Bleach TYBW E35 Review: kAmi-sAmA no iutoori

Bleach, Thousand-Year Blood War, Episode 35: Don't Chase A Shadow

This episode adapts the first part of the Kyoraku/Lille fight, which, again, just like the previous one, is pretty faithful. The biggest change, I think, is just the positioning and the re-ordering of the Wahrwelt saga's various action sequences. We do get a couple of extra fun scenes on the Ichigo/Askin front, but for the most part "Don't Chase A Shadow" is a rather faithful take on the first part of the Kyoraku fight. 

Which, in my opinion, does admittedly make me wished they did a bit more. These later fights in Bleach are some that I wanted them to fix some of the pacing and lack of foreshadowing in. I think the Mayuri/Pernida one is a fine battle from start to finish, but I really did hope that they added a bit more here. Still, not much to complain in this specific episode, since what I wanted to see would revolve more around the second half of the fight. 

"Don't Chase A Shadow" opens up with a bit of a follow up to the previous one, as Mayuri's gloating is interrupted when Konjiki Ashisogi Jizo begins to writhe and deform as Pernida is not quite dead and starts attacking it from the inside. They actually repeat this in the beginning of the next episode, so I'm not entirely convinced that including it here is particularly necessary, but there we go. 

We then cut to the bulk of the Gotei 13 group, with Shinji discussing how this mysterious enemy that's been attacking them is doing so from a location they can't pinpoint. Which... I dunno, Lille Barro shot like five people from roughly the same trajectory. Even if they don't have a ranged attack that can reach that far (Soi Fon does have a magic bazooka, though) they should know roughly where Lille Barro is hanging out at. Said Sternritter is lurking in his sniper's perch, waxing lyrical about how anyone who isn't afraid is either a fool or worthless. At this point, Kyoraku draws his twin blades and stays behind to fight against their mysterious enemy. 

Simultaneously, Kyoraku sees a giant green pillar of light from Lille's location... then gets shot straight through the chest and begins to cough up blood, much to the horror of Shinji and Nanao. This is something that flows a lot better in the anime because we see everything happening one after the other. I remembered being frustrated by the manga's version of this events due to them really prolonging the cliffhangers with constant shots of Kyoraku being riddled with holes. The anime also makes Kyoraku pinpointing Lille's location with Daruma-san a lot more clear. 

Lille, meanwhile, pontificates about how he's seen packs of warriors collapse due to the foolish action of a single person. But then Kyoraku's voice starts singing a children's song creepily, the Daruma-san ga Koronda song. Kyoraku emerges behind Lille unharmed, and slashes down at the Sternritter. Lille dodges seemingly in time, but his sniper rifle Diagramm was sliced in half. 

Lille is baffled by what happened before him, not sure how Kyoraku closed the distance between them so quickly. Kyoraku asks Lille if he's ever played Daruma-san ga Koronda before. We also have the revelation that Nanao was able to keep up with Kyoraku, following right behind his footsteps to the rooftop. The two have one of their typical bantering, which I guess Lille is nice enough to let them talk? Considering Lille's super-serious demeanour throughout this fight, this does feel like a weird action for him to take. 

This is something that has subtly characterized Kyoraku and Nanao's relationship throughout the series, with Kyoraku wanting to send Nanao off to safety back to the greater group... but Nanao refuses. Only when Kyoraku frames it as an order to inform the others to go ahead without him that Nanao complies, but with the snide retort that she will be back. There is also the utterly bizarre but hilarious threat that Nanao makes, threatening to shave Kyoraku's hairy chest bald if he dies before she returns. Nanao departs and Kyoraku compares her attitude to that of Lisa... before finally facing off against Lille again. 

Lille notes that the Wandenreich has intelligence on all the battles fought by the Gotei 13... and I actually like the subtle note that this Daten isn't the most useful when fighting Kyoraku since he can theoretically make new children's games a reality and the games we've seen in his battle against Coyote Starrk is implied to be a mere fraction of what Katen Kyokotsu's Shikai can do. There is an interesting conversation where Kyoraku explains Daruma-san's rules (for most of the Anglosphere, it's "Red Light, Green Light") and Lille identifies it as 'Chocolate Inglés'. Unlike some other manga like Hunter x Hunter or Jujutsu Kaisen, it doesn't appear that Kyoraku needs to explain his powers to Lille, so, again, the two discussing the Daruma-san game and how it lets Kyoraku see the reiatsu of the 'daruma' feels a bit like it's more for the audience's benefit. I've always found this sequence to be a bit odd since Lille is shown to be almost mechanically cold and Kyoraku is previously known as "fuck honourable one-on-ones, I'm fighting to win".

