Hit and Miss

Written by lovemesomeanime on May 17, 2014 at 3:29 AM

Good overall. The first arc is pretty well done. It starts out nicely and keeps the interest for the series. But it doesn't get big until Arrancar Arc. This is the peak of the series. This arc is very good, with lots of interesting characters introduced. The fights are good, the villains at some points are even more interesting the some of the main characters. And the end of this arc is handled very smoothly. Sadly the show (and the manga) goes downhill from here onwards. The end of arrancar arc would've been a brilliant point to end the series but unfortunately the series extends into a ball of badly handled arc with uninteresting and cliched stories. If you want to watch this, only watch until the end of arrancar arc, otherwise your experience will be ruined.

The characters are interesting. Ichigo's the typical stereotypical main hero with the equal amount of rashness and impulsive moments as any other shonen series, but he has his charms too. The other main characters - Orihime, Chad, & Uryu - falls short on the character side. Orihime's probably the weakest of the main characters in the show, with no points of charm and lots of gimcrack moments. Chad is the mysterious character, but boring too. Uryu's the best of the side characters, but he falls in the stereotype of tsunderes with hackneyed development. The Gotei 13 is the high point of the series, with lots of interesting characters with great development. Even the villains are very interesting and will keep the viewers hooked.

As a caveat, I'll say as usually with shonens, Bleach is a victim of overarching and atrociously written fillers. All the fillers are brassy, and irksome, the lowest point of the series. The most vexing thing about the fillers in this is that some of them are shown in the middle of canon as in the case of Arrancar arc, which has lots of fillers scattered in between. So I'd recommend one to skip them all or skim them over, if you want to watch them.

The verdict, it's a good show, with lots of interesting & complex characters and some great storylines, but it becomes a victim of overambitious writer (or mangaka) who loses the focus after sometime (end of arrancar arc) and tries to extend the series with a tastelessly done storylines. 3.5/5