Let's Play Pokemon Violet, Part 26: Teacher Interactions & Tera Raids

So I decided to do a bunch of teacher interactions this time around, and go through another batch of gym leader rematches, and also unlock another Treasure of Ruin.

First up is the Treasure of Ruin, who hangs up in Icerend Shrine on the Western side of Paldea. It's the Swords of Ruin, and apparently the hatred of those killed by the sword mixed with snow and ice to create a... long cat? Chien-Pao (or, more properly, Jian Bao, 剑豹 or sword panther) is the hardest for me to capture because I forgot that I was bringing a team with Iron Jugulis and Miraidon and four Pokemon I'm trying to evolve for the Pokedex, meaning I just had to keep alternating between hyper potioning the Miraidon and throwing balls. At least Miraidon has Thunder Wave on, which paralyzed the stupid long cat. 

It's an interesting design, I guess, with the swords forming the saber tooth fangs, but I don't really have all too much to say about it? It's Ice/Dark, and it learns Sacred Sword and I assume other sword-related moves. 

Ms. Raifort points out that the sword's blade and hilt form the fangs, so it's not technically two swords. She wondered if the sword was always split in twain, or if it broke when the rest of the legendary pokemon was formed. Raifort makes a theory that the king wouldn't buy a broken sword, so perhaps it's a weapon that's meant to be used in a broken state... probably as a Pokemon, then? Eh. 

But first, I finally got off my ass to grind those Gimmighoul coins and visit every watchtower and basically got my Gimmighoul coins up to 999. And then I leveled up one of my Gimmighouls and evolved it into... Gholdengo! Yeah, that's not what I was expecting. Or, honestly, I don't think anyone expected it when they first saw Gimmighoul. Little buggy coin-imp who hides inside a chest full of coins? I don't know what I expected, but it sure isn't this. Now I have been spoiled by what Gholdengo looked like before this thanks to all the guides out there that told me how Gimmighoul evolves, but...

I kinda like it? I think I would like it if Gimmighoul itself was a bit more viable since I enjoy Gimmighoul's design so much more. But the idea of a palm-tree man made entirely out of coins, and it carries the Gimmighoul chest as its belt? And it moves by surfing? And as he surfs, the coins at the back move to the front? Okay! Okay, it's interesting. Ghost/Steel, huh? This dude's so weird. It's not my kind of thing, but I do like him a fair bit after giving him some time to settle in. 

I go to Zapapico to do another hard-to-get evolution, where I trade in 10 Sinistea items to get a set of Malicious Armour. Charcadet is a Fire/Ghost Pokemon, and it's evolved due to interacting with a set of armour steeped in grudges. I... I don't really care too much for this design on a Pokemon, but as far as humanoid Pokemon does, I would ahve to say that Ceruledge outdoes his Scarlet counterpart significantly. Or it might be just those ghostly flames that get me. 

Ceruledge has a stupid amount of cool moves in its remembering slots, though, including Solar Blade and Night Slash. Okay!

Gym leader rematches! Next up is Larry. Larry notes that she's supposed to be meeting the boss, but sending students to do her job is totally something that she would do. You really do get the undercurrent of a frustrated salaryman from Larry, huh? He even mutters about how I got 'roped in' by La Primera, before we go back to the Treasure Eatery. Larry notes how he's using his regular team in the gym leader fight, and how his Pokemon are of the 'Normal' type. As in plain, average, unremarkable, run-of-the-mill... and then Larry says he really likes the Normal-types. They suit him perfectly, since he too is an ordinary man. 

Larry talks about how he likes the ordinary things, he likes the simplicity of going home, and that 'nowadays people only want a shock factor. Something weird, something bizarre'. Oh! Like terrible Tera Type gimmicks! Gotcha, Larry. (I'm two months into this game and I am still very much ambivalent at the Terastralization at best)

I like Larry. He knows the Pokemon he likes, and I honestly think he picks the Flying-type specialty as an Elite Four just to hang out with his Staraptor. 

I bring out my newer Pokemon against Larry's Pokemon, with Wo-Chien facing off against a new Oinkolonge first, then Iron Jugulis against Dudunsparce, and my Jugulis nearly got killed by a Stone Edge! Larry throws in his brand-new Braviary, who I fight with Ting-Lu and his Rock Slide, though Ting-Lu nearly dies to the Close Combat. Wo-Chien finishes off the Komala, and then Miraidon #02 takes out the Terastralized Staraptor. Yeah, these guys definitely have their EV's raised up because none of my newer-captured Pokemon have!

Larry then reflects afterwards that he understands why La Primera told him to pick the Flying type as the Elite Four, because there's scenery that we won't even notice if you stick to flat, well-trodden paths. Larry leaves a word about appreciating my own high-soaring talent, before calling it a day because he needs to cut down on overtime hours. Yeah, Larry, get some sleep, man!

First up is Hassel. Last we met him, he was confronted by a Dragon Tamer in the middle of the schoolyard. I later meet him in the entrance hall, where he reveals that he is the successor of a clan of Dragon Tamers. Very Claire/Lance! The Dragon Tamer we saw earlier is his relative (not a jilted lover as I originally assumed!) who wants him to return back and lead the clan, because Hassel's dad is sick. We also get some interesting information. Apparently Hassel left the clan to pursue a music career, before ending up as the teacher-cum-Elite-Four that he is now. 

I later meet Hassel in the art room, where he is confronted by the Dragon Tamer. Hassel says that while he's not indifferent towards the fate of his proud lineage, he also has other priorities -- nurturing his students and the art and creativity they make. There's a brief bit of acknowledgement between both dragon clan members that they are equally stubborn like dragons, and that Hassel has made his choice. Hassel also notes that the story about his father's health is apparently a lie, and that he's going to just stay and continue teaching in the school while his relative will keep coming back. Okay, then? A bit rushed of a conclusion, honestly, but okay. 

Next up is Dendra, who is trying to get Nurse Miriam to eat her sandwiches. Previously, she got Miriam sick with a meat-meat-meat sandwich, back when she was 'young and thoughtless'... which is last month. Haha! I kinda am afraid for Miriam's life if she tries to eat Dendra's sandwich, but the game makes me encourage her to eat it. Turns out it's 'not bad'. Okay, then. Dendra later shows up in the school store, buying sandwiches. Apparently her one and only goal at the moment was to just make a sandwich to pay back Nurse Miriam, and with that goal done, she's decided to focus on her actual strength... being full with energy, and basically gives the moral that people should focus on their strengths. Okay, then. Not the most interesting teacher interaction.

Savlatore is still trying to figure out about his Pawmi, who's rendered mute by the trauma of being attacked by wild Pokemon before arriving to the school grounds. Jacq and Miriam find nothing wrong with the Pawmi, but Salvatore basically decides to just let the Pawmi recover from its trauma all in good time. A good man, that Salvatore. Eventually Salvatore starts thinking what the best thing is to do with pawmi, since without the ability to communicate in the wild, it's not going to survive all that long... and then we suggest, of course, that Salvatore himself keep the Pawmi. At which point it finally speaks! Yeah, that whole sequence is pretty cute. 

Salvatore decides to give me a reward for my efforts, but instead of items, he gives me a Meowth? Okay, so you get a rodent and you give away your cat? That's... uh... it's a Galarian Meowth? Okay? Didn't expect the other Meowth regional variants to show up here. I evolve the Galarian Meowth into Perrserker, but... but there's no slot for Perrserker in the Paldean Pokedex? Um... okay? Weird. Bring back the National Dex, I guess?

Saguaro sends me on a side-quest, which is to give him the sweetest ingredient in Paldea, which he can't find on his own because he needs to keep up his reputation as a huge hardass badass who's totally never eating anything sweet, god damn it! Okay, um, I thought we solved this whole problem. He sends me off to get the Sweet Herba Mystica. Okay, neat. That's the thing I got after beating the Titan Klawf. I went all the way back to the Klawf location, trying to get that plot device, and... uh... no? Nothing in the caves?

Okay, I finally look up what the hell I'm supposed to do here, and apparently I have to get them from Tera Raids. I have to go and look up a specific pool of Pokemon in five-star raids. A bit annoying, but surely it won't take longe than a day or two to do? Haha, no. The rest of the article is just me ranting, so skip over it to the random notes section if you don't want to hear my rant about Tera Raids. You have been warned. 

After looking up a list of the five-star Pokemon that can drop Sweet Herba Mystica, I finally engaged the raids, and... hoo boy. Hoo boy. I have only done maybe less than ten 1-3 star raids? The only better part here is that all the attacks happen simultaneously and that the AI's don't bring Cosmic Power Sorlock anymore, but holy fucking hell do Tera Raids suck! And this is the offline experience, the very vocal online community are bitching about the online experience with the lag. 

Because guys, get this. There's a timer. In a turn-based video game.

Which, in itself, isn't the worst idea. But get this.

The timer doesn't pause if there are abilities or attacks that have extra words I have to click through. Or animations when burn or poison happens. Or if, god forbid, I Terastralize, which takes up even more seconds. And the raids of course force me to, because the fucking shields can only be broken by Terastralized Pokemon using the STAB types, and not what's actually effective against the enemy type. 

