What did you think of Aizen's battle against the combined forces of the Gotei 13 and the Vizard? When did he switch with Hinamori? Let me know your thoughts!

I love the irony that despite Omaeda being portrayed as a large and clumsy oaf, his stealth skills are so good he literally disappears from the story and no one ever notices. Truly a Captain in the making for his meta-levels of stealth

This is my favorite fight in the entire manga. Aizen is so iconic. The scene with Hinamori was just brutal, so much it was a little unsettling reading it.

48:47 concerning Aizen's shikai; it was stated that you had to withness the moment of it's release once to be put under hypnosis. After that the hypnosis reasserts itself whenever Aizen actives his shikai again. This is the key. Shinji is asking when Aizen actived his shikai because he's worried that Ichigo was there when it happened. Aizen's response is clear: his shikai was already active when they all arrived in FKT

At least in my head, it's very likely Ichigo had been screaming at the top of his lungs for some time at the captains to get their attention. It was only because he had lost his voice to the shock of Hinamori getting stabbed that it took him a moment to muster the words to scream at them again. A little meta, but I wouldn't be surprised if Kubo came out and said that we readers were under Kyoka Suigetsu's effects too during the fight and weren't allowed to see Ichigo screaming either until it was too late. 😅

This was the battle that battle that made me realize how much of a beast Yamamoto was. Granted, literally everyone there except for maybe Sanji was either tuckered out or injured from their previous battles, as in their battles just ended before they went up against Aizen, but Aizen was still able to solo all of them. Even with that, he didn't feel confident facing off against Yamamoto alone before the Hogyoku finally fused with him.

I always took Aizen’s use of Kyoka suigetsu was ended to make it seem as if WE the audience were also under the influence of its total hypnosis in an attempt to break the fourth wall.

I laughed so hard at Rose not looking at the camera, I didn't catch that detail before lmao

This might have been the hardest anyone has ever styled on anyone in the history of the Bleach universe. This fight was just Aizen saucing on everyone.

This fight put Aizen’s true strength into perspective. Until this moment the captains had assumed his strength comes from the abilities of his zanpaktou. But as Gin states, Aizen himself is power

As a Kyoraku fan it was heartbreaking seeing him get negged with two other captains in a SINGLE strike…

Whether Aizen-sama wins or loses, it's all part of the plan. He activates Kyoka Suigetsu before the battle even begins, granting the foolish opponent an illusion of victory

I personally think Aizen switched up at the last moment, just before Hitsugaya's attack. He did get surprised by Toshiro's ice, then negated Soifon's Shikai, got stabbed by Shunsui and did see Shinji's shikai. But arguments also work against this point- Aizen showed no signs of damage; unless he used Kyoka Suigetsu to purposely make himself appear that way lol. But none of the other Captain's attacks are visible on Momo other than Toshiro's, which means that she couldn't have gotten hit by all of them. She wouldn't even make it out alive with that many amount of blows. Ichigo also would've intervened or gotten suspicious quicker, even at high speed duels. But I agree that Ichigo was probably yelling at them to stop, but KS restrained their senses from hearing him sooner. Amazing analysis, Tommo!

This fight is why Aizen is the defacto Bleach villian. Yhwach has such great divine feats and power to himself, but in this moment Aizen became the GOAT among all fictional villians

I think you misunderstand a few things about Kyoka Suigetsu. As we learn later, it is either on or off and when it is on, its affects everyone under its influence. So, while its on, Aizen controls what everyone sees and hears from Ichigo. He could be screaming his head off and they would never know if Aizen doesn't want them to. The moment they hear Ichigo screaming is the moment Aizen turned Kyoka Suigetsu off. That is why they could now see Momo and hear Ichigo. You also asked how Shinji immediately know where Aizen was. Remember the moment they can see Momo is when Kyoka Suigetsu is off, which means he can now feels Aizen's real power and real location. As for when did Aizen make the switch? Who knows. It is entirely reasonable he could have made the switch at ANY time after Ichigo shows up. Cause we are never told if we are seeing what Ichigo is seeing, or what everyone else thinks they are seeing.

