One Piece Film Red

I'm far removed from where the manga and TV series are in story (been about 20 years nearly since I was current...) so I didn't know a lot of the characters, but I've watched the last few movies at the cinema since they're usually self-contained enough and this was no exception. Music was great, animation quality is very high (with the exception of some wonky CG golems later on) and Luffy is still as lovable as ever. Worth a watch for sure!

Kinda good but also kinda not. While Film Red certainly tries to do a lot of interesting things, I feel that the only one of them that it does really well is the music, which was sort of a given considering Ado's known talent. Uta was a good villain as far as these sorts of movies go, her motivation was good and it was interesting to see how someone completely disconnected from the world of One Piece would try to rectify what they see as problems. What I really didn't like in the movie was its over-reliance on cameos and guest characters, which seriously interferes with the flow of the film. While some inclusions make sense (Koby, Helmeppo, Bartolomeo to a lesser extent), some feel really forced. Like did we really need Blueno, Kalifa, Kizaru, Fujitora, Katakuri, Oven, AND Brulee to take up so much of the movie when the Straw Hats barely get anything to do? I would have much rather some of these characters been cut or given more interesting roles in the story.

Despite being the film's namesake and a major part of the marketing push, Shanks really only shows up for about one-third of the movie, and even then he's not very consequential until the final battle. For the sake of fairness, I do have to mention that seeing his crew in action after such a long wait was really cool, but went by a little too quickly to leave much of an impact. In fact, just about everything about the Red Hair Pirates in this movie just feels like sort of a cheap way to garner more interest in a story that would otherwise be less interesting to the One Piece fandom at large. Also, Tot Musica is an insane bullcrap addition to the film, rivaled only by those ridiculous volcano things from Film Z.

Although I was very critical of the way that this film handled certain elements, I do still believe it's a pretty solid addition to the One Piece films, even if it doesn't quite reach the heights of some of the more recent outings. The film has a lot of crowd-pleasing moments and some truly spectacular music and animation, even if it is muddled by the subpar story and the abundance of forced fan service. Also, my ranking of the most recent five One Piece films:

1. One Piece Film Z
2. One Piece Film Gold
3. One Piece Strong World
4. One Piece Film Red
5. One Piece Stampede

“Your Soul Is More Important Than Your Body, Isn’t It? In The New Age, Every Soul Will Live Forever.”

Having Shanks show up in One Piece is always epic. He's so mysterious and we don't know a lot about him but I know I'm always hyped when he shows up and to have a movie where he's in, even if it is for a short amount of time is still hype. And for them to show us more about the crew and a tiny bit of Shanks's past is still epic.

Again, the animation is solid like with most Shounen Anime movies and I always smile while watching the Straw Hat Crew. Throw in Koby, Fujitora, Katakuri, Blueno, Bepo, Bartolomeo, Trafalgar Law, Kizaru and Sakazuki, and you have some great characters showing up alongside the Straw Hats and the Red-Haired Pirates!

If you have seen One Piece of read the manga you will enjoy this one! If you aren't familiar with the source material I wouldn't recommend Film Red.

Good animation, beautiful music (was listening Ado already and got quite hyped by the songs).
Yeaah...the movie is a bit shallow in depth and has a very high pacing compared to the tv show.
Was my first anime movie I watched in the cinema. The whole soundstage was impressive.
I would at least recommend if you like Ado's voice/music and One Piece in general. It's not really for everyone.

MY FIRST CINEMA MOVIE
unfortunately ain't that great, most of it was just music, the fight scenes weren't enough at all xc plot was a bit shallow n silly .. it was more cartoonish than anime
however, the animation was amazing

TLDR: listen to the album and skip the movie.

Full review:
Great music (Ado is a talented singer), and animation for One Piece is, as always, good. This one is particularly colorful.

Unfortunately, it was crippled by a plot that could've been a 14 year old girl's self-insert fanfiction: Shanks' daughter, Luffy's childhood friend, wanted by the World Government for insanely powerful abilities, and events designed to cause maximum angst for the Red-Hair Pirates and Luffy.

I mean, really. Who wrote this and called it good?? The plot would've had significantly more impact if she'd been a stranger.

Absolutely love Luffy and Co. in this movie, insane visuals and music as well.

It almost makes up for Uta’s bullshit, I can’t stand that girl, not only does she come off as some sort of self insert with Overpowered talent and power, she also radicalised the idea of freedom. And worked to kill likely millions if not billions of people living in the one piece world with access to a transponder snail, absolutely insane, nothing the movie did could make me like her as a character or person. To some extent I could rationalise where her belief stemmed from but other than it, it is obvious that she truly does not see any wrong in potentially murder suicide millions. She see’s it in some twisted sense of “freedom”, girly has a major saviour complex, hell maybe even superiority. Only “she” can “save” them.

The movie does not make much of an effort to explain or expand upon her ideas in any meaningful way or even explicitly explain that her ideas are inherently wrong. I wish they made more of an effort in this department, in which case it could be possible to sympathise with her situation more (aka seemingly being abandoned by her “family” of pirates) mind you they don’t do much about the red haired pirates either. Ultimately they end up being completely useless to the progression of the plot and only used to effortlessly make the viewer feel sad about her “death”.

If the movie worked more in these departments with Uta as a character it likely would’ve been better, however that wasn’t the case. I still urge all to watch the movie despite these shortcomings and (Mind you) my opinions. Like I had mentioned the movie excels on its visuals and especially the music, Ado is a very very talented singer who deserves so much fame.

Often confusing, many things happened without a sound explanation, and the pirate theme could not be felt much. It did not really work as a gateway for the anime series.

First, I'd clarify the reason why I watched this movie is because I'm watching all the movies from the 1,000 "Box Office Mojo's All Time Worldwide Box Office". I usually don't watch movies without watching the prequels, but in the case, the prequel for this would be around 1,000 episodes of the One Piece anime and 14 other movies...so I wasn't going to do that.

So, is this movie understandable for the people who haven't watched the prequels? Basically, yes, but also, I'm sure that whatever made fans enjoy this, is precisely that, having the context for the actions happening in this movie. I can imagine having that many characters might have been epic for them, but for the rest of us, it just helps create a mess of a movie that spends too long going nowhere.

Overall, this is not a movie I'd recommend for anyone unless you are familiar with One Piece, even I'll dare to compare it with the "Demon Slayer Movie: Mugen Train" because that movie is also part of that list I mentioned, but it does a much better job at telling a story, both, understandable for the general audience that haven't watched the anime (because I haven't watched anything else from Demon Slayer previously either) and in making a movie that actually feels like a movie and not like a long episode. I don't know the general pacing of a One Piece episode, but nothing about this felt epic enough to be a movie. Should have been an episode, a season finale if you shall, but not a movie.

That didn't feel like the tv show.