Bleach: Thousand-Year Blood War - The Calamity

Episode 7

So, Uryu is trying to fight Yhwach. With one hand? Considering the story, it makes sense. But does Uryu provide the same satisfaction as Ichigo? Not even a little. Don't get me wrong: In light of the circumstances, Uryu's doing a solid job. And again, I like it in anime and manga where the powers make no sense. Uryu and Yhwach both deliver pretty well in that regard. But unsurprisingly, a fight between the two of them lacks the punchiness that Ichigo versus Yhwach does. Uryu's cool, but he's not Ichigo. And perhaps because he's not Ichigo, he just can't bring that same level of hype. Not to make it sound like it was awful or anything, it just lacked the sauce I've usually come to love and expect from this show. I can't find it in myself to feel excited about this, and as though to mirror that, the usual sense of spectacle this anime so obviously values felt pretty absent in this fight.

Even so, nothing was as anticlimactic as the sudden end to the fight with Gerard Valkyrie, with him just becoming essentially collateral damage, killed by Yhwach. Which is to say, that shot of him turning into a skeleton and falling—which does, admittedly, look super cool—is on-screen for maybe all of two seconds, but it still leaves you thinking: “...Damn, that's it?” Not too unlike how I mentioned a few weeks ago, the Hueco Mundo arc felt like one giant way of Kubo saying, “Oops, I accidentally made Orihime too powerful;” this kind of feels like that again. “Oops, I accidentally made Gerard too powerful, and I have to wrap things up now. Hope you weren't looking forward to that fight, which gathered three of my most powerful and beloved characters.”

I don't dare get into powerscaling discourse—I know when I'm out of my depth—but I will say, Gerard going out in this way does make it feel like he, rather than Jugram, is the most powerful (non-Uryu) Sternritter, since he's the only one that couldn't be dealt with by our protagonists, even when they tried to dogpile him. Is that actually the case? Debatable—and I'm quite sure that by now, many have. Considering how important Jugram was, versus how comparatively unimportant Gerard was, it probably shouldn't feel this way, even if it's only based on fairly arbitrary reasons.

At least the imagery of him turning into a skeleton and crashing down was incredibly cool. If all else fails, you can at least count on Thousand-Year Blood War to bring the visual flair, and this week was no exception. Gerard skeleton-izing, the crumbling environments, Yhwach trying to take his powers back from Ichigo, Uryu's attacks—the visuals, as always, are ridonkulous considering this is a TV anime. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: The animation quality, oftentimes, feels downright cinematic. Even with not one, but TWO Science SARU shows this season (The Ghost in the Shell and Jaadugar), both of which look gorgeous, I want to emphasize that I'd still call this the best-looking show of the season. Everything about it is so cinematic: The visuals themselves, the animation quality, the direction, the camera angles, the environments, the action—everything looks absolutely fantastic.

Especially fresh off the heels of some of the best episodes of Thousand-Year Blood War yet (and that says A LOT!), an episode like this one that still feels half-baked is pretty disappointing. All the more so considering how close we are to the end. There are still a few loose ends to tie up, and time is drawing ever closer with only a few episodes left before this generation-defining shonen hits its end. The biggest one is Yhwach, but he's hardly the only one. Even if there are bumps in the road, this anime has brought the heat often enough that I'm still looking forward to these last few episodes. If nothing else, the stage is very much set for the focus to stay entirely on the fight against Yhwach, whether it's Uryu, Ichigo, both, or someone else entirely that delivers the finishing blow, and that's a pretty exciting prospect.

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Bleach: Thousand-Year Blood War - The Calamity is currently streaming on Hulu and Disney+.