Tite Kubo

Biography: Born Noriaki Kubo in Hiroshima prefecture, Japan, Kubo-sensei started drawing manga in high school. It was in his third year of high school where he originally wrote his first manga, Zombie Powder. He submitted it to a Weekly Shonen Jump contest but lost due to lack of experience. However, he received a phone cal from one of the editors of the magazine, suggesting they work on it together. Zombie Powder eventually began publication in 1999 (in Weekly Shonen Jump) and ran for only 4 tankoubon or graphic novels. It was stopped by Weekly Shonen Jump due to lack of popularity and an overdose of sexual content.

Later in his career, Kubo-sensei created a new manga, called Bleach. He submitted it to Weekly Shonen Jump in hopes of having it published. Bleach was originally rejected due to similarities of Yoshihiro Togashi’s hit manga Yu Yu Hakusho. Although Bleach was a hit with a controlled group of readers, any hope of it being published was slim.

Kubo-sensei was discouraged b by the rejection of his manga. However, Akira Toriyama-sensei, creator and artist of the hit manga Dragon Ball, sent him a letter of encouragement. This inspired Kubo-sensei and soon, in 2002, Bleach was finally published and began serialization in Weekly Shonen Jump. It instantly became a hit and is still being run today with over 210 chapters and no signs of ending. It has also inspired a hit anime series that is currently over 60 episodes long. Tite actually does the character deign for the anime, which is extremely rare for a manga-ka, who usually just oversees it.… Expand