Here is another thing. The timer doesn't stop through all the animations. Some animations are long, like Miraidon's Electro Drift, or Shadow Ball moving so much more slowly than Rock Slide or whatever. And then there's that extra two seconds of some crystals popping out of the Tera doohickey when your Pokemon is about to use said Tera STAB move. Oh, and you can only Terastralize once in the entire raid, because your Pokemon can't re-Terastralize if it gets knocked out, making any raid where you Terastralize too early to break the Tera-shield or whatever kinda impossible to complete. Oh, and the defeat of a Terastralized Pokemon takes up several extra seconds. Oh, and the stupid boss gives an unskippable cutscene any time it's shield is up or its shield is down or it's 'about to unleash its power'. Nothing irritates you more than to know you've got a sliver of time left, and then the boss cuts down that time by roaring and going 'there's not much time left' bitch I know. 

And it's still bearable if you min-max enough to brute force the five-star and six-star raids alone, I guess, but in online? I haven't played online, I don't care or plan to play online, but... apparently the lag is terrible, and considering everything I've seen about this game, I'm honestly sad to say that I'm not surprised. 

But here's the thing, yeah? To get Saguaro's stupid herb, I need to find a five or six star raid of Weavile, Sableye, Vaporeon, Blissey, Cetitan, Dragapult, Froslass, Amoonguss, Delibird, Farigiraf, Ditto, Dondozo, Talonflame or Raichu. Which I'm kinda sad to say that I've kinda sorta memorized since I had to keep referring to the list screenshotted on my phone. Then I have to beat the raids themselves, which is kind of a crap shoot. Oh, and unlike the Raid Dens in Sword/Shield, there's no way to tell which Pokemon is in which raid den, forcing me to drive to each and every raid den to peek. (By the way, I did beat a 5-star Ditto!) ...and then you only have like a 10% chance, allegedly, for the Herba Mystica to drop. 

Haha, yeah, no, Saguaro. You'll be left in the limbo of never getting that Herba Mystica. It'd be one thing if I find the Tera Raids at least bearable to do, or if I could get someone to carry me, or if it's just a matter of perseverance. No, this is just dumb. 

So anyway, I borrow a Switch to set up some trades with the world of Scarlet, mostly to get myself multiple copies of the starters. I didn't really do a whole ton of progression -- my original Scarlet save file basically reached around two or three gyms before I traded the Quaxly to my Violet save file, and now I'm just mashing buttons to get the save file up to get myself the weed cat Sprigatito. Next up, I guess you guys will see some more Scarlet content from me!

Since we are clearing off all the evolutions, I suppose I'll acknowledge Palafin here, who I finally obtained after a evolving Finizen at level 38 in the Union Square while connected to another player. What a way to force the stupid multiplayer on people, am I right? It's pretty obnoxious. It is rather odd that Palafin is completely unrepresented in any of the gym leaders or titan quests or whatever? You'd think like, Clavell or Geeta would've carried it in one of their parties. But nope! Hell, you'd think this would be a perfect Pokemon for Kofu to bring in the rematch with him, isn't it? Not all Pokemon in a regional dex needed to be featured, of course, otherwise it would feel a bit too gimmicky, but having Palafin at least be in the party -- not even as a signature Pokemon -- of one of the characters is a bit surprising. 

Palafin's regular form doesn't even look different than Finizen other than a single star on its chest, but if you switch it out and switch it back in (helped by its presumably signature move, Flip Turn, a.k.a. Water-type U-Turn), it's, uh... it's that thing right there. It's a dolphin-mermaid superhero, and I guess the idea is that trope of Clark Kent ducking into a phone booth to speed-change into Superman. Which I kinda like, but I'm not the biggest fan of regular Palafin looking kinda bland outside of engaging this ability. 

Random Notes:

• I didn't notice that the load screen changes until, like, just now. The Pokeball and the Violet Book disappeared! 
• Miriam's office has Pikachu and Eevee dolls. I get it! There's also a Ralts and Hattena adorably sleeping on the couch. Honestly, I didn't really pay too much attention to it, but the sleeping animations for the Pokemon is one of the best additions in this generation. 
  
• I do like that Larry mentions that I've faced him as part of the Elite Four, and that this battle really wouldn't leave much of an impression. 
• There was a bit of a bug in the first Pokemon Larry sends out where the speech bubble of the guy at the counter that changes your tera types didn't disappear. 
• You can't actually re-challenge the Elite Four and champion to get money? But why?
• The Dudunsparce's attack animation involves it inflating one of its segments! That's so gross but so cool!
• I evolved even more Pokemon. The Perrserker, of course, and also Grumpig, Fraxure, Altaria, Weavile, Krookodile, Blissey, Sandaconda, Palossand, Salamence and a bunch of others. 
• Apparently the Metal Coat is in the Delibird Presents in Levincia. I need to get some things ready for the huge trading session that I'm going to do with my Scarlet copy. 
• Man, playing Scarlet and completing the dex there is going to be so much less of a chore! 

Let's Play Pokemon Violet, Part 25: Rematches, Classes & Vessels

The next legendary Ruin Pokemon I unleash is the Groundblight Shrine, which involves a particularly annoying spike on the side of Mt. Glaseado. And this is the 'vessel' of the four, I suppose, to fit with Wo-Chien being the 'plates'. This one is... uh... a bit less 'oh I love this' the way I reacted to Wo-Chien. The ancient jade-looking bowl on top of a quadrupedal body is neat, and I get that the body of Ting-Lu is meant to represent geological strata. But the design just doesn't really quite hit me as much as Wo-Chien does. Wo-Chien is a snail made of decaying leaves, though. Rather hard to get better than that.

Ting-Lu is surprisingly a lot more easy to capture compared to Wo-Chien or Miraidon or even Iron Valiant, taking like four balls to get into the ball. The Ruination move that Wo-Chien has, which halves the health a la Super Fang, is very helpful, though, for sure!

Ting-Lu is Ground/Dark, meaning that the remaining Treasures of Ruin are probably all also part-Dark, which kind of makes them a counterpart to the four 'nature-protecting' Tapus and their part-Fairy typing, right? Ting-Lu's name is 鼎鹿 and while I do know that 'lu' is deer, I didn't know the exact character for 'ting'. It's that ancient bowl on top of its head! 

The 'destruction' part for Ting-Lu comes from its ability to use the bowl to create gigantic destructive fissures on the ground. He's found on the Socarraya Trail on the North-Western part of Paldea, that weird huge patch of land North of the Cassseroya Lake, and I was wondering why there's this weird plateau there. I guess Ting-Lu rampaged there before he was sealed!

Showing Ting-Lu and Wo-Chien to professor Raifort does give us a bunch of additional dialogue. She focuses more on Wo-Chien's tablets that make up that scroll -- which was how I realized what that part of the anatomy was supposed to be -- and note that whatever was originally written there, which was now faded, are probably what drove the ancient king to get so insanely greedy. With Ting-Lu, she focuses more on the carvings on the vessel and what it was originally meant to be -- if it was some sort of 'eyes of a deity'...

But Ting-Lu's vessel is based on that of the Taotie, one of the Four Perils in Chinese mythology, which was something I kinda almost-hit-the-mark last episode by highlighting their more commonly-known opposite numbers. Wo-Chien doesn't really correspond to either the Hundun or the Qiongqi, so I guess by process of elimination it is the 'block stump' Taowu? Hmm. 

Speaking of new Pokemon, I also finally went to the bamboo forest where Eri's base is, and brought a Bisharp of my own. I taught the Bisharp Low Kick, and then just spammed auto-battles with my Iron Jugulis on the local Pokemon until Bisharp gang leaders leading tiny Pawniards spawn. It's such a weird way to evolve a Bisharp, but one that's kind of neat, I suppose -- I always enjoy it when the evolution method really does feel like a 'training' regimen or an evolutionary adaptation as opposed to some rather stupid ways of evolution that's just gimmicky. Looking at you, Finizen. 

Kingambit's Kowtow Cleave move is hilarious at it just bows, seemingly in apology, but it's actually slicing the enemy down with its big-ass sword jutting out of its helmet. I still find it rather odd that such a Japanese-looking Pokemon is introduced in the region based on Spain, but... eh? Love the weird-looking ribcage blades, the giant mustache sword, and the fact that Kingambit sits in that 'crotch open' dominating pose all the time. 

It refuses to get off its seat, which is the tip of its long cape-tail, and its movement has it just hover around. I'm not sure how it does this, since it is Steel/Dark... Electromagnetism, I guess? Or just shuffling those tiny feet really quickly?

I thought I saw all the new non-legendary Pokemon, but some random trainer in front of the Pokemon League fought me with a 'Ceruledge', which is like... a Megaman-looking Digimon with flaming blades for arms. It's Charcadet's evolution, I think. 

I was working my way up to my favourites, Ryme and Iono as far as the gym leader rematches are concerned... and next up is Brassius. He's all right! He's way more excited about fighting me-garde than any kind of evaluation from the Pokemon League. I have a feeling that between Brassius and Tulip, Geeta the La Primera isn't really well-liked among the gym leaders. He really doesn't give two shits about the assessment, and just wants to fight me and get inspired for his art.   

I don't care for Brassius too much since he's kind of a one-dimensional character gimmick gym leader, but man, the animators had way too much fun with Brassius's expression. Man's got way too much coffee! 

