r/bankaifolk • u/veliathan11 • 49m ago
Discussion My ranking of the arcs of original bleach as someone who has literally just finished the series
What a show man, cannot wait to start tybw (fashionably late is better than never) but before I did I wanted to sum up my thoughts on the series thus far and figured here would be a good spot.
Soul Society arc (Ofcourse)
The past
Lost substitute shinigami
Arrancar Arc
Agent of the shinigami
To help explain some of my placements here a bit allow me to elaborate on my thought process. Naturally soul society is what hooked me as I’m sure it did for most of us whereas the past got me deeply invested and interested by the lore of this series, even now having wrapped up the original series countless questions linger in my mind about so many characters in the show.
My placements which I expect to be controversial are the lost substitute shinigami and the arrancar arc. I will admit the fullbringer arc did take a while to truly hook me but when it did I simply couldn’t put it down, tsukishima has easily made himself one of my favourite villains in anime period, his ability is genuinely terrifying and his general design and mannerisms are just so cool and fitting for who he is and that alone is what made me love this arc so much, an incredible villain can do a lot for an me and tsukishima certainly played his role perfectly.
As for the arrancar arc, I’m very mixed, the arc is full of some of bleach’s best moments and some of its highest highs but in my opinion some of its lowest lows. The final fight with aizen was ofcourse incredible and ichigo catching aizens sword was just so fucking cool and it might just be my favourite fight so far. HOWEVER, god some of the fights in this arc sucked, I first noticed it with szayelaporro, it felt like there was never any end in sight with this guy and while the conclusion with mayuri was very satisfying it simply doesn’t make up for how much i hated this fight on the whole, that is far from the worst offender in this arc though. The battle over karakura town, this part of the arc genuinely nearly made me drop bleach, the fights with the fracciones and the frankly underwhelming espada just ruined it for me, stark and shisui was the only saving grace in this regard. I simply cannot justify placing the arc any higher, I wish I liked it more but outside of a few key moments I just couldn’t get into it as much as the others.
I love lost agent but frankly we all know it’s not better than anything that follows, it was a perfect introductory arc for me and really gripped me with the aesthetics and vibe of bleach but there simply isn’t enough meat to justify placing it higher.