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A piece may be one of the most popular anime in the world today, but the journey to the American shores was difficult to say the least. While fans can enjoy a faithful adaptation of Crunchyroll on Netflix (while eagerly awaiting the live-action adaptation), there was an earlier attempt to bring the series to the states over a decade ago courtesy of 4Kids Entertainment. 4Kids is not a beloved name in the anime community as they are more known for their awful anime dubs and a very strange rendition of the Star Spangled Banner being sung by mostly anime characters (one of them being Luffy himself) .
their adaptation of A piece ended up being arguably their worst dub of all time, and if someone asks “how bad can 4Kids dubbing be” all you have to do is show them an episode or two and the company’s reputation will immediately make sense. But the weirdest thing about that really bizarre story is that 4Kids wasn’t technically looking for a license once broken in the first place. In fact, they really didn’t know much about it and were more or less heavily armed to release it. That story is as strange as the 4Kids copy of A piece yourself.
No girls allowed?
4Kids had great success with shows aimed at boys. While pokemon was a series that was popular with both boys and girls, most of the other companies were successful because of the large male audience they enjoyed. Shows like Yu-Gi-Oh!, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Shaman Kingand Sonic X did have some crossover appeal, but the numbers showed that these series were mostly watched by guys and girls who just didn’t tune in to it. This made their struggling kids network Fox Box an inadvertent “boys only” club, and left money on the table by excluding the girls.
CEO Al Kahn decided that since they had some of the top-rated shows for boys, it made sense for the company to expand and acquire some shows for girls. Their first acquisition – Winx Club – was a minor hit for the company, and Kahn knew the next step would be to buy some shoujo anime from Japan. This is where a particular show caught their eye… but there were obligations if they wanted to acquire it.
Magical witches are not cheap
On a 2010 episode of the ANNCast Podcast, Mark Kirk – senior vice president of digital media for 4Kids Entertainment – revealed that despite rumors, 4Kids was not actively seeking A piece as a potential show to license. They knew it was about pirates and it had an audience in Japan, but they weren’t that interested in a pirate show when Disney cornered the market for that genre. Instead, when looking at the Toei Animations series of properties, the executives were drawn to one title in particular: Ojamajo Doremi!
The series revolves around a group of elementary school girls who become witch apprentices. The series was ideal for the 4Kids portfolio of shows. Popular anime aimed at girls? To check! Need colorful with minimal editing? To check! Potential for a lot of merchandise? To check! More than 200 hundred episodes?! Double check! In short, 4Kids wanted Ojamajo Doremi, and they ONLY wanted it! They reached out to Toei’s executives to discuss purchasing the show and making it Ojamajo Doremi a hit in America. Although Toei was eager to sell to them, they only wanted to sell it on one condition.
Make them an offer they can’t refuse
Although 4Kids had a bad reputation among anime fans, they had a good reputation as a company. As the production company behind two of the most successful anime properties of all time, everyone will be turning their heads. Toei saw what 4Kids was capable of pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh! and wanted the same kind of success for A piece. They felt like someone could make it A piece 4Kids was a success in America. So they made 4Kids an offer they couldn’t refuse: they would sell the rights to Ojamajo Doremi to 4Kids…but ONLY if they agreed to acquire A piece also!
While 4Kids didn’t seriously consider releasing A pieceat least they had heard of it, the whole pirate concept was definitely marketable, and they REALLY wanted to Ojamajo Doremi! Finally the feeling that A piece on paper at least sounded like a minor hit, they agreed to the deal and bought tricky shows: one they researched and one they knew next to nothing about.
The result?
When 4Kids got around to finally screening what they had picked up, they were shocked by what they saw. While A piece was funny and had quirky characters, the amount of violence, language and gunfights made the series extremely unsuitable for their target audience. The problem is, they were now contractually obligated to do something with the license, so they edited it in the best possible way. Mark Kirk said of the experience of producing: A piece “messed up” [4Kids] reputation”, revealing that they were producing the number of episodes they were legally required to produce and waiting for their contract to expire so they could drop the show.
It was such a fiasco that 4Kids took better judging measures to ensure they wouldn’t acquire series that mature in nature in the future. As regards Ojamajo Doremi, the series aired as Magical DoReMi and promptly bombed with only a dozen episodes airing before being pulled with another 4Kids localization Mew Mew Power (which was originally) Tokyo Mew Mew). With more and more flops in their hands, 4Kids would eventually get out of the anime business altogether if they lost the license to Yu-Gi-Oh! A piece would be rescued by Funimation who, after years of patience and dedication, finally found an audience on sites like Crunchyroll and Netflix. It’s just interesting to think that everyone has gone through so much pain. All for a show that 4Kids didn’t even want in the first place.
Source: Anime News Network
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