Bleach TYBW E48 Review: sosuke Aizen's soul society

Bleach, Thousand-Year Blood War, Episode 48: THE END 2 WORLD

So this is a bit of an interesting episode. After the mostly anime-original episode 47, this one follows certain aspects of the manga a lot more closely. And it's one that I know have raised some strong opinions from the fandom who had expected more. Not a lot more, but a bit more -- a couple extra flourishes to a long-awaited battle. And I think that is the big elephant in the room -- the fact that Aizen vs Juhabach is as rushed and as fast as it was in the manga. 

To be fair, this was a problem I had with some other fights that I also wanted to be extended -- the Gerard Valkyrie fight being a major contender in my head -- but considering how great the Thousand-Year Blood War is at extending major fights and even giving us brand-new ones, it is kind of a shame that there are many aspects here that are abrupt. 

One thing is, admittedly, there to note -- Aizen vs. Juhabach was always fanservice, even in the original manga. It wasn't a pivotal character the moment the way the extended Ichigo, Uryu or Orihime fights were in this final cour. Aizen, for all of the excitement of seeing Bleach's original Big Bad face off against the newest one, was ultimately irrelevant to the final story, and involving him in the finale would require a massive restructure... and it's a restructure that is fast running out of runway. As good as the TYBW anime has been at adding a lot of context to the major characters, there are still a lot of things I felt disappointed about -- the lack of relevance of Ryuuken and Isshin; the lack of relevance of Ichibei (though this is likely to be fixed in the next two episodes) and any explanation about the Soul King. 

And ultimately, them adapting Aizen's scenes as-is from the manga is... it wouldn't be bad. It wouldn't be good, but it wouldn't be bad... if the scenes were given some impressive flourish like 'The Perfect Crimson'. I also thought Kenpachi's Bankai and Hitsugaya's adult form were also kind of irrelevant, but they were spectacular in the anime that it does almost wash off the poor taste of the conclusion of the Gerard Valkyrie fight. 

But yeah. While I do think the Aizen sequence was ultimately irrelevant, the fact that they're including it at all and not doing stuff to make it be a bit nicer... that's a bit in poor taste. I wasn't as pissed as some of the fandom (many of whom are clamouring for Aizen's Bankai) but I did think that this was a rather weak episode in comparison. 

Anyway, after the events of the previous episode, we get a neat connective tissue scene as our main cast are being healed. Renji is inexplicably whole, which is something I'm going to bitch about. Nanao is smartly trying to heal Orihime first, who gets up and almost zombie-like goes off to try and use her powers to restore Tensa Zangetsu. Rukia also tells Nanao to focus her healing on Ichigo and Renji...  which is more to make sure that the manga equivalent of the scene of Ichigo and Renji going down to fight Juhabach happens. I am entirely unconvinced that Renji is a better fighter than Rukia, especially with their respective Bankais, but okay. It is a nice bit of detail as Nanao shrinks her little healing cube, and both Chad and Ganju start coughing blood. 

Surprisingly, at this point, a completely unexpected scene happens of Sajin Komamura standing in the afterlife. Komamura kind of disappears from the manga after his fight with Bambietta, last seen being carried in his dog form by Iba. I've always felt like there should be an epilogue to this beyond a tragic handwave. Komamura sees an apparition of Genryusai, before flowers blow at him to show him a vision of Soul Society.  Komamura realizes he's meant to protect it, before waking up in his wolf form alongside Iba. Which... I really love Komamura so some screentime for him is neat, but it is kind of an odd choice to give him this bit now, and over many other somewhat neglected characters. 

Speaking of neglected characters, the scene of Orihime being unable to fix Tensa Zangetsu happens as it does in the manga. Rukia and Pesche talk about Juhabach's powers. Renji picks Ichigo up in a manly elbow-lock, and tells Rukia that they don't really have a plan. Renji notes that it's impossible to come up with a plan against that monster anyway, but they have to fight at least. 

And then Ichigo gets stabbed through the back by Tsukishima! Again, this happens similarly to the manga. I've always found the Fullbringers' involvement in the finale to be shoehorned in, and it kind of is shoehorned in here. But at least it's something. Tsukishima and Ginjo show up, while Riruka, Yukio and Giriko hang out in the background. And essentially, Tsukishima does his big thing for the arc, using his bullshit reality-warping power to counteract Juhabach's bullshit reality-warping power. By rewriting the past, Tsukishima allows Orihime to restore the blade, and even Ichigo's inner world is restored. Ichigo and Renji head off, and the XCution fuck off to irrelevance, I guess. 

Speaking of irrelevance... Uryu wakes up to see Isshin and Ryuuken. We condense this meeting and the exposition to Ryuuken just giving Uryu the Still Silver arrow, the Standspitze. Unlike some of the other stuff -- like the Soul King or Haschwalth/Juhabach's powers and whatnot -- the Still Silver still really comes out of nowhere, and its connection to the Auswahlen blood clots is still inconsistent with how the anime has been showing the Auswahlen vaporizing Sternritters into skeletons. 

Still no explanation of what they have been doing, or what they will do. I really hope they at least get involved and shoot of some attacks during the final battle, because moreso than the Visored or Gerard or XCution or whoever, these two absent dads really should've been doing something. 

Anyway, Juhabach arrives back in the Soul Society. Which has places that look remarkably intact after the two different Vandenreich invasions. The anime's version of events with Uryu's big plan last episode does give Juhabach a more sensible return to come down to the Soul Society. He sends out gigantic blasts of reishi to casually blow up a bunch of streets' worth of generic Shinigami, as if there hasn't been enough dead generic Shinigami. 

Aizen in his chair, however, confronts Juhabach, and delivers the stone-cold line of "welcome to my Soul Society". 

We then cut off to Ichigo and Renji running down the spirit path down to the Soul Society, and in a nice bit of character moment taken straight from the manga, we get a nice scene of Ichigo asking Renji if he really needs to come. Renji goes and punches the also-wounded Ichigo a couple of times, before going on a 'manly man' rant. Renji notes that this is the only time he will ever admit to this, only because the two of them are alone, and that's a cute little scene. But basically he really appreciates Ichigo for being the person that allowed him and Rukia to get back together again, and because of that debt he's going to always keep going on to help Ichigo even if it means his death. And of course, ol' softie Renji goes "I'll never repeat what I said". A pretty cool scene!

In Soul Society, Juhabach unleashes a gigantic blast of black goopy energy that shatters Aizen's chair, and there's a cute little bit where Aizen mocks Juhabach for having trouble with Ichigo, while Juhabach counter-mocks him by saying that Aizen's just projecting his own failures to other people. Aizen thanks Juhabach for destroying the awful chair (Chair-sama was a meme back in the day),  and fully freed, blasts off the dust around him. Aizen tells Juhabach that he's going to fight him not because it benefits him, but out of principle against anyone that tries to control him. 

Now, everything that happens here is technically under Kyoka Suigetsu, and it's interesting to see how the next episodes are going to handle this. Ichigo and Renji come in and attack, but this whole fight is an illusion and I don't even know if Renji was ever involved (or was knocked out off-screen, or off-illusion). As Ichigo and Renji jump Juhabach, he does his whole "I see everything" spiel, and cracks Tensa Zangetsu. Interestingly, it doesn't break? That is just the illusion, I guess? 

Juhabach launches gigantic blasts that vaporizes part of the execution hill at the center of Soul Society, while continuing to gloat. Renji uses Zabimaru to attack, then goes Bankai to So'o Zabimaru, but gets his arms sliced off by Juhabach, before just getting swatted aside by giant Soul King powers. Before Juhabach can wipe out Renji, Aizen charges in and attacks with his sword. He then jumps to a rock and unleashes Hado #99: Goryo Tenmetsu. This was a hado that was very weirdly depicted in the manga, and only really fleshed out in the Can't Fear Your Own World manga. Aizen summons a couple of giant lightning dragons and Naruto-runs into battle with them. And that's really the only major addition to this fight. 

And then Juhabach apparently shatters Kyoka Suigetsu, and unleashes a blast that draws blood from Aizen and dispells Goryo Tenmetsu. Whoops!

