With the previous chapters building upon a possible transition into hollow-like characteristics for Ichigo, I couldn’t help but notice the current appearance of his mask. There have been subtle changes to its pattern over the course of the manga, a gradual thickening and/or addition of the red streaks to cover a larger area. Perhaps this is indicative of Ichigo’s growing assimilation with his Hollow.

Now that Ishida has cleared the stage of its secondary players, we can finally get on with the main spectacle: Ichigo vs Ulquiorra. Boasting an awesome two-page spread of Vizard Ichigo, no doubt the best visual representation of his hollowification yet, and Ulquiorra spearing through the ceiling of the dome to go resurrección, I can hardly wait for the next chapter.

More insight on Nnoitra before his death. Ichigo’s task is seemingly done, Kenpachi tells him to take Inoue back and leave the rest of the battle to the captains. But soon after, Stark arrives to ‘escort’ Inoue to Aizen, who then informs the captains and ryoka in Hueco Mundo of his plan to destroy Karakura Town and make the King’s Key. By capturing Inoue, he has succeeded in luring four captains to Hueco Mundo and sealed them in, thereby halving the combat force of Soul Society. Aizen’s entrance in Karakura is greeted by the remaining captains and vice-captains of Soul Society who have gathered to defeat him. Karakura Town has also been replaced by a replica to avoid heavy damage and casualties when the captains fight. In response, Aizen brings along the top three Espada (Stark, Barragan and Halibel) into the battle, leaving Ulquiorra in charge of Las Noches, looking forward to a rematch with Ichigo.

Some of the faces looked somewhat weird in this episode but no matter. Apparently, a filler segment will be up next and hopefully it won’t last too long. I’m highly anticipating the Pendulum arc.

Set in a post-apocalytic future, Pale Cocoon is a short OVA which focuses on Ura and his female companion, Rika, who both work at the Bureau of Records Excavation. Their task involves decoding archives of the Earth’s history in an effort to know more about the planet before its destruction. While Ura remains keen on discovering new articles, Rika has been spending most of her time lying idle in the upper levels of the Gap.

Over time, the Bureau has become deserted, many discouraged or disappointed perhaps with the historical records of human folly, which had cost them their original home world. Riko and Ura’s male colleague both serve as a foil to the main character, and perhaps representative of the stance that the rest of the surviving humans have taken: that it’s better not to know. On the other hand, Ura is almost obsessed with the past, immersing himself in the images of items that no longer existed, or at least were believed to no longer exist.

Both Ura and Riko want an escape from the mundane and inorganic environment that they lived in however Riko chooses to find peace in ignorance. Ura is willing to believe in the world that once was and in his final decoding of a visual and audio archive, he goes with the spur of the moment and soars to the top for a glimpse of the ’sky’.

The last few moments were rather unique as it seemed that both characters encountered a ‘fact’ that reinforced their own views on the situation. Yoko’s last words of a ‘rusted earth’ appeared to strengthen Riko’s belief that there was no going back; Ura seeing a blue Earth gave hope that the beautiful images from the archives were a reality.

Pale Cocoon has quite a thoughtful story although, with the length of 25 minutes, I would’ve preferred more insight on the living conditions of the Gap or more character introspection. Nevertheless, the visuals in this anime are crisp and beautiful, which makes this OVA worth at least one watch.

Final rating: 7.8/10

With Alucard stuck in dreamland with the spirit of his Jackal, the Major launches a full assault on London, instructing Zorin to take down the main headquarters of Hellsing. Integra is seen with Penwood, lending him mental support and spurs the latter to stand his ground as his officers do their best to consolidate their military resources against the invasion of Millennium’s undead.

On the way back to the Hellsing mansion to regroup, Integra and Walter are stalled by the Captain, to which Walter decides to hold him off to allow Integra time to return on her own. However, the undead soldiers find her and she crashes her car into a post. Integra’s haughty last stand of defence is interrupted by Alexander Anderson and the army of Iscariot in his command. Among them are Heinkel and Yumie. The final scene has Anderson leading the Iscariot to battle with the Nazi vampires.

