×
  • remind me tomorrow
  • remind me next week
  • never remind me
Subscribe to the ANN Newsletter • Wake up every Sunday to a curated list of ANN's most interesting posts of the week. read more

Review

by Theron Martin,

Bleach

DVD 17

Synopsis:
Bleach DVD 17
The mod souls continue to trouble Ichigo and the gang, but as Ichigo soon learns, they were actually only testing the teenagers' ability (on Urahara's behalf) to fight under real-world conditions and function as a team. The mod souls' ability to detect reishi, and the ability to transplant them into less conspicuous plushies, also makes them quite handy when a new threat appears on the scene: the Bounts. Vampire-like super-powered humans who use Dolls instead of zanpakuto and gain virtual immortality by regularly feeding on souls, the Bounts seem to have abandoned their ages-old ban on feeding on living souls, though to what ultimate purpose neither the inhabitants of Karakura Town nor the Soul Society have yet determined. Two of the Bounts seem to have taken a particular interest in Uryu because of his status as a Quincy, however, and clues indicate that they are not united in purpose. Jin Kariya, the Bounts' leader, also lurks in the background. Fortunately for Ichigo, the defense of Karakura Town has been further augmented by the return of Rukia, and she is not the only Soul Reaper to join Renji and Ichigo in town.
Review:

With episodes 68-71 Bleach wraps up its mini-arc focusing on Ichigo and friends dealing with the mod souls and officially touches off the Bount arc which will continue through episode 109. As filler stories in long-running series go, the Bount arc stands head and shoulders above most because it tells a single cohesive story which maintains the style of the original so well that a viewer is unlikely to realize that it is a filler arc (i.e. not based on canon manga content) unless told so or already familiar with the manga.

While this arc throws out the expected super-powered foes with diverse powers, it ultimately works where others might fail because of the solid foundation it starts to lay in episodes 69-71, which assures that these are not just random foes. That everything ultimately links back to the Soul Society and the Quincies is only barely hinted at through these episodes but will eventually become one of the arc's strongest selling points. Here, the episodes mostly focusing on establishing the most basic facts about the Bounts, that they are a forced to be reckoned with, that they are not of one mind, and that something fishy concerning them is going on in the Soul Society. In other words, these episode provide plenty of fodder from which to build a long and involved plot line which could cover a few dozen episodes while Tite Kubo had time to get further ahead on his originating manga storylines.

The actual course of events in this volume is very typical for Bleach: Ichigo fights, only rarely actually uses his brain, occasionally gets into squabbles with other characters, and tries to protect people without understanding that some of them take affront to having to be protected. Other characters occasionally contribute and/or cover Ichigo's butt when he overextends himself, powerful villains step forward to look down on the hero, Kon is annoying, and regular doses of comedy antics ensue. The understated comedy gem through this span is the simpatico pairing of the mod soul Noba with Chad, neither of whom speaks except when necessary; the scene in episode 69 where they just sit quietly in Chad's room until Kon interrupts is priceless. Oh, and Rukia also returns, sans zanpakuto. (Don't expect her to ever have one in this arc, either.)

As is (unfortunately) all too common in shonen series, Studio Pierrot's production of the animation and artistry suffers from occasional brief quality control lapses during these episodes, though it also continues its generally fine job of providing distinctive and memorable character designs. That does not necessarily mean that the designs are universally attractive, however; Kuroda's dual hair color is a positive fashion disaster, so he cannot turn into stuffed animal form fast enough. The series' odd sensibilities about using manga-style shading lines also continue, as do the flashy moves in the action scenes. All things considered, Bleach is not the best-looking of action series, but it fares acceptably well for what it is.

The series does much better on the music front, with various familiar stand-by themes mixing with some entirely new and creepy themes tailored specifically for the Bounts. The heavy third opener “Ichirin no Hana” continues through this run, as does the high-spirited sixth closer “My Pace,” here available in all its unedited-for-TV glory with the sharp original animation and visuals.

