BLEACH: AGENT OF THE SOUL REAPER (ANIME VOLUME 1)
December 21st 2008 23:03
Category: Videos
Based on the original Bleach manga by: Tite Kubo.
Director: Noriyuki Abe.
Screenplay by: Masahi Sogo et al.
Producers: Noriko Kobayashi (TV Tokyo), Yutaka Sugiyama & Ken Hagino.
Starring: Johnny Yong Bosch (Ichigo Kurosaki), Michelle Ruff (Rukia Kuchiki), Stephanie Sheh (Orihime Inoue), Derek Stephen Price (Uryu), Jamieson Price (Chad), Wendee Lee (Tatsuki) Yuri Lowenthal (Keigo Asano), Patrick Seitz & Kate Higgins (Karin Kurosaki).
Produced by: TV Tokyo, dentsu & studio Pierrot.
English version produced by: VIZ Media LLC.
Released by: Madman Entertainment.
Running Time: 100 minutes. Rating: M.
It was interesting for me to find out whilst I was reading a Lonely Planet guide to Tokyo to discover that dentsu, one the companies involved in the production of this particular series is actually an advertising agency of some note within Japanese circles. And here I was thinking that they were some kind of leading anime studio or television production company, still perhaps it’s all very similar anyway in Japan. Moving away from that little digression on Japanese corporations this volume is the very start of the Bleach anime which if its episode count is anything to go by has been very successful not only in the Land of the Rising Sun but also here in the west. Running into triple figures the story that drives Bleach obviously has had considerable staying power.
Now if you’ve been a regular of the Green Lantern you would have no doubt realised that way back when in the figurative mists of time I did a review of the first manga volume in this particular series. Now the interesting thing about the worlds of manga and anime certainly there is a lot of cross pollination so to speak, after all a great many successful anime have been spawned by equally successful manga. Conversely some anime have gone on to become successful manga as a result of their television success. But even though a manga might spawn an anime this does not mean that the entire process is simply a matter of rote replication. This very first volume of the Bleach anime is good illustration of this particular fact.
Having read the first manga volume and watched the first few episodes of the anime series it’s easy for me to pick up on this particular fact. Oh it’s not as if the actual story has been changed in any way, what it is all about is presentation, on the way that the story is shown to the audience at large. No doubt this is due to the medium involved, the television/DVD player, in which the format in which a story is presented is often different from that used by the printed word/illustration. So as the events unfold on the first episode of the Bleach anime series we see that its primary protagonist is the outrageously orange haired Ichigo “Strawberry” Kurosaki, a fifteen year old high school student who is able to see ghosts. One way to describe him is he’s like the kid out of the Sixth Sense in that regard but he has a whole truck load of attitude.
Of all the popular anime series that are making the rounds here in the west, Naruto and One Piece being the other biggies, this would have to be the first anime where the primary protagonist is not voiced by a female. I know for a fact that Naruto is voiced by a woman, Maile Flannigan, and I believe that One Piece is the same, here though Ichigo is voiced by a guy though perhaps this has got to do with the fact that in contrast with the other two series the main character is two years older – both Naruto and Luffy are thirteen and thus have slightly higher pitched voices. I have to admit that Johnny Yong Bosch does a good job with Ichigo; I couldn’t really imagine who else could fill the role. It’s certainly a far cry from his portray of Koizumi in The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, who despite having some incredible powers is a lot more ‘sedate’ than Ichigo.
So what is this all about, what is the story that unfolds in these initial few episodes? Like I said early if you have read the manga then there is a lot of common ground, but there are changes in the way things are presented. Like a large number of Shonen based manga/anime, the series focuses on the character of a teenage guy who has immense potential and untapped abilities and is completely unaware of this when we, the audience, first come across him. In the case of Ichigo this revolves around his ability to see ghosts, those spirits who for a variety of reasons seem to still be hanging around in the mortal world not passing on to the next for whatever reason. He isn’t the only one in his family who can do this, his younger sister Karin also has the same ability although she is in denial and doesn’t acknowledge the existence of ghosts.
Unfortunately this ability is about to land Ichigo in a lot of hot water and completely change his life irrevocably. It is at this point that the anime diverges somewhat from the manga. Something in the spirit world is after Ichigo, a hollow of considerable power and malevolence who has various other hollows under its command with which it can carry out its nefarious schemes. No doubt you’re wondering to yourself what the heck is a hollow? Isn’t it a basin or depression in an area of land? Well yes it is but in the case of this anime a hollow is a malevolent spirit whose heart has been consumed either by other hollows or negative emotions, as indicated by the round hole in their chests, and resulted in their transformation to a hollow. All hollows were at some point humans who were unable to pass on for a variety of reasons and ended up being transformed.
It seems that in the twilight world between the living world and the next their exists a hollow who is very keen to feast upon the soul of Ichigo Kurosaki, due to its great as yet untapped spiritual strength. So in order to fulfil its ambitions it sends out two hollows under its command to wreak havoc in the world of the living, what it didn’t count upon was the fact that the Soul Reapers, entities whose duty it is to fight hollows, have rumbled onto this particular little incursion into the world of the living. Enter Rukia Kuchiki, a veteran soul reaper, who is hot on the trail of these hollows.
