bleachness

Studio Perriot and I are re-evaluating our relationship. It has always been a shallow one but it lasted so many years and holds so many memories. I hereby announce that reconciliation papers have been drawn. SP's conciliatory gestures (i.e. fanservice) had been met with suspicion in the past but a new filler arc began and my curiosity could not be checked--

I have to say I'm not holding out a lot of hope to see much of my fave character Ishida or a strong nakama presence in this arc but the IshiIchi ED totally won me over (was Ichigo Ishida's "ray of light" there or WHAT? My IchiIshi friends and I are still replaying that ED over and over and over) and surprise! I actually enjoyed the episode! If the animation quality stays good, I'm looking forward to the fights (my Koma-chan! <3) and maybe I can coast with this filler like I did with the zanpakutou arc, which was an inoffensive enough diversion for me.

I'm already dreading the IchiRuki fanservice, to be honest (I love Kubo's wistful, subtle IchiRuki--SP's seems heavy-handed in comparison) but I have to approach the anime like fanfic--with a measure of suspension of disbelief and separation from Kubo's reality. The stand-alone eps leading to this filler arc, from what I gathered (I peeked at one and saw screencaps of others) were just awful, but hey I'm game for an actual story and SP has as fair a track record as any fic writer I know plus lots of shinies and background music. Spoilers for upcoming eps under cut.

The green-haired girl is pretty and promptly naked in the first episode. Dance for us, Studio Perriot! Dance! The promotion poster promises lots of Shinigami and Rukiaaaaaa.

The arc seems to be an inversion of what was successful for SP in the past--FTB. Only in reverse. See this translation of an ad at Bleach Asylum.

So far descriptions of the episodes don't have Ichigo losing his memories though, so we'll have to wait and see. There does seem to be a nice plot cooking and I'm particularly excited by the involvement of the 12th Division because hey, they're always fun and disgusting.

Coming up: Rukia busts Ichigo out of jail. The ones who arrested Ichigo are fake-gotei—the real shinigami are trapped in the dangai. Orihime throws a BBQ party?

See here

Some translations from Kubo's twitter yesterday regarding the airing of the first ep of new arc. Translations by

mezzo_marinaio

おっ、宣伝ありがと！ちゃんと自分のことも書いとかないとね(笑)。 RT @HitterNumber8: @tite_kubo 先生お休みなさいですー。明日はアニメBLEACH新章スタート、ＯＰ&ＥＤも楽しみですｖ

@HitterNumber8: "Goodnight, sensei... I'm looking forward to the start of a new Bleach chapter in the anime, and to the opening and ending as well."
@tite_kubo: "Ooh, thank you for the publicity! I should make sure to write about my own work too, right?" (laugh)

原稿が一段落して、やっと今日のアニメBLEACH観れた！すげぇっ！！オープニングはバトルしっ放しだし本編も工藤さん作監ですげークオリティだし！ストーリーも個人的には今までのアニメオリジナルシリーズの中で1番ワクワクしてる。ぴえろさんお疲れ様でした！！

@tite_kubo: "I took a break from my work so I could finally watch today's episode of Bleach! Fantastic...!! In the opening they just kept battling, and since Kudou-san was the animation director of the original story the quality was amazing! As for the story, for me it's the most exciting among the anime original series they made until now. Thank you very much, Pierrot-san!!"

@tite_kubo: 俺にもそう見えたから、多分そうじゃないかな。しかしよく観てるね！ RT @Saki10SS: @tite_kubo もの凄い集中して観てたんで、今日のアニメに出てきたおばちゃん、あれは織姫のご近所の新村さんだったんでは…？とか凄い細部にまで喰いついてしまいました(笑)

@Saki10SS: "I was paying an incredible amount of attention while watching the anime today... wasn't the woman who appeared in this episode Niimura-san, Orihime's neighbour...? Things like that, you know, I really nibbled on the smallest details." (laugh)
@tite_kubo: "It seemed that way to me too, so I wouldn't say that. Still, you really do pay a lot of attention!"

CHAD!FEST REGALO NEWS! Thanks to everyone who managed to post on bleachness for Chad's birthday even though LJ was being so wonky! The goal of the contest was just to get people to post comments. I happy to announce that the mods have chosen

imlikat as the winner so she gets the Chad plushie and because we didn't get all that many entries (although all the entries we did have were so full of love), we have one other winner,

enychan , and I'm proud to ship her Chad sticker and tattoo all the way to Mexico! Gals, PM me with your addresses!

One last thing--

Tsundere!Ishida.... aw, thank you SP! <3