Bleach is a known anime that recently came back with everything. The improvement they did in the anime design respecting even more the manga without censoring scenes is why many fans of Bleach are still excited to see the final arc. Their recent success is also why many new people want to start watching the series since the beginning. I discovered the anime 1 year before the release of the announcement of the last arc called Thousand Year Blood War, and I have to say that it became my favorite anime since the beginning. So in honor of this great project, created by Tite Kubo and adapted by Pierrot studio, and taking advantage that they released the trailer of the second part of TYBW, I want to write a post and enumerate the reasons why this became my favorite anime. (I will not focus on what happens in the series, but more on the features that made it my favorite anime).
Synopsis:
If you still did not watch Bleach, here is a little Synopsis that only explains what the series is about without spoilers.
Ichigo Kurosaki is a teenager from Karakura Town who can see and communicate with ghosts, and it allowed him to meet a girl called Rukia, who is a soul reaper (Shinigami). The soul reapers are supernatural humans that do not belong to the living world but to the Soul Society, which is the afterlife realm where the souls must come after death. The job of the soul reapers is to bring the souls that are lost in the living world to the Soul Society ensuring the safe crossing of the souls, but there are also evil souls called hollows, which they can feed from good souls, soul Reapers, and even humans. The soul reapers must also purify the hollows, although not all the souls would end in the Soul Society, because what they make to the ones who did horrible things when they were alive is sending them to hell (Jigoku). The purpose of their tasks is always to keep the balance between the souls in the Soul Society and the Living world because if that balance is somehow altered and broken, then both worlds would fall apart. To do their tasks, the soul reapers have their special swords called Zanpakuto, where each one has his unique ability, personality, and ways to behave. So, the soul reapers must also know and bond with their Zanpakuto to improve their powers and abilities.
After Ichigo shows Rukia that he is not a common person because she can see her, she realizes that the hollows she was slaying were pursuing him because he was showing a good level of spiritual pressure (Reiatsu), which means a good meal for a hollow. Because of that, another hollow makes an appearance and attacks Ichigo's sisters (Karin and Yusu Kurosaki). Ichigo tries to save them but he is not capable of doing it, so as a result, Rukia protects Ichigo and gets injured. To defeat the hollow, Rukia must then lend her powers to Ichigo. This is how this great story starts, where Ichigo must face many adventures and enemies to protect their beloved ones. While he does that, he will discover little by little more things about him and his origins that he never knew like how his mother died.
1) Their animation and designs:
Of course, the animations and designs of TYBW are insane but I will always feel attached to the old and classic version of the series. Actually, Bleach had an amazing approach and unique descriptive design from the beginning and this is one of the reasons why Tite Kubo is very known. What is more talked about in the show is the unique design of the captains and lieutenants of the Thirteen Court Guard Squads (Gotei 13) of the Soul Society, Los Espada, and Visored, all these groups were created so well, that each one has their own personality and even philosophy. Actually, each one of The Thirteen Court Guard Squads has its symbol based on a specific type of flower. For example, the flower of the 11th squad, in which the captain is Zaraki Kenpachi who loves fighting, is a yarrow which means Fight. Also, the 10 Espada are created based on the 10 aspects of death, which are: Isolation, Old Age, Sacrifice, Emptiness, Despair, Destruction, Intoxication, Madness, Greed, and Rage, and which explains a lot of the personality and the actions each one takes.
Of course, the new animation of nowadays in the last arc is insane! You can see a lot of work well made here and the new characters who are the Quincys (A group of humans with special abilities that were and are in conflict and war with the soul reapers), whose design is unique too!
2) Characters development:
Bleach allows us to see great development not just in Ichigo but also in other important characters like Rukia, Renji, Ishida, Urahara, and more, who had, have, and still going to have their respective evolution. On the other side, I also agree with some people that not all received the same development they deserve as others because the anime has a great number of characters, but still, I am intrigued by how each one is going to end in the final arc.