Her meeting with Ichigo throws everything into chaos and provides the catalyst for the events that are to unfold. It’s certainly a different part from Michelle Ruff’s role as Yuki in The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, that character is rather withdrawn and introverted in most aspects whereas Rukia is a bit more lively and completely out of sorts with the living world. She might be able to cut a hollow down in a single blow but her command of the vernacular is a few centuries out of date and she’s not exactly aware of her fellow classmates or how to use a straw. This certainly makes for some humorous moments in the show. Bleach is a series well worth catching, I am not sure if it is on pay TV here in Australia but you can certainly get a hold of it on DVD.
Director: Noriyuki Abe.
Screenplay by: Masahi Sogo et al.
Producers: Noriko Kobayashi (TV Tokyo), Yutaka Sugiyama & Ken Hagino.
Starring: Johnny Yong Bosch (Ichigo Kurosaki), Michelle Ruff (Rukia Kuchiki), Stephanie Sheh (Orihime Inoue), Derek Stephen Price (Uryu), Jamieson Price (Chad), Wendee Lee (Tatsuki) Yuri Lowenthal (Keigo Asano), Patrick Seitz & Kate Higgins (Karin Kurosaki).
Produced by: TV Tokyo, dentsu & studio Pierrot.
English version produced by: VIZ Media LLC.
Released by: Madman Entertainment.
It was interesting for me to find out whilst I was reading a Lonely Planet guide to Tokyo to discover that dentsu, one the companies involved in the production of this particular series is actually an advertising agency of some note within Japanese circles. And here I was thinking that they were some kind of leading anime studio or television production company, still perhaps it’s all very similar anyway in Japan. Moving away from that little digression on Japanese corporations this volume is the very start of the Bleach anime which if its episode count is anything to go by has been very successful not only in the Land of the Rising Sun but also here in the west. Running into triple figures the story that drives Bleach obviously has had considerable staying power.
Now if you’ve been a regular of the Green Lantern you would have no doubt realised that way back when in the figurative mists of time I did a review of the first manga volume in this particular series. Now the interesting thing about the worlds of manga and anime certainly there is a lot of cross pollination so to speak, after all a great many successful anime have been spawned by equally successful manga. Conversely some anime have gone on to become successful manga as a result of their television success. But even though a manga might spawn an anime this does not mean that the entire process is simply a matter of rote replication. This very first volume of the Bleach anime is good illustration of this particular fact.
Of all the popular anime series that are making the rounds here in the west, Naruto and One Piece being the other biggies, this would have to be the first anime where the primary protagonist is not voiced by a female. I know for a fact that Naruto is voiced by a woman, Maile Flannigan, and I believe that One Piece is the same, here though Ichigo is voiced by a guy though perhaps this has got to do with the fact that in contrast with the other two series the main character is two years older – both Naruto and Luffy are thirteen and thus have slightly higher pitched voices. I have to admit that Johnny Yong Bosch does a good job with Ichigo; I couldn’t really imagine who else could fill the role. It’s certainly a far cry from his portray of Koizumi in The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, who despite having some incredible powers is a lot more ‘sedate’ than Ichigo.
So what is this all about, what is the story that unfolds in these initial few episodes? Like I said early if you have read the manga then there is a lot of common ground, but there are changes in the way things are presented. Like a large number of Shonen based manga/anime, the series focuses on the character of a teenage guy who has immense potential and untapped abilities and is completely unaware of this when we, the audience, first come across him. In the case of Ichigo this revolves around his ability to see ghosts, those spirits who for a variety of reasons seem to still be hanging around in the mortal world not passing on to the next for whatever reason. He isn’t the only one in his family who can do this, his younger sister Karin also has the same ability although she is in denial and doesn’t acknowledge the existence of ghosts.
Unfortunately this ability is about to land Ichigo in a lot of hot water and completely change his life irrevocably. It is at this point that the anime diverges somewhat from the manga. Something in the spirit world is after Ichigo, a hollow of considerable power and malevolence who has various other hollows under its command with which it can carry out its nefarious schemes. No doubt you’re wondering to yourself what the heck is a hollow? Isn’t it a basin or depression in an area of land? Well yes it is but in the case of this anime a hollow is a malevolent spirit whose heart has been consumed either by other hollows or negative emotions, as indicated by the round hole in their chests, and resulted in their transformation to a hollow. All hollows were at some point humans who were unable to pass on for a variety of reasons and ended up being transformed.
It seems that in the twilight world between the living world and the next their exists a hollow who is very keen to feast upon the soul of Ichigo Kurosaki, due to its great as yet untapped spiritual strength. So in order to fulfil its ambitions it sends out two hollows under its command to wreak havoc in the world of the living, what it didn’t count upon was the fact that the Soul Reapers, entities whose duty it is to fight hollows, have rumbled onto this particular little incursion into the world of the living. Enter Rukia Kuchiki, a veteran soul reaper, who is hot on the trail of these hollows.
Her meeting with Ichigo throws everything into chaos and provides the catalyst for the events that are to unfold. It’s certainly a different part from Michelle Ruff’s role as Yuki in The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, that character is rather withdrawn and introverted in most aspects whereas Rukia is a bit more lively and completely out of sorts with the living world. She might be able to cut a hollow down in a single blow but her command of the vernacular is a few centuries out of date and she’s not exactly aware of her fellow classmates or how to use a straw. This certainly makes for some humorous moments in the show. Bleach is a series well worth catching, I am not sure if it is on pay TV here in Australia but you can certainly get a hold of it on DVD.
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