Bleach Club

[Andromeda]

Yeah, I hope that Bleach does not completely disappear as well. It is the only show that I enjoy repeatedly watching, that and FMA. But I do not think that they are stop the episodes during the week. They will just run them until they hit the last of the episodes they have and start over. Or they will show Blood+ again and then Bleach again. Personally I'll just take them rerunning Bleach during the week. It is only a third of the episodes that Inuyasha has, but it seems to move so much more quickly. But then again I didn't realize how fast they finished Inuyasha the last time. Though they are doing two episodes a night.

And yeah I watched tonight's episode as well. It just finished 30 minutes ago. I can wait to see the next episode because Ichigo will be a Shinigami again. Like you wanted to see the next episode immediately, but I pulled out my manga instead of going to youtube. ^^; And I just read through quickly up to the completion of the lessons and Ichigo's Shikai awakening. But it is still fun to watch Urahara continually make fun of Ichigo and just have him do silly things. Urahara has a lot of personality for being an ex-shinigami. But they come in all types don't they. Though Yoruichi's voice sounds a little funny like they changed VA or the VA just did not have the same tone as usual. But maybe that is just me and having gotten used to seeing female version.

[Rasler]

None of this is really spoilers, per se, just information. All of it is revealed rather bluntly, and shouldn't detract from any enjoyment if you read it. Nonetheless, I'll put in spoiler tags to be considerate.

Spoiler: I've been doing more overanalysis, and I think I have a fairly solid theory about Grimmjow's animosity towards Ulquiorra. Tite Kubo is either trying to prove or mislead us that Ulquiorra was a Vastolorde-class menos hollow. I personally believe he is one, but perhaps a weaker individual in the tiny Vastolorde population. (See pictures below) Obviously the two have radically different personalities, but why? Ulquiorra is a Vastolorde(highest evolution), Grimmjow an Adjucha(2nd highest evolution). All ambitious hollows strive to become a Vastolorde. First they have to become part of a Menos Grande. They must consume it. If any part of a hollow's mask is eaten by another hollow, then its evolution is permantly halted. Then, if the hollow can retain its individuality and conciousness, and force itself into dominance, it gains control of the entire Menos. These sentient Menos Grandes have a mask unique to the individual in control. By cannibalizing many more hollows of equal or greater power, even other Menos Grandes, the sentient Menos Grande condenses into a form unique to the individual. By again cannibalizing many more hollows of equal or greater power, an Adjucha condenses yet again into a human-sized, human-shaped being, called the Vastolorde. (Pictures 1, 2) Unfortunately, there simply aren't enough powerful hollows for more than a handful of Vastlordes to exist. So they start eating other Adjuchas. In fact, this is how Grimmjow met his later-to-be-subordinates. They tried to eat him. After eating a part of D-Roy's mask in self-defense, they elect Grimmjow their "king". They once again find it nearly impossible to find other powerful hollows, and suggest that Grimmjow eat them. Grimmjow clearly doesn't. It is speculated that Grimmjow could have evolved (Heh, po-kay-mans) if he had eaten his followers. But why go through all this trouble? Sure, to be strong. But the very nature of a Hollow's existence forces it to eat souls or other Hollows. We can assume that if a Hollow doesn't consume souls, it would, over time, just fade away. Evolution upkeep forces all sentient Menos-type hollows into a very tense life with the constant desperate search for strong hollows, and constant threat of cannibalism or reversion into a mindless Menos Grande. Grimmjow's personality is evident of this scrappy, tense, fight-for-your-life mindset. My theory concerning Vastolordes is that they have no evolution upkeep. Wikipedia says that they do, but it is just speculation. No such information has been revealed yet. If a Vastolorde had to do upkeep, they would revert to an Adjucha rather quickly. There aren't anywhere near remotely enough powerful hollows to maintain a Vastolorde. Ulquiorra has a radically different, minimalistic, zen-like personality. He can afford to be calm. As a vastolorde, he's achieved his goal, is strong enough to deter any attacker, and (my theory: has no upkeep). Higher evolved hollows get progressively smaller, and smaller bodies, logically, are more energy-efficient. Also, Ulquiorra doesn't seem to have any Fraccion. (Servant arrancar for the Espada. Hand-picked from the Numeros, numbers 11-99) Perhaps he ate his followers before he became an arrancar. When Ulquiorra finally gets around to transforming, I don't expect his appearance to change too terribly much. In fact, he's proably just going to gain a few bits of armor, maybe a complete helmet, and perhaps a weapon change. Ulquiorra is intriguing because he isn't much of a combat character. He seems to specialize in attack deflection and reconaissance. He hasn't even drawn his zanpakuto yet, even in the manga.

