PSA - The Return

We might have temporarily stopped functioning owing to a series of unfortunate coincidences which lead to a complete resignation regarding blogging. I apologise for not finding the indomitable will to start up again, but here you have it, I've returned. Unfortunately, finishing the unfinished coverage of the previous seasons will have to wait, but don't despair. Given a long enough amount of time, we'll have caught up on those, not to mention I'll be back blogging the new shows from this season (and resuming coverage of Bleach). Stay tuned for more!

Bleach - 548

A Song of Fire and Ice

To summarize, this chapter was basically Toshiro and Rangiku giving Bazz-B a pulping, though I doubt 'H' the Heat is actually down for the count. Firstly, Bazz-B hasn't even used any trademark Quincy abilities, and if he was struck down with Blut activated, that's something I highly doubt considering he survived a full-on incineration from Yamamoto relatively unscathed. But even then, he has yet to unveil his Vollstandig, the pinnacle of Quincy Powers granting them abilities akin to a Captain with Bankai. Though Kubo seemed to have ended the fight instantly, we can be sure this is just trolling and teasing on his behalf.

Bleach - 547

Peace from the Shadows

These past five weeks, Bleach was absent from Jump, and I eagerly awaited its return. For those out there who were disappointed, I must ask that you seriously didn't think Kubo would stuff his 5 week plan into an entire chapter? Assuming this is the final war, all the captain's bankais shall be revealed, and the opening colour pages throws into perspective that both Ichigo's blades are black. Credit to Kubo where it is deserved, though how long this will last remains to be seen in the coming chapters.

Naruto - 642

'Breakthrough'

First of all, I have to admit, Naruto's gone from garbage to gold... and in the space of one week. This chapter displayed true quality, and the deep, meaningful dialogue between Obito and Minato wasn't overdone to the point where it got lame. Actually, I felt the emotions coursing through, and I was thoroughly moved by Minato's various regrets. If I were to list all the events that occurred in this chapter, everything has gone right. Finally, there is a way to finish of Obito, once and for all. Who knows, maybe he'll be turned into a Frog Statue along the way, if Naruto plays his cards right. Still, what a turnaround.

This moment was when I christened Obito 'The Invincible'

Naruto - 641

Behind behind behind. I can only hopelessly count towards the end of my time abroad as the the reviews I need to catch up on pile with astonishing speed, not to mention arriving late. Well, I apologise for the lack of punctuality, and will proceed straight into reviewing all the latest from Naruto.

I didn't think someone could have such an awful naming convention

Naruto - 640

With Cynical returning to the land of terrorists, and Bleach being on a 5 week hiatus, I thought 'Naruto needs to be covered, and I have the spare time'. Where does this spare time come from considering I've had to delay many reviews substantially recently? Well, my summer holidays have just begun, hence I can do more productive things asides from sitting in a class listening to lessons (and catch up with everything I'm behind on). With the absence of Bleach, and One Piece, this Wednesday seemed particularly bland. I don't remember being so bored by a Weekly Jump Release (recent Yamada-kun to 7 Nin certainly didn't help), and the latest Naruto abysmally failed to alleviate my mood.

Obito trying to pierce Naruto and Sasuke's brains
(Not that it'd work on our Naruto)

Naruto - 639

THE HOKAGES ATTACK!

As you can clearly tell from the title (also, little irrelevant sidenote here. No, I have not stopped reviewing Fairy Tail, I have just been very busy recently and have not had time for a triple release. I will, however, be reviewing Fairy Tail on Friday. After that, and I apologise greatly for this, I will not be reviewing anything for 3 whole weeks due to going to a terrorist country. Anyway, on with the review), this chapter is primarily based on the Hokages vs Obito. Overall, it's a pretty awesome battle and I can't wait to see it animated. Hopefully the animator don't do what they did in Naruto vs Pain and actually decide to animate it well.

We see even more of the Juubi's incredible power, but there was one moment that got me REALLY confused. I saw Obito produce a black substance from the palms of his hands, which the third states is a mixture of at least 4 nature types, making it more powerful than any Kekke Genkai in existance. What got me confused it that, after seeing this black substance, I instantly thought it was a Bijuudama. I literally cannot distinguish this black thing (let's call it Shebango for now) from the Bijuudama. It's spherical...it's black...it kills stuff...what the hell is the difference?!?!?! Anyway, let's get into this.