With a couple of exceptions, the English dub executes surprisingly close to the original in style and delivery. A character like Ichigo pretty much has to be voiced by Johnny Yong Bosch, Orihime pretty much has to be voiced by Stephanie Sheh, and Derek Stephen Prince is an excellent fit as Uryu. Amongst new roles, Troy Baker (Schneizel in Code Geass, Abel Nightroad in Trinity Blood) is a fine choice for the Bount Jin. One of the few distinct differences comes in the role of Captain Kurotuschi, where Terrence Stone's stylized performance makes him sound more blatantly crazy-evil. The English script does not vary much, either, beyond Americanizing some of the insults and more typically referring to characters by their first names; all of the attack and weapon names are fully retained, even including the German Doll names.

For Extras, this disk has a clean version of the new closer, a few production art pieces, and both anime and manga previews. In addition, after the Next Episode previews for each episode are the “Golden Illustrated Guide to Soul Reapers” comedy bits that were apparently part of the original Japanese broadcasts but never seen on the American TV broadcasts.

Bleach is not the kind of show one watches for a fulfilling experience. It has all of the depth of single-topping thin-crust pizza, what passes for character development mostly consists of fretting over not being powerful enough, and it suffers from most common foibles of long-running shonen action series. It does, however, fully recognize and play to its strengths by providing a (usually) entertaining mix of flashy action, silly comedy, and good old-fashioned angst. This volume isn't one of the series' strongest efforts but still provides enough for fans to muddle through and gives a strong base on which to build the upcoming long plot arc.

Grade:
Overall (dub) : B
Overall (sub) : B
Story : C+
Animation : B
Art : B
Music : B+

+ Musical score, return of Rukia to action, some worthy comedy bits.
Minor quality control lapses, nothing feels especially fresh.