It makes sense Gin feels that way about Aizen, just because he hates him doesn't mean he doesn't acknowledge how absurdly powerful he is and respect that.

This is the moment that cemented Aizen as one of the most iconic villains in all of manga and anime. Truly a fantastic scene and one of Aizen's best displays of both his power and twisted personality.

Definitely feel like Shunsui should have been able to get through this arc standing, even if badly injured. Would have been great for him to work together with Kisuke, Isshin, and Yoruichi (like old times!!)

Honestly on the "how did Aizen suffer no damage from Soi Fon and Shunsui"? before he switched with Momo... i think he just pulled a Kenpachi against SS Ichigo where their blades hit him but did no damage. Due to his crazy reiatsu. And he just illusioned up some fake damage to make them feel over confident. And about your "why didnt gin help them?" Gin explained that. He knew Aizen had Kyoka suigetsu going the whole time. And its only weakness was to touch it when it was deactivated. Which Aizen didnt do until later.

My head-canon on why Rose was facing the other way is that he was expecting Aizen to attack them from behind, so he was trying to watch their backs. Probably just copium 😅

What an absolutely incredible breakdown and analysis. 47:00 It's truly one of the greatest moments in bleach

This fight was basically Aizen's morning exercise. He could have killed them all, but decided to let them live for entertainment purposes

One of the top 5 defining moments of Bleach for me. This is what certified Aizen as one of the best villains of all time.

Yeah shunsui been put down by one hit was weird, and this also proves the fact that kubo forshardowing for tybw was limited especially his bankai, seriously he had 4 holes plus the massive hole to the abdomen and still was fast enough to dodge and hit lille

I'd have to imagine the reason Unohana did not assist the Captains and Vizards in the battle against Aizen because she already assumed most, if not everyone, would be defeated by him, and should she also fall there would be no one available to heal the wounded. Of course, this is ignoring hindsight that she's a Kenpachi and should theoretically be stronger than him. Either Aizen was already aware of her past and still didn't feel threatened by her since she'd already been affected by Kyoka Suigetsu or Yamamoto was not confident she could beat him in a fight and ordered her to abstain from the battle. He gave her that exact order when the Quincies first invaded the Seireitei.

It's worth noting that aizen can use kido based illusions like we see in turn back the pendulum which makes it possible he was simply using those to hide the switch from ichigo.

I highly disagree that the Espada were pointless. The Soul Reapers were truly tested and in a lot of the fights their own hope was upon thin ice. Just because most of the cast showed up to fight Aizen doesn't mean they aren't pushing themselves past exhaustion, they want to be here to take him down even if they are aching and worn down.

When hitsugaya goes crazy I wouldn’t have been surprised if a hollow hole appeared in his chest. With all the rage and despair

Most likely the real answer is that Aizen was subtle. Ichigo saw the attacks barely miss him, because Aizen purposely barely dodged them. Everyone else saw them connect but that’s why Ichigo doesn’t react.

I love that komamura's first one on one interaction with ichigo was calming him down and thanking him, I just think it's a sweet moment

I love watching your battle analysis videos! Keep it up brother and happy holidays to you and your wife!

"It breaks my brain trying to think about it" Yeah, that's Perfect Hypnosis for ya', you are under its spell!!!

The switch has been debated for years. The biggest problem is we simply don't have enough info. We never get to see Ichigo's perspective as like everyone else we as the reader/watcher are also affected by his ability, which is the point. It is completely possible that Aizen has used his ability from the start. Did any of our captains even fight or was it all an illusion and they just stood there and got taken down in moments via Aizen as he waited for a the perfect chance to place Hinamori to receive that last blow. I doubt Kubo will ever give a clear answer on what actually happened here. For me, I like it as it is. All we know for sure is that She was stabbed and he was never hit once the entire fight. As for any of the attacks we saw, did any of that happen as it was presented, or were we all duped by the man.

