Tokyopop acquired the licensing rights to distribute the manga in English and released the first five volumes before the company shut down its North American publishing division in 2011.

A 12-episode anime television series adaptation produced by Manglobe aired between April and July 2011, pulling content from the first 21 chapters of the manga.

A massive anomaly caused a great earthquake that ravaged Japan's mainland and destroyed most of Tokyo, sinking three-quarters of the city into the Pacific Ocean.

Ten years later, Ganta Igarashi is a seemingly ordinary ninth grader attending Nagano Prefecture's middle school who survived the great earthquake, leaving him with a normal life and no memories of the tragedy.

This all changes when a mysterious person covered in blood and crimson armor floats through his classroom windows and massacres his entire class, but spares Ganta and embeds a red crystal shard into his chest.

A lethal poison is constantly injected into his bloodstream through the collar, but it can be neutralized by consuming a peculiar candy-like medicine every three days, which can be acquired through various activities in the prison, such as performing for audiences, working backstage, and purchasing with Cast Points (a form of currency among inmates at Deadman Wonderland).

After discovering his ability, Ganta is forced to participate in brutal gladiatorial death matches known as Carnival Corpse, whose anonymous spectators pay large amounts of money to watch.

In his long struggle to survive, he manages to befriend some of those he fought in the arena and with their help, Ganta continues his quest to uncover the identity of the 'Red Man', why he turned into a Deadman, and the dark secrets the prison authorities are hiding.