Beyblade, known in Japan as Explosive Shoot Beyblade (Japanese: 爆転シュートベイブレード, Hepburn: Bakuten Shūto Beiburēdo), is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Takao Aoki [ja] to promote sales of spinning tops called "Beyblades" developed by Takara Tomy. The series focuses on a group of kids who form teams, which battle one another using Beyblades. Originally serialized in Shogakukan's CoroCoro Comic from September 1999 to July 2004, the individual chapters were collected and published in 14 tankōbon volumes and was licensed for English-language release in North America by Viz Media.
An anime adaptation aired in Japan on TV Tokyo from January to December 2001 and was followed by two sequel series, Beyblade V-Force and Beyblade G-Revolution, and the 2002 film Beyblade: Fierce Battle. Nelvana licensed and produced English-language adaptations of the anime series and the film.
