Here’s Tite Kubo’s Explanation For Bleach’s Plot Holes

Bleach may have ended its manga run last year, but that doesn’t meant fans have gotten all their Soul Society questions answered. Tite Kubo still has plenty of fans out there begging for answers when it comes to the series’ various plot holes. From Aizen’s nonexistent Bankai to fluctuating power levels, Bleach has come under fire at times for feeling inconsistent.

Now, Kubo himself has given an explanation for his story’s holes, and it is not what you expected.

After a lengthy hiatus, Kubo returned to headlines after the Bleach creator did an interview with Yusei Matsui of Assassination Classroom. The two manga creators talked about their tenure as artists, and it was there Kubo shed light on his flighty Bleach plotting.

During the interview, Matsui asked Kubo what he thought about the difference between wanting to draw and actually drawing. Kubo bypassed the phrase in question as his answer got off-track, but the delineation work in fans’ favor. It was there Kubo laughed and said he would come up with great ideas for Bleach and white them down on paper even before the series got serialized. However, thanks to his forgetful nature, Kubo wound up losing a lot of his planned storylines and could never think them up again.

For Bleach fans, the excuse is nice to have but feels unsatisfying overall. Shonen lovers are surely grateful to Kubo for giving them Bleach and investing more than a decade into the series. However, by the manga’s end, even the most diehard Bleach enthusiasts began to admit the ‘Thousand-Year Blood War’ arc was starting to feel disjointed. So much of the series was focused on Aizen’s tyrannt that Bleach failed to move on properly from the over-powered villain. The accumulation of various plot holes also began to grate on fans, but they still bid Ichigo Kurosaki farewell with fond memories intact.

Maybe fans will get lucky one day should Kubo’s drafts ever reappear. There’s no doubt the original plans would sell for a pretty penny, and the discovery could very well lead fans to learn just what Aizen’s ungodly Bankai could be.

You can read Viz Media’s synopsis of Bleach below:

“Ichigo Kurosaki never asked for the ability to see ghosts—he was born with the gift. When his family is attacked by a Hollow—a malevolent lost soul—Ichigo becomes a Soul Reaper, dedicating his life to protecting the innocent and helping the tortured spirits themselves find peace.”

Bleach is author Tite Kubo’s second title. Kubo made his debut with ZOMBIEPOWDER., a four-volume series for Weekly Shonen Jump. To date, Bleach has been translated into numerous languages and has also inspired an animated TV series that began airing in Japan in 2004. Beginning its serialization in 2001, Bleach is still a mainstay in the pages of Weekly Shonen Jump. In 2005, Bleach was awarded the prestigious Shogakukan Manga Award in the shonen (boys) category.