His team consists of Liligant, Tsareena, Breloom, Arboliva and "Truleewoodo Part 2". No Sunflora either? Hmm. I honestly am kind of disappointed, I was half-expecting a Sunflora evolution or alternate form with how prevalent Sunflora is in Artazon. Oh well.  

Kofu is up next, and... he's also not particularly interesting. I think the most interesting gym leader rematch dialogues are ironically the ones that actually I find the least interesting, which are Katy and Grusha... though I also did find Brassius fun if nothing else. Kofu is just his jolly old self, talking about young and old people growing and all that jazz... but Kofu also has probably one of the longer quests to get to his gym fight, so I can kind of understand this rematch not adding much.

Kofu's team, in addition to his previous teammates of Veluza, Wugtrio and Crabominable, adds two older Pokemon -- Pelipper and Clawitzer. To spice things up, I fight him entirely just with Wo-Chien, Ting-Lu and Miraidon, though Ting-Lu was completely useless in this fight. 

I put my hat in at breeding and... it's weird? I just set up a picnic, eat some egg power sandwich and kinda hope the egg is created? It's bizarre. Apparently friendship may or may not play a role in it? The good thing is that the eggs basically don't cap at one, so I can just stay there and they'll give me a half-dozen eggs to collect from the picnic basket at once. 

Basically what I needed were the treetop Pokemon -- lots of Vigoroths and Slakings everywhere, but Slakoth is near-impossible to find. I did find a single Applin in my journey, but it's a bit faster to breed for another batch of Applins to get Appletun and Flapple. At least I don't have to hunt down for the apples, since they are sold in the Delibird Presents store. 

I also blaze through a bunch of classes to unlock the respective teachers' overworld interactions. Dendra's Battle Studies class is very... uh... bland. She talks a lot about auto-battles and it sounds a lot like tutorials. I guess this is where you're supposed to find out that Pokemon don't evolve from auto-battles... would've loved to have known that like a month or two before! Her final test is very alien to me since she's asking about like, Link Battle rules and Tera Raid cheers, two parts of this game I never interacted with. Thankfully I paid enough attention in her classes. 

Saguaro's class is also pretty bland, revolving mostly around the picnic/cooking gimmick. There is a funny moment when he accidentally keeps trying and failing to hide the identity of a student that asked him a question, basically nearly spills out Arven's name, and then I can spill it out and cause Saguaro to get super-duper shocked regardless. I mean, Arven literally introduces himself as one of three things -- he has daddy issues, he likes his dog and he likes sandwiches. I don't think it's anything to really keep secret.

Saguaro also tells me something genuinely new and informative... which is the fact that you can wash your Pokemon in picnics! Yeah! I... I didn't know that, but I guess they kept the Pokemon Amie or whatever the hell the seventh and eighth generations call that feature. There are places that the Pokemon likes to be touched more than others, and some Pokemon (presumably like Grimer and Garbodor) hates being clean. Saguaro also actually notes that this is something that has to be taken on a species-by-species basis, something that is 100% true if you've ever kept a non-mammalian pet. 

Hassel's final classes are a bit more varied, when I had expected it to be more about Tera Raid Battles and stuff. But his fourth class has a surprising guest star in Brassius, who goes and gives a surprising amount of actually pretty neat backstory. He was actually on the down and outs, forced to create 'shallow art' to make money, when he really didn't care for the art he made at that time. It's only Hassel's encouragement that ended up causing him to make the epic 'Surrendering Sunflora', which... hey, we finally realized what the 'surrendering' in that art piece is all about! A surprisingly nice and fuzzy feeling from this over-caffeinated, under-slept artist. Nice, Brassius. Hassel, as usual, gets overly emotional and cries at the end of that class. That's nice. 

Hassel's other fifth class is about the Ten Great Sights of Paldea, basically giving us a rundown of every single location in case you haven't gone to. His sixth class is about ribbons and titles, and... I completely forgot that ribbons in this generation would give your Pokemon funky titles when you send them out, like 'Dirge, the Paldean Champion'. 

And Salvatore's final classes all feature his adorable Pikachu, who acts out the three different alternate cries which indicate happiness, sadness and surprise. It's something that I noticed they added (or at least really improved) in this generation, that they really improved cries and the variations thereof. 

And then I take all the final exams and... it's kind of... really unremarkable? Barely any talk about me completing my education and whatnot. Just a bunch of EXP candies from the receptionist lady. Man, Jacq is kind of a lazy homeroom teacher, huh? Eh. Well, that's the boring part of the school out of the way. The hopefully more interesting parts of the Uva Academy would be the interactions with the teachers outside the classes.

Random Notes:

• In this runaround to get Bisharp into a Kingambit, I evolved so many of the random Pokemon in my boxes, because the Pokemon here yields quite a fair bit and they're all easily countered by Iron Jugulis and his Flying-type moves.
• Okay, the metal sheen on Pokemon like Bisharp and Magneton actually look pretty damn good. 
• I caught Stantler, and its Violet dex entry talks about how it used to be able to evolve under its own power. Poor, poor Wyrdeer, excluded from the dex...
• It's actually surprising that my core team didn't have as many of the Auto-Battling ribbons and titles as I expected. Actually, compared to all other aspects of the Pokemon games, I don't think I know too much about ribbons and the like... 
• In one of Dendra's class, she notes how some people got LP illegally by hacking. Penny, hide! She's on to you!
• There is a very cool line in Salvatore's class where he points out that language is very diverse among Pokemon species, including electromagnetic and ultrasonic waves, as well as telepathy. Cute topic to note in a languages class!

Bleach Thousand-Year Blood War E13 Review: zAngetsu

Bleach, Thousand-Year Blood War, Episode 13: The Blade is Me

The final episode of the first part of the Thousand-Year Blood War arc ends with a rather... interesting episode. It's still climactic in that it really settles a huge part of Kurosaki Ichigo's character development, and honestly arguably is the last huge character development our good ol' strawberry boy will ever get.

We start off right after the 'Everything But the Rain' two-parter, with Ichigo all badass after realizing the true scope of the backstory and the Quincy connection... and then Isshin asks Ichigo how he's going to get back. What a hilarious gag that was, actually. And honestly, the very convenient magical portal that sends Ichigo from the Soul King's Palace Realm all the way to the human realm is very much a deus ex machina, isn't it? Especially since a couple of episodes ago we made such a huge deal about how they used that gigantic pillar and cannon to shoot the Zero Squad up from the Soul Society to the Soul King's Palace. But anyway, Mera shows up to pick Ichigo back up, and Ichigo returns to the Ho'oden in front of Nimaiya. Ichigo ends up walking through the crowd of Asauchi, who all kneel down before Ichigo and they all turn black. Ichigo manages to single out 'his' Asauchi which transforms into a simplified version of White/Hollow Ichigo.

With the explanation we've received in the previous episodes, I suppose Ichigo has finally poured out the parts of his soul that he normally draws on to activate his Zanpakuto, and has created a "proper" Zanpakuto Spirit, so to speak? 

We then get a brief check-in with most of the captains whose Bankais got stolen, which is actually not a bad thing to do in an episode where we end off the first segment of the season! Hitsugaya trains again in the basics of zanjutsu. Kensei and Mashiro train Shuhei so that he can achieve Bankai, and... this scene is really interesting to me, because I really do hope that they can show it off? I'm not sure if we'll adapt Can't Fear Your Own World, or if Shuhei is going to be allowed to use it against Lille Barro's owl-demons or something, but keeping this scene but not giving it any payoff would be odd.

Akon, meanwhile, spies on what Mayuri is doing in his lab, and the dialogue in this scene is actually altered from the manga. In the manga, Mayuri is working on either Kira or the Privaron Espada, talking about how 'they're moving', but here he's specifically dealing with modifying Ashisogi Jizo? I don't think that zombie cyborg Kira would be adapted out, but this does actually foreshadow all the nonsense that Mayuri's going to do with the big red baby later on. 

We also keep the character development with Maerchiyo Omaeda and get a scene about him mulling about how Soi Fon didn't bring him along for training (she's doing one-handed pushups on the cliff) and... honestly, I've grown a fair amount of appreciation for Omaeda and his character development as a side-character from the Soul Society arc to the Fake Karakura Town arc and the Sternritter invasion. The scene we have of him here is neat, basically him talking to his little sister, who just wants to play. 

But the biggest side-character subplot is definitely Komamura, who shows up in a mysterious cave to meet up with the Wolf-man Clan Elder, his great grandfather who is a gigantic, dinosaur-sized big dog. Big Doggo, who I don't think ever gets named, isn't in good terms with Komamura, and gets pissed off that Komamura has the sheer, unmitigated gall to ask for their clan's secret technique. Big Doggo Grandpa wants the beast people clan to just hide out the crisis, since it doesn't matter to them whether the Shinigami or the Quincy rules the world, and gets even more pissed that Komamura pretended to be a human with that straw helmet all the way back in the beginning of the series. Again, it's been a while since Bleach ended, but it was pretty interesting that good ol' Komamura gets the backstory of why he's a dog given in the final arc. 

And then we get the sword-crafting scene and... we do get a fair amount of gravitas to this, and the Sword Five get animated pretty well. I do like that one girl who cries and her tears become the water used for the forging, and that one lady who pulls out her teeth to become a giant mallet. And... I do really like that for all the dickery that Nimaiya has done in episode 10 and 13, Nimaiya is in full-on serious mode when he's reforging the Zanpakuto, reverting Zangetsu back into his sword form and hammering on it without the aid of his sunglasses, because he needs to gauge the colour of the flames with his own eyes. 