An arm-less Ichigo charges in and swings down with his sword, and Juhabach notes that he had identified Kyoka Suigetsu working -- apparently, Juhabach was under the impression that Ichigo and Renji swapped places, with 'Ichigo' being the armless Renji. Juhabach then attacks Ichigo, blasting a massive hole in his chest. Juhabach unleashes gigantic gouts of energy, telling Ichigo that hsi resistance is over and he can perish alongside Soul Society. 

And, of course, this is just Aizen's illusion, and the body impaled by Juhabach is actually Aizen. Ichigo charges in, stabs Juhabach from the back, and unleashes a Getsuga Tenshou, which seemingly causes Juhabach to melt into the ground. Aizen does some explanation about how Ichigo's immunity to Kyoka Suigetsu ended up strangely becoming useful, and he's about to say another thing to Ichigo... when a gigantic blast of blood happens, Juhabach is of course still not dead, and Aizen gets eaten and consumed by Juhabach's goopy eyeball shadows. 

Juhabach, reduced to nothing but eyeball-goop and a mouth, mocks Aizen for undoing his Kyoka Suigetsu, seemingly because he's reached his limit. Ichigo charges in towards the massive goopy goop form of Juhabach, but he blasts off Tensa Zangetsu, and seemingly also overwhelms Ichigo and his blade while he does a monologue about being stronger than even death. 

Credits roll, as we cover the literal last parts of the manga that could be adapted faithfully. And so far, I do think that adapting these fights a bit too faithfully has been the wrong move, especially considering how cool the rewritten parts of the Uryu/Haschwalth and Ichigo/Juhabach (or Ichigo-Orihime-Rukia/Juhabach, more like) battles have been.

Anyway, after the credits, we get scenes from the real world which did run a bit too long -- and could've been given to other parts of the episode (like Aizen, or XCution, or Ryuuken and Isshin) where Tatsuki runs around to see the real world covered with rogue Hollows. Shino and Ryunosuke attack a Hollow and there's a bit where Tatsuki argues with them for being careless. But then Juhabach appears in the sky, causing all the Hollows to fly up towards him. Juhabach vaporizes all the Hollows with one shot, conveniently not hitting any of the living people or Shinigami. 

We cut away to Hueco Mundo, following Yammy's cute Hollow puppy. Somehow, despite last seen being around Orihime and the others, Harribel, Neliel, Pesche and Dondochakka have all been teleported back to Hueco Mundo. It really feels random, and having a Garganta or some kind of portal open behind them would've really been useful here. But they also see Juhabach in the sky. 

Juhabach, in the Soul Society, monologues that he has fused with the world itself, allowing himself to access all worlds. And there's a cool sequence where the background flashes around between Soul Society, the real world, and Hueco Mundo as Juhabach monologues about his absolute power. Juhabach then unleashes even more goopy Soul King power to create a brand new world. Ichigo struggles in the goop, and as a giant goop-dome is formed, eyeballs open up all over the inside of it. 

Shino and Ryunosuke take a stand against Juhabach in the real world... which I guess is a neat bit to bring their character into full circle, especially after getting some screentime in the beginning of the arc? But then four captains appear in the sky. Kyoraku, Byakuya, (kid form) Hitsugaya and... Soi Fon! Soi Fon? Soi Fon!!! They remembered she exists! Huh! Kyoraku gives a badass line about how he's ordering everyone to fight and return back alive, and dying is punishable by death. 

In Hueco Mundo, Harribel and little Neliel get ready to fight, and Grimmjow also walks up, pulls his sword and does a bunch of acrobatic flips through the air as he Leeroy Jenkins-es against Juhabach. 

Uryu comes in, uses a Quincy arrow to free Ichigo and grab Tensa Zangetsu, and after a brief bro moment, they get ready to fight Juhabach. 

So yeah, final battle time. It seems like it might be a nice little 'raid boss', as I've seen other fans online call it, allowing the captains and other characters to all fight against Juhabach while Ichigo and Uryu hold down the fort in the 'main' battle before it ends with Still Silver. There are still a bunch of stuff that is going around that Juhabach might not be able to predict (Antithesis and whatever Kyoraku/Ukitake is planning with Mimihagi). It's nice to see some of the Captains and Arrancar fight, and I'm really hoping for Aizen to be involved somehow still, even if it's in a minor role. As much as this episode and a bit of the previous one has been a bit rocky, it is a nice buildup to finally close the chapter to the final fight of Bleach. 

Random Notes:

• 
  A non-exhaustive list of things that Ryuuken and Isshin could have been doing off-screen between cours: 
• Gather the Still Silver from dead Sternritter, which would explain what they are doing off-screen. 
  
• Fight the Lille Barro birds. 
• Fight Gerard Valkyrie. 
• Rescue Team Ichigo from the throne room instead of Pesche and Dondochakka.
• Help Uryu last episode in his bombardment plan, which is an invention of the anime. 
• Join the rookie Shinigami in fighting the Hollows in the real world, which is an invention of the anime.
• Fight the Hollows pouring into the Rukongai last episode. 
• Help heal or gather the wounded, which would put them at Nanao and Momo relevance, but at least they would be doing something.
• I know I rag on the whole explanation about broken Bankai, and I'm not even bitching about Tsukishima and Orihime restoring Tensa Zangetsu. But with Renji's So'o Zabimaru being absolutely shredded by Juhabach last episode... the fact that Renji was completely whole in this episode, and uses his Bankai without any problems, does raise some questions. I suppose his Bankai could be an organic, restorative type just like Komamura? Or perhaps the Renji we saw in the illusion was just an illusion. 
• I probably shouldn't be too harsh on Rukia wanting Nanao to heal Renji to send him down to fight -- love does make you do illogical things, I suppose. 
• Orihime has such a "I'm done with you" death-glare at the XCution. Sure, it could be just exhaustion from the death battle she just did, but I like the idea that she's just not in a forgiving mood against Tsukushima. And honestly, I really did feel like XCution was handwaved and forgiven way too fast and what they did here in this arc was really not deserving of forgiveness. But I also really don't care about the two main guys of XCution to really be bothered by it. 
• Yeah, in the manga, Juhabach just decides to very randomly fuck off from the Soul King's Palace down to Soul Society after breaking Ichigo's Bankai, seemingly for no good reason. 
• I am never the biggest fan of the Fullbringer arc, but the shot of the Shinigami bursting out of an spiritual portal to help Ichigo at his lowest moment -- and that scene being part of Renji's "pledge" on always being there to help Ichigo -- is a very appropriate and cool one. 
• There's a random scar on Juhabach's mouth that is particularly prominent in the anime due to the colours. I'm not sure what this scar is meant to represent? The wound caused by Ichigo's Getsuga in this scene, I guess? 
• Neliel is reduced to her child form, because she uses her form-changing bracelets that Urahara gave her as something for Uryu to use Antithesis on. Really should have scrounged around for a brick or a Quincy button or something... 
• Other than those already established to be present, here's some other people who might make it to the finale:
• Presumably Renji isn't too wounded to join in the fight, even if he can't possible out-bro Uryu. 
• Kira still looks quite fresh in Soul Society, and can probably join the fight. 
• Iba is still also very fresh, and that flashback with Komamura should lead somewhere.
• Aizen might pop back out of being goopified. 
• XCution are very fresh and haven't really battled. At least Ginjo would be cinematic as an action fighter. 
• While we can maybe rule out Kenpachi (who's the most injured out of the Gerard squad), Mayuri and the Visored as we've seen them injured; we've also seen Rangiku, Momo, Ikkaku and Yumichika standing around. 
• Nanao presumably is still healing people?
• The Visored, maybe? Let them shoot some beams? Shinji, at least, wasn't super injured after his embarrassing defeat at the hands of Gerard.
• Other Arrancar that would be around are the Tres Bestias, plus Loly and Menoly, who aren't super strong but we've seen them earlier in the arc.
• Ichibei is a shoo-in for doing something, regardless of his allegiances. 
• Ryuuken and Isshin, the bums.

Bleach TYBW E47 Review: tri-world cooperAtion

Bleach, Thousand-Year Blood War, Episode 47: The End 2

Been a bit behind in Bleach: TYBW reviews, but considering that there's a bit of delays in the final two episodes, I guess it all works out in the end. After the previous episode was a relatively faithful adaptation/remastering of some segments in the manga, 'The End 2' gives us mostly new content. 

