Bleach (TV series)

• 1. Introduction

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  Bleach, the Japanese anime television series, ran for 366 episodes on TV Tokyo between 2004 and 2012. It adapts the manga Bleach by Tite Kubo. Studio Pierrot produced it, and Noriyuki Abe directed. The title is written in capital letters, and the story behind it is about death. A teenager gets the powers of a death personification, a figure much like the Grim Reaper. Then he is asked to protect the living and guide the dead. This documentary asks how an ordinary high school student ends up with that job. It asks what the anime invented that the manga never contained. It asks who gave the characters their voices in Japanese and in English. And it asks how a series that ended in 2012 came back for a sequel.

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• 2. Substitute Soul Reaper

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  In Karakura Town, a high school student named Ichigo Kurosaki crosses paths with a Soul Reaper named Rukia Kuchiki. A Hollow, an evil spirit, attacks Ichigo's twin younger sisters. Rukia puts her own life at risk to protect him, and Ichigo ends up with her powers. He is reluctant at first. Still, he takes her place. From then on he defends humans from Hollows and guides departed souls to the afterlife.

  His school turns out to hold other people with gifts. Uryū Ishida, a survivor of the Quincy, fights with spiritual particles. Orihime Inoue commands a group of protective spirits called Shun Shun Rikka. Yasutora Sado, nicknamed Chad, carries strength equal to the Hollows' in his arm.

  Rukia's actions in the human world soon bring a death sentence, and she is taken to the Soul Society. There Ichigo meets Kisuke Urahara and Yoruichi Shihōin, two exiled Soul Reapers. They allow him and his friends to attempt a rescue.

  The rescue exposes a far bigger plot. Sousuke Aizen, a former squad captain, had framed Rukia. He had also been experimenting illegally on Soul Reapers and Hollows. His tool is the Hōgyoku, a legendary substance that turns Hollows into half Soul Reapers. Aizen fakes his death and slips away to Hueco Mundo, the realm of the Hollows. Then he kidnaps Orihime, because she is needed to create the Oken. That power would let him kill the Soul King, the ruler of the Soul Society.

  Ichigo trains with the Vizards, who are Hollowfied Soul Reapers, and then travels to Hueco Mundo. There he meets the Arrancar, Hollows who have been given Soul Reaper abilities. Their elite are the Espada, ten Arrancar of exemplary strength who each lead weaker factions. With Aizen, Gin Ichimaru and Kaname Tōsen, the Espada match the strength of Soul Reaper captains.

  After Ichigo frees Orihime, Aizen explains that the kidnapping was only a distraction. Karakura Town's spiritual energy is what the Oken truly needs. Ichigo is trained by his father Isshin, another exiled Soul Reaper. When the Hōgyoku rejects its master, Ichigo sacrifices his Soul Reaper power to seal Aizen away. The Soul Reapers defeat the Espada.

  Months later, Chad and others reveal themselves as Fullbringers in a group called Xcution. They say they can give up their powers to restore someone else's. They offer this to Ichigo, who now uses the power of a Fullbringer. It is a ruse by their leader Kugo Ginjo, a Fullbringer and former Substitute Soul Reaper. He wants to extract Ichigo's power and empower his whole group. Once Ichigo gains the Soul Society's trust, his Soul Reaper powers return. He helps defeat Ginjo's team and resumes his duty as an official Substitute Soul Reaper.

  Yet the manga's arcs were not the whole show, because the anime also built storylines of its own.

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• 3. Arcs Beyond The Manga

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  Jin Kariya leads the Bount, a group of spiritual humans who prolong their lives by stealing souls. Kariya wants revenge and sets out to destroy the Soul Society. Ichigo and his allies defeat the Bount. This is the first of several arcs found only in the anime.

  The second arc centers on Shūsuke Amagai, a Soul Reaper captain who replaces Ichimaru. Amagai wants revenge on Captain Yamamoto for the death of his father. He turns to his clan's forbidden experiment. Then he realizes his mistake and kills himself.

  A sword spirit named Muramasa drives the third arc. Muramasa is a Zanpakutō spirit, and it is furious that the Soul Society imprisoned its master, Kōga Kuchiki. It turns itself and other Zanpakutō into spiritual beings to take revenge. After it succeeds, it is double-crossed and becomes a monstrous creature, which Ichigo defeats. Muramasa then reveals its true aim. It wanted Soul Reapers and Zanpakutō to speak with each other on equal terms.

  The fourth and final arc belongs to Kagerōza Inaba. He creates modified copies of every Soul Reaper in bodies called Reigai. He then tries to fuse with a girl named Nozomi Kujō to become a new being, Ōko Yushima. Nozomi sacrifices herself to defeat Inaba, and Ichigo loses his power.

  The flow of ideas did not run only one way. In a 2009 interview, Kubo and the character designer Masashi Kudō discussed the anime's original story Zanpakutō: The Alternate Tale. Kubo said he wanted to borrow events and concepts from it for the manga. He added that his drawing style kept shifting during the work and only settled after the anime aired. As one example, he no longer draws hair growing from behind the ears of characters.

