June 11, 2014

Bleach 584 - The Headless Star 3

New Bleach chapter.  Let's talk about it!




It looks like we're coming to a crossroads in the supposed Final arc of Bleach.

Ichigo has been fighting four of the Stern Ritter ladies for a couple chapters. There hasn't been much in the way of advancement in this "battle" yet.  Then in this chapter we have an interruption provided by Bazz-B and three others who may or may not have been named already.

Now that it's eight-on-one, what better time to throw a curve?

We knew from last chapter (or the one before it, who can remember) that Bach was standing atop Vandenreich HQ with Haschwald and Ishida.  Now Bach has Haschwald use "the key" to light up the sky with a white (?) light.

Apparently, it's time for all of Bach's children to return to him.

What does this mean, exactly?

If I had to take a guess, it's that the manga is slowly edging toward its conclusion.

As odd as that sounds, there doesn't seem to be a reason for Bach to consolidate his power at this point.  Not when Ichigo has just returned to the battlefield and is facing an 8-on-1 battle that could potentially end with him being severely beaten.

Or maybe I just stumbled onto the reason.  Literally, in the last paragraph.

After all, there's no better way to save Ichigo from a beatdown than by exploiting the plot.  It's flimsy, but then, if we're being honest, the plot of the manga thus far hasn't exactly been the strong-suit of it.

That said, it's hard for a weekly manga to maintain a solid direction.  Even in the Hueco Mundo arc, when Ichigo and co. went to save Orihime, the manga still got bogged down in the details of individual fights.  The same thing has happened here, no surprise, but now it appears that Kubo will move past that for the moment and supply the readers with a strong direction.  Perhaps he'll even pace it accordingly.

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