Bleach: Could be a decent watch if not for the fillers

Written by Little_Wolf-18 on November 11, 2011 at 6:53 AM

Appeal to all Watchers and Reviewers: Please stop the offenses. I am aware of the virtual war between Bleach, Naruto, and One Piece fanatics, but you should respect that everyone has a different view on the world and on anime. Tolerate your fellow watchers and reviewers. Support this by disliking offending reviews, and by not posting any offenses yourself. Also, please write your reviews in English. Thank you very much.
Gomen nasai (Sorry) to everybody who just wants to peacefully read my review!

---Note: Filler list at the review's end---

Frankly written, in my opinion, “Bleach” has kept going downhill after the first story arc. When watching the first few episodes, I was hooked. What seemed like a quite simplistic, generic fighting story became a plot with quite interesting twists; even if the protagonist was nothing special, I found it to be addictive. The second story arc, I was still watching with interest. The third and fourth, it was starting to get boring. And since then, even if I kept watching, it seemed like a mere waste of time. The beginning was far too promising from my point of view compared to what this anime has turned into. However, I will try to provide you with an objective review, but I will stay honest.

Sad fact is that the anime was started too early. The manga is still in making, and from what I heard, far from its end (I didn’t read it). Such, for the anime can’t stay on the manga’s heels forever, there’s filler episodes which ruin the original story. I’ll provide you all with a list of filler episodes with short introductions and a personal comment each at the end of this review, so if you want, scroll down.

Painful to watch is that there is no kind of transition between the original storyline and the filler, or even between single filler episodes. I think they have been trying to work on that lately, but the transitions are still so obvious it’s painful. One episode a few months ago ended with Ichigo clashing with some kind of enemy; and the next episode, he was standing in Soul Society joking around with Renji, Rukia and the whole crew. I have a feeling that it would be pretty difficult to take a holiday from a fight in real life. And the filler didn’t end at this episode but went on for fifteen eps or more, until I was left headbanging on my desk. Skip the fillers, especially those that are inserted in the middle of an important arc.

In the middle part of this series, there has been a time when seven to fifteen minutes of an episode are spent recapping what happened the episode before. (When they got back from the filler mentioned above, they filled one whole episode with what had happened before the filler.) Seriously, the story isn’t so complex that you’d easily forget about it. They fixed that flaw by now, but it was just another minus to the storyline. The manga might be much better regarding those two issues.

At first, the story was pretty exciting, well paced, with a dynamic storyline, mostly interesting characters, and humour in the right amount and the right places. However, since this promising start, the series has gone downhill. The story is not very deep, unless what could have been thought at the beginning; it is just another “good versus bad” anime. I stumbled over an interesting review saying that wasn’t true and that the villains had their reasons – maybe they do, but where it comes to a person striving for world domination, it isn’t exactly a matter of attitude anymore, is it?

Mostly, the story has become repetitive, and you can easily predict what will happen (not every anime is like this; most at least have a few small surprises. Bleach had as well, but at the beginning, not anymore lately.) Protagonist encounters random villain => random villain defeats protagonist => loads of talk while protagonist recovers => protagonist gets angry at random villain, thus develops more power, returns, and kicks random villain’s arse, no matter how easily that random villain was able to beat him before. This goes on for several arcs, and there is no end in sight. (--SPOILER ALERT – SPOILER ALERT – SPOILER ALERT--) I would have thought that after the main villain’s defeat, which was pretty rushed in relation to that guy’s power by the way, the story would have stopped, but it didn’t. I might just wonder when Aizen breaks free from prison. (--SPOILER END--)

The story seems to have lost its energy. It started off pretty well-paced, but by now, it has gotten slower. I must admit that with the last about seventy episodes I turned the volume off and watched the episodes in double speed (I’m a fast reader so I can easily keep up with the subs). I did miss the music, but that was fine with me.

The many subplots make a good background for the characters, portraying them in a rounder and very complete way since they are shown in very different situations; however, they also break the storyline repeatedly. On the brighter aspect, “Bleach” contains quite an amount of genres, although it is mostly made for action. There’s suspense, mystery, drama, and of course the supernatural or fantasy aspect; then there is humour; and there is lots of friendship, with a little romance strewn between, although the latter mostly depends on the viewer’s interpretation. Most episodes end with cliffhangers, which keeps the viewer on edge as long as there’s no filler following.

I have to comment on the concept, since that is by far the best point to the story issue. Part of the plot is set in a fictional town in modern Japan; in contrast, Soul Society has the architecture and traditions of ancient Japan, somehow with modern technology. And there’s various other dimensions and groups, making the concept a rather creative one.