And we start off with a rather fun scene, and one that quite interesting for the anime staff and the writers to focus on, since we start off in a strange purgatory with waters. The near-death Kyoraku gets dragged underneath by an a hand, and is confronted by the spirit of Ukitake. Ukitake gives a bit of a recap about Juhabach's plan to merge the Three Worlds, and how he's managed to delay it with his whole Mimihagi gambit. Ukitake notes that he's very likely to die soon (and Kyoraku agrees), and before he does so, he wants to make a gambit on Kyoraku by giving his last powers to him. There's a nice couple of jokes between the two old friends, before Ukitake notes that despite this not being Kyoraku's style, he's still going to do it since there's no one else that can. 

Kyoraku walks off into the distance and wakes up in the real world, while Ukitake fades away (and says his last line in his adult voice). It is quite surprising that we're getting a bit more for Kyoraku to do, but I am absolutely not complaining. 

Our main star in this episode is Uryu, however, as we go through a massive sequence that's original to the anime. Fresh off his victory over Haschwalth, zips down into the giant orb of deathly distortion, summons his fancy new four-pronged bow, and starts shooting arrows into it. The arrows whirl around the giant death-orb, and Uryu notes that this is exactly as his master (his grandfather) wrote. Utterly unexpectedly, the two best characters in Bleach, Pesche and Dondochaka show up. They were apparently caught up in the 'black eyeballs' and got teleported there. Which I guess are the portals that were opened a couple episodes by the science team? 

But much more exciting is the arrival of Neliel and... Harribel! There's a bit of a comedic bit from Pesche where he accuses Uryu at ogling Nel's adult form. Harribel is completely no-nonsense, pointing her giant shark-bone-sword at Uryu's face. Which, fair enough, he is a Quincy and even though Harribel has been out of the loop, her being suspicious would be entirely proper. Kyoraku and Nanao then show up, leading to a three-way meeting between the Shinigami, Hollows, and (a) Quincy. 

And can I just say how cool it is for Tier Harribel to have a large-ish role here? They didn't have to do this. They could've just had Harribel be freed in the epilogue and called it a day. But I've always had a huge soft spot for the Espada, and seeing Harribel get extended screentime where she had nothing in the manga is great. 

We get a brief cutaway to a whole ton of Hollow rampaging and destroying the Rukongai, with Akon and the rest of the science team remarking about how this appears to be stabilizing the distortion as best as they could, and while the destruction of the poor Rukongai to be a necessary evil. There's some discussion about how Shinigami need to ensure balance, although I don't think 'maybe Rukongai existed just for this moment' makes much sense beyond the Shinigami telling themselves that to feel better. 

We then get Kyoraku and Harribel both commenting on the big orb of doom, and Uryu identifies it as a 'final arrow' by Juhabach to trigger the collapse of the Three Worlds. And Uryu makes it clear that his duty and objectives as the Last Quincy is to destroy that Seed of Distortion. We get a flashback to Ishida Soken, Uryu's grandfather, apparently being the one to have discovered this distortion with his experimentation... and inadvertently caused this to be known to Juhabach. Soken notes that there might be a way to destroy the Seed of Distortion by driving it into the distortion itself. A bunch of handwave-y explanations that I have watched a couple of times and shrugged, but essentially it gives Uryu a game plan. 

The whole Seed of Distortion stuff is admittedly still a bit of a random plot device from out of nowhere, but we at least get some modicum of explanation and exposition this time around. I'm not the biggest fan of it, but I can see how it works around the explanation for Uryu's big moment in this episode, and at least one aspect of Juhabach's plans to merge the three worlds -- even if he seems perfectly capable of doing it on his own with just his Auswahlen powers. 

There's a bit of a 'tough guy' act from some of the parties involved, but ultimately the various factions decide to work together to enact Uryu's plan -- drop the castle down into the distortion. Uryu plans to drop the central tower of the five-pointed Soul Palace (apparently the other four mini-palaces keep the central structure floating in the skies? ....sure?). In an adaptation of the silly unexplained bombs from the manga, Uryu gives out 'Leiden Scherben', Quincy explosives that break down and scatter reishi. Uryu's allies will go around to tear down the bridges of Wahrwelt to drop the central castle. 

We cut back to Juhabach and Ichigo, where after the previous episode, Ichigo is basically in complete shock while Juhabach does an evil villain monologue. We get a short but powerful monologue from Ichigo, who notes that everyone there has had their powers rendered ineffective... and Juhabach attempts to take back the power he has given to Ichigo. I'm not sure if it actually worked or not, but Juhabach draws in power from Ichigo and Blut Vene appears all over Ichigo's body. As per Ichigo's flashbacking to the origin of his Quincy powers, Juhabach is drawing the Quincy-Hollow powers into himself, and Ichigo's hollow horn shatters. 

Shadowy goop comes out and creates a gigantic halo, and this slams down all over the battlefield. Everything is bathed in vague purple light... and sadly, this does mean that the Gerard Valkyrie fight ends the same way, without even the slightest bit of extra scene for Byakuya/Hitsugaya/Kenpachi to do something against Gerard and his heart. Boo! Boo boo!

(At least this time it does seem to be Juhabach unwittingly hitting the other Schutzstaffel in the crossfire while draining Ichigo, instead of him grabbing the villain ball). 

As the church-bells sound and Gerard gets atomized into a skeleton, the Auswahlen also slams onto the Lille Barro birds, wiping them out of existence while a confused Izuru Kira looks. It's...  it's a bit of a little bugbear for me, too, that we didn't even get a token scene of Kira fighting the Lille birds. We don't have to get a proper fight, just to see Kira clash maybe once or twice with the Lille birds. There were enough random scenes with the science team that I'm sure it could've been snuck in. 

More importantly, Mimihagi around Ukitake explodes and Ukitake presumably dies properly in this episode... but Kyoraku raises his hand, which contains a fragment of Mimihagi... and that shadow morphs into a mass of energy, and then an eyeball, and gets sucked in by Juhabach as well. What this means, and why Ukitake needed to entrust that power to Kyoraku, I'm not sure... but I really do appreciate the added Kyoraku/Ukitake stuff and hope that all of this builds to a less ass-pull-y finale for how they defeat the Almighty. 

Juhabach, fully empowered as thus, flies up above the Wahrwelt and notes about how his plan is entering fruition as the Seed blooms, and as he's about to make an offering to the 'chaotic tranquility'. 

(I will still be critical and note that the anime still doesn't explain why Juhabach needs to do a second Auswahlen to get rid of Gerard and Lille, which still feels as random as it was in the original manga. I can infer stuff, but it still feels rather random._

It's at this point that the five bridges blow up as Uryu's allies detonate the bridges, and Uryu flies in from the skies. And as if he's a goddamn proper main character this time around, Uryu challenges Juhabach. And as Uryu and Juhabach prepare to fight, we get a cute scene of Dondochakka's giant pet Hollow worm, Bawabawa, evacuating the rest of the main cast. 

Uryu and Juhabach fight, with Juhabach outspeeding Uryu handily... but then a gigantic blast of water slams onto Juhabach as Tier Harribel joins the battle! That's so awesome. Underused characters actually participating in big fights? I guess the Espada rightfully is more popular even among the writers and animation staff compared to the XCution or Visored. 

And Harribel just keeps slamming large amounts of water onto Juhabach. Nelliel charges in with Super Acceleration, although she gets pierced on the side. It is quite cool, since Nel did absolutely nothing but stand around and evacuate people in the manga version of the arc. Juhabach mocks the 'King of the Arrancar', noting the sheer gulf between their powers. Harribel cares not for power level gaps, or of the title of 'King'. 

Harribel and Neliel are completely outmatched, mind you. Juhabach is right. But it's still cool to see old school Bleach attacks as Harribel drops a Cascada on Juhabach, dodges some black shadow tendrils before being pierced. Uryu uses Feder Zwinger to break down the reishi of Wahrwelt to create a gigantic arrow, and does a massive combo attack with Nelliel's Lanzador Verde... the scene moves between multiple projectiles and it's a bit odd, but as Juhabach queries whether this is the 'future that Uryu has chosen', Uryu goes "I haven't chosen yet!" So... uncertainty works to work around the Allmighty? Lanzador Verde slams onto Juhabach and seems to stun him for a bit. 

