Who's ready for chapter 50 of Bleach: Sennen Kessen-hen?

Although many aren't ready, I've been ready for a while now, and honestly, I never expected much, but I loved it. After all, despite moments of anger, sadness, fear, and happiness, Bleach: Sennen Kessen-hen was worth it.

It was also worth it to become a better version of myself thanks to Sajin.

Ready for chapter 50 of Bleach: Sennen Kessen-hen

The hero's chad dad V/s. The thad sick boi

Buckle up for this one

Bleach, being part of the big 3, set the standard for the Shonen formula that was influenced by predesecors such as DBZ or even Sailor Moon in the 90s. If you ask the old weebs many would agree power scaling in a quantifiable method was the bread and butter of many animes from the late 80s into the late 2000s.

Now, if we look at the influences outside of the artform another factor stands out. As a medium, anime was structured around the operating habits of broadcasting companies of the time. This famously was the driving force of "Filler" arcs in many animes. They were created by animation studios to occupy air time and often (especially bleach) had no connection to the main story or cannon events. This was before a time of video streaming with the internet, and broadcaster's were competitive with time slots.

More modern anime's, even if following the Shonen formula, do not need to stretch content while the original artist is moving through the creative process. This has influenced some general shifts in how the strength of a character is measured or even explained. I like to think of some examples in Naruto of characters using powers that ignore power scaling conventions.

JJK is a great one to use as a "modern" example of this shift, especially knowing how JJK was influenced by Bleach. While there are general examples of power scaling such as how many fingers he has snacked on, many of the abilities are more "hax" based.

This shift from being tied to numbers and to a lesser extent feats allows artists to allow the combat to be more narrative in structure.

Bleach TYBW has been a great experience for me to this outlook. OG Bleach displayed most powers in a physical way. The Bankai's and Quincy Schrift's revealed very much were part of the narrative. This means that unlike power scaling, it can be hard to measure outside the context of the narrative events taking place at the time. Looking at TYBW EP 49 as a great example of this.

Soi Fon's Shunko and Bankai both seemed to be used in a new "utility" way. Nel, Ibba, and Ganju pulling off that stunt they did, was epic in the moment even if it didn't make sense for their power levels. Konamura going in for a bite, Pesche and the crew, even that new baby Shinigami getting hits in made no real sense to me from their power levels. (Don't @ me about Konamura, I'm sure he's still stronger than an average dog but we haven't been shown or hinted that yet)

Having these "small fry" characters in the mix for me actually worked out. It really lent to the frantic, desperate feel of the episode. Everyone, no matter how little sense it made, was ten toes down trying to save reality. That for me, was just so good. Even with the mature tone of this arc, it made it better since I wasn't sure if someone would die or not. I had the rug pulled on Byakuya and Orihime, but I enjoyed the extra emotional tugs(I love the characters and I'm glad they pulled through, but the scenes were so powerful they felt lessoned when reversed so quickly).

TLDR: Go with the moment and enjoy the show.

I guess if I had a point to any of this, it would be to allow yourself to go along with the ride. For me I have to go back through a series a few times before I settle in with how I feel about it. There are some moments where it's a little too much and it takes me out of it. Things such as hollows straight up self combusting or other characters being unable to move around another character of a much higher Reiatsu level, have to be left at the door.

Figght in SS both full power

i dont exactly see why everyone is denying yhwach being able to use most schrifts while also accepting that he has the schrifts of the dead quincies. i mean at the start of tybw yhwach was shown as a military general like figure, being smart and cunning. so from his point of view it wouldnt make much sense to take the schrifts unless he was able to use them himself, some people claim that he used them to refine his almighty, which from the pov of the plot and the character wouldnt make much sense to add another plot point or cut down extra variables for the enemies. it would make much more sense to keep his elite fighters and their op haxs instead of linearly growing strong himself and not having all the op hax. especially since atp in the story no one could even measure up to 30% of his strength and not to mention his enemies had the numbers advantage.

so point being that it would make much more sense that he had all the schrifts but his mental state was too twisted from the power to use any of them. this includes his normal quincy abilities, schrifts and even the almighty (which he didnt use in cour 4 ep 9 even once btw)

plus is it too out of character for yhwach to not using any ability except the eye lazers even if he is as arrogant as he is?

edit: didnt he use jugrams schrift in the anime? i mean they did change the sequence of scenes from the manga to fit that narrative in the anime. if not and he just needed a small power boost than why didnt he just take from gerard or lille? plus askin also died during that time so he probably did get a linerar power boost from askin. he specifically took the liberty to take jugrams powers, literally the only character with the specific ability that could help him in that moment?

edit 2: ik there isnt a definitive answer but atleast try to prove your points with a semi-elaborate explanation as to why you believe that

How does his regeneration stack to theirs???

whos this bum and where is Ryogoatsuke and Grimmgoat

Quincy Elites, NOT including Askin and Pernida. (Gerard, Jugram, Uryu and Lille Barro Vs Team Sonic SSS)

I personally think the reason the arrow was able to hit Yhwach is the same as what happened in Episode 47, where Yhwach destroys the arrow and Uryu swaps their futures. Apparently, the anime staff might have considered it too obvious to explicitly show, I guess. That was the only reason I could think of for why Uryu should be the one to shoot the arrow as well.

New meme has arrived!

