Guess what? Hiyori is still annoying as heck. But I didn’t feel like making this review all about her. Instead, let’s see what happens when Kisuke Urahara brings her to visit a prisoner. His name? Mayuri Kurotsuchi.
Why Mayuri was “redeemed” in Bleach is beyond me. The guy is as low as it gets when it comes to morals. Apparently it was Kisuke who gave him his big chance at being set free. Okay, I get it, but why? Why did Kisuke even consider this? Is Kisuke really the biggest villain, or the dumbest person? All these questions need to be answered or this “Turn Back the Pendulum” arc will prove to be just a waste of time.
Best girl of the episode: Yoruichi (13) (barely beating out Soi Fon)
Hiyori is so aggravating (how aggravating is she?) that I at one point in this episode felt like giving up watching Bleach forever. She had irritated me so much that I was ready to just turn off the episode and give up the dream of watching the whole series in a year. Thankfully I stuck it out, not because she got any better, but because the episode came to a merciful end.
What exactly is the point of Hiyori acting all over-the-top angry and violent? It’s not like there’s any love angle to it. It’s just her going into constant fits of rage. She doesn’t bring anything positive to the table. She isn’t funny, she isn’t likable, she isn’t useful to the plot, she’s just yelling all the time. Give me a break.
Thanks to her, I consider this the worst episode of Bleach thus far. My ears hurt from hearing her yelling and screaming and complaining the whole episode. There wasn’t anything good about this episode at all.
Best girl of the episode: Yoruichi (12) (she got a few lines, which allowed me to have a second female character to pick)
Time to go back in time! This arc brings us back I think a century in the past. Some Captains are still there. Others are Lieutenants, such as Sosuke Aizen. Still others are Visoreds, who I still hate even now. And some of them are people we know well, such as Squad 2’s Yoruichi and soon-to-be Captain of Squad 2, Kisuke Urahara.
This episode pretty much just sets things up. Most of the Captains are introduced, with only a couple left as mysteries. Then comes a very humorous scene where Soi Fon steals the show. She goes around spying on Urahara all day long, writing down his every move, because she wants to prove to Yoruichi that he doesn’t deserve to be Captain. Yoruichi laughs her off and tells her that she’s hopelessly in love with Urahara. This is what makes the Yoruichi-Urahara-Soi Fon “love triangle” the best one in all of Bleach.
Aizen is plotting something. You just know it from looking at him. But what? Oh, and one of the characters is said to have gone to Squad Zero. Which is relevant since I’m rewatching TYBW where they went to Squad Zero. Of course, TYBW just retcons a bunch of stuff, so I’m not sure if this is consistent. In any case, Soi Fon’s spying and Yoruichi’s accusation of her love for Urahara make this episode a good start to this ultimate of flashbacks.
Best girl of the episode: Soi Fon (12) (man, I could just listen to Karen Strassman’s voice the rest of my life)
… you’re running for your life, you’re a shooting staaaaaar…
It’s Rurichiyo vs. Kenryu in the ultimate showdown of Kemari, a sport that Rukia badly explains via her poor drawings and thus confuses everyone even further. I have no idea who’s on what team. Well, who is on first, of course, but I don’t know what’s on second. Or is he on third?
Anyway, as you’d figure, this Kemari game goes haywire, with Kon taking the ball way out of bounds, Yoruichi going naked, and a normal Hollow showing up which Ichigo feels the need to go all out with his Gensuga Tensho attack. And the result? Both Rurichiyo and Kenryu give in and choose to compromise. And that leads to a sappy ending, which anyone could have seen coming. But Rurichiyo still sounds wooden and awkward since they refused to let her speak the way she did in the subtitles.
If there’s a problem with this episode, it’s that the game is very poorly explained and that we have no idea what the objective of the game is, plus we’re only shown the two teams for a few brief seconds so it’s hard to figure out who’s playing for who. But it is highly entertaining, especially when Yoruichi just got naked (Survivor All-Stars is officially on), and she kicks the ball so hard it disintegrates (but Orihime rejects it back to its original form). So, despite the fact that it’s pure filler, I actually thought this was an awfully good episode.
Best girl of the episode: Yoruichi (11) (moving into a tie for fifth with none other than Soi Fon!)
Tommy A. Phillips 