Watch episode 144. New opening, I clipped it, click here.
Highlights:
00:01 That's Chad's LEFT arm
00:01 You probably noticed Uryu's new bow
00:14 Holy crap, the logo's on fire!
00:24 These characters will be introduced in 2-3 episodes.
00:33 That's the Hogyoku and the really neat pillar Aizen keeps it in
00:48-00:55 ZOMG t3h Espada!!11!one1!
01:04 Aizen. With a drink!
01:16 Why is Orihime drowning? That doesn't happen in the manga (at least not yet. Freakin' symbolism.
01:18-01-:25 Most awesome part of any Bleach opening ever.
01:29 If you paid for this, you suck at life.

Note:
01:24 The symbol that comprises Tensa Zangetsu's guard, Ban (Translation: full), is reversed. Oversight, or something else. By the time Ichigo reaches Aizen, is he reverse full---"empty"? (See picture 7)

[Andromeda]

I just watched the opening on Youtube, it was pretty cool seeing it that Asian Kung-Fu Generation did the song as they did a FMA opening as well. But the FMA opening was a lot better than this one. For such a heavily action oriented part of the show you'd think they would have a more action based song something to really get you excited. I finished watching it and felt like I was a little depressed rather than pumped up. The opening visually looks great, but the song just kills the mood unfortunately, and I love the song they did for FMA too. It is a shame that it turned out poorly as it did.

Though it was pretty cool seeing Ichigo bursting through the wall of the Espada on Aizen and party. That was a nice scene to watch. And his hollow mask breaks off the moment he gets in like it always seem to do. Just when he needs that power the most it is gone. And yeah the Orihime drowning would simply be symbolism, the Japanese love that sort of thing.

The opening reminded me of the opening for the second season where you Ichigo with his party invading the Soul Society. And now it is here again but this time they are invading Heuco Mondo now. The party is different as well since Renji and Rukia are with him in place of Ganju and Orihime. But they are far more useful in the attack than Ganju or Orihime would be.

The whole bleached white Espada group was a little strange. It was almost like I was watching manga rather than an anime. But the Espada are all white anyway taking from the Star Wars theme of bad guys in white. But it was nice to see them all, though Grimmjow was different than he should be at that point.

Spoiler: Being that he should be down an arm.

[Rasler]

Andromeda:

Spoiler: Aizen makes Orihime "undo" Grimmjow's injury. Orihime's power is closer to "undo" than "heal", which is why Aizen kidnapped her. Continuous use of the Hogyoku weakens it. Orihime's there to make it good as new, over and over.

Not for Andromeda. Sharing information that isn't implicitly stated, but is a spoiler.

Spoiler: I was reading, and since Aizen's slaughter of the Office of 46, Yamamoto has taken over its role (supreme, unchallengable authority). And he's a bit paranoid about defense of Soul Society, so no (authorized) help for Ichigo and co. in the Hueco Mundo arc.

-edit-
No new Bleach this week, but I have this to say about Death Note: "...Wow. F*cking wow."
Death Note is almost like Chuck Palahnuik's (Fight Club's author [it was a book first, yo]) novel Lullaby. (Which I recommend reading)

Death Note, like Bleach, uses the term "shinigami". Shinigami, literally translated as "death god." This shouldn't cause too much confusion for the dubbed Bleach watchers, as the Americanization process has Bleach's shinigami consistently translated as "Soul Reaper," whereas Death Note just uses "Shinigami." Death Note's and Bleach's shinigami are radically different in nature and appearance, however, they do seem to have some similarities in function.

