Three years after purchasing Crunchyroll for more than $1 billion, Sony plans to capitalize on its purchase (and anger countless anime fans) by banning free users from one of its most popular series. The company <a target="_blank" data-i13n="elm:context_link;elmt:doNotAffiliate;cpos:2;pos:1" class="link " href="https://x.com/Crunchyroll/status/1863614399472173093″ rel=”nofollow noopener” target=”_blank” data-ylk=”slk:said;elm:context_link;elmt:doNotAffiliate;cpos:2;pos:1;itc:0;sec:content-canvas”>saying that starting soon you will need a paid subscription to watch beyond the first 206 episodes of one piece. Cue the obvious jokes about locking a show about pirates behind a paywall. (Hello!)
Crunchyroll will use a staggered release to lock free members from most of the anime, which has been in production since 1999. On December 23, the story arcs from Water 7 to Fishman Island will become paid. On January 20, Punk Hazard on Whole Cake Island (and six specials) will be locked behind subscriptions, followed by Reverie and Wano Kuni on Egghead Island on February 17.
Until Sony's new content blocking takes effect, free users can (as they always have been able to) watch the entire series with ads. Fragments of one piece are also available on Hulu and Netflix (the latter is also home to the live-action version). But Hulu's library only reaches episode 384, while Netflix's reaches 238. The series currently has more than 1,100 episodes.
Sony is reportedly in talks to buy Japanese publisher Kadokawa. In addition to games like Elden Ring, dark souls and transmitted by bloodthe studio produces anime like Mister and Rise of the Shield Hero. If today's news is any indication, watching a lot of anime in the West that doesn't go through Sony could soon require the digital equivalent of the Straw Hat Pirates.