Kyoraku also notes -- and introduces for the first time -- the concept of 'Reikaku', spiritual sensing. Kyoraku reveals that the image of himself with a giant bloody hole behind him is just some 'solidified reiatsu' he left behind in the previous location. Apparently, skilled warriors rely so much on their Reikaku sense that it's easy to fool compared to sight, like a natural reflex, and Kyoraku was able to use that to fool Lille's honed senses. While conceptually this sounds like a cool way to get around a well-trained sniper with honed senses, I always felt -- and still do -- that the whole Reikaku thing is a bit of a random ass-pull and I would've liked it much better if it was just another one of Kyoraku's children's games. 

This does lead to one of the more badass lines in this cour, though, with Kyoraku Shunsui calmly declaring that he is the Captain Commander of the Gotei 13, and he can walk the walk. For as much as I dislike the Reikaku explanation, this bafflement and this badass line from Kyoraku is extremely cool. 

We then have a short scene as Nanao explains the situation to the group. Momo tries to insist that they stay and help Kyoraku, but Shinji gives a pretty cool line to trust Kyoraku and that the weight of the Captain-Commander means something. He also asks them what Ukitake would say if he was here, which Shinji interprets as 'Shunsui will be fine if he says he'll be fine', and notes that Yamamoto would've done the same thing as well -- and that this is what the rank means. It's... it's an interesting character moment for Shinji particularly considering his long and stories history with the Gotei 13 and how he was essentially abandoned by them, and he had to bear the burden of leadership for his people. It's a shame that this is basically one of his last lines in the manga. I do hope that even if we don't get an entire episode that we get some payoff to all the scattered Hirako Shinji scenes we've seen throughout the TYBW arc. 

We go back to the battle as Kyoraku and Lille do the Daruma game again. Really love the effect the anime puts here, with the world turning black and Kyoraku flitting in and out as a golden silhouette. Kyoraku appears behind Lille, Lille shoots Kyoraku, only for that to be revealed to be another 'solid reiatsu' clone. Kyoraku uses Kageoni to glorp out of a shadow and stab Lille... although Lille is able to dodge the strike. Kyoraku praises Lille for being the first person to dodge Kageoni on the first try. Unnecessary Coyote Starrk shade there, Kyoraku! 

However, Lille reveals that he has pierced a hole in Kyoraku's foot, and boasts about the difference of their information about each other. Lille boasts that his Schrift is "X", the X-Axis, and explains that his power penetrates everything in front of him. Lille fires at Kyoraku again, who appears to dodge... but turns out that this is an afterimage created by a game called Kageokuri, involving projecting a shadow they stared at to a different location. I don't know if Kageokuri is the source of the other 'solid reiatsu' clones, but the way Kyoraku and Lille reacts, it seems to be different. 

We get another badass line from Kyoraku who tells Lille how scary and unpredictable children's games are, with the visuals of a child dragging Kyoraku's hand and forcing him to play. I think the child is meant to be a child version of Katen? Kyoraku says that when a child asks you to play, you need to play all the way to the end. As if to punctuate this, Lille's rifle is cut in half once more, and falls to the ground. Kyoraku notes that he should've moved in a bit closer to sever Lille's arm, but Lille just reforms Diagramm (with a different barrel!), revealing that the big fuzzy sniper rifle is, in fact, his Spirit Weapon.

It's at this point that Kyoraku appears behind him and slashes again, before disappearing in darkness and warning Lille that seeing his shadow will cause him to see silhouette afterimages from Kageokuri. Kyoraku mocks Lille, noting that many children are scared of their own shadows... before a swarm of shadowy Kyorakus burst out and descend on Lille. The real Kyoraku's blades stab Lille from behind, and Lille... slowly opens his left eye and observes that this is the third time. 

