| Edens Zero | |
 First volume ofEdens Zero, released byKodansha on September 14, 2018, in Japan | |
| Genre | |
|---|---|
| Manga | |
| Written by | Hiro Mashima |
| Published by | Kodansha |
| English publisher | |
| Imprint | Shōnen Magazine Comics |
| Magazine | Weekly Shōnen Magazine |
| Demographic | Shōnen |
| Original run | June 27, 2018 –June 26, 2024 |
| Volumes | 33(List of volumes) |
| Anime television series | |
| Directed by |
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| Written by | Mitsutaka Hirota |
| Music by | Yoshihisa Hirano |
| Studio | J.C.Staff |
| Licensed by |
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| Original network | NNS (Nippon TV) |
| Original run | April 11, 2021 – October 1, 2023 |
| Episodes | 50(List of episodes) |
| Video games | |
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 Anime and manga portal | |
Edens Zero (stylized inall caps) is a Japanesescience fantasymanga series written and illustrated byHiro Mashima. It was serialized inKodansha'sWeekly Shōnen Magazine from June 2018 to June 2024, with its chapters collected into thirty-threetankōbon volumes. Set in a fictional spacefaring universe, the story followsShiki Granbell, a boy withgravity powers who embarks on a voyage aboard the titularstarship in search of a cosmic entity namedMother.
The manga was published digitally in six other languages as they were released in Japan, withKodansha USA licensing the series for English publication in North America onCrunchyroll Manga,Comixology,Amazon Kindle, and K Manga. Ananime television series adaptation produced byJ.C.Staff aired from April to October 2021. A second season aired from April to October 2023. A video game adaptation byKonami has also been announced for release in 2025.[3]
Shiki Granbell, a human boy, lives among robots on the deserted theme park planet Granbell in the Sakura Cosmos. His adoptive grandfather, the benevolent "Demon King" robotZiggy, teaches him to controlgravity with a superhuman power called Ether Gear. Ten years after Ziggy's death, the park is visited by spacefaringcontent creatorsRebecca Bluegarden andHappy, whom Shiki befriends when the dying robots force the three off Granbell before expending their vital Ether energy.
Seeking new friends and adventure, the three set out in search ofMother, the fabled goddess of the cosmos. Early in Shiki's voyage, thespace pirateElsie Crimson gifts him with Ziggy's interstellar warship,Edens Zero. Shiki assembles a crew from Ziggy's android companions, theFour Shining Stars, as well as others he befriends:Weisz Steiner, a criminal from analternate history created by a time-eatingChronophage;E.M. Pino, Ziggy's memory-impairedEMP android; andHomura Kôgetsu, a young swordswoman and pupil of the deceased Shining StarValkyrie Yuna. Meanwhile, Rebecca develops her own Ether Gear ability to reverse time and travel betweenparallel universes to save Shiki after he is killed by the crime lordDrakken Joe.
Before leaving the Sakura Cosmos, theEdens Zero crew encounters a revived, malevolent Ziggy, who wishes for machines to rule the universe by ensuring Mother's death in the near future, which would trigger anextinction event for all human life. CaptainingEdens One, an upgraded version ofEdens Zero, Ziggy draws Shiki's crew into a war with the neighboring Aoi Cosmos'sempire, where he detonates the empire's arsenal of 20,000antimatter bombs to kill them. Shiki leads his crew to escape, although the Shining StarWitch Regret sacrifices herself to protectEdens Zero.
Following a three-year conflict, Shiki discovers Ziggy's identity as his own alternate self who tried stopping the bombs, an act resulting in his and Rebecca's Ether Gear creating aspacetime distortion that sent them 20,000 years into the future. Ziggy reveals thatEdens Zero was built for him to prevent Mother's multiversal deaths by using Etherion—the ship's secrettime travel function made from the future Rebecca's Ether—to reach Universe Zero, the convergence point of all universes. Pino realizes Ziggy is being controlled when he discreetly repairs her memory, allowing her to access an empowered Overdrive state and free him with her EMP. At Ziggy's urging, Shiki destroys him to thwart his controller, theartificially intelligentEdens One.
