Bleach, Thousand-Year Blood War, Episode 38: Friend
Anyway, let's go through the episode! "Friend" starts with an ambiguous part of the world several decades before the start of the first battle against the Soul Society, in an area in the middle ages populated by Quincy tribes. It's... it's just the setting, go along with it. A young Jugram Haschwalth is just a kid in the forest, who tries and fails to kill a rabbit with a wooden bow and arrow. However, the rabbit is killed by a Quincy's holy arrow, a Heilig Pfeil, shot by a young Bazz-B with his Quincy crossbow as he hops down from the trees. Bazz-B criticizes Haschwalth's poor shooting, and the two kind of get into hijinks as Bazz-B goes "the Great Bazz does not need to identify himself!"
Haschwalth expresses some surprise that Bazz-B's injuries came from Auswahlen, and Bazz-B rants that all the Sternritters left behind were wiped out by Auswahlen. Haschwalth attempts to apologize, before pointing out that this is a conversation that goes nowhere because Bazz-B is never going to believe him if he said that he didn't know about it in advance. Which... I don't think the manga ever confirms either way, but Haschwalth does have limited access to the Almighty powers, which I suppose means that he probably knew and did nothing about it.
We cut back to the past with young Bazz and young Haschwalth. The two kind of bond because Bazz just kind of... decided to follow Haschwalth around under the guise of 'you're too weak to catch anything yourself'. We learn later on that Bazz is the heir of House Black, a local royal family, and he just plain don't know how to properly interact with kids his age. Haschwalth admits that, yeah, he is kind of pathetic because he can't make a Heilig Bogen. Young Bazz tries his best to explain that he is actually quite gifted, since kids his age can't make Heilig Bogens, let alone a unique construct like his crossbow.
(The anime actually adds a couple of scenes showing this button on present-day Haschwalth, which is very nice).
As Bazz-B screams in horror, we get the ominous scene of Juhabach manifesting a gigantic Sankt Bogen in the air above the castle -- which is a move he used against Ichigo -- and unleashes it downwards towards the castle. It's such an imposing thing to see from the far shot that the anime gives to us, showing the sheer power of Juhabach as he essentially executes an entire castle. Poor little Bazz-B, surrounded by nothing but dust and blood, watches with hatred as Juhabach and his four generals ride out from the wreckage of his family.
While this is also going on, we get to see a discussion of Juhabach with one of his lieutenants at the time, Seydlitz. Seydlitz is confused because there's nowhere else to conquer within the Lichtreich, but Juhabach makes it clear that his target is... the Soul Society, and that the new combat unit is going to be called the Sternritter.
This is where the paths of the two young men cross, as the four Lichtreich commanders arrive on a nearby village. Huburt gives a proclamation that a new combat unit called the Sternritter will be formed to invade the Soul Society, for the glory of the Quincies. So... again, the implication is that these are Quincy villages where most people are familiar with a lot of the spiritual world. Of course, we don't dwell on this too much because the focus is still on Bazz-B and Haschwalth.
Huburt draws his blade and denounces Bazz-B as a monkey, but Bazz-B counters that his friends will have to go back to Juhabach and report that he was killed by a monkey. However, before a fight can properly break out, Bazz-B and all of the villagers are slammed down by immense, overwhelming spiritual pressure. Great visual effects here for sure. Huburt kneels and apologizes to Juhabach for being driven to anger by a mere child... but Juhabach makes the proclamation that he is here to collect the person that will be his 'second in command'.
And Bazz-B mentally declares that he is this super-talented second-in-command, that he's the one that Juhabach is looking for, that Juhabach will pick him for his talents, that he will get close to Juhabach and get his sweet sweet revenge. We get a scene where Bazz-B is able to stand up from the sheer immense pressure that Juhabach is unleashing upon him... but as Bazz-B stands up, Juhabach ignores him completely and focuses on Jugram Haschwalth, calling him by name and identifying him as his 'other half'. To the confusion of every single person present, Juhabach says that Haschwalth will come with him as his advisor.