Lille then pontificates that he's actually been fighting with half of his powers sealed, and he can only utilize the full capabilities of The X-Axis with both eyes open. Where normally X-Axis allows his shots to penetrate his opponent's body, with both eyes open his body can penetrate the opponent's sword. As this happens, Lille's body seems to become incorporeal and Kyoraku's sword slides through it. Lille reveals that he has opened his eyes three times throughout this battle, which the anime is nice enough to actually show us the three times that he did so from Lille's POV. I briefly rewinded to those scenes, but I guess they were moving fast enough that it's excusable for the anime to handwave it as 'wrong angle, can't see his left eye'. In the manga, this was a big fat retcon. 

I love Kyoraku's response to this, blithely commenting that he wouldn't mind if Lille closed his eye again. 

Lille Barro then declares that he is the first Sternritter to be granted a Schrift, that he is Juhabach's masterpiece, and the closest one to god... and he activates his Vollstandig, Jilliel. I like the brief shot of the 'X' tattoo around Lille's eyes expanding and glowing, and we get the pillar of light and the church bells. And... I've always gone on record that while I can appreciate Lille's Vollstandig forms, I feel like they are so much less cool than his original 'badass sniper man' form. 

But we do have to adapt what has been written, and Lille's whole concept goes from 'badass sniper' to 'Tite Kubo's take on a biblically accurate angel'. Lille's Jilliel is like a weird cocoon that covers all of his body below the face, and eight massive wings each with holes on the wings. It's green, which... somehow works? I'm not sure. If you'd described this to me, I would've said that it would suck, but it actually works quite well here. In a display of power that Lille never shows again, Kyoraku is rooted to the spot and can't move, leading Lille to pierce Kyoraku with three shots. 

We get the title drop... and we cut to Kyoraku running across rooftops to reach a tower, resting and nursing his wounds. He's shot through his right shoulder and left hip... and also his hat. It is admittedly a bit silly that Lille was somehow able to freeze Kyoraku in place and... shoots him in the hat? Eh. Kyoraku gets a brief monologue, noting that it would've been so much easier to die instantly and laments that he's actually so strong that he can't use it as an excuse. Kyoraku muses that there's no point to bitching if Nanao-chan isn't there to listen, before leaping out of the tower he hides in... right as Lille Barro annihilates that tower with a barrage of shots from his wing-holes. Lille appears in front of Kyoraku, boasting of his invincibility. Kyoraku tries Kido, casing Hado #78: Zangerin. It's actually nice to see a Kido spell, even if this ring-shaped explosion does nothing to Lille.

We get a brief cut to Ichigo battling against Askin Nakk Le Vaar. In an anime-original scene, Askin actually asks Ichigo if he did some training in the Soul Palace. While it's a fair enough question for an opponent to ask Ichigo, it is curious that out of all people, it is 'promoted from the lower ranks' Askin that is asking Ichigo about this. Askin confirms that apparently this training is what's stopping Ichigo from getting Reishi poisoning, and Askin gets ready to adjust the flavour of his attacks. I'm not sure if we're going to extend this scene a whole lot more, or if this line is just there to give an explanation as to how Askin is able to off-screen defeat Ichigo, which canonically is what happens in the manga when we check in on them later on.

Kyoraku escapes to another building, noting that even though he didn't expect Zangerin to seriously beat Lille, he's disappointed that it doesn't even do a little bit of damage. Kyoraku notes that he is at the end of his rope, but he's also returned to the part of the city that the Shinigami arrives on. Kyoraku notes that everyone else should be far enough, apologizing briefly if Nanao gets caught up in this... poses with two of his blades pointed downwards, and then speaks the legendary word everyone has been waiting from the Captain-Commander... Bankai.

The Bankai activates with a huge area of effect, bathing the world around Kyoraku in a golden aura. Panels like a those on the screen doors in a traditional rakugo play appear in the sky (this bit is anime-original, I believe!), and we get shots of Ichigo and Askin; Shinji's group; Orihime's group and others reacting to this activation. Inky, shadowy tree branches extend from Kyoraku's position as a rakugo yell is heard in the background, and a shadowy figure lurks on Kyoraku's shoulder. This is Katen Kyokotsu: Karamatsu Shinju.