With Mother's death imminent, the crew activates Etherion, which imparts their memories and abilities onto their past selves in Universe Zero. Upon recalling their future, they find Universe Zero to be an idyllic world where Witch, Valkyrie, Ziggy, and many other deceased figures are alive, and various misfortunes such as the Granbell robots' Ether shortage have never occurred.Edens Zero traces Mother to anuncharted region of space, where Ziggy joins them in battle againstEdens One.
When Shiki reaches Mother, she reveals herself as the Overdrive form of planetEarth, Shiki's homeworld, which was transformed to prevent the planet's ruin 20,000 years ago. Learning that simply restoring Mother's power would undo the survival of those who died in previous universes, including himself, Shiki instead lures the Chronophage to revert Mother to her planetary state, inspired by an identical event that allowed Ziggy to discover the infant Shiki on Earth. AfterEdens Zero and Ziggy destroyEdens One, Shiki successfully restores Earth and vanquishes the Chronophage by appeasing the monster's true form, the amnesiac future Rebecca. The crew disbands after helping revitalize Earth with their technology, later gathering on Granbell for the birth of Shiki and Rebecca's daughter.
Following the conclusion of his seriesFairy Tail on July 26, 2017,Hiro Mashima posted aTweet on December 31, 2017, promising to start a new series sometime in 2018.[4] After his visit to theAngoulême International Comics Festival in France, Mashima revealed that the new series would be "a new form offantasy", and that the characterPlue from his earlier seriesRave Master would appear in the manga.[5] On May 14, 2018, Mashima commented on Twitter that he was becoming "a little confused" due to working simultaneously on this series, aFairy Tail continuation, and another "secret" project. He also stated that he was coming up with new ideas for the series "one after another".[6] On May 30, 2018,Weekly Shōnen Magazine revealed that the series was tentatively titledEden's Zero.[7] Although the title is the name of the main characters' spaceship, Mashima revealed that he thought of a deeper meaning for it, but that its usage would depend on future developments of the story.[8]
When developing the idea for his next series, Mashima originally anticipated using anothersword and sorcery setting similar to his previous manga, but decided on creating a "spacefantasy" adventure due to a lack of such contemporaryshōnen manga; he coined the term "space fantasy" from his own misinterpretation of "SF", the abbreviation ofscience fiction in Japan, as a child.[9] He also cited the genre's unpopularity inshōnen manga as an influence, viewing it as a challenge he wanted to overcome.[10] Mashima has described his approach to writingEdens Zero as being in between those ofRave Master andFairy Tail, combining predetermined story elements with ideas that he draws "just from momentum" while writing on a weekly basis to give the manga a "real time" feeling.[8] He also expressed an intention to endEdens Zero when its number of collected volumes is in between those of the two previous series.[10] In 2021, Mashima stated thatEdens Zero would continue the themes of friendship, family, and battles fromFairy Tail, but that it may change slightly by the end when the mystery of the character Mother is revealed.[11]
Edens Zero is written and illustrated byHiro Mashima. The series began inKodansha'sshōnen manga magazineWeekly Shōnen Magazine on June 27, 2018,[12][13] and ended on June 26, 2024.[14] Kodansha has collected its chapters into thirty-three individualtankōbon volumes released from September 14, 2018 through August 16, 2024.[15][16]
The series was published simultaneously in seven languages: English, French, Chinese, Korean, Thai, German and Brazilian Portuguese.[7][17] North American publisherKodansha USA has released chapters of the series on digital platforms such asCrunchyroll Manga andAmazon Kindle.[7] This was replaced with the K Manga app service that was released on May 10, 2023.[18]
