One Piece Prequel Monsters Looks Stunning In Its Official Trailer
Monsters 103 Mercies Dragon Damnation Ryuma
We’ve written about it a few times now, but Monsters 103 Mercies Dragon Damnation – a prequel to the legendary One Piece – is set to be released as an anime soon. We’ve had a few little teases here and there, like the poster released when Monsters’ release window was announced, but now we’ve got an actual trailer, and it looks stunning.
The official trailer for Monsters 103 Mercies Dragon Damnation was released by Netflix yesterday, and gives us our first proper look at the anime special. In it, we see Ryuma – Zoro’s ancestor and a legendary swordsman – digging into a meal before getting kicked out of a restaurant. It’s immediately clear that the same kind of serious-meets-silly tone we see in One Piece is on display here, and the rest of the trailer very much reinforces that.
Ryuma hears of another legendary swordsman, one that’s said to be the strongest in the land, and says he wants to try fighting the swordsman. Then all hell breaks loose, a dragon appears in the sky, and the race is on to strike it down.
The animation – from E&H Production, a relatively new studio with little behind its name as of yet – is absolutely gorgeous, and the art style feels very in-line with One Piece while still feeling like its own thing. The choice of music in the trailer is lovely too, and it’s looking like the episode could be a fun little romp.
For a little more context – I feel like I’ve written this so many times already but here we go – Monsters was one of a few one-shot manga that Eiichiro Oda wrote and illustrated prior to striking gold with One Piece. For a while it was thought to be entirely its own thing, but it was confirmed as canon to One Piece in the Thriller Bark arc, with Monsters main character Ryuma confirmed to be Zoro’s ancestor from 400 years ago.
The episode is set to be a one-shot, like the manga before it, and should run about 25-30 minutes. It’ll be released worldwide on Netflix on January 21, 2024.
