for "dog") in the translation by Glénat
 * Oars becomes Oz
 * Donquixote Doflamingo becomes Don Quijote Doflamingo
 * Whitebeard becomes Barbe Blanche (translation)
 * Blackbeard becomes Barbe Noire (translation)
 * Sogeking becomes Sniperking
 * Tamago becomes Delœuf
 * Caesar Clown becomes César Clown
 * Inuarashi becomes Caborage
 * Nekomamushi becomes Chavipère
 * Kozuki Oden becomes Oden Kozuki
 * Kozuki Momonosuke becomes Momonosuké Kozuki
 * Vinsmoke Judge becomes Judge Vinsmoke
 * Vinsmoke Reiju becomes Reiju Vinsmoke
 * Vinsmoke Ichiji becomes Ichiji Vinsmoke
 * Vinsmoke Niji becomes Niji Vinsmoke
 * Sanji becomes Sanji Vinsmoke
 * Vinsmoke Yonji becomes Yonji Vinsmoke
 * Charlotte Perospero becomes Charlotte Slurp
 * Charlotte Katakuri becomes Charlotte Dent-de-chien
 * Charlotte Custard becomes Charlotte Crème

Places and things
 * The Pirate King becomes "Le Roi des pirates"
 * Raftel becomes Rough-Tell (romanization)
 * Haki becomes Fluide (meaning: fluid)
 * Going Merry becomes Vogue Merry
 * The Shichibukai become "Les Sept Grands Corsaires"
 * Skypiea's Priests become "Les Quatres Grands Prélats de Skypiea" (meaning: The Four Great Prelates of Skypiea)
 * Zou becomes Zo
 * Whole Cake Island becomes Île Tougato
 * Wano Country becomes Pays des Wa

One Piece animé in France
In France, the One Piece Anime is much less popular. Only a cable TV channel from the AB Group Mangas obtained the rights to the first 52 episodes in 2003. However, after a disagreement, Toei canceled their association with AB.

Later with the development of the DTT (in 2005 in France), NT1 channel (also part of AB group) aired One Piece, but it only aired the episodes dubbed by AB.

In April 2008, Toei made a new agreement with another DTT channel Virgin 17 and Kana Home video for the DVD releases. As of 2013, 558 episodes are dubbed and 264 released on DVD. Special crossover episodes 492 and 542 were skipped.

On January 6, 2014 on MCM the episodes has restarted from episode 559. Currently, French episodes has reached the episode 588. It's unknown when episodes will restart.

Unlike in the manga, many of the character names have been kept, although in the AB dub, Zoro's name was changed to Zoko.

Episodes
As of Feb 2012, episodes 1-504 have been aired in Belgium via MCM Belgique and 504 episodes have been aired on TV in France via Direct Star (used to be known as Virgin 17 until 2010). Episodes 1-264 have also been released on DVD in 20 volumes or "Digi-Packs". Episodes 1-217 were released and aired on TV in 4:3 format (though Episodes 207-217 were made in 16:9) and episodes 218+ have been released/aired in 16:9 format. Below are the DVD releases and the corresponding episodes that are on them.

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One Piece en France