#bleach meta

[littleeyesofpallas]

well... after a lot of regret and having to resist the urge to course correct and turn this into a whole different project... I've compiled what is more or less all of the clear-ish-ly visible, unnamed background shinigami in Bleach, plus a few weird inbetween types who aren't unnamed and/or aren't "background" characters per say, but appear so infrequently that they might as well be.

I was going to try and track recurring characters but that quickly became untenable...

I was going to group them by similar looks in order to smooth over the ones that I couldn't be sure were recurring or just similar looking, but that was too much trouble...

I was going to separate out the named from the unnamed but got lazy...

I was going to include a bunch of others for technicality's sake but most of them were basically faceless stickmen in the background...

I was also going to include actual characters but then debated with myself over whether or not to include each of their unique outfits as a point of reference, but that's a whole massive thing all by itself --and I considered it because the idea behind this is sort of to be able to get a sense of what an "average" shinigami looks like, as far as face shapes, hair styles, accessories, etc... so to that end more costume details might have been nice

I know I threw the LN characters at the end but the forgot the other old zaraki, I'm probably not gonna bother fixing it

Other than a lot of generic anime shounen spikes and a few pompadours, and some predictably samurai-like topknots/ponytails, there are actually a surprising number of frizzy hair styles? It's hard to tell if some are more like punch perms or afros at times. Also a lot more glasses than I'd have expected?

And although I didn't expect my passing observation to actually hold true, there are in fact no random women in combat specifically throughout the whole manga. There are girls walking around the seireitei and the gotei facilities. There are specifically a few girls seen in groups of 4th division field medics. And there is just one nurse??? unless they've got a Nurse Joy thing happening. And the background girls are almost all black hair, twin tails, or a bun, and blunt bangs --I can't even tell if some of them might even be the same girl showing back up across different scenes, but i have no way of telling....

#bleach #bleach meta #but is it tho?

[selenestarmoon]

We know that Zangetsu's appearance was exactly the same as Ichigo's because he lacked an asauchi (which is basically a catalyst where the zanpakutō can manifest and shape it appearance however it wishes) but guess what appearance Zangetsu takes after getting an asauchi.

His appearance remains the same as Ichigo's and the only thing different is his face is the hollow mask that hints at the origins of Zangetsu as a product of the fusion between White and Ichigo's soul.

This shows that despite having the opportunity to look whatever he wants, Zangetsu loves Ichigo so much that he even wants to look like him.

As Himiko Toga once said:

Himiko: "Of course you wanna be like the one you love. It's natural. So you end up decking yourself out to look like him. But after enough time, even that's not enough. You literally want to become him. There's no helping it."

#bleach #bleach meta #bleach spoilers #ichigo kurosaki #kurosaki ichigo #zangetsu

[troius]

What we learned from the war

"Endings are hard" is a something of a truism, but it's borne out in Bleach, where every story arc besides after the first two stumbled at the finish (even the endings of the first two arcs don't really "end" so much as continue into a new story). In the Arrancar arc, the number of characters and plotlines got so overwhelming that an ending that had to be rushed if it was to arrive at all. In the Lost Agent arc, the characters were pared down, but the ending wound up thematically inconsistent with the story anyways, possibly due to real-life circumstances. And the Thousand-Year Blood War somehow managed to have both problems.

The change in direction from "tightly focused character drama" to "sprawling cast of soldiers" meant that it was unlikely to ever give us the development of our protagonist that we craved, and that lack of focus was only aggravated by the widely-reported health problems of the author. And yet, perhaps because we don't get that, because so little of this arc is filtered through Ichigo learning about himself, we get a much clearer statement of the values inherent in the work.

This is most evident in our antagonists for this Arc. Yhwach and the Wandenreich don't really have the relationship with Ichigo that previoius antagonists had. He never knew his Quincy heritage, never identified with their ideals, and so feels very little conflict about opposing them. He doesn't ever develop his Quincy powers, at least beyond integrating them with his already existing powerset. And he doesn't take much of a personal interest in Yhwach, who in turn, doesn't seem to think much of him when he's not directly in front of him.

But for all that Ichigo doesn't end up having much of a dynamic with them, the Wandenreich still manages to maintain a unique character. Every antagonist has a priority, something that they are willing to do great evil for. For Soul Society, it's its own existence, the continuation of the system they've built. For Aizen, it's his own self-aggrandizement. For the Fullbringers, it was simply living another day, screwing over others so that they can't screw you first. But the Wandenreich has no such priority. They simply want it all to end.

That's most obvious in Yhwach's ending monologue, but you can see it from the very beginning as he kills Yamamoto, the man who tried to move on from his bloody past being slaughtered by the man who would absolutely not let it go. Yhwach shows more emotion towards the skeletons of Argola and Huberdt, his dead soldiers from a war long lost, than he does towards any of his living subordinates. And his subordinates follow his lead in showing no love to one another, happily stabbing each other in the back without even the Arrancars' uneasy level of camaraderie. Their movement has no future, and neither do they, so nihilism is the only recourse.

Most of the time. I think it's important to note that every time a member of the Wandenreich expresses positive feelings towards one of their comrades, it's immediately followed by them turning on Yhwach. Liltotto, Bazz, Giselle, eventually, in her own twisted way…even Jugram, at the very end. Sure, Yhwach kills them for their impertinence (he is the bad guy), but he also massacres the Wandenreich faithful en masse. There's no salvation, only death, and he'll enforce that state on his followers rather than allow them to discover any alternative.

I imagine the lesson, and the general attitude of the Wandenreich, was not lost on Uryu Ishida. Even in his relative paucity of appearances, it's he who is at the moral center of the arc. His culture, which he had thought was nearly entirely dead, turns out to be alive, and out for vengeance against the people who exterminated them. It's something he probably fantasized about growing up, and I don't blame him for joining. How could he not?

But at the end, he makes the very easy choice. Calling it a matter of "life and death" is a little on the nose, but it's morally quite black and white. Yhwach has no hope for this world, or for his people within it, or even himself. He lost a war for the nature of existence to a monster a thousand years ago, and never got over it. But Uryu has the strength to look at the horrors of this world and yet hope for better. Because he has people he loves in life, and who love him in return, he can dream of a better tomorrow.

