Dr.STONE is a shōnen manga written by Riichirō Inagaki and drawn by Boichi. It was published in Shūeisha’s Weekly Shōnen Jump magazine from March 6, 2017, to March 7, 2022. An anime television series adaptation by TMS Entertainment aired between July 5 and December 13, 2019. A second season aired between January 14, 2021, and March 25, 2021. A third season is in production for 2023. Now, we have revealed that the manga ended its publication in March 2022, but is that really the end? Is Dr.STONE really over? We are going to tell you about it in this article.
The Dr.STONE manga ended on March 7, 2022, after a total of 26 volumes and a five-year run (almost to the date). There are no plans – as of this moment – related to a potential sequel to the manga, but Dr.STONE fans will still be able to enjoy the ongoing anime series, whose third season is set to premiere in April 2023.
The rest of this article is going to focus on the publication of the Dr.STONE series and all its aspects. We’re going to go over the whole publication history and ultimately tell you whether the Dr.STONE series is over or still ongoing so that you know how much material from this great series you can expect.
Is the Dr.STONE manga finished?
Written by Riichirō Inagaki and drawn by Boichi, Dr.STONE was announced in January 2017; this one is launched in the 14th issue of 2017 of the preprint shōnen manga magazine Weekly Shōnen Jump, which came out on March 6, 2017, and ended in the 14th issue of 2022 of the same magazine which came out on March 7, 2022.
It is one of many stories Inagaki pitched to his editor, who chose it because he had no idea how it would evolve. Boichi, who was looking for a story to work on, was approached around the time Inagaki (a fan of his drawings) finished the storyboards for the 3rd chapter. The first tankōbon volume was published by Shūeisha on July 4, 2017; to date, the series has twenty-six tankōbon volumes. They are:
In North America, the publishing house VIZ Media published the first three chapters as an overview of the series in his webzine Weekly Shonen Jump as part of the “Jump Start” program. In April 2017, the English version was added as a regular series in the same webzine. VIZ has also published the bound volumes since September 2018.
On top of that, it was announced in the magazine’s 47th issue, released on October 21, 2019, that Boichi will be directing a spin-off manga centered around the character of Byakuya Ishigam. It is launched in the 48th issue of Shōnen Jump, released on October 28, and is titled Dr.STONE reboot: Byakuya. The manga ended with only nine chapters, the last of which was published on December 23. The chapters are collected and edited in tankōbon format by Kōdansha in a single volume published on March 4, 2020 (ISBN 978-4-08-882244-0).
A light novel adaptation by Ichio Morimoto, with art by Boichi and supervised by Riichirō Inagaki, was published by Shūeisha as a single volume on February 4, 2019, as Dr.STONE Star’s Dream, Earth’s Song. A second light novel, titled Dr.STONE: The Voices That Face the Future, was published on April 3, 2020.
So, what do all of these things tell us about the series? Well, as true Dr.STONE fans will know, the manga series ended in March 2022, when the last chapter was published. Since then, the main series did not release any new materials; the spin-off manga and the light novels were all released earlier. These works are also over, all of them. So for all Dr.STONE fans, we can only confirm that the series, at least its written part, is over, and we don’t know that there are any plans to continue it. The anime adaptation is still ongoing, so fans can enjoy the story like that, but the manga is definitely over at the time of writing.
How does Dr.STONE end?
Dr.STONE officially ended with Chapter 232, as the astronauts safely return to Earth after having defeated Why-man. The world rejoices, and we see our heroes years later, living in an un-petrified society, with ambitious plans for the future. But, as fans will probably know, a final epilogue chapter, titled “Terraforming”, was released months after the manga ended and showed us a brief scene set after the manga’s ending. We shall now recap it for you and thus tell you how the manga actually ended.
Senku wakes up alone and lonely in the middle of the ocean, with no land or ship in sight and no memory of how he got there. It comes as no surprise to him that he had already covered his body in oil, which acts as a primitive heat insulator and gives him more time before hypothermia sets in. Senku then decides to conduct his own independent research and discovers that he already possesses some resurrection fluid and a homemade earphone modeled after the crystal radio that was originally manufactured on Treasure Island.
Kohaku is curled up in a ball, terrified, with the sound emanating from the beacon of her life jacket when he inserts the earpiece. He follows the buzzing sound to find her. Senku is then brought back to the memory of what had transpired, namely that Taiju and Yuzuriha’s plane had crashed on the way home from their honeymoon in Norway. Taiju uses the petrifying weapon to petrify them all in order to protect them as they fall. Later, after being struck in the head by a coconut tree, Senku was resurrected when one of his own resuscitation fluid bottles crashed into him.
When Kohaku discovers some debris and chooses to start building a raft, the reunion with Senku is interrupted. Senku pulls Kohaku back to life and is happy to have a companion. Senku realizes that they must have landed there given the abundance of wreckage in the Sargasso Sea and Bermuda Triangle. After bringing back Suika and Chrome, the group fishes so well that they end up having a lot of food, fish oil, and therefore drinking water. They begin fermenting coconut sugar and producing alcohol in order to produce more awakening fluids.
Then Ukyo is discovered, but he is unable to be returned until he locates a source of nitric acid. Suika then recalls that nitric acid can be produced via an arc technique. She wishes she could harness the energy of the regular thunderstorms she now feels. Senku realized they could harness the power of the storm by utilizing a palm tree and Ginro’s spear as a lightning rod after Chrome recounts witnessing a blue fire before the plane crashed.
As a result of their own error, they begin building the machine that generates nitric acid, collects jars from the ocean floor, and finds a shiny can of Senku’s Corned Beef. The canister used to process molten glass to create glass fiber was converted into a new cotton candy machine. In addition to Ukyo, they are able to revive Tsukasa, Chelsea, Sai, Ryusui, Gen, Taiju, Yuzuriha, Kinro, and Ginro as a result of their system’s ability to produce nitric acid. The crew then works together to make fish skin sails in an effort to elude the ocean currents that have captured them.
However, Stanley’s jet eventually finds them and carries them ashore as rescue teams begin to lose hope of finding any survivors. As they are welcomed by Luna and Xeno as they land, Senku offers them the treasure they originally discovered: ultra-pure metallic silicon used to make semiconductors. Senku goes on to declare that he aims to terraform society and make it even more evolved than it has ever been by using valuable minerals from other solar systems. While everyone is in awe at the sight, Senku tells them to get excited.