On June 12, 2020, Mashima announced onTwitter that the manga would be adapted into ananime television series.[19] At theTokyo Game Show livestream on September 26, 2020, it was revealed that the anime would be produced byJ.C.Staff and directed by Yūji Suzuki, withShinji Ishihira serving as chief director, Mitsutaka Hirota overseeing scripts, Yurika Sako designing the characters, andYoshihisa Hirano composing the music.[20] The series aired onNippon Television and other channels from April 11 to October 3, 2021.[21][22][a]Netflix acquired streaming rights to the series, which was released globally on August 26, 2021.[23] The opening theme is "Eden Through the Rough" byTakanori Nishikawa, and the ending theme is "Bōken no Vlog"[Jp. 1] byCHiCO with HoneyWorks.[24] The second opening theme is "Forever" byL'Arc-en-Ciel, and the second ending theme is "Sekai no Himitsu"[Jp. 2] bySayuri.[25]
Director Yūji Suzuki died on September 9, 2021, before the series' broadcast was completed.[26] Although he had worked in the industry as a key animator and episode director since the mid-2000s,Edens Zero was the first and only full series Suzuki directed.[27]
On February 9, 2022, it was announced that the series would receive a second season,[28] which aired from April 2 to October 1, 2023,[b] with Toshinori Watanabe replacing Suzuki as the director.[30][31] The opening theme is "Never say Never" by Takanori Nishikawa, and the ending theme is "Rinne"[Jp. 3] byAsca.[29][32] The second opening theme of season 2 is "Kaibutsu"[Jp. 4] performed byTani Yuuki, and the second ending theme is "My Star" by Lozareena.[33][34] The second season was licensed internationally byMediatoon Distribution and streamed byCrunchyroll in various regions.[35][36] A 72-minute recaporiginal net animation of the first season aired in Japan on the same day as the second season premiere, and was streamed by Crunchyroll from April 29, 2023.[37]
On September 16, 2020,Konami announced that they are developing anEdens Zero video game.[38] It was later revealed at theTokyo Game Show 2020 livestream that two separate action role-playing games were being developed, one being a 3D game for consoles, and the other being a top-down game for mobile devices.[39] In February 2022, the latter was revealed asEdens Zero Pocket Galaxy and was released on February 24 foriOS andAndroid.[40][41] The game ended its service on February 29, 2024.[42] In October 2024, the 3D game for consoles was revealed and titledEdens Zero. The game is expected to be released in 2025 forWindows,PlayStation 5, andXbox Series X/S.[43]
On December 17, 2021, Mashima announced that he was developing anEdens Zero video game by himself usingRPG Maker. Describing it as a "hobby project" that he worked on in his free time. He released the game,Rebecca and the Mechanical Mansion,[44][Jp. 5] for free onPC on March 16, 2022.[45][46][47]
In Japan, the first volume ofEdens Zero reached 13th place on the weeklyOricon chart with 30,178 copies sold.[48] The second volume ranked 16th with 41,506 copies sold,[49] and the third volume at 18th place with 31,316 copies.[50]
The first volume received a mixed response from critics onAnime News Network, where it was rated on a 1 to 5 scale. Amy McNulty gave the volume a 3.5 rating, calling it a "solid start" and praising the story's pacing, characters, and art, while adding that it "may not blow anyone away". McNulty also commented on Mashima's similar visual and design choices toFairy Tail – which she noted could be taken negatively – but opined that the manga could benefit from readers' familiarity withFairy Tail, and found it accessible to new readers of Mashima's work. Rebecca Silverman, who also rated it 3.5, considered the manga to be Mashima's darkest work, and praised him for using themes that "helped make his previous seriesFairy Tail work so well", citing Shiki and Rebecca's complementary backgrounds as orphans as an example. However, she expressed slight concerns over the story potentially becoming confusing for readers with the volume's implications oftime travel and flash-forward cliffhanger. Faye Hopper, who gave the volume a 3 rating, found that the shift from "high fantasy pastiche toStar Wars reminiscent sci-fi" helped enrich the story, but criticized Mashima's humor and adherence toshōnen manga conventions. Teresa Navarro gave it a 2 rating, finding the characters and art style to be nearly identical to those inFairy Tail, but considering its potential to gain a cult following from fans of theshōnen genre.[2]
It's here! The creator ofFairy Tail, manga superstar Hiro Mashima, is back with a high-flying space adventure!
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