Sometimes the villains can get a little smart.
Creative Staff:
Story/Art: Tite Kubo
What They Say:
Ichigo Kurosaki never asked for the ability to see ghost – he was born with the gift. When his family is attacked by a Hollow- a malevolent lost soul – Ichigo becomes a Soul Reaper, dedicating his life to protecting the innocent and helping tortured spirits themselves find peace.
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Bleach moves right along with another installment, though for longtime followers of the book it’s not exactly going to be all that engaging if you’re not invested in some of the really fringe supporting characters. This is part of the problem you get with any book that goes on as long as this and has as sizeable cast as it does as you get caught up in these sidebar fights and then shift gears to a different one, only realizing that it’s also with characters that may not energize the fanbase. There’s a lot going on in this arc that I’m still getting a handle on, but at the same time I know a lot of what I’m getting at the moment is just action material. At least Kubo and team feel like they put a bit more effort in this time around with better backgrounds in a number of scenes.
The initial fight is one that has some nice tension as we get Askin going through his recovery phase and revealing that once he survives a particular attack he ends up immune to it from there on out. Surely there’s a trick to exploit that will make short work of this later on, but for now that just sets Yushiro off to prove himself once again by trying to do the same thing again. Yoruichi is at least smart enough to understand it before he does that, but not fast enough to stop it from happening. It’s largely just an affirmation of his abilities and his confidence from surviving it, which ups his cool factor if that’s something that you’re actually into. Askin feels and looks like a low-rent Aizen to me so there’s not much engaging there.
The bulk of the chapter deals with the fight with Gerard elsewhere, however, as we get to see this group of Vaizards going up against him. Having been out of the loop as long as I have been, none of them are named characters for me so it’s just a matter of enjoying the visuals. Gerard’s a little easily flustered and that makes for some awkward attacks, but I do like that he seems to wisen up along the way in that the best way to get rid of them is to just drop the entire area that they’re in downward so that they’re not a part of it anymore. Presumably in a way that would have him staying where he is though. There’s some nice material to this in the visuals with the backgrounds and just the flow of it, but that may not be much to salvage it for others.
On the plus side, Hitsuguya returns at the end and it’s always welcome to have a familiar face, even if it’s just crowding an already crowded field even more.
In Summary:
The fights continue on as we get a range of characters going at it with situations that again reinforce the old adage that if you’re not reading a manga series from the start, you can’t just jump in. That proves to be a frustrating and limiting aspect for me, particularly since I’m using to being able to jump into a wide range of US comic book series that have been running for decades and get the hang of what’s going on after a few issues, if not quicker. Bleach is working its sprawling arc and mostly seems to be working with lesser known and side characters, resulting in some decent action sequences but mostly just a sense of padding things out as opposed to really telling a story.
Grade: C+
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Viz Media via Weekly Shonen Jump’s ComiXology Release
Release Date: January 18th, 2016
MSRP: $0.99
