‘Bleach’ Illustrator Shares Eye-Popping Orihime Artwork

Tite Kubo’s Bleach was one of the most popular manga and anime series back during its run, and its longevity ever since it ended has been buoyed by many of the series’ strong character designs.

This most definitely includes a fan favorite design overhaul for Orihime, who character designer for the anime Masashi Kudo recently paid an eye-popping tribute to.

As one might guess by the way the image is cropped, Kudo shared quite an exaggerated close-up of Orihime’s final outfit during the series’ final arc. Though the Thousand Year Blood-War never made it into the anime series (and fans have taken it upon themselves to do so), this outfit is one of the many reasons fans wanted to see the series animated one day.

It’s a funny moment when Ichigo first sees Orihime in this new outfit as well, as he suggests she’s being quite bold for obvious reasons, but this was just another reason fans love Orihime so much to this day. Any new art featuring the character is much appreciated online.

Kudo has previously shared love for the Bleach series with a sweet new sketch of Rukia, another alluring sketch of Orihime for her birthday, an equally spicy sketch of Rangiku, new sketches of Ichigo, Rukia, and Kenpachi, as well as an equally as striking new sketch of Grimmjow, and even sketches bridging the gap between Kubo’s older series and brand new one-shot Burn the Witch. It’s not just Bleach either, Kudo is sharing his love for either as he’s showed love for DC Comics villains Cyborg Superman and The Joker and reached across the comic world with a cool tribute to Venom.

Bleach was first created by Tite Kubo for Shueisha’s Weekly Shonen Jump, running from 2001 to 2016. The series follows the young delinquent Ichigo Kurosaki, who has the ability to see spirits. He soon obtains the power of a Soul Reaper – one meant to usher lost souls to the afterlife – and now has the duty to defend the living world from monstrous dark spirits known as Hollows.

It has been adapted into English thanks to VIZ Media, and has sold over 900 million copies in Japan. The series was later adapted into an anime by Studio Pierrot from 2004 to 2012, and has four feature-length animations, rock musicals, video games, and a ton of other merchandise. You can currently find the series now streaming on Hulu. There’s also a live-action adaptation on Netflix. You can find ComicBook.com’s review of the film here.