Lille swoops down and the bottom of his cocoon unfurls to reveal a set of strange prong-like centaur legs. Lille questions what this strange sensation is, and Kyoraku walks up calmly. Kyoraku asks if Lille sees the world as being gloomy and full of despair. Lille confirms this, realizing that this is the effects of Kyoraku's Bankai... and then starts ranting about how he is God's Messenger, and God's Messenger does not feel despair. He opens fire with all of his wing-holes, vaporizing a chunk of Wahrwelt, and gloats that a Bankai will disappear with its owner's death. Which... isn't strictly true, but I guess close enough of a boast. 

However, Lille is startled when a wound is made on his side, when he should, by rights, be invincible. Kyoraku identifies this as the First Act: Hesitance and Apportionment of Wounds. They're in a play now, a shinju or double-suicide play, and the story will go through several acts. This first one causes wounds inflicted on the enemy to appear on one's own body, and another wound corresponding to Kyoraku's appears on Lille's shoulder. As Lille panics, Kyoraku tells Lille to not talk between acts, and remain silent for the rest of the performance. 

Second Act: Pillow of Shame activates, and brown pockmarks appear on Lille's body. This is disease, apparently, and Kyoraku notes that a man who failed to kill his adversary will collapse from shame and suffer an incurable sickness. I guess there are certain conditions for the acts to progress? And then the world around them is covered with the ocean as the Third Act: The Severing Abyss activates. This is the man and his adversary accepting their fates, and tossing themselves into the waters until their reiatsu is exhausted. 

We get a frankly comical sequence as Lille in his wacky Jilliel form tries to flap his wings like a trapped bug towards the 'surface' of the 'ocean', but the surface is continually moving further and further away from him. Kyoraku talks about the inevitability of what has been done, and about Lille's selfishness. A second voice joins Kyoraku, and the figure of one of his two Zanpakuto spirits, the older Katen, joins Kyoraku. 

Back in the day, this was a huge deal as people went into debates about the seeming canonization of an aspect of a filler arc. But that filler arc is still that -- filler -- while the designs themselves are canon. Katen teases Kyoraku a bit, noting that Kyoraku got what he deserves for wearing another woman's kimono and pity is what's keeping her bound to him. Katen also bemoans that Kyoraku doesn't 'play' with her as often. Kyoraku also refers to Katen as 'O-Hana' (flower) and with the revelations about the true nature of Zanpakuto Spirits, it is very interesting what aspects of Kyoraku's soul and being that Katen and Kyokotsu manifested from. 

Similar to Cang Du way earlier in the saga, Lille demands to know why Kyoraku is talking to thin air, since he is unable to perceive the Zanpakuto Spirit. Lille rants that a mere Bankai cannot kill him, only for a wispy, ink-like white splotch to appear from Kyoraku's hand. Kyoraku narrates about how cruel a woman's pity is, and how a woman will not listen to a petulant man. He then describes the 'glistening white thread of regret' wrapping around the neck of a man... and then we get a very cool, artistic shot of Final Act: Thread-Cutting Shears upon a Bloody Throat. The background around them turns white as the aforementioned string turns read, and it just looks so fucking cool. 

The cut on Lille's neck expands and whether it's because of Lille's unique physiology or because of the effects of Karamatsu Shinju, the wound begins to swell and expand upwards, creating a tumorous mass that ultimately explodes, leaving Lille's headless body to plummet down the sea/sky. It's a badass sequence, and even though Kyoraku's Bankai leaves more questions than answers, I just really like him talking about a completely different play about a man and a scornful woman while Lille is just being continually bamboozled by the bloody effects of the play. 

The final sequence of the episode has a wounded Kyoraku falling down and falling into Katen's lap. Kyoraku flirts with Katen a bit, causing Katen to comically try and jab her fingers down onto Kyoraku's good eye. Katen notes that she is also missing her right eye, musing that fate has a way of playing games with them. Katen admits that she is glad they won, and Kyoraku is about to say something as the episode cuts to a close. Bit of a weird thing to close the episode in, since this 'something I have to say' doesn't actually lead anywhere and would be interrupted in two episodes' time. I wonder if the episode would've had a better stop when Lille reveals himself to be alive; or if it should've stopped a couple of lines earlier when Kyoraku's head falls on Katen's lap. 

