Bleach: Thousand-Year Blood War has been a glorious return for the once extremely popular franchise, bringing incredible animation, revamped storytelling, and entirely new scenes that have enhanced the story further. However, the series is still regarded as poor quality to some fans, and the true reason why has to do with Bleach's original big villain, Sosuke Aizen.

Aizen is, of course, the mastermind behind most of the bad things that happened in Bleach. He arranged for Rukia to be captured and executed, and later kidnapped Orihime to make use of her unique powers. He created the Espada, some of the deadliest and most iconic enemies in the entire Bleach canon, and had a plan that shook the very foundations of Bleach's world. Aizen's divine aspirations saw him gain tremendous power, and it took a great sacrifice from Ichigo to finally bring him down. Yet even then, Aizen wasn't dead and gone; now a functionally immortal being, Aizen was merely imprisoned.

Thousand-Year Blood War's Villain Can't Live Up to Aizen

Yhwach, Despite His Power, Will Never Be as Compelling as Aizen Was

When the Bleach manga first reached the Thousand-Year Blood War arc, it was regarded rather poorly by fans, who felt that the pacing and writing of the story were no good. The story starts off dragging quite slowly, but as it draws closer to the end, it rushes through the scenes that should've been the most important, and ultimately delivers an ending that many found unsatisfying. A lot of complaints tie back to the arc's major villain, Yhwach, the King of the Quincy. Yhwach's laundry list of superpowers and tremendous strength made him a "boring" villain for many fans.

Yhwach has a very serious personality, making him the kind of no-nonsense villain who kills his own subordinates for failing him. While he has a detailed and intricate plan, he's not exactly a genius mastermind with dozens of fall-back options the way Aizen was. He also only had a direct relationship with one major character, that being Head Captain Yamamoto, who dies quite early in the arc. He comes out of nowhere with little foreshadowing, takes over the plot, and his presence is the driving force for the rest of the story. Unfortunately, though, he's just not that interesting to watch.

Aizen, on the other hand, had a flare for the dramatic, faking his own murder at the beginning of the Soul Society arc. As a former Soul Reaper, Aizen had relationships with many of the newly introduced Soul Reaper characters, and so the reveal of his betrayal hit them very hard. Even when his plan to have Rukia executed failed, he was still able to extract the Hogyoku and secure his true goal, effectively defeating the entire Soul Society as he fled with his prize to Hueco Mundo. Ichigo has a reason to hold a personal grudge against Aizen, and that makes their conflict compelling.

Yhwach is a Disappointing Final Villain for Bleach

While Yhwach's Story is Good, His Character Just Isn't

The Thousand-Year Blood War arc does have a lot of great things about it. The deep exploration of the Quincy and their long-running conflict with the Soul Society, Uryu's struggles with who he should side with, and the Soul Society's dark past coming back to haunt them are all great elements, to name just a few. However, so much of the plot is driven by Yhwach, and he is so central to what's going on, that the arc as a whole is extremely dependent on his character, and, unfortunately, he's just a rather flat, evil man.

Yhwach's goal of creating a world without distinction between life and death is an interesting one, but it isn't explored as thoroughly as it should have been. Is there some great loss that drives him to do this? While it initially seems like he might be outraged over the fate of his father, the Soul King, he clearly doesn't care that much about him, since he absorbs him and his power later in the arc. And although many other Quincy hold a grudge against the Soul Reapers, Yhwach doesn't seem all that concerned about them in particular, except as obstacles to his plan.

Worse still is how Yhwach is finally defeated. Out of nowhere, Ichigo and Uryu's fathers appear in the Quincy Realm, turning over a special arrow that wasn't really foreshadowed in any way to Uryu. This arrow possesses the ability to turn off Yhwach's powers very briefly, and so Uryu uses it to provide Ichigo with the opportunity to kill Yhwach for good. It's all a very convenient way for the series to end, what most might call a Deus Ex Machina. This makes the ending unsatisfying, and leaves fans wondering just what Ichigo would've done if that arrow hadn't suddenly appeared.

The Thousand-Year Blood War Anime Has A Lot of Work to Do

The Anime Must Fix the Series' Ending For Good

Bleach is currently torn between remaining faithful to the manga and rewriting the ending to make it more satisfying. It's not clear just how that might play out right now, but Ichigo and Uryu's fathers have made their appearance, suggesting that things are still on track for the manga ending. To be fair, the anime has done a lot to enhance Yhwach's character, providing him with more backstory and some insight into why he is the way he is, but he still remains a far less compelling villain than Aizen was.

Thousand-Year Blood War also includes many other villain characters who are very compelling, like Haschwalth and Bazz-B, so it's not as if the arc is completely devoid of value. It's just Yhwach's inability to match up to the incredible villain that was Aizen that makes everything seem a little less interesting than it should be. The fact that Aizen plays a role in Yhwach's eventual defeat does make things exciting, but Yhwach himself still just feels... boring. As a final villain, Yhwach never hits the highs that Aizen's era did, and that explains some of the hate Bleach: Thousand-Year Blood War gets.