Kaidou - Reception

Reception

Allen Divers of Anime News Network comments that the male character designs of One Piece are "often quite varied and unique", while the female ones become "a bit repetitive". He further notes that, as the characters are "defined by what they seek", there is little room "for actual development". Todd Douglass, Jr. of DVD talk simply states that the series' characters have a lot of charm. His colleague Carl Kimlinger describes the visual style of One Piece as "unconventional" with "grotesquely exaggerated expressions, simple eyes, big mouths and bigger teeth", "supremely ugly supporting characters and skinny, gangly-limbed main cast" and comments that "it's all amazingly distinctive, utterly appropriate, and surprisingly cool—in a goofy kind of way." He also notes that "Funimation's English dub is light-years better than the 4Kids debacle", "unusually accurate, professional, and largely enjoyable, which is far, far more than can be said of the previous dub", but laments that Funimation's version of "Crocodile loses his sepulchral charisma" and that "the original's fine dance on the edge of mawkish sentimentality is disrupted often enough by less-than-stellar acting". He also states that "Colleen Clinkenbeard's Luffy is more a generic spunky kid than a personality in his own right, really coming to life only during the action scenes during which she does a fine job of being darned cool."

Dustin Somner of Blu-ray.com comments that the Japanese and Funimation voice-acting is "fairly good, but not exceptional" and sometimes "overly zany". Todd Douglass Jr. of DVD talk notes "the daunting cast of characters, both good and bad" as "one of the appealing factors" of the anime, but also comments that "Some of the voices were pretty irritating ... with a lot of high-pitches and over exaggerated speech." Brigitte Schönhense of Splashcomics comments that the "brilliant" (German: "genial") flashbacks into the characters' pasts make them so "likeable and lovable" (German: "sympathisch und liebenswert") and that they are the manga's real strength. Mania Entertainment writer Jarred Pine comments that Oda's characters are "whacky" and that his "bizarre" character designs create "wonderful characterizations and personalities". He notes the "well illustrated" facial expressions and says that "it's the whacky characterizations and designs that makes One Piece its own". His colleague Bryce Coulter comments that "One Piece's bizarre character designs will keep your attention as they can be very random and often memorable. Not the prettiest, but it will definitely capture your attention."