Blood Blockade Battlefront

Blood Blockade Battlefront (血界戦線) is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Yasuhiro Nightow. It revolves around a young photographer named Leonardo Watch, who obtains 'the All Seeing Eyes of the Gods' at the cost of his sister's eyesight. After the incident, Leonardo moves to the city of Hellsalem's Lot to join an organization known as Libra to fight several monsters as well as terrorists.

Nightow first published a one-shot chapter in Shueisha's manga magazine Jump Square in May 2008. A three-chapter series, with the subtitle Mafūgai Kessha, was published in the same magazine from January to March 2009. Blood Blockade Battlefront was later serialized in Jump SQ.19 from May 2010 to February 2015, when the magazine ceased publication; Shueisha collected its chapters in ten volumes. A direct sequel, titled Blood Blockade Battlefront: Back 2 Back was serialized in Jump SQ.Crown from July 2015 to January 2018, when the magazine ceased publication, and the series was transferred to Jump SQ.Rise, where it ran from April 2018 to April 2022; its chapters were collected in ten volumes. A third series, titled Blood Blockade Battlefront: Beat 3 Peat started in Jump SQ.Rise in October 2022.

A 12-episode anime television series produced by Bones was broadcast from April to October 2015. A 12-episode second season was broadcast from October to December 2017.

In North America, the first manga series has been licensed for English language release by Dark Horse Comics, while the anime series has been licensed by Funimation (later Crunchyroll). Both the manga and anime were well received by publications due to its story and characters.

Plot
Blood Blockade Battlefront centers around the crime fighting organization "Libra" and their battles in Hellsalem's Lot, formerly known as New York City. Hellsalem's Lot was created when a portal to the "Beyond" opened, becoming a paranormal melting pot of monsters, magic and the everyday mundane life, and it is up to Libra to clear the streets of trouble and prevent the horrors of this city from spreading to the outside world.

Manga
Blood Blockade Battlefront is written and illustrated by Yasuhiro Nightow. Nightow first published a one-shot chapter in Shueisha's manga magazine Jump Square on May 2, 2008. It only featured very few members of the final cast and had a much different tone, with more emphasis on it being a vampire hunting story in a contemporary city. A three-chapter series, titled Kekkai Sensen − Mafūgai Kessha (血界戦線 -魔封街結社-), was serialized in Jump Square from January 5 to March 4, 2009. Another one-shot chapter was published in the second volume of Jump SQ.M (Jump Square Masterpiece) on October 23, 2009. Blood Blockade Battlefront was then serialized in the then brand new quarterly magazine Jump SQ.19 starting on May 19, 2010. The series finished with the 18th and last issue of the magazine on February 19, 2015. Shueisha collected its chapters in ten volumes, released from January 4, 2010, to April 3, 2015.

In 2010, the series was licensed for English release by Dark Horse Comics. The ten volumes were released from September 14, 2011, to July 25, 2018.

Sequels
A direct sequel, titled Blood Blockade Battlefront: Back 2 Back, started in the first issue of Jump SQ.Crown on July 17, 2015. The magazine ceased publication on January 19, 2018, and the series continued publication in the first ever issue of Jump SQ.Rise, released on April 16 of that same year. The series finished on April 28, 2022. Shueisha collected its chapters in ten volumes, released from January 4, 2016, to August 4, 2022.

A third series, titled Blood Blockade Battlefront: Beat 3 Peat, started in Jump SQ.Rise on October 26, 2022. The first volume was released on July 4, 2023. As of April 4, 2024, two volumes have been released.

Anime
An anime television series adaptation was announced in May 2014. It was produced by studio Bones and directed by Rie Matsumoto. The series was broadcast for 12 episodes on MBS from April 5 to October 4, 2015. A 25-minute original video animation (OVA) titled "King of the Restaurant of Kings" was bundled with the official Blood Blockade Battlefront guidebook, released on June 3, 2016.

A second season was announced in December 2016. Titled Blood Blockade Battlefront & Beyond (血界戦線 & Beyond), the series was broadcast on MBS from October 8 to December 24, 2017. A 24-minute original animation DVD (OAD) was bundled with the fifth volume of the Blood Blockade Battlefront Back 2 Back manga, released on July 4, 2018.

Funimation licensed the series for streaming on its official website. Following Sony's acquisition of Crunchyroll, the series was moved to the platform. The series was licensed by Madman Entertainment and AnimeLab for an English release in Australia and New Zealand.

Music
The music for the series was composed by Taisei Iwasaki. The original soundtrack album for the series was released on July 15, 2015. The original soundtrack album for Blood Blockade Battlefront & Beyond was released on December 13, 2017. Bump of Chicken performed the first opening theme, "Hello, World! (song)", while Unison Square Garden performed the ending theme "Sugar Song and Bitter Step" (シュガーソングとビターステップ). For Blood Blockade Battlefront & Beyond, Unison Square Garden performed the opening theme "Fake Town Baby", while Daoko and Yasuyuki Okamura (credited as Daoko × Yasuyuki Okamura) performed the ending theme "Step Up Love" (ステップアップ LOVE).

Stage play
In the sixth volume of Blood Blockade Battle Front Back 2 Back, it was revealed that a live action stage play inspired by the manga was being produced. It ran at The Galaxy Theatre in Tokyo from November 2–10, 2019, and at Umeda Arts Theater Dramacity from November 14–17 of that same year. Daisuke Nishida directed and wrote the play.

Reception
The manga series of Blood Blockade Battlefront received generally good critical response. Brigid Alverson from MTV Geek criticized the artwork for being hard to follow and stated "it boils down to a matter of taste. Blood Blockade Battleground is a good choice for readers who like a lot of action and don't mind being dropped into the middle of the story, without a lot of setup." On the other hand, The Fandom Post's John Rose praised the artwork more specifically the monsters' designs. He highly recommended it to Trigun's readers as well as superhero comic reader, sci-fi hero and Futurama fans. Several of the volumes have also appeared in rankings for bestselling manga.

The anime adaptation of the series has received generally positive reviews. Jacob Hope Chapman from Anime News Network praised the cast and studio Bones' work. Additionally, he liked the consistency in quality and commented "The contiguous threads laced through these episodic adventures are beginning to converge fast, and while I can't see the full picture yet, I know Rie Matsumoto is building the anime-original material of Leo's romance into something special. The animation continues to be jaw-dropping. The music continues to be soul-warming. There's never enough time in one writeup to talk about everything that makes the episode so damn good. Blood Blockade Battlefront continues to be The Very Best." Jarius Taylor from the Fandom Post called it "both ridiculously cool and ridiculously weird" and praised the cast like Chapman. In a later review he said "It’s still not entirely clear what this show is going for yet but for now it’s a good ride and I have more than enough faith in the people behind it to believe the destination will be worthwhile." Rachael Verret, a writer from The Mary Sue, gave the series a perfect score having pointed out its "energy and joviality" seen through the cast and the ending sequences which reminded her of another series, Baccano!. Similarly, Chapman wrote an article titled "Three Reasons Why Blood Blockade Battlefront is the Best Show of the Spring" commenting "It's the coolest, cutest, and cleverest anime I've seen in a long time, easily the best new show of the Spring 2015."

The first DVD of the series sold 4,784 units during its debut. Meanwhile, the first Blu-ray sold 12,171 units in its first week of release. For the Newtype preliminary awards for 2015, the series was sixth in the category "Sound" while fourth in the category "Theme Song" for "Sugar Song to Bitter Step." In the category "Best Mascot", Sonic ranked first. In another poll by the Japanese magazine Entermix, the series was voted as the second most popular one.