Las Noches: A Bleach Podcast

Las Noches: Ep. 1

• Dani & Giovani • Season 1 • Episode 1

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Bleach: Thousand Year Blood War Episode 1: Blood Warfare

Joel:

Welcome to Las Noches. It's an anime podcast, and I'm your host Giovanni. And

Danielle:

I'm your host Danielle.

Joel:

Hey Danielle. Hello. Oh, you ready

Danielle:

to do this? Uh, yeah. You know, kind, kind, kind of. It's been such a long time since we have had new bleach to watch. So I'm

Joel:

excited. Uh, what's the last thing you remember about Bleach? Because we watched it on, cartoon Network.

Danielle:

Yeah. And I guess by now everybody should have, you know, hopefully it's not spoilers for anyone, but they ended, I guess like the last arc was the full bringer arc. Was that the last arc arch? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So I don't know. It's been about, what has it been like 10 years? More than 10 years since

Joel:

10

Danielle:

11? It's, it's been a while since. Episode of Bleach. So it's exciting to have something new to look at. We didn't think it was coming back. It was looking, grim there for a minute, but we, we, you know, through lots of pleading and,

Joel:

well, I mean, you know, in my opinion, like it was always the big three. You know, it was no to, it was one piece and it was bleach. Yeah, bleach has always been my favorite. And since we got it back in, uh, the creator of bleach, uh, TT Kubo, he was like, let's do it. A thousand year blood war. And I can't wait. I've been, I've been cheating a little bit, looking at spoilers, a little spoilers on the internet, but, uh, not big enough to just, you know, mess up this experience. So. Right. Are you ready to jump into.

Danielle:

Uh, yeah, we can get ready to, we can go ahead and jump in. So this one is, first episode is, called The Blood Warfare.

Joel:

Yeah, Blood Warfare. So it kind of kicks off with this crazy, Quincy prophecy. Quincy folk. lore, do you, do you remember it?

Danielle:

Uh, vaguely. No. I didn't. Well, I guess disclaimer, I didn't read the manga, so, my perspective is coming anime only from anime only. So you know, manga people. Just so you know, don't come for me, please.

Joel:

Well, I mean that's both of us. It's kind of both of us. Like I've, as you know, I do have the manga, but uh, I haven't gotten far in it. But, um, the folklore goes something like the sealed Quincy King. After 900 years of being sealed, he would regain this pulse. After another 90 years, he would regained his power and nine years recover the world. That's a huge, huge statement. Right, right. That's a powerful statement.

Danielle:

So that's the, that's what we first see when the episode opens. Is that right? quick, I guess definition of like the Quincy King and what all that means.

Joel:

Right. In my opinion too, just to kind of flush this out a bit, this is what it's all about. Like this is why we haven't seen. That Quincy King for so long is taking him roughly a thousand years to become full of power to Okay awake, to gain this power

Danielle:

to like to restore him, essentially.

Joel:

Right, right. To fully restore him. Yeah. And there's a lot of other questions we can build off that, but, you know, first episode. Yeah. And it kicks off with then

Danielle:

hollows disappearing. Oh yeah. from the world of the living. Yes. We move on to the Soul Society's Research and Development Center where, like you said, hollows have disappeared and we see, captain. I always forget his. Yes, thank you. Yeah. Yeah. He's one of my favorite, I always mess up the pronunciation,

Joel:

but you know, that team itself, they're responsible for not just research and development, they monitor the balance between how, between souls really, between souls, between earth and uh, car. Cool town seems like, uh, soul society, and. Maybe I don't know, but they did. They're noticing, okay, something's going on, something's not right

Danielle:

here. Something, yeah, something's big is happening

Joel:

and uh, it seemed to be caused a concern, especially from Mayuri cuz he's made a comment like, it's only one, one people or one type of person that could do.

Danielle:

Red flags. So like a little bit of foreshadowing right there because

Joel:

yeah, very intelligent guy.

Danielle:

So we, move into the next scene, um, has us going into the world of the living where we, are introduced to, Soul Society, officers yeah.

Joel:

Two soul reapers kind of, yeah. Kind of green kinda.

Danielle:

of squad 13 two squad 13 officers. Shino and, Ryunosuke.

Joel:

Ryunosuke. Yeah.

Danielle:

So, they're out patrolling for hollows and they get attacked.

