Bleach: Thousand Year Blood War has returned to the anime’s former glory. The fans had to wait for a long time. But after watching it for the first time, they believed it was worth the wait. Thousand Year Blood War will depict the final battle between the Soul Reapers and Quincies, introducing several new faces. Yhwach is the formidable leader of the Quincies.
Tite Kubo’s magnum opus shook the entire anime world when it returned in late 2022. One of the striking features was the improvement of the animation and the minute details. Even after such improvements, Takayuki Sugo, Yhwach’s voice actor, had a problem memorizing his lines due to the difference in the dialects. He had to ask for fewer lines after facing such a problem.
Yhwach Has Bigger Problems Than The Soul Reapers
Due to Yhwach being the leader of the Quincies, he had many dialogues. But Yhwach’s voice actor, Takayuki Sugo, did not want to say so many lines. While he was comfortable in the Hiragana dialect, the dialogues were written in the Katakana dialect. During an interview with Viz, Tite Kubo and Masakazu Morita, Ichigo’s voice actor, revealed the memorable incidents with Takayuki Sugo.
Kubo sensei said,
The thing that was most memorable was that Takayuki Sugo, who plays Yhwach, had a hard time memorizing lines written in katakana. After being told how to say them several times, he said, “All right, I’ll write it out in hiragana.” [lol] He said it in a really cool voice, so that made it even funnier.
Then Morita san added,
Sugo-san never changes, does he? That happened during the previous series as well. While in the booth, he asked me, “Ichigo, Ichigo, how do you read this line?” and I said, “It says Bankai.” Then he said, “All right, got it. It’s Bankai.” But once we started recording, he said something else.
Yhwach had a lot of complex lines, and it made Sugo san’s work more difficult. After realizing that he had the most lines, he asked Morita san whether something could be done about it. While the fans seem to have enjoyed every bit of the Quincy leader, he had to deal with bigger problems than the Soul Reapers.
Yhwach Has Proved Himself To Be A Great Bleach Antagonist
Yhwach is the most potent antagonist that Ichigo Kurosaki and the entire Soul Society have ever faced. He lost against Genryusai Yamamoto a thousand years ago and almost ceased to exist. But being a genius, he gathered his soldiers and regained his powers, then created a master plan and executed it by infiltrating the Soul Society. He shocked the Bleach fans when he sliced Yamamoto in half, thus killing him.
He has been great to watch. The first two parts of Thousand Year Blood War saw him slowly getting to his goal. With part three going to be released in a few months, it will be interesting to see how things shape up, especially after Ichigo Kurosaki has begun his training. But it would also mean Takayuki Sugo has to prepare for part 4, if there is any, in Katakana.
Bleach: Thousand Year Blood War is available on Hulu.
