BLEACH – AGENT OF THE SOUL REAPER (DVD VOLUME 3)
June 10th 2011 04:27
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 Ishida), Jamieson Price (Chad), Wendee Lee (Tatsuki Arisawa/Ururu), Kirk Thornton (Eikichiro Saido), Yuri Lowenthal (Keigo Asano), Michael Sorich (Tessai/Don Kanonji), Michael Lindsay (Kisuke Uruhara), Jeannie Elias (Jinta), Liam O’Brien (Captain Junshiro Ukitake) & Tom Fahn (Mizuiro Kojima)
English version produced by: VIZ Media LLC
Released by: Madman Entertainment
Running Time: 100 minutes Rating: M
Ichigo Kurosaki has two unusual features, one is patently obvious to all and sundry the second is one that is known only to his immediate family and a few rare others that he’s confided in, these features are his spiky orange hair and his ability to see ghosts. Unfortunately for him both his hair colour and his ability to see the recently departed are almost like honey to buzzing swarming, angry bees. His hair causes him to get into fights and his ability to see dead people to borrow the line from the Sixth Sense is a brewing maelstrom just waiting to happen. Still he has only just realised what kind of world he now finds himself.
In the universe of Bleach their exists two types of spirits, wholes who need to be given konso, or soul funeral, in order to pass on into the Soul Society and hollows, malevolent entities who feed upon wholes and the souls of others, mainly those with high spirit energy. Ichigo and his family have high spirit energy and this very fact draws the attentions of a particularly nasty hollow known as Fishbone D, all is not lost though, a soul reaper one whose duty it is to guide souls and reap hollows also becomes involved in the mix. Consequently as a result of the struggle with the ravenous Fishbone D this soul reaper, Rukia Kuchiki, loses her powers to Ichigo whilst he in turn becomes a soul reaper to first save his family then to work off his obligation to Rukia for helping him in a really serious pinch.
Now I confess to being a Bleach fan and have enjoyed watching countless episodes, but I have to say that this particular volume had me in a sort of meh attitude. It was for me a very much take it or leave kind of affair, in fact I think at one point I pretty much almost got up and left the DVD running whilst I made myself a cup of coffee at one point. A case of was the anime more important or was having a hot drink the main concern, sad to say the latter won out hands down.
No doubt you’re sitting there aghast wondering what on earth could have caused such a reaction, what serious flaw or discrepancy could cause the Lantern to focus its vigilant viridian gaze elsewhere. In a nutshell this volume has little to no continuity, which isn’t so much the fault of the actual series but the actual makers of the DVD itself. Sad to say that this volume starts out with the conclusion of one story arc and then moves into a one shot and then the start of another. So at the end of the day all you have storywise is something of a jumble rather than a semi logical progression.
It would have been better if the first two episodes on this DVD had been used to round things off on volume 2 as it would have worked better storywise. Then this volume could have then focused more on the story arc that is introduced in the third and fourth episodes on it, namely Quincy Archer Hates You whereby we are introduced to the character of Uryu Ishida and the once numerous Quincy clan. It seems that this group were once fighters of hollows like the soul reapers, but where soul reapers cleanse the souls of hollows the Quincy’s instead destroyed them completely. Apparently these differences in methodology lead to a clash between the soul reapers and the monastic like Quincy’s, the latter coming out poorly as a result. So it’s no wonder that Uryu, the number one student of Ichigo’s class and high school would have something of a chip on his shoulder in regards to soul reapers…
But because you only see two episodes of this story seemingly tacked onto two other episodes in order to make up the quota for the disc it just doesn’t have the impact that it should have. Which is kind of disappointing as this series has such a great story, great characters and great moments of pathos, action and humour that a little bit more consideration should be shown when compiling a disc. Anyone who’s a fan of the show wants a bit of oomph, not a bit of meh, lacklustre dross especially when you may be forking over spenduli for it. And why do we have the sudden appearance of some goon from the Stealth Force? In the manga there was no mention of Eikichiro Saido yet here he is in the anime for no apparent reason getting involved in the story – obviously this little incident is down to the studio execs in charge of making Bleach, so why is he there? One of life’s little mysteries – my advise if you’re a Bleach fan make sure you have Vol 2 and Vol 4 before watching this one, it’ll work better watching it with those three volumes…
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