[Andromeda]

Yeah, I found a little surprising that they were going to be calling them Shinigami in Death Note as well. I was pleased to see that they were keeping to the original Japanese, but it is disappointing that they could not have done the same for Bleach. And yes, no more Bleach for a while. I keep looking at the AS schedule hoping that they will up date it, but they are being very lazy or very secretive about what their next move is. I know I flipped through the boards to see if there was word there about the reasons and time frame when Bleach would return. Unfortunately, everyone is just as confused and annoyed. No one knows why they took off Bleach and AS is not making announcements to their reasons as well. They only have 52 episodes aired, which is over a third of the show thus far. They should have been going at a good enough rate that it would not have matter. But the only other show AS has that is as long as Bleach is Inuyasha and they flipped timeslots so much it was not even funny. It was Saturdays sometimes and weekdays sometimes. They would show 5 new episodes a week and then only do one. They would take breaks often as well, but the break were usually not after 52 episodes. It was usually shorter spans. The only reason I can imagine is that the dubbers are behind and need time to catch up or something.

Oh well, we'll just have reruns during the week to keep us going for a while. I'll keep watching the reruns because Bleach is that good. But I will be bothered every time they get to Renji and Byakuya and start over again.

[Rasler]

Since there's no new dubbed episode to talk about, and the latest subbed one was rather uneventful, I have done more conjecture and prediction.

When Orihime's brother became a Hollow, he removed his mask. That would've made him an arrancar, but a very weak, natural, and basic one, as he gained no shinigami powers nor zanpakuto.

Spoiler: One note from the latest subbed episode: They've censored Halibel. Pictures are below. She's the only current female Espada, as well as one of the four Espada with currently unknown rank. (Probably #7, seeing as the aggressively chauvanistic #5 isn't at conflict with her. He frequently assaulted the former #3 because she was female and had a higher rank than his.) For future Bleach storylines: After Aizen's eventual defeat: (It's going to happen. It's inevitable.) Yamamoto runs Soul Society like a dictator. Aizen slew the government body of Soul Society before defecting, and Yamamoto took over its role: supreme, unchallengable authority. Soul Society considers the acquisition of Hollow powers an ultimate taboo. Yamamoto discovers Ichigo's use of Hollow powers and orders the execution of Ichigo. This would lead to a war between Ichigo+allies and Soul Society. Ichigo's allies include: Vizards Arrancar: (Possibly) Nell, Dondo-chakka, and Pesshe Urahara group: Urahara, Yoruichi, Ururu, Jinta, Tessai, Lilin, Cloud, Nova Earth group: Uryu's dad, Ichigo's dad, Don Kanonji, Kon, Uryu, Orihime, Chad Soul Society allies: Renji, Rukia, Ganju, Kukkaku, Jidanbo, maybe Squad 11 Ichigo's long presence in Hueco Mundo and continuous use of his Hollow powers has strengthened Ichigo's inner Hollow. It resumes attempting possession over Ichigo's soul. I'm waiting for Tosen to attempt an assassination on Aizen. He claims to be a supporter of justice and righteousness, but also of the path of least bloodshed. He's probably waiting for Aizen to let his guard down. Let's say that Ichigo undergoes a complete Hollow transformation again, including soul domination by the Hollow. It would be interesting for Aizen to make Ichigo an arrancar of himself. Chad, Uryu, and/or Orihime die. They would end up in Soul Society, and in all probability, because of their abilities, become shinigami. This would be particularly amusing with Uryu.

[Andromeda]

I don't know about that for Orihime's brother. I know he managed to over power the hollow in him and regain his control over his spirit. But as you said he did not gain any shinigami powers in the process. And it was temporary at that. It was more just the soul being fought over for dominance. Since he was made a hollow against his will and unnaturally. So there was resistance. The process was not completed yet. Because of that I don't really think you can call him an Arrancar. He was just a hollow that was fighting over dominance.

The Arrancars did exist back then in Bleach being soon with Grand Fisher. But Orihime's brother was not one of them. There was no transformation or return to a human looking form. He just simply took over his soul. It would have been interesting to see that happen, but it was far to early in the show to have that happen and have to explain it. Especially since I doubt that Rukia knows about the Vizards or Arrancar until they make their appearance.

As for Bleach on AS. From what I have read it sounds like they ran out of dubbed episodes. Which seems a little strange, but I guess they are not dubbing an episode a week. I don't know why it would take more than a week to translate and dub a 30 minute episode. I would imagine that the translation takes the longest, but once that is done I would imagine that the dubbing is like a couple day process. Unless they dub en mass and well that I guess makes since. Well either way, I have Death Note until they return with Bleach. They better have another 52 episodes to show up with when they start again. Well they better have more than that. At the very least complete the Bount Arc. But they just stopped in the middle of the Soul Society Arc before Ichigo gains his Bankai and goes to save Rukia. The best part and they go and stop before that. They better not do that with Bount.

