BLEACH: Thousand-Year Blood War, Part 3: The Conflict Episode 31 brought a follow-up to one of the best adapted episodes this season and featured the return of a series longtime favorite. Last episode featured an anime-original battle between Ichigo and Uryu, starting off with the two trading words and ending with them trading magnificent and powerful blows. That episode shone in its attention to detail, animation quality, and via artistic details like lighting, all of which were especially helpful when showing off Uryu’s newfound abilities. The episode concluded with Ichigo falling after taking a serious wound in their confrontation after he made the mistake of holding back severely against Uryu. Overall, it was a good opportunity to see how strong both characters had become and was perhaps one of the most welcome additions when it comes to anime changes from the original BLEACH manga.
This episode is an immediate continuation of the final scenes of last episode, after Yhwach absorbed the power of the Soul King and seemingly sealed the fate of the Soul Society and all those still within it. While the episode didn’t necessarily introduce the bevy of new content that Episode 30 did, this episode, following in the footsteps of a lot prior to it, shuffled around the original order of a lot of scenes, ending up with a compilation that encompasses bits and pieces of much more than the typical 3-4 chapters that the rest of the BLEACH anime tended to adapt per episode. The episode was much more of a bridge into the next section of the plot than a climactic series of scenes, but overall it was a strong entry into the season, especially with who it brought back.
Spoilers ahead for BLEACH: Thousand-Year Blood War, Part 3: The Conflict Episode 5 “AGAINST THE JUDGEMENT”
Welcome Back Sosuke Aizen
The episode opens with Yhwach letting loose a torrent of the Soul King’s power onto the Seireitei. The little creatures it manifested as were absolutely creepy in the best way, and the anime made a point of giving them teeth to lend credence to the fact that, left undisturbed, they would eat away at the Soul Reapers until their death. Curiously, a line from the manga is omitted here, one that emphasizes that the creatures formed from the Soul King’s power will only attack the Soul Reapers as those are the Soul King’s enemies, not Quincy. Without that line, it feels less like this is a manifestation of the Soul King’s will, but rather a new power that Yhwach is able to wield. A subtle detail but one that definitely changes the meaning of the initial scenes.
Aizen’s first appearance on screen is a nice one, and also features the use of an effect I’ve come to miss: the visual depiction of spiritual pressure on screen alongside the standard shaking effect it causes. This isn’t quite the way the effect was shown in the original BLEACH anime, but I appreciated the showcasing of Aizen’s power when he’s barely trying just the same. As for his depiction though, the anime made a choice that I don’t fully understand, and that’s in changing out his smug expression for a more straight-faced, conciliatory one. In general this episode, I felt like Aizen was displayed as a bit less of an asshole and a bit more like someone under the control of Kyoraku. On the one hand, I appreciate how authoritative this makes Kyoraku seem, but I’d have liked Aizen to have a bit more of use usual personality reflected in his early scenes as well.
Where he did shine, without question, was his use of Kido and his attempts to shoot down the Royal Palace with his spiritual pressure. Both of these moments were animated beautifully, and the updated art style really brough out the purple of his energy in a way that I really liked on screen.
Preparing for Counterattack
The middle portion of the episode was admittedly a bit slow for my taste, even if it was a bit cool to see so many Soul Reapers assembled and ready for action. To me, the highlights of this section included: (1) the bit of humor between Shinji and Hiyori (BLEACH: Thousand-Year Blood War has cut out so many of the brief humorous moments like this that I wasn’t sure whether this one was going to make it or not) and (2) Aizen’s speech about the many species of people going after Ichigo into the Royal Palace. The BLEACH anime has consistently been contrasting Ichigo and Yhwach not just in terms of their ideological differences, but also by positioning Ichigo as a syncretic, mixing multiple spiritual beings together, while positioning those on Yhwach’s side as only seeking to benefit Quincy. Adding Quincy who have chosen to go after Yhwach adds another layer to that and that was nice to see.
Turning now to Ichigo’s group, we got to see some heartwarming contact between Ichigo and Orihime as well as some good interactions between the gang in general. The back half of the episode featured the re-introduction of another series favorite, that being Grimmjow. The arrancar got the upgrade of the updated art style and looks cooler than ever.
Looking toward next episode, with how much of this episode was dedicated to preparation and setting up everyone moving toward the royal palace, I’m looking forward to some more motion and additional screentime for our returning characters.
© TITE KUBO / SHUEISHA, TV TOKYO, dentsu, Pierrot
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