Juhabach notes about how futile this is, and uses his powers to 'break the arrow of hope'... but then, Uryu finally, finally shows off why Antithesis is actually important to fight against Juhabach. 

In the face of Juhabach's future-swapping abilities, Uryu notes that he could already see that the future's going to be swapped... and he uses Antithesis to reverse the futures, restoring the arrow that Juhabach broke. It breaks apart and swarms around the Seed of Destruction, finally sending the Royal Palace descending down into the giant void in space. 

Again, this is cool. In the manga, Uryu barely gets to use his Antithesis powers, but everyone keeps calling him as some kind of special Quincy. Uryu actually having the power to defy Almighty with Antithesis, and his still-unexplained immunity/survival of the Auswahlen (which I really hope the anime explains) really does make it understandable why he's super crucial to defeating Juhabach, instead of it feeling arbitrary. The added Uryu fight scenes against Squad Zero, Renji and Ichigo, of course, most certainly helped out too. I know I did complain a bit across my reviews about some things that could've been extended, like the Visored, or Gerard, or whatever.... but Uryu definitely is someone who went out of this new rewrites with a massive victory. 

As the Seed of Distortion falls into the distortion itself, and Juhabach mocks Uryu that this is going to blow up the Seireitei... Uryu uses Antithesis to swap some stuff. With the trinkets that Uryu and Neliel has thrown around, Uryu swaps Juhabach and traps him within the explosion, while teleports the Arrancar into safety. And then with a gigantic amount of Feder Zwingers that take the form of like, mummy bandages, Uryu wraps everything around the gigantic explosion to contain it. The interlocking Quincy arrows is some over-the-top CGI stuff, but it looks impressive enough. Uryu gets a pretty cool Dragon Ball Z style yelling, before the explosion happens. 

And Uryu falls out of the sky, and just like Orihime a couple of episodes ago, this feels like a victory. But then Juhabach appears in the sky, laughs, and notes that this alters nothing of the future he had planned. Can't... can't Uryu just Antithesis this again? But sure. I get where they are going for with this, and we could handwave it as Uryu just losing power. 

Juhabach boasts as eyeballs appear all over his body that 'all Schrifts have sublimated' within him, and that the final end and beginning is about to happen. With the distortion plan gone, Juhabach walks into a portal and heads down to the Soul Society. This happens in the manga, too, but felt random and arbitrary. 

While I'm still a bit salty about some choices, I really do appreciate that the anime is really showing off some characters that really deserved better. Harribel, Nel and Kyoraku all having stuff to do is absolutely welcome, but Uryu getting a proper huge gambit to fight against Juhabach is great. I also really like that between the Antithesis powers of Uryu and the whole Mimihagi gambit by Ukitake and Kyoraku, that we're slowly building up various other ways to properly get around The Almighty beyond just a vague handwave of 'plot device magic arrow'.

This episode does feel a bit clunky, and if we're being honest a couple of the changes are quick handwaves just to give us some popular characters returning as a bit of a fanservice... but I can't lie; I did really enjoy all the returning characters and the huge Uryu moment. It feels like they could've did some work to make the pacing work better, but otherwise it's still a nice episode. 

Random Notes:

• Kyoraku and Ukitake getting extra scenes is most welcome. One could already make an argument that Kyoraku had his big moment, and Ukitake's big moment comes off a lot better now that the anime equivalent of that scene has a flashback attached to it. But having a proper conclusion to that is most certainly welcome. 
  
• And I would be remiss if I didn't mention that Ukitake getting a proper close-out is probably a nod to his upcoming big role in the Hell Arc, whenever that happens. 
• 
  Among the discussion between Kyoraku and ghost!Ukitake, there's  a cute line where Ukitake notes that the chances of their plan working out is the same chance as Kyoraku successfully asking Unohana out on a date. Okay!
• With Xcution really not doing anything more than their manga counterparts in the next episode, I really thought that they could at least help out in laying down the bombs. At least Kujo, Riruka and the Time Tells No Lies guy would have something to do? They would represent the 'Earth' part of the Three Worlds a lot  better than just Uryu alone, at least. 
• It was a bit confusing how Pesche, Dondochakka and Harribel got sucked to the Royal Palace. Pesche claims that some 'black shadowy eyeballs' teleported them there, which seems to imply Juhabach's powers, but considering they were all last seen in Hueco Mundo, and the only portals that opened to Hueco Mundo seem to be the one activated by the Gotei 13... it's just a bit odd. 
• Nanao was fully ready to throw down and Hado the Arrancar if Kyoraku hadn't stepped in. 
• The Gerard fight really does rankle me. Even a couple of extra scenes showing them figuring out that it's the heart that's the source of regeneration and commenting on it would've been something. 
• As Juhabach does that final Auswahlen  and everything goes purple, there's a very cool chanting background music that I think is Never Meant to Belong (?) but with the Auswahlen church bells effect overlaid on top of it. 
• I do like that among the five orbital palaces, we get to see the massive terrain damage caused by Gerard's kaiju fight, as well as Lille's Trompete attack. 
• So despite Renji being cut up into ribbons last episode, I guess only the Bankai parts are broken? Because he seems quite whole on top of Bawabawa. 
• The bangles that Nelliel drops to allow Uryu to use Antithesis are the bangles that prevent her from reverting to her child form... she does get turned back into a kid next episode, so it's a bit... foolish, I would say, to use those when any item would really do. 
• Really love the scene of Uryu swooping in like a damn fighter jet into the glowing yellow explosions of the Seed of Distortion. 
• Rangiku, Momo and motherfucking HANATARO make brief cameos around Byakuya and Hitsugaya as they witness Uryu stopping the big explosion. 
• ...did none of the Shinigami try to help contain the blast? Even with the handwave that the more powerful Arrancar are wounded, the Shinigami no longer have Gerard to deal with, after all...

Bleach TYBW E46 Review: bAlAncing Act

Bleach, Thousand-Year Blood War, Episode 46: The End

After 'Life to Defend You', it is a bit jarring (if not unexpected) to return fully to a more straight-up faithful adaptation of the manga material. And this is, admittedly, material that I have complained heavily about. Out of everything in the final chapters for Bleach, these fights are the ones I associate the most with the spiraling mess that the final couple of volumes ended up being. 

But there are two crucial aspects to these fights -- Juhabach's total domination of Ichigo; and the Uryu/Haschwalth Antithesis-Balance fights -- we actually have build-up to them. One major problem of the Juhabach and Ichigo fight in the manga is that we spend so much time building up to Ichigo rebuilding his true Zanpakuto and him running out to the throne room... only for Juhabach to instantly one-shot Ichigo before he even got to do anything with his manga. Having not just 'Life to Defend You' to really show off Ichigo, Orihime and Rukia doing stuff against Juhabach and having a good show before that big moment of domination? That works so much better. It might be a more traditional shonen way of 'the heroes do well until the villain does a power-up', but it is most certainly better than the abrupt nothing of the manga. Juhabach actually having good monologues and properly expounding on his objectives, motivations and values is also nothing special in the grand scheme of action anime, but it does a great job of making me care for this moment. 

And the Uryu/Haschwalth fight is... it's still bad, and it really is eclipsed compared to the fights we saw fragmented throughout the last four or five episodes. But again, at least we have a proper confrontation between the two -- and so it doesn't feel quite as rushed. I still don't like the Uryu/Haschwalth fight and how it ends, but it's something. 

I'm going to cover all the Juhabach-vs-Ichigo material first, then the Uryu-vs-Haschwalth because it's divided quite cleanly between the two. 

Anyway, the episode picks up where we left off, with Orihime's big dramatic sacrifice. And of course it doesn't hold, although I kind of wished that maybe we cut to some of the Uryu/Haschwalth fight to milk the omment a bit more instead of resolving it within five seconds. We get an unexpected cameo by Tatsuki, who feels her best friend's death or something in the human world and walks up to the window and cries. We cut back to the throne room where finally Renji, Chad and Ganju show up and regroup with Ichigo and Rukia, who both disengage their Bankai and inform them of Orihime's sacrifice. I do like that Ganju goes "that means the world is saved, right?" God damn it, Ganju, read the room!

