Bleach stars Ichigo Kurosaki, a fifteen-year-old high schooler who can see ghosts. He’s something of a delinquent, but he has a good heart, even if he can be a little hard-headed. He has a run-in with Rukia Kuchiki, a Soul Reaper who exists to slay Hollows – huge, malformed spirits that are born when deceased humans with unfinished business fail to pass on peacefully into the Soul Society.

After Rukia winds up injured trying to protect Ichigo’s family from a Hollow, he borrows her power to become a substitute Soul Reaper, unleashing his own hidden potential to defend his family. This action robs Rukia of her powers and incurs the wrath of the Soul Society, who condemn Rukia for her actions and sentence her to death.

Thus begins the first arc of Bleach, as young Ichigo grapples with his newfound powers, his responsibility to destroy Hollows, and ultimately leads to his invasion of the Soul Society to save Rukia from her unjust execution.

Bleach really laid the groundwork for many of the other great shounen works to follow. Kubo’s series was much-respected by both his contemporaries and those who followed in his footsteps. In 2021, a number of famous mangaka came together to honor Bleach with an art exhibition hosted by Shueisha, and many authors cite Kubo and Bleach as inspirations for their own works.

Jututsu Kaisen, one of the current best-selling anime and manga, is penned by Akutami Gege, and in a bonus comic from 2018, she credited Kubo as being one of her main inspirations. Bleach’s incredible character designs and secret societies - like the Gotei 13 branch of the Soul Society - were also listed as inspirations for Gotouge Koyoharu, the author of Kimetsu no Yaiba (Demon Slayer).

With Bleach being the inspiration for many popular series, any shounen fan should definitely check out the original material responsible for these incredible new works!

So, now that you understand the history and context behind Bleach, why should you dedicate the impressive amount of time required to read through Kubo’s masterpiece? Let’s break it down the one way that Honey’s Anime knows best – with the Top 3 Reasons You Should Read Bleach!

Bleach always had a particular energy to it, a confident swagger that brought to life gorgeously illustrated characters that practically leaped off the page. Every chapter illustration, without fail, slams home with a grunge-inspired, urban edge that serves to ground the series even in its most fantastical moments.

While modern manga are drawn with digital tools and special effects, Bleach started all the way back in 2001, when drawing tablets were practically unheard of in the manga industry. Despite that original pen-and-paper approach, Bleach’s artwork hasn’t aged a day in the past twenty-one years.

Battles are fast-paced, but never chaotic; they’re action-packed, but never outstay their welcome. In various interviews, Kubo revealed that he constructed his action sequences with the aid of rock music, and the fights in Bleach certainly have a musical quality to them. We’d definitely love to know what songs inspired Kubo for some of our favorite fights!

Bleach also changes up character designs quite often, with Ichigo evolving his sword multiple times throughout the series. His classmates and friends each become fighters in their own ways, participating alongside Ichigo even when death is a very real possibility. They, too, undergo multiple evolutions, gaining new clothes and weapons that lend a sense of progression to the arcs.

The world of Bleach is populated by societies from many walks of life, and Kubo paid specific attention to naming characters and abilities based on real-world influences. For instance, the Soul Society was conceived from the idea of a shinigami – a ‘death god’ – wearing a kimono. Thus, the inhabitants of the Soul Society are all Japanese and their nomenclature was reportedly inspired by ancient Japanese literature – giving us their powerful bankai attacks, and the zanpakuto blades.

In the Hueco Mundo – “Hollow World” – arc, the characters and their world are named and inspired by Spanish words, giving us the powerful Espada unit of Arrancar fighters. Equally so, the Quincy fighters and the Wandenreich empire have strong roots in the German language. And although it might not be everyone’s favorite arc, the Fullbring group were given names based on English rock music.

Kubo Tite’s Bleach spin-off, Burn the Witch, continues this theme. It takes place in ‘Reverse London,’ the British branch of the Japanese Soul Society, where the main characters fight Dragons instead of Hollows – paying attention to England’s historic usage of dragon livery throughout the ages.

In this regard, Bleach feels more robust than some other shounen series, which tend to circle around just one or two cities and a specific subset of enemies or supernatural threats. Bleach’s multicultural aspects give it a broad appeal to many different types of readers, too, and if nothing else, this linguistic focus adds a very memorable layer to an already excellently developed world.

Yes, we did start this article by reminding you that the new anime is coming out at the end of the year – but you’re in the manga part of Honey’s Anime, so of course, we’re going to recommend the manga first and foremost!!

The anime has… not aged gracefully, shall we say? The early episodes are produced in 4:3 ratio, and the anime frequently added long, irrelevant filler arcs. Meanwhile, the manga still looks great despite its age, and although the major arcs frequently span at least one hundred chapters or more, they are action-packed and fly right off the pages.

Although we’re very excited to see Bleach return to our screens, the character design that works so well in the manga doesn’t translate perfectly to animated format. With such a heavy focus on the concepts of “black” and “white” – an artistic obsession that covers everything from the series’ name, all the way down to the Shinto religious connotations of the human soul – the two-toned pages of the manga bring out the best in Kubo’s vision.

There’s another reason to read the manga…it’s finished! If you start reading now, you could likely finish the entire 74-volume series and know exactly what’s coming in the Thousand-Year Blood War before the first of the new episodes drop!

If you’re familiar with Bleach, you might have also heard that the ending was a little rushed. We’re not going to pretend that the final few chapters of Bleach are amazing – but since the series ended in 2016, tempers have cooled, and opinions have generally improved regarding Bleach’s final pages.

That said, Kubo wasn’t allowed to end his series as he desired. Disputes between himself and his publisher arose throughout the last few years of Bleach’s publication, and the editors of Weekly Shounen Jump called for Bleach’s end due to falling popularity. This led to a compromised ending that didn’t quite satisfy fans back in the day.

Since then, however, Kubo has been open to continuing Bleach – with numerous light novels either written by himself or co-authored with other writers. The most recent light novel trilogy, released throughout 2020, is entitled Bleach: Can’t Fear Your Own World and takes place after the Thousand-Year Blood War arc, adding some additional context that was sorely missing from the manga’s ending.

Despite the rushed ending, we would still highly recommend reading the manga. There are nearly seven-hundred chapters of action-packed battles, shocking betrayals, political machinations, and a persistent theme of humanity and the nature of the soul itself.

That’s pretty heavy stuff for a substitute soul reaper to deal with!