Bleach: Thousand-Year Blood War Part 3 - The Conflict

Episode 33

There's not a long list of anime TV series that I think could get away with having episodes smashed together to be cinematic-length, and then being shown in a movie theater without anyone being able to tell that it was a TV series. But episodes like this really show off how Thousand-Year Blood War is one of those fleeting few titles. I never cease to be amazed at how jaw-droppingly gorgeous the animation looks every single week, and yet every single week it still manages to find a way to out-do itself. The animators over at Pierrot Films should be incredibly proud of themselves, because Thousand Year Blood War—especially this third season—has consistently looked absolutely top-notch. From the view of the Wahr Welt at the start, to the fight between Uryu and Renji at the end (and we'll get to that), there wasn't so much as a second in this episode that didn't look exceptionally gorgeous.

This was, suffice it to say, a strong episode. We start with that aforementioned dynamic shot of the Wahr Welt at the beginning, we get Grimmjow chasing and scuffling with Askin Nakk Le Varr, but the meat and potatoes of the episode is, of course, the fight between Uryu—who thought he killed Ichigo, but now realizes that he didn't—and Renji. While I know it's never exactly been controversial to call Renji one of the cooler characters of Bleach, I don't know that he and his voluminous red hair have ever been quite as awesome (not to mention strong!) as he was in this episode.

Furthermore, if I had to pick a single favorite moment—visually—from this beautifully animated episode, it would easily have to be the moment where, whilst using his bankai, a skeleton arm pried itself out of his skin. And I say “easily” not because it had no competition (because it had plenty of it), but because it just looked that stunning. In a series that's loaded with some of the best looking fights in the shonen genre at all, this one honestly might be the best from a visual perspective. Which is something I'm pretty sure I've already said at least once before this season (during Ichibei's fight with Yhwach, for example), so let the fact that I'm having to once again say it be testament to just how unbelievably breathtaking the animation in this series is.

It's honestly really hard to overstate just how great the direction for this series has been in general, and episodes like this one are proof of that. I know I've spent a lot of time praising the visuals in particular—and they are deserving of lots of praise—but the overall direction has also been nothing short of brilliant. The visuals, the pacing (which this series has had problems with in the past), the storyboarding, the sound design, the script, the voice acting—this was an episode that really checked off all the production boxes.

But tempting as it is to act like Renji vs Uryu was the only thing that happened this week, again: there was more to this week's episode than just that. No Aizen unfortunately, but we did get the start of a fight between Grimmjow and Le Varr (side note: I really appreciate that we have at least one antagonist who's still around who's not necessarily actively looking for a fight—even avoiding it). We got Shunsui's crew suffering some casualties. And we got some fun banter between Mayuri and Kenpachi, who at this point in the series, make for quite the unexpected duo. But I enjoyed the comedic relief of their dialogue; it gave the episode some breathing room, which was refreshing.

But again: Renji vs Uryu really was the star of the show this week—or rather, to be more specific: this was absolutely Renji's episode and everyone else was just taking up space in it, save perhaps for Uryu since he was the one fighting Renji. And the fight between these two powerhouses had everything I possibly could've wanted, short of a victory for Renji: tension, A+ visuals, spectacular new attacks, both showing off just how ridiculously strong they've become in such a short amount of time, and a speech in which Uryu, covered in dramatic shadows, explains to Renji why he lost—which most notably includes that, unlike Uryu, Renj wasn't going for a kill (although I have a hard time believing that Renji's going to die here). Uryu has definitely gone full villain-mode at this point, but it wouldn't be a shonen anime betrayal if he didn't.

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Bleach: Thousand-Year Blood War Part 3 - The Conflict is currently streaming on Hulu and Disney+.