Edens Zero (stylized in all caps) is a Japanese science fantasy manga series written and illustrated by Hiro Mashima. It has been serialized in Kodansha's Weekly Shōnen Magazine since June 2018, with its chapters collected into thirty-one tankōbon volumes as of March 2024. Set in a fictional spacefaring universe, the story follows Shiki Granbell, a boy with gravity powers who embarks on a voyage aboard the titular starship in search of a cosmic entity named Mother.
Edens Zero | |
Genre | |
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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 – present |
Volumes | 31 |
Anime television series | |
Directed by |
|
Written by | Mitsutaka Hirota |
Music by | Yoshihisa Hirano |
Studio | J.C.Staff |
Licensed by |
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Original network | Nippon TV |
Original run | April 11, 2021 – October 1, 2023 |
Episodes | 50 |
Game | |
Edens Zero Pocket Galaxy | |
Developer | Konami |
Genre | Action role-playing game |
Platform | iOS, Android |
Released | February 24, 2022 |
The manga is published digitally in six other languages as they are released in Japan, with Kodansha USA licensing the series for English publication in North America on Crunchyroll, Comixology, and Amazon Kindle. An anime television series adaptation produced by J.C.Staff aired from April to October 2021. A second season premiered from April to October 2023. A video game adaptation by Konami was also released.
Shiki Granbell, a human boy, lives among robots on the deserted theme park planet Granbell in the Sakura Cosmos. His adoptive grandfather, a benevolent Demon King robot named Ziggy, teaches him to control gravity with a superhuman power called Ether Gear. Ten years after Ziggy's death, the park is visited by spacefaring content creators Rebecca Bluegarden and Happy, whom Shiki befriends when the robots force the three off Granbell, saving Shiki from solitude before expending their vital Ether energy.
Seeking new friends and adventure, the three decide to search for Mother, the fabled goddess of the cosmos. Early in the journey, the space pirate Elsie Crimson gifts Shiki with the Edens Zero, an interstellar warship left by Ziggy. Shiki prepares for the voyage by assembling Ziggy's android crewmates, the Four Shining Stars, along with others he befriends: Weisz Steiner, a criminal from an alternate history created by a time-eating chronophage; E.M. Pino, a memory-impaired EMP android built by Ziggy; and Homura Kôgetsu, a young swordswoman and pupil of one of the Shining Stars. Meanwhile, Rebecca develops her own Ether Gear ability to reverse time and travel between parallel universes.
Before leaving the Sakura Cosmos, the Edens Zero crew encounters a revived, malevolent Ziggy, who desires to kill Shiki and eradicate all human life. Following an attack with his enhanced Edens One warship, Ziggy draws the Edens Zero into a war against the neighboring Aoi Cosmos's reigning empire, where he detonates the empire's arsenal of 20,000 antimatter bombs against them. Shiki leads his crew to escape, although their crewmate Witch Regret sacrifices herself to protect them.
Three years later, Shiki learns Ziggy's identity as a mechanical version of himself from 20,000 years in a parallel future, where he and Rebecca were sent after triggering a spacetime distortion while trying to disarm the antimatter bombs. Having traveled back in time aboard the Edens Zero, Ziggy reveals that Mother's death will cause a multiversal extinction event for humans and machines, and that she can only be saved in Universe Zero, the convergence point of all universes. Pino realizes that Ziggy is being controlled when he discreetly repairs her memory, allowing her to enter an empowered Overdrive state and free him with her EMP. At Ziggy's request, Shiki destroys him to thwart his controller, the artificially intelligent Edens One, which seeks to ensure Mother's death.
With Mother's death imminent, the crew travels to Universe Zero's past by activating Etherion, the Edens Zero's hidden time travel function made from the alternate Rebecca's Ether. In the process, the parallel universes are merged into a single, idyllic reality where all those who were killed in previous universes are still alive. The Edens Zero traces Mother to an uncharted region of space, joined by a resurrected Ziggy in battle against the Edens One's android avatar, Void, whose consciousness Ziggy recognizes as that of his and Rebecca's future son.
Upon meeting, Mother reveals herself to Shiki as the Overdrive state of a ruined planet Earth, Shiki's homeworld. Mother further explains that restoring her power would undo every resurrection in Universe Zero, while letting her die would allow them to live until the extinction event. To guarantee both parties' survival, Shiki formulates a plan to revert Mother to her original form by luring the chronophage to her.
