Toei Animation announced on Friday that Erica Schroeder, the original voice of the One Piece anime’s main character Monkey D. Luffy in 4Kids Entertainment’s 2004 English dub, will voice Joy Boy in Crunchyroll’s English dub. The character will appear in the next batch of the anime’s English dub (episodes 1144-1155), debuting on March 24 on Crunchyroll.
Image via Toei Animation’s X/Twitter account
©Eiichiro Oda/Shueisha, Toei Animation
In a similar way, Urara Takano voiced Joy Boy in the anime in Japanese. Takano originally voiced the series’ main character Monkey D. Luffy in the One Piece: Defeat The Pirate Ganzak! Jump Super Anime Tour 1998 special prior to Mayumi Tanaka voicing him in the main One Piece anime in 1999. Joy Boy [spoilers below, highlight the white text to read] is a character who not only looks like Luffy, but also ate the same Devil Fruit as him centuries ago.
Image courtesy of Toei Animation
© Eiichiro Oda/Shueisha, Toei Animation
One Piece anime producer Ryūta Koike announced on October 28 that Toei Animation’s One Piece anime is reducing its annual episode output to a maximum of 26 episodes moving forward starting in 2026. Following the conclusion of the Egghead arc last year, the anime is taking a three-month production hiatus from January-March 2026. The anime will return in Japan on April 5 for the first of two cours (quarters of a year) with the start of the new Elbaph arc.
According to Toei Animation, the new schedule will allow episodes to “incorporate more content, tempo, and pacing of the manga while continuing to leverage the unique storytelling that is only possible with animation.” Historically, with only few exceptions, the anime has aired most weeks since its premiere in 1999. However, the pace has slowed considerably over the years.
The Egghead arc in the anime debuted in January 2024. In mid-October 2024, the franchise announced that the anime’s Egghead arc would pause to “recharge,” and then the arc would continue in April 2025. Part 2 of the Egghead arc premiered with its first episode (1,123rd overall episode) on Fuji TV on April 5 and aired alongside a recap episode of Part 1 of the Egghead arc. The second episode (1,124th overall episode) aired on April 6 with its new timeslot at 11:15 p.m. JST (10:15 a.m. EDT).
During the Egghead arc’s break, One Piece Log: Fish-Man Island Saga; a 21-episode abridged version of the Fish-Man Island arc of the anime with reshot scenes, retouched art, and other improvements; aired in its place.
One Piece: Into the Grand Line, the second live-action season based on Eiichiro Oda’s One Piece manga, debuted on Netflix on March 10. The first two episodes played in over 200 theaters in Canada, the United States, and Japan on the same day.
Source: Toei Animation’s X/Twitter account
