manga chapter reactionsss
Oh Winter War arc, why so boring? I really don't understand. For an arc that has been building up since the very beginning of the manga--hell, for an arc comprised entirely of battle, where every single character is fighting one or multiple opponents usually beyond their level, it really takes a lot of talent to make these chapters as consistently and thoroughly dull as they have been. Not that I don't love Bleach or anything, but seriously, Kubo, come on, there's no reason for this.
The battles got marginally more interesting when the chapters stopped focusing on the ranked shinigami EVEN HITSUGAYA. BLASPHEMY I KNOW I'M SORRY and started focusing only on Ichigo and company in Hueco Mundo. I'm having an identity crisis here! ayerxsama and I were seriously partying when they first showed Hitsu and Matsumoto, and while I guess her fight was marginally interesting, minus the fact that she totally got her ass handed to her, and got even more interesting when Hinamori got her epic entrance, and got plain annoying when they both had to be saved by two vice captains who had already had their spotlight, and just plain frustrating when even they had to be saved by Old Guy even though they weren't even fighting an Espada, and christ this is a run-on sentence, Hitsugaya pretty much just had a staring contest for three chapters. Come ON.
I had such hope for this arc in the beginning, at the pillars. Remember Yumichika? Remember how awesome he was? Remember how his shikai totally seems like something you'd have to hack the game in order to get? Remember how dramatic Ikkaku's defeat was (even though it was his own damn fault), and how batshit crazy Yumichika went when his lover SHUT UP IT'S CANON AND YOU KNOW IT was defeated? Yeah, I want more of that.
I mean, I'm totally stoked that Owl-quiorra released his sword, and that he pretty much is an owl now (HE HAS WINGSSS), and that he's as badass as he is, but WHY DOES IT TAKE SO LONG FOR ANYTHING TO HAPPEN? Seriously, in twenty pages, huge plot developments (plural) happen in Naruto. WHY DON'T WE AT LEAST GET MORE THAN ONE HIT? I'm thinking this arc will be a thousand times better when it's on screen, not that it'll take much. And at least this time we only had one panel of Inoue going, "Kurosaki-kun!" instead of eight thousand.
Oh, and apparantly Rukia is fighting someone? Someone whose sword thing creates tons of little soldier-zombies with which to spam Rukia? And she's been fighting this guy for a while and is having a tough time? WHY HAVEN'T WE SEEN THIS? Christ, the one battle where interesting things happen, and it's not even drawn.
Anyway, it all comes down to the fact that Naruto is just so much better than Bleach right now.
Naruto. Naruto is where it's at. Naruto has huge, village-destroying battles, where five minutes of fighting actually merits six chapters, and where said chapters are full to bursting with character growth, plot development, drama, epic ultimate moves, TEASING ME ABOUT KAKASHI EVERY FIVE PANELS, WHO IS ALIVE DAMN IT, reminding us what all our favorite side characters are doing, and general badassery. Really, what this post all boils down to is the fact that Kishimoto-sensei should host a class, How To Draw Epic Battles: 101, and Kubo Tite should be his number one pupil.
Naruto, right now, is awesome enough that on Thursday night or Friday, when the scanlations go up on OneManga, I am temporarily reduced to a sputtering mass of incoherent glee, so that our house, at these times, is pretty much like this:
Shannon: ERINNN OMG NARUTO IS UP ON ONEMANGA RIGHT NOW I JUST READ IT AND LDKJFSLDKFJS DFDLSFF ♥_♥
Erin: OMG NO WAY IMA READ IT RIGHT NOW HOLD ON kdjfkshfskjhfskfhds ♥_♥
And then a lot of thundering up and down the stairs.
We have a problem. I know this. But seriously I wish I knew more people who read Naruto who could back me up on this fact. It's just so good! I mean, Yamato is nowhere to be seen, all the other teams we care about made it through relatively unscathed, Naruto suddenly became totally ass-kickingly awesome and everyone knows it, Kakashi is ALIVE, damn it, Shizune is dead (finally! serves her right for being such an annoying, tattle-telling, worry-warty bitch for the past gazillion chapters. SORRY SHE WAS JUST SO ANNOYING UGH), and Team Gai has no idea any of this is going on and is poised for the best "Holy crap wtf did we MISS?" entrances in the history of manga. What could possibly be better?
Oh, and did I mention that Shikamaru and company (somehow even his and Ino's parents count as "and company" now. He's just that awesome.) got a reasonable amount of screen time and a scene that sets them up to be awesome and useful in the near future? Now all I need is for Kakashi's confirmed pulse, and for Temari to show up just in time for a romantic reunion and to stake her claim so glasses-chick knows to back the fuck up.
And can I underline the fact that Naruto went away with the frog people and came back totally fucking awesome? Because, really, I don't think you quite understand.
Anyway, if you haven't figured it out, this chapter was epic as usual, and there's really nothing coherent I can say about it other than to repeat the words "totally fucking awesome" a couple hundred more times.
OH GOD I AM OBSESSED. I need more friends who care about this, so I can obsess over IM when I read and spare your LJs. Whatever.