Oh well, I watched Bleach tonight like I do every night. It was Orihime and Uryu finishing the fight with Geronbo or however it is spelled. I still don't know why they recapped so much of the previous episode when airing this one. My only guess is that they ran out of things to do and wanted to end the episode where they ended it and not go on for another minute. So they wasted like two minutes at the beginning. Ichigo and Ganju meet Hanataro making the comment that he has a girly name or stupid name something to that effect. Hana meaning flower, but that's Hanataro for you.

So we need something to chat about. The club has been quiet for a while and I have not been doing my job in posting here when I should have. It has been nearly week. I don't know why I didn't post sooner other than I think I did not have anything to post at the time. But we do need something to chat and discuss about. We've done Zanpakuto's quite a bit already and life in the soul society. What more can we speculate about? I guess we could always start doing an in depth analysis of each episode. That would certain keep us busy for a long time.

*shrugs* Ideas?

[Xeim]

I’m very sorry for not being around. School can really be a pain. I won’t elaborate, but I’ve been having some problems lately, and they aren’t clearing themselves up easily. Onto club business though.

I’ve counted up all the points and submitted them to Rasler for comparison. I’ll be counting up whatever Rp posts there are to count up soon, and will post the long overdue results in the club as soon as I can. I’m terribly sorry that I have not done this sooner. I’m intensely embarrassed that this has taken me so long. I feel like I’ve let everyone down for putting off the post counting and posting in here for so long. >_<;;

Anyway, Andro has asked for conversation ideas. I’ve always been terrible at suggesting conversations, but I’ll give it a shot. I do agree that an episode-by-episode analyzation would be a good thing to fall back on. Anime and manga comparisons, which we have been doing already, and I would say Japanese to English comparison as well, but it may be hard to locate the earlier episodes in Japanese now that they have been dubbed.

I’ll start with a story I suppose. I was talking to my friend on the phone the other day, and he was watching English bleach on you tube. So, I was able to listen to the different voices through the phone. It was an interesting experience. >_> He was on episode 3 I believe, where Orihime’s brother attacks her. The voice for young Orihime was rather amusing, and her normal voice was interesting as well. It was actually similar to the Japanese one. >_< So anyway, I was throwing in comments about how the Japanese version did things to my friend, and then I tried to impersonate the Japanese Rukia yelling “Ichigo” after I heard her do so in the English. I uhm, sounded like a duck *cough * My worst impersonation ever…

Rasler:

Spoiler: On Ulquiorra (*fangirl scream*)’s transformed form, I’d have to say that it’ll probably have something to do with eyes. >_< He has the ability to remove his eye and replay things that he has seen or done (like a projector xD) and his zanpukto has a strange eye-like quality to it (to me, at least). So, while I’m hoping he’s not going to sprout a million eyes (because that’d be creepy), his transformation will probably have some sort of focus on the eyes. Perhaps some sort of floating guardian eyes (things) like that one Bounto. Though, I’d hope his released form would be cooler than the Bounto’s. xD Nice analyzation of the different hollow levels though. It’s very interesting. I would have to agree that Vasto Lorde’s probably don’t have to do upkeep, because like you said, there wouldn’t be enough powerful hollow for them to feed off of.

Andro: Actually, the translation probably would take less time than the dubbing process. Fansubs get translated within a day, and a final version with no mistakes would probably only take a little longer. And since they have so many episodes at their disposal to translate, they probably just have 10 people sitting there translating all day, every day. Actually dubbing though, takes time. You have to bring the voice actors in (which probably takes a little time), and then they have to be able to get it perfect. And that’s no easy task. They have to say everything they need to within a certain amount of time, in the right tones. Unless they’re spectacular, that's probably a few hours a scene. But still, I don’t see how they would run out of episodes. Perhaps one of the voice actors got sick? At least Death Note is good- and short. Only 37 episodes in the entire series. (L for the win! * cough * back on subject…)

Well, we’ve worn out lots of subjects, but there’s still got to be something good to talk about. This is Bleach afterall. But what? I guess we could be really strange and analyze Tite’s writing style- comparing it to other manga artist/writers. But that’s a little tough, especially since we can’t read the original Japanese manga too well (well, I can’t at least. If any of you can, then go ahead and start spewing stuff!). Translations obviously can’t be too literal or nothing makes sense. Hm…

Well, I’ve gone this whole post without coming up with something solid to discuss. Perhaps some of my ramblings will turn into something good. If not, I’ll just keep thinking. My creativity level kind of bottomed out recently though….Must have sugar to boost it up!