discuss this in the forum (7 posts) |
bookmark/share with: short url
Add this anime to
Add this DVD to
Production Info:
Director: Noriyuki Abe
Series Composition:
Tsuyoshi Kida
Kento Shimoyama
Masashi Sogo
Script:
Kazuyuki Fudeyasu
Miho Imamura
Mio Imamura
Rika Nakase
Masahiro Okubo
Masao Ōkubo
Kento Shimoyama
Masashi Sogo
Natsuko Takahashi
Michiko Yokote
Genki Yoshimura
Storyboard:
Noriyuki Abe
Masami Anno
Koji Aritomi
Tetsuya Endō
Manabu Fukazawa
Kiyomu Fukuda
Shigeki Hatakeyama
Yasuyuki Honda
Masashi Ishihama
Satoshi Ishino
Shigenori Kageyama
Jun Kamiya
Rei Kaneko
Akio Kawamura
Masahiko Komino
Chiaki Kon
Junya Koshiba
Masashi Kudo
Hodaka Kuramoto
Toshihiko Masuda
Tadahito Matsubayashi
Hitoyuki Matsui
Yasuhiro Matsumura
Yukihiro Matsushita
Yuzuru Mitsui
Shigeyuki Miya
Kazunori Mizuno
Yūji Moriyama
Minoru Murao
Takehiro Nakayama
Yasuto Nishikata
Hiroaki Nishimura
Satoshi Nishimura
Mitsutaka Noshitani
Tetsuhito Saito
Masami Shimoda
Ogura Shirakawa
Yoshifumi Sueda
Natsuko Suzuki
Hideki Tachibana
Yuzuru Tachikawa
Jun Takada
Hiroki Takagi
Motosuke Takahashi
Takahiro Takamizawa
Shinichi Tōkairin
Sanzou Tsuyukida
Shigeru Ueda
Atsushi Wakabayashi
Shinichi Watanabe
Hideyo Yamamoto
Minoru Yamaoka
Episode Director:
Noriyuki Abe
Eitarō Ano
Koji Aritomi
Matsuo Asami
Kiyomu Fukuda
Shigeki Hatakeyama
Tomoko Hiramuki
Tetsuo Ichimura
Akane Inoue
Yasuo Iwamoto
Akira Iwanaga
Taiji Kawanishi
Takushi Kimura
Chiaki Kon
Harume Kosaka
Junya Koshiba
Masashi Kudo
Hodaka Kuramoto
Yasuhiro Kuroda
Keizou Kusakawa
Tadahito Matsubayashi
Nobufumi Matsuda
Yasuhiro Matsumura
Yuzuru Mitsui
Ryo Miyata
Kazunori Mizuno
Geisei Morita
Eiko Nishi
Yasuto Nishikata
Hiroaki Nishimura
Kazuo Nogami
Mitsutaka Noshitani
Yoshinori Odaka
Rokou Ogiwara
Yukio Okazaki
Masaya Sasaki
Kazuma Satō
Yuji Sekimoto
Akira Shimizu
Kazunobu Shimizu
Ogura Shirakawa
Yoshifumi Sueda
Yuzuru Tachikawa
Hiroki Takagi
Takeshi Tomita
Shigeru Ueda
Takeshi Yamaguchi
Minoru Yamaoka
Mitsue Yamazaki
Unit Director:
Noriyuki Abe
Masashi Kudo
Shingo Ogiso
Yuzuru Tachikawa
Music: Shirō Sagisu
Original creator: Tite Kubo
Character Design: Masashi Kudo
Art Director:
Natsuko Suzuki
Sawako Takagi
Art:
Tsuyoshi Fukumoto
Masaya Hamaguchi
Yuki Kasahara
Hideaki Kudo
Katsusuke Okamura
Mayu Shirai
Sawako Takagi
Shinobu Takahashi
Mayu Usui
Norihiko Yokomatsu
Animation Director:
MANASITA
Chiaki Abe
Yoshie Anzai
Shigemi Aoyagi
Eiki Arasato
Eri Baba
Bum-Chul Chang
Manabu Fukazawa
Akihiro Fukui
Yeong-Hun Han
Daiki Handa
Kenji Hattori
Yūri Ichinose
Shin Jae Ick
Hidenori Igari
Hiroaki Imaki
Keiichi Ishida
Masashi Ishihama
Tomomi Ishikawa
Nobuyuki Iwai
Gil Soo Joo
Akio Kawamura
Toshihiro Kikuchi
Gi Nam Kim
Hyon Ok Kim
Hyun Ok Kim
Il Bae Kim
Sang-Yeob Kim
Seong Beom Kim
Yong Sik Kim
Yoon-Joung Kim
Seiji Kishimoto
Akemi Kobayashi
Ryo Kobayashi
Yukari Kobayashi
Ryou Kodama
Makoto Koga
Masahiko Komino
Atsushi Komori
Mitsuki Kosaka
Fumiaki Kouta
Tsuguyuki Kubo
Masashi Kudo
Manabu Kurihara
Shinichi Kurita
Boo Hee Lee
Sung Jin Lee
Shuji Maruyama
Ippei Masui
Tamami Miura
Shuuji Miyazaki
Kazuya Miyoshi
Joo Yeon Moon
Minoru Morita
Yūji Moriyama
Tsutomu Murakami
Keiya Nakano
Shingo Ogiso
Masaya Ōnishi
Shigetsune Ōsawa
Chang Hwan Park
Hye-Ran Park
In-Hee Park
Jong Jun Park
Tomoko Satō
Yang Kwang Seock
Sanae Shimada
Makoto Shimojima
Jae-Ik Shin
Kim-Young Sik
Sayuri Sugitou
Natsuko Suzuki
Shin'ichi Suzuki
Shinichi Suzuki
Yoko Suzuki
Hiroki Takagi
Motosuke Takahashi
Akira Takeuchi
Yukari Takeuchi
Masaya Tanaka
Seiki Tanaka
Takashi Uchida
Miyuki Ueda
Tomomi Umemura
Masaru Yamada
Asuka Yamaguchi
Keiko Yamamoto
Osamu Yamamoto
Yoshimitsu Yamashita
Naoki Yamauchi
Teruhiko Yamazaki
Takeshi Yoshioka
Director of Photography:
Toshiyuki Fukushima
Katsufumi Sato
Producer:
Shunji Aoki
Ken Hagino
Kyoko Kobayashi
Mai Nagai
Yutaka Sugiyama
Jun Takibuchi
Yukio Yoshimura
Licensed by: Viz Media

Full encyclopedia details about
Bleach (TV)

Release information about
Bleach - The Bount (DVD 17)

Review homepage / archives