Joel:

They do, but uh, you know, a little before that, you know, they seem very green, right? They seem like, why would they? Guarding Ur Town and Ur Town is probably the most dangerous place on earth if you're human or to

Danielle:

Send two green.

Joel:

Right two green. So they are the shinigami of Karakura Town, Ichigo hometown, and they split up north and south, you know? Yeah. And. It didn't go too well, right?

Danielle:

No. They both get attacked. I think it was, Shino got defeated and, I quickly, quickly, very quickly offscreen, quickly off screen quickly and, um, it was looking dire for a second there. And then we get. Help, help swoops in

Joel:

right in the form of, uh, da da.

Danielle:

I need to get the, hand claps, right? Ichigo and Friends. Ichigo and Crew, right?

Joel:

We have Chad, Orihime, Ichigo and Uryu. Yeah. So, and they, and

Danielle:

I must, I must say, I'm sorry. I must say that I love a good entrance. Bleach does it real really well with, you know, the music and the graphics and everything is like, here comes the heroes to save the day. Right,

Joel:

right. Yeah. And that, that's the, the good feel you get when, I don't know if it was. Ichigo coming in first and it's like, Hey, you need some help. I don't know what it was, but yeah, it's good to see Ichigo and Chad even, Orihime, they all stepped in like, okay, we've done this before. Just sit back you little green shinigami. We've saved the world from Eisen. Okay, these Arrancars, were they Arrancars? I think so. Been there done that. We'll show you how to do this. Goodnight.

Danielle:

So of, of course it, they made quick work of them right. Of the

Joel:

hollows and at the same time, Orihime heals these weak little like green soul reapers. Right. So, and that healed all the way, she healed them enough to not die it seems

Danielle:

like. Right. So, after they swoop in and save the day, we. We fast forward to two, I guess two days later, and, they're back at Ichigo's house with the, surviving soul Reapers,

Joel:

right? And everything happens at Ichigo's room like Ichigo's room. I've seen like high level captains and lieutenants on Ichigo's bed. So it is the second boardroom. It's the boardroom on Earth Ichigo's bedroom. That's my opinion.

Danielle:

Yeah, we get the, the nice group dynamics that we like from bleach also with the, you know, the little bit of comedy that they give with the characters, before our hell breaks loose a second time.

Joel:

Right. And they go over some things they, they talk about like, Food, what you've been doing. And uh, yeah, this is just, it's just pretty much small talk, right? Small

Danielle:

talk with a little, like some catch up for the, I think mainly for the audience,

Joel:

It was good to see, you know, Uryu is still kind of distant, but in the group he's still around and, we don't know what his part is now, but most likely it's gonna be a big part. Right, because there's a knock at the door. A knock at the window. Yeah. And this, Arrancar comes in. He calls himself Ebern.

Danielle:

Ebern B. Yeah. Yeah.

Joel:

But he said he's the, he's a member of the Wadenreich. that doesn't sound like an Arrancar.

Danielle:

Well, it was confusing cuz he, you know, that's what he looks like. Right. He's wearing the mask. Right. I guess it was a little bit of mystery there as to exactly what was going on.

Joel:

in a funny scene, Ichigo just kicks him out the window and they go flying in the, um, Somewhere to, to give distance between his house. Right. And, I guess the initial encounter and

Danielle:

which sets up the fight scene that's gonna, come up with the two of them. Right. And then, I guess we flash again. And so we're back in the Rukon district with. Squad 11 and the investigating, village disappearance,

Joel:

right? So we have, yeah, two, two hard-hitting guys. Ikkaku and Yumichika and these guys are, are under Kenpachi. These guys are all about fighting. They wanna beat you up and kill you without getting scratched, and they wanna brag about it. Yet they are investigating the disappearance in the Rukon Yeah, it is a little weird to me, like you got the Warriors doing investigative work.

Danielle:

It was interesting that they, made that decision to do that. And so then we have, Squad one is, at the barracks with the head captain, like you said. And so we have these infiltrators and they're declaring war.