I can’t say I enjoyed this episode as much as the previous installments but then again, the events of Hellsing Ultimate V are really more of a prelude to the upcoming fights. The animation is noticeably more fluid now that Madhouse is in charge. Anderson is awesome as always, Wakamoto Norio’s voice-acting never fails to deliver and his Anderson embodies all the fanatic and relentless qualities of the character.

Manga: Gantz ガンツ
Mangaka: Oku Hiroya 奥浩哉
Volumes: 20
Chapters: 237
Overview: Gantz follows the deaths of two high school students, Masaru Katou and Kurono Kei, who are hit by a train after they rescue a homeless man from the tracks, into a special room with a black sphere. Thereafter, together with other people who have died before, they are forced to go on alien-hunting missions in order to preserve their ‘new’ lives.

Story
I think the most unique aspect of Gantz is how ordinary the characters appear initially, despite being tossed into a situation where they’ve to kill to survive. They are scared and confused, selfish and often die in very unheroic ways. Fact is, not everyone turns into a hero overnight and not everyone can fight effectively, especially on their first time, regardless of how well-equipped they are. Beneath the high level of violence and action, there’s something psychologically horrific in the way life and death seem inconsequential in the world of Gantz.

Characters
Very few characters are likable or sympathetic in the beginning, even Katou seems to try too hard sometimes. And I think that’s Oku Hiroya’s intent. This makes their development interesting, particularly Kurono, who is forced to mature and discard his callous attitude in response to the brutality he experiences in Gantz. He’s actually one of the few heroes I’ve come across who don’t start out with an inherent predisposition to care about others.

Art
Art is fairly simplistic and clean although there’s more attention to detail in the backgrounds as the manga progresses. In general, Oku Hiroya’s art is adequate however his faces and expressions are overly simple. As such it’s sometimes difficult to tell what the character is feeling in the absence of thought bubbles and occasionally takes away from the emotional potential that could’ve been generated from a scene. There’s slightly more detail in facial expressions in the later volumes but they still can’t fully convey the more complex emotions in the characters. Other than that, Oku is quite adept at depicting dynamic action sequences and perspectives.

Final rating: 8/10

The volume to conclude the 1st Phase of Gantz left a lot of questions unanswered, especially concerning the vampires. Why are they after Gantz? This volume had a few lighter moments thanks to Kurono’s amnesia, which resulted in episodes of extreme confusion and a struggle to come to grips with the fact that he was in trouble for reasons he didn’t understand. By the time the action goes full swing with the vampires, the body count starts and we get three significant deaths.

The problem with Kurono Akira is that we know so little about him that it’s difficult to fully invest in his character. He seems to be a good person in general although the circumstances of his vampiric nature remains unknown. From previous chapters, the brothers seemed somewhat distant possibly due to their parents’ show of favoritism for Akira so it was nice to know that they did, in dire situations, care about the other: (i) Akira risked his life to inform Kurono about the vampires and their weakness, (ii) Kurono’s look of anguish when he saw Akira’s head.

And just when I was starting to like Izumi a little, he’s killed. In his last conversation with Kurono, he almost seemed upset that the latter couldn’t remember him. Izumi himself was still struggling with his memory loss and in an amusing exchange with Nishi, states that no matter how hard he tries to remember he has absolutely no recollection of Nishi. It’s an interesting parallel; memories can sometimes be proof that one was alive. Furthermore, Nishi’s decision to contact the other Gantz members when Izumi was attacked by the vampires doesn’t really reflect the person he was when we first see him in the Onion alien mission. Was he hoping that the others would come to Izumi’s aid? Or was he informing them so that he wouldn’t be solely blamed for not doing anything? But then again, he could’ve just feigned ignorance since no one knew he was with Izumi anyway. Moreover, the fact that he was hanging out with Izumi suggests that they might have been team mates rather than mere acquaintances.

Kurono’s death was unexpected. He actually recovered his memories in the last fight and the way he stormed out of his room to face the vampires head-on was quite brilliant. The two remaining vampires have also managed to enter the Gantz room by grabbing a member of the Gantz team during the transfer, but their intentions are unclear. For now, Katou has decided to achieve 100 points to revive Kurono.

With a good number of the Gantz fighters achieving 100 points, the overall death toll for this mission ended up at a minimum and we have three revivals.

