To Make It Crystal Clear--My thoughts on the pointlessness.
Let me make this clear to everyone.
I am not happy with the new chapter. Not one bit.
But--it has nothing to do with Aizen's betrayal of Harribel. That's not unexpected. It's AIZEN. Betrayal should be his fucking middle name. I've roleplayed Aizen in a bunch of communities--one of them that started their rp canon at the beginning of Soul Society arc--I know about his personality and penchant for betrayal.
So, no. It's not that which pisses me off.
It's that all the other espada got a chance to fight. All the other espada got a chance to show their skills. All the other espada died at the end of battles. Whether the battles were stupid and not-well-executed or not, they still were battles.
They also all for the most part got flashbacks.
They got to show their worth, and we got to learn more about them.
And Harribel doesn't get to do EITHER of those things. I'll be quite surprised if her death is little more than an afterthought. It's a load of bullshit to be honest--she's an Espada too, and one of the top three at that--why does she not get the same treatment?
Is it because her death jurisdiction is sacrifice?
I don't think your leader cutting you down because he feels like it really counts as sacrifice. Now, if her death would give him power or serve some sort of ulterior purpose, then yes, that would be sacrifice.
But Aizen says that she's "not good enough to fight under him".
That does not belie sacrifice at all. It's a waste.
Also, on the lower rung of the spectrum, Hiyori and Lisa don't get to fight either.
So, my entire thought on this?
It's rather sexist. Yes, I said it. Sexist.
The women are falling, and being knocked to the wayside to get to the men fighting again. This was predominantly going to be a girl v. girl fight--Harribel, Lisa and Hiyori. And Aizen, male, takes out the main enemy for this fight, and sends Gin and Tousen to fight.
He effectively halts the fight between the women--and also calls her weak. I don't know if I just want to call that "Aizen", or say that it was a metaphor to show that anything that women do is pointless and weak in the presence of a strong male influence.
Bleach has steadily gotten more sexist as the series has progressed--at first, Orihime had drive to fight, Rukia stood on her own as a force to be reckoned with and showed Ichigo the way, and there were others like Yoruichi who were more than fantastic.
Now, Orihime is a mewling, quivering shadow who only knows two words: "Kurosaki-kun". Rukia's been thrown to the wayside, and the others have taken a decent backseat.
It reminds me of Naruto; which has a history of being sexist. Sakura--no matter how much strength she's gained over the series always does something to shoot herself in the foot (crying for Naruto during Pein's attack, for example) and show that she needs the men to lean on. Ino, who has so much potential for strength and drive to stand on her own, falls back to the crying weakling as she wails for Sasuke--instead of standing to do something about it, she cries over the predicament. Also, save for the Chiyo/Sakura v. Sasori fight--mostly in the series, all the female characters have had to be saved by a male one. Even the strongest one in Tsunade has been trumped by ones like Naruto--having to be saved instead of making a true lasting difference.
I worry for the Mizukage--she'll probably die easy or have to be defended by Ao and Choujiro because she's up against Sasuke. Strike another count for Naruto's blatant gender devides. Also in the same vein about Sasuke, I think about Karin. Even though Karin doesn't have a redeeming personality or really much of one at all (and one could make an arguement about this being sexist--as her only point is really to fawn after a strong male in Sasuke), she's still the female member of Taka. what has she done in this fight, or really any of the fights except be the stereotypical female support/healer character? She fades behind Suigetsu, Juugo and centrally Sasuke.
Shonen series are for boys, yes. I guess that can give an explanation for some of the sexism. Also, Japan is a very male-oriented country. That probably explains even more.
Then again, FMA is a shonen series, and its women are all strong. But, then again, that may be due to the fact that the author, Arakawa Hiromu, is female. Also, shonen series have a heavy female fanbase now--shouldn't times change?
I guess my last point is, why make 'strong' female characters if all you are going to do is throw them away? It's insulting and cheapens your series.
I really think Kubo and Kishimoto should be taking notes from Arakawa.
Also--This is my damn blog, I can bitch about this if I want to. ♥
/ENDRANT