Note: Aizen couldn't use his illusions on Ichigo's dad (lsshin) and had to fight him normally. Isshin then made fun of Aizen. He said Aizen was "slowing down" and getting weaker during their fight. So there is a real limit to Aizen's power when he can't use illusions.

I remember reading/watching a line from toshiro saying to aizen “you don’t look like you wanna fight us” or something like that and I believe that’s when aizen did the switch and only came in to take out the captains and the vizards and for the Ichigo part maybe ichigo was just too stunned to speak, and he was actually speaking at first saying stuff like wait a minute, wait, wait and all that building up to him yelling at them when they defeated hinamori and remember they are all moving pretty fast so he didn’t have enough time to really react and stop them idk just what I think happened

I’ve yet to see a feat as impressive in all of bleach. And had aizen not wanted to talk so much and mess with people he could have literally deleted the gotei 13 in under a minute lol. Even ichigo would have lost had aizen not wanted to have so much conversation. The moment he tapped ichigos chest could have just been a deletion lol.

39:20 could it be that Aizen made all the captain's unaware of Ichigo yelleing at them until it was "too late"? Meaning that what Kubo drawn was the perception of the captains of Ichigo while in real life he was warning them?

All this fight is a big hole about when the illusion started but imo it's so artistic that i can accept it. The only thing i mind is that as Aizen controls all five senses, Reiatsu sensing is not one of them and with so enormus reiatsu, i can't understand that some of the old captains as Kyoraku (TIGHT TIGHT TIGHT), SInji etc don't use this sense to avoid the Suigetsus' control. Anyway very dynamic and artistic fight.

Been waiting for this one!

The most chilling aspect of the Captain's defeat is Aizen deliberately sparing them so they can see the results of their failure, the destruction of Karakura and massacre of the townspeople as he continues on to the next phase of his plan. Only Ichigo and Kisuke stood against a destructive bloodbath made worse by the fact that humans would not have even known what's going on at all.

I just think Ichigo was shocked and confused that they were fighting Momo, and didn't say anything till it was to late. I thought the swap was made at the start.

I always thought that Aizen used Kyoka Suigetsu to prevent the Shinigami from hearing it which was combined with an incredible speed of it all and Ichigo's shock.

I always love rewatching these scenes and new people’s reactions to it. After doing nothing for hundreds of episodes/chapters, Aizen throws down even harder than he did in the Soul Society arc till the very end. And it’s an absolute spectacle

Shunsui kyoraku got a full abilities he never used plus Yamamoto also. It was setup for ichgo to beat him bro

Great video man. Aizen was so awesome, definitely my favorite character.

Regarding the switch, I think it's a combination of things moving faster than you'd think they were and Ichigo being too dumbfounded by what's happening. I think he was simply so taken aback by everyone suddenly and brutally attacking Momo like that that it took a moment for him to actually speak up.

EXACTLY TOMMO it was the hatred for Aizen that called the plans to go off rails & i like to think that the captains took turns so everybody could try & get they lick back bc everyone felt they had a dog in the fight

You forgot to title this video as a battle analysis

Honestly, i think aizen was useing it slightly the entire fight, any attacks landing only appeared to land as he barely dodged till he litersly had to swap last minute. Like soifons attacks never landed only appeared to. Like swinging wide. So when he noticed shinji he last minute swaped, moving just that fast.

I can't unsee Rose's arrogance 😂😂😂 He really thought he was HIM, turning his back to Aizen of all people is a death wish and a half!

My theory for why Ichigo didn't notice the switch is because of 2 things, the Ice blocking his field of vision & that Ichigo struggles with sensing Reiatsu in someone espcially someone he's unfamiliar with e.g. Momo I doubt Ichigo even knows she exists. Aizen let himself be caught by the Ice (because he's too fast to be caught so easy) so as to block Ichigo's vision & then made the switch, I don't believe he was there when Shunsui stabbed him he had already switched places by then (maybe you could say the Hogyoku healed him since it does give him healing powers). With Ichigo's lack of spiritual awareness (showcased many times he can't sense spiritual power very well) & that Ichigo isn't the smartest character he likely didn't notice anything wrong until it was too late.