So, the 2nd Hokage starts off the chapter with a pitiful attempt to "kill" Juubito.

...why didn't you do that...IN THE FIRST PLACE!?!?!?!?

Basically, this EPIC FIGHTING EDO TENSEI JUTSU YOLOSWAG is just the person summoning a ton of exploding paper bombs to create a continuous explosion. Anyone else getting a sense of deja vu? Yup, Konon did the exact same thing but with six hundred billion tag bombs. She did this in order to kill who she thought was Madara, but was actually Obito. It seems like Obito is a magnet for paper bombs eh? Anyway, this obviously doesn't kill him and he appears in the smoke unscathed.

Bleach - 546

'The Last 9 Days'

WHAT??!?!?! YOU GOTTA BE SQUIDDING ME! Bad news first, Bleach will be on hiatus for 5 weeks! Yep, that's right, 5 weeks. Well, could've been worse. Anyway, this means there'll be no Bleach for the coming weeks, meaning I'll be at the complete mercy of Naruto's crappiness, which seems to have no bounds lately. On the bright side, One Piece is beginning to heat up, with the tournament finally kicking off once Luffy gets a slice of the action. So, it looks like Bleach is having its last call, confirmed in this weeks issue of jump. The rough translation is as follows:

'After this weeks issue, Bleach will be on hiatus from Jump 35-40. Starting from jump 41 (09/09), the "1000 years Blood Ward Arc - The Separation Story"  arc will start, and will be Bleach's final arc.

Before the last battle, I will be going on a long hiatus so that I can approach the final battle fully charged and give it my absolute all. When the manga resumes, please prepare yourselves for the "1000 years Blood Ward Arc - The Separation Story".'

We can presume this arc will cover... 9 days

Bleach - 545

Blue Stripes

With each passing Bleach chapter, what's becoming more and more apparent is the fact Ichigo will never return to the human world ever again (Possibly never meeting his spiritually weak family members, or friends ever again). In hindsight, this is all really tragic. He's stepped up to a problem threatening to destroy reality, and has to make some sort of sacrifice along the way. By this point, there is no turning back, and Ichigo is destined to rest upon the mantle of greatness which no one has reached before. Nevertheless, separating the main character from his friends seems like a rather short-term plan, and I believe Tite Kubo has some sort of future arrangement to settle this issue (i.e. everyone dies, and comes to Soul Society, though that is quite a grim prospect)

Sorry Yuzu, not going to happen...

Naruto - 636+637

WHY WON'T HE DIE?!??!

First thing I'm going to do here is say sorry. Yes, I've been pretty inactive recently for multiple reasons. Unfortunately, this is only the start of my inactivity since I'll be going to Iran for 3 weeks. But hell, no-one asked me for my life story, so I'll go ahead and move on. Hopefully CrapHaxx or another writer will be taking over my reviews for those 3 weeks, but we'll just wait and see. Let's get into these...chapters.

When I read chapter 636, I honestly felt like giving up on Naruto. Why? It was the worst chapter I had ever read in my entire life. I honestly could not tell whether Kishimoto was trolling us or not, because the chapter was horrendous. So, let's talk about Obito Uchiha. First impressions? He's an absolute pansy who couldn't take the pain of getting friend-zoned and decided to vent out his rage on the entire world. It seems like even after all these years, he's still a sulky little child who can't handle pain. And yes, before you scream at me saying "BUT HE SED DATT HE NMO KARE ABOOT R1IN ND JUST WNNA TKE OVER DA WLRD!!?"?%^£$56:D" I am aware of the fact that he said this, but the flashbacks that Obito had throughout the recent chapters suggest that he lied. So why do I hate Obito? Because he is a horrendous villain who has a terrible motive and just...won't...DIE!!! That's the thing I hate most, how on earth is Obito still alive? I'm going to list all the moments where he should have died, but didn't:

- Hit by Minato's rasengan.

- Slashed by Minato's knife.

- Stabbed in the chest by Kakashi.

- ...something that Madara did...

- Half his body crushed by a rock.

- Covered in bugs by Shino.

- That weird purple crap on his arm that he said would eventually destroy his entire body.

- Billions of paper bombs.