Because for Bazz-B, as we learn in his monologue... even if one of them would be chosen for talent, it should be him. Haschwalth silently pleads with Bazz-B not to look at him like this, not understanding why his friend is angry with him.
Haschwalth even speaks up, and you can tell this isn't an easy thing for the meek young man to do. He asks if there has been a mistake -- much to the anger of Huburt because how dare anyone suggest His Majesty made a mistake -- and Haschwalth points out that he is talentless, while Bazz-B is a genius that would be a better fit of being Juhabach's advisor. Bazz-B, instead of being glad or grateful in any way, gets even more pissed that Haschwalth is essentially taking pity on him.
However, Juhabach gets off his horse and explains that Haschwalth is not aware of his own awesome power... because a Quincy without the ability to create Heilig Bogens is born every 200 years, but that's not because they are powerless, but rather because their power is different -- it's the ability to share powers. The last Quincy to be born like this? Juhabach himself. Juhabach then turns around and reveals that Haschwalth is unconsciously giving power to other Quincies, and actually turns to face Bazz-B, revealing that Bazz-B's extremely rapid and 'genius' growth was because he was training in close proximity to Haschwalth.
But it also puts things into perspective, because one of the pillars of Bazz-B's existence, the sheer pride he puts into his amazing talent and rapid growth in comparison to the talentless Haschwalth, is not because he's special but because Haschwalth is.
While all of this is going on, while Haschwalth is being told how special he is by Juhabach and while Bazz-B is doing nothing but glare at him in hatred, Juhabach tells Haschwalth how he "needs" him at his side. This, by the way, has been identified by many people as tying into Haschwalth's history of being an abuse victim, and how he latched on to Juhabach as essentially a 'provider' of sorts.
We get a lot of great visuals of Bazz-B trying to process all of this with his eyes wide open, and a shot of a dark void with Juhabach and Haschwalth standing on one side, and Bazz-B on the other end... with Haschwalth having this very cold expression on his face. It's not clear to me -- and kept ambiguous on purpose, I think -- how much Haschwalth has decided to essentially abandon Bazz at this point. But in Bazz's head, the 'treachery' is done. He screams in anger, summons his Quincy bow and fires an arrow at Juhabach... only for Haschwalth to stoically, with a dead expression on his face, jump in the way and catch the arrow before it hits Juhabach.
And we cut away to a different time in the past, a bit later after their confrontation with Juhabach. Apparently, Juhabach and his lieutenants didn't kill young Bazz, and he grew up to an adult. At some point, Bazz-B worked his way into the Sternritter, and one of his first acts is to fire arrows to provoke Haschwalth to a fight. Haschwalth, however, doesn't rise to the bait, only giving some vague warning that infighting among the Sternritter is punishable and he has no intention of fighting. We get a montage of various seasons and years as Bazz-B keeps trying to goad Haschwalth into a fight and he keeps ignoring him.
We then cut to the final stages of their present-day confrontation. Bazz-B yells about how he's "not lost yet" to Haschwalth, but Haschwalth finally decides to go on the offensive. With a single strike, he cuts off Bazz-B's arm on the shoulder as he's leaping down with Burner Finger Four active. It's very fluidly animated, particularly the flame effects as the arm rockets off like an out-of-control engine and slices through a pillar in the background. The blood effects are really cool too. Bazz-B stumbles for a bit, but gets back up and uses his other hand to unleash Burning Full Fingers. Bazz's ultimate technique takes the form of a whirling five-pronged energy beam that erupts in one hell of a massive explosion. Again, extremely well animated.
And... yeah. The anime did a masterful adaptation here, and I really do think that the very flawed relationship between Haschwalth and Bazz is told extremely well both in this episode and in the original source material. Haschwalth and Bazz clearly care for each other as friends, as brothers. Even late in their life with all the animosity, there's still some bond between them. But unlike how Ichigo and Uryu would treat each other even post-betrayal, there's no real amount of communication between them. Bazz's story is tragic, yes, but he's not a particularly good and supportive friend to Haschwalth... and vice versa.