This is when everyone knew it was Momo, and lied and pretended they saw Aizen.... Classic

I always find it weird that some people believe the whole fight was an illusion from the start. I mean it makes sense but I fell like the point of the fight is to showcase how much of a problem Aizen is even without KS, which is why Gin is pointing it out in the voice over. And I mean Kyoraku coming out of Aizen's shadow should be proof that Aizen was there at least on that moment since I don't believe a fake shadow would activate the ability. If KS fooled even Zanpakuto abilities than it would truly be busted as hell and Aizen wouldn't even need the Hogyoku lol

That fight alone should've been enough proof of why Aizen is an iconic and stands among the top tier anime villains in history. This dude alone created the whole bleach story

I think the reason the Gotei 13 doesn't do well against Aizen is ingrained into their organization. Fights are typically 1v1 and interrupting is seen as gauche. Also, many of their Zanpakuto abilities don't work well in concert with each other. And I doubt there are interdivisional synergy meetings as every division is a separate and distinct entity. Plus the Vizards are still a wild card in their eyes despite the common enemy.

Its stupid how jushiro was one shotted and taken out of the rest of the arc , we could have gotten a interesting conversation beyween him and aizen . In case you guys forgot , whne aizen , gin and touse left the soul society , jushior approached aizen and asked him what hisnplan was , and aizen actuallu got serious , before that , he was being a troll to everybody who confronted him , i was expecting a payoff from thag brief talk between the two . Im not saying jushiro would have been a match for him , just wanted to see them talk . P.S . I wandered for years , why the fuck did ichigo wait until after the captains mauled momo to say something, but then i realized that aizen most likley used his kyoka suigestu to mess with their hearing .

Awesome fight

14:27 This is when Aizen should have used Black Coffin on Sajin again 😅

I think the only time Aizen has a chance to switch himself with hinamori is immediately after his arm is frozen, he triggers the illusion, breaks himself free dodging the first strike, and between the first and second strike, he's already pulled Hinamori from the barrier and places her In the ice after the second strike just before Toshiro strikes from behind.

I think Aizen may have been tampering with the captains sense of hearing. Maybe he just stopped them from hearing Ichigo’s screams until the last second as a final F you to the Gotei 13

Should do a what if video if the old man did kill everyone in the battle and who would be the new head captain

For me I think Aizen activated his shikai but in standby leaving everything normal when Shinji stands up to battle Aizen. They show a panel where he mentions not using his sword. Aizen starts using Kyoka Suigetsu before flexing away Soi Fon's shikai I think. This would be the moment allowing him the chance to flash step to go grab Hinamori. Aizen is faster than Ichigo can follow as shown when he touched him like a creeper when they fought. At distance it would be very easy for Ichigo to miss a quick flash way over to Hinamori's location. Plus the kido cube would obscure Ichigo's vision like sunglasses indoors. Hinamori under Aizen's spell, then races to support the others as the shinigami squad believes Aizen just got stabbed by Kyoraku. Ichigo wouldn't've had any suspicions with Hinamori racing to the group. This would place Hinamori in the spot she needs to be in to get stabbed as her and Toshiro meet. Aizen chills in the cube until the reveal, and this is where Ichigo is like oh fuck shit guys we got played!

Now this is my favorite battle my goat vs EVERYONE

The soul society has been dealing with hollows for so long and Aizen took the Arancar into a fight with a huge disadvantage Most of them had never even seen a soul reaper before 😭

As always, while I may totally and absolutely disagree with your take, I love and absolutely respect your knowledge and thoughts on potential twists to the story. 🙂

8:24 MELEE MENTIONED RAHHHHH

Your videos butter My biscuits thank you

TOSEN WAS A TRAGIC CHARACTER FOR SURE

39:36 What if Ichigo's reaction was an illusion conjured by Aizen? What if Ichigo was actually trying to warn them but all they saw was him not reacting?

As you guys said. if he wasnt letting them hear ichigo, we as reader see ichigo start talking than yelling.. so it safe to say he wasnt yelling before..since than he would yell not start talking than yelling..you see him ask... "What are you guys" in silently than yells...

