We begin this weeks entry into the world of Bleach with a
bit of history. It may be hard to
believe but there was a time when Bleach was a juggernaut of an Anime title,
often placed alongside Naruto and One Piece as the Big 3 of Modern Shonen
Anime. The show ran for over a decade
and never reached a proper conclusion while the manga continued on even longer
and only wrapped last year. Naturally,
this meant that films based on the Anime series were inevitable, theyre kind of
a Shonen staple: some will have only 2 like Fairy Tail and others will hit 15
like Dragon Ball Z. When Memories of
Nobody first came out, it was about the time that Bleach was hitting its peak
so anticipation for a movie was very high.
Before I get into that though, a moment about Filler. Filler Arcs were the ultimate downfall of
Bleach, often taking up entire seasons for no reason other than for the manga
to get ahead of the Anime in order for new main story material to arrive. I cant recall ever hearing about a Filler Arc
of Bleach that wasn’t terrible, even the early ones were despised immensely
since it cut into a very important and very high paced central story arc. SO, why talk about all of this before getting
into todays review? Well first everyone
needs a primer on Bleach and second, this movie is really slow, really not so
great filler…ergo this movie isn’t the best for Bleach’s big screen debut.
Like any Shonen film in the past, Memories of Nobody acts
as a stand alone tale that doesn’t have a set place in the main Bleach Universe
and thus can be viewed without much knowledge of the series. That can be a bit of a trial since the shows
cast of dozens is all present and accounted for, even for a few short
seconds. As far as filler esque arcs go,
the one thing that makes Memories of Nobody stand above them is that it is over
a helluva lot faster. At 90mins, the
story does move a lot faster even though it starts painfully slow and doesn’t
have much action until around the halfway mark.
The establishment of Senna and the new bad guys takes a bit longer than
it should. I will admit that even though
her bumbling around with Ichigo did slow things down when we really should have
been running, their bond did feel genuine the longer they were on screen
together and it does payoff in a rather emotional finale I didn’t expect. This is thanks to Senna’s presence showing us
the more kinder side of Ichigo when he isn’t being a bad ass. The Substitute Soul Reaper has been an idol
Anime hero for a long time for a reason.
He may act tough and scary but he’s a softy and wont turn away when
anyone, even a stranger like Senna needs help.
Everything else storywise is standard fare: discount bad guy wants
revenge and to destroy the world…nothing new or special, moving on.
Ichigo and Senna are the heart of the story but this is a
Shonen Action flick first and foremost.
Bleach often succeeds in this department as a whole (no matter how long
certain fights go on). Once things do
get rolling on this front, things get both entertaining and a little
frustrating too. The entertainment part
speaks for itself: lots of swords and magic and bad ass moments that have
defined Bleach from the get go. And as I
said above, the increased pace and time limit on the film means that fights are
a lot shorter than we’re used to…but that’s not a bad thing. The bad stuff comes from the finale trying to
cram in every single Bleach character introduced up until this point. The movie did a decent job bringing in a few
characters like Toshiro, Rangiku, Soi Fon and Renji, who could have been the
only force needed to assist Ichigo in the end.
But they bring the entire gang of dozens as well and chances are your
personal favorites who aren’t the aforementioned four or Kenpachi or Byakuya
don’t get any attention beyond a glance.
The only slight forgiveness ill accept here is this: it is never a bad
thing to see Byakuya Kuchiki or Kenpachi Zaraki have a little fun on the
battlefield, even if they are sorely underutilized.
One major point of frustration is the animation. This is Bleach’s debut Anime Feature Film…and
it looks on par with the TV Series or occasionally a step below that. The only moments where I get a glimpse of
film level quality animation is during Toshiro’s ice duel with his opponent
during the films finale. Otherwise, Memories
of Nobody isn’t anything to write home about animation wise and emphasizes the
fact that, in the end, the film as a whole is nothing short of a 3-4 part
filler story that you’ll either like or dislike depending on your relationship
with the show.
Bleach: Memories of Nobody had a couple of good moments
to it. The action never fails in Bleach
and Ichigo and Senna do have some touching scenes. Everything else either feels standard (the
villains) or wasted (an over extension of the cast). This should have been an event level
movie. Heck even for it’s brevity Dragon
Ball Z: Dead Zone felt like an event level film to kick off the DBZ Movie
franchise. Memories of Nobody feels like
a quickly slapped together project with a teeny bit of heart to get a film
series going right away while the Bleach iron was still hot. My only hope is that the later films get
better cause this was definitely not the win that Bleach needed to get this
train rolling.
6/10
Looking at the synopsis for Movie 2, it looks like some
improvements might be made already.
Check back next week for Bleach:
The Movie 2-The Diamond Dust Rebellion and see if everyones favorite
secondary Soul Reaper character survives his attempt at Anime’s take on The
Fugitive. See ya then.
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