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• 4. Two Casts

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  Masakazu Morita, who voices Ichigo in Japanese, tried to recreate the mood he felt while reading the manga and imagining its dialogue. In an interview with Elicia O'Reilly of the Japan Foundation, he described a trick. To get into a character, he would say one line that captures that character.

  The English version was made by Studiopolis, a company based in Studio City, Los Angeles. Its cast was drawn from experienced actors with dozens of roles in other anime, films and video games. Johnny Yong Bosch, Ichigo's English voice, first found the character names hard to pronounce. He tried to copy a deep, gruff voice for Ichigo. Around episode 10, he says, the directors loosened their control as he grew into the role. The long scenes of screaming and panting, especially one in episode 18, nearly made him pass out.

  Stephanie Sheh noticed that her Orihime sounded higher-pitched and "innocent-sounding" in English. The dub producers wanted Orihime to sound tough and comedic without being "ditzy". Sheh says she relates to the character's unusual food creations.

  Derek Stephen Prince likes playing Uryū because he is the black sheep of the cast and a complex character. Prince is also the English voice of Shino Aburame in Naruto. To set the two apart, he gave Uryū a Clint Eastwood tone.

  Some parts changed hands along the way. Marc Worden voiced Chad in English until episode 85, and then Jamieson Price took over. Michael Lindsay voiced Urahara until episode 214, and Doug Erholtz took over from there.

  The work had its own hurdles. Actors had to speak Japanese phrases while keeping the right pronunciation and inflection. The story's double life was hard to keep up with, as the cast had to perform characters living very different lifestyles. The voice actors often suggested scene changes that differed from the approved script, and those led to rewrites and extra takes that went into the finished dub.

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• 5. Screen And Score

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  For the first 167 episodes, the series was produced and broadcast in the squarer 4:3 screen shape. Episodes 168 through 366 were produced and broadcast in 16:9 widescreen.

  Credits for the writing were shared. Abe is listed as head writer for episodes 1-212. Tsuyoshi Kida is listed for episodes 230-265, and Kento Shimoyama for episodes 17-366, so the ranges overlap. Masashi Kudō created the character designs, and sometimes provided key animation or served as animation supervisor himself.

  Shirō Sagisu composed the music. His scores for the television series came out in four-CD sets, and four more CDs covered the music for the four animated films. Sony Music Entertainment Japan released the soundtrack volumes along with an anniversary box set. Bleach Original Soundtrack 1 held twenty-five songs and came out on the 18th of May 2005. Original Soundtrack 4, with thirty songs, arrived on the 16th of December 2009 as the final volume. The box set, released on the 29th of July 2009, included a CD of 21 previously unreleased songs.

  Sony also issued albums where the original Japanese voice actors stepped out of their roles. The Bleach Beat Collection began on the 22nd of June 2005. It offered a look at the personalities of the characters and of the actors who play them. Twenty-one more volumes followed across four named sets called Sessions. The Bleach Breathless Collection added six releases, each with five tracks for one Soul Reaper. They featured Ichigo, Rukia, Renji, Toshiro, Shuhei and Byakuya.

  Radio shows got their own discs too. Three Radio DJCD Bleach 'B' Station season sets, each holding six volumes, were released in Japan.

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• 6. Around The World

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  On the 15th of March 2006, Viz Media obtained the foreign television, home video and merchandising rights to the Bleach anime from TV Tokyo Corporation and Shueisha. Viz later licensed the individual merchandising rights to several companies. In Japan, Aniplex had already begun issuing the series on DVD, with 88 compilations released between the 2nd of February 2005 and the 23rd of January 2013.

  North American television came quickly. On the 9th of September 2006, the series premiered on Canada's YTV channel in the Bionix programming block. The next day, Cartoon Network's Adult Swim began airing it in the United States.

  The broadcast then stalled several times. On the 13th of October 2007, Adult Swim stopped after the first 52 episodes. Death Note, another Viz Media series, took the slot so that Studiopolis would have more time to dub additional episodes. Bleach resumed on the 2nd of March 2008. It paused again on the 21st of November 2009 after episode 167. It came back with new episodes on the 28th of August 2010, replacing Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood.

  The anime joined the relaunched Toonami block when Toonami returned to Adult Swim on the 27th of May 2012. The series ended on the 2nd of November 2014, and reruns continued until the 1st of February 2015.

  On home video, Viz released the first 135 English episodes on 32 DVD compilations between the 28th of November 2006 and the 21st of September 2010. The entire series later appeared on 26 box sets from October 2008 to September 2015. In July 2016, Viz announced uncut Blu-ray box sets. Thirteen sets collected all 366 episodes between the 19th of July 2016 and the 7th of December 2021.

  Elsewhere, AnimeCentral in the United Kingdom premiered the series on the 13th of September 2007, with weekly episodes. Animax Asia showed the English dub from the 18th of December 2009, beginning with the first 52 episodes. Its "season 2" arrived on the 18th of March 2011 with Japanese audio and English subtitles. Anime Limited began releasing the series on Blu-ray in the United Kingdom on the 4th of November 2024.

