Things are beginning to heat up in Bleach. OK that’s not entirely true, things are beginning to boil up and out of the saucepan that is Karakura Town, that’s how hot it’s getting!

At the end of the previous chapter we saw Kensei step in to protect Mashiro against  Wonderweiss’ surprising strength that caught Mashiro a little off guard, leaving her severely injured. Read the rest of this entry…

If you’ve got over the shock of the previous week, Tite Kubo clearly decided it was worth continuing the theme established in the previous weeks chapter and therefore this one is entitled: Execution, Extinction 2.

We begin this chapter with Aizen in the process of executing Tia Harribel, the Espada Tres, who also happens to be the only remaining Espada. Read the rest of this entry…

If you’ve been following thus far, we’ve just witnessed the end of one of the most nicest bad guys we’ve had in the Manga for a while, the Primera Espada, Coyote Starrk.

This chapter opens with additional background to Starrk’s origins and how he ended up with Sōsuke Aizen. We see Aizen stumbles upon Starrk surrounded by a mountains of the remains of hollow, that we can only assume Starrk defeated which Aizen ask’s if he indeed killed them, to which Starrk replies something to the effect of, “No, they just died”. An interesting reply, which helps to further skew the picture we all have of Starrk as increasingly we find him to be troubled, disturbed and so very lonely. I for one have mixed emotions about him,  should I sympathise with him? But I can’t he’s a bad guy, right? Or maybe it’s not supposed to be so clear cut. Read the rest of this entry…

Luffy has gathered together a temporary band of odd-balls including past foes and new friends such as Baroque Works’ Mr. 3,  Buggy, Emporio Ivankov along with two former Shichibukai, Sir Crocodile and Jinbei.

The chapter starts just before we see Luffy and his band come crashing into the fray as we see them, quite fortuitously, stuck atop a massive frozen Tsunami in their stolen Marine Battleship overlooking all the goings on below. Read the rest of this entry…

One week late, here is my review for the best chapter in quite a long time – loads of great content, Sasuke got punched in the face, Madara does the funky thing Kakashi’s Mangekyo does on himself and disappears into thin air.

Good times!

So the chapter starts off with the mighty Raikage and little Uchiha picking up where they left off, after it seems Raikage kills Jugo, at least in this manga people die! Read the rest of this entry…

Let me start by saying, ‘WOW!’ what an episode. For me, this has been one of the events that I’ve been waiting for since I began watching the show some many months ago now.

The way Bleach works is that it only slowly (in some cases very slowly!) reveals secrets; and thats secrets about people, about their abilities and about their pasts. One character in particular I continue to look forward to learning more about are the more illusive Captains of the Gotei-13 of which the anime viewers and manga reader know very little. Read the rest of this entry…

I’ve seen this particular chapter title translated in several ways, one has translated the title as ‘ Sasuke’s Ninja Way’, while another has translated it as ‘Sasuke’s Dogma’. Which ever way you translate the title its clear that this chapter is very much concerned with understanding why Sasuke does what he is doing and has been doing since the beginning of the Part II (AKA ‘Shippuden’ in the anime) of Naruto manga.

This chapter continues with the fight going on between the Raikage and his ninjas from Kumogakure (the Hidden Village of the Land of Lightning) against Taka/Hawk, comprised of Sasuke and his band of rogues. Read the rest of this entry…

With Barragan out the way, the Primera Espada takes centre stage for this chapter. We see Starrk has begun his fight against former Captain, now Visored/Vizard, Love Aikawa while Rōjūrō Otoribashi (commonly referred to as Rose) watches from the sidelines, seemingly so as to not get in the way of the impressive destructive power of Love and his Zanpakutō Tengumaru. Read the rest of this entry…

If you haven’t noticed, the filler is still on and we have another underwhelming episode that I will struggle to write anything positive about. Speaking to a few fans however there are mixed feelings about this filler arc. I have no doubt that it has the potential to be the best filler arc so far but it’s episodes like these that leave a lot to be desired.

This episode feels almost as if it ends where it started, we seemingly have got no further after conclusion of the episode. We are still watching the face-off between Muramasa and Ichigo (and his Hollow alter ego), while both Renji and Hisagi battle their respective Zanpakutōs. Read the rest of this entry…

Well things are coming to a head across all three manga at the moment, each seem to be competing for our attention. In the Naruto manga we fairly recently saw the conclusion of a massive battle between Naruto and Pain and after a few chapters of plot building we see Sasuke accompanied by the newly re-formed and re-named band of rogues, Taka (鷹 Hawk) which was formally known as Hebi,  heading toward the summit of the Five Kages. Read the rest of this entry…

Well in case you didn’t know or maybe couldn’t tell we are still very much in the filler. For the uninitiated that simply means the current storyline/arc is not manga canon and by that I simply mean, it doesn’t follow the manga and the manga pretty much dictates the direction of approximately 90% (that’s just a guesstimate) of the anime out there.

What normally happens with filler is that they brew up some strange storyline based on a set of villains that will obviously be defeated in a way that ultimately upon returning to canon, can in no way corrupt the direction the manga intends to take things. So don’t expect to learn anything new about any of the characters or for any seemingly new abilities they pick up to be carried through. Nor should you expect to have anything particularly revelatory revealed to about anyone, least of all any of the central characters. Read the rest of this entry…

Oh One Piece, you’ve run on longer than Dragon Ball Z and yet you still remain entertaining, exciting and enjoyable. How is that possible? Well, that’s not the answer I’ll attempt to answer on my lonesome but I would like to take some time to review the recent episode. The plan will be for this to be regular in time with each airing of the TV show. Please note that from here on out, there will be spoilers. I can only hope the title is a sufficient deterrent for those that are not quite this far in the One Piece saga. Read the rest of this entry…

It should be noted that while Peacemaker (AKA Peace Maker) Kurogane, as with all good anime, began life as a manga, this review is only for the anime adaptation which aired between 2003 and 2004 and lasted 24 episodes.

I have to confess at the offset that I have a fondness for samurai -themed anime, particularly those series that take place during the Meji/Bakumatsu (Last Shogunate) period. So anything in the vein of Sumarai X/Rurouni Kenshin would normally get my immediate approval. This however is no Kenshin remake. Whether that is a good or a bad thing in my humble opinion, read on. Read the rest of this entry…

Ok, so it’s been about 19 episodes since by last post and I’ve neglected this blog for sometime and I have to say thanks to those people who took the time to comment/spam on the last review as it’s prompted me to return (that and the fact that this episode was, in a word, immense – but more on that later!).

Well since Bleach #200, we were in the throws of another massive show down between Nnoitra Jiruga and Kenpachi Zaraki. Since then a number of the Espada have fallen and Sōsuke Aizen, along with his cronies (Gin Ichimaru and Kaname Tōsen) have made their way to Karakura Town, albeit the fake Karakura Town. Read the rest of this entry…

The bleach anime at the moment has nothing short of dire. Oh where, oh where have the those gripping storylines disappeared to? Those ones that used to keep you begging for more, those once where you couldnt get enough of seeing Ichigo rip a hollow in two with his Bankai?

Well, this is the 200th episode of the Bleach saga, and for those that need to catch up — you’ve not missed much. Since the collosal fight between Ichigo and Grimmjow in episode 1xx (need reference!) and the commencement of the filler which featured the lovable Captain Amagai amidst a fairly weak storyline, especially for Bleach filler, known commonly as The New Captain Syūsuke Amagai arc. If you really want to know more about it see here. Read the rest of this entry…