While it already feels like I’ve reviewed this 100 times due to covering it on Anime UK News for various articles, it’s time to actually take a deeper dive into the first chunk of the anime adaptation of Bleach’s final story arc (for now!): The Thousand Year Blood War. I’ve gone on record as saying the actual manga version of the story is … not great, but given the crazy animation quality plus the amazing returning voice cast and music composer this was a great weekly watch. Let’s take a look!
Before we even get to the actual story what stands out most with Bleach: Thousand Year Blood War is the animation quality and how faithfully it’s adapting the source material. The animation is stunning in places with a great use of colour and shade and fluid motion, and it sticks extremely close to the manga not just in adapting several chapters in one go (in other words no filler, except a few new scenes created by Tite Kubo himself!) but by using stuff like the episode titles appearing framed within the show the same way manga chapter titles were, previews looking like the volume previews with the same box and typeface, and the volume poems being used as a way to preview the next episode’s contents. As I said in the opening paragraph combine that with the now-veteran returning voice cast and original series composer Shiro Sagisu and this is an adaptation that is frankly far better than the source material deserves, and I’m a big fan of the series!
Look at all that colour and detail…. Lovely.
On that note let’s talk about the story, and to be fair at this early stage it’s actually good and full of so much promise… *sigh*… So as the title of the arc suggests 1,000 years ago there was a war between the Shinigami and the Quincy, the during that war the latter were all but wiped out and the Quincy’s leader Yhwach (Yu-ha Ba-ha, is apparently how its pronounced… well, in Japanese, we’d pronounce it as “Yuha Bach”, but whatever. Still a stupid name regardless!) is pretty much killed by Yamamoto Genryusai, taking a thousand years to recover his strength. This leads to the new Quincy army, dubbed the Wandenreich, invading Soul Society and decimating the place. It’s actually very effectively downbeat just how outclassed the Shinigami are and how hopeless they feel, it sets up their big come back really well (spoilers? I don’t know, I doubt anyone would assume the villains would win in the long run…)
Ichigo and Uryu are the leads of the arc, I mean Ichigo is the lead of the whole series but it is nice to see more focus on Uryu after all this time, the anime version of the story gives him even more focus as well, looking into the history of the Quincy via his father’s old books, including a handy bit of new retcon explaining how the Quincy could be wiped out twice (1,000 years ago was just Yhwach’s forces, then the more recent purge Uryu mentioned at the start of the series was the Shinigami “finishing the job” so to speak). After a visit from an Arrancar who had been recruited by the Quincy Ichigo, Chad, Orihime and Urahara soon head to Hueco Mundo with the re-childed Nel after the Quincy invaded the dimension as a “spearhead” while at the same time Genryusai’s long-time lieutenant Chojiro is assassinated. Ichigo does battle with a Quincy Sternritter Quilge after he defeats some surviving Arrancar from the classic arc and ends up imprisoned by the Quincy as he is Sternritter J: The Jail, revealing each one has a letter and special ability.
Quilge is the most Nazi-ish of the very Nazi-like Quincy, that’s for sure.
This is where things get grim as the Quincy invade the Soul Society outright and en masse and while I’ll get into the specifics in the spoiler section it is an effective beat down of our powerful heroes, along with one moment where several of them act like complete idiots… you see the Quincy show the ability to seal Bankais, Chojiro gargled as much before his death, so Byakuya, Hitsugaya, Soifon and Komomura all activate their Bankais as they face down their opponent and are shocked to find out that they don’t seal them, they steal them. Either way though Science Department head and Squad 12 Captain Mayuri rightfully calls them idiots for not waiting for his research to be completed. Byakuya’s opponent, As Nodt, has been a favourite design of mine since his debut and I’m happy to report he’s been given a suitably creepy voice to go along with his Fear-based powers (he is Sternritter F: The Fear, you see).
The other thing I’ll mention is more added scenes, specifically flashbacks to the first Quincy/Shinigami war includes the original Gotei 13, not just Yamamoto, and given eleven of them have never been seen before means Tite Kubo sat and designed them all especially for this scene (unless he wishes to use them for the much touted Hell arc?) The other one was a scene mentioned but not show in the manga where Yhwach pops down to the lower-depths and meets with Aizen in hopes of recruiting him to his cause, but the meeting doesn’t go his way. I loved a moment where Yhwach all but says “I think I could probably kill you but you’re practically immortal so… can’t be arsed” and leaves. Plus Aizen is still one of, if not my all time favourite villain so hearing his calm arrogant self again was great and the fact that he stealthily put Yhwach under his Zanpakuto’s spell (now he’s fused with the sword) is a fun twist a few scenes later where Yhwach realises he’s spent more time down there than he realised.