Okay, I know that many would say that the reason he isn't dead is because of his Zetsu regenerative abilities. In my opinion, he has stolen more abilities than Madara Uchiha himself. He has absolutely NO skill. He just spams his Kamui, uses Jinchuriki for his Rikudou Jutsu, stole someone's Sharingan in order to survive being killed by billions of paper bombs, stole Nagato's Rinnegan, uses Zetsu's regenerative abilities and stole Wood release.

Here's the chapter in a nutshell. Obito becomes the Jinchuriki of the Juubi.

On a scale of 1-10, I'd give chapter 636 a one. In fact, I won't post any pictures from it because it was just that horrible. Instead, here's a picture of a duck.

Bleach - 544

Walking with Watchers

So to begin with, Uryu Ishida did fall under the extermination bracket for Gemischt Quincies, but became the lone survivor due to the fact he possesses the ability to surpass Juhabach. I have to say, while I begrudgingly accepted this explanation for Uryu's sudden power up, I was not pleased to say the least with how patchy and rushed it all seemed. Of course, Kubo is bound to reveal everything in the long run, and I'll look forwards to whatever plot twists the future may hold.

Good question, I'd like to know myself too

Fairy Tail - 337

The Golden Plains

Usually I like to come up with a lot of stuff to make fun of the chapters that I review. Unfortunately, I really couldn't come up with much for this chapter, mainly because it didn't contain any battles of such. Anyway, let's get into the chapter.

So, as expected, this arc has finally ended and this chapter is pretty much wrapping it up. Funnily enough, not a single dragon was killed throughout this entire chapter, which is ironic seeing as there was 7 dragon slayers...

Anyway, Carla says something pretty clever here:

To which I replied with:

Naruto - 636

The Current Obito (The crappy antagonist)

I'll start off by apologizing for the late post. I was actually ill yesterday, so I was unable to review this week's Naruto chapter. Fortunately, it doesn't seem like I missed a particularly good chapter, seeing as it was just as crappy as every other chapter that's been released these couple of weeks. Ironically, it seems that the Naruto chapters are getting crappier and crappier the closer they get to the Devil's number (666). Hopefully Kishimoto references the Devil's number when chapter 666 comes out...though that would be quite an optimistic statement.
Anyway, let's actually review this week's chapter.

So, as suspected, this chapter is primarily about Kakashi v. Obito and (as usual) Kakashi obviously manages to win using some stupid reference to the Will of Fire and Naruto...

Yeah. That was a FREAKING GENJUTSU

Bleach - 543

'Letters' (ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ)

Juhabach's gone Yhwachy......

Completely against my initial expectations, this chapter had almost no correlation with the previous chapter. These past few chapters haven't really been all that exciting, but make up by establishing facts, and setting a couple of hints wide open to speculation. For instance, in a miraculous turn of events, it would seem that Uryu is now the new 'King of the Quincies'. I'm sorry, but I couldn't help but draw the similar comparison between this, and a moment in Family Guy, as you can see below.

I don't have all day to gossip about these new turn of events, so onwards to the review!

Fairy Tail - 336

In Order to Live Today to the Fullest
(by smashing a gate...)

I think this chapter was pretty damn awesome, and we get to see how strong Natsu is...or how weak Lucy is. However, I got terrified at the start of this chapter. As you all know (or those who bothered to read my introduction), I prefer the Fairy Tail manga to the anime for multiple reasons. I won't go through them all in the current review as it will probably lengthen it by one-hundred thousand pages or so, but one of these reasons is due to the ridiculous "magical circles" in the anime. The reason I got terrified was that we got a sneak peak at something that looked suspiciously like one of these abominable circles...

No wonder the dragon is trying to kill her...

Before everyone starts raging at me, saying "DAT';s NOTT  A MAJIKAL SHIRKEL!!!", I know that it is actually a shield that is part of Wendy's dragon slayer powers...

Bleach - 542

The Blade is Me...

           I'm One with the Blade

Dual wielding has (unfortunately) become quite the trend lately, with the likes of SAO coming to mind. Hope it won't be as overpowered as Kirito's one was. Speaking of which, I actually found it to be the most interesting part of this week's chapter, though I'll have to wait and see before making an overall judgment. Though some people would say it was generally anti-climactic, that was expected considering the peak of the story was last chapter's revelations. Many questions are open to speculation, especially those regarding the true nature of Ichigo's new powers.

