The longest battle in anime history has now come to an end. In episode 1076 of One Piece, Luffy has mastered a long fight in his Gear 5 form. The fight breaks a new record with its scope.
Warning, spoilers: The article contains some spoilers about the battle between Luffy and Kaido. If you don’t want to read anything about it yet, you should read the article only from the second heading.
What kind of battle is it?
- Kaido has oppressed the land of Wano for many years
- Luffy and his alliance partners want to put an end to the tyranny
- The battle takes place on Onigashima, Kaido’s base
- Even Kaido’s child turns against him
- Luffy is close to death in the fight against Kaido but then activates his Gear 5
- With Gear 5, Luffy defies the laws of physics and defeats Kaido
Especially the episode in which Gear 5 awakens has caused a great stir. The animations of the fight were top-notch and the comic sound effects were well-received by many fans.
You can watch Luffy’s final blow against Kaido in the video from MontCorvo_Off:
Luffy can change his body size at will and turn his surroundings into rubber with his new ability. This allows him to grab lightning or use the ground as a trampoline. No wonder Kaido had hardly a chance against his awakened powers.
How long did the battle last? With his ultimate ability, Luffy has managed to defeat Kaido and free Wano from tyranny. He took 61 episodes to do so. Since only one episode is released per week at most, the battle lasted over a year.
With the 61 episodes that the One Piece anime needed for the battle, it catapults itself straight to the top of the longest battles in anime history.
The beginnings of One Piece, for which a second season has now been announced, can currently be seen as a live-action adaptation on Netflix:
Other anime battles took fewer episodes
What other long battles were there? With 61 episodes, the One Piece battle is the longest in anime history. It even surpasses the battles from Dragon Ball Z, in which sometimes Son Goku and his opponents only yelled at each other and had a brief exchange of blows.
On X (formerly Twitter), kaneda471 summarizes how many episodes other memorable events from anime have in comparison. He provides the following examples:
- Dragon Ball Z: Son Goku vs Freezer (19 episodes)
- One Piece: The Battle of Marineford (32 episodes)
- Naruto: The Chunin Exams (47 episodes)
- Hunter X Hunter: Chimera Ants Arc (58 episodes)
The battle from One Piece even lasts longer than complete anime series. The battle has about as many episodes as the entire anime of Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood. For comparison, the user presents the following examples:
- Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood (64 episodes)
- Death Note (37 episodes)
- Great Teacher Onizuka (43 episodes)
By the way: The entire “Wano” arc is also a huge chunk. The arc is divided into three parts and already includes 149 chapters in the manga. Currently, the arc consists of 184 episodes in the anime, and it is still not over.
A good alternative to the anime is, by the way, the Netflix series, which MeinMMO author Sophia visibly raves about: After many disappointments, Netflix does the impossible: a really good anime adaptation
