Bleach episode 133 review

“With a love like that, you know should be glad.”

Ikkaku gets roped into a kendo contest by Mizuho, who is once again the star of the show. Seriously, who would have bet Mizuho would be gaining ground on Rukia and having more focus than Ichigo himself? She gets Mizuho to start training her peeps, who are in the exact same situation as Karin’s friends in the last episode: beat a rival group, or be forced to disband. It’s amazing that they came up with identical storylines like this.

But not only that, Ikkaku loves doing it because he loves competition so much. He even ropes Renji and Toshiro into it. That’s right, for the second consecutive episode, Toshiro is competing in a contest to save someone’s skin. And for the second straight episode, he succeeds.

Midway through the big kendo battle, after Ikkaku has coached up his boys, the Soul Reapers get called to a Hollow sighting, and they are all forced to leave their defective Soul Candy bodies behind. (Yachiru of all people is behind the Soul Candy, as proven by the post-credits sequence.) But the kid that Ikkaku trained actually wins his match, leaving no need for Ikkaku to battle. He then takes on everyone in sight when he returns from beating the Hollow. It’s a very Three Stooges ending.

Sadly, I found myself laughing during this episode. And it wasn’t unintentional humor. So you might say that I… liked this filler? Oh boy. I’m feeling guiltier every minute.

Best girl of the episode: Mizuho (3)

Episode rating: 8/10

Bleach episode 132 review

Don’t call it a filler episode! This episode is one of my all-time favorites. Karin and her gang want to play soccer on a field, but some mean guys won’t let them play. So, Karin challenges them to a game; if Karin’s team loses, they have to eat grass. Enter Toshiro Hitsugaya. Karin finds him and sees that he’s got mad skills at soccer. In his typical tsundere style, he refuses at first, before ultimately choosing to go and do it.

And then he turns into Nagi from Blue Lock. He scores four goals to even the match at 4 apiece, before assisting Karin on her game-winning goal. And thus is born one of the cutest couples in all of Bleach: Toshiro x Karin. If this would have been canon, I would be head over heels for it. I’m not sure what canon is for Toshiro, but I can tell you that he could do a lot worse than Karin.

Rangiku shows up at the end of the episode, but Karin easily wins the “best girl” award this week. This episode produced better soccer than Season 2 of Blue Lock did, and now I’m hooked. Give me more Bleach sports, please! (I know there’s another one eventually…)

Best girl of the episode: Karin (3)

Episode rating: 9/10

Bleach episode 131 review

Renji joins the fray to fight off Hollows/Arrancar/enemies. “These guys keep coming and coming!” he says, in what could easily be misconstrued as… something else. Eventually Rangiku and Toshiro take down the main Arrancar, and Shota and Yui get to go to the Soul Society. Everything’s fine and dandy.

This little mini-arc at least took us away from the Vi-sores which will hopefully stay away another day. I hate those guys. I’d much rather see Toshiro and Rangiku. This was a blah episode with nothing to write home about.

Best girl of the episode: Rangiku (18) (making a hard charge at Orihime!)

Episode rating: 6/10

Bleach episode 130 review

So! This one’s a lot more interesting than the last one. Shota (the boy) has found his sister (Yui) but she’s acting very suspiciously. Toshiro & pals decide that the best thing to do is put her under a barrier until they have more information. But while Rangiku is off patrolling, Yui convinces Shota to let him out of the barrier. You guessed it, Yui really isn’t Yui, or not completely Yui, at least. She’s being controlled by an Arrancar.

Toshiro and Rangiku now jump into action to save Shota from the Arrancar brought on by “Yui.” And while a lot of the dialogue was wooden from Shota and Yui, at least this episode brought a little more suspense than the last one. It wasn’t anything to write home about, but for the most part, I was entertained, including the part where Rangiku calls Toshiro on his “soul phone” (and as always, the phone call ends with one of the parties involved getting attacked; see Jurassic Park). Not a bad episode today.

Best girl of the episode: Rangiku (17) (Watch your back, Orihime!)

Episode rating: 7/10