And that's what the ending is all about. Yhwach loses to Ichigo, and it is very much "good guy beats bad guy". But he also loses to Uryu, and to "I hope to have a family with my girlfriend who I love so much" Renji Abarai, and to "I have a tremendous amount of hope to eventually make myself king of everything" Sosuke Aizen, and eventually (in a way I'm still confused about mechanically) to the child Ichigo and Orihime will eventually have, the literal embodiment of the potential of the future.

The final villain of Bleach is not society's tendency to preserve itself at any human cost. It's not individual selfishness, or manipulativeness, or any of the many vices we saw embodied in the hollows throughout the series. It's despair, the idea that life might not be worth living even through all the struggles and horrors our protagonists have endured. Sure, it will always raise its head, sometimes at the most inconvenient, or ill-fitting times. But having its reincarnation be blown away by the supernaturally normal lives of our cast…well, that's as clear of a message as I can imagine.

#bleach #troius reads bleach #bleach meta #this turned out way more positive than I thought it would? #I dunno I guess I just think “choose life” is a pretty great message for a comic book aimed at teenagers #who would have thought the Wandenreich would win me over in the end #even if I still think their aesthetic is kinda silly

[bleachbleachbleach]

Been thinking about Shinji and Momo and specifically abt them in relations to the system or the ideal of the system that kind of screwed them over. With Shinji being unjustly thrown out and no one rlly fully unpacking how much of an HR concern was Aizen’s weird boundaries with Momo. You once mentioned in one of ur posts abt Shinji that the Vizards for sure do not come back with full trust in the soul society again and have their own agendas. This makes me wonder how Shinji and Momo navigate that system together now that both of them have made the decision to continue to serve under it? Momo, herself does come across as duty bound but has shown instances of acting against it when she feels the need to for the sake of the greater good (like disobeying orders to save hisagi, or admitting that not all laws are good laws even if she’s technically quoting Aizen) Sorry for the rambling! These two just fascinate me cuz I feel like aside from the whole Aizen thing, they’re like two diff flavors of being back on the job after being screwed over. The somewhat jaded mentor and the eager beaver who got the rug thrown under her.

We joke about Gotei HR all the time, but honestly in the context of their own world and worldviews would Aizen and Hinamori come across to anyone as having weird boundaries? I’m not saying it didn’t get weird but I kind of feel like part of the nature of the thing is that it’d be hard for anyone in Soul Society to point to anything Aizen did that was notably weirder than anything else everyone else does. I’m not saying it wouldn’t be an HR violation somewhere (I just completed my state-mandated sexual harassment training three days ago, so it’s all nice and fresh, LOL) but even if the Gotei had HR I doubt it would have helped in Aizen and Hinamori’s case.

I know there are people who get very deep into canonicity debates about whether Aizen and Hinamori ever slept with each other, but I’m not personally all that interested in the genre as a whole—like, the nailing down of what is or isn’t canon. In fanfic, I figure anything goes if you can make it work for you in your story. For my part, I think Aizen would take pride in not having to have sex with Hinamori in order to make his plans work. Like an *everyone* does sexual manipulation but he doesn’t even *have* to and that’s the *beauty* of the game kind of deal.

But to the question itself!

My take on Shinji is that he is, of course, very well aware of the ways the Gotei fucked him and the rest of the Vizard, and has no illusions about that. But he’s not someone who simmers in that in the same way that Hiyori does.

Honestly, maybe a good comparison might be that Shinji treats the Gotei the way he treated Aizen as a vice-captain. According to Aizen, that was a mistake, but Shinji knows the Gotei better than he ever knew Aizen. Arguably, the Gotei is more knowable than Aizen. Shinji has a certain savvy about him with respect to the Gotei as an institution, and if you now how it works, then there are degrees to which it can be managed, and perhaps even made to work for you. And if you want that to happen, the only place you can do that work is inside it, as one of its Captains. Shinji’s known that since even before TBTP, probably since before he was even himself a Captain the first time around.

But I think another key element here is that Shinji is very, very good at separating the work from the institution from the people. He can engage his octopus brain and hold the meaning of what shinigami effect in the world separate from the ethical and bureaucratic conundrums posed by the Gotei, separate from the personalities that make it up (which are the problem and the best part about the Gotei in turns). He reminds me of this guy who’s been in my toxic-ass profession for AGES but still has a ton of energy and capacity for wonder and enthusiasm and being smart in ways that make everyone smarter, and he manages this by being absolutely ruthless about not getting all sopped up by departmental drama or overly precious about ~the profession~ and making very intentional decisions about what matters and what absolutely doesn’t. I think having that as a model was incredibly useful for Hinamori, as someone with a propensity to care deeply for and about everything.

I mentioned in the tags of another post that I envisioned Hinamori as having a healing justice orientation to the world, part of which is about locating “evil” outside of individuals. It is not inherent, but made. While this does not absolve Aizen of his actions or their supporting worldviews, a path to forgiveness is at least partly about recognizing the bigger picture that produced the conditions for the fomenting of these views/plans. (And that’s before the many ways the system failed them in ways that didn’t come directly through Aizen.) Which means that moving past Aizen is also about moving past the Gotei/Soul Society, while also continuing to work for it—in a major, responsible way.