While he dupes himself into thinking that they're friends, Bazz-B views the relationship as being very unequal when the chips are on the table, and he couldn't bring himself to be happy or to cheer for Jugo's victory. Lots of little moments here and there over their backstory -- and while Ichigo and his friends may be a bit rough around the edges, their relationship is a lot healthier. And, indeed, that puts a lot of "Ishida, what the hell are you doing!" attempts at communicating into perspective. So yeah. I really do have a lot more appreciation for this fight now for sure! Great episode, well-animated, well-structured.
Random Notes:
- Not that the previous episode was bad or anything, but this episode has a very pronounced increase in quality in the present-day sequences! Particularly the first and last confrontations of the episode. I guess someone on the production staff really liked these guys!
- In the manga, we never see Haschwalth hold Bazz-B's button until all the way at his death scene. Here, the button is shown prominently several times throughout the episode any time the episode zooms into Haschwalth's sword. Most prominently is this shot right before Bazz-B charges in with Burner Finger Two.
- Some bonus content in the final episode of this cour has given us the proper spellings for the four 'Schutzstaffel' of the past, including the name of the blue-haired sniper girl -- since this episode is where they're getting a bit more screentime, I'll cover them here. We've got the douchebag subcommander of the original Licht Reich, Huburt Alexander Kleich (previously 'Hubert'), the eyepatched Johann Seydlitz (previously 'Zeidritz'), the burly Algora Lallau (previously 'Argola' or 'Algora') and the sniper lady Nikita Deslock.
- We've seen Huburt draw a saber in the manga, and Nikita has used her rifle in the anime before, but the sacking scene reveals that Seydlitz uses reishi pistols and Algora uses reishi hand-axes. Nikita, of course, uses her sniper rifle. That headshot of Bazz's mom is brutal.
- The manga's version of the events of 'Friends' only has Huburt and sometimes Seydlitz show up, but the anime seem quite intent on having the four older Schutzstaffel show up as a unit.
- I did mention it in previous episode reviews and in this one, but in the manga, 'Friend' takes place before the 'Baby Hold Your Hand' and 'The Theater Suicide' storylines, whereas the anime swaps things around. It doesn't really matter which one happens first, but this way it does really help to bring the parallel between Bazz and Haschwalth's friendship and betrayal in very stark contrast with Ichigo's confrontation with Uryu next episode.
- Really love the highlighting of 'end' in the anime's title episode for 'friend'. That isn't actually from the manga, but it also feels like something that Tite Kubo would absolutely do.
- I get why Kubo wanted to be ambiguous on where the Quincies come from geographically, and if timeline-wise it's just "several decades/years before the original invasion of the Soul Society", but it really is kind of vague where all of these Quincy kingdoms and tribes have been. I guess they're all wiped out by either the Soul Society or Juhabach's Auswahlens?
- In the manga, there is an aborted confrontation between Bazz-B and Shinji's group that wasn't adapted into the anime. This was the first showcase of Burner Finger 3. That technique makes its debut in this episode.
- It is a bit of a missed opportunity for the scene where Bazz-B joins the Sternritter to not have some cameos from some of the older Sternritter. Wouldn't it be nice to have, like, Lille Barro or Quilge Opie or some others show up in the background?
- Also, assuming that this incarnation of the Sternritters invaded the Soul Society (and since we know Huburt, Algora and Seydlitz are killed by Yamamoto's Bankai), were Haschwalth and Bazz-B also killed in that conflict? Or did they survive and just somehow 'migrate' to the Wandenreich separately?
- So... no new Vollstandig for Bazz-B, although I suppose it's appropriate because out of all the Sternritters, he's probably the one that's going to reject Juhabach's powers the most.
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