Bleach 583 Review – “The Headless Star 2”

Bleach 583 Review – “The Headless Star 2”

Written by: ClayDragon

Filler, but funny.

After the four Femritters have decided to attack Ichigo, we get a brief montage of them all firing their arrows at him. As soon as the arrows get close to him, the action zooms out to show several nearby buildings being destroyed. When the action focuses back on the fight, it turns out that not only did Ichigo dodge the arrows, he managed to throw Candice into another wall – followed swiftly by Giselle, Meninas, and Liltotto.

Well, that'll be Kenpachi buried in the rubble.

As Candice throws the other three off of her, they note that Ichigo is indeed strong, and Giselle, Meninas and Liltotto all decide that he should die. Candice appears behind them and agrees, saying that if they all agree on the same thing then it should be easy. However, as she activates her Vollständig, the other three take this opportunity to deride her choice, which only serves to make her even angrier.

The exact definition of teamwork.

Choosing this moment to try and give a rousing speech, Candice asks her peers how they could stand in front of Yhwach after failing to defeat Ichigo. Unfortunately, this backfires on her as the other three seem more interested in ignoring her, dismissing her, or mocking her. Giving up, Candice decides to attack Ichigo alone, and says that if she defeats the number one war potential, Yhwach will be sure to grant her any wish she wants.

Look at Giselle's face! How could anyone stay mad at a face like that?

This more than anything seems to motivate the other Femritters, as Meninas dreams of a life of luxury, Liltotto dreams of food, and Giselle dreams of…blackness, which could either be very dark or very funny depending on how you see it. Candice flies towards Ichigo and pulls two swords out of her wings, and then uses them to attack him. However, he manages to block her strikes with just one of his swords, at which point Candice reveals that her wings are actually swords, meaning she has six in total.

Well, so much for that 'same opinion' thing.

As Ichigo retreats, she pulls another sword out and fires it at him. Before it can reach him, Ichigo simply draws a line with one of his swords (the one that represents his Quincy powers) and fires off a Getsuga Tenshou which eradicates Candice’s sword. Now ever so slightly annoyed, Candice summons a huge bolt of lightning which hovers behind her, and she orders Ichigo not to get too confident as she throws the huge lightning bolt towards him.

To be honest, I'd say she's acting way more cocky than Ichigo is.

Ichigo decides to move position, and as he’s moving he pulls out his other sword (the one containing Hollow Ichigo). As he draws another horizontal line with his Quincy sword, he also draws a vertical line with his Hollow sword, creating a cross-shaped Getsuga Tenshou, which is apparently called Getsuga Juujishou.

I like the concept, but I'm still not too sure about the name.

As I said last week (and elaborated upon in the comments section of last week’s review), there are many, many plot threads that are still left hanging in Bleach. As a result, there is no shortage to the things that Tite Kubo can focus on, from Mayuri and Urahara, to the Hueco Mundo Squad, to the Visoreds or Fullbringers. And instead we’re just slowly working our way down the list of Quincies that have yet to be beaten.

Competition time! Match the arrows to their owners!

I think part of the reason that things seem to be going so slowly is that many pages are either comprised of one big image, or made up of lots of reaction shots or pictures of the battlefield as opposed to the action itself. If the chapters didn’t have so much filler going on, the story would move along at a much faster rate. Although I do want Bleach to continue going for as long as possible, I don’t want it to drag itself out by slowing the action down.

Either Giselle can't think of anything, or she wishes for darkness, or her wish is so horrifying to contemplate that it can't be shown.

On the positive side, although I wasn’t too keen on the pacing of this chapter, it was the first one that made me laugh since a long time ago. I wasn’t too keen on the four Femritters at first, but after seeing how they interact with each other, they’ve quickly become some of my favourite Sternritters. The other good thing about this chapter is Ichigo’s new ability, as not only does he seem to be able to fire off a Getsuga Tenshou with little to no effort, his new Getsuga Juujishou implies that he might have even more new tricks up his sleeve, and it’s made me all the more eager to see his new Bankai.

Today is not Candice's good day.

Good Things:     The hilarious interactions between the Femritters.

    Ichigo’s new Getsuga Juujishou.

Bad Things:       Slow pacing.

                           A lack of focus on any other plot threads.

Manga Rating:   2.5/5

ClayDragon:









ClayDragon is currently studying Physics at university, and is constantly bewildered by it. The main method of contacting him is his Gmail account at kyleroulston1993@gmail.com. The alternative is his Skype account at kyleroulston1993. When not playing games or reading, he can be found with his head in his hands whilst trying in vain to understand quantum physics. "We all change. When you think about it, we're all different people all through our lives, and that's okay, that's good. You've got to keep moving, so long as you remember all the people that you used to be."