Joel:

This is the, uh, seven cloaked figures you're talking about. These are these, uh, these figures, invading, the, so, the Soul Society, squad one, and this is the, Captain Yamamotos area. Right. Okay. Yeah. And, uh, that's interesting itself, that they could make it through all the way to the, the, uh, the general. Yamamoto without getting a scratch. I mean, it,

Danielle:

it was interesting that, yeah, like that they were able to get in there. The

Joel:

place isn't heavily guarded, right? No. Like, this is your leader Yamamoto. And like, they kinda just walked in with no issue. Like they, they, um, made some

Danielle:

fuss and, and immediately, defeated Sasakibe

Joel:

right, right. And when I did a rewatch, I did notice that he, he did use his banki because Yamamoto noticed it. He said, ah, Sasakibe's banki. And then it was gone just like that. It was like, uh, lightning. It was like lightning strikes and then it was gone. Just like that. And then, um, maybe it caught us attention. Maybe not. And then, I mean, It was, I don't know. It's it, I don't think they did a lot with Sasakibe. I don't think they ever did enough with him cuz he's a fascinating character. He's an interesting character. He's that character who is good enough to be a captain on every level. Yeah, on every level. He's been with Yamamoto for years, like hundreds of. But he's de, he's declined being a captain over and over again, just to be by the side of Yamamoto and, okay. In an instance that's, that's interesting. These seven cloak figures walk in and defeat him with, without musing

Danielle:

their hair, without even seeing crystal even trying, it seemed like right.

Joel:

Yeah. And it goes to, it goes a lot further than that to me. He went to his banki and was easily defeated. These guys mean serious business, right. You know, it's, it's something.

Danielle:

And so, I guess through that interaction, we kind of picked up that it seems like the enemy, after defeating Sasakibe can steal a soul. Reaper's banki. banki. Yeah. How crazy is that?

Joel:

That was, uh, Sasakibe's last words before he passed out was they can seal your banki. And did it flip back to the fight with Ichigo and,

Danielle:

uh, yeah. Then they, after that they, um, they did take it back to, Ebern and Ichigo, I guess fighting is not going that well for Eber though.

Joel:

Right? This fight was, um, this fight was good and it is, it's good because you want to see Ebern get beat up, right? Right. You want to see Ichigo cuz you know, he goes banki at will. He has no, no real rhyme or reason for going banki. He'll just do what cuz that's what he feels to do. Right. But in this particular case. Ebern is kind of goading him. Like, is that all you got? Come on. soul reaper, show me what you got. And then, you know, Ichigo, Ichigo is like. You wanna see a banki, I'm gonna show you a banki. Right. And you know, he uses his sword banki and what's his sword name? Oh, we're gonna mess this up. Uh,

Danielle:

No. Getsuga Tenshou

Joel:

right? Right.

Danielle:

Getsuga

Joel:

Tenshou you can, he tries it and Ebern, tries to seal it, and it does not work. So something's different about Ichigo. His banki cannot be sealed.

Danielle:

But this is where we also find out that, oh, I guess Ichigo realizes that Ebern is just not an Arrancar as he looks. He is a, a Quincy, Quincy,

Joel:

Quincy, yeah. Yeah. He drops the, the medallion, the Quincy Medallion, and just like a Quincy. He, um, this is also interesting to me because to me this introduces a character can be multiple things because Ebern is not just an Arrancar with a resurreccion. He's a Quincy with a medallion and may have a Quincy, uh, a final Quincy form. They have a holy form, uh, by, I don't know the name of it now, but they have a holy form, final holy form. And, um, we know that okay, a character can be multiple things. And I guess in a way each Ichigo is multiple things cuz he's a full bringer. He's a human. Yeah. And he's a soul reaper.

Danielle:

Yeah.

Joel:

So

Danielle:

and so, Ebern gets beat up. Yes. But he does escape.

Joel:

Right. In a very cool way, he uses his shadow, shadow power, and kind of shadow shimmies back to the the Quincy world.

Danielle:

Yeah. And gets away essentially. So, I guess we're closing things out right now. We get to, which is like the final scene we get to see. The new enemy leader, like, Ebern shows up there with his tail tucked between his legs essentially after failing to steal Ichigo's, um, banki,

Joel:

right? He meets, uh, another Arrancar and they have these harsh words with each other. Like they don't like each other like they have history. Yeah. And, uh, The Quincy King, we'll call him the Quincy King for now. He sees two or wrong cars arguing, and he's disgusted, not worth. It's insulting to him. He's a Quincy King. Don't do your bickering near me. In an instance like destroys his arm.

Danielle:

Oh, blow off his arm, you know? What's the point of being king without a show of force? Right. Oh my God. I mean,

Joel:

it's kind of extreme.

Danielle:

You have to let the peons remember who you are. It was extreme. It was, it, it really was.