Nimaiya explains that Ichigo's Zanpakuto and the 'inner Hollow' is one and the same, and notes how the creation of White is similar to Nimaiya creating his Asauchi... and White has merged completely with Ichigo's natural Shinigami powers, and thus it's his real Zanpakuto spirit. It kind of goes unsaid, but presumably the whole 'lack of training' and lack of Asauchi is why Inner Hollow Ichigo, or the 'real Zangetsu', is so feral. 

Ichigo, of course, asks the very important question -- who is 'Old Man Zangetsu', the mysterious old man who Ichigo has been calling 'Zangetsu' all this while?

Nimaiya calls him the 'man masquerading as Ichigo's Zanpakuto spirit'... and we cut away to Ichigo's inner world, animated even more beautifully in the new animation style. Nimaiya explains -- and it's even more evident in the anime with the voice-acting -- that Old Man Zangetsu is actually the manifestation of Ichigo's Quincy powers, taking the form of young Juhabach. There's also a couple of neat acknowledgements and a neat little nod to how Ichigo knew instantly to go straight for Juhabach when he arrived after escaping Quilge Opie.

(From this moment on, I'll call them H!Zangetsu and Q!Zangetsu, for the Inner Hollow and Old Man Zangetsu, since Ichigo acknowledges them both as Zangetsu). Ichigo meets up with Q!Zangetsu in the inner world -- which briefly takes the awesome pink tinge of the opening -- and demands explanations, and Q!Zangetsu does admit that everything Nimaiya said is true. I'm not sure if it really stands up to viewing, but Q!Zangetsu does note how everytime there's trouble threatening Ichigo's life, it's his innate H!Zangetsu hollow/Shinigami powers that takes over. Q!Zangetsu also notes that he always had help from H!Zangetsu whenever he teaches Ichigo how to master his Zanpakuto, and how the only thing he lied about was his name. Basically, Q!Zangetsu wasn't particularly happy that Ichigo took the path of the Shinigami, but eventually years of seeing Ichigo fight so fiercely basically won Q!Zangetsu over, regardless of the fact that this would lead to a fight between Ichigo and Juhabach in the future. Which is why Q!Zangetsu has been actually suppressing Ichigo's powers, and what he's been using is a mere fraction of his true potential. Gee, it's a bit similar to Kenpachi, admittedly.

Q!Zangetsu, after pulling out a Reishi sword, then basically decides that it was time for him to say goodbye, saying that he now knows the 'joy of separation', and I think the implication here was that he was finally ready to acknowledge that Ichigo has chosen the path of the Shinigami, and he's willing to step aside. But Ichigo begs Q!Zangetsu to stay behind and wait, as he disintegrates and forms into a sword. The music here swells up very dramatically, too -- I haven't mentioned music at all throughout the discussion of this scene, but man it's all on point.

Ichigo then does a declaration where he accepts both the Hollow and the Quincy as parts of his own powers, and how they have both done their parts to protect Ichigo all this while. We cut back to the real world, and Ichigo walks up to the furnace, instinctively completing the final segment of forging the Zanpakuto... and the act of doing so causes such a hgue explosion that it evaporates all the water in the Ho'oden. Ichigo stands with two Zangetsu blades in his hands -- a longer one with a 'hollow' hole, and a shorter solid one. A Shinigami-Hollow sword, and a Quincy sword. Nimaiya congratulates Ichigo, and Ichigo promises both Zangetus that they're both Zangetsus, he will not push them away, and they will all fight together... because THE BLADE IS ME. Title drop!

And... does it make sense? Does it hold up? I did always feel that while the inner Hollow genetics passing down thing was always a bit convoluted, the Old Man Zangetsu twist and how it was a representation of Ichigo's inner Quincy powers is actually done relatively well! And it definitely is a pretty well-executed animated adaptation. The voiceovers definitely really help to sell the 

The episode also closes with a final scene as Haschwalth approaches Juhabach, leading with him Uryu in a Sternritter uniform, setting up for the next part of the season. 

And... and that's a wrap! I definitely do think that the more compact pacing and the amazing animation does help the Thousand-Year Blood War arc a whole lot. Ending in this sequence of flashbacks and Ichigo's resolution and reaffirmation about who he is as a character definitely works amazingly well, I feel. And... well, I'll see you guys with more Bleach when we come back! 

Random Notes:

• The, uh, second 'cour' of this season will be released in July. Since when was that a term for anime seasons? Well, it'll happen in July, anyway! In the meantime, I'll be talking about either Chainsaw Man or Stone Ocean. 
  
• We remove an explanation from Mera about how Nimaiya's method of sending Ichigo to the world of the living has a timing restriction and he'd be pulled back regardless... but the manly mutual look of understanding between Ichigo and Nimaiya works much better, yeah?
• There are a couple of removed minor scenes in the montage of Gotei 13 leaders -- some no-named Shinigami gossiping about Hitsugaya losing his Bankai; Iba waiting in the cave outside where Komamura is meeting big doggo, and a brief scene with another one of Marechiyo's younger siblings, the creepier-looking Marejirosabu, who offers to play with Mareyo.
• There is a cute moment that the anime doesn't really call any attention to, but pay attention to what happens to the poor Hollow-Asauchi-Zangetsu when he and Ichigo falls into the pool. 
• I really don't care about Nimaiya's five Shinigami forging minions, since they don't really matter outside of this one scene. However, one of them, Nonomi Nomino, doesn't actually do anything in the manga's equivalent of this scene.
• Back when I first read Bleach, I didn't understand what a 'Kamen Rider' is, but now I definitely appreciate Mashiro Kuna and her Kamen Rider homages. 
• Also, speaking about that scene, Shuhei gets pissed about Kensei about badmouthing Tosen. Only... Kensei has all the right to badmouth the shit out of Kaname Tosen. Lest we forget, the oh-so-noble cricket jackass hollowfied Kensei and Mashiro, basically did a coup d'etat on Kensei's original Squad, and, y'know, there's the whole thing about the Hollowfiction and painting their reputations dirty. Aizen is the main leader, yes, but Kensei has all the right to be pissed off!
• The two blades of Zangetsu dissipating into differently-coloured Reishi hammers home better than the black-and-white manga did about how the two blades represent different aspects of Ichigo's powers. 

Let's Play Pokemon Violet, Part 24: Paradoxes, Shinies & Decay Snails

HOLD UP YOUR HORSES, before we get to the post-game content, I got a surprise shiny! Here I was, minding my own business, walking around Area Zero and trying to catch the brand-new Paradox Pokemon, and... hey, what do you know, there's a casual bright blue and yellow Gible just hanging out with its four peasant red-bellied Gible brothers. So yeah, I got myself a Shiny Gible! 

I've actually been trying to try and look for shinies in the outbreaks, particularly with how so many people told me that it's easier to get shinies in Scarlet/Violet, but no such luck. At least they had the forethinking of realizing that the auto-battling feature will accidentally kill shinies and no one wants that, so your Pokemon won't actually attack wild Shiny Pokemon and auto-kill them. 

Well, this Shiny Gible will forever and ever remain a Shiny Gible, because Shiny Garchomp is only really different to regular Garchomp when you put them side-by-side and realize that one is grayish-blue and one is bluish-gray. Shiny MEGA Garchomp has a wonderful bright pink colouration that's hilarious, but they're not in this game.

So anyway, I've been going around exploring Area Zero to try and capture the Paradox Pokemon. Bit annoying that they don't have a map of Area Zero, but what are you going to do, I guess? Iron Moth, the Paradox Volcarona, and Iron Hands, the Paradox Hariyama, spawn a lot in the overworld. I guess there's an actual in-story reason for them to start walking around, because we blew the locks on the Zero Lab! Interestingly, while Iron Hands is the predictable Electric/Fighting, Iron Moth is Fire... and Poison? Okay, that's... that's a bit weird. And interesting. And cool!

I ventured deep into the deepest depths of Area Zero, and found... well, not the other missing Paradox Pokemon, but Miraidon #02! That jackass! He's just hovering smugly near the entrance of the laboratory. I... I guess it makes sense? I never really put too much thought into where this dude disappeared after our fight with him. Well, he sure got captured in a Timer Ball, after a couple dozen turns! I guess the idea is that my Miraidon keeps getting converted back into 'bike mode', which is a bit of an annoyance, so this is an alternate Miraidon if you want to use the jerk. If you forgot, this is the guy that murdered out Miraidon and killed the real Professor Turo, accidentally causing the chain of events that caused the time machine and the Paradox Paradise Protection Program or whatever to run rampant! Miraidon, more like MURDERaidon, am I right?

That's five out of the seven Paradox Pokemon, and I had to do a fair bit of running around to find Iron Thorns and Iron Valiant -- or Paradox Tyranitar and Paradox Gardevoir/Gallade. It's a bit harder to find them. I eventually managed to figure out that Iron Thorns hangs out around the huge rockslide, it's just that I have to beat up the Pokemon that spawn there to get him to spawn. He's Rock/Electric, and... okay, yeah, I guess I can see why they went a bit different with most of the Paradox Pokemon. It wouldn't be interesting to have everyone be just [one of their original types]/[Electric or Steel]. Which... raises some interesting questions about the past Paradox Pokemon in Scarlet, which I haven't met yet!