Like, Hinamori is not clocking in to sweep the floors and then leave to her wife and kids. She’s leading the thing. So what’s the journey there? We see her reclaim her role as 5th Division Vice-Captain in the Winter War (as distinct from being Aizen’s Vice-Captain—ymmv on this, like Matsumoto’s does). In that role, Hinamori has not seemed to have much of a problem with challenging authority when she felt it just to do so, even in moments of more even temper (shouting at Byakuya over Renji’s unconscious body lol). Which I feel like lends credence to the idea that Aizen’s betrayal was probably not her introduction to the world being often an unjust and deeply painful place, or even to the Gotei being these things. Like, I think she understood that. Maybe Aizen even talked to her about that, and part of why she liked him so much was the opportunity to have these long, intellectual conversations about philosophy and governance. And what do you do at the end of these conversations? You can be bitter and angry about it; you can be angry and want to burn it down; you can drink the Kool-Aid and become complicit in it; you can naively deny it and either become complicit in it or get destroyed by it; or you can—

Do what Shinji and Hinamori do about it together, which is to resolve to be the energy they wish to see in the world, which in their interpretation also requires some complicity—being officers in Gotei—and, having made that choice, periodically needing to process that. I mean, I think that’s part and parcel of being involved in any kind of institution (I know I think about it allllll the fucking time), but I imagine the experience is further magnified by the particular histories Shinji and Hinamori have with the Gotei.

I imagine sometimes—a rough week at the office, or in the aftermath of a Blood War they wonder if they aren’t being too complicit. Or, conversely, if they aren’t echoing Aizen too much, in their resolution to craft a world of their own devising. But they were different people, both from each other and very much from Aizen; their devices and visions are different, too. And so the fear falls away.

It will come back. It will probably never leave. But sometimes it’s better to be haunted than not, and ghosts can be welcome reminders.

#i'll reiterate our standing invitation to all tumblr anons #please make a blog! join the fandom! we want to engage in dialogic communications with you and also be friends! #conversation is so rare on this platform and that makes me sad #hirako shinji #hinamori momo #bleach meta #bleach headcanons #asks #no brain just bleach

[enby-axels]

it's so fitting that ichigo is a translator, and not just bc he's canonically a shakespeare nerd and studied english in uni. like it fits on a thematic level. the entire series is about ichigo gaining community throughout different worlds, wanting power only bc he wants to protect his loved ones (not for any grand ambitions), finally accepting his human limitations, and slowly opening up his heart. of course he has a "normal" human job. and of course the job in question is translating—or rather, building bridges between "normal," human worlds

#bleach #bleach meta #my meta #character analysis #kurosaki ichigo

[chaoticreivingu]

You can't make this up

Ichigo literally dreams of seeing Hanataro in a swimsuit and Hanataro carrying him when he passes out unconscious.

Not only that, the next time we see Ichigo's dream in Brave Souls he's dreaming about Hanataro again, getting flustered when Yoruichi asks if it was a different kind of dream.

#Yoruichi not understanding the concept of Ichigo liking men #🏳️‍🌈? #canon #bleach #bleach meta #bleach brave souls #queer coding #gay coded #ichigo kurosaki #kurosaki ichigo #ichigo #hanataro yamada #yamada hanataro #hanataro #yoruichi shihouin #shihouin yoruichi #yoruichi #kon #kon bleach #bleach kon #ichihana #ichigo x hanataro

[takibikaen]

Why Isane still went after Rose and Kensei's bodies

lmao the screenshots

My first thought was that she didn't believe Gremmy saying they were dead but then I read the chapters for this episode and she did scan their pulse so she know they were dead in the manga. Then, I remembered the Echoing Jaws of Hell Arc one-shot Kubo wrote.

The Reisai ritual from the Hell arc

Renji talks about how captains who died in battle would get this ritual and we also know that shinigami who are greater than third class reishi are captains and they have to be cast into Hell. Kensei and Rose are Vizards adding to being captains so they would fit that category after the war if they weren't saved by Mayuri.

Now of course, most of the captains including Kurotsuchi, Soi Fon, and others didn't even know about the true purpose of the ritual so how could Isane know about it? (Even though the true purpose doesn't need to be known to do it)

Eh, I would just chalk it up to her being Unohana's lieutenant and Unohana being a OG Gotei 13 and the head canon of her having to send her fellow captains to Hell and knowing she would soon be in it.

Anyways, I kept seeing people asking why she went after their bodies when they were dead already and thought of this.

#isane kotetsu #bleach tybw #bleach #kensei muguruma #rojuro otoribashi #bleach hell arc #bleach meta #bleach headcanons

[berrymascarpone]

A Brief Tour of Seireitei

So I’ve been reading the Soul Society Arc again after finishing the Bleach manga a while back and now that all the plot tension has already been resolved, I’ve found myself looking at the scenery. And by scenery, I mean the architecture and city planning of Seireitei.

Now, the good thing is Ichigo and co really get around a bit in this arc, not to mention the cuts to the captains and lieutenants doing there thing in the background, so here’s a brief tour following along with them.

The first thing we notice about Seireitei is that clearly they spend much more on infrastructure in the city than in Rukongai. That is where all your tax money has gone folks, to nice tiled roofs, whitewashed walls, fancy windows.

But also, considering the magically appearing wall that just straight up falls from the sky when you go near, it’s probably a good idea to have some way of demarcating where you have to stay away from in order to stay un-pancaked.

(Also electrical wires? Just what era is their infrastructure from?)

It looks like there’s a pretty open layout here, but later on, the streets get more labrythine, with long walls splitting the space into narrow roadways.

However, from above, it appears that these complicated halls are actually just blocks of mazes, separated by normal roads. Are they compounds? Is this just the geography of that particular area? Are they individual houses? Who lives there?

And although the streets look pretty narrow from these angles, another ground angle shows that they are actually pretty wide. But also, you might run into something like, uh this.

We all knew the Gotei 13 was pretty fucked up, but uh, yeah. Makes me wonder which earlier generation captain had this installed.

Anyways, after destroying many of those walls, Ichigo and Ganju eventually make it below the uniformly tiled floors to make it to the sewers (or are they storm drains? They feel very tall for sewers.

These remind me somewhat of the Tokyo Metropolitan Area Outer Underground Discharge Channel, which I had to look up once for a fic, so that makes me think it’s more of a stormwater system. Also, apparently they don’t mark their manhole covers in Seireitei? And it looks kinda fragile too, what with only that tiny little ledge to hold up such a big board. What happens when a particularly heavy person (and we know there are some real big boys in the Gotei 13) steps on one of these tiles and falls through? I imagine Komamura and Zaraki Kenpachi have learned to memorize the locations these manhole covers, or they accidentally step through the floor every few blocks.

Once we exit the underwater canals, we arrive at Sōkyoku Hill, the most scenic view of Seireitei, and also where they lock up and execute their prisoners. I guess they would at least get a good view before they die?

Not only is it on a hill, but the architecture takes quite a brutalist turn. All square blocks and flat tops (except for the nice little row of towers up there? And also a few sky bridges, for the scenic view.)

As a side note, this area appears to be surrounded by several warehouse-like buildings. Not sure if it’s actual warehouses, and this is the prison/industrial district of Seireitei, but interesting to note.

But also, when Ichigo and Renji absolutely wreck a few of these buildings in their fight they appear to contain…absolutely nothing?? Like not even some broken furniture, or debris.

Anyways, after a bit of regrouping back in the underground waterways (which also have some room-like areas a bit further away from the water…for…reasons…) our heroes finally venture forth into brutalist architecture wonderland.

I assume this area is a prison complex, since, judging by the texture, it appears to be made out of Sekkiseki, the reiatsu-suppressing stone. Also interesting to note, the buildings appear to be placed haphazardly, at odd angles. Is this to confuse invaders and/or escaped prisoners? Is it because their city planning consisted of Yamamoto scribbling out something on a napkin? Is it because this hill was one big sekkiseki deposit and they had to carve buildings out from the ground, so their planning had to follow the natural contours? And why is there absolutely no one here? Like the empty warehouses, this area seems to be abandoned. Are there not enough prisoners, or did the last crisis in Soul Society wipe out enough people that there aren’t enough to fill these houses? Is it like those fake buildings that are actually subway stations and the top part is just for show?

Anyways, it seems like I’ve hit the limit on the number of images I can add on the mobile app, so I’ll continue in a part 2 once I get around to it.

#bleach #bleach meta #bleach worldbuilding #seireitei architecture #such an interesting place #why is it so big and yet so empty

[sunflowersandcherryblossoms]

Here's something the crossed my mind yesterday...

These idiots show up like the entire Seireitei wasn't mourning, claiming that defending it wasn't their job, (which I call bullshit...) being noisy assholes, being rude and disrespectful to everyone around...

And then, they take away (by breaking in the 4th squad, may I remind you...) Renji, Rukia and Byakuya.

It all rubs me the wrong way and made me hate Squad Zero with a fucking passion!

By I was thinking about Kirinji and Uhohana's interaction....

What if this reason was a lie? What if Kirinji is just taking advantage of Unohana's emotional disarray over seeing the Seireitei ravaged, having just lost Yamamoto and probably already knowing she's about to face Kenpachi and all that entails?

He plants the seeds of doubts about her healing abilities, he "offers" his "help" and in the meantime these people who are shady as fuck now have a hold on the four people who are the closest to each other.

THESE are a tight knit team!

And you may think "Well, they're going to recover together, train together, fight together.", right....?

Except we know they don't!

The first thing they do is separate Renji and Ichigo from the other two (still recovering, I know...) and then as @mondengel already explained beautifully in a previous post, they reach Nimaya where Renji and Ichigo get very different treatments that is probably engineered to break the latter even more.

After that, poor Ichigo is thrown into Ichibei's hands and completely cut aside from the other three. ( with his mind filled with doubts and, probably, a certain dismay over being kicked when he was already down, while Renji got a pat in the back...)

We don't know, because we're not shown, but I think it's unfortunately implied that Ichigo's entire training his separated from Renji, Rukia and Byakuya...

Ichibei wants him to lose. Needs him to lose. He wants a new, more powerful pawn to encase in that crystal prison.

For that to succeed, the Kuchikis must be away from Ichigo, lest all of them together came to the conclusion that Squad Zero aren't interested in Ichigo's success.

It's only by absolute luck (for Ichigo) that Byakuya never loses sight of what and who really matters in this war, ending up by destroying Ichibei's plans by sending Rukia and Renji to the Soul King's palace to help Ichigo...

So, I think Squad Zero had planned to take those four people and try to drive and wedge between Ichigo and them... Because they could better control them close by.

It's just that they got unlucky by underestimating Ichigo, Rukia, Byakuya and Renji's attachment, trust and concern towards and between each other.

They also kind of forgot Byakuya is no fool...

#bleach #byakuya kuchiki #ichigo kurosaki #renji abarai #rukia kuchiki #squad zero #retsu unohana #bleach meta

[littleeyesofpallas]

O FOR FUCKSSAKE. how did I miss all these years that MAYURI'S name is in katakana[マユリ] and not kanji because it's just straight up NOT JAPANESE. It's the Sanskrit word Mayuri[मयूरी]: peacock. It's why his hair is peacock blue. And why his neck pillow had peacock feather "eye" patterns on it originally

It's not even a matter of my limited vocab either because it's still like one of THE most common Indian words in English speaking countries just because it keeps showing up in Indian restaurant names

Like goddamn. Fuck me

In my defense it IS still also a Japanese name: 真結里, 真百合, 真優里, 真友梨, 真友里, 真悠里, 真有里, 真柚里, 真由利, 真由理, 真由里, 真由莉, 真祐理, 真裕理, 摩由璃, 眉利, 眉莉, 舞百合, 摩友織, 摩由璃, 摩由莉, 麻百合, 麻佑里, 麻優里, 麻友梨, 麻友理, 麻有里, 麻由利, 麻由理, 麻由里, 麻祐理, 麻夕里, 繭李, 繭梨, 繭里, 万百合, 万佑里, 万友梨, 万由利, 万由梨, 万由理, 万由里, 万由莉, 万祐理, 眞百合, 眞優李, 茉百合, 茉優莉, 茉友梨, 茉由梨, 茉由理, 茉由里, 茉由莉, 茉祐理

(every single one of those is a way to write the name "Mayuri" with different meanings, and they're all women's names)

And while we're here

Kurotsuchi[くろつち], KuroTsuchi[黒土]: Black Soil

Kurotsuchi[涅] Mud/Slime

But then Nehan[涅槃] Nirvana

So Mayuri Kurotsuchi basically scans like

"Peacock Slime"/"Peacock Nirvana"

God no wonder Mayuri is one of Kubo's favorite characters

#bleach meta #kurotsuchi mayuri

[linkspooky]

Here's a Bleach ask for you, what do you make of the relationship between Ichigo and Grimmjow during the arrancar arc and the narrative value of their dynamic?

Grimmjow's relationship with Ichigo is one of the best written character rivalries in the series, because much like Uluiorra he's a near perfectly crafted foil and jungian shadow of Ichigo. The only difference really between his foiling between Grimmjow, and his foiling between Ulquiorra is that the confrontation between Grimmjow helps Ichigo grow, while his relationship with Ulquiorra is entirely destructive and stunts his growth for a long time after the fact.

1. Hail to the king, baby.

Grimmjow isn't just Ichigo's enemy, he practically is Ichigo under different circumstances, the similarities betwen them run so deep. My greatest evidence for this of course is how much Grimmjow's motivations and actions resemble that of Hichigo / Zangetsu, the literal mirror to Ichigo's soul made up of his repressed desires.

Grimmjow's words, reflect Hichigo's words, which reflect Ichigo's words as well. Hichigo tries to assume control of Ichigo's body, because he believes Ichigo lacks both the desire and resolve to win because he is too afraid of internal desires like Zangetsu and has suppressed them.

Grimmjow's desire to become king, reflects Hichigo's speech about the horse and the king, that if he doesn't rule over his own emotions, that if he doesn't use his power to win then he won't be king anymore and will be ruled by someone else. As much as it seems to be deviating away from Ichigo's true goal of protecting his friends to care more about winning fights then the action of protection, Ichigo also can't help or protect anyone if he is too insecure or too unwilling to fight with everything he has.

Grimmjow also much like HIchigo, only exists in the first place because he is a strong enough Gillian that he retained his personality by consuming all of the other Gillian around him, and was able to maintain himself. He is similiar to Hichigo, and the hollow part of Ichigo's soul in general, suddenly born in emptiness given intelligence and the only way to maintain that intelligence is to fight. A smaller part of a greater whole, threatening to consume Ichigo from the inside out if he does not rule him. If Grimmjow does not fight and eat other hollows, he'll just stop existing. If Ichigo is too weak and dies, then HIchigo will stop existing as well, which is why he will hijack the body in crisis situations and soemtimes even believes he could do a better job fighting than Ichigo could.

Grimmjow and Hichigo both desire to become king, to dominate others through their power, and it's not just a selfish desire for power that fuels this, they need to fight and win in order to survive. This is also not an entirely selfish desire on Grimmjow's part, because for instance Ichigo also wants to win. The only way he can protect his friends is to gain strength and win, otherwise he's useless. Hollows are apparently empty creatures without emotions and yet Grimmjow was the king over subordinates and apparently a good enough leader that they were all willing to sacrifice their lives for him.

Which is the precise moment that Grimmjow becomes a darker reflection for Ichigo's character, because Ichigo may desire to win, he may desire to be king, but that selfish desire is also balanced by the selflessness that he mainly uses that power for the others around him. Contrast this to Grimmjow who having lost those subjects by having consumed everything around him, he has no real reason to be king.

Having no connection to the world around him, Grimmjow seeks to die by Ichigo's blade rather than just suffer the humiliation of the loss to him, because fighting is literally the only thing he has to give his life worth and meaning.

Each Hollow represents an aspect / means of death, and Grimmjow's death is by destruction. Despite his desire to be king and ruler, he has effectively lived his life (Unlife?) by destroying everything around him until there is nothing left, and there is no end to that path except self-destuction.

When Ichigo stops him despite the fact they are mortal enemies, despite the fact Soul Reapers live to fight Hollows (though, they don't kill them, quincies do but killing hollows and eradiacting their existence has always been bad, Soul Reapers have a duty to cleanse them so they can return to the cycle of souls), it's a healthy move on Ichigo's part because he's telling both Grimmjow and himself that there's more to life than just battle, and that living to fight another day is more important than dying out of shame for the loss.

2. Howling

Grimmjow functions as a jungian shadow to Ichigo as much as Zagnetsu does, he is just externalized rather than internalized. There's a rich dirge of symbolism to how Grimmjow represents the primal, repressed part of Ichigo's mind that he does not see.

To explain what a Jungian Shadow is briefly.

Jung regarded the shadow as unconscious—id and biography—suppressed under the superego's ego-ideal.[12] The shadow is projected onto one's social environment as cognitive distortions. Contrary to a Freudian definition of shadow, the idea can include everything outside the light of consciousness and may be positive or negative. Because a subject can repress awareness or conceal self-threatening aspects of the self, consensus of the idea of the shadow that it is a negative function in the self, despite the extent of the repression failing to prohibit these aspects.[16] There are positive aspects that can remain hidden in one's shadow—especially in people with low self-esteem, anxieties, and false beliefs—with these aspects being brought to the conscious mind and exercised through analysis and therapy. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_(psychology)

Ichigo is incredibly repressed, his struggle throughout the series is to try to make sense and find balance within the several different parts of his soul, his quincy self, his soul reaper self, his human self, his hollow self. Zangetsu similiarly not simply Ichigo's evil side, but rather a mix of the traits he has repressed both good and bad. For example, as much as Zangetsu sometimes threatens to hijack Ichigo's body, he also does so out of love because Ichigo cares more about protecting others whereas the one Zangetsu wants to protect most of all is Ichigo.

The shadow isn't just repressed desires though, it's also theorized by Jung to be constructed of our instincts.

 Jung construed [...] the personal shadow, [as] a biological and biographical shadow unique to each person, consisting of whatever innate instincts and transpersonal potentials we have suppressed in the course of adapting to society, along with archaic and traumatic memories [of the unconscious]. [...] The personal shadow is rooted in the shadow of our social group, which has moulded our ego-ideal and world view[.]  Humphrey, Caroline (2015). "Shadows Along the Spiritual Pathway". 