Need to preface this by acknowledging that I have never really liked Aizen as a character and haven't considered him a top tier villain since I was a teenager, but his fight does make him look pretty good. As for when he switches I have always assumed it was when he looks back at what we assume to be Hitsugaya's ice that catches his arm, but is actually at Hinamori as it was the first moment where Ichigo's vision of him may have been obscured enough to get away with it. That is unless you believe what I do and that Aizen had always had Ichigo under his hypnosis and simply continued to play it off that he wasn't, in which case he simply dropped the illusion for Ichigo a few moments before he did do for everyone else.

42:40 thats a really good theory

the switch with Aizen and Momo would have happend after Soifon's attacks and Hitsugya's attack, likely after he broke out of the ice. While he could surpress Soifon's shikan, Momo would be super dead. On your note of Aizen's thought bubble, it could be as a result of Ichigo not being under his sword influence and him concerened over an attack by him.

I think it's great for his character for kyouraku to be 'taken out' Make the enemy believe you're out of the battle and no longer needs to plan for you,then strike when it's not expected. Perfect for what we've seen him doing continually

Aizen really had it out for Hitsugaya. I always wondered why he seemed to go so far out of his way to fuck with him specifically.

This is my favorite fight in all of bleach.

Now we want ichigo vs ulquiorra analysis.

In my head canon this entire fight was an illusion controlled by Aizen.

To be honest this was my favorite Aizen fight Aizen vs Ichigo and the Gotei 13 it also submitted Aizen as my Favorite Character of All Time because think of it only a few individuals were even capable of standing a chance it was either you were stronger than him or you were significantly below him what are your thoughts on this Mrtommo2304?

Shower thought. How would Aizen vs the Schutzstaffel go down? Say for example he ascends to Butterflaizen and the Quincies take the opportunity to invade Soul Society when the captains are distracted protecting Karakura Town. Yywach makes it up to the royal palace with his guards in tow and Aizen arrives not long after. What does that showdown look like?

Perhaps aizen secretly activated his bankai giving him the ability to affect ichigo without him having to see his shikai release because he has to have bankai the thing is the only thing we know about it is that it has to be a stronger version of shikai in some way even if we don't know what it actually does we know that it affects ones senses Perhaps perception of time and space idk

I love Shinji as a character and felt he was given a poor hand, but I also feel that applies to a lot of characters in Bleach. In terms of how Shinji could have been used in the final arc I would have preferred if Shinji was the character who defeated three Stern Ritter in the second invasion over Byakuya. Shinji's bankai ability to reverse perceptions of allies and enemies on everyone in its AOE lends itself better to Shinji defeating three Stern Ritter and still give the Stern Ritter a great showing. After Shinji recovered from his injuries from Bambi he could have easily been used to face some of the same SR that were trying to kill Ichigo. I could see Shinji attacking 2 or 3, then trying to run away to lure them into following him. Shinji pretends to be at their mercy and barely keeping them at bay, only to later reveal to the audience that he intentionally leading them away from his allies. Maybe we could see Momo has set up a multi layered Kido barrier to keep everyone else outside of the area Shinji is in, while locking the SR and Shinji alone in the area. That could have been the moment Shinji reveals his bankai. Since they are in a closed off area the SR immediately see each other as the enemy and Shinji as their ally, so they attack each other. That alone could have been 3-4 chapter fight where we see 3 SR go all out against each other. We get to see their abilities and powers revealed against each other. We get to see Quincies fight against each other in a featured battle. It would be different from the other fights in the arc, which would be fresh. Since it is not really mind control, they would have their personalities intact, thus we could still get witty banter between them. Each one would eventually unleash their own Complete Holy Forms and the fight ends with 1 of them coming out the victor, with Shinji from the shadows, and playing up he is helping one of them to play up how he is their ally, to show off what his bankai's effect is. By the end of it when only 1 SR remains Shinji congratulates them, then slices their head off, when their guard is down, while he is wearing his hollow mask. I think that could work to show how deadly Shinji's bankai is, but also why he cannot use it as freely as some of his fellow captains. It would be a cool way to show Shinji's cunning, by helping different SR at different points to help him pick the enemy off. This could even show off character development for Shinji, since in order for his abilities to shine without hurting his allies he would need to rely on Momo to secure the area with a barrier. That would mean unlike with Aizen that Shinji trusted his new vice-captain enough to share his abilities and spend time with her to get to know her, which he failed to do with Aizen. It shows Shinji and Momo created a genuine and trusting bond between superior and subordinate who can work together. At the same time this still doesn't just kill SR off-screen, but actually still gives them a featured fight to flesh out their characterizations and give them a good showing. It doesn't really even have to divert too much time away from the story. That way even if Shinji still gets written off in the fight against Gerad people would still have had that memorable fight with Shinji that showed him defeat 3 SR with his abilities.

