Bleach Recaps: Ep. 222, Elephantitis

I'm Tite Kubo.  I am the lord successor to Akira Toriyama, and the greatest manga author of my time.  Fuck that, I'm the greatest author of anything ever.  Check out how boss my sunglasses are.  Oh, you're unimpressed with these shades?  Watch me take them off.  See that style.  You wish you had that kind of style.  Here, I'll put them on and take them off again.  Super cool.  What was I talking about again?  Oh yeah, the most interesting subject ever: me.  Yeah, I'm not just stylishly cool, I'm also half-dragon.  Yeah, my mom was a dragon, its cool.  This episode here is based off a chapter I drew for "Bleach".  Because I made it, its the most awesome episode of anything ever.  This episode is especially special for me, because I drew it while two Thai prostitutes were having sex on my coffee table to give me inspiration.  Unfortunately, I didn't get any because they weren't sexy enough.  So I murdered them both and got my publisher to mix their blood into the ink of every copy.  I just want to say, I dedicate this episode to those prostitute, and myself for being so great.  I'm Tite Kubo, and I'm just that awesome.

Fuck that guy.

Anyway, this is a "Bleach" recap.  While Tite Kubo was busy murdering prostitutes, he forgot to actually make this part of the story good.  What happens in Episode 222 is two battles among the fifty-three we have going on at this point.  One of the fights is actually exciting, the other is two big dudes yelling at each other.  The most exciting conflict however was my right hand desperately looking for a beer, which sadly I ran out of.  To fight off the pain, I started drinking shaving cream, which certainly made me semi-conscious, if nothing else.  Then I beat myself over the head with stapler.  When I came to, life was a little bit better.

But then I had a "Bleach" recap to write... Crap.

Last episode, everybody on the planet started fighting everybody else.  This episode is focused on only two of those fights, because if we have gave them all equal time each would get about a minute and it would take twenty episode to see a resolution to anything.  Gio Vega was fighting Soi Fon while his buddy, a hocky player was fighting Soi Fon's pet moron.  Soi managed to catch Vega in a little magic trap, and was about to kill him off.  Let's see what happens next.

So before I used to think that Soi Fon was nothing but a cutthroat bitch filled with unimaginable lesbian rage.  However, she is also a "Bleach" character, meaning that eventually she's going to do something really really stupid.  Like now, she decides to tell Vega how her Shikai works.  Two taps in the same place, insta death.  Then instead of doing that and ending the fight, Soi Fon spends thirty seconds explaining how her weapon works.  Vega, hugely to his credit, figures out how to get out of the magic pin by blowing up the building he was crucified on.

Then he gets even further favor in me by pointing out the exact plot hole I mentioned above.  "For an assassin you're not very efficient, why didn't you just kill me when you had the chance instead of being an idiot?"

"Vega, shut up!  You're poking holes in our show!"

And then what follows is a pretty decent bit of teleport spam fighting.  Vega is cool, Soi Fon is cool, this is a good fight.  Not up to the standards of Mr. 69 vs. Findor, but still okay.  And speaking of a fight not up to standards:

OHMYGOD!  KILL IT!  KILL IT!

Yeah, its Soi Fon's lieutenant vs that hockey player.  I don't actually know what either of their names are, and honestly I don't care to learn.  Soi Fon's lieutenant is like the least important of least important characters, he's been in like three episodes so far, one of which was spent gorging on potato chips.  Let's review his combat record:  first Ichigo kicked his ass with a bitch slap, then Jin Kariya kicked his ass with another bitch slap, and finally he was beaten by Enryu of all people in the Amagai Arc.  He's a walking disgrace!  And in this episode, he spends the entire thing acting like a total piece of crap.  He's whiny, he's ugly, he's fat, he's stupid, he can't fight, and he sucks.  So hockey guy, kick his fucking ass!

This really is the worst kind of fight.  I'm talking Granz-bad here.  They spend the whole time talking, there's no speed, neither really can land a blow, and there's no tension.  Its a giant joke.  Why should I care?  Even the animators don't care!

Wow.  Just wow.

Finally hockey-guy kicks Lieutenant-Guy down.  The Arrancar admits that he secretly wanted to fight Rangiku - "that blond chick" - mostly to get her number.  Since when was Rangiku blond?  That helmet must ruins your eyesight.  As for Soi Fon's Lieutenant, he's "just a fatass".  Damn right, hockey-guy!  Tell it like it is!  Unfortunately this begins a long argument over which character is really ugly.

Oh great, its fucking Yamichika vs. Charlotte again!  Another argument over looks.  Before it was which character was homosexual-er now its which one is uglier.  I'm gonna say Lieutenant Dumbass is the ugly one, because actually if you take a look at hockey guy, he's not actually all that ugly:

Wait a sec...  Could it be?  Yeah, it is!  Its 80s Rutger Hauer!

Meanwhile lieutenant guy has a big fat face, Elvis chops, and a bizarre foe-hawk.  The Soul Reaper makes things even worse by claiming this whole thing is some kind of Class Warfare.  Yeah, the Lieutenant is rich and a nobleman.  Meaning that above everything else he's a spoiled brat who got his job through nepotism.  Can he die now?

Back with Soi Fon, she gets very close to actually hitting Vega.  So he decides to evolve:

THUNDER THUNDER THUNDERCATS!  HOO!!!

Weirdly even though Vega is stronger, faster, and has two blades now, he can't actually hit Soi Fon in any way other than quick kicks to the gut.  He should consider investing in swords for his feet too.  This fight is cool.  Yeah, Vega is basically a low-rent Grimmjow, but that's more Grimmjow than we're going to get otherwise.

And meanwhile, just when I thought the other battle couldn't get any dumber... it did:

Rutger Hauer deserves better roles than this.

I don't even know what to say anymore.  They're not taking this seriously.  Why does this even need to happen?  Why did Tite Kubo create a character just to be a walking joke then have him fight a giant elephant monster?  This is so stupid as to basically a mind-altering drug.  The entire fight now is a game of cat and mouse, or elephant and moron in this case.  Moron flees, elephant chases, moron reveals he knows Flash Step, elephant gets hit in the head.  Elephant seems dead, moron gloats, moron makes fun of nose, elephant wakes, twists moron's nose, episode ends.  AND LIEUTENANT MORON IS STILL ALIVE AT THE END.  All anybody wants out of this show now is for him to not be alive anymore, but no.  We can't get that.

We do get an admission from the Lieutenant that he's obsessed with long noses...  And every time I read that sentence my hand naturally finds itself bound to my face.  Every.  Single.  Time.

At the end, Soi Fon has been knocked down, but who cares?  How can you care about anything after a display like this?  I'm so glad I live alone now.  Imagine if somebody walked in on you while you were watching this show?  You'd die of embarrassment, at least.

Worse:  this isn't the ending.  Nothing was solved!  We got a whole second episode of elephants coming up.  And Vega, a character I've found I actually like, is going to die, because the good guys always win.  I usually say "here's to next week" at this point, but what is there to toast to?  Nothing.  Nothing but more shit.

Here's to more shit.