Iron Valiant was nearly impossible to me to find, until I looked up a guide online, which directed me to a small little opening leading to a secret cave which leads to a waterfall and a secret cave filled with Golducks and Sneasels and Dugtrios, and I have to keep beating them up until Iron Valiant pops up. And even then, the goddamn bitch refuses to stay in the Poke Balls I tossed at him. The Iron Valiant I captured wasted like almost 10 Dusk Balls, 20 Ultra Balls and 20 Timer Balls! Or thereabouts! It's more difficult to capture than the actual cover legendary!

What a jackass. It's a cool-looking jackass, though. It's Fairy/Fighting, which I guessed when I first fought A.I. Turo's Iron Valiant. 

At some point I also pulled out all the purple stakes on the South-East side of Paldea -- which I did during my wandering around. I finally decide to go to Grasswither Shrine (which explains the slightly-blighted bog nearby!) where the purple Chinese-looking seal has finally been broken. I touch it, and herein lies the Ruinous Tablets. These are the tablets that bring about ruinous knowledge according to my history teacher, and touching it unleashes... 

WO-CHIEN! Or "蜗简", snail-bamboo. 

It is a snail made up of detritus! Of masses of leaves and gunk and grime, with a shell made up of an orb with a spiral-shaped cone shell made out of a flat wooden surface. And those weird-looking eyes! Man, this thing... and its got fancy edgy blighted-creature moves like 'Ruination' and its ability 'Tablets of Ruin' lowers the ability of all Pokemon except for itself. 

Yeah, when they told me that there are four Chinese-inspired Pokemon on four sides of the map, I thought we were going with the Four Symbols -- the dragon, the bird, the tortoise and the tiger (which we kinda already did with the Forces of Nature kami) -- and I am so glad that what we got is something as bizarre as this Grass/Dark decaying snail of doom. This is like the antithesis of Xerneas -- a plant-based creature of rot and death and decay. 

It's also kind of a bitch to catch, but not as much of a bitch as Murderaidon or Iron Valiant. It's in my party now, and will stay there unless one of the Treasures of Ruin ends up being something far, far more bizarre.

I still haven't really done any of the other classes yet, and I think I do want to take a break from more serious legendary capturing (I do think I might just use a guide to hunt down those little demon-sealing stakes, just so I can get Violet over and switch to Scarlet) and just dick around and do some battles before I go back to cutscenes with the classes and the Academy tournament.

So I go around and start fighting the gym leaders, starting with the ones that I genuinely don't remember the most. I'll leave Ryme and Iono for last. 

Which means I go back to the farm town with the Bug-type gym leader lady. Katy! That's her name. She's so bamboozled that she doesn't even have anything ready -- she's even in the gym office building for handing out pastries! And... well, at this point her team is at a respectable even 65, but mine is at around 70-ish. And I'm confident I'll be able to sweep her team with my Fire-type starter.

So yeah. She has a Lokix, a Foretress, a Heracross, a Spidops and that dumbass completely not-a-bug Ursaring, who terastralizes with those two goofy-looking bug antennae which actually made me chuckle a bit. I take down her team with mostly one-shots, and the only one that slowed me down was the Forretress's Sturdy. What did the dumb metal bagworm do? Curse. Gah. 

I do like Katy's dialogue, where she reflects that she's been going too easy because all the students that go past her city tend to be total greenhorns, but she got so energized by the battle that she wants to go full-on ham on the next batch of challengers to truly test their worthiness. Um, okay, good luck, you guys with your level 20 Oinkolonges, I guess. 

Who else left a minimal impression on me? Right, Grusha. Another one that Skeledirge will one-shot, too. His story, at least, is a bit nicer. He talks about how he's happy to see me reach my goal, despite how the comment might come off as sarcasm, and later on reflects on how he's already lost snowboarding... and gym leading is the only thing he has left. And he really can't afford to lose the only thing that gives him meaning. 

His team is a lot less drastically different, since he's meant to be one of the later-game gyms. He adds a Weavile to his team of Frosmoth, Beartric, Cetitan and the Terastralized Altaria. 

I get Tulip out of the way, too, and her team is also not super different. A Gallade is added to her team of Farigiraf, Gardevoir, Espathra and Terasttralized Florges. She does have a fair amount of dialogue about being happy that she groomed a person of a talent into someone, and her dialogue about people with talent and skill and whatnot is kind of all right, I suppose. She talks about beauty and stuff and has a bit of cattiness towards La Primera. I just can't remember any of it now that I'm sitting down to write this paragraph. 

I also decide to finally start knocking off some of my classes (I had basically completed Clavell, Miriam and Raifort's storylines as much as I can prior), and basically blitzed through my Maths class with Tyme all the way to the end. If you think her maths class is any more interesting in classes 4-6... yeah, no. Even the game acknowledges this, I guess? It is just talking about things like STAB and move accuracy and whatnot, and while I understand these concepts, actually being made to count the numbers is not something I am willing to do at 2 a.m. in the morning. Sorry, Tyme, I press Flamethrower fire croc go brrrr.

Tyme's story isn't the most interesting thing either, where she's dealing with an 'intense glare' from a stalker. After a bit of hiding in the cafeteria kitchen to identify the identity of her stalker, she decides to confront her in an 'ambush', and turns out that stalker is just a fan-turned-student who wants to know why she quit being a gym leader.

Jacq's class, all the way to the end, really doesn't have anything all that interesting. He talks about evolution, Shiny Pokemon (OH HEY I GOT A SHINY GIBLE IT'S A ONE IN A 4000 CHANCE), regional forms and form changes. He really doesn't have much of a personality or a story, does he? Does he even have a character quirk or a character story?

Anyway, I think I'll try to slowly go through the post-game content in the next couple of days, alternating between gym leaders, stake-finding, classes and playing my copy of Scarlet.

Random Notes:

• So yeah, the Area Zero posts were all basically written up around the end of December, it's just that it took a while to proofread them and to make it into something presentable. The post-game ones are more closer to real-time, though. 
• Katy still doesn't have a Vivillon in her rematch. What was the point of showing her with those Vivillons in her original battle cutscene, then?
  
• So I guess Ursaluna just doesn't exist in Paldea, either?
• Tyme neatly sneaks in her role as a prior Rock-type gym leader when she brings up the debate between Rock Slide and Stone Edge as something she is very invested in when giving her class about move accuracy. 
• I caught an Applin at last (they fall from trees!) and the dex is kinda cheeky, noting that they will dehydrate and shrivel up if they're separated from the apple. Well, that explains why they never modelled Applin outside the apple, then!
• Jacq does have a brief hint about how Primeape evolves, so that's one bit of information about the super weird ways that some newer Pokemon evolve.

One Piece 1071 Review: The Mysterious 'Him'

One Piece, Chapter 1071: A Hero's Offensive

Huh. It's one of those chapters that seem to be a bit more common in the Egghead arc where we continually check in with characters all over the world, and... let me just quickly go through the actual Egghead story first, because I feel like it's kinda a bit... I don't want to say 'less interesting', but 'more predictable', perhaps is the right term. 

There is a brief discussion between the CP-0 agents about Luffy and Lucci's fight, and Lucci's excuse of fighting is... he refuses to acknowledge Luffy as an Emperor? Okay, sore about his previous defeat, then. Gotcha. We get the full lineup of Vegapunk and all of his satellite bodies minus, obviously, Atlas. I absolutely love the visual image of Vegapunk with a big-ass backpack like he's going to go camping, while Lilith, Shaka, Pythagoras, Edison and York are hanging out around him. Only Shaka and Lilith really have any kind of meaningful dialogue, with Lilith wanting to go all-in and fight the CP-0 agents while Shaka insists that Stella Vegapunk's survival is the most important thing. 

The other Vegapunks talk about how they have another 'ally' on the island, that would be put at risk if they help out, but Stella-Vegapunk just calls this mysterious ally without much preamble, and all we get is a generic message on the vein of "I'm always prepared for this order". With that dealt with, Vegapunk notes how all seven of him/them are going on board the Thousand Sunny, which... I'm not sure why everyone (myself included) is assuming that we're just going to take either regular Vegapunk or one of the satellite bodies? Hmm. 

The Frontier Dome preventing the CP-0 agents from going up gets taken down by a currently-mysterious person, and apparently none of the Vegapunks or CP-0 are responsible for it, with Lucci and Stussy being confused. No one is also in the control room (and definitely not Lilith, who's the obvious red herring suspect). The CP-0 agents Geppo up and Kaku does a gigantic Rankyaku to attack the Thousand Sunny... and Zoro casually wakes up, unsheathes his sword and blocks the Rankyaku. And... okay, that was a very badass moment as Zoro and Kaku regard each other, and the two begin to clash almost immediately!

Also, while all of this is going on (it's a bit of a chapter that jumps around). We continue the misunderstanding last chapter where Bonney is still pissed off at Vegapunk, and later on we get to see her about to beat the shit out of Vegapunk with a pipe, while Vegapunk confirms that Kuma can't be turned back to normal... though whether this is the actual yruth, or one of those 'Vegapunk is such a perfectionist' gag, I'm not entirely sure. Anyway, other than Bonney chasing Vegapunk around, all our guys have regrouped together. 

