The Cartoon Network will air two Bleach movies, Bleach the Movie: Memories of a Nobody and Bleach the Movie 2: The DiamondDust Rebellion back-to-back on August 14th. A week later the final two rerun episodes of the Bleach series, number 167 and 168, will air on August 21st before “new” episodes begin appearing starting on August 28th. But the addition of new episodes of Bleach also coincides with the shrinking of the anime portion of the Saturday night Adult Swim block.

Produced by Studio Pierrot and based on Tite Kubo’s popular manga series, the Bleach anime has now reached 278 episodes in Japan.  Adult Swim last broadcast new episodes of Bleach in March.  The hiatus is likely due at least in part to the time it takes to dub new episodes of the series. 

While the airing of new episodes of Bleach followed by an episode of Kekkaishi is good news, the new schedule indicates that late night reruns of Adult Swim anime staples Cowboy Bebop and Ghost in the Shell are ending in August to be replaced by King of the Hill and Boondocks reruns, effectively slimming the anime portion of the Saturday night Adult Swim block from three hours to two.