The new opening and ending songs began in this episode. This is even more indication that this filler arc still isn’t close to finishing yet. I think the new opening song isn’t too bad. I like it more than the previous opening by HIGH and MIGHTY COLOR. I haven’t liked a “Bleach” ending since Younha’s “Houkiboshi”. The animation that goes with the ending for this new song is pretty nice too, especially the very end of the song. As for the two episodes themselves, I didn’t find them too boring or anything. They weren’t great, but they’re still a lot more entertaining than “Naruto” fillers. Unfortunately Chad and Orihime ended up being of no use once again. Eventually Ichigo will have to get outside help because currently the only allies he has right now are useless.

Even more Bounts show up in this episode. For the time being it seems like a good thing since I was starting to lose interest in this filler arc. With these new characters in the story things may get somewhat more interesting. We find out who was responsible for the missing book in Soul Society. Although we’ve never seen or heard of this shinigami until now, we do get a brief flashback so we can learn about him a bit. Based on what we know about him it seems like the only reason why he would help Kariya is because he still holds a grudge against Zaraki. I highly doubt we’ll see Zaraki actually do something about him considering his personality. I was hoping to see Yoruichi and Soi Fong in this episode, but they were nowhere to be seen. Next week will be another one hour special followed by a one hour premiere of “Gintama”.

This filler arc is beginning to feel too long. I’m starting to lose interest already since they keep introducing more and more characters that don’t seem all that interesting. Chances are I’ll probably just tough it out and hope it gets better. Besides Hanatarou, we also get to see Ganjyu has come for some reason. It felt pretty random for him to just show up, but maybe we’ll find out why he came sooner or later. The only parts I enjoyed in this episode were the scenes with humour in them. It’s great seeing Rukia and Ichigo together since they always manage to make it a funny whenever it’s appropriate. Once again “Bleach” is taking yet another one week break. The next episode will be a one hour special scheduled to air on March 28th.

Normally “Bleach” is pretty good at keeping their art fairly consistent. Unfortunately, I thought the art in this episode was pretty lacking for certain scenes. A few things became clear in this episode. If we are to believe everything Yoshino told Ishida, then she may end up helping Ichigo in the others. We learn from Yoshino what Jin plans on doing by feeding off the souls of live humans. To make things easy to understand Rukia provides us with yet another one of her wonderful drawings. Even with such a high-tension atmosphere, they were still able to incorporate some humour into the episode. Kon’s appearance in the episode was quite random, but I found it pretty funny to see everyone’s reaction. You’d think with dangerous individuals like the Bount, Soul Society would keep a closer eye on them. All information regarding the Bount in Soul Society seem to be stolen so it seems someone may be working with Jin from within Soul Society.

Instead of getting any information on what the Bount have planned, we’re introduced to another character. From the looks of it this filler arc is going to go on for quite a while. We can probably assume that all the Bounts have varied abilities based on what Yoshino and Ryou have revealed. I can understand them adding Rukia back into the filler arc since she is one of the main characters, but I thought adding Hanatarou was kind of random. It didn’t seem like Hanatarou was sent over to support Rukia and the others. It pretty much felt like he was only added for comedic reasons. My guess is he will probably play some minor role later on in this arc. There is no “Bleach” next week. The next episode is scheduled to air on March 7th.

It is now safe to say that this “Bleach” filler arc is better than any of the fillers “Naruto” has been able to spit out. They managed to answer pretty much all the questions we’ve had from the previous filler episodes in this one hour special. This special pretty much starts the real plot of the filler arc. I thought it was quite interesting how they had set things up so that Ririn and the others were actually working for Urahara. Ichigo and the gang find out that Ishida lost his Quincy powers. We also see Rukia come back and save Ichigo at the end of the special. These two events are going to change things a bit when they actually continue back on with the real story of the series. We learn the existence of the Bount through an easy-to-understand comparion between them and the Quincy. It seemed a bit random to just throw them into the series, but it will probably make it a more entertaining filler arc. Kon once again stole the spotlight in my opinion. I thought he had some pretty hilarious lines in the special. I like where this filler arc is going and I hope they will keep up with this level of entertainment for the rest of this arc.

I thought it was interesting how the whole point of this new “game” is to find the impersonator. I ended up trying to guess who the imposter was for most of the episode. It was pretty funny watching them suspect one another, especially Orihime’s “Sado-kun ni pass”. We still have no idea what their motive is by having Ichigo and the others participate in their “games”. It looks like Yoruichi is up to something since we see her and Soi Fong late in the episode. Next week is a 60 minute special so maybe we’ll finally have everything revealed to us then.

Kon gets an upgrade in this episode. After this episode they will probably start producing Kon version 2.0 backpacks. I wasn’t expecting them to include Kon in this episode. Who would have thought Kon would be so useful. Thanks to Ishida we find out just who Claud, Nova, and Ririn really are. The odd plushies in the new ending song make sense now. It seemed kind of random when it was first used. This filler arc for the moment is faring better than “Naruto” filler arcs. It’s without a doubt more enjoyable. I thought the omake at the end of this episode was pretty funny. It adds nothing new to the characters featured in it, but it was still entertaining.

We don’t find out what the three individuals that captured Orihime are. All we learn is that they are Claud, Nova, and Ririn. The three of them end up capturing Chad as well. At this current time we still don’t know what their motives are for capturing Orihime and now Chad. For an episode that was supposed to be serious they manage to throw in some humour. It may not be side-splitting humour, but it had its moments. At the moment this filler arc can go two ways. They can either make it something intense or a snore fest. It will pretty much depend on the next 1-2 episodes to see if this arc can compare to the arcs based on the manga.

Prepare for a pretty long filler arc. There is a new ending song starting from this episode. The video that goes with it looks as if it is specifically tailored to this arc. After listening to the song once I don’t think I’ll bother listening to it again. Some people may like it, but it’s definately not for me. I must say, Renji has a nice sense of style. At least he had a theme going instead of just random pieces of clothing. I thought there were some pretty hilarious scenes in this episode. One scene that comes to mind is when Renji tried to ask for seconds. Nothing really happend in this episode in terms of development until the end when Orihime is visited by her brother. Now that we officially have a situation taking place, the next episode should be a lot more interesting.