Poor Shuuhei
--Pffft. So, "Turn Back the Pendulum" has been bothering myself and kay_willow for a while, to varying degrees.
BLEACH SPOILERS (and plot holes) TO FOLLOW. You have been warned!
(On the smallest scale: The rate at which Shinigami age. I'd always sort of figured your aging slowed down dramatically when your power matured, thereby explaining why Rukia and Renji age perfectly normally for ten years but don't look much older now than they did when they entered the Spirit Arts Academy 40 years ago. But then we get Gin, who shows all signs after the nine-year timeskip of being a perma-kid, like Hitsugaya, but who seems to be aging perfectly normally -- for a Shinigami -- in the present day. No matter how I logic it out, his aging has to have sped up to result in him being almost thirty in the present day.)
Then we started re-reading, and we noticed:
Moving on to the reason why I used that subject line. XD
Shuuhei breaks continuity.
It's all well and good to inform us that Shuuhei was a little kid, maybe 7 or 8, who met Kensei and decided that "69" was an awesome tattoo to put somewhere on his body.
But this would make him almost contemporary with Gin and Byakuya.
You know, the guys that become captains shortly after Shuuhei finishes up school.
(kay_willow: He failed the entrance exam a lot more than twice.)
Not only does this mean it took Shuuhei literally seventy years to follow up from first meeting Kensei to becoming a Shinigami, it might also make him the slowest aging of our entire younger generation. He is seriously giving Hitsugaya a run for his money here.
Oh, and he makes Yamamoto a liar. I thought there were only two dual-wield zanpakutou, Yamamoto! What do you call this?
One good thing: We've got all our Division captains, at least, and an almost guarantee that Isshin was the captain of the 10th prior to Hitsugaya (he disappeared 20 years ago, so it fits, and the 10th and the 11th are the only blanks Turn Back the Pendulum left us with, but Isshin technically must have become captain AFTER TBtP anyway, because Shinji doesn't recognize his reiatsu).
BLEACH SPOILERS (and plot holes) TO FOLLOW. You have been warned!
(On the smallest scale: The rate at which Shinigami age. I'd always sort of figured your aging slowed down dramatically when your power matured, thereby explaining why Rukia and Renji age perfectly normally for ten years but don't look much older now than they did when they entered the Spirit Arts Academy 40 years ago. But then we get Gin, who shows all signs after the nine-year timeskip of being a perma-kid, like Hitsugaya, but who seems to be aging perfectly normally -- for a Shinigami -- in the present day. No matter how I logic it out, his aging has to have sped up to result in him being almost thirty in the present day.)
Then we started re-reading, and we noticed:
- Isshin states that the Vizard/Visored (official spelling plz KT?!) are Shinigami who were banished for using illegal methods to gain the powers of Hollows.
- Okay, so Yama-jii is a dick, but this is just a mean lie to tell people. I mean, wtf. "Victims of illegal experiments by Urahara Kisuke" would be closer to the truth?
- You could argue that Urahara looks a little shifty when he replies, but really no more than usual. It's not a reaction shot, it's not him looking away in shame, nothing.
- Hiyori is pretty bitter about humans and Shinigami "hating" them, which you could take to imply that there's more to the story than Isshin's matter-of-fact analysis, but it'd make more sense for her to fixate on on the BETRAYAL if TBtP's events are true. I could easily see her bitterness, on the other hand, being because she was just trying to get stronger! All Shinigami want to be stronger, right? etc.
- We're told that the reason why Urahara was banished was for his mod souls and making gigais like the one Rukia wore -- gigais that hide spiritual presence and eat it, taking away a Shinigami's powers.
- This doesn't need to have been the be-all, end-all of Urahara's illegal activities, but what he winds up actually getting banished for in TBtP isn't even his fault. After building up Urahara as such a Gray Hat and a morally dubious guy... he's essentially completely innocent of the "crime" that got him banished, and there's no mention of any other crimes.
- This is especially weird after what we established BEFORE the timeskip during TBtP: the Soul Society has a giant prison for, essentially, thought crimes. Not only should Urahara really have been locked up here, but -- so should Aizen, given that Shinji expresses such certainty that Aizen was fucked in the head. It doesn't look like people are given trials before they're thrown into the witch prison, so... (Also, Urahara's decision to release Mayuri, their most dangerous thought criminal, back out into the wild. Gray Hat again!)
- Now, granted, maybe Aizen could have wormed his way out of it -- but Shinji doesn't mention ever even considering this as an option.
Moving on to the reason why I used that subject line. XD
Shuuhei breaks continuity.
It's all well and good to inform us that Shuuhei was a little kid, maybe 7 or 8, who met Kensei and decided that "69" was an awesome tattoo to put somewhere on his body.
But this would make him almost contemporary with Gin and Byakuya.
You know, the guys that become captains shortly after Shuuhei finishes up school.
(kay_willow: He failed the entrance exam a lot more than twice.)
Not only does this mean it took Shuuhei literally seventy years to follow up from first meeting Kensei to becoming a Shinigami, it might also make him the slowest aging of our entire younger generation. He is seriously giving Hitsugaya a run for his money here.
Oh, and he makes Yamamoto a liar. I thought there were only two dual-wield zanpakutou, Yamamoto! What do you call this?
One good thing: We've got all our Division captains, at least, and an almost guarantee that Isshin was the captain of the 10th prior to Hitsugaya (he disappeared 20 years ago, so it fits, and the 10th and the 11th are the only blanks Turn Back the Pendulum left us with, but Isshin technically must have become captain AFTER TBtP anyway, because Shinji doesn't recognize his reiatsu).