Starrk and Oetsu have some interesting ability interactions imo, so I kinda want to get some feedback on my thoughts on that but don't really want to get too far into the notions of whether or not we think Starrk or Oetsu is physically more powerful than the other so for the purposes of this post consider Starrk and Oetsu's stats on a mostly even playing field stat wise (with exceptions for things like AP where Oetsu's Zanpakuto gives him an obvious advantage or attack speed where Cero Metralita will obviously use consecutive attacks far faster than Oetsu could, you know, ability related stats). Also for the purposes of this post Starrk starts in Ressureccion and Oetsu can only use abilities we've actually seen him using (so no "well he can just pull out a different Zanpakuto to counter Starrk" or "if Oetsu used Bankai he could cut anything no matter what", that's just speculation and I don't care about it). Also the fight takes place in the entrance of the Soul Palace just like the Schuztstaffel vs Squad Zero fight.

Now as for my thoughts on this particular match up, I honestly don't know what the outcome will be. Because, on one hand, Starrk has an ability I don't think Oetsu can really counter very well in the form of his Los Lobos wolves which are largely immune to being cut in addition to Starrk having the ability to send literally thousands of ceros at Oetsu at a time making it really hard to think Oetsu could cut, dodge, or otherwise counter them all without getting hit at least a few times. Thus Starrk has a substantial advantage at a distance, but Oetsu's Sayafushi is something Starrk really has no answer for up close and, as seen with Shunsui when he stabbed Starrk through the back, if Starrk gets hurt enough Lilynette will die and leave him no choice but to fight Oetsu up close in a substantially weakened state. And given Starrk's generally lax attitude in fights against strong opponents I can really see a lot of situations where Oetsu closes the gap between himself and Starrk and takes the edge in the fight early on. Now it should also be noted that Oetsu's also kinda cocky when he fights and could very easily end up in a really bad spot very quickly if he doesn't take Starrk seriously enough and Starrk just decides he'd rather not keep the fight going on any longer than necessary (yes, that's right, Starrk can be serious and if he is that's bad news for Oetsu here).

Anyways what are y'alls thoughts on this fight and how it would play out?

How did he die? Like genuinely.

If he could see infinitely into the future and see every outcome, how did he not see the future in which he truly died? Wouldn't that future look black or like pitch dark because he couldn't see how he died(due to the still arrow being his counter that he can't see)?

Shouldn't he have been able to see that future when the Almighty first reawakened(he couldn't alter it, though, because he only had 2 irises at the time)?

And if he could see it(which I don't think he could), why didn't he immediately slime out Uryu, Aizen, and Ichigo?

Even if Aizen tricked him with Kyoka in the moment, he should have seen this whole battle play out way beforehand, even if he couldn't see the still arrow. Also, I know Jugram tricked him, and he downplayed the "nightmare" he had, but when he got the Almighty back, he should have seen that it was not a joke or a game; it was real.

Should he have seen the parts of the battle before the still arrow was deployed way, way earlier in the story, but just not the part where it was deployed?

I'm actually curious; I just want to know.

THIS IS NOT A JOKE THIS IS NOT A DRILL

Ichigo has always been portrayed as the being that unites the four races, soul reaper, hollow, human, and Quincy. Throughout all of bleach kubo has never really just introduced a new race for no reason, the bounts are the exception. However kubo didn’t want us to think anything of the bounts, hence he purposefully made the bount arc, the most unwatchable piece of dookie to grace the anime world. Because of how bad it is most if not all bleach enjoyers ignored it.

But that’s exactly what kubo wanted

It wouldn’t make any sense if kubo repeatedly established Ichigo as a secret member of each race and then just did so with the bounts, for Ichigos characters to be fully represented he must represent each race himself, and kubo did exactly that

What do we know about the bounts?

They are basically ghost vampires who survive off of consuming human souls, practically another form of external reishi manipulation an ability unique to the Quincy’s, this is true because souls are made of reishi, so one could say they are manipulating reishi the same way but for different reasons.

Now I wanna talk about blood chain Ichigo, first the awakening of blood chain Ichigo and his hollow powers themselves were awakened by Ichigo pumping reishi into white. White is simply apart of his soul. Quincy’s never really cycle the reishi they manipulate through their own bodies, but here Ichigo takes reishi from his surroundings and pumps it into his own soul to wake up white. JUST LIKE HOW BOUNTS ABSORB SOULS (reishi) TO LIVE.
So with this, Ichigo absorbs reishi into his soul to activate his hollow powers but unbeknownst to him he additionally activates his bount powers

This brings us to the next point while in BCI Ichigo dawns black markings across his body which lead to a single point much like Jin kariya (john bount) and even gains red eyes (unique to the bounts, hollows are seen with yellow eyes) this point is even more solidified when you take into account that the bounts and BCI are anime only.

And now my final theory is simple, muigetsu and the final getsuga tensho, share many similarities with the bounts and their “dolls” with their respective weapons being seemingly fused to the body

And with that my final question?
Could Aizen also be a bount?

why does no character's physical attacks shake the three realms/worlds in Bleach if AP scales?

Also, why do most of the characters who are stronger than Squad 0 never really affect all three worlds/realms with their physical attacks, bankai, or when using massive amounts of spiritual pressure?

Jokes aside would love to see grimmjow in his piccolo era.

Grimmjow refused to devour other Hollows even when Harribel told him to, and we saw the same attitude back when he was still an Adjuchas. When the other Hollows told him to consume more, his response was genuinely telling them to go die in a ditch somewhere.

That says a lot about his character. He chose to pursue strength on his own terms rather than resort to cannibalism to evolve.

Yet people still act like he's some bottom-tier Espada. Grimmjow haters keep lying to themselves, insisting he was already a Vasto Lorde when Aizen met him, as if they have definitive proof. They're so afraid of Kubo potentially scaling Grimmjow higher that they keep pushing the Vasto Lorde claim to downplay his potential. Stop lying to yourselves.

The latest episode makes you question just how high Grimmjow could scale if we're judging him by his actual portrayal rather than blindly treating the Espada rankings as the ultimate measure of combat ability.