The story is by far not over; there’s too many mysteries left open for that… and plot holes as well. (SPOILER ALERT, SKIP TO NEXT PARAGRAPH IF YOU STILL PLAN TO WATCH EPISODE 342 – SPOILER ALERT) Differences in power just appear and disappear randomly like soap bubbles. Also, a major plot hole in the recent Fullbring Arc is that Ishida, a Quincy, hunts the Hollows Ichigo can’t hunt anymore; whereas some (long) time before it was said that Quincy destroy Hollow souls, thus pose a danger for the balance of the worlds. However, Ishida doesn’t seem to get any problems, be it by toppling worlds or angry shinigami. -- The fact that Ichigo cannot see Rukia anymore, however, is probably not a mistake. I read the question somewhere in the reviews. Ichigo has had spiritual powers before he met Rukia, since he could see spirits ever since his mother died. He just received kind of a “power-up” from Rukia when she transferred her Death God powers to him. The power he had before and the Shinigami power is of the same kind, just of a different level, with the Shinigami power being cut out for fighting and everything. Now after the defeat of Aizen, Ichigo has been losing all spiritual power, even the he had before meeting Rukia, which would eventually lead to him becoming unable to see spirits. (SPOILER END)

The story, all in all, has become a classic; nothing that has been done before, especially in fantasy works, but it can be enjoyable if you like action which is easy to understand. Some sudden increases in power are quite unbelievable, as well as people winning over their opponents for the most random reasons ever. Also, the anime can be quite profane and violent; thus, I wouldn’t see it as an anime for children, but for mature viewers it seriously could need a more serious storyline.

Moving on to the characters; most of them are quite a decent job, individual with a believable background, although there’s a very high number of characters. Character dynamics and development are overall well thought-out. Each character has unique powers, and even the shinigami squads have their individual strengths and weaknesses. It’s pretty amazing how many characters Tite Kubo has mixed into this; there’s loads of different groups, and even the swords, in a way, have unique personalities. The relationships between the characters are interesting. Little fights popping up here or there can be really funny from time to time.

However, there’s a few hiccups here as well. The character development and relationship seem well thought-out, but not so the plot which builds the base for those. For one, only the “bad” guys die. Yes, a few people from Soul Society did die (Hisana, Kaien), but that was before the original story, and is only shown in flashbacks. (Yes, shinigami can die. They go to heaven afterwards => see Hisana side story.) This anime seems to be afraid of killing the good guys, although I don’t know why. Unimportant characters just disappear – they aren’t killed, they don’t die, they just don’t show up anymore, and you’re left asking yourself “what the hell happened to him/her?”

The protagonist of this whole anime, Ichigo, seems pretty clichéd. For one, the story of “somebody knowing nothing being thrown into a situation where he suddenly has to be the main hero” is nothing new, it usually happens in fantasy works. Lines like “I have to become stronger to protect my friends” – ah, well, the usual. But things like “I have to get stronger so I can save my friends, the world, and the day because there’s that total badass guy out there who could blow up the whole country in one go if he wanted to”… let’s say, it goes a little far. Don’t get me wrong, I like the determination most characters show, but something like that is exaggerated. It’s all about power. What do you expect from a shounen anime? Ichigo defeats people who are way too strong (if you’ve watched the anime, you know what I mean.) Also, his intelligence seems to drop through the series – he wasn’t silly at the beginning, but recently I get the feeling he’s just charging into things without thinking about what he’s doing. And then, he has only one attack: Getsuga Tenshou. Granted, a few stages of that, but it’s still just one attack. No offense, but it reminds me of Naruto’s way of “Rasengan the bad guys into next week”. Also, there’s plenty of strong characters (just look at the captains) but somehow, it’s always Ichigo who’s saving the day with his one attack. Also, Ichigo, like most shounen heroes, tends to push himself to his limit, but at least it doesn’t stay without consequences.

Not bullying Ichigo further; it isn’t hard to see why this anime is so popular. Regarding interpersonal relationships, Bleach focuses strongly on friendship, getting across the message “we’re all in this together; nobody’s an island”. Well, it might get a little exaggerated from time to time (“Let’s all be friends forever”) but generally, it’s one of the very strong values Bleach promotes. Others include hope, trust, loyalty, honesty, and determination – despite or maybe because of all the fighting. So, it isn’t hard to see where all the 5 star reviews come from, but I think Bleach expresses the feelings of young teenagers more than of adults.

The artwork is one of the definite strong points of this anime. Although even here there are a few hiccups (Gin’s eyes change colour during the anime…), the artwork is mostly very detailed and colourful. Kubo Tite has a great sense of design. Also, the characters are drawn with amazing detail and devotion. Facial expressions are drawn and animated in great detail. Also, I love the idea of drawing butterflies to represent spirits.

Something you’ll definitely get your fill of while watching this anime are sky shots. ^_^

For fanservice, there’s a little ecchi content (Matsumoto!) as well as a few bishounen (Byakuya… ^^) so you won’t miss out on that. Sometimes I feel like the ecchi has been exaggerated though… ^^°

The animation started off average, but it has become better, although the animators tend to get a little lazy during filler episodes. There’s many very long and sometimes very random fights, from time to time mostly consisting of cool poses and talking. :? Or the opponents just stare at each other when a fight is about to begin. The techniques, sadly, have been watered down throughout the filler arcs and don’t seem as amazing anymore. Fights are mostly sword fights with more or less use of supernatural powers, but there’s a few scenes of hand-to-hand combat as well. If you love battle-based animes with a little blood and fantasy, this anime might be fine for you, and if you’re a hardcore action lover, it might just be perfect. Pure shounen anime for this topic.

From time to time, however, the battles are a little unbelievable. For one, it happens quite often that moves are explained during fights. Either explain them afterwards to someone clueless or explain them in an omake at the end, but this – we can see what’s happening, and it’s quite uncool to explain your own moves to your opponent. Also, sometimes a fight stops in the middle for some serious talk. Bleach is becoming more of a parody in these instances… and sadly, I’m not into parody anime. Also, there’s sometimes a few seconds between a hit and the fall of the injured person. Or a person falls from somewhere during an attack and screams an attack name which is so long you actually need to pause the video file to read it fully. Being a little closer to reality wouldn’t hurt there, but many people seem to find that funny.

The music is good, mostly not my style, but it fits the atmosphere.

The dialogue is mostly overrated. It gets repetitive to clichéd after a while. There’s loads of talk and explanations, most of which aren’t really needed. However, it’s blunt, thus easy to understand, and I like that each character has an individual way of talking. The translations may not always be good but they sometimes produce comic effects. There are a few instances in the dialogue that make you think, but it’s made rather for comedy and explanations than for emotionality or philosophy. Beware of perversion and vulgarities though.

Generally, this anime is funny in a way; it has quite a dry sense of humour relatable for teens. There are slapstick jokes, sarcasm, and exaggerations equally, which sometimes result in a random injection of humour that have you either fall off your chair or roll your eyes. As a rather typical shounen anime, it isn’t overly emotional (I counted like three really emotional episodes in a series of nearly 350). It’s rather directed towards older kids and younger teenagers, although I must say I wouldn’t recommend it for children because of the violence.

If you’re a hardcore action lover looking for bloody fights and some humour without caring too much about plots or clichéd characters, and if you like anime that never seem to end, Bleach is the right choice for you. If you, however, actually care about plots and characters, hate clichés and vulgarities, you should refrain from watching this. The first arc, even the first two or three, might be good for beginner anime watchers, but there’s not too much behind those arcs anymore.

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List of filler and anime episodes.
Be warned… of filler spoilers.

001-063: Soul Society arc, original story.
064-109: Bounto arc, FILLER although it makes a decent job of looking like it was part of the storyline xD
110-167: Arrancar arc, original story.
168-189: “Captain of the 3rd Division” arc, FILLER
190-229: Rest of the Arrancar arc, original story.
230-255: Zanpakutou rebellion arc, FILLER actually might be interesting if you think it’s interesting that the swords have unique characters. However, it is quite unrealistic that all people beat their swords, which are stronger than themselves. :P
256-265: Sword Beast arc, FILLER basically basing on the Zanpakutou rebellion arc… a filler grown from a filler. -.-
266-316: original story… has something to do with Aizen but I forgot the arc :P
317-341: Reigai rebellion arc, FILLER, has some good action and animation (for everyone who wants to see two Kenpachis clashing… or two Byakuyas :P) other than that no function for the story.
342-currently ongoing (episode 346): Fullbring arc, original story.

I’m pretty sure there are a few lone filler episodes in all this, too, but honestly I don’t have the patience to go through almost 350 episodes to look for those all over again. (Bleach Wiki doesn’t help with that by the way.) You’ll know when you stumble over a filler episode… they’re usually somehow funny but make no sense altogether.

This has to be one of the longest reviews ever on anime-access. Thanks a load to those who actually had the patience to read this ^_^
(I’m just assuming there are people who actually read this fully xD)