I was always under the impression that ichigo was just so dumbfounded he didn't know what to say, watching the captains jump around at nothing like idiots from the beginning, and finally realized this wasn't a crazy distraction plan on their part and spoke up.

random thought but maybe aizen targeted the organ connected to reiatsu (forgot the name) in his slashes at the end of the fight which would explain why it dealt such severe damage to kyoraku

The way I always looked at this fight was that Aizen used Kyoka Suigetsu's hypnosis ability to have the captains all fight one another, with Ichigo not responding until the last minute due to a surprise and bewilderment at what was happening in the battle.

"Since when were you under the impression that i wasn't using it" geez what a chad 🔥🔥

Kubo is seriously the goat of character design

So this is what that poll was for

it is a tricky situation, just because Ichigo isn't under Kyōka Suigetsu's Kanzen Saimin doesn't mean he can be of any help to people who are under it. because it is "perfect hypnosis" Azen can control whether those under it see or hear anything

Most iconic battle of aizen

Realistically do we think that Kyoraku, or like, Unohana could have solo’d Aizen in this specific scene if given they could use their Bankai (or if they were there)? I’ve always kind of wondered if there were hacks strong enough to take him out among the captains prior to his full fusion with the hogyoku or if it really was a stomp absolutely regardless of any potential twists

I believe that when Aizen saw Soi Fon doing a direct attack, he knew it was a trick. He set an illusion there to "fall for it", blocking the senses of the Gotei to Ichigo's pleas and starting the switch. Hinamori was fed the illusion that she was still watching as normal. He then placed Hinamori where the illusion would be hit and thus his trap was achieved. He then unblocks their senses, so Ichigo's scream breaks their flow even more, the shock makes them act in anger and panic, leading to a checkmate.

A) unahano(?) Wouldnt care about Old Man Yama death anymore then Zaraki if she truely is a kenpachi (imo) B) It makes sense that she left after healing. Basic game rules. Keep the healer in the back NO MATTER WHAT. Esspecially since she knows that she cant really win anyway.

I know that Kubo wanted to end the fight between Ichigo and Aizen the way he did, but could you imagine how crazy it would have been if he actually ended it with Aizen's total victory. Him stepping foot in the Soul Palace about to complete his goal, only for us to see a silhuetted figure strike him down and defeating him instantly. Imagine the suspence for us having to wait until TYBW to finally see who that mysterious individual was.

Damn you’re right. The Espada were mostly scrubs in the end lmao

Has Kubo ever explained how his characters ever regrow/heal their limbs? I know healing in this series is just outright powerful but I don't think we've seen anyone on screen get healed like that. Just Orihime I'd imagine?

Can you do a versus video of Zombie Hitsugaya vs Aizen? I wonder just how much stronger the zombie version of Hitsugaya is with nothing holding him back.

aizen is not that bad.. he could kill all of them but he didnt.. what nostalgia at its finest.. thanks for this..

I personally think Ichigo didn't say anything for a minute is that he was too shocked by what happened. I mean, you see some allies stab a fellow ally that they all like so much, that's gotta be a huge shock to anyone.

Aizen’s Eye glasses is his Real Zampakuto😂😂😂