Ultimately, I did like this portion of the fight. I think I made it quite clear that I'm not the biggest fan of the Reikaku stuff, but I do like expanding a lot more on Kyoraku's Shikai abilities. Lille's powers, I felt, could've been foreshadowed a bit better, particularly the 'both eyes open' part, and I kind of wished we saw a bit more of this 'enemy attacks can't harm me' in his Jilliel form. The Theatre Suicide parts of the fight, with Kyoraku's Bankai, are all pretty great, though. The visuals and music make the Bankai work so well, and while it did go on for a bit long, I felt like this was a pretty awesome showcase of Kyoraku's long-anticipated Bankai. All enigmatic, confusing but badass at the same time. Not much in terms of surprises in this episode, but I did enjoy seeing Katen Kyokotsu: Karamatsu Shinju brought to life on the stage of animation. 

Random Notes:

• The review title is a reference to the somewhat bloody but pretty great manga, Kami-sama no Iutoori, which features a supernatural force forcing people to play deadly, fucked-up versions of children's games. The very first game, and the mascot of the manga, is also Daruma-san ga Koronda. 
  
• It perhaps seems so quaint right now, but it was such a huge deal back in the day that Kubo canonized the otherwise non-canon designs for the Zanpakuto Spirits of Katen and Kyokotsu. While it was common knowledge that almost all the Zanpakuto Spirits were designed by Kubo, it's a bit of a surprise to see them actually show up in such a major part of the canon.
• Katen's voice actor was recasted from Fujimura Ayumi to Koshimizu Ami, but apparently becuase Fujimura is taking a hiatus from her career. 
• Katen notes the similarities of their missing eyes, which I wonder whether it was part of Kubo's plans when he designed Katen for the filler arc. The Zanpakuto Rebellion arc, after all, was animated way before the Thousand-Year Blood War arc was published in the manga and most certainly before Katen's appearance in the manga.  
  
• It really is weird that the Gotei 13 gang acknowledges that they can sense Mayuri's reiatsu fluctuating... but not a single one realize that they 'left' Mayuri and Kenpachi behind?
• The anime removes a scene where Urahara and Renji discuss the surviving Vice Captains, because we added a scene in 'Gate of the Sun' showing just who got sniped by Lille... but it's also frankly a line that makes Urahara look a bit incompetent.
• I can't actually find which culture 'Chocolate Inglés' is from, though 'Inglés' does imply Spain. The game seems to be called Pollito Inglés or El Escondite Inglés in Spain; and Hot Chocolate in the UK, so it's possible that Kubo just mixed the two. 
• There is a line where Kyoraku notes that 'a game cannot begin until both sides understand the rules', but that is clearly bullshit since throughout both of his battles against Starrk and Lille, Kyoraku is shown to pull off Katen Kyokotsu's abilities without explaining or calling out the game that they're playing.
  
• We never really know who puts these limiters on Lille's powers. Is it Juhabach? It has to be Juhabach, right? But what purpose does this serve? "Being unfair to sinners" doesn't seem to be something that either Juha or Lille would really care about.
• Also removed from the episode are the dialogue in Ganju, Chad and Orihime's scenes about how 'cold' the Bankai activation is. They still get a cameo reacting to it, but the lines are gone. 
• I don't think I processed it that well when I read the manga, but the whole point why Kyoraku's Bankai is so powerful in this case is that it was able to damage Lille's undamaged form. I almost wished they had shown us a bit more of Jilliel's ability to phase through things to hammer this threat a bit more.
• Apparently the Wandenreich does not have Daten on Kyoraku's Bankai. I guess they hadn't set up the data-collection when Kyoraku unlocked his Bankai? We don't know from when the Quincies began gathering data on the Shinigami. Or Kyoraku could alternatively have utilized his Bankai in another realm that's not the Soul Society. 

Blog Refurbishing

Happy new year to all! So things have been a bit slower in this blog, thanks to a lot of real-life stuff and traveling that I've been doing. I've been slowly catching up on some TV shows and anime that I've been doing, and One Piece reviews are still regular, but I don't have quite as much time to read/watch and write this year.

As we near the end of the year, I would like to note about the projects that I'm doing in the future, and what I have been doing. I'll get future projects out of the way: yes, I'll continue reviewing Elden Ring monsters as I continue playing through the game. Bleach: Thousand Year Blood War, as you can tell, is still being written and will be wrapped up hopefully by the first couple of weeks of January. Trying to track the differences is one of the bigger challenges.