Enough to evaporate an entire sea, but these people remain unscathed....

Naruto - 635

A new wind (boring title for a boring chapter)

I'll go ahead and apologise right away. Recently, I've been pretty unfortunate with the Naruto chapters that I am expected to review. The past few chapters have had a distinct lack of content, and it's as if Kishimoto is trying to rush the series at some points, but at other points seems to slow it down so much that no new information is given in the latest chapter. Thus, this makes the recent arc for Naruto seem extremely inconsistent, and there is no balance within the events that are going on. Anyway, let's go ahead and review this chapter (whatever there is to review, that is).

So the chapter starts off with Orochimaru arriving at the aftermath of the Kages vs. Madara Uchiha (//sidenote: For those who have either heard of, or played Naruto Ultimate Ninja Storm 3, this fight turns out quite differently within the game. Within the manga, as we all know, any actions that the kages took were purely futile and Madara could have killed the 5 of them within the click of his fingers. The game? All the kages (especially Tsunade) had a HUGE power boost and were apparently able to defeat Madara. For those who had not read Naruto, this fight was pretty awesome. However, this battle drove those who had read Naruto absolutely insane. :sidenote\\) and we discover how bad of a conditions the Kages are in. Something that I did not realise until this chapter was the Tsunade...WAS SPLIT IT HALF. Anyway, after a ton of useless filler pages in which Suigetsu and Karin argue, we finally get to the chase. Turns out the "chase" wasn't so exciting after all.

Orochimaru seems to like the idea of Sasuke blowing his windmill,
if you know what I mean...

Fairy Tail - 335

The Time of Life                                                                 (which is apparently one minute)

I'll go ahead and admit it, this chapter was pretty controversial. Some thought it was epic since Gray did survive (WOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!) and others thought it was absolute bull since, once again, a random epic power which has never been mentioned in the past suddenly gets introduced once times go bad. This has happened in every shonen anime. Final Getsuga Tensho (not so much anymore, since it's actually been explained, but at the time...) and Sage Mode were never mentioned in the past and were suddenly introduced. But this one trumps the lot of them, the power was never ever mentioned in the past and they explained it within one chapter. Anyway, let's actually get into this review.

So the chapter begins off with an absolute ton of deaths, mainly to emphasise the futility of the humans against the dragons, including Macao, Chelia, Gray, Droy and probably a lot more that weren't mentioned. We then get the ridiculously short explanation for Ultear's epic power.

Master Hades: "Ultear, what's wrong with you, that's a cookery book..."

Bleach 541 – The Blade and Me 2

I'm not Zangetsu, or Bringetsu, I'm Juhagetsu...                            and your Hollow is actually Zangetsu...

First up, this chapter continues to play off the precedent set at the end of last chapter. Zangetsu is not Zangetsu, he is in fact… Juhabach from 1000 years ago, and is somehow the manifestation of Ichigo’s latent Quincy powers. Ichigo begins to see the links between things he previously dismissed, as well as how conclusive facts begin to stack themselves neatly. Meanwhile, having been exposed as an impostor, Juhagetsu is subjected to an onslaught of questions concerning his motives, and asked to explain everything. Rightly so, considering his identity has been revealed as that of the villain who overran Soul Society, and more importantly, the man behind Masaki’s death.

Congratulations, Captain Obvious

Naruto - 634

Team 7 kick some ass (Poor Sai gets left out...)

I'll admit, as the chapters go by, Sakura becomes more and more of a badass. Oh sorry, did I say badass? I meant "Tsunade". Seriously, with this chapter it becomes pretty evident that Kishimoto is really rushing through Naruto, and everything has suddenly become super fast.
I'll start off by saying this, Sasuke and Naruto have a couple of differences to Jiraiya and Orochimaru (e.g. Naruto has 9-tails, Sasuke has everything Orochimaru desired to have etc.). But Sakura? She's almost an EXACT copy of Tsunade! Seriously, she suddenly activated the Byakugou, learnt how to summon slugs and use Katsuyu's healing ability within what feels like approximately 15 minutes or so.

So let's begin actually reviewing the chapter.

"No, this is Patrick!"