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• 7. Ratings And Reviews

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  A 2005 Internet poll by TV Asahi ranked Bleach as Japan's 27th favorite anime program. The following year it ranked seventh. The series appeared several times in the top ten of the Japanese TV Ranking, and its DVDs often charted in the Japanese DVD Ranking. In February 2009, it was the ninth most viewed animated show on Hulu.

  Critics were warm. Carlo Santos of Anime News Network called it "...one incredibly entertaining anime that will grab you and refuse to let go." Maria Lin of Animefringe liked the varied, distinct characters and the attention to detail. She also praised the balance of seriousness and comedy. In her words, "It has something for everyone: the supernatural, comedy, action and a little bit of romance."

  Adam Arseneau of DVD Verdict called Bleach a "show that only gets better with age." Holly Ellingwood of Active Anime said the series captured "the excitement, the caustic humour and supernatural intrigue" of the manga. Don Houston of DVD Talk felt the characters rose above anime typicals. His fellow reviewer John Sinnott first saw a "monster-of-the-week program" that grew more epic as the characters were fleshed out.

  Louis Kemner of CBR praised "one of the most interesting and flexible combat systems" in anime. Von Feigenblatt offered a caution. In his view, Bleach appeals to a narrower international audience than Naruto, because its plot is more complex and has religious aspects.

  Awards were harder to win. At the 2007 America Anime Awards, Bleach received nominations for best manga, best actor, best DVD package design and best theme, but won none. In 2024, at the 8th Crunchyroll Anime Awards, Thousand-Year Blood War - The Separation was nominated for Best Action. Johnny Yong Bosch was nominated for Best Voice Artist Performance (English) for Ichigo. At the ninth edition in 2025, The Conflict was nominated for Best Continuing Series, Best Action and Best Score for Shirō Sagisu.

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• 8. Spinoffs And Revival

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  Four animated films were all directed by Abe, and each told an original story with original characters designed by Kubo. That is unusual, since the author of a source work usually has little creative involvement in anime films. Bleach: Memories of Nobody opened in Japan on the 16th of December 2006 and had a limited North American release in June 2008. Bleach: The DiamondDust Rebellion followed on the 22nd of December 2007. Bleach: Fade to Black arrived on the 13th of December 2008, and Bleach: Hell Verse on the 4th of December 2010.

  The stage had its turn too. Studio Pierrot and Nelke Planning jointly produced rock musicals, five in all, covering parts of the Substitute and Soul Society arcs. Three more performances called Live Bankai Shows did not follow the plot. The first run was held from the 17th to the 28th of August 2005 at the Space Zero Tokyo center in Shinjuku. Takuya Hiramitsu directed, Naoshi Okumura adapted the script, and playwright Shoichi Tama wrote completely original songs. Tatsuya Isaka played Ichigo, Miki Satō played Rukia and Eiji Moriyama played Renji. Aniplex also released thirteen drama CDs with the original voice actors, available only as part of DVD releases.

  Hollywood showed interest as well. In March 2010, Warner Bros. confirmed talks about a live action film, with Peter Segal and Michael Ewing lined up to produce. In 2012, Dan Mazeau was added as screenwriter and Masi Oka joined as producer. A different live action Bleach film, produced by Warner Bros., directed by Shinsuke Sato and starring Sota Fukushi, was released in Japan on the 20th of July 2018.

  The television story returned in March 2020. The Weekly Shōnen Jump magazine and a livestream called the Bleach 20th Anniversary Project and Tite Kubo New Project Presentation announced an anime of the manga's last arc, Thousand-Year Blood War. In November 2021 it was confirmed as a television series, and a trailer appeared at Jump Festa '22 on the 18th of December 2021. Tomohisa Taguchi replaced Abe as director. He oversees scripts with Masaki Hiramatsu, while Kudō and Sagisu both returned.

  The series was planned for four cours, a cour being a broadcast block of roughly a season. It premiered on the 11th of October 2022. The first cour, The Blood Warfare, ran 13 episodes. The Separation, also 13 episodes, aired from the 8th of July to the 30th of September 2023. The Conflict ran 14 episodes from the 5th of October to the 28th of December 2024, produced by Pierrot's second studio, Pierrot Films. On the 5th of October 2024, Aniplex released a 20th anniversary video of climactic scenes redrawn in the new style.

  Viz Media held the North American premiere at New York Comic Con on the 8th of October 2022. The series streams on Hulu in the United States and on Disney+ in most other regions. In Asian territories, Medialink kept the rights and uses the Ani-One Asia YouTube channel. Toonami began airing it in the United States on the 18th of May 2025.

  The fourth and final cour, The Calamity, was set to premiere in July 2026. Its first three episodes were scheduled for United States theaters from the 25th to the 29th of June 2026, in Japanese with English subtitles and in the English dub. Each screening was to include a behind-the-scenes conversation with Kubo, Taguchi and series director Hikaru Murata.

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