And interestingly -- and probably one of the most interesting scenes for me in this episode -- is Ichigo walking off and saying 'not yet', with his footsteps creating pools and a small lake behind him. All of this culminates to a gigantic curtained throne, presumably the Soul King's throne, manifesting in front of Ichigo. Waterspouts whirl around Ichigo; and all the imagery of the Soul King Adyneus's death in the primordial world has always used lakes and waters. I do hope we do get a brief flashback later on of Ichigo and Ichibei's discussion. Ichibei wanting to groom Ichigo up into the replacement Soul King was always something hinted in the manga (and confirmed in novels and built up in the anime), but I do want to see it spelled out properly.

But then, of course, things don't quite happen that way. The colours distort briefly, ominous music plays, and everyone turns around to see Orihime floating in the sky, all horror movie style. Eyeballs appear and Juhabach reforms. We get the explanation that Juhabach got the full power of The Almighty back (which the voice actor has a great time hamming it up, saying the name of that power) because of the day/night cycle. Which... is a bit anti-climactic since the audience didn't really see that, but sure. 

Juhabach reforms and begins to give a rant about how 'that version of the future has never existed'. This is Juhabach's bullshit The Almighty powers, very JoJo and very nonsensically reality-warping. It's not just the power to see the future (as what we saw with Haschwalth's version of The Almighty) but also the power to jump to other timelines and select them. In the manga the explanation was done well, but the way they got around the Almighty was just a vague handwave and I'm curious to see how they do it now. 

Juhabach unleashes a blast of Conqueror's Haki reishi that forces all the characters other than Ichigo to their knees. Ichigo charges in, and Juhabach knocks Ichigo backwards, showing off his two swords in a hilariously mocking "did you think you are the only one who can wield dual swords?"

Juhabach then goes on his 'grains of sand' monologue, essentially explaining multiverse theory and how Juhabach can jump from one grain of sand to the other to select the futures that he wants, allowing him to reject futures he doesn't want and make a mockery out of the idea of 'hope defying fate'. There is a lot of holes with how this power works, but it's been compared a lot to quicksaving in a video game, and there are a couple of unstated limitations -- clearly there's some wibbly-wobbly memory stuff since Ichigo, Orihime and the rest of the people in that room remember the 'old' grain of sand/timeline; he can't time-travel into the past; and it's clearly not all possibilities if Juhabach can't just select a timeline where he wins.

Juhabach then gives another speech about how the Wahrwelt he's going to create is a world without conflict, similar to what Orihime desires. Ichigo then goes into a speech about how despair has been something he's familiar with, since that's how he continually goes stronger. We get a nice flashback to scenes from the original anime of Ichigo's victories over various opponents, while he's activating the fiery chains of his Bankai. The moon effect happens again, and Ichigo goes into his Bankai, Tensa Zangetsu... 

And it's immediately broken by Juhabach. Juhabach does say that "this is why I needed you, my son"... which the episode doesn't make fully apparent due to the placement of the scenes (there's a huge chunk of dialogue after this on the other side of the battle), but this seems to be talking about Haschwalth instead of Ichigo. Because the Auswahlen happens and kills Haschwalth, and this appears to be how Juhabach manages to break the Bankai. 

So it is the implication that Juhabach needed that little boost (or perhaps The Balance, specifically) to break Ichigo's true Bankai, which is interesting? It does fix a weird plot hole beyond 'Juhabach is being a stupid arrogant idiot' with his random Auswahlen, and does make these scenes more dramatic. Ichigo dramatically explode sin power only for the scene to immediately cut with the blade being snapped in half, and Juhabach dropping the tip of the blade. This is 'respect to Ichigo's power', that it's a powerful Bankai, and he's jumped into a future where he's already broken it. Juhabach then snaps off Ichigo's horn and launches it at him, before beating up Ichigo. 

And now some more anime-original fight scenes, as Renji finally stands up, activates his own Bankai, So'o Zabimaru... and Juhabach teleports behind him. He goes on a deviously assholish speech about how he likes the word 'Bankai' as it's normally associated with hope for the Shinigami, but he's about to one-shot everyone that can do Bankai and make it be despair. We don't see the exact wounds, but as we cut away to Rukia, we see pieces of Renji's bloody limbs fall down onto the ground which is surprisingly brutal. Juhabach then grabs Rukia by the face, and looks like he's about to crush her skull in... although we don't see it happen, we do see Rukia's sword arm visibly snapped like a twig. 

Ganju and Chad also get impaled unceremoniously with shadow-pillars. And Ichigo watches this while Juhabach monologues about how Ichigo could only overcome despair 'simply because I wasn't there'...  the final shot of the episode before credits is a black screen with an amazing pained scream by Ichigo's voice actor Morita Masakazu. 

The other half of the episode is the Uryu/Haschwalth fight. Haschwalth explains that the 'time limit has already passed', and that that he's going to fight with his own powers now. Haschwalth does his manga counterpart's claim that "my original power is more suited for battle than His Majesty's", which... has always felt bullshit whichever version of Juhabach's powers we're talking about, but particularly egregious here. 

The anime doesn't really call it into stark attention here, but Haschwalth also is portrayed and animated as being a lot more stoic and less hammily-mocking as he has been in the past couple of episodes, which I thought was a nice touch to show him when he's being host to Juhabach's powers. 

And Haschwalth's fight against Uryu is... it's animated well. The scenes from the manga are adapted faithfully. I just never found this fight to be particularly engaging, and with this being really the only times we've seen these powers in a full fight (yes, we did see Balance and Antithesis cameo in the Squad Zero fight if you know what you're looking for) it really does take the wind out of the sails. Haschwalth's Balance reflects misfortune back at the opponent, and Uryu's Antithesis can swap events that happen between two objects. It's essentially a game of 'no, you' except Haschwalth has some stuff about how he can absorb damage with his Freund Schild/Friend Shield. There's some nice animation with the giant CGI balance, sure, but while I know why the fight is what it is, it really doesn't leave me much to discuss. 

And Haschwalth does go on one of the 'letter rants', going on and on about the balance and putting everything on the balance. This is something that a lot of the Sternritter does, like As Nodt and Gerard Valkyrie and Mask and Pepe and Askin... but Haschwalth's little rant really does get eclipsed by Juhabach's and it's frankly just not that interesting. There's some nice nods to how humans place right and wrong on a balance and sort out what's right by themselves -- a lot of this really does tie to the Bazz-B relationship, but we don't really get this bit until the very end. And I really feel like Haschwalth has enough of a character buildup from that flashback that we really didn't need to fall back to the writing crutch that's this big theme-motive rant. 

We then get misfortunes and wounds being reversed on each other, and the anime shows off the anime-exclusive scenes from previous cours of Uryu using Antithesis in the Squad Zero fight and earlier in this one. So that's a nice bit -- and I do hope that Antithesis is used a bit more as Uryu is clearly going to be more involved in the finale (and gives more weight about Haschwalth giving the cryptic hint that Uryu might be the only one that has the ability to challenge the Almighty). 

There is one really nice additional scene where Haschwalth compares Uryu to the stupid humans. And then Uryu goes through all of his friends. Ichigo, Rukia, Orihime, Chad and Renji are all idiots. But if being an idiot makes Uryu the same as them... he can live with it. It's a really nice way to showcase Uryu's true loyalties and go through all that 'nakama' stuff. Not the most revolutionary, again, but quite needed here -- particularly with the Haschwalth/Bazz-B contrast at the end. Especially with Uryu comparing himself to being a cold intellectual like Haschwalth, who puts things on balances. 

Haschwalth questions what merit these bonds have, since Uryu has gained such an immense boost in power and ability by simply being associated with Juhabach, but Uryu is adamant that his bonds and his friendship are more important. Of course, this is right when Juhabach does his Auswahlen and kills Haschwalth, and that there's no need for 'self-interest' because they are friends.

(It is also nice that only Haschwalth is shown being Auswahlen'ed here, instead of alongside Gerard, which adds to the dramatic moment here). 

And of course, Haschwalth lies there dying, and Uryu kneels next to him. Haschwalth goes on a bit of a last-minute rant about how he's totally proud of his status, how his was the power that Juhabach decided to take, and how he could be of service to His Majesty. But on the same breath, he also tells Uryu to use Antithesis to transfer his wounds to the dying Haschwalth, and he flashes back to his own friend who he betrayed for power and out of impulse -- to young Bazz-B -- and the last shot of that post-credits scene is the little logo that they had as a child. 

And honestly? 

This was great. There was a lot of expansion for Juhabach's dialogue, of course. Him mocking the concept of Bankai, and having a slight theme hammering the 'despair and hope' on Ichigo really does work well, particularly building up on the previous one. Juhabach breaking the Bankai after we saw what Ichigo could do with it, and also seemingly massacring the rest of Ichigo's friends works a lot better as a gigantic gut-punch. But I do really feel like while the actual Uryu/Haschwalth fight is still kind of lame, the conclusion and the little discussion between them is well-done. Having Uryu actually have stuff to say about his own friendship and having it be the one that shakes Haschwalth... and particularly having Haschwalth's death tie into the Juha/Ichigo fight is nicely done. 

It's still not perfect and I can still poke a lot of holes in the Juhabach/Haschwalth power sharing dynamic and The Almighty in general, but overall? A nice execution if they really had to keep all of the scenes in the manga intact during the adaptation. 

Random Notes:

• Oh, there's also a brief moment in the middle of the episode of Akon and company in the lab, trying to figure out stuff about the reishi imbalance. They discuss how they need a large amount of energy to solve the reishi imbalance, and Akon falls on the solution of opening a gate to Hueco Mundo. This is an unexpected but very welcome return to how the Arrancar and Hueco Mundo were kind of built up in the beginning of the arc but we never really got any follow-up to that. 
• There are some theories out there between episodes 45 and 46 that Uryu putting the Leiden Hant on Haschwalth to dispel his Almighty powers is what caused Juhabach to regain those powers, and... it does push some blame to poor Uryu, but I do like it as an explanation a lot better than 'oops, it's no longer night in this strange spirit-world where you don't really see the sky'. 
• Previous episodes have shown shots of the human world where Karin and Yuzu are reacting to massive unexplained earthquakes; or Tessai, Ururu and Jinta fighting Hollows. It is a bit weird that Tatsuki was literally just sleeping through the whole damn thing and the skies outside her house is just rainy.
  
• We do get a lot of Ichigo/Orihime shipping moments in the last couple of episodes which does explain the big love-triangle choice, but I do like the brief bit where Renji rushes over to Rukia's side in this one. 
• After all the hullaballoo with Byakuya telling Rukia that her Bankai needs care to disengage, Rukia just does so basically instantly here. Although I suppose it isn't particularly uncommon in Bleach that power-ups that are supposed to have drawbacks get instantly handwaved by the next appearance. 
• I like that out of the characters around, Renji immediately goes to realizing and pointing out that this might be something that the 'damned priest' Ichibei is doing. 
• With how serious Juha has been throughout this whole final fight, I really loved his sass with mocking Ichigo's dual swords. 
• The fight also has Uryu show off his new four-pronged bow, which... kind of feels really lackluster after him showing off far more elaborate forms and abilities throughout the past dozen episodes or so with his Vollstandig. 
• The manga version of the Juhabach/Ichigo fights has Juhabach lay down explosive traps, but while the explosions are still retained in the anime, it's just rolled into the rest of Juhabach's generic-big-bad-anime-powerhouse abilities instead of changing the future to lay traps... which is absolutely a good change. 
• The addition of the previous fight does make it kind of funny when we get the manga dialogue of Uryu asking Haschwalth if he "wants to see [his] Schrift" and Haschwalth saying that he would've used it earlier in the fight if it was enough to beat him. Except Uryu did use the Antithesis to get the Leiden Hant on him. So this dialogue is kind of off. 
• I know how Antithesis worked so I have been looking for moments where Uryu is using it, but I wished that the flashback to the previous episode actually showed the glove materializing around Haschwalth's hand to properly show off the Antithesis. 
• Ganju is 10000% absent from Uryu's list of his comrades, but that honestly makes sense and I genuinely don't think Ganju deserves to be in that room. Not over so many other characters running around the battlefield at the moment. 
• Ichigo's Tensa Zangetsu in this episode is 100% identical to the blade we see in the manga's version of this scene, which is noticeably different from his dual-horned, spade-blade Bankai last episode. The huge red fiery effects from the anime is still here, though, which confused me for a bit into thinking that Ichigo's Bankai is just revised. But apparently it's a Bankai with multiple forms?
• Notably, while Ichigo does say 'Bankai' last episode, he never identifies it as 'Tensa Zangetsu'. 
• Orihime's powers from last episode is given the name Rokutenshinshun in the cutaways. 

Bleach TYBW E45 Review: orihime inoue's lAst stAnd

Bleach, Thousand-Year Blood War, Episode 45: (Life to) Defend You

So this is the actual 'movie' of this season, huh? 

I don't think I've ever been quite so tense watching a Shonen anime before, and I didn't think that I would ever have this feeling watching something that is a show that ended a clean decade ago -- and is, as far as I understand, still going to adapt the original ending of the manga. So I already know what's going to happen. 

And it's still so intense to watch. 

After the past couple of episodes focusing on adapting the Askin and Gerard fights of the manga, and giving a proper Uryu/Haschwalth extension and a buildup to Ichigo vs. Juhabach... 

Again, I would like to preface this by saying that the original Ichigo vs. Juhabach fight essentially ended after maybe half of what we've got in this cour. Barely any of the Orihime monologue, and right after Ichigo goes through the Gran Rey Cero / Getsuga Tensho attack, he just zips in, activates his brand-new Bankai... and it literally gets snapped in half without doing anything. That was part of the horrid final volume of Bleach.  

I still assume that the anime will go through the same motions, except with an actual fight -- the way they handled Uryu's clash with Ichigo in one of the previous seasons, or the Squad Zero battle. It was something that was implied to be built up to, but we didn't get the payoff. And we've been getting a better Juhabach monologue, some actual motivation from him, some parallels between Ichigo and Uryu's fights, and Orihime gets monologues. 

This episode elevates everything, though. Not just the Orihime stuff, which is probably the unquestionable highlight for me, but it even brings us a lot of great Ichigo moments and even some power-ups and choreography that was definitely lacking in the source material. Which, as I keep emphasizing, the manga equivalent to this sequence is Ichigo charging with his barely-changed Bankai, and getting one-shot by Juhabach. 

But we do start off (after a brief recap of last episode's post-credits sequence) catching up on the statues. And normally I like to meme with Chad. Chad gets to unleash a La Muerte, but the statues regenerate with the Soul King goopy power. But Renji and Rukia arrive, and after a brief discussion,  Renji does some cool Zabimaru whip-swing things to slice off some of these statues. There's a smooth sequence where Rukia runs on Zabimaru to get to the throne room, before Renji flexes Zabimaru to use it to decapitate other statues. 

That's all we see of them, and honestly, it's kind of a bit sad for Chad and Ganju that even their irrelevant role is usurped by the more relevant Renji. But oh well. The episode also really likes to cut into Uryu and Haschwalth... and god bless the new incarnation of the fight with more dynamic powers, but I really didn't care for this fight at the moment with all the bright blues and whatnot. It doesn't help that we've seen the Uryu/Haschwalth fight in the first two or three episodes in this cour and this is mostly more of the same until the end. So for the purposes of this review, I'll talk about the Uryu/Haschwalth fight all together in one go at the beginning:

And, right, in the middle of all that intense emotions and action scenes, we do get the Uryu/Haschwalth stuff. Again, all of these fights are a lot more dynamic than anything we saw in the manga. But it is getting a bit repetitive. Uryu uses his not-Senbonzakura Vollstandig to constantly try to overwhelm Haschwalth, and there's the nice implication that he's repeating some attack patterns -- gathering his flechettes into a big arrow, launching it at Haschwalth, and having them spread apart to surround Haschwalth -- to figure out the timing. 