Future projects? Yes, I'll let's play Pokemon: Legends ZA as I play through it. Yes, I'll review What If Season 3, though maybe around February (I've written reviews for around the good half of the season, but I'm not the biggest fan of some of them). Ditto for Your Friendly Neighbourhood Spider-Man. Can't promise reviews-as-episodes-come-out. At some point, I might do X-Men '97. Yes, I'll review the outstanding newer superhero movies that came out last year (Deadpool & Wolverine, Kraven the Hunter and I still haven't talked about Across the Spider-Verse). 

But I haven't been entirely doing nothing in the lulls between my blogging. I have been fixing a lot of stuff on the back end, particularly everything on the 'reviewing monsters' page. A bunch of the Pokemon and Digimon reviews have had their layout fixed, though I honestly still agree with essentially a lot of the content. The D&D articles, while they are a bit less format-intensive, have also been fixed a lot. 

What needed a lot of work, however, is Yu-Gi-Oh and Magic: The Gathering, both of which needed a ton of image formatting. I haven't touched Yu-Gi-Oh at all mostly because I honestly might just want to redo all the articles in general and be a bit more willing to split expansions into multiple pages. 

_____________________________________

But Magic? Magic the Gathering holds a special place in my heart. I last did a MTG review sometime during COVID times, so it's almost been half a decade since I did a MTG article. Since then, I've played a lot of Magic, with my interest in no small part being piqued by doing these reviews. However, my reviews have been stuck for a while. Ironically, I really would've liked this hiatus to happen before Mirrodin so we have all the old-format cards in Dominaria be covered beforehand... I'd really like to start off these reviews with Magic's actual 'soft reboot'. But that's what happens. Oops!

But before I talk about the final block in the 'traditional' magic (the Onslaught block), I had wanted to fix the many, many broken links in my old MTG articles. A lot of pictures are broken, a lot of the actual content is not the best, and I had tried my best to clump multiple expansions in one page just to rush through things, which made things really cluttered. I was also very obviously trying to speed through as many expansions as I could, which ends up really coming off in the middle articles. I really didn't like it, particularly when I was going through the articles and going 'wait, why didn't I talk about this, or that card?'

I was also very wound up with formatting at the time, which I felt informed my choices of not talking -- or talking too much -- about certain aspects of it. Having reviewed a bunch of other stuff since that, I think I can do a much better job -- and be a lot more comfortable -- making longer articles.

Having actually played more the card game, I also think I have a bit more to offer in terms of talking about some gameplay mechanics and how it ties to the flavour, which meant I had a bit more to talk about. The focus of my talk will still be on the monsters, but I would take time to highlight some gameplay mechanics here and there.

Which brings me to a bit of a conundrum... do I re-release these articles to reflect the time working on them? But then that would clog up the blog with a lot of long articles. But did it matter if I was going to have a slower output in the next couple of years anyway with my work?

So I have been editing some of these articles in the background, and a lot of them did need a bit more work... and I'm announcing that I will be re-releasing ('timeshifting', to use a MTG term) them in 2025 as I fix them. That incentivizes me to put in a lot more writing effort since these will be translated as 'new posts', and to really fix some of the content in them. Over the next couple of weeks you'll get to see a bunch of the articles that I've already done. And with the exception of my third article (The Dark/Antiquities) I'll be splitting almost all of the 'two smaller expansions' posts, another motivation to change stuff. I'm not sure how long this will take, but it's definitely something that lets me be a lot less passive in editing and writing as compared to making new articles. 

To that end, I'll be taking down all my older M:TG articles, and will re-release them over the next year. Some of the earlier articles have had the changes made to them, but some of them need a bit more work. Hopefully that revamping will be done by half the year (optimistically) and I can start talking about the Onslaught block and beyond afterwards!

_____________________________________

On the TV show front... this is probably a bit less exciting to most, but I've watched a lot of the CW DC superheroes shows on-and-off ever since I also hiatus'd myself from them in 2020-ish. I haven't completed all of them, but I've watched enough to write seasonal reviews of them. I don't think I care that much for them to do individual episodic reviews like I used to (and I don't think people would care as much), but longer articles would work. 

Also expect, once I get to watching it, season 2 of Jujutsu Kaisen be done in a similar format... maybe. We'll see. I don't think I'll be doing One Piece's Egghead arc, not unless they give us a lot of expansion, but I would like to note that I have been watching the anime and have been liking it. 

So basically, things to expect next year: