Top 10 One Piece Moments Way More Brutal in the Manga

Buggy the Clown is one of the series’ most recurring and amusing antagonists. However, this gag villain originally had a far more serious introduction in the manga. We first meet Buggy in Orange Town, where one of his crew members apologizes for losing a map to the Grand Line. During his apology, the man says something which Buggy misinterprets as a shot against his big, red, and very real nose. He then chokes the man with his then-mysterious Devil Fruit abilities. But, while he forgives the man and lets him go in the anime, in the manga, Buggy holds him in front of a cannon to be executed. Buggy loves to do things “flashily,” but this was a little too flashy for the anime.

Sanji’s fight against the invisible, lion-faced man Absalom to rescue Nami is a bit more disturbing in the manga. While the similarities between the two opponents’ “ardent appreciation of women” is unsettling enough, the manga features a lot more blood than the anime does. Toning down the blood in fights is par for the course for the “One Piece” anime, but this moment has a story behind it. During the fight, Sanji is stabbed from behind by his unseen foe with a knife. Unfortunately, this episode aired soon after the 2008 Akihabara massacre in Japan, where a dozen people were stabbed with a dagger. Instead, Sanji is merely kicked. The DVD and international versions do restore some of the scene’s bloodiness though.

Luffy collects several notable battle scars on his adventure. But the way in which he got his most famous one was originally cut out of the anime. Early in the series, chapter 1 in the manga, Luffy is a little kid and looks up to Shanks and his crew of pirates. Although the anime shows Luffy and Shanks in a bar and Luffy asking to join Shanks’ crew, the manga had a scene before this. In it, Luffy declares that he’ll prove he’s tough enough to join their crew - by giving himself the scar below his eye with a knife. In the original anime episode, Luffy lacks the bandage from his injury. The scene was later animated properly in a TV special though.

Bellamy the Hyena may think he’s much stronger than he is at first, but his sadistic and cruel attitude is still plenty threatening. He’s introduced plays cards with a pirate named Roshio. When Roshio wins, Bellamy grabs his hand and squeezes, accusing him of cheating…in the anime. He still makes the accusation in the manga, but he does it after stabbing Roshio’s hand to the table! Additionally, before throwing Roshio out the window as he does in the anime, the manga features Bellamy and his crewmate Sarquiss break a bottle of alcohol on him and light him on fire! Not only is this more brutal, but it also adds more tension to Bellamy’s first confrontation with Luffy.

Bartolomeo is the Straw Hat Pirates’ number one (in-universe) fan. However, he’s also a gangster-turned-pirate, so he’s not exactly a peaceful guy. When we first learn of his fanboyism, Bartolomeo overhears a man badmouthing Luffy for failing to save his brother. And Bartolomeo takes that personally, like any of us would! Flattening the man against a wall with his powers, Bartolomeo explains how he came to worship Luffy, while holding on to the man’s tongue. In the anime, he threatens the guy’s taste organ with a knife, but in the manga he pierces it fully! And then Bartolomeo does some other violence to him that was too extreme for even the manga!

When the Straw Hats go to Little Garden, they and some dueling giants on the island, are captured by Mr. 3. The crafty bounty hunter encases them all in some slowly creeping wax that will eventually turn them all into a pirate-themed wax museum. To escape their predicament, Zoro declares that he’s willing to cut off his own legs to escape the trap and take the fight to Mr. 3 and the rest of Baroque Works. Thankfully, Luffy arrives with back-up and Zoro doesn’t have to go through with it. Well, mostly - he already got halfway through. The anime shows blood dripping down, but the manga shows the grisly mess he’s made of his legs in more detail. It’s amazing Zoro is so nonchalant.

Luffy’s fight with Katakuri is one of the most intense and awesome bouts in the entire series, not only because of the intense action, but also because of the mutual respect that develops between them. Unfortunately, Katakuri’s awful, terrible, no-good little sister Flampe shoots Luffy in the leg with a numbing dart, leading to Luffy slipping and getting hit by a devastating attack from Katakuri. While the anime does show a lot of blood, it’s practically to cover up the damage Luffy takes in the manga. Originally, you can see Katakuri’s weapon going clean through Luffy and a huge chunk missing from Luffy’s mid-section. Chopper is an incredible doctor, being able to patch that up!

“One Piece” backstories tend to get pretty tragic and pretty dark, so several are subject to censorship. The first is Nami’s backstory. When the fish-man Arlong and his crew take over Nami’s village, they force the villagers to pay them “protection money.” When Nami’s adopted mother, Bell-mère, doesn’t have enough for herself, Nami, and Nami’s sister Nojiko, she offers herself to protect them. Her death is traumatic and tragic regardless of the version. But, in the manga, Arlong points his gun at Bell-mère's face, instead of her chest. It’s brutal either way, yet we can see how a mother getting shot there, in front of her kids, might’ve been a bit too dark.

Another Straw Hat backstory, this one details how Sanji and his mentor Zeff were both stranded on a small island with little food to survive. In both versions, Zeff loses one of his legs to save Sanji. However, the “how” differs between mediums. In the anime, Zeff’s leg gets caught in a chain while saving Sanji at sea, forcing him to remove it. He then gives Sanji all his food so he can survive. But, in the manga, Zeff has both legs when they reach land…and he still gives Sanji all the food. Zeff cuts off his own leg - and eats it to survive. Self-cannibalism isn’t exactly a family-friendly topic, so we can understand the censorship, in this case.

The death of Ace made a lot of people angry - most of all Ace’s adoptive dad, Whitebeard. The legendary pirate is quick to pursue Ace’s killer, Akainu, to give him an epic beatdown. However, despite taking a quake punch to the face, the dogged Admiral retaliates with a magma punch. In the anime, this merely burns off a portion of Whitebeard’s signature crescent mustache. But the manga went even more brutal. Whitebeard doesn’t just lose half his ‘stache - he loses half his face! After such a gut-wrenching death, we can see why the animators toned down this gory injury. Still, it’s too bad that Whitebeard looks like slightly less of a beast for fighting on with such a grisly wound!