Influences iii

Written by Peter McLaughlin

Bleach is a long running Manga series written and illustrated by Tite Kubo. Bleach follows the adventures of the Japanese teenager Ichigo Kurosaki who obtains the powers of a "Shinigami" (Death God in translation) and has to take on the role's responsibilities. Bleach Manga has been in production since 2001 and has been made into an Anime television series aired in Japan, the U.S.A and streamed over the internet. 3 Movies have been made and put to DVD in Japan and America showing the success of the series.

Getting to the point, the part of this series that may have influenced my addition to the story-line of our thriller may be the "Hollowfication" process. In being a regular reader of this series I have been influenced by the series while approving of certain elements within our film.

The sword in our media video may have also been influenced by my watching of the Bleach series as the sword is seen as part of the character. But the main influence from this series I can find is the "Hollowfication" process, which is a technique a character uses to gain power and the upper hand whilst in battle. This technique involves the character summoning a blank mask, which grants him greater strength, speed, mobility and power. The mask itself contains the characters "Inner demon" or "Hollow", which is an entity that lives inside a person and is their negative persona in the series meaning that they are evil and bent on destruction. The mask harnesses their evil power and the character is able to use it to their advantage, as shown below: