Opinion: Bleach Japanese Animated Series. The series that never reached its potential

Bleach burst onto the scene in 2001, bringing with it a mix of unique witty humour, fast paced action and creative aesthetics. Tite Kubo was renowned for his great artistic skills from a young age and this is shown in the manga.

Bleach is a Japanese animated TV series that is based on the Manga, which is written by Tite Kubo. This article will start off by briefly discussing the setting of bleach’s world, so that as a viewer you have a better insight of what bleach is about. I will then discuss my favourite aspects of the tv show, and why I thought it was a great. Finally, I will then analyse the downfall of bleach, and scrutinise where the show went wrong, and why Kubo lost his will and desire to complete the manga with top quality. The objective of this article is to give my own review on Bleach and in the process, look at the highs and lows of the whole TV series in relation to the Manga. Shonen Jump, is a Japanese manga anthology magazine, where all the top manga’s gain their popularity.

The start of what could have been great

Bleach burst onto the scene in 2001, bringing with it a mix of unique witty humour, fast paced action and creative aesthetics. Tite Kubo was renowned for his great artistic skills from a young age and this is shown in the manga.  Each character in the show had their own style and aura, but it was his beautiful artwork of the characters that stood out amongst the sea of mangas in Shonen Jump at the time and earned him a top three spot in the magazine. At his best, Kubo could bring a scene to life and make you feel as if you are standing right there. Every facial expression was drawn with the utmost detail, to convey exactly what he was thinking. From the swing of a sword to a conversation with a friend. Everything up to the surroundings was drawn with effort to help create a vivid setting for the reader.

In comparison to the two big Japanese animated series; Naruto and One Piece, that are set in their own fantasy universes, Bleach was set in a similar world to ours. This immediately made it more relatable, in terms of the way of living and the beliefs of our world. Kubo bases his storyline on the unknown of life after death. This is how he created his world for Bleach. Souls will go to heaven or hell based on how evil or good they were. Heaven in this case was signified by the soul society and hell is referred to as Hueco Mundo. If a soul is evil, it is turned into a hollow, which is basically a ghost that is never granted eternal peace. These hollows then float around earth trying to consume the souls of the spirits that have not yet passed. The soul society has an army of soldiers known as Soul Reapers who protect the world of the living from these hollows. As you can see, these are interesting theories that resonate with the Japanese youth of the day. However, Bleach was a global success and part of this is because the concepts of life after death, the souls and heaven and hell are common to many faiths across the world. This made the series stand out more for myself and many others, because it didn’t follow the normal trend of Shonen Jump manga.

The main protagonist Ichigo Kurosaki, a grumpy yet likeable character was born with the ability to see soul reapers and ghosts. Right from the first episode, Kubo made sure to showcase his grumpy/fearless personality, which captured me right from the start. One scene from the first episode which still makes me laugh today is, possibly one reason why I started to watch bleach. An action-packed series, with an amazing story line is great, but consistent witty humour will make it 10 times better. Rukia, a soul reaper, entered his room randomly in the world of the living thinking no one can see her. Ichigo born with this ability, could see her, so he got up and kicked her in the ass, which led to her falling face first on the floor. At this point, I was nearly in tears, because she is supposed to be a strong invisible soul reaper that ushers the souls of the dead. I guess this is when they became friends.

As the series progresses, Ichigo must take Rukia’s soul reaper powers to defeat a hollow, which leaves Rukia a mere human. She decides she must stay with Ichigo until she can figure out how to get her powers back. The show now began to take off and it started to blossom. As a viewer, I wanted to see Ichigo and Rukia become close friends, which is what happens in the following episodes and because of this I developed an attachment to Rukias character. Rukia then gets kidnapped after they become good friends, and taken back to soul society on a death sentence for helping Ichigo. So, as you can imagine, most viewers were eager to watch the next arc, and contributed to why it was such a hit at Shonen Jump.

Kubo designed his characters to look a bit older than the average Shonen manga, which was another reason why Bleach stood out. It felt like I was watching a group of teenagers growing into adulthood, which is more emphasised in the second arc. I believe there are a few scenes with subliminal messages by Mr Tite Kubo. One scene, which has remained with me since a kid, has always intrigued me. The first battle Ichigo (The main protagonist) has with Kenpachi Zaraki (A squad captain from the soul society) was a test of Ichigo’s strength, will and desire. Kenpachi Zaraki, a giant 8-foot man, with crazy hair and an eye patch, who receives all his joy in life from fighting enemies. Yeah, he was quite an intimidating human. This is Ichigo’s biggest adversary he has faced, and arguably Kenpachi is stronger at this point. Kenpachi faces Ichigo, but Ichigo is literally pissing buckets at this point. Like I said, Kenpachi is quite an intimidating person even before he lets his spiritual pressure off. Ichigo tried to attack Kenpachi with everything he has, but when he went to attack Kenpachi, he hit him with no will or intention to hurt him, Ichigo was so scared. Kenpachi allows Ichigo to take a clean strike on his body, and after the attack, Ichigo has done no damage to Kenpachi whatsoever. In fact, it was Ichigo’s hand that was bleeding after he just took a clean strike at Kenpachi. Now I was just as confused as Ichigo was after this happen. But, soon realised that it was a subliminal message. My interpretation of this is; if you fight someone with no intention to hurt them and are scared, you will do more damage to yourself.

The second arc at soul society is considered the best arc in the series. The group of teenagers including Ichigo and his friends must now travel to the soul society and battle with the entire order. You could say this is a metaphor of a group of teenagers facing a society they don’t understand with rules that don’t make sense. This is related to the feeling of a teenager on the verge of entering adult society for the first time.

The introduction of the soul society allowed Kubo to bring in a complete new diverse cast of characters which included; soul reapers and court squad captains. As you can imagine this gave Kubo the chance to show off his aesthetic skills with his unique designs of each character, as they seemed to come to life.  A favourite captain of mine is Kenpachi Zaraki. He was detailed so well, to have an image as a ruthless, war mongering demon.

All the captains were uniquely designed and each has their own swagger and personality which we could clearly see. It is in this arc where we can see Kobo flex his artistic skills. Everyone in soul society could fight, which gave the arc a sense of unpredictability. This led to some stunning and amazing encounters/ battles.

The downfall of bleach

The series continues to give consistent humour and action which keeps the viewers attracted until Kubo had a row with the editors at Shonen jump. From this point, it was clear from the manga he had no will and motivation to continue, with the same quality he had been writing them in. Over the years you can see bleach gradually disappearing from the covers of Shonen Jump. In comparison to the early days, when Ichigo was on the front cover of most the Shonen Jump magazines.

There were interviews suggesting that editor- artist relationship troubles started early as chapter one. Which suggests; An artist that doesn’t trust their editor and an editor that lost faith in its artist. I believe the tough work schedule and the tense relationship with the Shonen Jump would have been gruelling to deal with long term. This is a possible reason that led to the decline of the quality of the manga and therefore the series.

If you have a look at the manga early on, the artwork and layout for each page is very concise and every picture is crafted with quality and effort. Now, if you have a look before Ichigo’s fight with Aizen, the artwork is poor and the layout is unorganised, thus making it difficult to make sense of what is going on, which is not like Kubo. In relation to the tv series, the downfall starts to begin in the third arc when Ichigo travels to Hueco Mundo to save his friend Orihime. They enter a world they don’t understand with enemies they haven’t met before. Sounds familiar? Yes, it is pretty much a repeat of the second arc, when Ichigo had to go to the soul society to save Rukia, the only difference is the setting. Even the battles between opponents are set in a similar layout which suggests Kubo’s laziness and lack of motivation to write and design something new and creative considering the potential for the series.

However, the Hueco Mundo arc is not completely bad, in fact there are some great battles and moments. But it represents like I said above, an unwillingness to take risks. Which is weird. This is because from the first to second arc in bleach, he went from fighting hollows to having serious sword battles with other captains, which made it so exciting.

Re-structuring arcs allows us to see characters in new ways and giving a new setting, keeps episodes and the story fresh. A short while before the fight with Aizen, I could already tell that Kubo had given up on the manga and series, because, suddenly the story seemed rushed and unorganised, which is the opposite of what the series has been like. This clearly suggested that Kubo, was demotivated and lost all will to complete the manga, which was due to the problematic relationship between the editor and Kubo. This saw bleach the tv series close abruptly as it did.

If we compare the settings of bleach to the ever-changing world of hunter x hunter and one piece, we can see how boring and bland Hueco Mundo was. The settings in Japanese animated series like these are generally always evolving to stay innovative and to keep the series’ longevity. Ichigo starts off as a cool human that beats up ghosts, and ends up as a boring dull protagonist that lives just to saves his friends. If we look at the main protagonists of the other two, Luffy and Naruto have their own goals. Luffy wants to find One Piece and Naruto wants to become Hokage. They are self-motivated, and thus more suited to a long series.

However, with Ichigo we never knew what he wanted to do, or who he really was. Therefore, his character just seemed very boring at the end. It felt like his character development came to a halt near the Hueco Mundo arc. In conclusion, Bleach never reached its full potential at all, and it began to crumble at the start of the Hueco Mundo arc. It started to drop rankings after the announcement in 2012 that the series is cancelled. This is quite sad, because we know Kubo’s talent and the potential this series had. The series deserves a much better ending and I would love to see a remake of bleach if Kubo has some spare time on his hands! Either way, if you have not seen the show, I would recommend watching it, as the early arcs make it worthwhile!