A lot of things happened this episode. Some for the best, some for the worst. The big bad guy is uberpowerful. He manages to execute his plan. And Rukia is no longer needed, so she needs to be killed. I wasn’t very pleased with these turn of events. It all seemed to go too easy for the bad guy. Then suddenly everyone arrives right at the same time to help out Ichigo and company. I’m really having love-hate feelings over this. It was of course great to see all those characters back with some roles, especially since it wasn’t at the last possible minute that they made their entrance. I also found it highly enjoyable after I saw the first ones appear. But isn’t it a bit too coïncidental to make ALL of them appear at the same friggin’ time? Well, afterwards, you finally think that they are going to give a nice turn to the story, but no. The bad guys just ascend into heaven and disappear. I guess the creators wanted to have everyone important see the events that were about to happen, for god knows why. Anyway, everyone’s happy, everything is over, everyone’s still alive (Ugh! >.<), and the bad guys still roam somewhere, probably waiting to be slaughtered by Ichigo in the end.
There are two things I really liked about this episode. The first thing was the fox trying to get to Tousen. At the beginning, this seemed to go totally wrong, as he got slaughtered by the big bad guy in less than a second, but the creators managed to execute this part pretty well. I’m curious about what is about to happen to them. The other thing I liked was Byakuya’s explanation of his reasons. These actually seem very plausible, and left me with a good feeling afterwards.
Overall, I’m looking forward to the next couple of episodes. The climax is over now, so there’ll probably be more time for comic relief – the strength of Bleach. Let us hope they won’t screw this up as well.
