Is the One Piece Dub catching up to the Sub? – Shortened

The One Piece anime has been a long-running favorite among fans of the shonen genre, with a massive following both in Japan and internationally. The anime adaptation of Eiichiro Oda’s manga series has been ongoing since 1999 and has since accumulated over 1000 episodes. However, due to the production process of the English dub, which has to go through translation, voice acting, and other post-production processes, the English release of the anime has always been significantly behind the Japanese release.

The English dub of One Piece is produced by Funimation, a company that is now part of the anime streaming giant, Crunchyroll. Funimation did not start working on the One Piece English dub until 2004, five years after the anime’s initial release in Japan. This caused a considerable gap of five years between the two releases, making it difficult for English-speaking fans to keep up with the latest events in the anime. However, in recent years, the gap between the English dub and the Japanese sub has been closing at a faster pace than ever before.

The most significant indication of this change is the release of dubbed episodes at a much faster rate than subbed episodes. In 2022 alone, 156 new dubbed episodes were released, averaging 13 episodes per month. In comparison, the subs released 46 episodes in the same year, averaging only three to four episodes per month. The difference between the two releases is still significant, with a 131-episode gap remaining between the sub and the dub. However, this difference feels much more surmountable with how fast the dub is going.

If the current rate of production continues, the English dub of One Piece could catch up to the subs by March or February of 2024. By the end of 2023, the dub could make it up to Episode 1070, while the sub should be up to Episode 1093 at the most. This means that the English audience will finally be able to hold a conversation with their sub-only friends without the risk of being spoiled by them.

The reason behind the increased production of the English dub could be the changing nature of modern anime viewing. In the past, it was not a big deal if a dub was a year or more behind the Japanese release. However, with the increasing popularity of anime and the demand for simulcasts, most anime are now expected to be dubbed within weeks or months of their Japanese broadcast. To keep One Piece as far behind as it was would be nigh inexcusable in this environment, and it seems like the appropriate measures were taken to move things along.

Overall, the closer release of the dubbed episodes to the subbed episodes is a welcome change for fans of the English dub, who can now keep up with the series without worrying about being spoiled by sub-only viewers. It also means that English-speaking fans can now enjoy the latest developments in the series without being significantly behind the Japanese audience.

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Zoro, Nami, Luffy, Kaido, Bigmom, Shanks, Usopp, Franky, Jinbe