Instinct, is not only what Zangetsu says that Ichigo is lacking and why he can't master his hollow self or be the king.

Grimmjow is also, literally an animal. He's a big kitty. Hollows rip off their masks to take more human forms, and then when they release their swords return to the shape of the animals they began as. Grimmjow's motivations are almost pure animal instinct, fight, kill, eat, survive.

There is so much jungian symbolism in bleach it isn't even funny, Tarot is made up of Jungian ideas, and the tarot card that has the most in common with a jungian shadow is the moon.

One of the biggest symbols of the moon card is the dual image of the dog and the wolf, howling up at the moon. The dog is the domesticated animal, the wolf the undomesticated primal instinct. The dog the disciplined part of our conscious mind we are in controll of, the wolf the unconscious mind made up of what we cannot see and cannot control.

The Moon represents your fears and illusions and often comes out when you are projecting fear into your present and your future, based on your past experiences. You may have a painful memory that caused emotional distress, and rather than dealing with the emotions you pushed them down deep into your subconscious. Now, these emotions are making a reappearance, and you may find yourself under their influence on a conscious or subconscious level. 

And, what does Zangetsu translate to?

Zangetsu (斬月, Slaying Moon) is the manifested spirit of Ichigo Kurosaki's Zanpakutō as well as his inner Hollow. Getsuga Tenshō (月牙天衝, Moon Fang Heaven-Piercer; Viz "Moon-Fang Piercer of the Heavens") is a Zanpakutō technique of Ichigo Kurosaki's Zangetsu and Isshin Kurosaki's Engetsu.

Ichigo's zanpakuto is literally named after the fact that he uses his literal repressed shadow in order to fight against his opponent, and Zangetsu takes the form more often than not, of Ichigo's reflection. Ichigo's internal world is literally an empty city over an ocean where half the city is above the ocean and half is bellow it. It's not subtle, ya'll.

Grimmjow represents how those internal fears and anxieties are a part of Ichigo. They are one in the same the domesticated dog, and the wolf. Ichigo is the king as a man, Grimmjow is the king of beasts. As I said they even have the same desire, Ichigo's desire to win is for the sake of bringing his comrades home, whereas Grimmjow's desire to win is inspired by the fact his comrades believed in him so much they were literally willing to lay down their lives and let him eat them.

Grimmjow reflects all those aspects positive and negative, he is also just in general, an ID character.

The id is the animal part of the personality, an unconscious drive to have lots of sex, survive, and thrive. It urges you to push in and eat your weight in cake. The ego is where the conscious mind lives. It's lumbered with the tricky job of satisfying the id's wild desires in a realistic and socially acceptable way.

Hunger is the word for Grimmjow, his hollow hole is literally in his stomach, his tragic backstory is he had to kill and eat his own allies, he's modeled after a panther which is a predator at the top of the food chain. However, these are also all things Ichigo needs to survive. Hichigo says as much, he needs an insatiable hunger, a ravenous bloodlust... and the id may seem selfish but if we don't eat we can't live. Just like how Ichigo's way of defeating Zangetsu is to admit to those desires that both Zangetsu and Grimmjow represents. He is once again, stabbed straight through the stomach, the same place where Grimmjow's hole is.

The only thing that gives him the strength is his desire to have his sword back and not have it get taken away from him, Zaraki of all people appears in his mind and tells him that he has a very selfish desire to keep on getting into fights and getting stronger (much like Grimmjow) however it's not entirely negative because once again Ichigo needs this killer instinct withint himself in order to win, because winning is living.

Ichigo's greatest moment of character grwoth in the fight comes when he uses his strength not only to protect Orihime, but to proect himself, the same way Hichigo does not want him to die, Orihime does not want to see him hurt, and that moment strikes Ichigo's growth.

Which is once again just how positive Ichigo and Grimmjow's relationship is, that it's only by facing Grimmjow Ichigo is pushed to learn these things about himself, only by accepting someone like Grimmjow can he accept the more negative aspects of his own self and grow past them rather than succumbing to him.

#grimmjow jaegerjaquez #ichigo kurosaki #orihime inoue #grimmichi #bleach meta #bleach theory #bleach analysis #bleach #bleach monday #happy bleach monday again!!! #let's see if i can do one more #metasks

[alexiethymia]

In relation to that earlier (crack)post, it dawns on me that for all that they call him ‘Aizen-taichou’, neither of Aizen’s vice-captains really choose him.

Sure, Aizen has only disdain for bonds, but I’m also of the interpretation that he tried to replicate at least a facsimile of them through twisted ways - loyalty, dependence etc. - but it always boiled down to no one would ever be able to understand him because no one was at his level, so he discards them.

What makes a prodigy? Age? If so, Nanao would be considered one. Intellect? But no one really alludes to either Hirako or Urahara as a prodigy. Maybe potential, and if so it would make sense that Gin and Hitsugaya are referred to as prodigies. And it would make sense to show that Aizen was at around the same age (at least physically) as Gin when he started to question everything. Despite being prodigies, Gin and Hitsugaya had what Aizen didn’t - people who understood them and made sure they didn’t feel too “other”. From his perspective, I could easily imagine Aizen perceiving his fellow prodigies as being held back by those bonds, at not even attempting to nurture their potential to be ‘god-like’. I am also of the theory that Aizen did want to bring Hitsugaya into the fold, or that he had a sense of his potential so if he wasn’t going to be under his control like Gin, then he had to be cut down.

But going back, when I say that neither of Aizen’s vice-captains choose him, this is prefaced with the context that both Gin and Hinamori were people he cultivated for years, maybe even centuries. Aizen showed Gin his true face (or as true as it could be knowing that Gin meant to kill him) while showing Hinamori the ideal captain, the image of the best captain even. But unlike Gin’s vice-captain who fights Hinamori to defend him (no matter how sick and self-loathing it made him feel deep inside), Hinamori despite being ordered by Aizen himself couldn’t manage to avenge him (she didn’t even try to her fullest capabilities). This was not in Aizen’s plans, and he even says it himself. Aizen was one of the most revered Captains, and he intentionally manipulated Momo to become dependently loyal on him, to the point that, he alleges, ‘she couldn’t live without him’. But if both were a test of loyalty, Kira passed his while Hinamori didn’t. And Gin rewards this (in a twisted sort of way) by involving Kira just enough that he could make sure that he and Rangiku were outside the blast point.