All around the world are other things happening. The chapter itself opens up with the 'real' Kuma, who slams onto the Red Port? We've been on the impression that he's heading to Egghead, but either the Paw-Paw Fruit transportation got interrupted halfway through by him slamming to the Red Port, or he actually intended to go there. We don't actually know what Kuma intends to do, but he sure is rampaging and the people there are sure panicking! 

We check in with Kid and Killer, who pass an island with giant fishes... and we get a little nod of the similarities between Kid and Luffy about how Kid always explores every single island he gets to. And the island Killer asks Kid about? Elbaf, homeland of the giants! DUN DUNNN DUNNNN!

Oh yeah, just like how Rob Lucci is supposed to contact the government for permission to fight a Yonko, another guy technically in employ of the government is about to do the same, as Garp calls Doll for reinforcements, and he refuses to clear it with top brass. Garp arrives and Helmeppo, in tears, gets on the ship with Hibari. Garp then declares his decision to... storm Hachinosu, beat the shit out of Blackbeard, and get Coby back! DUN DUNNN DUNNNN!

Can he beat Blackbeard, though? We haven't really gotten a conclusion to the Blackbeard/Law thing yet, and we're about to move into another major character fighting Blackbeard... is Marshall D. Teach  just going to beat the hell out of every secondary character before Luffy shows up?

A surprising amount of setup, and perhaps jumps around a fair bit -- I'm not the biggest fan of hysteria Bonney for sure -- but it's an okay chapter to close out last year!

Random Notes:

• No cover story for this chapter. 
  
• One of the crack theories I've seen floating out there is that Vegapunk can't "turn Kuma back to normal" because maybe PX-0 isn't actually Kuma, but a prototype clone? But then he does bleed red blood, and we've seen him use the Paw-Paw Fruit multiple times, so. 
• We get the revelation that Vega Force 01 can only fly around the island, which I'm going to assume is something to do with the anti-gravity field or whatever we've been mentioning. 
• It's kind of hilariously dark and completely lacking of self-awareness of Vegapunk to go 'oh, jeeze, sorry, Sentomaru' despite him practically twisting the poor dude's arm last chapter.
• Sanji doesn't care which Vegapunk joins, as long as Lilith comes with them. Doesn't like York, huh. 

Bleach Thousand-Year Blood War E12 Review: kurosAki genetics

Bleach, Thousand-Year Blood War, Episode 12: Everything But the Rain "June Truth"

So this is like the second part of the 'Everything But the Rain' backstory to Ichigo's complex (some may say convoluted, and I won't dispute that) backstory. 

But it really is nice to revisit the Isshin/Masaki relationship, yeah? We don't go through every single event that happened since the first meeting between Isshin and Masaki, and we condense the manga's version of events relatively efficiently, I feel. We start off in the Soul Society where Isshin gives his report of the incident to Genryusai, and the main point of this sequence is to show how Isshin is covering up Masaki's existence and involvement. Shown to use more or less simultaneously is a scene of Masaki in the human world, thinking about that rugged, handsome Shinigami that saved her life, and thinking about how she really should've asked for his name. The same thing happens with Isshin, and the two basically think a lot about 'man, I really should have asked for his/her name, he/she is such a great person and not at all like what I thought Quincies/Shinigami would be'. The relationship between Isshin and Masaki and how they end up falling in love with each other is basically as good as you could make it with the limited time -- both in terms of screentime and in-universe time -- and the function here is mostly to show off their initial attraction anyway. 

Everything's not okay with Masaki, though, and she' just going through regular high school until she bumps into -- by coincidence -- Urahara Kisuke, who realizes that something isn't quite right with this girl she just passed. Masaki returns home to the Ishida estate, and is immediately confronted by Mama Izumi, who gets pissed off that Masaki fought a Hollow to save a Shinigami. Ryuken is visibly angered by this breach of information, confronting Katagiri about her informing Izumi about this. Poor, poor Katagiri isn't even doing this out of jealousy or anything -- she took Ryuken's rationalization and his speech about the importance of the Quincies as the honest truth of her master's views, and Katagiri just wants Ryuken's goals to be realized. It's really only at this point that Ryuken, in rage, snaps that the whole 'pure Quincy' thing doesn't matter to him. 

To everyone's horror, Katagiri is right, and there actually is a problem. Masaki sustained a grievous wound from White's atrtack, with a very gross and disgusting veiny Hollow hole on Masaki's chest. Masaki faints, and Ryuken picks Masaki up and tries to get help for her. Unfortunately, Ishida Soken is still off training and doing whatever the hell he's doing. Not willing to wait, Ryuken picks up Masaki's body and runs off into the night sky.

And... and in a scene that I genuinely don't remember happened in the manga, we get to see Izumi scream out at Ryuken and beg at him to not be near that 'thing' since the now-infected Masaki isn't pure anymore... and we get to see Izumi's leg be encrusted with what seemed to be a Hollow wound. We never really get to see Izumi after this, and back in the day when I read the manga clearly my attention was focused on the actual main characters... but it does bring a lot of things into a new perspective, huh? It is always kind of weird that Soken and Izumi only had a single child especially since they're all about rebuilding the Quincy bloodline, but if Izumi herself is actually infected and rendered 'impure' by a Hollow attack, her desperation for the Ryuken/Masaki pure blood marriage makes a bit more sense and it adds a bit of tragedy to the whole thing since it ends up being a case of Izumi trying to basically "fix" what she couldn't provide for the Quincy people by hoisting everything on the next generation. 

Anyway, back to the actual main characters! Wracked with guilt for not stopping (or, hell, helping) Masaki on that night with White, Ryuken gets so distracted that a gigantic Hollow appears behind him. Fortunately, Isshin chooses this time to show up, one-shot the Hollow, and the two recognize each other. Ryuken is super-duper pissed, rather unfairly but understandably yelling at Isshin about how it's all because Masaki risked her life for a Shinigami that something like this would happen. Before they can really talk, though, Urahara shows up.

While this is going on, Masaki's "spirit" falls down a peaceful black void... before the gigantic Hollow head of White yawns open and is about to devour her. 

Urahara explains the Hollowfication phenomenon quickly to Isshin and Ryuken, telling them that he has been researching the phenomenon for quite some time now. Urahara also shatters Ryuken's hopes, noting that Masaki can never return to being normal, especially with how the Hollowfication process breaks apart the boundaries between different kinds of souls. Urahara talks about how the original Hollowfication process will end up with the afflicted to self-destruct in a process called Soul Suicide, but then offers an option that will safe Masaki, by injecting Masaki's soul with a substance that will maintain the balance between the boundaries. She won't be a pure Quincy, but she would at least get to live. Urahara notes that he cured the Hollowfied Shinigami with a vaccine created from a Quincy's arrow and a human soul, allowing them to remain in a stable state... but it's a bit harder for an infected Quincy like Masaki, since she has no resistance against Hollow. They need a counteracting force that has to be by Masaki's side constrantly -- this will save Masaki's life, prevent Hollowfication and allowing her to continue existing as a human. Since Masaki is currently a Quincy-Hollow, they need a Shinigami-Human, the opposite of the two components of Masaki. 

It's a wee bit complex and this is the double-abridged version (the anime abridges the manga, and I abridged the anime explanation) but, well, clearly Ishida Ryuken is much smarter than me, and he is absolutely distraught and pissed-off at this solution. The only choice for this counteracting force is another Shinigami -- which is Isshin -- to give up his status, his Shinigami powers, position in the Soul Society and basically hang around Masaki indefinitely. And Ryuken, having had a pretty negative view of Shinigami... well, the thought of Isshin giving up his life for a Quincy is completely impossible, especially since there is absolutely no merit in it for Isshin.

...and, of course, Isshin immediately agrees, to the astonishment of Ryuken and Urahara. Isshin notes that, yes, of course he's not happy about giving up everything he's known all his life, and I do like that we acknowledge it instead of just handwaving it completely with 'shonen protagonist go yolo'. Isshin notes that, yes, he's not happy about it, but he can't live with himself if he has a chance to save the person that saved him in the first place, and didn't take that chance. 

And then we cut to Masaki's inner world, where Isshin shows up and rescues Masaki from the giant Hollow head with a Getsuga Tensho. The original version of this chapter in the manga is notorious for showing Masaki completely nude, with visibly-drawn nipples, something that still surprises me was allowed to run in Shonen Jump. With the power of glowing anime auras, though, Masaki gets the typical barbie-doll anatomy this time around. 

In the real world, Masaki stops her self-destruction and is finally stabilized. With their two souls bonded, Urahara confirms that Masaki will survive. A still-slightly delirious Masaki then starts to giggle about meeting Isshin again. Ryuken walks off into the rain and meets Katagiri, and while Ryuken is a bit in despair for his inability to protect the Quincies, Katagiri refuses to leave his side, and yells about how it's her duty to devote her entire life to serve him... and while it's certainly nowhere as bubbly as the Masaki/Isshin moment, I think this is when Ryuken ended up realizing that Katagiri loves him. And... well, we don't get to focus on the Ishida family, but all context clues did point to Ryuken and Katagiri loving each other in their marriage, and since Izumi is clearly a 'pure blood' supremacist, it's a form of Ryuken choosing love over traditions.

