Sanctum of Memories

D.Gray-man (ディーグレイマン Dī Gureiman^?) is an ongoing Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Katsura Hoshino. It was first serialized in 2004 in Weekly Shōnen Jump, published byShueisha under their Jump Comics imprint and currently fifteen volumes have been released. There is also a novel series called Reverse, authored by Kaya Kizaki, that tells the characters’ backgrounds. As of May 6, 2008, Viz Media has released the first nine volumes in the United States. The anime series began airing on October 3, 2006 in Japan and is still ongoing.

Many characters and their designs were adapted from some of Katsura Hoshino’s previous works and drafts, such as Zone, Book-man, and Continue, and her assistants. Earlier titles considered for the manga were Dolls, Chronoa, and Zone.

Set during the end of a nineteenth century on a fictional Earth, D.Gray-man mostly centers around 15-year-old Allen Walker, who is gifted with the ability to control a weaponized form of a divine substance from ages past, called Innocence, and becomes an Exorcist of the Black Order. This secretive organization aims to stop the plan set in motion by the Millennium Earl to destroy all life on Earth, thus ‘cleansing’ it. But the Earl has raised an army of Akuma, created by taking advantage of grief over a loved one’s death, and summoned the direct descendants of Noahhimself, the 13-strong Noah family, to aid him in his second attempt. Because of the Akuma’s ability to wear a human’s skin, they are nearly undetectable by any human. Allen proves to be a powerful asset as his ‘cursed’ left eye is able to detect the Akuma. But soon, this battle nearly turns into a race to collect the 109 Innocence fragments, scattered since the Great Flood of Noah, as the search to find the most powerful Innocence, the ‘Great Heart’, ensues.

Manga

Written and drawn by Katsura Hoshino, the chapters of the D.Gray-man manga series have been serialized in Weekly Shōnen Jump since its premiere on May 31, 2004.^[4] The individual chapters are also published in collected volumes by Shueisha. The first volume was released onOctober 9, 2004, and as of June 4, 2008, fifteen volumes have been released.^[5][6] In Japan, the series was put on hiatus twice since Katsura had an illness, however, the series continued a few weeks later.^[7][8]

The series has been licensed for an English language release in North America by Viz Media.^[9] Viz serializes the chapters in their monthly manga anthology Shonen Jump Advanced, with the first chapter appearing on May 2, 2006.^[4] Viz released the first collected volume of the series on February 5, 2008, and as of May 6, 2008, nine volumes have been released.^[10][11]

Anime

On October 3rd, 2006, an anime adaptation of D.Gray-man, directed by Nabeshima Osamu, was released and is ongoing. As of 2008, it consists of more than ninety episodes run on TV Tokyo in Japan and Arts Central in Singapore.^[12]

The first 51 episodes of the anime series are licensed for an English language release by Funimation, the first release is set at the beginning of 2009.^[13][14]

Soundtracks

All of the music for the D.Gray-man anime series were composed by Kaoru Wada, and so far two CD soundtracks have been released in Japan by Sony Music Entertainment.^[15] The first, D.Gray-man Original Soundtrack 1 that contains thirty-four tracks was released on March 21, 2007 with musical production and composition, which includes several of the series opening and ending themes.^[16]

The second soundtrack containing thirty-one tracks, D.Gray-man Original Soundtrack 2, was released December 19, 2007.^[17]

Watch ANIME

Read MANGA

**courtesy of Wikipedia.com**