Bleach Thousand Year Blood War episode 7 review
“Obi-Wan never told you about what happened to your father.”
And so it goes. Look, I am trying to stay as positive as possible about this, but this episode made no sense. Yamamoto getting split in two? Okay, that made sense, right after we got a brief flashback for him. But how is Ichigo suddenly here after being stuck in Quilge’s Jail? You’d think they would have at least resolved that before just suddenly popping him out here in the Soul Society. Instead, we’re just supposed to think “he got out cause he’s Ichigo.” And while that’s true, it would have been a lot more powerful if we would have gotten a dramatic breakout by Ichigo shown on screen rather than just an assumed one.
But it gets worse. Ichigo battles Yhwach, and he has no chance. Okay, that I can live with, I understand how we’re trying to build up Yhwach and the Quincys to be the most powerful villains since Aizen. But Yhwach decides he’s not going to kill off Ichigo, or even to continue to destroy the Soul Society. Instead, he decides to just… go away. And all of his minions, too. Really? This seems to be a too-easy way to explain away why Yhwach doesn’t triumph right here and now. I would have much preferred if they fought to a stalemate or something. Instead, it’s Yhwach completely dominating and then suddenly deciding he’s not going to continue, for no real reason at all. His parking meter ran out or something. I know we’ve got to pad this out for 52 episodes, but come on.
And then he throws out some stuff to Ichigo, saying he never knew what happened to his mother. And that Ichigo is his “son of the darkness.” This is crazy talk. We now have to retcon Ichigo’s backstory for some reason. I think I know the reason why, via spoilers, but I’m never a fan of retconning. Oh well. At least Ichigo has some secret reason for something to do something to someone.
Not a terrible episode by any means. Just a little too many things that made no sense and could not be explained away, except by retconning. So, hopefully we get an improvement here.
Best girl of the episode: None (not sure a single female got more than a second of screen time)
Episode rating: 5/10
Tommy A. Phillips 