Overall Thoughts:
Yhwach vs. Yamamoto managing to live up to the crazy visuals of the manga… and then some!
The start of the Thousand Year Blood War arc is where all the actual plot and development happens, as well as a great and impactful debut for our new villains and one amazing showdown. With the exception of some great fights (that I’m really looking forward to seeing in this lavish animation!) it’s all down hill from here, at least in the manga, but either way the crazy production value should make this a really enjoyable trip through Bleach’s (currently) final arc.
There’s quite a bit to process in this chunk of story, but the biggest two are a dramatic and frankly stunning battle between Yhwach and Yamamoto which sees Yhwach actually be another Sternritter who is able to copy other people’s powers pretending to be Yhwach allowing the real deal to cut his opponent in half, killing the Head Captain; and the resulting showdown between Ichigo and Yhwach where we find out Ichigo’s mother was actually a Quincy and therefore our lead protagonist is a mix of human, Shinigami, Quincy and Hollow all rolled into one. This is followed by Yhwach’s right hand man Hashwalth breaking Ichigo’s sword leading to Ichigo being kicked back to the real world in time to hear his father tell the tale of how he went from Captain Shiba of Squad 10 to living on Earth with a Quincy wife. Would you believe it was due to Aizen again? Well, it was. I guess that explains how he found out about Ichigo and was following him since he was born.
Isshin saves Masaki during the long-awaited flashback.
Who kicked Ichigo back to Earth? Well it was Squad 0, a.k.a. the Royal Guard, the long-teased division that guards the even-more teased Soul King. They’ll play a much bigger role later (well, Ichibei their leader will anyway) but basically they serve to give Ichigo, Renji, Rukia and Byakuya a big power boost before the rematch with the Quincy. The latter for the record I still fully believe was supposed to die in this arc: he’s smashed into a fine paste by his own Bankai and tells his once-enemy Ichigo to save the Soul Society on his behalf in a perfect send off, but no… he’s saved by the power of Squad 0’s healing. The same goes for… actually, that’s a spoiler for later in the story, I won’t go there. Anyway once he finds out about his true heritage Ichigo is given a new sword, or a pair of swords, and we see the truth: Ichigo’s hollow spirit was right all along when he said “you idiot, don’t you get it? I’m Zangetsu!” because the spirit he’s been seeing that we now realise looks like a younger Yhwach is actually Ichigo’s Quincy powers who have been following his mother’s instincts by trying to protect Ichigo from harm, including holding back some of his powers, and the other spirit is Zangetsu, admittedly mangled with the hollow powers. It’s fun to look back at certain scenes once this information was revealed.
The other big moments include Kyoraku losing an eye but gaining the position of Captain Commander after his mentor’s death and one of his first decisions in getting peace-loving Squad 4 Captain Unohana to go back to her old self: the first Kenpachi Yachiru Unohana, in order to train the current Kenpachi to stop instinctively holding back his powers to drag the fights out after he lost to Yhwach (after taking out three Sternritters, to be fair…) The fight is pretty nuts and once again really shines with the production value here as Unohana goes full on sadistic kill mode and reveals her Bankai can keep reviving people from death so the fight can go on as long as she wants, and it’s through this method that she powers up Kenpachi until he kills her. Zaraki then hears the voice of his Zanpakuto, something teased way back in the Soul Society arc then dropped until now…
Kenpachi is stripped of his flesh during his battle… and loves it! (the battle more than the skin melting)
So yeah, lot’s of death and destruction on the Shinigami side, but like I said that just sets the stage perfectly for their heroic comeback. Right at the end we also get the big reveal that Uryu has sided with his fellow Quincy, which was a great moment in the manga… sadly ruined here somewhat by it being shown in the opening but hey-ho… Looking forward to seeing some of the crazy fights later in the year, and seeing what else Tite Kubo will add retrospectively…
Hogan Reviews 