Haschwalth mocks Uryu a couple more times, using the moniker 'Last Quincy' a couple of times. There is a cute moment around the halfway point of the episode where Uryu tries to backstab Haschwalth with a blade, and Haschwalth makes a joke about Uryu using a 'sword'... but the blade shoots out! It's actually an arrow! It's a bit of a running joke with me back in the Vandenreich era that Sternritters using bows and arrows seem to be the exception rather than the rule, and I found this to be funny. 

And finally, at the climax of the episode, Uryu seems to be putting the Sanrei glove -- or Leiden Hant -- which is the source of his Letzt Stil power-up form. Haschwalth continues to mock Uryu underestimating his foresight powers, and seemed to be able to predict Uryu's Sternenstaub attack that's about to hit him from behind. Uryu grabs Haschwalth, and Uryu notes that Haschwalth needs a gap of three seconds any time he uses Juhabach's powers. But that three seconds is enough for Uryu to get the Sanrei Glove on Haschwalth, and activates it... leading to a cliffhanger for this fight. 

____________________________________________________________

Anyway, the Throne Room battle! We start off with something from Dragon Ball Z, with Ichigo and Juhabach zipping around the sky in streaks of colourful light, clashing and slamming onto each other. And Orihime seems to be reduced to her manga counterpart's role after her big moment two episodes ago. And hoenstly, I think most would be fine with Orihime's really cool moment a couple of episodes ago. But no, it's not over. 

Juhabach holds Ichigo up with his shadow tendrils, and does his 'what is power' spiel. A good part of why this episode is so good, I feel, is the running themes going through this episode, too. Not to diss on Askin or Gerard; but I really like a personal villain. Juhabach is great at taunting Ichigo (and eventually Orihime), and throughout the first and final sequences of this chapter he goes through a little villain monologue about the nature of power that Ichigo has. 'Power to protect' is weak, according to Juhabach, and that his definition of power is a tyrannical, oppressive one. Pretty simple shonen manga stuff, but the scripting and voice acting is good enough. 

What really makes it work, however, is the contrast with Orihime's constant repetition (almost like a madness mantra) of "my powers are weak,  if only my powers are much stronger, much stronger" all throughout the battle any time we zoom in to her POV. And that constant discussion of power even as Juhabach, Ichigo and later on Rukia are slinging around their big showy attacks is really well done. Even in this first scene, Orihime mentally replies to Juhabach's ramblings about the power to defend or protect to be the power that she wants, with a really nice shot of her hand reaching up towards the trapped Ichigo.  

And then Juhabach runs Ichigo through with his sword. 

This was a bit abrupt and surprisingly graphic with loads of blood, actually showing Juhabach carving a giant hole. Orihime uses Santenkesshun to reject it, restoring Ichigo's chest hole... and in a bit of black comedy, Juhabach just stabs Ichigo again. Orihime then heals Ichigo again... and this time, snaps off Juhabach's sword. 

This earns Orihime the full attention of Juhabach's ire, and he starts launching the shadow-waves at Orihime. One big one to knock her against the pillars, then another spear slamming right through her chest. And then Juhabach attacks Ichigo again...

And still Orihime stands back up, healing Ichigo after healing her own wounds in the split-second that Juhabach turns around. And we get a rather tasteful sequence of depicting Juhabach stabbing and piercing Orihime with near-kill shots, with flashes of her silhouette backlit while being pierced by Juhabach's shadow spears. And she keeps rejecting, and rejecting, and seemingly hits her limit at some point. 

But she keeps rejecting. She keeps healing. 

She keeps standing up. 

Having read Bleach from end to end,  I don't think I would ever say that Inoue Orihime is a 'badass' character at any point in the story. But seeing this? Seeing her stand up, hair strewn around with so much detail from the animation staff on her eyes and hair, dripping blood, doing the one thing she knows she can do -- to heal -- and just holy shit. What a well-done moment. There are shots of her glaring death glares at Juhabach as she keeps standing up. 

Juhabach keeps mocking her. She keeps telling herself that 'if only her powers were stronger', et cetera. 

Not realizing, again, just how impressive she has been throughout just these short five minutes or so. This was what Aizen was saying when her powers could 'trespass into the domain of gods', all the way back when she was kidnapped and reduced to a damsel in distress for the Arrancar arc. And it's such an insane growth to how much she could heal in the past. It's so cool, it's the only thing keeping Ichigo in battle... but Orihime is right that is isn't quite enough. 

And then ice! Rukia shows up!

Rukia freezes Juhabach, gets Ichigo back up,  and Ichigo very briefly checks on Orihime before the two of them stand side by side. How cool is this? How cool is this that the original protagonist duo from the very first chapter of Bleach actually get to stare down Juhabach together? Even if Rukia seemingly only gets this episode, the anime is acutely aware just how starved Ichigo has in terms of conclusions and closures with most of his close friends. Uryu got quite a bit with Ichigo in the last cour, and I've been so impressed with the Orihime stuff,  but Rukia? As Juhabach puts it, the 'Shinigami that set everything into motion'? It is really so nice to let Rukia have a great moment of relevance this close to the end. 

And we get some cute, classic bickering between the two, including a random line about Ichigo defending "the horn is cool!" 

Again, this fight is very smooth and cool. We get a brief cutaway to the Uryu/Haschwalth fight which is understandable considering the intensity of the Orihime stuff. Ichigo blitzes Juhabach with sword blows, while Rukia swings upwards with her ice. There's a bit of commentary about Rukia's powers from Juhabach (?) that makes it hard to fight together with allies? But then Juhabach unleashes what can only be described as a Giant Quincy Laser, which punches a hole through the wall, vaporizes a pillar, and causes Orihime to have a most concerned :o face. 

Ichigo and Rukia do a cool combo attack, with Ichigo slamming down the Gran Rey Cero Getsuga down from the top while Rukia swings upwards with her ice... but Juhabach just summons more pillars of shadows with eyeballs, and the eyeballs all shoot the black-pink Quincy Laser Beams. These pierce Ichigo and Rukia through their chests, 

And we cut back to Orihime. Her hands are trembling, and she continues with her mantra, blaming her own weakness for Ichigo and Rukia being wounded. Juhabach creates giant pillars, and a giant five-pointed Quincy star with shadows, which unleashes the mother of all Quincy Death Lasers in a rather over-the-top pink explosion. 

And Juhabach walks away.... only for an artistic blood moon in the sky to appear. 

And then Ichigo says: "Bankai". 

The red moon in the sky gets eclipsed... and the screen is plunged into pure darkness. And then Ichigo's brand-new Bankai form is shown, glowing and silhouetted with red, flaming light. Ichigo walks out of the darkness, which bleeds off his body and trails off his two horns, and chain-like flames wrap around his wrists, ankles and neck. His sword looks completely new. 

This, by the way, is completely different from the nothingburger 'final Bankai' that we got in the original Thousand-Year-Blood-War arc in the manga, which was just a sword on a chain that I've always felt was a visual downgrade to any of Ichigo's many, many forms. Rukia just calls this 'Zangetsu'. Which, knowing just how much 'the Blade in Me' has been emphasizing that Ichigo needs to reach the true, original form of his Zanpakuto, makes sense!

Juhabach summons more of his eyeball lasers, but Ichigo creates a web-like shield of his fiery chains to block them. It's very cool, and Ichigo does a badass boast about how he needs all of this power to protect everyone from Juhabach. 

Bankai Ichigo does have a cute little gimmick to it, which I'm not sure was the intention with the manga's original form of the Bankai, but Ichigo is able to create what are essentially afterimages or shadow clones. "Delayed strikes" whose impact Juhabach can feel, afterimages that split apart and disappear into shadows, and additional Ichigo 'clones' that appear and slam onto Juhabach with strike after strike... there are moments when Ichigo just summons additional shadowy clones (with a similar effect to Juhabach's own Soul King powers, too) and they all just blitz Juhabach like a goddamn fighting game. 

The next couple of minutes is really hard to describe without going in-depth, and it's just a great showcase of loads and loads of laser beams from Juhabach, and a lot of speedy maneuvering from Ichigo. We get nice shots of Rukia joining in, and at one point Ichigo blocking Orihime from another round of Quincy eye lasers. It's just a delight to watch. Juhabach taunts Ichigo at some point, noting that while it's a new power-up different from Shinigami powers, it's still weak. 

