‘Bleach’ Shares Brand-New Artwork of Ichigo, Others

Bleach is getting ready to celebrate its upcoming 15th anniversary with the release of a brand-new artbook, Bleach JET, collecting over 700 artworks including new sketches of fan-favorite characters.

Fans recently got a preview of what’s to come in the artbook, and it includes several cute shoutouts to some of Kubo’s villainous women of the Strenritter.

Along with this great sketch of the Sternritter femme fatales enjoying a movie night in a comfortable environment, there are two cool new sketches of Ichigo showing off just how fashionable each of Kubo’s creations were. Bleach was often as well now for its characters’ sense of fashion, and it’s carried over in the artbook as well.

The next sketch leans much heavier on its fan service elements as it features some of Bleach‘s fan-favorite female characters, such as this new version of Orihime, having a nice beach day. Although the series is known for its fashion sense, it does draw just as many fans for its strong character design as well. Fans are able to glean even the smallest details in a sketch, meaning the original design was incredibly strong from the start.

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.

The upcoming Bleach live-action film adapts the first arc of the series, the “Substitute Shinigami” arc. Early reactions to the film have been positive overall, and the film stars Sota Fukushi as Ichigo Kurosaki and Hana Sugisaki as Rukia Kuchiki, MIYAVI as Byakuya Kuchiki, Ryou Yoshizawa, as Uryuu Ishida, Taichi Saotome as Renji Abarai, Erina Mano as Orihime Inoue, Tomo Koyanagi as Chad Yasutora, Yosuke Egochi as Isshin Kurosaki, Masami Nagasawa as Masaki Kurosaki, and Seiichi Tanabe as Keisuke Urahara.