I could easily believe that Aizen intentionally did make Momo fall in love with him (his use of the words, ‘as a man’ in his letter for example), but unlike Hitsugaya who was ready to commit murder and treason just to keep Hinamori away from threats, she couldn’t fully severe that connection with Hitsugaya to avenge him. For all that Aizen seems to be above Hitsugaya and Gin, and they both lose to him, they will always have something he will never have. Even later, Momo despite the centuries of hypnosis chooses to stand on the battlefield against him.

In other words, in that confrontation, as a vice-captain, Hinamori couldn’t do for him what Kira did for Gin, and as someone who ‘loved’ or ‘admired’ him, she couldn’t do for him what Hitsugaya was willing to do for her, and this is after years and years of intentional emotional manipulation. For all of his ambitions, he failed to be the most important person for someone he intended to mold for that exact same purpose. And this is why in the realm of canon and headcanon, I do believe that as much as Hitsugaya hates Aizen, Aizen also hates Hitsugaya, just as much, insofar as someone like Aizen is capable of hatred. This is where you can see Aizen’s surface level understanding of bonds, as well as his being an unreliable narrator. His plan was for Kira and Hitsugaya to kill her, both people shown to love her, and when they couldn’t do it, for him as the person she ‘loves’ to deal the final blow. Did he really think that either Kira or Hitsugaya could actually go through with it? Maybe because he assumed that Momo actually would (because he knows the lengths Hitsugaya would go through and suspects the same of Gin, so as someone she ‘loves’ he might have had that same expectation of her).

He made sure she knew who was the one to hurt her, and he did it in the cruelest way possible. When I think about his overall plan, the interaction in Central 46 never had to happen. He already had his distraction. He didn’t have to deal death blows to both Hinamori and Hitsugaya, especially since no one at the execution knew what was going on at Central 46. In fact, it was because of that interlude that Unohana was able to warn the rest of the Gotei. But that wasn’t just an interlude. It really was part of his plan to kill Hinamori because ‘she couldn’t live without him’. Or maybe he convinced himself of that fact.

Even with Gin. For all that he says it was all part of his plan, and that he only kept Gin around because he knew Gin was going to kill him, I find it difficult to believe that he told Gin Kyouka Suigetsu’s weakness with that in mind. This is where his being an unreliable narrator comes in. When all is said and done, he can just claim it was all part of his plan. But I noticed he let his guard down when Gin claims to have killed Rangiku, and that he acknowledges that he could have been wrong about Gin having feelings for Rangiku. It seems to me that having another prodigy who was against Soul Society was something that he maybe wanted? And that he was just waiting for Gin to fully cut off those ties (to Rangiku) and prove his loyalty, in a manner of speaking.

So showing both his true face and his ideal face didn’t secure him the loyalty that he [wanted]. All the pieces fell into place, but it was actually his vice-captains who acted against his expectations. He claims it was Hirako’s rejection or suspicion that allowed him to hollowfy the Vizards, but even when he actually and actively exerted his influence over them, still neither of his vice-captains choose him. Even Urahara, who he considers an intellectual equal, still does nothing about the Soul King despite knowing the truth, because Urahara also has existing bonds he wishes to take care of. No matter how many people he hurt and defeated, and no matter that he considers it all a part of his plan, no matter that he doesn’t consider bonds important in the first place, ultimately Aizen was rejected on every front.

#bleach #bleach meta #aizen sousuke #hitsuhina #ginran #ichimaru gin #hinamori momo #hitsugaya toshiro #matsumoto rangiku #hirako shinji #urahara kisuke #I love squad 5 dynamics #there’s so much betrayal #ramblings about bleach

[vahvah]

I really don't understand people who love Gin and hate Kaname at the same time. No, really, think about this for a second before you go back to your blind, fanatical love for cute boys (of course, I'll go back to that too).

Gin acted like a bastard, hurting people, killing, dooming people to death for about a hundred years because, well, as a child he saw what Aizen's minions did to Rangiku (almost sapped her powers as a soul). He realized that Aizen is a dangerous, cruel psychopath who poses a threat to three worlds. Honestly, I don’t remember canonical materials on whether Aizen shared with Gin the truth about the structure of the three worlds (about the Soul King as a puppet of Squad Zero, etc.), but even if Gin knew how ugly the setting of Bleach is - I believe he believed that putting him in the hands of Aizen, who did not care about the lives of civilians and even loyal subordinates, would be madness. His motivation makes sense, it shouldn't be reduced JUST to revenge for Rangiku, especially since she survived.

On the other hand, Kakyo (Tousen's friend/lover, in case you didn't know) didn't survive. Tokinada killed her (and the other shinigami), not for the sake of a higher goal that “justifies” the means, but because he was a sick bastard who liked to torture and kill, just like that. Yes, he also knew the truth about the Soul King, but he handled it differently than Aizen. And, well, being a vicious aristocrat, he used every opportunity provided by the clan to avoid punishment, and he was FAR from the only one of his kind. Kaname was trampled, the Soul Society system literally shouted in his face about its injustice, and Aizen was the only one who extended a helping hand to him. Aizen trusted Kaname, and Tousen asked him to kill himself so that he would never end up on the side of the Gotei 13.

(I think Aizen trusted Gin too, because at the moment of his betrayal, he actually looks shocked - it was not part of his plan lol).

I think Kaname and Gin were very similar and both suffered similar sins and can be understood.

#bleach #kaname tousen #gin ichimaru #sosuke aizen #bleach meta

[bleachbleachbleach]

You can't kill my vibe

Like many others, I have been both enchanted and intrigued by the new TYBW opening theme song, "Stars." It has everything! Modern living world fashion! Coffee shop AU! Karaoke sing off! But I think the thing that has really captured everyone’s attention is whatever the hell Ichigo is doing with that guitar.