Following the conclusion of his series Fairy Tail on July 26, 2017, Hiro Mashima posted a Tweet on December 31, 2017, promising to start a new series sometime in 2018.[3] After his visit to the Angoulême International Comics Festival in France, Mashima revealed that the new series would be "a new form of fantasy", and that the character Plue from his earlier series Rave Master would appear in the manga.[4] On May 14, 2018, Mashima commented on Twitter that he was becoming "a little confused" due to working simultaneously on this series, a Fairy Tail continuation, and another "secret" project. He also stated that he was coming up with new ideas for the series "one after another".[5] On May 30, 2018, Weekly Shōnen Magazine revealed that the series was tentatively titled Eden's Zero.[6] 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.[7]
When developing the idea for his next series, Mashima originally anticipated using another sword and sorcery setting similar to the manga he had drawn for the last 20 years, but decided on creating a "space fantasy" adventure due to a lack of such contemporary shōnen manga; he coined the term "space fantasy" from his own misinterpretation of "SF", the abbreviation of science fiction in Japan, as a child.[8] He also cited the genre's unpopularity in shōnen manga as an influence, viewing it as a challenge he wanted to overcome.[9] Mashima has described his approach to writing Edens Zero as being in between those of Rave Master and Fairy 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.[7] He has also expressed an intention to end Edens Zero when its number of collected volumes is in between those of the two previous series.[9] In 2021, Mashima stated that Edens Zero would continue the themes of friendship, family, and battles from Fairy Tail, but that it may change slightly by the end when the mystery of the character Mother is revealed.[10]
Edens Zero is written and illustrated by Hiro Mashima. The series began in Kodansha's shōnen manga magazine Weekly Shōnen Magazine on June 27, 2018.[11][12] Kodansha has collected its chapters into individual tankōbon volumes. The first volume was released on September 14, 2018.[13] As of March 15, 2024, thirty-one volumes have been released.[14]
The series is published simultaneously in seven languages: English, French, Chinese, Korean, Thai, German and Brazilian Portuguese.[6][15] North American publisher Kodansha USA has released chapters of the series on digital platforms such as Crunchyroll Manga and Amazon Kindle.[6] which ended on January 16, 2023.
This was replaced with a new app service that was released May 10, 2023, known as "K Manga" which included the new simulpub chapters of the series.[16] This new platform is available for Android, with a full website later released. [17]
On June 12, 2020, Mashima announced on Twitter that the manga would be adapted into an anime television series.[18] At the Tokyo Game Show livestream on September 26, 2020, it was revealed that the anime would be produced by J.C.Staff and directed by Yūji Suzuki, with Shinji Ishihira serving as chief director, Mitsutaka Hirota overseeing scripts, Yurika Sako designing the characters, and Yoshihisa Hirano composing the music.[19] The series aired on Nippon TV and other channels from April 11 to October 3, 2021.[20][21][a] Netflix acquired streaming rights to the series, which was released globally on August 26, 2021.[22] The opening theme is "Eden Through the Rough" by Takanori Nishikawa, and the ending theme is "Bōken no Vlog"[Jp. 1] by CHiCO with HoneyWorks.[23] The second opening theme is "Forever" by L'Arc-en-Ciel, and the second ending theme is "Sekai no Himitsu"[Jp. 2] by Sayuri.[24]
Director Yūji Suzuki died on September 9, 2021, before the series' broadcast was completed.[25] 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.[26]
On February 9, 2022, it was announced that the series would receive a second season,[27] which aired from April 2 to October 1, 2023,[b] with Toshinori Watanabe replacing Suzuki as the director.[29][30] The opening theme is "Never say Never" by Takanori Nishikawa, and the ending theme is "Rinne"[Jp. 3] by Asca.[28][31] The second opening theme of season 2 is "Kaibutsu"[Jp. 4] performed by Tani Yuuki, and the second ending theme is "My Star" by Lozareena.[32][33] The second season was licensed internationally by Mediatoon Distribution and streamed by Crunchyroll in various regions.[34][35] A 72-minute recap original 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.[36]
On September 16, 2020, Konami announced that they are developing an Edens Zero video game.[37] It was later revealed at the Tokyo 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.[38] In February 2022, the latter was revealed as Edens Zero Pocket Galaxy and was released on February 24 for iOS and Android.[39][40] however the game ended it's service on February 29, 2024.[41]
On December 17, 2021, Mashima announced that he was developing an Edens Zero video game by himself using RPG Maker. Describing it as a "hobby project" that he worked on in his free time, he released the game, Rebecca to Kikai no Yōkan,[Jp. 5] for free on PC on March 16, 2022.[42][43][44]
In Japan, the first volume of Edens Zero reached 13th place on the weekly Oricon chart with 30,178 copies sold.[45] The second volume ranked 16th with 41,506 copies sold,[46] and the third volume at 18th place with 31,316 copies.[47]
The first volume received a mixed response from critics on Anime 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 to Fairy Tail – which she noted could be taken negatively – but opined that the manga could benefit from readers' familiarity with Fairy 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 series Fairy 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 of time travel and flash-forward cliffhanger. Faye Hopper, who gave the volume a 3 rating, found that the shift from "high fantasy pastiche to Star Wars reminiscent sci-fi" helped enrich the story, but criticized Mashima's humor and adherence to shōnen manga conventions. Teresa Navarro gave it a 2 rating, finding the characters and art style to be nearly identical to those in Fairy Tail, but considering its potential to gain a cult following from fans of the shōnen genre.[2]
It's here! The creator of Fairy Tail, manga superstar Hiro Mashima, is back with a high-flying space adventure!