Very happy to see Katou return, if only because he can be reunited with his younger brother. I was dreading some disastrous find when Katou returned to their apartment but thankfully, his brother is alive and well. Come to think about it, Katou’s fate was almost similar to Sakurai’s, where the thought of returning to a loved one hence the need to survive failed to allow them to overcome their opponent.

And Nishi is back! I thought it was a good decision on Kurono’s part to not bring back Kishimoto. Obviously, he loved her but reviving her alone would be a display of ingratitude to Sei who died protecting him. Nishi’s return may or may not help the team but there’s no doubt that his knowledge could be useful in figuring out why the rules have changed. Interestingly, he knows Izumi.

Kurono is persuaded to opt for freedom and his memories of Gantz are erased. Somehow, I think one can never be free of Gantz, as was the case with Izumi. Although he no longer remembers the missions or his death, Kurono doesn’t go back to the selfish and apathetic youth that he was in the beginning of the manga. He’s different, suggesting that the experience which his mind and body went through remains, just that the ‘data’ has been removed. Furthermore, Gantz doesn’t seem to perform any ‘after care’ to go with the memory erasure. This would ultimately lead him back to Tae, and inevitably, Gantz. You gotta wonder if the sloppy way Gantz in which functions in his offer of freedom is just a coy method of leading freed fighters back to that giant, black ball.

This is the very reason why I’m so interested in Ichigo vs Ulquiorra. Being in Hueco Mundo, where the Hollows thrive, Ichigo should be experiencing some growth in his strength considering that his current source of power comes from his Hollow side. If Chad realized his offensive strength in this place thanks to his Hollow-like arm, would it be too much to ask for an appearance by Shirosaki?

And then there is Ulquiorra. While he likes his mind games and such, I just can’t help but notice his almost child-like curiosity of that little thing known as ‘emotion’. He clearly didn’t understand the camaraderie that defined the group of ‘fools’ that infiltrated Hueco Mundo to save Inoue, nor the latter’s emotional response to that attempt. And not so much because he’s lacking in rationality as the fact that he has an extremely matter-of-fact approach.

If the beginning of this chapter was supposed to provide some foreboding to the character of Inoue, I’m not intrigued. After her miserable showing for the past 100 chapters or so, I fail to see the merit in her character other than serving as a plot device.

I’m still wondering where Hoi Hoi is. A panda in the latest Gantz team is truly one of those epic WTFs, not to mention its attachment to Izumi, of all people.

The Oni aliens are quite the different target compared with its predecessors. For one, they can assume human form and thus blend well into society with no need to hide in deserted apartments or dinosaur displays. With each mission, the alien targets also show a progressively higher level of intelligence and perspective, and as usual Gantz is on the offensive side of the battle. Lack of insight on Gantz’s motivations is getting a bit frustrating.

Kurono’s development into the eventual leader and hero of Gantz has been an interesting one. Perhaps there was some truth in some of the earlier volumes where he feels that the world of Gantz is where he belongs to and be a hero. Sure, it reflected his egoistic nature in the beginning but his encounter with Gantz has brutally forced out his will to survive, knock him out of his own cynicism and opened his eyes to the value of human life. IMO Kurono has always been a beast of a fighter, made evident in his very first mission with the Onion alien, but lacked all the essential prerequisites of a hero. It’s almost paradoxical that he’s consciously modeling himself after Katou, who has all his life aspired to be like Kurono.

Now that Kurono has inflicted more damage on the Lightning Oni than Izumi could ever think of, I guess this can only mean more blows to Izumi’s pride, or will there be gradual acceptance that Kurono is quite simply the better Gantz fighter? Well whichever it is, it was nice to see them put up a united front at the end.

I’ve been disappointed in the animation standard of Bleach lately, they seem to be relying heavily on still frames instead of fluidly animating the fights. And this episode isn’t any different. The revelation of Kenpachi’s kendo skills didn’t really have any kind of impact, but then again, it was the same in the manga. That said, I really enjoyed the focus on Nnoitra here. Nnoitra’s past with Nel was one of the more interesting albeit tragic among the Espada. The BGM and atmosphere in Nnoitra’s final moments were well-executed.