Interestingly, while looking at Ichigo making his shadow clones, Juhabach observes that this runs contrary to Ichigo's own principle, since his powers "scream that you don't need your friends". This feels like a bit of a loaded thing to say, but the episode doesn't really follow up on it. Another speed-blitz attack of Juhabach using his laser spam against Ichigo's shadow clone army ensues. 

This leads to the mother of all Getsuga Tensho's, creating a gigantic, inky black crescent moon in the sky. 

And by gigantic, I mean gigantic. This giant burst of power and black and white energies carves a moon in the sky, and we see shots of everyone else in the battlefield looking up at it. A very cool moon, and in the little space where the two tips meet floats Ichigo. 

It really looks cool. 

And as the moon fades away, Juhabach is seen scattered into little pieces of shadow... but he doesn't seem worried. He mocks Ichigo, noting that Ichigo is trying to get a shot in while Juhabach is underestimating him... but that 'instant' has ended. And Juhabach spreads out with his shadowy eyeballs, and does his own gigantic radial laser-beam spam, shooting eyeball beams everywhere. Ichigo falls out of the sky.

And we're back to focusing on Orihime, who runs towards Ichigo but gets trapped by Juhabach in a shadow pillar. Juhabach is taking this a bit more personally, and taunts them, noting that Orihime will be the last one to see Ichigo -- powerless Ichigo -- vanish from the world. Orihime continues her mantra about needing more power. Juhabach then continues to taunt Orihime, commending her for her resolve... but then trying to deconstruct the fact that it's because Orihime is here, this weak little crutch, that Ichigo couldn't achieve the full strength of his power. Essentially, Juhabach is trying to tear apart the whole 'power to protect' stuff.

This pisses Ichigo the fuck off, who gets a second wind and charges at Juhabach. There's a cool bit where Juhabach shoots a dozen lasers that curve around to strike Ichigo from behind. 

But Rukia yells Ichigo's name and freezers the shadow-pillar holding Rukia in place, calming Ichigo down for the two of them to do a Bankai combo move. Ichigo creates/splits into a dozen black shadow clones that begin zipping all of the place, before charging in to tank Juhabach's own beam-spam. And Rukia goes Bankai! Rukia activates her Bankai a second time in the anime! That is so cool. Ichigo uses his fire chains to hold Juhabach in place; while Rukia unleashes the gigantic icy nuke of Hakka no Togame. And just to seal it in, Ichigo does another of the giant ink-moon Getsuga Tensho. Just big attack after big attack. 

And Orihime wakes up, seemingly seeing Rukia in her snowy Bankai form similar to how the anime (and manga) presented her after the As Nodt fight... only for the fog to clear and instead of showing off Rukia all cool, we see her impaled by a sword, bent backwards and unconscious. Ichigo, meanwhile, is being stabbed on the ground by Juhabach, who monologues about how "this is power", and how his analysis about the 'strong power' is justified. 

And Orihime has a bit of a breakdown. The animation, again, is particularly great here especially in the closeups to Orihime's eyes. She repeats her lines about if only her own powers are stronger. Blood drips on the ground, her hairpins shatter, and the little Rikka birds start moving around and trailing lines of blood in the air. This moment is animated gorgeously as Orihima calls out the names of her six Shun Shun Rikka. 

Juhabach shoots his laser spam, which the Rikka line up in front of her and block, creating a badass 'explosion behind an action scene character' shot for Orihime. Juhabach then does the shadow-pillar-eye-beam attack he used earlier against Ichigo, and Orihime blocks that too. Her Rikka start tracing the air around here like a circle, while Orihime goes back to her little mantra. Blood starts rising up from the ground. She thinks to herself that she wants to make it so that pain and suffering doesn't happen, if only she had stronger powers. Orihime throws herself through what appears to be a strange circular portal of blood (????) before she shoots herself like a cannonball at Juhabach. In another bit of black comedy, Juhabach punts Ichigo at Orihime, who zips past him.

Orihime charges at Juhabach, and her powers form a golden halo around her head, before she pushes a mighty "I reject" at Juhabach. Orihime Inoue is actually 1v1-ing Juhabach at this moment, and I am genuinely so impressed at how well-done this is. How amazing the buildup is. The animation, the voice-acting, the sound effects. It doesn't even take away from main character Ichigo, who had a great showing earlier. 

And Orihime unleashes a gigantic bright light that appears to be reversing time. Her own fallen blood appears to get retracted into her own body, and Juhabach's gloopy eyeball-shadows appear to be reversing as well. Ichigo and Rukia yell at Orihime to stop. Orihime says something that Ichigo can't hear because of the loud noise, and we get a gigantic explosion of black-and-white that envelops Juhabach and Orihime...

And petals fall, leaving only Ichigo and Rukia in the empty throne room. 

The anime cuts away to two tiger lilies from episode 2 of the cour, and one of the tiger lilies fall off, revealing the full title of the episode: "LIFE TO DEFEND YOU". Smash to credits. 

Woah.

People use it as a meme. But honestly? To quote the kids, this was 'absolute cinema'. 

____________________________________________________________

Intellectually, I know --  I know that they're not going to change the ending that much. Even if they rewrote the final battles against Juhabach and Haschwalth, that they're not going to change that much of the ending. Orihime isn't dead, or at least, won't be by the final episode. Neither is this how Juhabach is dispatched of. But honestly? Honestly, this was done so well that if they adapted out Aizen's participation or the Isshin/Ryuken silver arrow nonsense, would people be really mad? 

I don't know what else I can say here, since I think it's made abundantly clear just how much I was impressed with this episode when I was watching it. Juhabach's new powers, Ichigo's new Bankai, Rukia being involved in the final fight at all, the 'power' monologues, the depiction of the new Getsuga Tensho, and of course, everything about Orihime? This was just phenomenal. The final couple of episodes of the Thousand-Year Blood War was always the ones that needed the most work, and I am so happy that we're getting rather extensive rewrites. 

Random Notes:

• 
  The credits are completely silent, set against a black screen, instead of playing Rasen. Very atmospheric. 
• There's also a great, subtle insert song happening as Orihime does her last charge against Juhabach!
• The original version of the reviews of episode 44 and 45 had a whole section talking about how Rukia and Renji basically disappeared after the Gerard fight. That is true for Rukia, but I 10000% forgot that Renji appeared for a bit in the manga's version of the final clash with Juhabach. Which really shows just how unmemorable that fight really is in the manga version! (Also, Renji? Really? Over Rukia, or Isshin?) 
• There is a brief, subtle adorable moment when Renji poses with Zabimaru at the close of his 'rescue' scene, and the big Zabimaru blade just covers Ganju entirely, and he has to peek to the side to get inside the shot. 
• I do wonder if the anime is just doing away entirely with the Allmighty's decidedly uncinematic "lol I can see your next move" powers, as well as the Antithesis-vs-Balance battles... which were always so boring to read about? I wouldn't mind if these fights replaced those, if we're being honest.
• There is also argument that Uryu managed to swap the Sanrei Glove onto Haschwalth's hand with the Antithesis, which would be cool if/when they explain the Antithesis powers later on in the future, but... but honestly, I have so little memory of the original Antithesis power that I wouldn't mind if they just decided that Uryu's new Sternritter powers is just 'action hero'. 
• I like that Haschwalth only calls it 'Leiden Hant', which was just casually dropped as an alternate older name during the Letzt Stil's original debut. 
• I do appreciate the anime not making this an excuse to graphically show Orihime being mutilated on-screen multiple times. They still couldn't resist a 'ass-up' shot, Yoruichi-style, at around 8 minutes in, though.
• I actually kind of forgot the plot and why Juhabach wants Ichigo dead now, since he went through all the trouble of creating him in the first place. Did he really just need Ichigo to crack open the Soul King? I genuinely forget.  
• Interestingly, the mid-episode data cutaway for Ichigo's new Bankai is 'burnt off' and impossible to read. 
• "The horn is cool!"
• But no, seriously, incorporating two horns into his new Bankai really does make it a lot cooler and gives us a nice continuity between the 'Horn of Salvation' form and the Bankai instead of it feeling like them just tossing random form designs for Ichigo.