Bleach Chapter 579

The first half of this chapter was nicely polishing off the Gremmy fight. At first I was annoyed to see Gremmy’s face again and really wanted to story to just move on. After we learnt more on how exactly he died, it seemed a bit more reasonable and I changed my mind. In short Gremmy’s body tried to imitate the power that Kenpachi held in his body in order to defeat him. Unfortunately for him he didn’t realise that neither his body nor imagination was strong enough to hold the amount of power that he contained (how badass can you get?).

Gremmy’s true form is reveal to be ‘a brain in a jar’….. I did not see that coming, although it did make sense in theory. Mr ‘Brain in a Jar’ was able to use his power to create a body of which he was known as Gremmy. This begs the question, what the hell happened to Gremmy previously for him to end up like that?

Something interesting to note is that Kenpachi’s sword reverted back to its previous Shikai state that he had been using until recently. This is obviously more practical, but it makes me wonder how someone can have two usable Shikai forms available.

Kenpachi has a little bit of a sour moment where he coughs up blood and makes a comment on how he was actually badly damaged in the fight. Since Kenpachi’s fight with Onohana he seems to have matured at become more mature in every way. This is present in the way that he acknowledges that he had been damaged. As usually he would have said something like “that brat actually put a scratch on me” when his arm was half hanging off and liver missing. For this reason I’m not really sure if the damage will effect him or not. The previous Kenpachi just laughed off wounds and got stronger no matter how bad he was, until he was unconscious. However since his battle with Onohana took place, his battle instincts have matured.

 

The part of the chapter that interested me the most was when we see that Yachiru’s clothes or at least her sleeve is laying on the ground. The obvious answer is that either Gremmy made her disappear as a final act of revenge, or the Female Knights (I’ll talk about them in a minute) or even another charter kidnaped/killed her.

I have a crazy theory so hear me out. The last chapter that we see Yachiru in is 577, on the same panel where Kenpachi says the name of his sword ‘Nozarashi’. After the battle both Kenpachi and his team were not able to sense her anywhere and that is very unusual. Even if the enemy took her Kenpachi and friends would still be able to sense her for a significant distance.

My theory is that Yachiru was actually the manifestation of Kenpachi’s sword, or at least something like it (don’t leave yet). If you recall the previous flash back when Yachiru met Kenpachi is also around the time that he forgot the name of his sword and given the fact that she was last seen on the page where he called the name Nozarashi. Plus the fact that her clothes were there but not her body and the fact that Isane was pointing out about how strange Yachiru’s Zanpackto was, it seems more likely. The only thing that makes me doubt this is that is draws to many parallels to the Stark and Lilnette relationship. Kubo is never one to do something even remotely similar twice.

In all honestly, I hate my theory, I think Yachiru is the balancer that has made Kenpachi such a good character overall. Not to mention that Bleach has become very, very dark recently and Yachiru has been the only comedic relief for a good 60 chapters now.

Ideally I would like the seen some of the Sternritter to have kidnaped Yachiru, hurt her enough to make Kenpachi angry (sorry Yachiru). Then watch Kenpachi absolutely lose his shit and actually get angry in a fight for once.

 

The last page revealed the ‘Female Knights’ or as I will call them, Bambi Slut Brigade. After previously killing Bambietta (one of their own) in a truly brilliant battle strategy, they make their appearance, but personally I don’t think they will be fighting Kenpachi. This is for two reasons first, he just finished off a weak enemy there is no need for another, and second, Kenpachi simply has better shit to do.

This chapter had a lot more content than previous chapters but was still lacking and took me no time at all the read. The wrapping up of the Gremmy fight was nice and we now have the mystery of what the happened to Yachiru.

Something I did notice with this chapter is that some of the art was truly amazing. It is clear that Kubo has been putting some serious time into his art and may be the reason why they are lacking content. Either way Kubo has come amazingly far from the drawings back in the earlier volumes.

I give this chapter a 7 out of 10, a good chapter but more content was need, but I will look forward to next week all the same.

- PandaSlayer