Although he was absent from Weekly Shonen Jump for a whole month, one piece shared a series of 4 articles with the title “Road to Laugh Tale” that expose various ideas that Eiichiro Oda had during the Wano arc, and in the fourth volume of this special compilation are the Luffy’s first designs using his new Gear 5.
Image: Shonen Jump
The presentation of Gear 5 brought about a radical change in the design of the protagonist of one piece, one that was born among several sketches that the author had imagined for this moment. The first sketches of this power show that Eiichiro Oda thought, from head to toe, what would be the characteristics that would define Luffy’s appearance when he uses this power. In the ones below we can see a much more corpulent version of the character (similar to Gear 4 or even the “Nightmare Luffy” version of Thriller Bark)
Sketches of Gear 5th Luffy, featuring among them a design labeled as “giant”, as well as another where (just as a personal observation) looks a lot like a sulong awakening 🤔 pic.twitter.com/wVgsYlxaTh
– Artur – Library of Ohara (@newworldartur) July 18, 2022
The Gear 5 designs were so large that they even extended to the character’s face, giving Luffy an “unusually familiar” look with his swirling eyebrows and flame-like hair.
Several sketches of Luffy’s many faces in Gear 5th pic.twitter.com/aIDMALqvYs
– Artur – Library of Ohara (@newworldartur) July 18, 2022
The sleeve of one piece will return from his hiatus Coming Soon and it will do so just in time to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the franchise with an event that promises several announcements about this series that has become the mainstay of the magazine Weekly Shōnen Jump where it is published, as well as one of the longest running stories today.
one piece began as a manga written and illustrated by Eiichiro Oda in the pages of the magazine Weekly Shōnen Jump since July 1997. Currently its history has 1,035 chapters and 101 compilation volumes that are among the sleeves best sellers in the first half of the year 2022.
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