It’s been a decade-long wait for Bleach to make another jump from the pages of a manga and into an anime adaptation, but the time is finally upon us for Bleach: Thousand-Year Blood War to hit the small screen, and to the delight of a few eagle-eyed fans, it came earlier than expected.
In a somewhat uncharacteristic fumble for Disney, the first episode of the anime series appeared on Disney Plus nearly a full day before it was supposed to, with fans in Brazil and New Zealand jumping at the opportunity to get stuck back into the beloved universe, before Disney inevitably caught on and swiftly took the episode down.
However the damage was already done, with many fans successfully downloading the episode for offline viewing before Disney was able to pull the plug.
Despite its imminent release, fans were left in the dark for quite some time in terms of where exactly Bleach: Thousand-Year Blood War would be streaming, with most presuming it would end up among its Studio Pierrot-produced peers some place like Crunchyroll, but it was only a week ago that Hulu and Disney Plus was confirmed as the new home for the franchise.
The original Bleach lived on Crunchyroll for a time, however it has since been removed. It followed soul reaper Ichigo Kurosaki’s adventures as a Soul Reaper, and the Thousand Year Blood War series will continue and presumably conclude his story over 52 episodes.
For those of you that missed out on the inadvertent Disney Plus sneak peek, fear not, because Bleach: Thousand-Year Blood War will premiere today, Oct. 10 2022.