Joel:

And then he, he, he makes a statement and it is, maybe it's chilling. I don't know. It set, it did set well on me on. And he was saying, Ebern, tell me how your work toward peace is progressing your work towards peace. And to me that is a maniacal mind. Mm-hmm. His work towards peace because he was on a fact finding mission. I guess discover more about Ichigo whether he did or didn't, I don't know. But I figure like it always is more to the story. Right. And I think that kind of caps the first episode of, uh, ah, yeah. What's

Danielle:

the Blood warfare? Blood Warfare? That, that about wraps it up. Very exciting. I, I thought it was a pretty good showing, for first episode after bleach has been gone for so long. Like it, I think it feels like it came out the gate pretty srong.

Joel:

Right. The foundations were, were led. It was great foundations. You have a definite bad guy, an overpowered bad guy, and the the good guys, the heroes, they're, they're wondering what's going on. They don't know the first steps. It's a lot to do. A lot to talk about. Yeah. So highs and lows. Let's talk about highs and lows. Okay. What are your highs and what are your lows of this episode?

Danielle:

My highs, I guess I'll just talk about the highs. I don't feel like I have a whole ton. I don't really have much lows. Uh, um, but my high, um, just outside of bleach beam back is, I, I think the, the graphics were really good, you know, I don't know. I mean, granted it has been quite a few years, so they should be better than they LA they were the last time. Yeah. You know, really looked at bleach. But I mean, I thought they had a strong showing with the graphics. They got me excited. You know, the animation itself, right. So that, that, that was a, a high

Joel:

for me and it kept things the same too. Like some of the music, like, uh, yeah. But Bleach

Danielle:

always has, I mean, I guess you can add that in there with my high, um, bleach always has good music, you know. I have a, um, yeah, a few of my favorite bleach intros slash outros that I always go back to and so bleach always has good music. So I'm, I'm glad that that is, is staying consistent and I'm glad that they, um, you know, managed to kind of up the ante in terms of giving us good

Joel:

visuals. And what is your lows? What are your low points?

Danielle:

In terms of story, low points. I guess maybe, we could have flushed out. I don't know. I, I guess, I guess I want the, the pace to stay. I don't, I mean, I want it to make sense and I want them to flush out the story while, but I, um, I, we could have gotten to more of, um, what's the deal with this Quincy king a little bit more. I mean, I, I feel like we just kinda. Poked it with our toe. Right. But not really, we haven't really like got us, you know, a solid feel as to exactly what has taken place. So maybe, if we had a little bit more of that in the first episode, that would've been okay. But that's, I mean, I'm, I mean, I'm nitpicking at this point though. It was pretty good for first episode.

Joel:

Okay. That's cool. I guess, listen, I'm waiting for you to tell me my,

Danielle:

what of my choices. Uh, yeah, what, what are your highs and your lows? Well,

Joel:

I am a Mayuri fan, so just his, his key knowledge of knowing exactly what's happening. Like, he's a researcher. He's done some, you know, crazy testing, some sane, some insane. He's okay, you know, he's not new to. And by that one

Danielle:

statement, he's not new to this. He's true to this. Yes.

Joel:

They're back and he knows that these Quincy's are back and they shouldn't be. Yeah. He, you know, so to me, best, and he, he is such a small, small part, but like, if you are gonna get out of this, he's gonna be the one to get you out. He's one of the figures who's gonna out think you and get you out of here. Right, and of course my worst is Yamamoto. You know, the guy of great power who has an overpowered banki. Everything in the universe reduced to ash. And he let seven unknown assailant, some, uh, what do they call'em? Reka. Reya, um, I can't me think of it now. Oh, Reka. Reka, okay. He let them escape. Not even a cinder. We're not even burning a cloth on their uniform. I mean, come on. This, this, this doesn't spill. This isn't, it's not good for Yamamoto. Yeah, I know. And to me that's the worst of the episode. Yamamoto, you gotta step it up.

Danielle:

Okay, so I, I, I mean, I, I thought those were good points and so, we have, uh, episode two coming up and hopefully, you know, they're gonna flush out the story a little bit more and keep the pace hot. You know? Yeah. I don't, I don't want any downtime, you know? Let's do this. Yeah. So, did you have anything else? I think that's it then,

Joel:

right? Nope, that's it. Okay. Next episode.

Danielle:

Next episode. We'll see you back. here for, bleach thousand year blood war. Episode two. Thanks for joining us. See you next time.