At What Point Does it Compel?

Bleach was the second of the big three that I have been trying to catch up on in order to become more knowledgeable of the shonen genre in general and to analyze the works’ influence on modern anime/manga culture in both the west and in their home country of Japan.

I started first with One Piece, as it was the longest and I would be more accustomed to reading about 15 chapters every day and keeping up the schedule. I do want to say that I tried reading One Piece a year prior, but only made it to chapter 23. This fact becomes important later. After reaching Arlong Park, which is around 100 chapters in (which is less than 10% of One Piece at its current point), I was completely entrenched in the story, the world, and the characters of the One Piece manga. When catching up, I felt no regret for reading and no distain towards any of the arcs I had read.

I’m now at 35% of Bleach. 251 chapters into the manga, and yet I have not felt this moment of being compelled in the characters, the world, or the story of bleach. It’s very upsetting. It’s not that I didn’t want to enjoy bleach at all, I chose to put Bleach in my second to read list because I was genuinely interested and I wanted to read something great. I thought Bleach would be great. I wanted Bleach to be great.

In the introduction arc, I was surprised to find that it was mostly a monster of the day format, which I don’t hate at all. I like the animanga Kekkai Sensen, after all. Kekkai Sensen is incredibly strange, convoluted and half the time you don’t understand what’s happening and yet it’s still one of my favorites. I was happy to find that Bleach in its beginning was a monster of the day format the same way one of my other favorites was. However, I soon realized that Bleach lacked the charm. Hearing about how Ichigo’s mother was killed by a hallow, I did not care for. His feelings of revenge towards the hallow, I did not care for. I’ve seen it all before, it wasn’t anything new. I tried telling myself that well, since Bleach is older, I should approach it with an understanding that Bleach possibly did these tropes first. But the manga started in 2001. For context, One Piece was 3 years in, We were in the middle of Jojo's Part 6, the Trigun anime ended 3 years prior, all of these staples of anime and manga who explored these feelings of revenge and tragedy towards losing those you loved, had their stories told in a far more compelling and interesting way that truly showed the gravity of these losses. Hell, I felt more sadness and intrigue in the Usopp “the boy who cried wolf” ripoff than hearing how Ichigo’s mother died, how he felt he must enact revenge, and that Rukia couldn’t help him in order for Ichigo to not lose his sense of honor. And this the main character. The person you’re supposed to root for, the character that you’re meant to feel the most intrigued about. As a writer who, in part, started this journey to analyze how main characters are able to succeed in accomplishing this versus not being able to. I can say, 35% into the manga, that Ichigo does not compel me.

Rukia did, somewhat? It’s hard to say. I found her abduction into the soul society and being executed arc to be somewhat interesting, but once again it was stuff I had all seen before. Is the best friend being abducted and the higher ups thinking they betrayed the group a shonen trope? If so it’s really contrived and repetitive. Arlong Park did it in an interesting way, because of the themes behind it. Nami, someone who is seen as an oppressor of the fishmen is held captive by those who are oppressed, as it demonstrates the hypocrisy of Arlong. It’s revealed later that Arlong never experienced oppression firsthand, which truly cements the theme in stone. However everything that occurs in Bleach just seems to happen for the sake of it. There’s no deeper meaning behind anything that happens to Ichigo or to Rukia, and the rest of their friends. Could an argument be made that it’s about humanity reaching god-like status by taking control of the spirit world? Sure, but like, every fantastical story does this. For a manga that is painted as “paving the way for shonen” it doesn’t really seem to do anything new. How did it pave the road that was already paved by thousands of authors before it?

I thought the end of the soul society arc, and most of the arc to be good. Not fantastic, awe inspiring media, but good. The twist was good and executed well, the true betrayal in the order of the soul society was good. Great villain, interesting premise. But what really irks me is how Uryuu had this big dramatic moment of sacrificing his powers only to gain them back by fighting his dad in some spirit arena. That just belittles his sacrifice in the first place. So, he sacrifices everything, then is magically back to where he was prior? And I get there’s going to be an arc in the future that expands on this. I get it, but I don’t really care because the story and the writing of these characters have not compelled me enough to where I should care. I’m not surprised that any of these events have transpired, except for Aizen’s betrayal.

Then Orihime gets manipulated into joining Aizen, and now Ichigo, Chad, Uryuu, Renji, and Rukia are trying to get her back. Is this not the same as Rukia’s capture? Why is this happening again? The time between these two arcs is no time at all. Sure we learn about Ichigo’s hollowification (which I don’t care for and was predicable since Urahara put Ichigo in the pit) and he trains to control his hollow powers. To be honest, training seems to be the only way Kubo knows how to go from one arc from another. Don’t know how to make it so Ichigo’s magical whacking of the big baddies believable? Just toss him to the side for a few days, make everyone magically want to stop fighting him, and his plot armor will explain the rest! These antagonists are so considerate to wait 3 whole days for him to be stronger, while assured that even after he trains they could beat his ass. Why wait? If you think you could beat his ass (and is communicated that they could) then go beat his ass! But alas that would make Bleach too short. If you can’t make it believable that Ichigo could beat these characters before he goes ass first into the beginnings of a war, then you fail as a writer. What could’ve been done was a way of communicating that while Ichigo fights, he grows stronger. Maybe his strawberry nickname was foreshadowing and like a plant, he sucks up all the spirit energies around him like a plant’s roots sucks up water in soil. That would be funnier than most of the jokes in the manga so far.

I know I’m hammering it in, but for real it’s not bad. I’m just being hyperbolic because I think that’s more interesting to read than me droning on and on about nonsense. If you like bleach I genuinely don’t care if you do, and I can see why someone would like it. These opinions I have are entirely my own and it does not make me “a smarter consumer and analyst” than someone who likes Bleach.

In the end, I think I’m just not a fan of battle shonen. I’ll continue reading bleach just for the sake of saying I’ve read all of the big three, but I definitely will be taking my time with it. I doubt I’ll have it finished before the Thousand-Year Blood War arc is animated in the fall.

I finished One Piece in a month.