Btw andro, love your new sig pic. ^^

-Xeim--

[Mistress Sheena]

As far as all the episodes are concerned, I hope you know I have 1-147 on my computer at this very moment. So if you ever want to do dialogue comparisons or whatnot, just let me know.

But yes, the dubbing takes forever while the translating is quick.

[Rasler]

I have all currently released manga chapters (1-299) on my comupter.

More sad news for Bleach. Filler for at least the next 3 subbed episodes. I suppose it gives a little more time to flesh out Nell, Pesshe, and Dondo-Chakka, as well as Hueco Mundo itself.

It was revealed that Hueco Mundo is a multi-layered place. The desert is on top with Las Noches (Aizen's castle) as its only prominent landmark. It is stated that only the arrancar and the three rogue captains live on top, in the desert. The desert is supported from underneath by large trees; The "trees" in the desert are merely the tips of the giant underground tree trunks. Beneath the desert is a large cavernous area called the "Menos Forest" where Menos Grandes and other hollows of varying strength live.

Once below the desert, Ichigo and the others were overrun with enemies. About time, I was waiting for them to be overrun since their arrival in Hueco Mundo.

[Andromeda]

Thanks, Xeim. I needed a banner since the last one was destroyed with the forum moving. So the Bleach ones were the only thing left around for me to easily pick. I still like this one out of the others that I made. It is just a little unusual for me to have something so specific as a banner.

On the subject of dubbing, they've bee going for more than two years straight without a stop on Naruto. They keep airing an episode every single Saturday and now two episodes. If Naruto can keep it up you'd think that Bleach would be able to as well. It just does not make a lot of sense why one show is lagging behind while so many others are doing perfectly fine.

So Hueco Mundo is multi layered huh? Are their divisions in the underground with strong hollows in the upper layers while weaker ones are further below. But why is Ichigo and company underneath when they should be fighting up in the desert. Is it just to lengthen out the fighting?

Well I have the manga and as well as Adult Swim continuing to air reruns of Bleach I'll have the English dubs of the episodes. So it depends on where you want to begin or how you want to go about doing it. I've done a little comparison with the manga already pointing out the large differences that exist.

I still want to do our own Shinigami Cup, but I know that is a while away since we have to be shinigami first. But it will still be a lot of fun to play around with. We could always invent our own filler arc. Since if Bleach continues on past the Hueco Mundo arc and Tite has something planned after Aizen and everything there is going to be another filler arc in the anime. It's something that would keep us busy and thinking. Might lead some discussions as well.

[Xeim]

I bring rankings!

1st Division

Jenova33:13
Itachi Uchiha: 6
Lady Rika: 5



2nd Division


Oathkeeper13: 28
Captain Fishie: 11
Yuuki: 4

3rd Division


Captain CLOUD: 32
Toph Bei Fong: 23
WaterPrince: 1


4th Division

Vice Captain Andromeda: 175
Captain abarai Renji: 50
Evangel: 37
Suzu Kitamura: 6
DarkWolf: 4


5th Division

Captain Rasler: 58
GrimmJaw: 2
Emoloz: 0


Shinigami Academy

Lethal Seraphim: 22
Howl Furore: 1
RagnaToad: 1

Last RP post counted: post 76 on page 6
Last Club post counted: post 757 on page 51

Lethal's almost out of the Academy!

Well, since it seems eveyone has access to materials that allows us to compare, that is an option. We'd probably want to start from the beginning. If we do persue this, Toph, I'd need to get the earlier episodes from you somehow...I only have the later ones.

I also like the idea of creating our own filler arc. Filler arcs are the worst things about anime, but they have the potential to be likeable. We could design our ideal filler arc.

So, we could start with picking the setting, then designing the villains. And then discuss what would go on in it?

I think we should stick to one of the known relms. It would be interesting to see Hel, but I doubt they'd be able to get out once they go in. So, that may not work. Though, it would prove for an interesting arc, as the true 'sinners' are down there. We'd be dealing with true evil, not just powerful weirdos and their dreams. o_O

Forgive the shortness of this post. I don't want to say much more until I know if we're going to be persuing these ideas or not.