Question: What characters were hard to make their designs?
Oda: Hancock and Shirahoshi. It really bothers me to make designs of beautiful women since the amount of female faces I like are limited considering the long serialization of ONE PIECE. I can make designs of male characters as many as I want. I can draw various female characters’ faces such as Amazon Lily women, but things are different when it comes to “beautiful woman”.
I hyped up my audience that Hancock is incredibly beautiful although I didn’t specify her detailed designs before she appeared. It means I had to convince my audience of Hancock’s beauty once she actually appeared in manga. I managed to find a solution about what kind of face the most beautiful woman in the world would have. I was relieved to see Hancock became a popular character.
However, I hyped up my audience again thoughtlessly that Mermaid Princess is as beautiful as Hancock!! One more female character as beautiful as Hancock..!? Actually, I’m kind of a person who can expect my potential in the future. Then, I produced a beautiful character named Shirahoshi. She was the first woman during my more-than-10-years-serialization whose eyebrow was downward-sloping!! (the eyebrows which make her look like as if in trouble) I hadn’t drawn a woman like Shirahoshi since I love strong-willed women, but I enjoyed the drawing process of Shirahoshi, thinking, “She looks nice than expected.”