We kind of extend the little montage of romance and marriage a fair bit, which I think is kind of necessary and sweet. Masaki graduates from high school and leaves the Ishida estate and the Quincies after that, while Urahara helps Isshin set up the Kurosaki Clinic. And I do like that the two isn't just immediately in love with each other. There's the matter of Masaki's age, of course, but the two got closer over time as Masaki keeps showing up to 'make fun of Isshin's white coat', and scenes of them eating sushi together or watching movies together definitely does sell the romance between the two in the limited time available to us in this episode. That line about Masaki being Isshin's sun is very sweet...

And then we cut to the present day, where Isshin tells Ichigo that he was born after that moment, and we get a brief recap of, well, Bleach. Isshin also confirms that his Shinigami powers returned only after Rukia stabbed Ichigo with her sword. Since Isshin's Reiatsu could no longer suppress the Hollow powers that transferred to Ichigo, Isshin's Shinigami powers returned to him for the first time in 20 years... which also neatly explains why Isshin never participated in any of the battles up until the Fake Karakura Town arc... and more importantly, why he never saved Masaki from a scrub Hollow like Grand Fisher...

Which is what we go to now, after the credits roll -- we get a super-long post-credits scene. And it really is kind of sad that a character as developed as Masaki was in these short flashbacks ended up having such an undignified death at the hands of Grand Fisher, and... it's not that Isshin could do anything. He couldn't even see a Hollow, much less fight it, and while it does initially sound like 'man, you dropped the ball', even if Isshin arrived at the place he really wouldn't be able to do much other than be a bit of a distraction. But more to the point, Kurosaki Masaki is a full-fledged Quincy, and a hollow like Grand Fisher would be relatively easy prey to someone like beginning-of-the-series Ishida Uryu, let alone an experienced Quincy like Masaki. As Isshin put it -- the gulf in strength was so high that it would be stupid for him to think Masaki was in danger. As an Echt Quincy, her Blut Vene was naturally insanely powerful.

...except Auswählen, or the Holy Selection, happened right at that point.

(It's nice, by the way, that the anime actually animates the moment where Masaki's Blut Vene shuts off and she gets impaled by Grand Fisher, showing just how sudden it is and how much she was ready to tank the attack.)

Both Masaki and Katagiri (who was sickly) died that day from Auswählen, and I do like the anime-original Uryu scenes shows a brief scene of Ryuken finding the journal underneath the bridge where Uryu was reading it from -- with the implication that Uryu found out most if not all about the Quincy Purge and the truth of his own mother's death at around this point. Again, they really didn't add as many Uryu scenes as I thought they would, but the little they added definitely really help to build up Uryu's character to explain his eventual recruitment to the Sternritters. 

Anyway, Auswählen. It ties to the mysterious Juhabach and his resurrection -- power in 900 years, mind in 90 years, and strength in 9 years... which falls in line with how Juhabach took back the powers of the Quincies he deemed to be impure or weak. I'm not sure why Katagiri qualified for it, I guess because her body was physically ill? But Masaki, marrying a Shinigami and 'tainted' by a Hollow, definitely would fall under that category. 

We also finally get the confirmation of the identity of the Juhabach, the immortal king and father of the Quincies... which I think we can already guess over the past 12 episodes. Ichigo, having a full picture of his own origin story and that of Juhabach, thanks Isshin. The rain (everything but the rain! It's symbolic!) clears up, and we get a short scene of Ikumi showing up to return the substitute Shinigami badge that Ichigo left behind in her shop. Ichigo thanks Ikumi, before leaving with determination. 

So yeah. I really do think that these two episodes of 'Everything But the Rain' tells the original story and adapts it amazingly well. The pacing of those chapters really did make it a bit frustrating to read week-by-week and reading Bleach's sixtieth tankobon does give us a much more pleasant reading experience. The same happens here, and... again, there's always going to be some debate on whether Ichigo's backstory is 'too convoluted', or if it should've been told to the audience in a different way. I do think that retrospectively the flashback and where it was placed was definitely fine. How it tied to Juhabach and his Auswahlen is a bit debatable, and honestly while I really enjoyed the Ryuken/Masaki/Katagiri/Izumi Quincy purebloodedness family drama, it's not something that would be followed up on in the rest of the arc. That's for me to complain in later episodes, though. For now, it's a fun episode!

Random Notes:

• There is a nice little bit of scene where Mayuri grouses about Isshin not recovering the remains of the super-unique Hollow and how it's a huge breach of conduct, but we all know Mayuri just wants to dissect some interesting new specimens.
  
• Actually, I've never really thought about it, but did this incident and Soken's unavailability be one of the huge bridges between Soken and Ryuken? I also wonder if Soken approved of Ryuken and Katagiri's marriage -- presumably Izumi didn't. 
• It is kinda weird that Isshin does a Getsuga Tenshou, huh? How does that work, considering Ichigo's very unique Shinigami-Hollow powers boosted by Quincy heritage with a weirdly inactivated Asauchi thing? The new anime, at least, makes it a bit more clear that Isshin's Getsuga is a different thing, with different colours corresponding to the flames of Engetsu.
• Another somewhat more dated joke/content that's removed isn't a fanservice thing, but Isshin's comment about not wanting to receive thanks from men.
• In the manga, one of Masaki's friends noted that she would jump Ryuken if she was in Masaki's position, cousin or not. Ooookay.
• A little nice moment of Isshin recalling that Ryuken was the one that let Masaki leave the Ishida household after graduating high school is also cut.
• There was also an explanation -- which I assume got shunted into one of the commercial break infodumps -- about how Echt Quincies can use Blut naturally while Gemischt Quincies need to do some training.
• Don't ask why Urahara casually has a Gigai created from a human soul or whatever. Just... just don't ask, and don't ask which unfortunate human got turned into that thing. 

Bleach Thousand-Year Blood War E11 Review: mAsAki's hAndgun bow

Bleach, Thousand-Year Blood War, Episode 11: Everything But the Rain

The 'Everything But the Rain' arc in the Bleach manga will always hold a bit of a special place in my heart, because this was around the time that I started to seriously read Bleach weekly. And... well, these next couple of episodes are going to be the huge plotline revelations about Kurosaki Ichigo and his admittedly rather confusing and convoluted origin story... which is also something that I'm sure a fair amount of people did have their problems with how it's paced. It is really interesting in the next couple of episodes to see which scenes they decide to remove and keep. 

We get a brief check-in with Nimaiya Oetsu talking about how he knows the location of every single Asauchi he has ever forged, since he is the 'god of swords' and all that, and Ichigo has never made a proper bond with his Asauchi. But Ichigo has awakened his Zanpakuto without the aid of an Asauchi, and thus a lot of the regular rules that apply to other Shinigami won't apply to Ichigo. 

Which is where Ichigo ends up in the human world, right in front of his house in the Kurosaki clinic. Isshin comes out to greet Ichigo but Ichigo just bolts away running through the rain, going and taking some shelter in the house of his boss Ikumi -- a character honestly only really relevant, vaguely, in the Fullbringer arc and I really must confess I don't remember at all. As a normal person, Ikumi does try to give some 'big sister' advice to Ichigo, not realizing how utterly cosmic and reality-warping the problems that Ichigo is facing. It's a scene that I honestly wouldn't be surprised if they cut entirely out of this more compressed anime adaptation, but I am definitely glad they decided to leave a part of it in, to give Ichigo some moments to freak out and recollect himself after his failure. Isshin shows up in his Shinigami form and Ichigo steels himself to go back and talk with dad about their origin story. 

We get a nice little nod to the past about how Isshin and Ichigo had kinda agreed to leave the discussion about their past for later when Isshin is ready... and he just drops the bombshell that Ichigo's mom, Kurosaki Masaki, is a Quincy. We cut back to a time in the past that happens after the 'Turn Back the Pendulum' story, and I really do feel like the Isshin/Masaki stuff is something that really has been built into the idea of what Ichigo's backstory is all about... it's just maybe the Hollow stuff that kinda felt a fair bit convoluted. 

Past Isshin is the previous Captain of the Tenth Division, with Matsumoto as his Vice-Captain and Toshiro as his Third Seat. The three's dynamic is actually quite cute, too, with Matsumoto playing cat-herder for the immature Isshin. For a moment it seemed like Toshiro is going to be the one sane person there that's a gigantic buzzkill, but I absolutely adore that moment when he gets pissed off at Isshin for looking for his missing manju in the middle of the meeting before deadpanning that those cakes that he ate were tasty. Nice little acknowledgement about how talented Toshiro is and how he's basically a shoo-in for the Captain position after Isshin, even though Matsumoto is older. Toshiro brings up a strange report about how some Shinigami have been disappearing in Naruki City, leading to Isshin going off to investigate on his own, with Matsumoto and Toshiro basically handwaving it as them being deemed too weak to accompany Isshin. 

We also get to see the legendary Bad Eyesight Trio in their secret evil lair -- Sosuke Aizen, Ichimaru Gin and Tosen Kaname! I missed these guys, but particularly Gin and Tosen, who hadn't appeared in the new anime yet thanks to them being, y'konw, dead. They're still hunting down Shinji's group and trying to do some Hollowfication experiments, which leads to, of course, the mysterious Hollow named 'White' that's terrorizing Naruki City. Which is just looming ominously in Naruki City. Speaking of which, we meet two random nameless Shinigami patrolling the city, self-awarely talking about how the rain is a bad omen and bad, dramatic things often happen in the rain. Isshin shows up, tells them to go home and leave the patrol to him, with the ever-flippant excuse of him wanting to pee alone. 

And then we cut away to the Quincies! Specifically, Ryuken (Uryu's dad) and Masaki. This plotline does exist in the manga, but I do feel like the anime does give Ryuken's mother, Izumi (who isn't named in the manga) a bit more focus on how she, as a very traditionalist Quincy, is all about the pure-blood mingling of pure-blood families and to keep the pure-blood genetics of the pure-blood Quincies pure and blood and pure. Which is to say, she is kind of a tit! She's all pissed off that Masaki is trying to kind of be a 'normal girl' and not put her heart and soul into training as a Quincy and maintaining the pure traditions of their people. We get the quick revelation that the Kurosaki clan is kind of decimated, and that she was taken in by the super-rich Ishida clan in order to preserve the Echt Quincy bloodline, in an arranged marriage with Ryuken

And then in comes Ryuken, and... again, the plotline is the same with the manga, but the added focus and pretty good voice acting does really make me feel a lot more for Ryuken. Ryuken is clearly not willing to fight against the tradition of his family, but he draws the line at Izumi mistreating and badmouthing Masaki. I do also really like the teasing bits that Masaki does to Ryuken when Izumi's not around -- it's clear that Masaki and Ryuken don't mind each other and, hell, given different circumstances, might even have organically loved each other. It's just that the hanging specter of family tradition, echt Quicny blood and the pressure of arranged marriage that will always cast a huge shadow over the two's relationship. 

We also get a bit of Kanae Katagiri, Ryuken's butler and a gemischt or 'impure' Quincy that is extremely formal, but we'll see does have the hots for Ryuken and would eventually become his wife. Katagiri doesn't really get to shine all that much since the main focus of these stories are Isshin, Masaki and Ryuken, but it's nice that she shows up here. The conversation between her and Ryuken, and how she clearly just wants what's best for Ryuken's happiness is neat, as is the tragic misunderstanding about how she thinks Ryuken's rationalization about the future of the Quincies is Ryuken's true goal. There's also something quite sweet about Katagiri trying to make the best out of the arranged marriage, noting that someone like Ryuken who wants to make Masaki happy is the best Masaki could get out of the terrible situation. 

And then we cut back to the horror show! Isshin goes all Super Saiyan aura to draw out the mysterious killer, and the two nameless Shinigami is just watching in awe... when suddenly one of their heads slides apart like a sliced apple from the profile, and the sheer suddenness of the brutality in that scene actually caught me off-guard. 

And in comes White, a monstrous humanoid Hollow with features very similar to Ichigo's Inner Hollow, and it's already pretty evidently clear what this is. White's entire body is black, he's got giant blade-arms, and his hollow-hole is filled with a tumorous mass. Isshin clashes with White, and the sheer amount of Reiatsu ends up attracting the attention of the Quincies. Masaki goes off to help out, and Ryuken tries to stop her -- talking about how the Quincies are supposed to head out and let the gemischt Quincies like Katagari handle the situation first, and how the echt cannot shed their blood easily. It's pretty sad stuff with how classist the Quincies are, and it clearly chafes at Masaki and even Ryuken. Masaki gives that Spider-Man speech about great responsibility before running off, and Ryuken doesn't stop her -- instead, he and Katagiri get their own weapons ready to back her up if needed. 

Meanwhile, Isshin is getting more and more flustered at the abilities that White is displaying, showing the Cero explosions of a Menos (remember, this is before the Shinigami had regular encounters with Arrancar) and the fighting skills of a Shinigami. Isshin also realizes that a creature as powerful and intelligent like White couldn't have rampaged without Soul Society knowing, and quickly gets into the correct assumption that someone is covering him up. Isshin unleashes Engetsu, and is about to attack... when suddenly he is slashed. For a moment the animation really does make it look like White moved faster than Ishin... but turns out it's Aizen! In his ominous villain cloak! 

Now I'm not sure if a single slash is enough to be the great equalizer, and the manga and anime never made it clear if Isshin's unsanctioned mission means that he's wearing one of those power suppressors*, but White definitely isn't letting up and is beating the shit out of Isshin. We get a very cool move from Isshin where he spits out a wad of blood into Engetsu which transforms into a gigantic explosion of flaming explosion very roughly shaped like a bird. HELL YEAH! Yeah, Isshin doesn't really get much to do in the manga other than this flashback, and I do like that they're giving him a bit more than just 'fire sword guy'.  

*I do remember the manga did have a line about how Aizen and company note how Isshin's too wounded to use his Bankai... which I think would be a bit distracting since Isshin never uses his Bankai for the rest of the story. 

Despite having one arm less, White continues to manage to fight evenly with Isshin, and even nearly gets a point-blank Cero fired at Isshin until Masaki shoots a Heilig Pfeil right onto him. We get an interesting scene where Aizen just wants to observe everything and see what's going to happen, despite Tosen wanting to zip in and end the interference of the Quincy. White ends up charging in and attacking Masaki, leaving the wounded Isshin on top of a building and easily evading the storm of arrows that Masaki fires.

And in one of the most badass moments ever, Masaki just very calmly disperses her Holy Bow, lets White bite her shoulder... and then with the most cocky smirk, hugs White, puts her hand on White's head shaped like a finger pistol with a tiny handgun-sized Heilig Bogen and fires it dead right in White's head. 

I am sorry, but I forgot this moment happened and holy hell that's a badass moment. The resulting explosion that erupted out of White's head is also pretty awesome. 

This seems to have killed White, but then the weird hole-tumour mass thing expands, and it's Isshin's turn to save Masaki, zipping in and blocking the self-destruct mechanism and we get a very cool pillar of flame that's cut in half being seen from a distance. White is gone, and a wounded Isshin finally gets to talk to Masaki for the first time, and Masaki realizes that all the Quincy propaganda fed to her is not necessarily accurate, since there are kind Shinigamis like Isshin out there who doesn't go immediately into genocide-mode when the word 'Quincy' is announced. Ryuken and Katagiri, ready to swoop in if needed, ends up leaving when they decide everything is fine. 

We get a brief little epilogue with the Aizen Squad in the evil lab, with Tosen being super-angry at White for being a failure and going into a Quincy during the 'metastasize stage', but Aizen then notes what a strange, unexpected and unique thing it is for a Hollow created from a dead Shinigami soul choosing the opposite of itself -- a Quincy -- to parasitize. 

And we get one final scene of the present day, continuing the 'Uryu joins the Sternritter' subplot unique to the anime that foreshadows him infiltrating the Sternritter, which I think is done with all the implication that he's learning most if not all of the information that the audience is learning from all these flashbacks about the Quicy extermination and the past between his dad's family. There really isn't any dialogue, but just Uryu all sad and emo in the rain, being approached by Jugram Haschwalth.

Very neat episode, and... I've always liked the Isshin/Masaki scenes in the manga. Again, not so much the explanation of Ichigo's weird soul composition which I hope they handle well in the anime, but this backstory is always pretty nice. 

Random Notes:

• Bleach really likes the rain, which is why I remembered the anime forums back in the day made some teasing fun at the title of this arc, 'Everything But the Rain'. But man, the anime did a lot of fancy tricks with the raindrops in this one, particularly when we 'roll back the time' to see the past and the raindrops stop and hover briefly in the air for a bit as the title comes up, before gushing back down. 
• There's a brief note of Ryuken and Izumi discussing that Souken is still off training in the Funft-Feld, whatever that is. 
• Oh yeah, in case I forgot to mention, Masaki and Ryuken are technically cousins. I don't remember if they're first cousins or what, but they're definitely related, adding yet another layer of ickiness to the whole arranged marriage thing. 
• I forgot to mention that one stupid-ass Thirteenth Division Shinigami that meets Isshin as he runs into Karakura Town, and his priority isn't "what the hell, there's a CAPTAIN here!" but no, his priority is "ey yo this is 13th Division territory, the hell are you doin' here?" He, obviously gets a grisly death via Cero for his idiocy. 
• Okay, the badassery of the 'let the Hollow bite me to get into my range' scene is really kind of diminished because we know what happened thanks to the bite, but let Masaki have her badass moment in this episode, ok?
• This episode isn't entirely bereft of humour, since Masaki, Isshin, Matsumoto and Ikumi are all pretty fun characters, but we did cut a bunch of the present-day Isshin's antics, and a fair chunk of Ikumi's dialogue (the only ones that are left in are the supportive, heartwarming ones), to make the present-day stuff more serious. 
• Another not-as-kosher-nowadays scene with Isshin pointing at Matsumoto's sweaty boobs and basically going 'nice' is also removed, which... yeah, I can see why they did that. 
• A much sadder casualty of the trimming is Masaki's snarky-ass line to Ikumi about how 'I learned cabbage and pickles are free in the school cafeteria!' Although knowing Masaki, it might be genuine. 
• Also removed is the explanation of the Aizen Squad cloaks, which are Reiatsu-hiding cloaks developed after copying Urahara's designs. 
• We also cut a rather interesting character moment for Tosen, where he gets pissed off at Aizen and Gin for not respecting how White is created from a Shinigami's soul, thereby granting him more respect than your average Hollow experiment.