[TYBW OP 2]

At first glance there’s some things we can infer. Ichigo’s zanpakutou has been reforged and now he’s a dual wielder. He absolutely has no idea what he’s doing and needs to relearn how to use his sword, so of course he’s going to be clumsy and awkward in the beginning. But if Ichigo has one thing going for him, it’s gonna be his ability to just Square Peg Round Hole his way through any situation. No technique needed, if you can blunt force trauma your way through.

Notably, there are very few characters in Bleach with multiple swords (Ukitake and Kyouraku) and both of them I think we can go so far as to say have achieved mastery, as they have bankai and are Old (TM). So that’s great! Ichigo has some role models to look up to and can be inducted into the dual-wielder Hall of Fame!

Taking a closer look at the guitar in the OP though, it’s not just any double-neck guitar. Ichigo appears to be holding a Gibson EDS-1275, which is the “coolest guitar in rock” according to the Wikipedia page. While never widely used, the guitar was played by a couple of famous musicians such as Elvis Presley, Steve Miller (Steve Miller Band), Don Felder (Eagles), and Jimmy Page (Led Zeppelin). I’ll give it to the wiki page, that is pretty damn cool.

[And just for the sake of being thorough: Japanese guitar maker Ibanez produced a double-neck guitar that was based off the Gibson EDS-1275. It looks virtually identical to the Gibson (at least to my untrained eye).]

The Eagles are most famous for their song "Hotel California" and Don Felder famously used a white EDS-1275 for performances of that song. There are lots of various themes and interpretations of "Hotel California", many of which are fun to apply to Ichigo and Bleach. The Eagles vocalist said, “Lyrically, the song deals with traditional or classical themes of conflict: darkness and light, good and evil, youth and age, the spiritual versus the secular. I guess you could say it's a song about loss of innocence” which I think is some interesting fodder to mull on.

BUT! Ichigo is holding a red guitar! And someone else famously had a custom-made, cherry-red EDS-1275. And that someone was Jimmy Page. Page was arguably the one who popularized the EDS-1275, as he famously played it during live performances of "Stairway to Heaven."

[Jimmy Page in 1973]

I don’t have much to say about "Stairway to Heaven" other than it also seems to be a song about death. However, on a very literal sense, the song is about, well, a stairway to heaven. And you know who is ascending into the heavenly skies in TYBW???

[TYBW ep14]

So. Many. Stairs.

#I've connected the dots #B3 you didn't connect shit #I've connected them #I originally thought I was going to go somewhere with this and then I absolutely did not #no brain just bleach #kurosaki ichigo #bleach tybw #bleach meta #bleach anime #shinigamiology #actually is this really shinigamiology? it's about ichigo who is sort of a shinigami #but it's really more about guitars

[recurring-polynya]

So, a thing that is happening at my house right now is that the youngest Polynya decided she wanted to start watching Bleach. That's too much to unpack right now, the upshot is, I am rewatching Bleach. Yesterday, we got to the parakeet episodes, and I was enchanted by this little exchange here, as Chad is getting ready to throw Rukia at Shrieker:

As I'm sure you all know, I adore the peculiarities of Soul Society speech, particularly early in the series. The first place my brain went was @littleeyesofpallas 's post about how the four gates of the Seireitei correspond to the Four Auspicious Beasts. In this case, "the direction of the tiger" would be west, which is...not left, although I suppose if you were being a little dumb about it, you could say from the POV of the view, north is up, west is to the left? Feels like a stretch.

After a little googling, I found out that the "direction of the tiger" could mean a number of things. In kung fu, tigers are associated with forward movement. While I could certainly see the shinigami combat styles including that kind of terminology (not that we've seen any evidence of it), it does not seem like a particularly good way of telling someone how to aim. (Also, all the websites I found on this topic were mildly shady western kung fu schools, so please take that with the appropriate grain of salt)

I also saw a few astrology references, which at first didn't seem right, but what meant was using the animals of the Chinese zodiac as clock directions. This system was used in Edo era timekeeping, and I half-joking posited before that they use this system in Soul Society. In this case, the hour of the tiger is 3:00-5:00 a.m.. Keep in mind that this system segments the day into 24 segments, not 12, so 3-5am is roughly where 8 o'clock would be on a western clock (there's a diagram in that time-keeping post), which could reasonably be interpreted as "left", I think, if you consider "noon" to be "forward", although it seems like it would be a lot further left than the animation indicates. (Edit: I guess this is still west, if you were to line it up with a compass, which obviously makes sense, but I think it's more common to use clock directions for relative direction where as compass directions are by definitely absolute directions)

I didn't mention it, but the first thing I actually did after watching the episode was to dig out the manga panel.

It doesn't mention the direction of the tiger thing at all, so I assumed that there was some localization going on in one or the translations, although I have no way of knowing which. It does use clock directions, though (although 1 o'clock is neither 3-5am, nor is it left).

Anyway, my best working theory at the moment is that Rukia is giving directions in zodiac animal-based clock time, which the anime subs and Viz have chosen to localize in slightly different ways.

The reason I put that clip in as a video instead of a gif is so the audio would be included. I would love it if anyone who speaks Japanese, or anyone who has the manga raws wanted to weigh in further.

#bleach meta #bleach worldbuilding #i really hope it does turn out to be hour-of-the-tiger related #esoteric time-keeping headcanons my beloved

[chaoticreivingu]

Imagine suddenly dying on the battlefield, accepting it wholeheartedly, but then getting revived against your will, without your consent, and nobody doing anything to stop it or pointing out how unethical it is.

Furthermore, 3 of your subordinates and comrades' souls unwillingly get stuffed inside of you, forever unable to rest in peace. And even after months, decades of living as a forced stitched together corpse, no one has a problem with it.

That's the current life of Izuru Kira.

#i know going against Mayuri would be a bad idea but still #plus iirc the Kira short story pointed out that he's constantly in pain? #why has nobody done anything about this even 12 years later in the hell arc one shot #bleach #bleach meta #izuru kira #kira izuru #kira