onepiece
Casey Crafford / Netflix Tudum — editorial use, removal on request
Quick answers
- Who plays Arlong in Netflix's One Piece?
- McKinley Belcher III plays Arlong in Netflix's live-action One Piece (Season 1).
- Who is Arlong?
- Arlong (Saw-Tooth): A sawshark fish-man who occupied Nami’s home and built Arlong Park on human fear.
The character
A sawshark fish-man who occupied Nami’s home and built Arlong Park on human fear. The live-action’s East Blue “big bad” — practical creature work, not a CGI afterthought.
Character development
A sawshark fish-man who built Arlong Park on human fear and a child's stolen talent — Nami's maps bought him a kingdom, eight years of her life bought him an empire of extortion. His supremacy creed is the story's first taste of inherited hatred, and his fall at Cocoyasi is the series proving what one navigator's freedom is worth.
Powers & abilities
- Fish-man strength — ten times a human's, overwhelming underwater
- Regrowing saw teeth — bite, break, repeat
- The Shark Saw — a saw-blade weapon the size of a person
The actor
McKinley Belcher III — as Arlong · Season 1.
McKinley Belcher III is an American actor known for Ozark and We Own This City — a résumé of coiled, watchable menace that made him the East Blue arc's most important casting question: could the live-action's first real "big bad" carry the weight of Nami's story?
Known for
- One Piece (Netflix, 2023)
- Ozark
- We Own This City
The casting story
Belcher was announced with the 2021 cast, and the production's answer was to go practical: Arlong is creature work — prosthetics and physical presence, not a CGI afterthought — with Belcher performing inside it. Season 1 moved Arlong Park to its climax so the season had a true final boss, and the occupation of Cocoyasi became the finale's emotional engine.
Why this casting works
McKinley Belcher III (Ozark, We Own This City) carries Arlong’s rage and the occupation of Cocoyasi. The show moved him up so Season 1 had a true final boss.
The fan corner
Arlong Park was the fandom's most anxious adaptation test — Nami's story is sacred — and the verdict landed overwhelmingly positive: Belcher's Arlong is called genuinely hateful in exactly the right way, and the "help me" scene is held up as proof the live-action could deliver the series' heaviest beats.
Community reaction and speculation — shared because it's fun, not because it's fact.