Also, anime shows you at the right moment the how some of these characters are linked together, and in case the anime introduce new characters that appeared from nowhere, that means we are going to know more about them in next episodes and see why they are link together with the plot and the villains. Like it happened for example with the Visored, when they introduce these new characters I was afraid that they will not explain so much about them but, fortunately, they did it. The development of each character has its logic and justifies the action that each one takes along the story.
3) Story:
I have never seen a so well-planned story like this one. The first two arcs (Agent of The Shinigami and the Soul Society arc) were incredible and are the main structure of the whole series. Tite Kubo knew how to create a whole story that will reveal surprising facts little by little. In the beginning, I thought some characters got their powers from nowhere and they would never explain it, but they explain it in the middle or even in the final episodes of other arcs. And that is for me the magic of this series, it keeps you intrigued about why some things happen in the series, or what are the purposes or who really are some characters, and the great mix of each mystery that is going to be revealed piece by piece showed me how well was this story planned by Tite Kubo. Until now many other things got revealed in the first part of TYBW.
4) Creativity and small details that make the anime even better:
There are small details that I do not why but they called my attention, like some Spanish terms some characters used. Like for example when Aizen called his fortress "Las Noches" and of course his group "Los Espada". Also, each Espada had to invoke his liberation by using Spanish terms too, for example, the liberation of Nnoitra is called "Santa Teresa", and the one from Halibel is called "Tiburón". Also, one special feature of Los Espada is the tattoos that each one has on different parts of their bodies, and are based on their level of strength and power. To me, it was creative to put one on Nnoitra's tongue. Also, they did the same with the hole each one has (all types of hollows have one hole in their bodies, that is also why they are called like that).
The same thing happens with the Quincys, for me, it was a wonderful idea to make some similarities of the Quincy's with Nazis. They are basically inspired by them and that is because their abilities and powers have German terms like the Seele Schneider, which is an arrow that can be used as a sword too and is created by spiritual particles (Reishi). Those and more small details make this Anime great.
5) Zanpakuto:
When the series explains to you that each Zanpakuto has its own ability, I thought it would be too much, but actually, they implemented this idea very well because when they introduce each soul reaper I always wondered what she or he can do. I wanted to see all their abilities but what most people want to discover while watching the series is when each captain is going to show their Bankai, which is the second and definitive liberation of the Zanpakuto. Nowadays there are still some captains that did not show their Bankai and are about to do it in the last arc. Another thing that they are showing little by little and not all the material at once.
6) The great openings, endings, and soundtracks:
I would say too that this is one of the best series with soundtracks. Since the beginning we can hear wonderful themes like "On the Precipice of Defeat", "Invasion", or "treachery", and in TYBW it keeps evolving. What is curious here is that actually some of these themes I already heard before just I didn't know at that time that they were from this anime. Also some openings and endings of the series are awesome. My favorite 5 openings of Bleach are number 1. (Orange Range - "Asterisk"), 3. (High and Mighty Color - "Ichirin no Hana"), 9. (Aqua Times - "Velonica") 13. (SID - "Ranbu no Melody"), and 16. (Tatsuya Kitani - "Scar"). Bleach has a big number of endings but the ones that I still keep hearing are "Echoes" by Universe, "Last Moment" by Spyair, "Haruka Kanata" by Unlimits, and "Saihate" by SennaRin. I have to give a great credit to Tatsuya Kitani because their great job playing other songs in Bleach like "Rapport" and "I Don't Want Eternity Eternally" (both videos from the anime contain spoilers, so I would recommend it to hear them on Spotify if you still didn't watch the series but want it some day).
Conclusion:
To me, Bleach is an underrated series, or at least where I am living because no one that I know speaks about this anime. It was considered one of the big 3 of anime and maybe it is until today. What I must recommend is just to skip the filler episodes like I always do in all other animes.
Of course, I know that many people opine that the series has its incongruences and maybe they can be right. But I have to say this series is unique, all the details and features that I talked about before are richly very well mixed in the series, where at some point it has a great plot twist which of course I will not talk about it.
I have to say I am so happy that we can get the chance to see the final arc, and we are so close to seeing the second part of it in July 2023!
Here is the trailer of the second part of TYBW!
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